Futility Infielders

Over at SB Nation, Grant Brisbee wrote a humorous piece analyzing the Major League teams based on "how closely their utility infielder matches the Platonic ideal of a utility infielder."  He described a utility infielder as the following:

He's short, scrappy, and probably a switch-hitter, although he can't actually hit. He can field just enough to get by, but not enough to force his way into a starting role. He's not exactly slow, but his SB/CS ratio is often bad and lopsided.

I'd have to disagree slightly with some of that description, but the 'short, scrappy, and probably a switch-hitter, although he can't actually hit' is right on the money.  The Cardinals, thanks to old friend Nick Punto, ranked first on Brisbee's list, while Minnesota came in fourth.  In ranking Minnesota, Brisbee wrote this:

[R]ight now the factory of utility infielder is based in Minneapolis. The factories usually shift every few years because of tax codes and cheap labor and things like that, but right now the Twins are spitting them out. The Twins don't even have scouts for the last half of the draft, they just have experts in utility infielder names. "Go with Tony Mason in the 42nd ... ooh, Andy Rando in the 43rd ... Skip Stansilus in the 44th ..."

It would be funnier if it weren't so true.  Ron Gardenhire, a prototypical utility infielder himself in his playing days, loved no one more than Nick Punto, and has continued that infatuation with Matt Tolbert and others.  Those players who actually have hitting skill and/or potential, such as Danny Valencia, quickly find their way into his doghouse upon making mistakes, while lesser utility players have praise heaped on them.

Brisbee does get it wrong, though, when he also lists Luke Hughes and Trevor Plouffe along with Matt Tolbert as utility infielders.  Tolbert fields well enough, is a switch-hitter, and can't hit a lick, while, despite average speed, also being a sub-par base-stealer.  Meanwhile, both Hughes' and Plouffe's best attribute is their power.  No utility infielder should be able to make that claim.  In addition, both have experienced many doubters in terms of their defensive ability, Hughes especially.

Plouffe has played all over the diamond since his call-up, from outfield to first base to shortstop, but his skill set is simply not that of a utility player, and he's got a good chance to start in a middle infield spot for Minnesota  Meanwhile, Hughes' defense isn't nearly good enough at any position for him to be considered for a spot as a utility infielder.  He much better fits the profile of a bench bat, although he'd obviously have to hit better than he has this year to successfully fill that position.

To sum it up: Matt Tolbert is the very definition of a utility infielder.  Luke Hughes and Trevor Plouffe are not.

White Sox Put Hurt on Twins

It was a rough night for the Twins, and Carl Pavano in particular.  Pavano got absolutely pounded by the White Sox, allowing 15 hits in 6+ plus innings of work.  I almost had the feeling Livan Hernandez was back as the balls kept falling in.  Somehow Pavano had actually only thrown 87 pitches before he was removed with nobody out in the seventh.  I'm sure Ron Gardenhire wanted to save the bullpen after Francisco Liriano and Scott Baker's short outings the previous two nights, but at that point enough was enough, despite the relatively low pitch count.

A lot of people will point to the fact that so many batted balls fell in for hits and say that Pavano was a victim of an unlucky BABIP this afternoon.  And of course he was--you don't give up 15 hits without getting unfortunate, no matter how badly you're pitching.  But I don't like to blame bad performances on BABIP in such a small sample, especially when Pavano wasn't fooling anybody on his pitches yesterday.  In a case where there really are a bunch of bloops and bleeders that find holes I might point it out, and there were certainly some of those, but balls were flying all over Target Field while Pavano was out there.

Pavano's feat, however, is pretty rare.  It's not easy to give up 15 hits, because most managers will have seen enough well before the pitcher gets to that point.  In fact, only 21 pitchers have allowed at least 15 hits in a game since 1990 (3 of them allowed 16), making it rarer than a no-hitter over that span.  Pavano was able to do it because of his low pitch count and, considering the hit total, low number of runs allowed.  In fact, Brad Radke is the only pitcher to ever allow at least 15 hits with fewer pitches (86) than Pavano.  Now, they haven't always recorded pitch counts, so I don't know how many years back it goes, but it's still impressive.  Pavano kept his pitch count low by walking no one, one of only three players to allow 15 hits and walk no one in a game since 1990.  Radke is also the other one to accomplish that.

Meanwhile, Nick Punto injured himself in the game, and is currently doing his best Carl Pavano circa 2005-2008 impression.  He was placed on the disabled list and Matt Tolbert (a.k.a. Nick Punto Lite or Black Holebert) was recalled from AAA.  Punto's now missed time on four separate occasions in 2010: the second half of April, about a week in late May, the past few weeks, and now this time.  With J.J. Hardy, Orlando Hudson, Justin Morneau, Alexi Casilla, and Tolbert also unable to play for various amount of time, it's meant a lot of shuffling around the infield for the whole year.  Let's hope everyone can get healthy for the stretch run, especially Morneau.

Roster Updates

The Twins' roster underwent a minor overhaul during the past weekend.  The acquisition of Matt Capps meant the Twins had 13 pitchers, meaning they needed to cut that number down by one.  Nick Punto also hit the disabled list, which is becoming a monthly-scheduled event now, resulting in the need for another middle infielder.

