I was scanning through boxscores this morning, pausing on the boxscore of the Twins' latest defeat and suddenly I had a particular curiosity. After writing yesterday about how an organizational change in philosophy is needed, I thought, "besides the Twins current lot of mediocre pitchers, who else is out there that has come through the Minor League system with the club...what have been their results?" As I compiled the list, with the the help of some of my twitter followers (@KirbysLeftEye, @Robert_Short, @trtx84, @thisisbeth, and @SethTweets), another question became rather obvious...what has the Twins farm system really produced in the way of pitching in the last 10-15 years?
The list of home-grown Twins pitchers, excluding anyone on the current roster, is actually fairly short...shorter than I thought it would be. I didn't differentiate between starters or relievers, the only requirement was that the pitcher had to have come up (more or less) through the Twins farm system and had to have reached the Majors at some point in their career. Here's the list:
*Matt Garza - currently a starting pitcher for the Cubs
*Jose Mijares - currently a reliever for the Royals
*Kevin Slowey - currently in the Minor League system for the Indians
*Jesse Crain - currently a reliever for the White Sox (on the DL)
*Pat Neshek - currently in the Minor League system for the Orioles
*J.C. Romero - currently a reliever for the Cardinals
*LaTroy Hawkins - currently a reliever for the Angels
*Kyle Lohse - currently a starting pitcher for the Cardinals
*Grant Balfour - currently the closer for the Athletics
**Notable names missing from this list include Johan Santana (a Rule 5 selection who only spent one year in the Twins Minor League system), Matt Guerrier (taken off waivers from the Pirates in 2003), and Carlos Silva (came over in the Eric Milton trade).
Here's another list - of pitchers the Twins have drafted in the first or second round since 2000 (source):
2000 - Adam Johnson, Aaron Heilman, J.D. Durbin
2001 - Scott Tyler
2002 - Jesse Crain
2003 - Scott Baker
2004 - Glen Perkins, Kyle Waldrop, Matt Fox, Jay Rainville, Anthony Swarzak
2005 - Matt Garza, Kevin Slowey
2006 -
2007 -
2008 - Carlos Gutierrez, Shooter Hunt
2009 - Kyle Gibson, Matt Bashore, Billy Bullock
2010 - Alex Wimmers
2011 - Hudson Boyd, Madison Boer
When you look at that list, one thing should pop out to you and that is this fact: the Twins have not produced even ONE big-league pitcher drafted within the first two rounds of the draft in the past 6 years. The last couple of draft classes excluded (for obvious reasons) the Twins have only drafted ONE pitcher in the first two rounds who even stands a decent chance to be a Major Leaguer and that is Kyle Gibson who is currently on the DL after undergoing Tommy John surgery last year. Since 2006, the Twins have drafted only two pitchers anywhere in the draft who have reached the Majors: Jeff Manship (14th round, 2006) and Anthony Slama (39th round, 2006), both of whom are currently pitching for AAA Rochester.
Maybe suggesting that the Twins need an "organizational change in philosophy" is putting the cart before the horse. Perhaps what really is needed is a change in the methods (or the personnel) that this team uses to scout young talent. (Side note: It's interesting when you take a look at the tenures of the current members in the Twins scouting department. Deron Johnson, the Twins current Director of Scouting started in 2007, the same year Bill Smith took over as GM.) To be fair, most other teams in MLB have only had a small handful of pitchers drafted in '06-'11 reach the Majors, but the Twins currently have zero. Another thing to point out here is the hit-or-miss nature of drafting pitchers...it's
like drafting a starting quarterback in the NFL. Unless you're looking at a Stephen
Strasburg type who is clearly a big-league commodity when drafted, it's
difficult to project what a pitcher's potential will be 2-5 years down
the line when they finally make it to the Big Leagues. That said, prior to 2006 the Twins did have some success drafting pitchers which bore fruit in the likes of Scott Baker, Glen Perkins, Matt Garza, Jesse Crain and Kevin Slowey - all of whom had at least a good season or two with the Major League club. Perkins is currently the best reliever in the Twins bullpen and Matt Garza has had some very good numbers for the Cubs over the last two seasons and tossed a no-hitter in 2010 with the Rays. They've shown the ability to identify good talent, at least at some point in the past, but that ability appears to have waned...or flat out disappeared.
I'd love to hear what you readers think - also, let me know if I left anyone out of the first list above.
Showing posts with label Kevin Slowey. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Kevin Slowey. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 8, 2012
Friday, August 12, 2011
Oh What a Difference an Infield Can Make
With the hometown team having fallen on hard times (again) of late, we need something else to look at and today I'm here to provide that. There's been some talk around the Twins blogosphere lately about J.J. Hardy and how he's having a monster season for the Orioles...basically revisiting what a mistake it was for the Twins to trade him away for practically nothing. I am, of course, in wholehearted agreement with these sentiments, but I want to look at things from a slightly different angle. It's been no secret that for the majority of the season the Twins starting rotation (and bullpen) have struggled and though the rotation is pretty much composed of the exact same pieces, the results have been vastly different. I want to try and see what role infield defense has played in that difference and see if we can draw any conclusions.
First, some numbers.
Here are the ERAs, FIPs and xFIPs for the starting 5 from last year. I've also included their groundball-to-flyball ratio and their HR/FB%. For those not familiar with these metrics, FIP and xFIP attempt to remove variables from the equation that the pitcher cannot control with the goal of giving you an ERA-type number than more accurately states how a given pitcher performed. For example, though Francisco Liriano had a 3.62 ERA last year, his FIP was 2.66 and his xFIP was 2.95, good for 3rd and 2nd in all of baseball respectively. In other words, Liriano's pitching performance as a whole last year was much better than his ERA suggested. For more on FIP and xFIP, click the links.
