The last time the Twins organization saw this many changes in one season was back in 2007, when perennial all-stars Torii Hunter and Johan Santana departed. In trying to avoid replicating a disastrous 99-loss season, Minnesota sacked Bill Smith and reinstated Terry Ryan as General Manager, who stepped down in that same 2007 season. The moves Ryan have made since then have mostly been positive, as he's helped situate the Twins to be better than they were in 2011--thought that wasn't all that difficult.
There are still many holes, however, and many of the problems that produced 99 losses last year are still present. While the Twins will probably be better, hopes are not nearly as high as they've been in years past. Let's take a look at each of Terry Ryan's moves one-by-one and evaluate their effect on the prospects of the 2011 Minnesota Twins.
Matt Capps- The gift that keeps on taking. In mid-2010, Bill Smith traded top catching prospect Wilson Ramos for the overrated Matt Capps. In the 2010 off-season, Smith retained Capps for the next season for more than $7 million, a result of Smith's complete over-valuation of the save statistic. In December of 2011, Terry Ryan decided to re-sign Capps for $4.75 million. While that represents a significantly smaller sum than his previous salary, it was still far too much, especially considering the number of quality relievers available as free agents. Aaron Gleeman depressingly captures exactly what the Twins could have done to improve their bullpen with that $4.75 million they spent on Capps. Oh, and they also would have received an extra draft pick if Capps had signed with another team. Ouch.
Jamey Carroll- This was meant as a move to fill the chasm that was created at shortstop last season when Tsuyoshi Nishioka turned out to be woefully under-prepared for the Major Leagues. Of course he's still around and could be better this year, but nobody's hopes are very high. Carroll will presumably begin the year as the starting shortstop, a role that he adequately fits. He's 37 years old so his good defensive ratings from last year are no bet to continue, though, and his slap-hitting tendencies won't make up for his defense if it's below average. Considering the black hole the Twins have often been sporting at shortstop over the last decade, however, this move is solid. 2 years at more than $7 million total may be a little high, but all around this was a decent acquisition.
Ryan Doumit- I don't think there's anything to complain about with this signing. For the low price of $3 million, the Twins have added a switch-hitting catcher who can also play the outfield. With Denard Span and new acquisition Josh Willingham locked into outfield spots, Doumit will either play DH or take the third outfield position from Ben Revere. In addition, he provides a very capable option at catcher if Joe Mauer gets injured or just to fill in on his regular days of rest. Doumit is no superstar but he's a great fit for the Twins at a great price.
Josh Willingham- The biggest move of the Twins off-season was essentially choosing to sign Willingham over re-signing Michael Cuddyer. Cuddyer's popularity with Minnesota fans and the media is well-known, but the fact of the matter is that this was the correct move to make. Cuddyer signed with the Rockies for $30 million over 3 years, while the Twins got Willingham for $21 million over the same period. In addition to saving $9 million, Minnesota will also get two extra draft picks because another team signed Cuddyer. And, despite that, they really didn't lost much, if anything, in terms of on-field production. Willingham is a poor-fielding right-handed power bat, just like Cuddyer, except that he gets on base a little more while hitting for a slightly lower average. It's sad to see Cuddyer go, but Ryan did well in making this tough decision.
Joel Zumaya- This was a low-risk, high-reward signing that will probably give the Twins little to no value. Zumaya hasn't pitched since mid-2010, when his elbow shattered while pitching for the Tigers against Minnesota. The likelihood that Zumaya will be healthy and effective at all in 2012 is low, and the likelihood that he will be both of those for anything resembling an entire season is essentially zero. Nonetheless, for $800,000 it was worth the risk. In the past, when healthy, Zumaya has been a top-flight reliever, something the Twins sorely need with the departure of Joe Nathan.
Showing posts with label matt capps. Show all posts
Showing posts with label matt capps. Show all posts
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
Monday, August 2, 2010
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.
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.