The beneficiary of the Punto injury is Trevor Plouffe, who will see his second stint in the big leagues this season.  The addition of Capps, meanwhile, forced Nick Blackburn to AAA, after his recent demotion to the bullpen.  I was very glad to see it was Blackburn, and not Anthony Slama, who was sent down to the minors.  I figured the Twins, with their obvious reluctance to give Slama a chance, would have seen enough of him after he gave up runs in two of his first three outings.  Fortunately, that's not the case (at least not yet), and Slama will get more opportunities to show off the dominant form that finally earned him the promotion.

In the  meantime, Justin Morneau continues to very slowly work his way back from his concussion.  He was scheduled to take batting practice yesterday, but will instead do so today.  Apparently the decision to hold off a day was made solely because of the amount of people around during the Twins family day on Sunday.  As a very important member of the Twins, and also a member of one of my two fantasy teams, it's painful to see him work his way back so slowly.  Don't mistake that for me calling him weak or anything; head injuries are a serious issue, but when he originally planned to miss just a few days, it's tough to watch his stay on the disabled list become never-ending.  By the way, he still ranks third in MLB with 5.2 WAR.

A Look Back at August

For the third time in five months, the Twins played exactly .500 ball, finishing August at 14-14. It was not a steady month, though, as the Twins played horrible baseball for the first half of the month, winning just 4 of 15 games, and then finished strong by winning 10 of their final 13 games. That culminated in Minnesota being above .500 for the first time since July 31st.

Record: 14-14
Best record at any point (games above .500): 66-65
Worst record at any point (games below .500): 56-62
Days in first (and biggest lead): 0 (2.5 GB)
Days in last (and furthest out of first): 0 (6.5 GB)
Longest win streak: 5 games
Longest losing streak: 3 games
Runs scored/runs against: 148/151
Most runs scored/most runs allowed: 11/14
Shutouts/times shut out: 2/1
Extra inning games: 1
Longest game: 10 innings

Hitter of the month: Joe Mauer (115 AB, 21 R, 8 HR, 23 RBI, 12 BB:9 K, 3 SB, .391/.449/.652)
It was another spectacular month in a monumental season for Joe Mauer. If not for a sub-par final week, this may have looked very similar to his performance in May when he hit over .400 and got on base half the time. In August, though, he threw in an added bonus of a few stolen bases to make his skill-set complete.

Bizarro World hitter of the month: Nick Punto (51 AB, 6 R, 0 HR, 5 RBI, 6 BB:16 K, 1 SB, .235/.310/.294)
For the fifth time in as many months, a middle infielder lands in this spot, and Punto receives it for the second time this year. Despite finally finding the bench towards the end of August, he did enough damage in his playing time to warrant this. He struck out in almost 1/3 of his at bats and yet again had a slugging percentage under .300, something he's avoided in only one month this season.

Pitcher of the month: Scott Baker (4-0, 39.2 IP, 33 H, 5 BB, 29 K, 3.18/0.96)
Baker continues to pitch well after a stint on the disabled list to start the season and a rough few weeks after that. In August he had his lowest ERA of any month and allowed opponents to bat just .220. In four of his six August starts he pitched at least seven innings, and in six of his last nine starts he's allowed 2 runs or fewer. Jose Mijares was the best reliever for the Twins in August.

Bizarro World pitcher of the month: Anthony Swarzak (0-4, 13.1 IP, 33 H, 3 BB, 8 K, 14.85/2.70)
He's back in Rochester now, but Swarzak made four starts for the Twins in August. He lost each of those four starts, lasting until the fifth inning just once, which isn't surprising when he allowed at least 5 runs in each start. In 16 fewer innings than Baker, he allowed the same number of hits because of the ridiculous .471 batting average opponents had against him. He also gave up as many home runs (8) as he had strikeouts.

Plays of the Week

At the suggestion of frequent commenter Barnacle, I have decided to start posting defensive plays of the week to go with the Hot & Cold feature. I can't post the videos directly because of Major League Baseball's strict copyright laws, but I will put up pictures and link to the videos.

Usually I'll include it in the same post as Hot & Cold, but since it's the inaugural edition, I figured I'd let it stand alone.

#3- Delmon Young makes the catch in foul ground and completes the double play by nailing Alberto Callaspo at home plate. Unfortunately, even with that play, the Twins were already down 9-1 in the 4th inning.

#2- Orlando Cabrera robs Billy Butler of a base-hit, sliding to his right and getting up quickly to make a strong throw to first base. He would do it again the next day in almost the exact same fashion, but it would be too boring to have both of them on this list.

#1- Matt Guerrier attempts to start a double play, but throws low and Cabrera can't handle it. As the ball bounces away, Josh Anderson takes off for third, but Nick Punto is alert and chases the ball down and fires it to Joe Crede just in time to get Anderson out.


