Sullivan at Baseball Analysts likes Twins as AL Central favorite
Basically says that Minnesota is younger and more room for error and aren't relying on bounce back from two over-30 guys coming off injuries (Hafner and Martinez).
about 3 years ago
Ryan Kelsey
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We have over 30 guys coming back from injuries? No wonder we finished .500!
Signature to be named later.
isn’t it a bit of a stretch to say that martinez is “on the wrong side of 30”?
he’s been 30 for less than a month. . .
by Cap'n Snegiryov on Jan 22, 2009 11:39 AM EST reply actions
yeah. that’s really the only reason not to have us at 1.
Anti-Ben Fran before it was cool.
by Gradyforpresident on Jan 22, 2009 4:25 PM EST up reply actions
And maybe I’m being naieve, but I think there’s a pretty high probablity victor will “bounce back”.
He had an injury, missed some time, came back and performed well. Its not like he’s a Joe Crede type player.
by world dictator on Jan 22, 2009 4:59 PM EST up reply actions
I think the Twins and Indians are clearly the best two teams in the AL Central heading into the season. Sullivan’s piece doesn’t actually have much substance to it, though. A number have people have started running sims of the 2009 season based on various projection systems and for whatever they are worth (not enough for a cup of coffee), everyone one I have seen has projected the Indians as a few wins better than the Twins.
In looking at the two teams, I think it’ll be interesting to compare how Carmona and Liriano perform – as two young pitchers with previous big-time success who will play a major role in determining how well or how poorly each team does in 2009.
Serious question: why aren’t the White Sox going to be good? Not enough offense? Not enough pitching?
Yep. I won’t make the same mistake again.
Burn on, big river, burn on...
by Turkmenbashi on Jan 22, 2009 5:09 PM EST up reply actions
I’m just saying, we’re talking about 86 wins winning the division. The Sox are totally within range of that. I mean, they might have a better rotation than us and their bullpen is still average at least, right?
by NickFantana on Jan 23, 2009 10:04 AM EST up reply actions
yeah but they’re evil
Anti-Ben Fran before it was cool.
by Gradyforpresident on Jan 23, 2009 10:43 AM EST up reply actions
Re-reading my original post, I find it comical how much I hedge when I write about actual baseball stuff on this site. That last sentence has an “I mean” and a “right?” in it. What a wimp I am.
On my hate for America, I just don’t want to be the fan who is sitting here in June saying, “Argh, the White Sox, the only team I didn’t worry about.”
They traded away Vazquez and haven’t adequately replaced him. I think John Danks is legit, but he is going to have a hard time reproducing last season’s success, if only because he was really good last year. Gavin Floyd had an interesting season last year, flukey first half, followed up by a much stronger second half, albeit his ERA was actually higher. Buehrle is a rock. After those three, there are some major question marks. Poreda is a very good prospect, but he hasn’t seen AAA yet so I’m not sure how aggressive the Sox will be with promoting him.
Right now, their lineup looks like:
C-Pierzynski(32)
1b-Konerko(33)
2b-TBD
SS-Ramirez(27)
3b-TBD
Lf-Quentin(26)
Cf-TBD
Rf-Dye(35)
DH-Thome(38)
Internally, they have some options for second, third, and center, but none of them are that good. Chris Getz is probably the best of them and will probably win the job at second.
I’m not going to write off the Sox just yet, heck the offseason isn’t even over, but I think most people are pegging them for third/fourth place for legitimate reasons.
Hello ClarkM,
Additionally, their farm system is quite thin, so they don’t have many internal reinforcements to count on – they do have Fields (is he penciled in for 3B?), but beyond that, they have very limited short-term options, and their long-term options aren’t considerably better.
If those 30+ players can all stay healthy and produce as expected, they could challenge again, but the big question is, how long can these guys hold up and keep producing – Dye and Thome are both 35-40, and both have had considerable injuries, especially Dye. While Konerko is under 35, he has shown signs of being an “old” 33, so again, their middle-of-the-order looks quite vulnerable, outside of Quentin and Ramirez, provided those two can continue to excel, and it’s likely the league will adjust to them a bit, which may temper their production some (especially Quentin’s) in 2009.
Just my 2 cents.
The "cream of the crop" doesn't always rise to the top.
Anyone with a couple of minutes and a bias can make a great case for the Indians or the Twins and I’d probably agree with their reasoning. Any other team and I’d be pretty skeptical. In fact I had quite a long discussion with a colleague about this very topic yesterday.
The tricky part is that 86+ wins look like enough for this division, and come on, it’s not hard to paint a team winning 86 games unless they suck.
Steel Nick
The real question is whether or not whoever comes out of the Central stands a chance of getting past the first round of the playoffs.
Burn on, big river, burn on...
by Turkmenbashi on Jan 22, 2009 2:15 PM EST up reply actions
haven’t we decided that there is no real way to prepare for being in the post season, from a personel standpoint?