Saturday, July 31, 2010
Accepting the Matt Capps Deal
So Matt Capps isn’t that great. I’ve moved on. I’ve accepted the fact that the Twins no longer have Wilson Ramos. But that doesn’t mean I will rationalize it. I’m going to run through the reasons people have used to explain either why the Twins did it or why it was a good trade for Minnesota.
--The main one I’ve seen is that the Twins have Joe Mauer signed to a long-term extension, meaning they had no leverage because all the other teams knew they had to trade Ramos. That doesn’t fly, because assuming more than just the Nationals were interested in Ramos, they were still bidding against one another. Unless every team agreed they wouldn’t go over a certain price, they would bid higher and higher until they reached something equal to Ramos’ value. Even then, there’d be an incentive for every team to cheat the agreement, until one team again reached something equal to Ramos’ true value.
It’s simple game theory. Consider if there are 5 people at an auction for an item they all value at $100. If they don’t meet beforehand, it will obviously be bid up to $100 before stopping. If they meet beforehand, and agree not to bid over, say, $50, the final bid will still be $100. Once the auction is at $50, every other person has an incentive to break the deal with no consequences, meaning everyone will break the deal until the bid is up to $100. Same is true of trading for Ramos, except the agreement to not bid over a certain point is implicit.
--With this is the problem that perhaps teams did not value Ramos as highly as us Twins fans and bloggers did, and this is really the best the Twins could get for him. I have no way of knowing if this is true or not, but I find it unlikely since Baseball America ranked him at #58 in their annual list of their top 100 prospects. Perhaps his prospect status has dropped because he has not played all that well at AAA this year. Again, that’s possible, but BA had him ranked #26-#50 in their midseason update. A lot of that upward movement is caused by other prospects being called up and losing their prospect status, but it’s obvious BA does not think his stock dropped that much. And, while BA is not a bible, I think their rankings reflect a very general idea of how teams view prospects.
--Going along with the first point, many people thought, since it was inevitable that the Twins would trade Ramos, it was essential they do it now, while he was young. I can’t see how waiting until the offseason, or even for the next trading deadline, would hurt his value all that much. He’d still be a 24-year old, certainly young enough to be a good prospect.
--Some have said that since they had to trade him anyways, getting Capps was good enough. I think the best you can expect from Capps is about half a win the rest of the season. And he won’t come cheaply in arbitration after the year since he has all the saves to increase his price tag, so I don’t know that the Twins will want to or should keep him next year. Is that the best they could get for Wilson Ramos? Keep in mind the opportunity cost of trading Ramos for Capps is the player(s) the Twins could have gotten for Ramos if they hadn’t traded him for Capps.
--Lastly, Jon Rauch was struggling, and Capps will bring stability to the closer position, goes one more argument. Yes, Rauch had a bad few weeks, but everyone goes through rough stretches; I’m sure he would have and will get out of it. Saves and closing are vastly overrated. It was tolerable when the Twins signed one of their own players (Joe Nathan) to a closer-priced deal, but it’s not tolerable when they’re paying the closer premium to get someone from another team. This time they paid it in the player they had to give up, and not in actual money, but the concept is the same. If Capps was the exact same player with 26 fewer saves this year, he would have been much cheaper to acquire. And for no reason, as experience in the closing job does not make a player any better at closing specifically.
--The main one I’ve seen is that the Twins have Joe Mauer signed to a long-term extension, meaning they had no leverage because all the other teams knew they had to trade Ramos. That doesn’t fly, because assuming more than just the Nationals were interested in Ramos, they were still bidding against one another. Unless every team agreed they wouldn’t go over a certain price, they would bid higher and higher until they reached something equal to Ramos’ value. Even then, there’d be an incentive for every team to cheat the agreement, until one team again reached something equal to Ramos’ true value.