Oddball play of the week: Justin Morneau strikes out and makes it all the way back to the dugout before the umpires confer and allow him to continue hitting. After looking at the ball, they determine that he did tip it (inconclusive on the replay) and that it hit the ground before Kelly Shoppach caught it (also inconclusive). With the Indians already trailing 9-0, Eric Wedge of course gets tossed and really gets his money's worth.

Twins get Orlando Cabrera

As was rumored very frequently over the past week, the Twins have finally finished a trade for Oakland Athletics' shortstop Orlando Cabrera. This certainly didn't come out of nowhere, meaning most people have already decided whether or not this would be a good addition before it actually happened. What I said previously was: "I think it would be a mistake to trade for Orlando Cabrera, unless it were just a very marginal prospect, because he figures to be only a marginal upgrade."

I went on to say that he would be a little bit more of an upgrade if he took Nick Punto's spot in the lineup, rather than Brendan Harris'. I'm trying to talk myself into Cabrera, but I just don't think he's going to make that big of a difference. However, with Freddy Sanchez traded to the Giants (for much more than the Twins would have--or should have--given up), and Marco Scutaro seemingly not available unless Roy Halladay is traded, I'm happy the Twins made a move that was at least a slight improvement (as opposed to, say, grabbing David Eckstein).

Now, with Cabrera actually acquired, I'm going to delve much more into the statistics than I did in my last discussion of him. His offense is not so good, but that makes him many times better than Punto, and a tad better than Harris. I realize I'm sort of just ignoring Alexi Casilla in this discussion, but that's because I'm assuming he'll be sent to Rochester to make room for the new acquisition. If Ron Gardenhire puts him in the #2 spot, as I presume he will, that would be a mistake, since his OBP is only .318 (and .322 for his career). Of course, it won't be nearly the mistake that having Casilla or Tolbert there was.

Meanwhile, his normally good defense (5.0 UZR/150 career) has taken a hit this year. He has rated as a pretty sub-par shortstop in 2009 (-9.6 UZR/150), and he's already played almost 900 innings there this season, which makes it hard to blame on a small sample. In fact, according to UZR, Harris has been a significantly better shortstop this year. It's bold, certainly, but maybe it'd be a good idea to try Harris at short and Cabrera at second base. Cabrera played 3 innings at second in 2000, and otherwise hasn't played there since 1998.

I really have no credentials to be judging how hard it would be for Cabrera to adjust to the position, so I won't try. All I'll say is the Twins should give it a shot if they think its doable. Now, I know they never will, and since Gardy hates Harris at 2B, I think that means Punto will still be playing every day.


So, I've talked about Cabrera plenty, but what about the player the Twins traded to the Athletics: Tyler Ladendorf? Ladendorf is a 21-year-old shortstop who was the Twins' 2nd round pick in 2008, and was currently playing at Low-A Beloit. He was hitting pretty poorly (.233/.292/.267) but that was in just 65 plate appearances, so you can't make too much of it. He was promoted to Beloit earlier this year after mashing for 74 plate appearances in Elizabethton (.410/.500/.721). He was ranked #32 among Twins prospects by Aaron Gleeman, but middle infield is a very weak position throughout the organization and he was considered a good prospect by many people.

My overall reaction to the deal is a slight thumbs up. With everything that's been going on--from Justin Morneau and Joe Nathan's comments to groaning fans--I'm glad the Twins were able to put something together. Additionally, it's something that has the potential to help the team, but only if Gardenhire plays it the right way (he almost certainly won't). And they didn't give up anything great to obtain Cabrera. At this point, only time will tell if it was the right move.

In need of some relief

Actually, before I take a look at the relief pitchers that are options for the Twins I want to address another person the Twins may be targeting at middle infield: David Eckstein. To be brief, this would be a pointless move that wouldn't improve the team at all. At the plate, he's essentially Nick Punto if he consistently played like his 2008 version (see below), and that's not necessarily a bad thing for a shortstop/second baseman. Unfortunately, Eckstein's defense has eroded to the point where he can no longer play shortstop effectively (and he hasn't played there this year). At 34 years old, that's not surprising. At second base, his defense has been below average, but not horrible, in relatively few innings (~850) the last two years. Punto, meanwhile, has rated above average to good at second over the last two seasons.


That, combined with his weak hitting this year and low upside, makes for an unappealing trade target. He could be a very slight upgrade over Nick Punto if everything works out right, but that's unlikely, especially considering he just came off the disabled list yesterday. I think the last thing the Twins need is another scrappy, light-hitting middle infielder for Gardy to be infatuated with.


On to the real topic now. Yesterday I mentioned a few relief pitchers the Twins have been linked to, and I'd like to run through an expanded list: Sean White (SEA); John Grabow (PIT); Michael Wuertz (OAK); Jason Frasor, Scott Downs, and Brandon League (TOR); and George Sherrill (BAL). It's rumored that the Twins are trying to address both their middle infield and bullpen needs in one trade--Sherrill and White are the two that don't fit that bill. Personally, I don't think they should bother trying to do that if a deal for Sanchez like the one I looked at yesterday is on the table. I'd just take that and worry about a reliever separately.