2010 Pitching Numbers for Twins Starters: (ERA/FIP/xFIP), GB/FB ratio, HR/FB%, BABIP
Francisco Liriano (3.62/2.66/2.95), 1.96 GB/FB, 6.3%, .331
Carl Pavano (3.75/4.02/3.86), 1.66 GB/FB, 10.6%, .281
Scott Baker (4.49/3.96/3.82), 0.85 GB/FB,10.2%, .323
Kevin Slowey (4.45/3.98/4.24), 0.56 GB/FB, 8.2%, .307
Nick Blackburn (5.42/5.07/4.46), 1.57 GB/FB, 13.5%, .305
Numbers for the Twins starting staff in 2010: (4.17/3.91/3.84), 1.28 GB/FB, 9.9%, .299, 3.91 SIERA
2011 Pitching Numbers for Twins Starters: (ERA/FIP/xFIP), GB/FB ratio, HR/FB%, BABIP
Francisco Liriano (5.00/4.53/4.41), 1.45 GB/FB, 10.2%, .286
Carl Pavano (4.71/4.08/4.30), 1.48 GB/FB, 7.8%, .302
Scott Baker (3.21/3.49/3.55) 0.77 GB/FB, 8.9%, .299
Brian Duensing (4.56/4.05/4.00), 1.16 GB/FB, 9.6%, .317
Nick Blackburn (4.36/4.76/4.17), 1.98 GB/FB, 14.3%, .310
Numbers for the Twins starting staff in 2011: (4.30/4.18/4.10), 1.30 GB/FB, 9.7%, .296, 4.14 SIERA
Quick Discussion:
The first thing that jumps out at me with these numbers is just how poorly the starting rotation has pitched in 2011 when compared to the 2010 numbers. Even though the HR/FB% is down this year and the GB/FB ratio is up slightly, all three pitching metrics (ERA, FIP, xFIP) are worse for the staff this year. The second thing that pops out to me is that the staff BABIP (batting average on balls in play) is actually better this year than last. This is probably due to the fact that 4 of the Twins starters this year are ground-ball-heavy pitchers compared to only 3 of the 5 in 2010. More ground-balls equals more outs. The main culprits for these year's poor pitching results are Liriano and Pavano, that much is fairly obvious. Both are having terrible seasons compared to 2010 while the bottom 3/5ths of the rotation is actually performing a little better than last year's 3, 4 and 5 starters.
Now, the fielding numbers.
Quick caveat here, I obviously don't have a complete season's worth of number for this year. As a work around to that I calculated how much of this season has been played so far (72.2%) and for the counting stats, I just made the statistical assumption that the Twins will continue at the pace they've been on.
The Whole Team 2010:
78 errors
.987 Fielding%
+54 DRS (Defensive Runs Saved)
30.7 UZR (Ultimate Zone Rating)
3.2 URZ/150
Middle Infield 2010:
34 errors
.979 Fielding%
+27 DRS
11.1/9.9 UZR/UZR150 for 2B
14.0/13.2 UZR/UZR150 for SS
The Whole Team 2011:
116 errors
.981 Fielding%
-19 DRS
3.1 UZR
-0.4 UZR/150
Middle Infield 2011:
40 errors
.975 Fielding%
-18 DRS
-0.8/-0.5 UZR/UZR150 for 2B so far in 2011
-9.4/-12.0 UZR/UZR150 for SS so far in 2011
The numbers really do speak for themselves. Of particular note is the "Defensive Runs Saved" stat. This stat is like WAR (Wins Above Replacement) for defenders. 0 is "average", anything above is good and a getting better, anything below is bad and getting worse. Last year's middle infield for the Twins had a +27 DRS mark which was Top 5 in MLB, this year's team is pretty much the complete opposite story, not only playing to a negative DRS number, but also playing to negative UZR numbers as well. For a team with so many ground-ball-heavy starting pitchers (4 of 5 starters have a GB/FB ratio north of 1.00)...a strong defensive middle-infield is a must and sadly, we've gotten to see first hand how much of a difference it can make.
To my original premise, as I've gone through this I've come to realize how difficult it would be to isolate the effect of poor middle-infield defense on pitching results. It's easy to see that this year's middle infield has been much worse than last year's, but how that ends up affecting the pitching?...well, that's hard to say. I feel confident in saying the two are correlated, of that I have no doubt, especially when the starting staff is as adept at inducing the ground-ball as this one has been. This is my plea to Bill Smith and the Twins...PLEASE get some middle-infield help this off-season...if you're going to keep the same pitchers, improving the middle-infield defense on this team should be, far and away, priority #1 this off-season.
First, some numbers.
Here are the ERAs, FIPs and xFIPs for the starting 5 from last year. I've also included their groundball-to-flyball ratio and their HR/FB%. For those not familiar with these metrics, FIP and xFIP attempt to remove variables from the equation that the pitcher cannot control with the goal of giving you an ERA-type number than more accurately states how a given pitcher performed. For example, though Francisco Liriano had a 3.62 ERA last year, his FIP was 2.66 and his xFIP was 2.95, good for 3rd and 2nd in all of baseball respectively. In other words, Liriano's pitching performance as a whole last year was much better than his ERA suggested. For more on FIP and xFIP, click the links.
2010 Pitching Numbers for Twins Starters: (ERA/FIP/xFIP), GB/FB ratio, HR/FB%, BABIP
Francisco Liriano (3.62/2.66/2.95), 1.96 GB/FB, 6.3%, .331
Carl Pavano (3.75/4.02/3.86), 1.66 GB/FB, 10.6%, .281
Scott Baker (4.49/3.96/3.82), 0.85 GB/FB,10.2%, .323
Kevin Slowey (4.45/3.98/4.24), 0.56 GB/FB, 8.2%, .307
Nick Blackburn (5.42/5.07/4.46), 1.57 GB/FB, 13.5%, .305
Numbers for the Twins starting staff in 2010: (4.17/3.91/3.84), 1.28 GB/FB, 9.9%, .299, 3.91 SIERA
2011 Pitching Numbers for Twins Starters: (ERA/FIP/xFIP), GB/FB ratio, HR/FB%, BABIP
Francisco Liriano (5.00/4.53/4.41), 1.45 GB/FB, 10.2%, .286
Carl Pavano (4.71/4.08/4.30), 1.48 GB/FB, 7.8%, .302
Scott Baker (3.21/3.49/3.55) 0.77 GB/FB, 8.9%, .299
Brian Duensing (4.56/4.05/4.00), 1.16 GB/FB, 9.6%, .317
Nick Blackburn (4.36/4.76/4.17), 1.98 GB/FB, 14.3%, .310
Numbers for the Twins starting staff in 2011: (4.30/4.18/4.10), 1.30 GB/FB, 9.7%, .296, 4.14 SIERA
Quick Discussion:
The first thing that jumps out at me with these numbers is just how poorly the starting rotation has pitched in 2011 when compared to the 2010 numbers. Even though the HR/FB% is down this year and the GB/FB ratio is up slightly, all three pitching metrics (ERA, FIP, xFIP) are worse for the staff this year. The second thing that pops out to me is that the staff BABIP (batting average on balls in play) is actually better this year than last. This is probably due to the fact that 4 of the Twins starters this year are ground-ball-heavy pitchers compared to only 3 of the 5 in 2010. More ground-balls equals more outs. The main culprits for these year's poor pitching results are Liriano and Pavano, that much is fairly obvious. Both are having terrible seasons compared to 2010 while the bottom 3/5ths of the rotation is actually performing a little better than last year's 3, 4 and 5 starters.
Now, the fielding numbers.
Quick caveat here, I obviously don't have a complete season's worth of number for this year. As a work around to that I calculated how much of this season has been played so far (72.2%) and for the counting stats, I just made the statistical assumption that the Twins will continue at the pace they've been on.
