— BTF's Preseason Previews
Tuesday, March 30, 2004
Minnesota Twins
Sometimes, baseball is but dumb luck. The last few years, the Twins have had much dumb luck:
- In 2003, the Twins surpassed their Pythagorean win projection by 5 games.
- In 2002, the Twins surpassed their Pythagorean win projection by 8 games.
- In 2001, the Twins surpassed … aw, heck with it, 4 games.
- Between 2001 and 2002, the 2001 AL Central division winners, the Cleveland Indians, drop 17 games.
- The Twins play in the AL Central, the Third World of baseball.
- The 2003 division runners-up, the Chicago White Sox, have not improved themselves over the off-season, and may well have become worse, losing Bartolo Colon and adding Cliff Politte.
The Twins will likely drop 5 games in the standings when Pythagoras’s luck leaves them, However, The generosity of the White Sox lets the Twins drop those games and lose two top relief pitchers, while keeping the team on top and letting the Twins bring up baseball’s best catching prospect.
For the Twins to win, they need to avoid surprises. Aside from middle infield, where the backup, Nick Punto, is not much worse than the regulars, the Twins have no depth in the lineup. The idea of Jose Offerman earning 300 at bats is not a happy one.
Since every division needs a winner and the Twins are the only good team in this division, the Twins will win theirs with about 87 wins.
Catcher—Joe Mauer
The Twins traded A. J. Pierzynski, its catcher of the last three years, to the Giants because they had possibly the major leagues’ best prospect, Joe Mauer. Playing Mauer and trading Pierzynski was not only the right move, but also a gutsy move. It may not be clear right away, but Mauer can play, and Joe Nathan, the man whom the Twins gained for Pierzynski, can pitch. Given that the Twins were likely to need a replacement for at least one of Eddie Guardado and LaTroy Hawkins, this move helped the team.
In his minor league career, Mauer has hit .330 with 75 walks per 600 at bats, and has walked more than he has struck out. This is a very good record of accomplishment for a 21-year-old catcher, which he will be on April 19. His last name rhymes with "power," and the Twins hope this is more than a chance rhyme. He is a big (6 ft. 4 in., 220 lbs.) man and has hit 35 doubles per 600 at bats in his minor league career. If he develops power, he is an MVP candidate. If he does not, he is still as good a player as A. J. Pierzynski, the man who was the Twins catcher last year and hit .312. He may take some time to adjust to major league pitching.
Infield
I have little new to say about the Twins infielders, since the Twins infielders are the same four men they have been for the last four years. None of them is at an age where we would think he would have a big change in performance, though now Koskie is 31, so he will start hitting less sometime in the next couple of years. Even then, he has a broad base of skills, so he can lose one of them and still be a useful ballplayer. Mientkiewicz is a year younger.
First Baseman—Doug Mientkiewicz
Mientkiewicz over the last three years has lost and regained about 100 points of OPS. Due to the beauty of talking out one’s ass, I shall say Mientkiewicz will hit somewhere in the middle of this, which is his career averages of .279/.371/.415. Coupled with his defense, Mientkiewicz is a valuable player. Mientkiewicz’s defense is worth more than most folks think because so many teams play absolute clods at first base. If he does hit .300 again, he’s the new Mark Grace.
Second Baseman—Luis Rivas
Luis Rivas has a career of what I normally think a Telegenic White Guy would have. He does nothing particularly well aside from run, and has no command of the strike zone. He does not field well, though the Twins keep thinking that he is a good defensive player. He has a .263 career batting average, which is average, but has no other accomplishments. To steal a little from Casey Stengel, Rivas is 24, and in 10 years, he has a chance to be 34. He is Pat Meares with speed.
Third Baseman—Corey Koskie
Talk about a late bloomer … Koskie did not even play baseball until after he graduated from high school, but now he is one of the top third basemen in the league. He has something of all skills—some batting average, some speed, some power, some plate discipline, good fielding. He is a hard player for some folks to rate, since he does many things well, and not one single thing that is a signature skill.
Shortstop—Cristian Guzman
I used to think that Guzman would be a star once he learned some plate discipline. Obviously, I was wrong. Plate discipline is not something a player just learns overnight. I still insist that Guzman is one of the most exciting ballplayers I have ever seen. He has plenty of speed and athletic skill, and those are fun to watch. He just isn't a very good ballplayer. He does run very well, and is an adequate shortstop.
Outfield
The Twins keep coming up with a bunch of reserve outfielders. About five years ago, I could not tell the group apart, but now Torii Hunter and Jacque Jones are the ones left. Hunter has a big reputation and is a good player, but is not a front-line star. The Twins added Shannon Stewart in midyear last year, who hit .322/.384/.470 in 65 games, and the Twins played better after he came. The Peter Gammons crowd decided this made Stewart an MVP candidate, an impressive showing of post hoc ergo propter hoc logic. Heus, scisne quomodo ludus basipilae ludatur, stulte Petre?