Sean White is an uninspiring choice, with a nearly even strikeout-to-walk ratio (21:20) and more of the same on his minor league track record (52:43 in 125 AAA innings in 2008). He does induce a lot of ground balls and gives up limited home runs, but he's not the late-inning option the Twins need.

John Grabow is a southpaw who fares only slightly better against fellow lefties than he does against righties. He strikes out more batters than White but also hands out more walks. His WHIP is pretty high (1.57, 1.46 career) and his FIP is 4.47 despite a significantly lower HR/FB% than any other season of his career. So, while I'd like him more than White, he's not that great of an option.

Michael Wuertz has been very good this year, and presents a pretty good option. He's struck out 64 batters in 48.1 innings against just 13 walks. His 3.17 ERA is actually worse than his 2.56 FIP, which he's accumulated with a HR rate right in line with his career average. I believe he still has another year of arbitration, meaning he'd be around in 2010 too. Between all of that, though, the A's may be asking for a lot for Wuertz.

The Blue Jays have a nice trio of relievers in Jason Frasor, Brandon League, and Scott Downs. All 3 would be nice additions, as they all strike out about a batter an inning and have a walk rate around 2.5 per nine innings. Downs is owed the remainder of $3.5 million this year and $4.0 million in 2010, Frasor is in his last year of arbitration and will be a free agent, and League still has another year of arbitration. Downs' contract makes the lefty a little less desirable, but it also means he might come cheaper in a trade.

George Sherrill is another solid option. While I don't like him quite as much as Wuertz and the Toronto relievers, he would be a good addition to the bullpen. His walk and strikeout rates are similar to the Blue Jays corps, but he's an extreme fly ball pitcher (50.6 % fly balls) who gives up very few home runs (0.77/9). Even though he's managed to do this throughout his career, I still don't like counting on those odds.

So, overall, it's hard to determine who's best to trade for when you don't really know what the Twins would have to give up. If you consider recent trades as a baseline, perhaps you can get some idea. The Rockies just traded high-A pitcher Connor Graham to the Indians for reliever Rafael Betancourt. While he's a righty, he's otherwise pretty similar to Scott Downs, since Betancourt has a club option for $5.4 million next year. Graham is a 23-year-old who's pitching pretty well (9.75 K/9, .231 BAA, 2.96 FIP), but walks too many (4.59/9) and perhaps has been aided by a really low HR rate (0.22/9). He did, however, have a rate of 0.18 for 2008, so maybe it's not a fluke.

Perhaps that's someone like David Bromberg? If so, the question becomes are you willing to part with Bromberg for Downs this year and next at the aforementioned price. I'm not sure, and that's why I feel like the trade discussed yesterday is a better bet. But I suppose it's possible the Twins could make two trades--we'll just have to wait and see.

Slowey and the trade deadline

With the trade deadline looming, the Twins took a big hit to their chances for a division title when it was announced that Kevin Slowey would undergo surgery on his wrist and thus miss the remainder of the season. Any thoughts of a deal involving one of the Twins other starting pitchers (Glen Perkins or Francisco Liriano were most talked about) are essentially moot at this point. Now that Anthony Swarzak is in the rotation full-time, the Twins' options for replacing a starter are a bunch of mop-up men: R.A. Dickey, Kevin Mulvey, Phil Humber, Bobby Keppel, and Brian Duensing.

The two areas the Twins really need to address, if they plan on making a serious run this year, are second base and the bullpen. You could argue the starting rotation also might need a little help now, but there's never very much quality starting pitching available at the trade deadline, meaning you always have to pay through the nose for it. I don't see the Twins doing any such thing, so I'm not going to consider that possibility.

There have been many names thrown about at both positions: Orlando Cabrera, Freddy Sanchez, and Marco Scutaro at second base, and Michael Wuertz, Brandon League, Scott Downs, John Grabow, Matt Capps, and others for the bullpen. I think it would be a mistake to trade for Orlando Cabrera, unless it were just a very marginal prospect, because he figures to be only a marginal upgrade. If he were to take Nick Punto's spot in the starting lineup, he'd be a little bit better of a trade target, but I, like many Minnesota fans, believe Gardenhire would play Cabrera in place of Brendan Harris. Harris is no superstar, but Cabrera isn't much better, if at all.

Freddy Sanchez and Marco Scutaro would both be much more significant upgrades. And if a deal for Sanchez similar to the one Doogie Wolfson speculates is possible, I would pull the trigger in a heartbeat. His idea is Alexi Casilla, Brian Duensing, and a "low-level pitcher who has a chance" (someone like Bobby Lanigan or Dan Osterbrock?). I really want to give Casilla a chance, but he's had way too many at this point and Sanchez is a no-brainer upgrade; Duensing is just an extra reliever for mop-up duty; and, while you never like to give away young pitching prospects, the chance that the one guy the Twins trade will be a difference-maker in the big leagues is small.

In return for that, they'd get a good defensive second baseman (career UZR/150 of 4.5) who is actually an above average hitter, as opposed to the league-worst hitters they've been trotting out there for the entire season thus far. Even if he plays like he did in 2008, the only year of the last four that he wasn't above average both offensively and defensively, he'd be a huge upgrade over Nick Punto and Alexi Casilla. He can also play third base if the situation arose, as he's shown a pretty slick glove in the past (17.9 UZR/150), though he hasn't played there since 2006.