The Whole Team 2010:
78 errors
.987 Fielding%
+54 DRS (Defensive Runs Saved)
30.7 UZR (Ultimate Zone Rating)
3.2 URZ/150
Middle Infield 2010:
34 errors
.979 Fielding%
+27 DRS
11.1/9.9 UZR/UZR150 for 2B
14.0/13.2 UZR/UZR150 for SS
The Whole Team 2011:
116 errors
.981 Fielding%
-19 DRS
3.1 UZR
-0.4 UZR/150
Middle Infield 2011:
40 errors
.975 Fielding%
-18 DRS
-0.8/-0.5 UZR/UZR150 for 2B so far in 2011
-9.4/-12.0 UZR/UZR150 for SS so far in 2011
The numbers really do speak for themselves. Of particular note is the "Defensive Runs Saved" stat. This stat is like WAR (Wins Above Replacement) for defenders. 0 is "average", anything above is good and a getting better, anything below is bad and getting worse. Last year's middle infield for the Twins had a +27 DRS mark which was Top 5 in MLB, this year's team is pretty much the complete opposite story, not only playing to a negative DRS number, but also playing to negative UZR numbers as well. For a team with so many ground-ball-heavy starting pitchers (4 of 5 starters have a GB/FB ratio north of 1.00)...a strong defensive middle-infield is a must and sadly, we've gotten to see first hand how much of a difference it can make.
To my original premise, as I've gone through this I've come to realize how difficult it would be to isolate the effect of poor middle-infield defense on pitching results. It's easy to see that this year's middle infield has been much worse than last year's, but how that ends up affecting the pitching?...well, that's hard to say. I feel confident in saying the two are correlated, of that I have no doubt, especially when the starting staff is as adept at inducing the ground-ball as this one has been. This is my plea to Bill Smith and the Twins...PLEASE get some middle-infield help this off-season...if you're going to keep the same pitchers, improving the middle-infield defense on this team should be, far and away, priority #1 this off-season.
Friday, July 22, 2011
Verlander'd
22 days into the month and this is only the 5th post of July here at TBS...our apologies. My excuse is that I was on vacation for awhile and while that one is pretty weak, Matt's excuse is that he has been busy spreading HUGE news...our very own Matt Larson will be a brand-new dad soon! Congratulations to him and to his wife Ali! That's very exciting stuff, can't wait to meet his new daughter, due sometime in mid-January.
After a nice 5-day break from humanity up in the North Woods of Wisconsin, I returned yesterday to a pleasant surprise...the Twins hadn't dropped in the standings! Yay. I didn't get to catch last night's game, but in reading the box score this morning, one thing was clear...the Twins got Verlander'd. 8 innings, 5 hits, 1 run, 9 strikeouts, 0 walks...looks like a Verlander line to me. With the loss last night, the Twins have now lost 10 straight games against the Tigers dating back to last year. If the Twins want to be in the AL Central race come Monday morning, they had better reverse this luck quickly, starting tonight against Max Scherzer. The Twins throw Brian Duensing out there tonight and Duensing has pitched well in July so far with 2 wins and a 2.01 ERA in 22.1 innings. Scherzer hasn't had very good luck against the Twins in his career with a 9.13 ERA in 4 career starts against our hometown team.
The Twins get Jason Kubel back tonight after an extended stint on the DL. Kubel was pretty much the Twins lone bright spot during the first two months of the season, hitting .310/.355/.465 with 30 RBIs in the first 52 games of the season. He hasn't played in a Major League game since May 30th when he went down with a foot injury. During his most recent 5-game rehab stint with Triple-A Rochester, Kubel 6 hits in 18 at-bats with a HR, 2 RBIs, 3 walks and 4 Ks. Hopefully he can provide a spark to an offense that has struggled lately, scoring 5 of more runs only twice in 9 games since the All-Star break. Kubel's activation means that Scott Baker, Denard Span and Justin Morneau (and Kevin Slowey) are the only Twins' players that remain on the disabled list. Baker is expected to be activated for a start tomorrow against the Tigers.
During the "critical 12-game stretch" to start the 2nd half, the Twins are 5-4 so far which isn't great, but it means they haven't lost any ground either. They are currently 6 games out of 1st with 64 games left to play. In order to get to 85 wins, which is how many I believe it will take to win the division this year, they need to go 39-25 (.609, 99-win pace)...not an impossible task, but getting more difficult with each loss. To put it in perspective, the Tigers only need to go 33-31 (.515, 84-win pace) in their final 64 games to get to 85 wins. If Bill Smith decides to add a piece or two within the next 9 days, I'd like to see what we can get in the way of serviceable relievers. That said, my confidence in Smith to make a savvy trade or two is not very high. Hope is still alive though, Go Twins!
After a nice 5-day break from humanity up in the North Woods of Wisconsin, I returned yesterday to a pleasant surprise...the Twins hadn't dropped in the standings! Yay. I didn't get to catch last night's game, but in reading the box score this morning, one thing was clear...the Twins got Verlander'd. 8 innings, 5 hits, 1 run, 9 strikeouts, 0 walks...looks like a Verlander line to me. With the loss last night, the Twins have now lost 10 straight games against the Tigers dating back to last year. If the Twins want to be in the AL Central race come Monday morning, they had better reverse this luck quickly, starting tonight against Max Scherzer. The Twins throw Brian Duensing out there tonight and Duensing has pitched well in July so far with 2 wins and a 2.01 ERA in 22.1 innings. Scherzer hasn't had very good luck against the Twins in his career with a 9.13 ERA in 4 career starts against our hometown team.
The Twins get Jason Kubel back tonight after an extended stint on the DL. Kubel was pretty much the Twins lone bright spot during the first two months of the season, hitting .310/.355/.465 with 30 RBIs in the first 52 games of the season. He hasn't played in a Major League game since May 30th when he went down with a foot injury. During his most recent 5-game rehab stint with Triple-A Rochester, Kubel 6 hits in 18 at-bats with a HR, 2 RBIs, 3 walks and 4 Ks. Hopefully he can provide a spark to an offense that has struggled lately, scoring 5 of more runs only twice in 9 games since the All-Star break. Kubel's activation means that Scott Baker, Denard Span and Justin Morneau (and Kevin Slowey) are the only Twins' players that remain on the disabled list. Baker is expected to be activated for a start tomorrow against the Tigers.
