Did you know...

Carl Pavano allowed 262 hits this year – which is the 169^th time someone has allowed 262 hits or more since 1961. None too impressive, right? Yet it is just the fifth time since 2000 that someone has allowed 262 hits or more – mostly because of the inning allotment necessary in addition to the patience required by the front office to allow that sort of punishment to continue. The others on that list are Sidney Ponson (265 , 2004), David Wells (266, 2000), Livan Hernandez – twice (266, 2001, 268, 2005) and Tanyon Sturtze (271, 2002). Excellent company.

Speaking of Pavano, his fastball was the second-worst in baseball last year. According to Fangraphs.com’s pitch value statistic, his fastball was 24.5 runs below average (or approximately two and a half losses). Interestingly, his regularly battery mate, Drew Butera, also proved to be quite inept when it comes to fastballs. He found himself at 23.9 runs below average when hitting against fastballs (or approximately two and a half losses). This was the worst mark in the American League.

Pavano’s 42% chase rate on his offspeed pitches was the best in the American League and second in baseball behind some guy named Roy Halladay (45%).

Ben Revere led all of baseball in grounders with a 68.5 percent ground ball rate. This has been the highest rate of bouncers hit (outside of Roadhouse of course) in Fangraphs.com’s batted ball warehouse. Fangraphs.com’s data starts in 2002. Likewise, Revere also holds the lead for fewest fly balls hit (11.6%) as well.

What’s more is that his strength was not pulling the ball this season: Revere’s .389 OPS on balls that he pulled is the lowest in baseball. Part of the reason for this is because he was terrible at making solid contact when being pitched inside. According to Inside Edge, Revere’s well-hit average on pitches inside was .036 – the fourth-worst in baseball.

Revere put 60% of the fastballs thrown to him in to play – the second-highest rate in baseball behind San Francisco’s Jeff Keppinger (61%).

Alexi Casilla (6.8%) saw fewer sliders than anyone else in baseball with a minimum of 250 plate appearances.

Michael Cuddyer’s .993 OPS versus left-handed pitching was the sixth-best in baseball.

Don’t throw Cuddyer a change-up (like many left-handed pitchers did), he crushed them to the tune of 9 runs above average (roughly one win). Overall, his .341 batting average on offspeed pitches was the fifth-best in baseball.

Nobody squared up on right-handed pitching like Joe Mauer did. His 27.7% line drive rate against righties led the majors. On the other hand, his backstop mate, Drew Butera, held baseball’s lowest OPS against righties at .403.

If you threw anything to Mauer over the midsection of the plate (horizontal), the chances are that it was thwacked pretty hard. The often-injured catcher/DH/first baseman/right fielder held a .273 well-hit average on pitches in the zone. The next closes was Boston’s David Ortiz at .217.

Drew Butera’s .449 OPS narrowly missed being the worst in Twins history thanks to a 4-for-8 outburst in the final week of the season. The honors for worst offensive season with a minimum of 250 plate appearances still belongs to Jerry Zimmerman and his .436 OPS in 267 plate appearances. For what it’s worth, Butera joins the blessed Twins hall of sub-.500 OPS members including Houston Jimenez (1984), Danny Thompson (1970), Ron Clark (1968), Al Newman (1991) and, of course, Zimmerman (1967).

The Twins had two of the three worst hitters for pitches down in the zone. Butera led all players with a .032 well-hit average while Tsuyoshi Nishioka was the third-worst at .040.

Butera’s .142 batting average on fastballs was the worst in baseball.

Battle of the soon-to-be free agents: Jason Kubel had the fifth-highest batting average on line drives in play (.817) while Cuddyer had the eleven-lowest batting average on line drives in play (.603). One thing this could tell potential suitors is that Kubel’s 2011 season was on the lucky side while Cuddyer was not nearly as charmed.

Denard Span and Jim Thome both chased after just 10% of non-competitive pitches (those well out of the strike zone) – tied for third-best in baseball.

Francisco Liriano’s ability to get strike one was horrendous this year. His 49.4% first-pitch strike rate was the sixth-worst in a season since 2002. He also threw his fastball for a strike just 53% of the time – the worst among starters.

Nearly 30% of the batters Liriano faced went to three ball counts (27% vs 20% league average). That was the highest mark among qualified starters.