And Sanchez would even be around in 2010 for the modest price of $8 million. If you think that's expensive, consider that the Twins were willing to pay Punto $4 million to be around in 2010, and Sanchez is, quite literally, worth about 20 of him (Sanchez has a WAR value of 2.2 versus Punto's WAR of 0.1).

I know this is based on one person's idea for what it would take to get Sanchez, but the point is that Sanchez would fill an absolutely gaping hole in the Twins organization and help them compete both this year and in their inaugural year at Target Field. Tomorrow I'll take a look at the relievers that are available on the trade market.

Rangers Announcers

The Twins won the first two games of the series with Texas, meaning it has obviously been enjoyable to watch. But even more than that, I've really liked listening to the Ranger announcers. I don't know what it is about them, but they just seem very relaxed and comfortable, and are relatively funny. I also find them to be very fair, with just enough bias to remind you that are announcing for the Texas Rangers.

Additionally, while they're no Bill James, they seem to do a little better job ignoring useless stats like wins. They also quoted on base percentage over the beloved batting average more often than you'd expect from an announcer. And there were a lot of interesting things they said that I didn't think were true; but the ones I could look up easily I did, and they were all correct. For instance, one of them commented that the Mariners have 3 of the top 5 or 6 pitchers in the AL as judged by ERA, or at least would if Erik Bedard had enough innings to qualify. Turns out, if Bedard qualified, Felix Hernandez, Bedard, and Jarrod Washburn would rank 2nd, 4th, and 6th respectively.

All of that almost went down the drain when I heard this at one point in yesterday's game: "Nick Punto has become a very popular player in Minnesota". It only made me like them more, though, when I heard them conclude the sentence: "Nick Punto has become a very popular player in Minnesota, certainly with his manager Ron Gardenhire," they finished with a chuckle.

And, of course, they described him as a "scrappy middle infielder," followed by a digression on how the Twins like his hustle, but don't want him to be reckless. Translation: stop sliding head first into first base!

The Second Base Experiment

I was browsing through my daily baseball websites when I saw an article on Fangraphs regarding the Kansas City Royals' trade for Yuniesky Betancourt. The main point of that article was to point out what a bad player Betancourt is (he "doesn't hit for power, walk, take coaching well, field, or keep himself in shape"). But what struck me was the first line: "The Royals desperately needed a shortstop. Their collective group was batting a cool .208/.234/.281 [now at .210/.242/.275] with awful defense..."

The thing about that is, that's actually almost equivalent to what Twins second basemen have done in 2009. As bad as those Royal shortstops have been, Twins second basemen have combined to hit .191/.271/.243, resulting in the worst OPS (.514) at any position for any team in the big leagues. Royals shortstops narrowly beat them out at .518, although the Twins second basemen are ahead of them in wOBA (.243 to .236). No other team's position has an OPS lower than .570 or a wOBA lower than .256.

So on the hitting side, I think it's clear that these two groups have been the worst in the league. For the Royals, the culprits have been: Willie Bloomquist (126 PA, .729 OPS, .330 wOBA), Mike Aviles (123, .473, .212), Tony Pena (53, .118, .118), Luis Hernandez (48, .355, .167), and Alberto Callaspo (5, .650, .320); for the Twins: Matt Tolbert (140, .504, .237), Alexi Casilla (121, .467, .221), Nick Punto (66, .686, .336), and Brendan Harris (47, .437, .187). Yes, as surprising as it may be, Harris' time at second was actually the most abysmal.

(As a side note, check out Tony Pena's offensive (in both senses) stats over the past two years and tell me he's not one of the worst hitters ever.)

The Royals SS have combined for 15 walks and 72 strikeouts, a ratio only Delmon Young wouldn't be embarrased by. Meanwhile, the Twins 2B have accumulated just 12 extra-base hits in 374 plate appearances. All of it adds up to some pretty awful performances.

How about that "awful defense" from the Royals shortstops? That should put the Twins over the top, right? Fangraphs doesn't have UZR totals for teams, so we'll have to consider individual performances, which of course causes problems with small samples. Bloomquist (-14.0 UZR/150 this season) is a bad defensive shortstop for his career, but that number is most likely a little exaggerated. Aviles (-8.0) has probably not been nearly that bad, as he rated at 31.6 UZR/150 over almost 750 innings last season. Hernandez (1.7) doesn't have many innings in his career, so I'll just assume that's fairly accurate. Pena's number (-15.4) is almost certainly way off, as before this year he'd logged just short of 2000 innings at shortstop and sported a 14.6 UZR/150.

The Twins defense at second, meanwhile, has been legitimately awful this year. Punto's (13.0) been the bright spot and his career numbers there are good, so it may be a good estimate. Harris (-20.5) and Casilla (-20.1) have been awful this year, and are bad second basemen for their careers, meaning those aren't necessarily too far off. Tolbert (-11.1) has limited innings for his career, so you have to take his value for what it is, and that's not good.