During the "critical 12-game stretch" to start the 2nd half, the Twins are 5-4 so far which isn't great, but it means they haven't lost any ground either. They are currently 6 games out of 1st with 64 games left to play. In order to get to 85 wins, which is how many I believe it will take to win the division this year, they need to go 39-25 (.609, 99-win pace)...not an impossible task, but getting more difficult with each loss. To put it in perspective, the Tigers only need to go 33-31 (.515, 84-win pace) in their final 64 games to get to 85 wins. If Bill Smith decides to add a piece or two within the next 9 days, I'd like to see what we can get in the way of serviceable relievers. That said, my confidence in Smith to make a savvy trade or two is not very high. Hope is still alive though, Go Twins!
Wednesday, July 13, 2011
Ready for the Ride to Continue
Last night I actually watched the All-Star game. More precisely, I glanced up at the TV every once in awhile while playing games on my phone. It was boring...except the Timberlake interview which was decidedly awkward and amusing. I thought it was fitting that the respective leaders in the MVP-race for each league hit homeruns. The NL pitching dominated, though to be fair the AL was sans Sabathia, Price, Hernandez, Lester, etc. It's a shame that this game actually decides something. Oh well.
Now that the All-Star game is mercifully over, I'm looking forward to two things: a) Chris Berman being used strictly for Monday Night Football purposes and b) the 'second-half'. I think the Twins have a legitimate shot to make up for their horrible start and I'm excited to see how they play in these first few games post-All-Star-break. I'm excited for a 12-game homestand. I'm excited to see if Delmon Young can find his sea-legs again and help carry the load a little. I'm excited to see what happens if the Twins pull even closer to the Tigers and Indians by the end of the month. Yes, our beloved Twins are 6.5 games out of first, but the gap doesn't seem that large.
To quickly update the Twins injuries:
Scott Baker is in line to make his next start on Monday, July 18th against the Indians. His MRI last week showed only a minor flexor strain so hopefully he will be able to pick up right where he left off.
Delmon Young was activated and will start tomorrow against the Royals. He had a nice 9-game rehab stint at Triple-A, seeing 5 of his 9 hits (31 at-bats) go for extra bases including 2HRs.
Kevin Slowey threw 4.2 innings of scoreless baseball at Triple-A last Sunday with 3Ks and 1BB. He will pitch in one more rehab start coming up this week. According to Ron Gardenhire the Twins have no plans to call him up once he's ready, which really makes absolutely ZERO sense to me. At the very least he could be used in the bullpen and in my opinion, he deserves strong consideration for a rotation spot which would give the Twins the option of putting Brian Duensing in the bullpen as a left-handed specialist or long-reliever. Wasting Kevin Slowey's talent in Triple-A is just plain stupid.
Jason Kubel continues to rehab his injured foot and is probably still another 10-15 days away...and that's if things go well. He's expected to start in some rehab games at Fort Meyers here over the next few days, but there is no concrete rehab schedule at this point.
Denard Span will be meeting with doctors (perhaps today) in hopes of receiving clearance to start a rehab assignment. He ran the bases and worked out hard this past weekend and reported no symptoms. If cleared, he will probably need about 7-10 rehab games before he comes off the DL.
Update 12:03pm CDT: According to D-Span's twitter feed, he was cleared to begin a rehab assignment today, great news!
Justin Morneau is still on doctor-ordered post-surgery rest, but could resume light baseball activity here in the next week or so. His target for a return is mid-August, which may be slightly optimistic but, if true, could prove quite valuable to the Twins if they can stay in contention until then. Positive word from him is that his wrist has been feeling much better lately and continued rest will hopefully allow it to fully heal.
Whew, I think that's it in terms of injuries. Jim Thome has been dealing with a sprained toe, but it doesn't seem like anything a few days rest won't take care of. Injuries have been the main storyline for the Twins this season, but it looks like (fingers crossed) the Twins may finally be getting closer to "healthy" here in the next 2-3 weeks.
Some Interesting Reading Around the Twins Blogosphere (and elsewhere):
Nate Gilmore over at Puckett's Pond gave the Twins a first-half report card of sorts. I can't say I disagree with any of his marks.
Corey Ettinger put together an AL Central All-Star team with a little bit of justification for each selection. There aren't many Twins players in the bunch but then again, they haven't had that many stand-out players yet this season.
Nick Nelson wrote a good piece comparing this year's team to the 2003 Twins team that was in a similar situation at the All-Star break and went on to win the division. Hope seems to be running high again in Twins Territory and damn it, it feels good.
TT over at Granny Baseball is going through a series of posts explaining statistics. So far they've done BABIP, K/9 and IP. Nothing super in-depth here, but it's a nice primer for people looking to better their understanding of baseball statistics. What's odd about these posts is that Granny Baseball has been a very anti-sabermetrics blog...
The Common Man and Bill over at The Platoon Advantage had an interesting read about the number of players selected to the All-Star game.
And finally, Deadspin had a good read today about the 100 Worst Baseball Players of All-Time. It's interesting to see a lot of pretty good managers high on that list including Tommy Lasorda, Billy Martin and Ozzie Guillen. This is the first installment of the list.
Now that the All-Star game is mercifully over, I'm looking forward to two things: a) Chris Berman being used strictly for Monday Night Football purposes and b) the 'second-half'. I think the Twins have a legitimate shot to make up for their horrible start and I'm excited to see how they play in these first few games post-All-Star-break. I'm excited for a 12-game homestand. I'm excited to see if Delmon Young can find his sea-legs again and help carry the load a little. I'm excited to see what happens if the Twins pull even closer to the Tigers and Indians by the end of the month. Yes, our beloved Twins are 6.5 games out of first, but the gap doesn't seem that large.
To quickly update the Twins injuries:
Scott Baker is in line to make his next start on Monday, July 18th against the Indians. His MRI last week showed only a minor flexor strain so hopefully he will be able to pick up right where he left off.
Delmon Young was activated and will start tomorrow against the Royals. He had a nice 9-game rehab stint at Triple-A, seeing 5 of his 9 hits (31 at-bats) go for extra bases including 2HRs.
Kevin Slowey threw 4.2 innings of scoreless baseball at Triple-A last Sunday with 3Ks and 1BB. He will pitch in one more rehab start coming up this week. According to Ron Gardenhire the Twins have no plans to call him up once he's ready, which really makes absolutely ZERO sense to me. At the very least he could be used in the bullpen and in my opinion, he deserves strong consideration for a rotation spot which would give the Twins the option of putting Brian Duensing in the bullpen as a left-handed specialist or long-reliever. Wasting Kevin Slowey's talent in Triple-A is just plain stupid.
Jason Kubel continues to rehab his injured foot and is probably still another 10-15 days away...and that's if things go well. He's expected to start in some rehab games at Fort Meyers here over the next few days, but there is no concrete rehab schedule at this point.
Denard Span will be meeting with doctors (perhaps today) in hopes of receiving clearance to start a rehab assignment. He ran the bases and worked out hard this past weekend and reported no symptoms. If cleared, he will probably need about 7-10 rehab games before he comes off the DL.