It’s simple game theory. Consider if there are 5 people at an auction for an item they all value at $100. If they don’t meet beforehand, it will obviously be bid up to $100 before stopping. If they meet beforehand, and agree not to bid over, say, $50, the final bid will still be $100. Once the auction is at $50, every other person has an incentive to break the deal with no consequences, meaning everyone will break the deal until the bid is up to $100. Same is true of trading for Ramos, except the agreement to not bid over a certain point is implicit.
--With this is the problem that perhaps teams did not value Ramos as highly as us Twins fans and bloggers did, and this is really the best the Twins could get for him. I have no way of knowing if this is true or not, but I find it unlikely since Baseball America ranked him at #58 in their annual list of their top 100 prospects. Perhaps his prospect status has dropped because he has not played all that well at AAA this year. Again, that’s possible, but BA had him ranked #26-#50 in their midseason update. A lot of that upward movement is caused by other prospects being called up and losing their prospect status, but it’s obvious BA does not think his stock dropped that much. And, while BA is not a bible, I think their rankings reflect a very general idea of how teams view prospects.
--Going along with the first point, many people thought, since it was inevitable that the Twins would trade Ramos, it was essential they do it now, while he was young. I can’t see how waiting until the offseason, or even for the next trading deadline, would hurt his value all that much. He’d still be a 24-year old, certainly young enough to be a good prospect.
--Some have said that since they had to trade him anyways, getting Capps was good enough. I think the best you can expect from Capps is about half a win the rest of the season. And he won’t come cheaply in arbitration after the year since he has all the saves to increase his price tag, so I don’t know that the Twins will want to or should keep him next year. Is that the best they could get for Wilson Ramos? Keep in mind the opportunity cost of trading Ramos for Capps is the player(s) the Twins could have gotten for Ramos if they hadn’t traded him for Capps.
--Lastly, Jon Rauch was struggling, and Capps will bring stability to the closer position, goes one more argument. Yes, Rauch had a bad few weeks, but everyone goes through rough stretches; I’m sure he would have and will get out of it. Saves and closing are vastly overrated. It was tolerable when the Twins signed one of their own players (Joe Nathan) to a closer-priced deal, but it’s not tolerable when they’re paying the closer premium to get someone from another team. This time they paid it in the player they had to give up, and not in actual money, but the concept is the same. If Capps was the exact same player with 26 fewer saves this year, he would have been much cheaper to acquire. And for no reason, as experience in the closing job does not make a player any better at closing specifically.
Friday, July 30, 2010
Kenny Williams Matches Bill Smith
Yesterday it was the Twins trading away a prospect for an underwhelming return, but today it was the White Sox who parted ways with a valuable commodity in what appears to be a pretty questionable deal.
Chicago sent starting pitcher Daniel Hudson to Arizona for Edwin Jackson. The Diamondbacks also received a second prospect, David Holmberg, but I know nothing about him and Hudson is the clear deal-maker anyways. For those reasons, I’m just going to forget about Holmberg.
To me, this deal looks remarkably similar to the one the Twins pulled off to get Matt Capps. Like the Twins, the White Sox traded a consensus top-3 prospect in their organization (here’s the proof) and a player ranked highly by Baseball America (#66 in the Spring rankings). Like the Twins, the White Sox gave up a second player (Holmberg) as a throw-in. Like the Twins, the White Sox will have control of their new player for next year, too. And, like the Twins’ trade, this deal makes no sense.
They traded Hudson, their #1 pitching prospect, for a decent pitcher in Edwin Jackson. Unfortunately, Hudson appears to already be just as good a pitcher, with the potential to be a much better pitcher. ZIPs projects Hudson to have a 4.06 FIP for the rest of 2010, compared to its projection of 4.16 for Jackson. In addition, Jackson still has a few million dollars on the docket for this year, plus $8.35 million committed to him for next year. Hudson, meanwhile, would make a few hundred thousand for the next couple of years, before he could even approach would Jackson is making.