Between their horrible defense and humiliating offense, Twins second basemen have laid claim to being the worst position in the big leagues to this point. Swapping Tolbert for Casilla probably won't solve that problem, as Casilla's been part of it to this point, but I definitely would rather have him than Tolbert.


[Fangraphs also had a good read on Twins prospect Rene Tosoni]

Roster Updates

There's been a lot going on with the Twins the past few days, so this is as much for me to keep track of everything that's happened recently as it is for you readers.

==>Most notably, Luis Ayala was designated for assignment. I know he wasn't great, but I'd much rather have him than Sean Henn on the roster right now, even if it means there's only one lefty in the bullpen. Bobby Keppel got the call from AAA to replace Ayala.

==>Denard Span is headed to Rochester for a rehab assignment and will hopefully return to the Twins on Wednesday. That means Jason Pridie will be going back to AAA then, and most likely will still be hitless in his big league career. He's made just one pinch-running appearance during his Major League stint.

==>Nick Punto bruised his ribs on Saturday night sliding head first into first base--how appropriate! He might have been safe if he'd run through the base (as it's always quicker), but he definitely would not have gotten injured.

==>Justin Morneau missed his first game in almost 2 years on Sunday, after playing all 163 games last season. With the day off Monday, that makes two consecutive days of rest, but over at the Star Tribune they're only saying it's 'probable' that he'll be ready for today's game.

==>Jason Kubel was pulled from Sunday's game with flu-like symptoms. He will in all likelihood be ready for the Twins' series against the Brewers.

The Month of May

[There will be no Hot-Cold feature this week since Monday coincides with the end of the month.]

Despite Joe Mauer's return and sizzling performance, the Twins were under .500 in the month of May. Let's run down exactly how they did.

Record: 14-16
Best record at any point (games above .500): 18-17
Worst record at any point (games below .500): 18-23
Days in first (and biggest lead): 1 (tied)
Days in last (and furthest out of first): 0 (5.5 games)
Longest win streak: 4
Longest losing streak: 6
Runs scored/runs against: 168/138
Most runs scored/most runs allowed: 20/10
Shutouts/times shut out: 1/1
Extra inning games: 4
Longest game: 13 innings


Hitter of the month: Joe Mauer (99 AB, 27 R, 11 HR, 32 RBI, 0 SB, .414/.500/.838)
What a month it was for Mauer in his return from injury. His OPS for the month was 1.338 and he tied a Twins record with 11 home runs in a month. Mauer's month-long performance was so good that it relegated Justin Morneau's 9 home runs, 29 RBIs, and .713 slugging percentage to an afterthought. All in all, it was far more than any of us could have expected when Mauer returned on May 1st.

Three more up
Justin Morneau (108 AB, 24 R, 9 HR, 29 RBI, 0 SB, .361/.459/.713)
Michael Cuddyer (109 AB, 23 R, 8 HR, 26 RBI, 2 SB, .312/.395/.651)
Joe Crede (68 AB, 9 R, 6 HR, 16 RBI, 0 SB, .265/.311/.574)

Bizarro World hitter of the month: Nick Punto (66 AB, 10 R, 0 HR, 8 RBI, .152/.244/.182)
When the Twins re-signed Punto in the off-season, reactions were mixed; but even the positive opinions were based on Punto not reverting back to his 2007 version. And so far that's exactly what's happened. Punto has been awful, especially in May, and mercifully he found the disabled list towards the end of the month. This, however, was better than his worst month of 2007: in August of that year, he hit .127/.210/.155 over 71 at bats.


Pitcher of the month: Joe Nathan (12.1 IP, 9 H, 3 BB, 14 K, 2.19/0.97)
Nathan threw only seven innings during April, and was still not used all that much in May. He did, however, up his innings total to 12 1/3, and was as dominating as ever. He blew one save in the month (against the Yankees on May 15th) and that was the 4th consecutive day he had pitched. Without that game, Nathan was filthy: 11.2 IP, 6 H, 1 BB, 13 K, 0.00 ERA! And including that game, he was still very good.

Three more up
Nick Blackburn (38 IP, 38 H, 13 BB, 21 K, 3.08/1.34)
R.A. Dickey (19.1 IP, 17 H, 7 BB, 10 K, 1.86/1.24)
Matt Guerrier (15 IP, 7 H, 4 BB, 12 K, 2.40/0.73)

Bizarro World pitcher of the month: Francisco Liriano (30.1 IP, 39 H, 17 BB, 30 K, 7.12/1.85)
Liriano was utterly hittable and could not control his pitches for the entire month. While he still posted a good strikeout rate (8.9 per 9), he was not effective in the least, throwing only 4 innings in each of his last 3 starts. You can point to some bad luck, as in his last start, where there were 3 infield hits against him in one inning, but Liriano just wasn't good in any aspect this month.

Victory

[Edit 5/27/07, 1:28 AM: I've just purchased MLB.TV, meaning that I will be watching almost every game from now on. This is very exciting, as I've only been able to watch a handful of games the past few seasons.]

This is going to be very short, as I've already spent a lot of time today working on very long posts meant for later this week.