Update 12:03pm CDT: According to D-Span's twitter feed, he was cleared to begin a rehab assignment today, great news!
Justin Morneau is still on doctor-ordered post-surgery rest, but could resume light baseball activity here in the next week or so. His target for a return is mid-August, which may be slightly optimistic but, if true, could prove quite valuable to the Twins if they can stay in contention until then. Positive word from him is that his wrist has been feeling much better lately and continued rest will hopefully allow it to fully heal.
Whew, I think that's it in terms of injuries. Jim Thome has been dealing with a sprained toe, but it doesn't seem like anything a few days rest won't take care of. Injuries have been the main storyline for the Twins this season, but it looks like (fingers crossed) the Twins may finally be getting closer to "healthy" here in the next 2-3 weeks.
Some Interesting Reading Around the Twins Blogosphere (and elsewhere):
Nate Gilmore over at Puckett's Pond gave the Twins a first-half report card of sorts. I can't say I disagree with any of his marks.
Corey Ettinger put together an AL Central All-Star team with a little bit of justification for each selection. There aren't many Twins players in the bunch but then again, they haven't had that many stand-out players yet this season.
Nick Nelson wrote a good piece comparing this year's team to the 2003 Twins team that was in a similar situation at the All-Star break and went on to win the division. Hope seems to be running high again in Twins Territory and damn it, it feels good.
TT over at Granny Baseball is going through a series of posts explaining statistics. So far they've done BABIP, K/9 and IP. Nothing super in-depth here, but it's a nice primer for people looking to better their understanding of baseball statistics. What's odd about these posts is that Granny Baseball has been a very anti-sabermetrics blog...
The Common Man and Bill over at The Platoon Advantage had an interesting read about the number of players selected to the All-Star game.
And finally, Deadspin had a good read today about the 100 Worst Baseball Players of All-Time. It's interesting to see a lot of pretty good managers high on that list including Tommy Lasorda, Billy Martin and Ozzie Guillen. This is the first installment of the list.
Friday, June 10, 2011
Don't Give Up on Kubes
I'm really digging the Twins winning ways lately and the hopeful Twins fan in me is starting to have dreams of this team winning 25 out of 30 games and getting back into the division race. The realistic fan in me knows that's not likely. In the likelier scenario that the Twins are still "out of it" at the end of June, they'll likely become sellers and I'm here to beg that they consider re-signing Jason Kubel. Here is my case:
We're all familiar with the ups and down of Jason Kubel's career with the Twins. Kubes destroyed Minor League pitching for 4 years before getting a shot at the Bigs in 2004. He didn't disappoint, hitting .300/.358/.433 as a 22-year-old in 23 games with the Twins. That fall, he endured a serious knee injury which kept him out of baseball for the entire 2005 season, and while he re-emerged with the Twins in 2006, the results were nothing like before. Kubel struggled for a couple of seasons in 2006 and 2007 before putting it all together in 2008. In '08, he hit .272/.335/.471 with 20HRs and 78RBIs while seeing part-time action in the outfield. In 2009, he had his 'breakout' hitting .300/.369/.539 with 28HRs and 103 RBIs. In a contract-year last season, he only managed a .249 batting-average, but did surpass the 20 homerun plateau for the 3rd straight season while driving in 92 runs.
Last off-season, the Twins picked up a $5.25M option on Kubel which was a pretty good deal for them and a pretty good deal for Kubel as well, considering how little he did in 2010 to help himself out. At the beginning of this year, while almost everything and everyone fell apart around him, Kubel was spectacular hitting .310/.355/.465 with 5HR and 30RBI before landing on the DL with a sprained left foot on June 2nd. As we get closer to July, talk around the interwebs has increased about the likelihood of the Twins being sellers, and Kubel's name gets mentioned often, along with the likes of Michael Cuddyer, Kevin Slowey and Delmon Young. Let's take a look at other left-handed power hitters over the last three years:
 |
| Click to enlarge (props to fangraphs.com) |
I'm not trying to make it sound like Kubel is a superstar player. He's not. What I am trying to say is that Kubel, as a left-handed hitter with power, possesses an offensive skill-set that is not all that common in MLB, and is not easily replaceable if they trade him or let him go. Kubel has had some injury problems over the years, but for the past three season he's been a consistent producer and a valuable part of the Twins lineup. For a reasonable amount of money, say $5-$7M per over 3-5 years (Kubes is only 29) you could have yourself a very capable DH who gives you some flexibility to play him in the field if someone goes down with an injury. With the salaries of Michael Cuddyer and Joe Nathan coming off the books at the end of the season, $5-7M/year is a reasonable amount of money to spend on a guy who can hit with power from the left side of the plate.
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
Who could the Twins get for Slowey?
With the recent news that the Twins might be trying to deal Kevin Slowey, I thought I might try my hand at trying to figure out who they might be able to get for the 26-year-old right-hander. I personally think the Twins should hang onto Slowey, especially since he's under team control through 2013 and I also question the wisdom of trading a young-ish starting pitcher for bullpen help, but because the Twins could use some better bullpen options, and because they have a definite surplus of rotation arms, I'm open to the idea.
The team with the most public interest in Slowey has been the Toronto Blue Jays. Joe Christensen reported yesterday that the Jays had 3 scouts watching Slowey and that they feel they have a surplus of relievers, some of whom might interest the Twins. In looking at the list of Blue Jay relievers, nothing impressive stands out, but I'll let you decide for yourself.
Frank Francisco
Octavio Dotel
Jason Frasor
Shawn Camp
Casey Janssen
Carlos Villanueva
Josh Roenicke
I think we can safety rule out getting Jon Rauch in a trade. Frank Francisco can probably be ruled out as well due to his $4M price tag this season. Dotel would be about right money-wise, but he has struggled mightily the past few seasons and is 37 years old. Frasor is definitely worth taking a look at and the Twins have been reported to have been interested in Frasor in the past. Shawn Camp would struggle to beat out relievers the Twins already have, as would Casey Janssen. Villaneuva would be a decent cheap option but Roenicke is not appealing at all.
Jason Frasor
Frasor has been a picture of durability over the course of his 7 year career. He has pitched in at least 49 games in every season since 2004 and has averaged almost 59 appearances per year over that time. He has a tasty 0.8 HR/9 mark for his career to go along with a career 8.4 K/9 rate. His $3.5M price tag is a bit on the high side, but he would fit in nicely in the Twins 'pen. He's tough on both righties and lefties, holding RHBs to a .649 OPS and LHBs to a .696 OPS for his career. Frason and prospect or two would be a decent get in return for Slowey.