I just don’t understand it at all. It seems like the White Sox mortgaged the future, but made no improvement for the present. They’ve replaced Hudson with Jackson in the rotation, but Hudson is probably close to, or as good as, Jackson is right now. Is this just a total overreaction to Hudson’s 3 less-than-stellar big league starts thus far in 2010? That’s the only explanation I can see.
In a response to a comment I left on FanGraphs, one White Sox fan offered this reasoning:
"Believe me, most of us White Sox fans don’t understand it either unless it’s because Washington wants Jackson instead of Hudson in a trade for Dunn. Either that, or “The Don” Cooper sees some sort of purportedly easily fixable flaw that will quickly turn him around. None of us discount his ability to change the fortunes of talented pitchers (Thornton, Danks, Floyd, etc) but he’s also got some failures (Mike MacDougal being an obvious one) where he never was able to do much of anything."
All in all, for the second consecutive day, an AL Central General Manager has managed to mystify me with a trade. The fact that it was a rival of Minnesota significantly lessens the pain of giving away Wilson Ramos.
Chicago sent starting pitcher Daniel Hudson to Arizona for Edwin Jackson. The Diamondbacks also received a second prospect, David Holmberg, but I know nothing about him and Hudson is the clear deal-maker anyways. For those reasons, I’m just going to forget about Holmberg.
To me, this deal looks remarkably similar to the one the Twins pulled off to get Matt Capps. Like the Twins, the White Sox traded a consensus top-3 prospect in their organization (here’s the proof) and a player ranked highly by Baseball America (#66 in the Spring rankings). Like the Twins, the White Sox gave up a second player (Holmberg) as a throw-in. Like the Twins, the White Sox will have control of their new player for next year, too. And, like the Twins’ trade, this deal makes no sense.
They traded Hudson, their #1 pitching prospect, for a decent pitcher in Edwin Jackson. Unfortunately, Hudson appears to already be just as good a pitcher, with the potential to be a much better pitcher. ZIPs projects Hudson to have a 4.06 FIP for the rest of 2010, compared to its projection of 4.16 for Jackson. In addition, Jackson still has a few million dollars on the docket for this year, plus $8.35 million committed to him for next year. Hudson, meanwhile, would make a few hundred thousand for the next couple of years, before he could even approach would Jackson is making.
I just don’t understand it at all. It seems like the White Sox mortgaged the future, but made no improvement for the present. They’ve replaced Hudson with Jackson in the rotation, but Hudson is probably close to, or as good as, Jackson is right now. Is this just a total overreaction to Hudson’s 3 less-than-stellar big league starts thus far in 2010? That’s the only explanation I can see.
In a response to a comment I left on FanGraphs, one White Sox fan offered this reasoning:
"Believe me, most of us White Sox fans don’t understand it either unless it’s because Washington wants Jackson instead of Hudson in a trade for Dunn. Either that, or “The Don” Cooper sees some sort of purportedly easily fixable flaw that will quickly turn him around. None of us discount his ability to change the fortunes of talented pitchers (Thornton, Danks, Floyd, etc) but he’s also got some failures (Mike MacDougal being an obvious one) where he never was able to do much of anything."
All in all, for the second consecutive day, an AL Central General Manager has managed to mystify me with a trade. The fact that it was a rival of Minnesota significantly lessens the pain of giving away Wilson Ramos.
Why?
The Twins have won six games in a row. They've been an offensive juggernaut over that span, and they've gotten some pretty darn good pitching too. Today's post was supposed to be about how incredible Joe Mauer, Delmon Young, and Danny Valencia have been of late. About how Mauer is 27-for-51 with 17 RBIs in 12 games against Kansas City this year, giving him a triple slash line of .529/.550/.784. About how Young has been one of the best hitters in the Majors in July, putting up a line of .439/.462/.745. About how he's been ever more ridiculous in his last six games, going 15-for-31 with 3 homers and a 1.513 OPS. About how, for four games, Valencia lit the world on fire, collecting 14 hits in 20 at bats to go with a 4 doubles, a grand slam, and 8 RBIs.