The Twins beat the Red Sox 5-2 in the second game of the series thanks to a good start from Nick Blackburn and a three-run homer from Justin Morneau. Blackburn had a season-high 7 strikeouts in 7 innings, and gave up two runs (one earned). I was nervous when Gardy sent him out for the seventh inning, but Blackburn allowed only an unearned run in that frame. Matt Guerrier followed that with a perfect inning and Joe Nathan closed out the game for his seventh save.

Nick Punto also had a good day, which has been the case on rare occasions this season. Although he did make an error, he had two hits, including his third double of the season. His OPS jumped up to .516, though his average is still below the Mendoza Line.

Delmon Young is going in the opposite direction. Since returning from the bereavement list, he is hitless in 12 at bats and has 8 strikeouts, dropping his average to .242. It's getting harder and harder to hold out hope for Young, but maybe (just maybe? Or am I just wishing here?) these most recent struggles have been because of the passing of his mother. Whatever the reason is, he's running out of time to prove himself a competent Major League hitter.

That'll do it for this post, but like I said, I have some big posts coming later in the week, and one of them will probably be tomorrow.

Casilla on the DL

Suddenly this has a huge impact. Now Brendan Harris, Nick Punto, and Brian Buscher will seemingly be playing everyday, with Adam Everett periodically filling in for one (particularly for Buscher against lefties). Yes, that Adam Everett. He's finally back after spending the last two months on the DL and subsequently rehabbing his injury. Immediately after being outrighted to the minors, the Twins changed course and he was added to the Major League roster due to Alexi Casilla's finger injury. I don't know about you, but I look at the lineup now and see a huge void. It appears Nick Punto will hit second and I don't like that at all. I think the best thing to do would be to move Joe Mauer back to the number two spot, but I can't see Gardy doing that at this point.

And why not move Harris back to second base and put Punto at shortstop? Gardy has indicated Harris will play short and Punto second, which doesn't make much sense. Punto is a very superior defender so shouldn't he be at the more demanding position? Everyone agrees Harris is very stretched at shortstop. Is his inability to execute the double play from second base so bad that he should play short of Punto? I guess Gardy thinks so...

Santana Struggles, Punto Picks It Up

The Twins had another disappointing loss as they continued their trek towards their first sub-.500 record since 2000. Johan Santana struggled once again and this season looks destined to be the worst of his full-time starting career, with an ERA of 3.29 and a whopping 33 home runs allowed. Santana has always been a bit prone to the home run ball, but this year has been absolutely ridiculous. I'm not sure what the cause of this rise has been, as his groundout-to-airout ratio is well above his career ratio, and only in the 2006 season has he ever had a better ratio (as a starter). Like many Twins fans, I wish there was an easy solution to Johan's second-half struggles that would put him right back on track, but obviously it is never that easy. On the bright side, he did strike out 11 in the game and once again, despite the down year, is leading the league in strikeouts as a result of Erik Bedard's season-ending injury, albeit by only 2 over the Rays' Scott Kazmir.

In other news, Joe Mauer had his first 3-hit game since August 13th, and Nick Punto had another multi-hit game. Punto seems to be turning it around in September, as his line is now .360/.396/.460, which is infinitely better than his .127/.210/.155 line in August. I don't know if it is possible to ever make up for a month like his August (and the rest of his putrid season), but at least Punto is showing some improvement. As written over at Nick & Nick's Twins Blog, Punto, though maybe not the .290 hitter he was last year, is not a sub-.200 hitter either, and this September he has already risen his average 16 points to reach .214. And that's what scares me the most: I actually just wrote a positive note about how a player now has a .214 batting average.

One last note: how did Matt LeCroy and Lew Ford manage to get into the starting lineup over Jason Kubel? Oh, I forgot, Ford (.256/.347/.419 this season) and LeCroy (.183/.274/.220 in AAA this year) are much better hitters against lefties than Kubel (.242/.342/.355). Seriously, Kubel is a 25 year old hitter who has been on fire lately and seems to be finally hitting his stride after a major knee injury, while LeCroy and Ford are both 31 and on the decline. Gardy, sometimes you just have to use this thing called your brain in setting the lineups, rather than looking at which arm the pitcher throws with. And just as an aside, Buehrle's splits for the year:

vs. Lefties: .314/.358/.503
vs. Righties: .258/.300/.395

Michael Young Wins Game for Twins

A day after losing on a walk-off error the Rangers suffered another defeat because of some not-so-slick fielding. This time, Michael Young had three errors in the game, and two in one inning, which allowed two unearned runs to score. This gave the Twins their margin of victory in a 4-2 win. Carlos Silva had a good start, giving up only two earned runs in six innings, and improved his record to 12-14 in the process. Glen Perkins came into a tight spot in the seventh and was very un-Dennys-Reyes-like by getting the batter, Hank Blalock, on the first pitch. In other words, he didn't look like he was just guessing where the ball would end up. Joe Nathan finished the game for his 33rd save in 37 chances.