Left Fielder—Shannon Stewart
Shannon Stewart is good player though not a real MVP candidate, and like so many Twins, has been unusually consistent. Since 1999, he has hit .304, .319, .316, .303 and .307. He just got a three-year contract from the Twins, so he is stuck in Minneapolis for at least two years. He is 30, so the last year of his contract may be a lemon, but he will keep hitting for the next two years at least.
Center Fielder—Torii Hunter
An area of debate about Torii Hunter is his fielding skill. His four-year UZR says he fielded 5 runs better than average a year, but he has won the Gold Glove the last three years. In this one area, we can compare him to Kirby Puckett—his defensive stats do not live up to his defensive reputation. As a hitter, Hunter, like Shannon Stewart and most of his teammates, is fairly consistent. His PRO+ over the last three years go 102, 126 and 97, not what you would think from a man regarded as a star.
Right Fielder—Jacque Jones
Jones has played left field until last year, when the Twins traded for Shannon Stewart and then moved Jones to right. This is a small nit to pick, but left field in the Metrodome is big. Jones is a better fielder than Stewart, and could easily play center. His PRO+ over the last three years look like Hunter’s—96, 125 and 106, but he is not considered the star Hunter is. One may think this could be because he drops to .231/.274/.336 against left-handed pitchers in this time frame, but that is because the questioner did not ask Ron Gardenhire.
Designated Hitter—Matt LeCroy
Matt LeCroy remains a good hitter but a poor catcher. LeCroy has a career .457 slugging percentage but a 27% OCS rate. Granted, the latter is in about 600 innings of work, so there are plenty of sample size issues, but the Twins have decided that LeCroy is not much of a catcher. Therefore, they have him on the roster as a designated hitter, backup first baseman and backup catcher. Both Blanco and LeCroy are right-handed hitters, thus platoonable with Mauer, a left-handed hitter.
Bench
During the Tom Kelly era, the Twins had many good bench players. One such feature of these benches was the super sub, a guy who could play many different positions. Early in this time, Al Newman, a non-hitter but a good fielder, held this role. For the past few years, Denny Hocking, another man who could field but was not a great hitter, though Hocking was a better than Newman, has filled that role.
Hocking is now gone, and the Twins would like another Denny Hocking. They have chosen Michael Cuddyer to be Denny Hocking.
Cuddyer has played some third base in his career, 112 innings. He has had a range factor well below the league norm. This might be an illusion, since Corey Koskie, the regular third baseman and a good one, has had a range factor of about the league norm. Still, it is not a good sign for someone whom the Twins also want to play second base. More to the point, Cuddyer is an outfielder most of the time, not a third baseman. Hocking was first an infielder whom Kelly made learn to play the outfield to make him more useful. It is easier to teach an infielder to play the outfield than it is to teach an outfielder to play the infield.
On a general note, the Twins bench is not as good as it was during the Tom Kelly era. Jose Offerman? Henry Blanco? I know Blanco’s job is to play against left-handed pitchers, but he cannot hit left-handed pitchers, or anyone else for that matter.
Cuddyer is a career .250/.316/.422 hitter and is the fourth outfielder and Denny Hocking clone. He does not bear the slightest resemblance to Hocking, but Cuddyer is out of options. For some reason, letting Cuddyer do his natural role, platoon in right field with Jones, is not what Gardenhire wants. The Twins plan on using Cuddyer at third base in 2005.
The Twins signing Henry Blanco to back up Joe Mauer is a good sign the Twins believe in Joe Mauer. Blanco is 32, and has hit .219 for his career. He, like Mauer, has a good arm, and has pegged out 41% of would-be base stealers, lifetime. This makes him the opposite of Matt LeCroy. He is as much of a long-term regular than many Primer readers are.
Bill James gave him the nickname "Jack" in the 1992 Baseball Book, in a Beavis and Butt-head moment. Offerman was out of baseball in 2003 after hitting .232 as a first baseman/designated hitter in 2002. Gardenhire wants him to pinch hit against left-handed pitchers. He has hit well in Spring Training, but I cannot see him hitting enough to stay around the whole year.
He is a switch-hitting shortstop the Twins gained in the Eric Milton trade. He can hit about .250, runs well and will take a walk. He is 26, and will not become any better, but he can play, though he has Ozzie Smith-type power. Punto is likely the best player the Twins have off the bench.
The Twins switched their AAA team from Edmonton to Rochester in 2003. Edmonton was an unreal hitter’s park, and in doing so many Twins prospects had their stats fall to earth.