That’s partially true, but there are certain things that should put you at an advantage. If our bullpen is even 3/4 as good as it looks on paper, that’s a big weapon. But our rotation still scares me. Look at 2007 — we had CC and Fausto coming off their best years ever and Jake Westbrook. I felt really good about our 1-2-3 punch going into the playoffs last year. This year, with Lee-Carmona, time will tell whether they can duplicate or come close to their best seasons, but when I look at our rotation, it doesn’t exact look like something that would strike fear into the hearts of playoff opponents.
Burn on, big river, burn on...
by Turkmenbashi on Jan 22, 2009 4:05 PM EST up reply actions
true, but going into 08, you wouldn’t think a Lee-Reyes combo would have been much of anything- unless you were talking about the International League playoffs. Yet, if we were in the playoffs last year, they would have been our 1-2 and probably matched up reasonably well with the top 2 of other playoff teams.
Right, I’m just saying as of now. They could end up being a solid 1-2-3, but there’s no way to tell.
Burn on, big river, burn on...
by Turkmenbashi on Jan 22, 2009 4:40 PM EST up reply actions
Look Turk, nobody knows what the hell’s gonna happen. Lee ‘09 could be better than Lee ’08, Hafner could turn into Pronk again, Carmona and Reyes could be lights out, DeRosa may have found his AL HR stroke, our BP could be our strongest element with Woods being the next Rivera, and Grady could have a career year. Or not. Anything can happen – that’s the beauty of the off-season. For me, personnaly, I’m going with everything comes up Aces and we win 116 games, sweep the Yankees – at home – in the play-offs with Pronk hitting a 3-run HR in the ninth of a tie game offa Chamberlain and then we go on to pound the Padres into mud in the ‘09 Series. How’s that work for you?
by mauichuck on Jan 23, 2009 9:12 PM EST up reply actions 2 recs
That sounds fantastic. GO TRIBE!
Burn on, big river, burn on...
by Turkmenbashi on Jan 24, 2009 9:59 PM EST up reply actions
As we’ve talked about before, BP’s Secret Sauce says that three things help teams win in the playoffs: a strikeout-heavy pitching staff, a dominant closer, and good defense. Of course those things don’t guarentee anything, as we know luck plays a big role in a 7-game series, but their study showed that teams who win in the playoffs usually share these qualities.
The best thing probably is to hit [Grady] 2nd -- Jay
by Buckeye Brad on Jan 22, 2009 4:38 PM EST up reply actions
Well 2 outta 3 ain’t bad, right?
Burn on, big river, burn on...
by Turkmenbashi on Jan 22, 2009 4:41 PM EST up reply actions
And we trade for CC.
Burn on, big river, burn on...
by Turkmenbashi on Jan 22, 2009 5:10 PM EST up reply actions
That would definitely make it a heavy pitching staff.
"...leading the league in most offensive categories. Including nose hairs."
by sarcasmdave on Jan 22, 2009 5:28 PM EST up reply actions 1 recs
We don’t need that momaluke to win the Series. In fact I hope we get a shot at that culone in the play-offs.
If he faced the Indians in the postseason he would hyperventilate and they’d have to carry him off the mound.
Safe to say it would take the whole grounds crew?
Burn on, big river, burn on...
by Turkmenbashi on Jan 24, 2009 9:59 PM EST up reply actions
I really like Rich Lederer, but the other guys at Baseball Analysts are pretty underwhelming. Sullivan mentions the Twins pythag advantage, but the Indians were actually a couple of games better according to BPro’s third order wins. As others have already mentioned, I think Indians and Twins are the favorites.
I didn’t read the link, so maybe he addressed this, but from what I know of the 2008 Twins is that they enjoyed incredible success because of RISP hitting and a solid bullpen. Those two aspects are also the most flukely thing to rely on from year to year. You can have the same personnel for two seasons and still produce drastically different results with those stats.
I think the White Sox still finish ahead of them.
He doesn’t address that directly. Basically, he says that they have 3 awesome players in their prime (Mauer, Morneau, Nathan) and a bunch of young pitchers and position players that are above average and could improve.
How’s Joe Nathan in his prime? He’ll be 34 in April, and he has faced 1365 batters in the past five seasons. He showed signs of being human in 2008. The pen is dodgy in front of Nathan.
The Twins offense relies heavily on Morneau and Mauer. In the past three seasons Morneau has played 157, 157, 163 games. I bet he doesn’t play in as many as 157 in 2009.
The Twins have a great pitching rotation, by far the best in the AL Central. But they were lucky offensively last year. If they are unlucky this year—and in the unlikely event that the Indians are lucky—they’ll finish in third.
See you guys knock the WBC, but there’s a very real chance that Morneau gets hurt playing for Canada. Something about the Maple Leaf makes guys take crazy risks on the field…remember when Stubby Clapp leaned headfirst into that inside pitch at the Olympics? I’m banking on Justin pulling a Kirk Gibson and being out for the entire season after winning us the WBC.
by supermarioelia on Jan 22, 2009 6:37 PM EST up reply actions
Does that include Morneau winning a World Series game for the Twins with a ninth inning, pinch-hit home run?