Carlos Villanueva
This is definitely the cheap option as Villanueva is only slated to make $1.415M this year. The Jays traded for him in the off-season, so that may impact their willingness to trade him away. Villanueva would likely come with a prospect or two as well, so that's definitely something to keep in mind. Villanueva had an interesting year last year as he saw his K/9 rate jump to a career-high of 11.45 which was very uncharacteristic for a guy who sat solidly in the high 7s for most of his career up to this point. As far as whether he's a ground-ball or fly-ball pitcher, he's kinda right in the middle holding a 1.01 GB/FB ratio for his career. He seems like an interesting option, though I'm not sold on his K-rate staying above 10. If the Twins dealt for Villanueva, I'd be more interested in which prospects they received.
Other teams speculated to have interest in Slowey include the Cardinals and Yankees, but I'm not seeing much reported interest from either team. There have been conflicting reports from the Cardinals, some saying they will look internally to fill the void left by Wainwright's injury, others saying they will look externally. Whatever they decide to do, I think it will be a couple of weeks until they make a decision to look outside the organization and by then, Slowey may have been traded already. As far as the Yankees go, I just can't see them being terribly interested in Slowey, especially considering how impressive some of their young guns have been in Spring Training so far. I see the Yankees waiting till mid-season to acquire a pitcher over trying to get Slowey now. The Yankees are looking to a make a splash, and acquiring Slowey would be more of a splat, at least in the eyes of the media and various Yankee blogs. In fact, Mike Axisa over at River Ave Blues wrote about this very topic the other day. Should be interesting to see what happens in these last 3 weeks of Spring Training, 7 starters, 5 slots. I'm in denial that Blackburn is a sure thing for the rotation.
Wednesday, March 2, 2011
2 Spots, 3 Pitchers...
With Ron Gardenhire stating in an interview today that Brian Duensing will "absolutely" be in the Twins starting rotation, and assuming that Francisco Liriano and Carl Pavano are also assured spots, 3 starting pitchers are vying for the final 2 spots in the rotation...the music is still playing, but this game of musical chairs only has about a month to play itself out. I know that Gardenhire could very well change his mind between now and Opening Day, and an injury (or, *gasp*, a trade) could occur, but based on what we know now, I thought I would play manager for a minute and break down the 3 remaining pitchers to see who I would choose.
Scott Baker
For each of the last 3 seasons, Baker has given the Twins at least 28 starts and at least 170 innings. With a 38-22 record over that time (i know, wins don't mean much) he's proven himself a competent starting pitcher and most teams would be lucky to have him in a 4th or 5th starting pitcher role.
It's a little hard to gauge the end of last season for Baker because he was having some elbow tendinitis. In his last two starts of the year, he pitched 5 innings in both game, and struck out 16. What has been somewhat frustrating over the course of Baker's career is that he can go from looking like in ace in one start, to a rookie in the next. This was highlighted perfectly by two starts Baker made in the middle of the season last year. On June 16th, Baker faced the Rockies at home and threw 7 innings of 2-hit ball, striking out 12 and walking just 1. In his very next start at Milwaukee, he got shelled for 5 earned runs and walked 5 in 6 innings (he also gave up 5 runs against KC in his start prior to the Colorado game). This roller-coaster ride is frustrating to no end and it's a strike against Baker in terms of his consideration for the starting rotation. Fortunately for him, his competition has similar problems.
In terms of WAR and WPA (Win Probability Added), 2010 was Baker's poorest showing in both categories and in fact, his WPA has declined in each of the last three seasons to the point where he was only very slightly above average last year. His inability to make his best pitches (fastball and slider) work for him is most certainly the culprit, as evidenced by the graph below.
As you can see, Baker's slider has been his most valuable pitch over the course of his career (see here for Pitch Type Values explanation). In 2008, that pitch was worth 10.4 runs, but it declined to -0.3 runs in 2009 and 2.4 runs in 2010. In 2009, his fastball was 21.9 runs which carried him through, but that fell to -8.9 runs in 2010 and with his slider only being slightly above average last year, his overall results were fairly mediocre. The predictive value of these statistics is pretty limited, but it's fair to say that Baker needs to concentrate on either his slider or his fastball and have at least one effective weapon in order to make him truly effective as a pitcher. We've all seen that he has "stuff" (near no-hitter anyone?), he just needs to be more consistent with it, whether "it" is the slider or the fastball.
Kevin Slowey
Since 2008 when Slowey started 27 games for the Twins and pitched to a 3.99 ERA, it's been a rough ride. In 2009, his season was cut short by a wrist injury (missed most of July and all of August and September) and in 2010, he started 28 games, but was hampered toward the end of the season with triceps issues. Even despite all of that, he still makes an intriguing option in the 4th of 5th slot of a rotation and he sports the type of thing the Twins coaching staff loves...pitch control.
What Slowey and Baker share in common is that they are both flyball pitchers. This seems to be less of a issue in the new ballpark, but it tends to lead to higher ERAs on paper. Slowey's 2010 season qualified him as an extreme flyball pitcher due to the fact that over 50% of the balls hit in play against him were of the flyball variety (as opposed to only 28.3% groundballs). Since 2007, only 3 pitchers in all of baseball have induced flyballs at a higher rate than Slowey: Chris Young, Oliver Perez and Ted Lilly. Scott Baker is 10th on that list. What makes Kevin effective is his ability to command his pitches and over that same period of time Slowey is 2nd to only Roy Halladay in K/BB ratio at 4.60.
I'm not going to highlight any charts when talking about Slowey, but suffice to say he's been a VERY average pitcher during his career to this point. I could go on a rant about how Slowey is the very definition of the type of pitcher the Twins organization seems to love and how he's a poster boy for "average pitcher," but I'll stop. Slowey is a pitch-to-contact pitcher and I can't see his being all that much better than he has already shown. His zone contact percentage (% of time a hitter makes contact on a pitch thrown in the strikezone) was 90.2% last season and it sits at 88.6% for his career. Without the ability to miss bats, a pitcher's ceiling only goes so high, particularly when they are as extreme a flyball pitcher as Slowey is.
Nick Blackburn
To say that Blackburn had a rough 2010 season would be to put it lightly. He started the year in the starting rotation, had a terrible April and May and an absolutely brutal June and July, got demoted to Triple-A and then rejoined the starting rotation when Baker and Slowey went through their injury troubles. To his credit, he was actually mostly effective in his final 8 starts of the year (except for a 9/28 start when he gave up 8ERs to the Royals), and seemed to find something of what he had been missing prior to his demotion.