In 2002, Michael Ryan was 25 and hit .261, not well for the Edmonton, but also 31 home runs. The Twins have lacked good power hitting for years, so even a low-average slugger would be a prize for them. In 2003, in Rochester, Ryan his .225 with 15 home runs. He is now 26, and the Twins want him on the bench to pinch-hit against right-handed pitchers. It does not make sense to me either.
He is 28, but the Twins are high on him since he has consistently hit for a high batting average, save for a half-year .218 average at New Britain in 2001. He is not any kind of prospect, but he could likely outhit Michael Ryan.
Starting rotation
In spite of all the fretting about the bullpen losses, the Twins have quietly built a drab starting rotation filled with third and fourth starters. Furthermore, the Twins have a strong tendency to give starting jobs to control pitchers. Of the five men who are in the Twins 2004 starting rotation, three are clearly control pitchers—Brad Radke, Kyle Lohse and Carlos Silva—and one other, Rick Helling, has seen his strikeout rate fall in recent years. In some ways, the starting rotation now is the opposite of the 1987 Twins, when the Twins had Frank Viola, Bert Blyleven and a bunch of has-beens and never-will-bes.
The staff ace, he is career 116-110. He has been a better pitcher than that since his best years were years when the Twins were not good, but he has been a league average pitcher for the last two years, when healthy. When he is healthy, he eats innings at a bit better than league ERA (ERA+ 94 in 2002, 103 in 2003), but that is not what you want in a staff ace.
The one clear power pitcher of the Twins rotation, having struck out 400 men in 380 innings in his minor league career and 398 men in 395 innings in his major league career. He has been in and out of the rotation in the majors so far, but is in the rotation now. He is the one Twins starter who has a legitimate chance to be outstanding. The Twins, maybe knowing that Santana is the only strikeout pitcher they have in the rotation, have not overworked him, letting him pitch in long relief and spot start. He pitched 108.1 innings in 14 starts and 13 relief appearances in 2002, and 158.1 innings in 18 starts and 27 relief appearances in 2003. He has not had a good spring training, however, which has led the Twins to worry.
Lohse has great control, and cut his walk rate almost in half last year. He is not a great pitcher, but an OK one. He would look better were the Twins to have a solid front two starters. He needs his control, having given up 70 home runs in 471 career major league innings.
The slated fifth starter, who has until now pitched in relief in the major leagues. His minor league walk rate is amazing—126 walks in 684 innings. As a starter, he could have a Bob Tewksbury-like career, but that is a long shot. The Phillies had him in relief the last two years.
Helling is hurt right now, and looks to be out for at least a month. Like the loss of Joe Mays to an injury for the whole year, this is addition by subtraction. In 2003, he gave up 31 home runs in 602 at bats. That is two leagues of average hitters becoming 30 home run men against Helling.
Bullpen
The Twins have lost both their closer, Eddie Guardado, and their setup man, LaTroy Hawkins, to free agency. Expecting this, the Twins traded catcher A. J. Pierzynski for prospective closer Joe Nathan. Since both Guardado and Hawkins were outstanding, the Twins expect to have a worse bullpen in 2004.
He had a big year last year, going 12-4 in relief and striking out 83 men in 79 innings. His $H—that’s the Vörös McCracken number—was .239, so he gave up about 8 fewer hits than one would expect, though this is not a big effect on his statistics. More of a concern is that Nathan has not pitched this well before, anywhere. I think he can pitch, but it would take another year of great pitching for me to be sure. He was a starter in the minors.
Last year, Romero walked Rob Picciolo. Alright, I am exaggerating, but he did walk 42 men in 63 innings. The Twins want him to be the setup man based on his outstanding 2002, but if he blows leads early in the year, the setup man would be …
… who may well start some too. His 2001 and 2002 minor league seasons are quite good—a 2.88 ERA in 153.1 innings with 133 strikeouts and 57 walks at New Britain in 2001, a 4.80 ERA in 101.2 innings with 75 strikeouts and 35 walks at hitter’s paradise Edmonton.
He is 30, and has struck out men everywhere. In the majors, he has been mostly a mopup man (57 career games finished, only 2 saves), and has not pitched like a man who struck out 902 in 937 career minor league innings.
In his time as an Oriole farmhand, he has also struck out many men—683 in 697 innings. In 81 innings in the majors, he has given up 15 hone runs, which is what we would expect from Rick Helling.
Minor league control pitcher, though not on the same level as Carlos Silva. He strikes out more men than Silva does.
Yet another minor league strikeout king, he has pitched well in AAA the last two years—4.18 ERA in 71.1 innings at Edmonton in 2002 with 88 SO and 3 HR, 2.41 ERA in 71 innings with 87 SO, 6 HR and 16 BB at Rochester last year. The Twins moved him to the bullpen in 2000, so he has mostly pitched there since then, though he did have 12 starts last year, Rochester and Minnesota total.