The offense also had some good performances. Torii Hunter went 2-4 with 2 RBIs, Joe Mauer had a ground-rule double and RBI, Jason Kubel went 3-4 with 2 doubles and 3 runs scored, and Nick Punto had 2 hits, including a double, again! On the other hand, Justin Morneau and Luis Rodriguez both had tough days. Morneau came up twice with a runner in scoring position and two outs and didnt get a hit either time, while Rodriguez grounded into two double plays and went 0-4 overall.


The aforementioned four players (with good games) totaled five doubles for the game. As a team, the Twins have not had that many doubles in a game since June 23rd in an 11-1 win against the Marlins, and only two other times this year (April 21st in a 7-5 win over the Royals and April 14th in a 12-5 victory versus the Devil Rays). The last time-- and only time this year-- they had more than 5 doubles in one game was way back on April 17th, in a game that ended 11-2 in favor of the Twins over the Mariners. Mauer had three doubles and the team combined for eight. That was so long ago that Ramon Ortiz started and Josh Rabe played, that Jason Bartlett was collecting his first extra base hit of the year, and that Mauer was batting .364.


And now I move to the topic of Nick Punto again. Luis Rodriguez needs to be warned that Nick Punto may surpass him in batting average if he continues his recent pace. He has already jumped over Richie Sexson in order to not be last in the majors for batting average by going 7-17 (.412) with two doubles and an RBI over his last five games. And yes, those are significant; he's only had three RBIs now since July 21st and the two doubles are the same amount he had in each of three individual months. And, of course, these last five days have made the whole season of Punto worthwhile.


Lastly, I'm awarding retroactive game balls for the two games which I posted entries about before I had that idea. For Friday's game, it goes to Justin Morneau, who went 1-4 with a 2-run home run. For Saturday's game, it goes to Johan Santana, who pitched eight innings, gave up four earned runs, and allowed six hits and two walks to go with seven strikeouts.

Twins Swept

After being swept by the Tigers for the second straight time, the Twins have fallen to 72-77, 5 games below .500, the farthest they've been from .500 this season, and the farthest since June 11th of last season. Scott Baker provided a pretty good start, but began roughly as Johan Santana did yesterday, giving up four runs in the first three innings. The offense was again lackluster, batting 7-34 (.206), but pushed across 4 runs and had a chance late when Joe Mauer, pinch-hitting for Chris Heintz, struck out looking with the bases loaded. It was an especially rough night for Jason Kubel, who went 0-5 with three strikeouts, while Nick Punto went 2-4 with a double.


Speaking of Punto, he had two hits in each of his last two games, which is the first time in his last 81 games (72 with a plate appearance) that he has had consecutive multi-hit games, dating back to July 10th and 12th. That sort of futility meant research had to be done. After looking at some of the other worst hitters in the league (in terms of batting average), there wasn't much conclusive data, but I decided to put it up anyways because this relatively small amount of data took a while to collect. I've listed games since consecutive multi-hit games, times with consecutive games with extra base hits, number of games with multiple extra base hits, and regular old slugging percentage for the players with the lowest batting averages in the American League, and a few of the worst in the National League too. The numbers in parentheses indicate games with a plate appearance.


Nick Punto................81 (72)........3.........1......... .262
Richie Sexson...........17................10........3......... .399
Ray Durham.............67.................5.........2........ .346
Andruw Jones..........14................11........1......... .411
Juan Uribe................3...................6.........4........ .393
Julio Lugo.................10.................8.........6......... .348
Lyle Overbay...........56 (55)........9.........7.......... .394
Brandon Inge...........82 (80)........5.........2.......... .389
Vernon Wells............35 (34)........9.........7.......... .408
Jermaine Dye...........14................11.......10........ .484
Jason Varitek...........37................5..........2.......... .394
Travis Hafner...........9..................9.........7.......... .437


So as it turns out, that streak is not the longest, even among the small sample size (although presumably the longest streaks would be among the guys with the lowest batting averages). But what is apparent is his utter lack of extra base hits. His three times of having consecutive games with an extra base hit is behind everyone's. This is even though all of his streaks are two games, and everyone else has at least one of three or more games, excluding Inge (any streak would be counted as 1; for instance, 5 consecutive games would be counted as just 1 streak). And most appalling of all, even though Andruw Jones equals him in this category, is his ONE game with multiple extra base hits this year. You ask when that game was? Opening day.


Of course, these statistics, albeit interesting to look at, really don't show us any more than this one:

Bizarro World MLB Leaders:

Slugging %
Punto....................... .262
Omar Vizquel......... .295
Jason Kendall......... .315
Marcus Giles.......... .319
Tony Pena Jr......... .337

OPS
Punto...................... .552
Vizquel................... .595
Pena Jr................... .615
Kendall................... .617
Giles....................... .620

Make sure to notice how far "ahead" he is of the next "best" in each category in the American League (in case you need help, it's Tony Pena Jr.). Nick Punto, congratulations; you've raised your average to .205, your slugging percentage to .262, and your OPS to .552 by going 4-7 over the last two games. But I'll give him some credit for hitting .273 with a .636 OPS in September, because if he'd kept that up the whole year, he'd only have the 2nd worst OPS in the American League.