Unlike Baker and Slowey, Blackburn's success comes when he is keeping the ball down and inducing groundballs. If he can't keep the ball down, he gets shelled because his fastball doesn't fool anyone (only 3.9 K/9 in 2010). Now you might say, "but Blackburn induced groundballs at a career-best 50.8% last year!" And you'd be right. Where he struggled was in the strikeout and walks department, namely, he gave up more walks and struck out even fewer batters than normal. I could go through it all, but David Golebiewski over at FanGraphs did that for me last year. In case you don't feel like reading it, or it makes you sick to your stomach to read about Blackie's struggles last year, the main premise of the piece is that Blackburn struggled last year due to his inability to get hitters to swing at marginal pitches. Because Blackie wasn't missing bats, and because he was unable to throw many strikes with his secondary pitches (cutter, curve, change) he walked more guys and for a guy who strikes out as few as he does, even a small change in the results he's getting from his pitches can equal a drastic difference in his numbers.
Getting back to the final 8 starts of last season, Blackburn only gave up 13 walks in his final 57 innings pitched while striking out 33. This allowed him to regain some effectiveness and the overall results of those 8 starts were much better than the previous 18...which all brings me back to the question of whether he should be in the rotation. I simply don't know, only the Spring (and Rick Anderson/Ron Gardenhire) will tell.
So that's the analysis. I guess if I had to say who I would choose, it would come down to Scott Baker and Kevin Slowey. One other thing to consider is, would Blackburn be an effective pitcher out of the bullpen? If the answer to that question is no, then you're kind stuck having to throw him in there. The Twins can't just demote him to Triple-A because for some unknown reason they decided to give the guy a $14M contract prior to last season. I think Blackburn will be a more effective pitcher than he was in 2010, but I just can't say for sure. If he can't be effective out of the 'pen though, I think you have to make him the 5th starter and put Slowey in the pen. I've seen too many flashes of greatness from Baker and he definitely has the most upside out of the bunch, so I want him in the rotation. I could further complicate things by reminding everyone that Kyle Gibson is sitting there waiting for his chance as well...who's he gonna replace? Or will he be a bullpen player as well? Should be an interesting season in the starting rotation category.
Scott Baker
For each of the last 3 seasons, Baker has given the Twins at least 28 starts and at least 170 innings. With a 38-22 record over that time (i know, wins don't mean much) he's proven himself a competent starting pitcher and most teams would be lucky to have him in a 4th or 5th starting pitcher role.
It's a little hard to gauge the end of last season for Baker because he was having some elbow tendinitis. In his last two starts of the year, he pitched 5 innings in both game, and struck out 16. What has been somewhat frustrating over the course of Baker's career is that he can go from looking like in ace in one start, to a rookie in the next. This was highlighted perfectly by two starts Baker made in the middle of the season last year. On June 16th, Baker faced the Rockies at home and threw 7 innings of 2-hit ball, striking out 12 and walking just 1. In his very next start at Milwaukee, he got shelled for 5 earned runs and walked 5 in 6 innings (he also gave up 5 runs against KC in his start prior to the Colorado game). This roller-coaster ride is frustrating to no end and it's a strike against Baker in terms of his consideration for the starting rotation. Fortunately for him, his competition has similar problems.
In terms of WAR and WPA (Win Probability Added), 2010 was Baker's poorest showing in both categories and in fact, his WPA has declined in each of the last three seasons to the point where he was only very slightly above average last year. His inability to make his best pitches (fastball and slider) work for him is most certainly the culprit, as evidenced by the graph below.
As you can see, Baker's slider has been his most valuable pitch over the course of his career (see here for Pitch Type Values explanation). In 2008, that pitch was worth 10.4 runs, but it declined to -0.3 runs in 2009 and 2.4 runs in 2010. In 2009, his fastball was 21.9 runs which carried him through, but that fell to -8.9 runs in 2010 and with his slider only being slightly above average last year, his overall results were fairly mediocre. The predictive value of these statistics is pretty limited, but it's fair to say that Baker needs to concentrate on either his slider or his fastball and have at least one effective weapon in order to make him truly effective as a pitcher. We've all seen that he has "stuff" (near no-hitter anyone?), he just needs to be more consistent with it, whether "it" is the slider or the fastball.
Kevin Slowey
Since 2008 when Slowey started 27 games for the Twins and pitched to a 3.99 ERA, it's been a rough ride. In 2009, his season was cut short by a wrist injury (missed most of July and all of August and September) and in 2010, he started 28 games, but was hampered toward the end of the season with triceps issues. Even despite all of that, he still makes an intriguing option in the 4th of 5th slot of a rotation and he sports the type of thing the Twins coaching staff loves...pitch control.
What Slowey and Baker share in common is that they are both flyball pitchers. This seems to be less of a issue in the new ballpark, but it tends to lead to higher ERAs on paper. Slowey's 2010 season qualified him as an extreme flyball pitcher due to the fact that over 50% of the balls hit in play against him were of the flyball variety (as opposed to only 28.3% groundballs). Since 2007, only 3 pitchers in all of baseball have induced flyballs at a higher rate than Slowey: Chris Young, Oliver Perez and Ted Lilly. Scott Baker is 10th on that list. What makes Kevin effective is his ability to command his pitches and over that same period of time Slowey is 2nd to only Roy Halladay in K/BB ratio at 4.60.
I'm not going to highlight any charts when talking about Slowey, but suffice to say he's been a VERY average pitcher during his career to this point. I could go on a rant about how Slowey is the very definition of the type of pitcher the Twins organization seems to love and how he's a poster boy for "average pitcher," but I'll stop. Slowey is a pitch-to-contact pitcher and I can't see his being all that much better than he has already shown. His zone contact percentage (% of time a hitter makes contact on a pitch thrown in the strikezone) was 90.2% last season and it sits at 88.6% for his career. Without the ability to miss bats, a pitcher's ceiling only goes so high, particularly when they are as extreme a flyball pitcher as Slowey is.
Nick Blackburn
To say that Blackburn had a rough 2010 season would be to put it lightly. He started the year in the starting rotation, had a terrible April and May and an absolutely brutal June and July, got demoted to Triple-A and then rejoined the starting rotation when Baker and Slowey went through their injury troubles. To his credit, he was actually mostly effective in his final 8 starts of the year (except for a 9/28 start when he gave up 8ERs to the Royals), and seemed to find something of what he had been missing prior to his demotion.
Unlike Baker and Slowey, Blackburn's success comes when he is keeping the ball down and inducing groundballs. If he can't keep the ball down, he gets shelled because his fastball doesn't fool anyone (only 3.9 K/9 in 2010). Now you might say, "but Blackburn induced groundballs at a career-best 50.8% last year!" And you'd be right. Where he struggled was in the strikeout and walks department, namely, he gave up more walks and struck out even fewer batters than normal. I could go through it all, but David Golebiewski over at FanGraphs did that for me last year. In case you don't feel like reading it, or it makes you sick to your stomach to read about Blackie's struggles last year, the main premise of the piece is that Blackburn struggled last year due to his inability to get hitters to swing at marginal pitches. Because Blackie wasn't missing bats, and because he was unable to throw many strikes with his secondary pitches (cutter, curve, change) he walked more guys and for a guy who strikes out as few as he does, even a small change in the results he's getting from his pitches can equal a drastic difference in his numbers.