2004 ZiPS ProjectionsName P AVG OBP SPC G AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB K SB CS Cuddyer rf .304 .384 .507 120 424 74 129 23 3 19 70 51 99 6 7 Restovich rf .281 .355 .523 144 530 90 149 32 3 30 80 56 143 7 6 LeCroy c .303 .358 .499 111 379 48 115 21 1 17 65 29 87 0 2 Mientkiewicz* 1b .293 .391 .438 146 502 65 147 38 1 11 67 77 67 3 3 Stewart lf .311 .373 .451 143 599 92 186 40 4 12 78 55 65 11 7 Koskie* 3b .279 .380 .451 140 505 77 141 35 2 16 73 78 117 11 9 Ford cf .304 .368 .460 119 437 80 133 31 2 11 61 40 56 12 7 Morneau* 1b .284 .344 .481 129 472 72 134 21 3 22 77 39 102 2 1 Jones* lf .301 .346 .474 144 538 78 162 34 1 19 84 32 109 10 5 Mauer* c .311 .377 .387 129 463 66 144 19 2 4 48 45 47 1 0 Hunter cf .267 .324 .477 154 591 86 158 35 4 27 95 45 114 11 8 Ryan* rf .260 .328 .457 144 527 84 137 32 3 22 80 48 121 4 4 Rivas 2b .277 .331 .395 135 488 70 135 17 7 9 51 36 69 18 8 Heintz c .282 .326 .392 85 316 33 89 19 2 4 34 17 42 0 0 Guzman# ss .288 .324 .401 144 586 84 169 23 11 7 55 26 80 17 12 Bartlett ss .272 .341 .371 135 518 91 141 25 4 6 51 49 70 24 17 Punto# ss .255 .354 .313 115 396 57 101 14 3 1 30 57 85 18 8 Prieto 2b .257 .308 .361 84 296 34 76 14 1 5 31 19 56 4 3 Simmons# lf .237 .298 .361 76 266 29 63 14 2 5 28 20 64 3 3 Marsters c .237 .281 .377 92 329 38 78 22 0 8 40 16 89 0 1 Bowen# c .215 .282 .348 93 302 38 65 14 1 8 34 25 67 1 0 Ojeda# ss .221 .300 .298 94 285 41 63 12 2 2 30 30 28 3 1 Blanco c .203 .272 .320 78 222 18 45 12 1 4 21 21 45 1 1 Name ERA W L G GS INN H ER HR BB K Nakamura 3.41 5 3 51 1 87.0 75 33 7 28 87 Santana* 3.44 11 5 40 19 144.0 112 55 14 54 178 Balfour 3.62 5 3 43 6 82.0 67 33 8 32 93 Munro 4.04 9 6 39 17 127.0 124 57 10 42 76 Radke 4.06 13 9 31 31 195.0 208 88 25 26 114 Erdos 4.16 4 3 49 1 67.0 67 31 5 24 42 Silva 4.31 6 4 50 12 121.0 126 58 15 29 69 Lohse 4.38 12 11 33 32 185.0 188 90 25 50 136 Romero* 4.40 4 3 57 8 92.0 86 45 8 42 74 Greisinger 4.42 3 6 22 19 114.0 125 56 14 23 57 Estrada* 4.43 7 6 23 20 122.0 129 60 16 30 76 Rincon 4.46 8 7 40 15 125.0 121 62 12 52 94 Nathan 4.50 6 7 52 6 80.0 69 40 8 44 74 Thomas* 4.61 6 7 24 22 121.0 126 62 14 42 77 Hoard* 4.66 6 7 24 20 114.0 118 59 13 42 73 Mays 4.73 10 10 29 26 158.0 174 83 20 44 80 Guerrier 4.75 7 9 25 24 142.0 149 75 20 43 93 Pridie 4.77 6 7 28 22 132.0 135 70 10 62 75 Helling 4.82 9 11 33 29 181.0 194 97 30 52 130 Tolar* 4.89 4 3 45 4 57.0 56 31 6 28 47 Fultz* 4.90 2 3 63 0 68.0 70 37 9 25 55 Hodge 4.91 4 4 50 0 77.0 83 42 10 27 45 Durbin 5.08 8 11 28 28 163.0 172 92 22 66 106 Johnson 5.09 7 9 29 23 138.0 143 78 19 60 96 Eyre 5.09 5 6 33 11 99.0 101 56 8 53 61 Bonser 5.12 6 7 26 26 139.0 142 79 18 66 98 Roa 5.31 3 6 23 17 105.0 115 62 21 14 55 Douglass 5.51 5 8 28 24 129.0 133 79 20 65 99 Mills* 5.96 4 8 29 12 83.0 87 55 8 59 50ZiPS Projections are not playing time predictors; they project a player's performance given playing time in the majors in their accustomed role. As with all projections, specific knowledge of non-statistical attributes of the player should temper what the computer says.