The best thing probably is to hit [Grady] 2nd -- Jay
by Buckeye Brad on Jan 22, 2009 7:04 PM EST up reply actions
Nope, he never even sniffs Opening Day.
by supermarioelia on Jan 22, 2009 7:40 PM EST up reply actions
to clarify, he said that he was one of the best in baseball, not in his prime. plus, he is coming off his best year ERA and ERA+ wise while keeping awesome k and bb rates.
as for their offense, I don’t think its as much a matter of luck as you do. Besides Mauer and Morneau, Sullivan pointed out guys like Spahn, Young, Casilla, and even Gomez as really really young and pretty good with room to improve. Heck their OBP was one point higher than ours.
I like our chances as much of the next guy, but the more I think about it, I think Minnesota is the best competition for us.
Gutz out hit Gomez last year. Just sayin’.
by rockemsockem on Jan 23, 2009 2:13 PM EST up reply actions
Being young doesn’t necessarily mean that guys are going to improve, especially when their track records are rather short. I think the 2008 Indians had more than a couple of examples of this.
More specifically, Span and Casilla don’t look like very good bets to improve on their rate stats, though they might improve their counting stats. Young should probably see an increase in his power, but with an approach as poor is his, it’s hard to see him improving by that much. Ditto for Gomez.
In looking at the veterans, as good and healthy as Mauer and Morneau were last year, you almost have to expect at least a little bit of regression from those two. Cuddyer, like Vic, is coming off an injury plagued year that seemed to have affected his performance while on the field. He should probably improve, but unlike Vic, he has a history of injury issues. With Kubel, there seems to be no reason why we should expect him to be more productive or healthy next year. Punto is a year removed from being absolutely horrible and third base is a mystery. The few good position prospects the Twins have aren’t close to the majors.
Taken with the presumed regression in BA w/RISP, I think the Twins offense is going to score less runs this year. With that said, their pitching might be even better.
Span is 25, Young is 24, as is Casilla. Sizemore is 26, Peralta is 27. The age difference isn’t that significant.
I’m responding to Dayton’s (and Sullivan’s) assertion that these Twins players are “really really young” with tons of upside. Harmon Killebrew had played in nearly 500 big league games by the time he was Span’s age. Neither Gomez nor Casilla nor Delmon nor Span have a tremendous amount of potential.
I read Sullivan’s piece as a simple piece of contrarianism. He isn’t too convincing, even though the Twins are clearly the Indians’ closest competitors.
Span’s OPS+ was 125 as a 24 year old- I think that’s pretty impressive. Young and Gomez were just 22 and Casilla was 23. And that’s to say nothing of the pitchers.
I’m not saying the Twins are going to run away with the division, but I’d be surprised if they won less than 82 games and not shocked if they won more than 89.
They were those ages last year, but I was a year younger then, too. I’m willing to bet Span doesn’t get close to 125 OPS+ again in 2009. I say 110 tops, and that’s if he’s lucky. Big regression in store. He hasn’t had the history of taking walks he showed last year. I bet pitchers start him swinging again.
Hello DaytonDogg,
Regarding Min’s OBP being one point higher than ours, keep in mind Hafner and Martinez were out of that lineup for a good chunk of last season, with the likes of BenFran and Frankie G out there regularly (with BenFran being in the #3 spot). Heck, we even had Marte and Dellucci making occasional appearances in that lineup, so that likely contributed to us being one point lower than Min’s in OBP.
Granted, Min’s lineup has some upside, and they could improve, but as we know with young players, they can go back and forth, so they could just as much fall off a bit, even for just a period of time in 2009, and that could cause that OBP to fall off a bit. Combine that with, hopefully, our regular lineup being together more often than not, and I think the Indians could come out ahead in the OBP in 2009.
Certainly, I think Min. is our best competition, both now and long-term (though KC could become more of that contender long-term if they can find the “right” path and stay on it, which might be likelier to happen with Dayton Moore leading the way). Chicago and Detroit both have poor farm systems and are relying on more older players than younger players, which I think will affect their ability to contend long-term without some significant changes (which they could accomplish, being that they have the payrolls to do it, but it likely won’t be easy or that quick).
Just my 2 cents.
The "cream of the crop" doesn't always rise to the top.
i think the twins won’t win 84 games
Anti-Ben Fran before it was cool.
by Gradyforpresident on Jan 22, 2009 4:26 PM EST reply actions
This is all so much bovine excrement. I want a show of hands. Who had the Rays winning the AL East last year? That’s what I thought – nobody.
I know, but predictions are fun, and partially because we can look back on a thread like this in October and laugh at our comments.
A friend of mine had them winning the AL East. A girl and a MF Yankees “fan” nonetheless.
by world dictator on Jan 25, 2009 12:36 PM EST up reply actions
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