Getting back to the final 8 starts of last season, Blackburn only gave up 13 walks in his final 57 innings pitched while striking out 33. This allowed him to regain some effectiveness and the overall results of those 8 starts were much better than the previous 18...which all brings me back to the question of whether he should be in the rotation. I simply don't know, only the Spring (and Rick Anderson/Ron Gardenhire) will tell.
So that's the analysis. I guess if I had to say who I would choose, it would come down to Scott Baker and Kevin Slowey. One other thing to consider is, would Blackburn be an effective pitcher out of the bullpen? If the answer to that question is no, then you're kind stuck having to throw him in there. The Twins can't just demote him to Triple-A because for some unknown reason they decided to give the guy a $14M contract prior to last season. I think Blackburn will be a more effective pitcher than he was in 2010, but I just can't say for sure. If he can't be effective out of the 'pen though, I think you have to make him the 5th starter and put Slowey in the pen. I've seen too many flashes of greatness from Baker and he definitely has the most upside out of the bunch, so I want him in the rotation. I could further complicate things by reminding everyone that Kyle Gibson is sitting there waiting for his chance as well...who's he gonna replace? Or will he be a bullpen player as well? Should be an interesting season in the starting rotation category.
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Meeting Expectations: Kevin Slowey
The Twins and Kevin Slowey agreed to a 1-year, $2.7M deal Tuesday, avoiding arbitration in Slowey's first year of arbitration eligibility. A few others have written about the deal, including a good piece by Nick Nelson for TwinsCentric. I'd also like to take a look at Kevin Slowey and see what we might be able to expect from the 26-year-old right-hander going forward.
Slowey has about as impressive a minor-league track record as anyone has had in the Twins organization. In 367.1 minor league innings, he compiled a 1.94 ERA, a 0.849 WHIP and an eye-popping 6.94 K/BB ratio. His Major League success has been much more tempered, though Slowey has continued to exhibit fantastic command throughout.
Kevin is entering his prime years, the period from 27-32 when a pitcher should (*) have his most productive seasons. Slowey's had a couple of injuries so far in 3 full seasons though one of them was more of the accident variety (getting hit in the wrist by a batted ball), so I hesitate to label him "injury prone." In those three seasons, he's started 71 games which is an average of almost 24 starts per year...not bad. I think if Slowey is going to have that "breakout" year, this might be it.
In 2009, Slowey had a rough April before settling down and putting together a nice string of starts. In 12 starts between April 18th and June 19th, Slowey averaged about 6 innings per start and only allowed more than 3 runs in 2 of those 12 starts. Things got rough again after that, with Slowey complaining of wrist pain (likely from his batted ball incident the prior year), which led to season-ending wrist surgery. In 2010, Slowey was back in the starting rotation and started the year nicely, allowing more than 3 runs only 2 times in his first 12 starts of the year. Things took a turn in mid-June and Slowey was held out of a few starts due to right-elbow pain, including being pulled in the 7th inning of a no-hitter (which I was at). His innings through the end of the season were pretty limited, though he did finish the year with a tidy 13-6 record and serviceable 4.45 ERA.
In comparing Slowey's 2008 and 2010 seasons, I noticed a couple of things (he pitched 160.1 innings in 2008 and 155.2 in 2010 so the sample size is comparable). In 2008, Slowey induced GBs at a much higher percentage (36.1%) than in 2010 (28.3%). Meanwhile his LD% stayed about the same (19.1% in 2008 vs. 21.1% in 2010) while his FB% went from 44.8% to 50.6%, good for an increase of almost 13%. Over the course of 3 full seasons, his GB rate has dropped every season while his FB rate has increased. This isn't overly concerning since Slowey now pitches in a spacious ballpark half the time, but it's certainly not the direction you'd like to see him headed in.
In looking at his swing statistics, another pattern emerges...
 |
| Thanks to FanGraphs |
Between 2008 and 2010, Slowey's O-Contact% (percentage of times a batter makes contact on a pitch thrown outside of the strikezone) went from 70.1% to 77.6%. His Z-Contact% (percentage of times a batter makes contact on a pitch thrown inside the strikezone) went from 85.7% to 90.2%. In short, batters are simply making contact with Slowey's pitches at a higher rate, and when they are making contact on over 90% of pitches in the K-zone...you're gonna give up some runs, especially when you don't have overpowering stuff (for comparison, Liriano's Z-Contact% was 85.8% in 2010, and is at 83% for his career). On top of all of this, Slowey's BB/9 was higher in 2010 (1.68) than it was in 2008 (1.35), and his K/9 was lower in 2010 (6.71) versus 2008 (6.90).
Curiously, Slowey's FIP in 2008 vs. 2010 is not much different, 3.91 vs. 3.98 respectively. So why a 4.45ERA in 2010 vs. a 3.99 mark in 2008? It's hard to put a finger in it exactly, yes the walk rate was up and the K-rate down, but Slowey's strand-rate was almost identical and his HR/9 was nearly identical as well. More than likely a combination of more base-runners (1.15WHIP in 2008, 1.29WHIP in 2010) and a slightly higher BABIP, .307 in 2010 vs. .290 in 2008, added up to the extra 1/2 run on the ERA (maybe throw poor outfield D in there?).
So, all that said, what can we expect from a healthy (hopefully) Slowey in 2011? I would take an average of 2008 and 2010, depending on luck of course, which we can't really account for. What is going to prevent Slowey from really being dominant in the Majors is the fact that he relies so much on location. In the minors, pinpoint control goes a long way because a lot of the hitters don't have well-developed plate discipline. In the Majors it's a different story and history bears out the truth. You can certainly be a good location pitcher in the Majors, people like Moyer, Maddux (later-years), Radke, Glavine (later-years), Buerhle, etc. have had great careers. Slowey doesn't have a bad fastball (90-91mph) and his sinker (90-92mph) is a good pitch too, but they aren't blow-you-away pitches.
Slowey's game is limiting base-runners and insofar as he can do that, it will determine how much success he has. My guess on the numbers we can expect from Slowey are as follows:
180 IP
4.20ERA
1.20 WHIP
130-140K
25-35BB
13-16 Wins
2.0-3.0 WAR
For $2.7M, that's a pretty good deal. Fortunately, the Twins aren't relying on Slowey to be a #1 or even a #2 starter. He makes a very good #3 or #4 (depending on where you slot Baker) and should be in line for a bounce-back season of sorts.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)