When Liriano does hit the strike zone, he’s clearly hard to hit. Liriano’s 21% swinging-and-miss percentage on strikes was the second-highest in baseball trailing only Atlanta’s Brandon Beachy in that department.

Just 16% of runners Scott Baker put on base scored. That was the third lowest rate among starters.

Kevin Slowey lost 8 starts in a row. The most recent time that happened was by Boof Bonser in 2007. Oddly enough, in their respective losing streaks, they both worked 44.2 innings, allowed 59 hits each and had 36 runs scored on them.

Parmelee's September to Remember

Its funny how small sample size success can frequently send a fan base atwitter.


True, Chris Parmelee posted one of baseball’s best weighted On-Base Averages (wOBA) in the past month. He raked to the tune of .355/.443/.592 with four home runs and six doubles in just shy of a hundred plate appearances. And, all in all, it was one of the best September call-up performances in recent memory.


Still, it is difficult to project a player’s true capabilities just based on a one-month sampling – even if you are combining it with his recent minor league track record.


To be sure, there is plenty to like about Parmelee’s potential just based on his smattering of at bats this year:

• He has shown a keen understanding of the strike zone. His 28% out-of-zone chase rate was below the league’s average meaning he was not helping the pitchers’ out. Because of this, he was able to draw 12 walks (compared to 13 strikeouts).

• Likewise, he keeps his hands back to handle breaking and off-speed stuff extremely well. This led to a low swing-and-miss rate of 22% on curves/sliders along with a .813 slugging percentage as several of his balls in play went for extra bases. Not chasing breaking stuff out of the strike zone will tend to result in a smaller strikeout rate.

• Mechanically, he keeps his hands inside the ball too. This has allowed him to get around quickly on the inside pitch and drive it. Keeping one’s hands in can equate to more power from that leveraged position while incorporating the entire body (rather than swinging with just your arms).

These elements are solid building blocks for a fundamentally sound hitter. Additionally, Parmelee has also shown that he can make modifications too. Beginning two years ago, he axed his upper-cut swing in favor of a more leveled one. This yielded an almost immediate difference in his performance as he cut down on the amount of strikeouts and increased his line drive rate substantially:

 

TwinsCentric’s Nick Nelson did a thorough job of analyzing Parmelee’s cup of coffee and pumping the brakes for those who yearn for something to believe in with this organization. Nelson particularly advised about getting too amped up over his power output based on his September numbers – which I completely agree with. While Parmelee has a powerful swing and, at 24 years old in 2012, he could develop more pop, at the same time, there are plenty of similar prospects who have murdered it in a small section of the season only to be knocked back down to size.


One such extreme example is the Rangers’ Taylor Teagarden.


In 2008, the catching prospect was having a middling season in the minors but received a September call-up. Prior to joining Texas, Teagarden hit .211/.319/.374 with nine home runs in 286 plate appearances split between AAA and AA. Yet when he reached the majors he had a monster of a month, hitting .341/.426/.829 with five home runs in 36 plate appearances. Following the ‘08 season, based on his late season performance, Teagarden’s name was often cited by the Boston Red Sox as one of the potential targets to eventually replace the aging incumbent Jason Varitek. Instead, the Rangers opted to hang on to Teagarden - along with backstop partner Jarrod Saltalamacchia – only to be rewarded with a .205/.268/.356 line since then (and in a freakin’ hitter’s park, no less).


Teagarden’s story is fairly consistent of what happens to a lot of hitters that have talent but do not demonstrate the ability to respond once the competition adjusts to them. In September ’08, opponents fed Teagarden a steady stream of fastballs. Over 70% of his pitches were fastballs and the right-hander hit .407 on them resulting in an incredible value of 8.1 runs above average. Not surprising, the following season Teagarden saw fewer fastballs coming his way and, when he did get one, he was not able to do much with it. It got to the point where he was sent back to AA to figure it out.


Now, this is not to say that Teagarden’s misfortunes will end with the same results for Parmelee, but it is a cautionary tale of how, when given time to study, scouts can adapt quickly. As the Strib’s Joe Christensen pointed out, teams will eventually find his soft spot:


“[T]here are holes in his swing that big league scouts are sure to exploit by the time he starts facing teams a second time”


As it stands right now, Parmelee’s holes are so obvious it can be seen from space.