But then Bill Smith had to go and ruin all that good work of the Minnesota players. Bill Smith had to go and trade Wilson Ramos to the Nationals for Matt Capps. Wilson Ramos, the same guy who was a consensus top-5 prospect in the Twins' organization and ranked the #58 overall prospect by Baseball America at the beginning of the season. And if that wasn't enough, the Twins also sent minor league pitcher Joe Testa to Washington. I guess to be thorough I should mention the Twins are getting cash considerations, but does that really matter?
I just don't understand this at all. Capps is a solid reliever, but the Twins already have a bunch of solid relievers. It's pretty clear this is just another over-valuation of the save statistic. Bill Smith and the Twins organization saw a guy who had struggled in the month of July (Jon Rauch); on the other side, they saw a guy who's picked up 26 saves in 30 chances for Washington. Of course they didn't see that Rauch's FIP is 3.43, a tad better than Capps' 3.51. How can they be so oblivious to this?
Congratulations to Mike Rizzo, the Nationals' General Manager. He convinced the Twins to trade a top prospect for just a solid reliever, and even managed to steal a second player. While Testa is no world-beater, he was ranked #40 among Twins prospects by Aaron Gleeman and #49 by Seth Stohs this past off-season, so he's not a total nobody. Ramos may not have had any future with the Twins, since they've got Mauer, but that doesn't mean you just give him away.
They couldn't have gotten anything better for Ramos? I really find that hard to believe. I want to say that Rizzo extracted more from the Twins than the Diamondbacks managed to get for Dan Haren! This deal just absolutely confounds me. When Twin #2 told me, I was sure he was joking. Then I went through denial as I begged him to tell me it wasn't true. And now I'm in the stage of depression, but hopefully I'll move onto acceptance sometime soon. As Twin #2 pointed out to me, we better see Capps closing out the World Series for the Twins this October, or this was just a complete waste of talent. And even then...
But then Bill Smith had to go and ruin all that good work of the Minnesota players. Bill Smith had to go and trade Wilson Ramos to the Nationals for Matt Capps. Wilson Ramos, the same guy who was a consensus top-5 prospect in the Twins' organization and ranked the #58 overall prospect by Baseball America at the beginning of the season. And if that wasn't enough, the Twins also sent minor league pitcher Joe Testa to Washington. I guess to be thorough I should mention the Twins are getting cash considerations, but does that really matter?
I just don't understand this at all. Capps is a solid reliever, but the Twins already have a bunch of solid relievers. It's pretty clear this is just another over-valuation of the save statistic. Bill Smith and the Twins organization saw a guy who had struggled in the month of July (Jon Rauch); on the other side, they saw a guy who's picked up 26 saves in 30 chances for Washington. Of course they didn't see that Rauch's FIP is 3.43, a tad better than Capps' 3.51. How can they be so oblivious to this?
Congratulations to Mike Rizzo, the Nationals' General Manager. He convinced the Twins to trade a top prospect for just a solid reliever, and even managed to steal a second player. While Testa is no world-beater, he was ranked #40 among Twins prospects by Aaron Gleeman and #49 by Seth Stohs this past off-season, so he's not a total nobody. Ramos may not have had any future with the Twins, since they've got Mauer, but that doesn't mean you just give him away.
They couldn't have gotten anything better for Ramos? I really find that hard to believe. I want to say that Rizzo extracted more from the Twins than the Diamondbacks managed to get for Dan Haren! This deal just absolutely confounds me. When Twin #2 told me, I was sure he was joking. Then I went through denial as I begged him to tell me it wasn't true. And now I'm in the stage of depression, but hopefully I'll move onto acceptance sometime soon. As Twin #2 pointed out to me, we better see Capps closing out the World Series for the Twins this October, or this was just a complete waste of talent. And even then...
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