Parmelee’s biggest strengths are inside and down in the zone. In fact, lower in the hitting zone the better: According to Inside Edge, he has a .203 well-hit average on all his swing down in the zone (.087 MLB average). On the other hand, he clearly has a fairly significant hole in his swing when it comes to pitches up and over the plate:

His ability to keep his hands in also hinders his ability to reach the outer-half of the plate. In the most basic terms, step one of the opposition’s game plan would be to implement cutbacks on the amount of pitches thrown down in the zone and step two would be to feed him more fastballs up and out over the plate.


This doesn’t necessarily mean that Parmelee will experience a collapse like Teagarden did – it simply means that he is less likely of getting “his pitch” (down in the zone) and more likely to get more of those up and out over the plate. As you can see in the chart below, teams already started to focus on that area of the zone. To his credit, Parmelee displayed an adept amount of patience on the majority of those pitches – recognizing it is better to not swing at the ones he knows he can’t handle:

Overall, Parmelee’s offensive attributes are impressive. He has shown veteran-like comprehension of the strike zone, a keen ability to adjust to the breaking and off-speed stuff, a tight swing that gives him power on the inner-half and has demonstrated that he is capable of making changes. With Justin Morneau a huge question mark for next season, while he may never reach the power levels of Morneau, there is some comfort in knowing that Parmelee, who appears very close to a finished product, is readily available.

*****

Now that the Twins' season is over, DiamondCentric has plenty designs avialable on sale - including the Thome Is My Homey, 600 Naturally, FranKKKKKie!, I Love Koobs! and others. 

If you are looking for a fall diversion, DiamondCentric now has a football-themed shirt celebrating the greatest day of the week during autumn: Sunday Funday.

This is the end.

The 2011 Twins season is mercifully over.

It’s odd. When the Twins’ season ended last year, TwinsCentric focused on how the front office can get our team past the New York Yankees during the offseason. This winter, we’re hoping the front office is able to get past the Royals.

The TwinsCentric crew – Nick Nelson, Seth Stohs, John Bonnes and I – will be presenting our Offseason GM Handbook in the coming week. Until then, I hope to provide you with some various statistical breakdowns and some video analysis in this space.

Thanks again for those that have stopped by – even when the baseball was the furthest thing from the minds of most Twins fans. If you have any questions, statements, thoughts or insights, please leave a comment below, email me at TwinsFanc1981@gmail.com or follow me on twitter (@OverTheBaggy). 

Infield Hits: Death by papercuts?

I have spent plenty of time in this space dedicated to the deterioration of the Twins’ infield defense. The once flourishing empire has crumbled into a shell of its former self.

We know that the 2011 infield defense has been both porous and error-prone – a lethal combination for the home team – but it is equally terrible at converting balls that remain in the infield to outs just the same. Heading into last night’s game, the Twins infield had allowed 198 infield hits, by far the most in the AL. That’s also 25 more than they allowed last season. They have allowed 17 more hits than the next closest team, the Chicago White Sox, and a whopping 56 more infield hits than the Boston Red Sox who have allowed the fewest hits within the infield area.

On Monday it was the Twins inability to turn grounders that stay within the infield dirt into outs proved to be their ultimate demise as they allowed another FIVE infield hits.

Kevin Slowey cruised through the first five innings while scattering several hits. Unfortunately, some of those scattered we ones that could have been turned into outs. With one out in the first, Melky Cabrera hit a slow chopper towards shortstop Trevor Plouffe. Plouffe was unable to make the play on the ball and get the speedy Cabera at first. Then, by means of small ball, the Royals were able to move Cabrera to third and score him on an Eric Hosmer sacrifice fly.

Admittedly, the play was somewhat difficult – especially considering from where Plouffe was starting from – but it is not a play that we haven’t seen more athletic shortstops make in the past. But, to be fair, the Royals are one of baseball’s speedier team – racking up 154 infield hits of their own, the second-most in MLB – so it’s difficult to put tonight’s five infield hits entirely on the Twins defense.

That stood as the Royals only run until the sixth inning. Once again it was Cabrera who singled on an infield grounder to Plouffe and once again, the Royals moved Cabrera around to score. Now, Slowey – who was on the brink of collapsing as he is wont to do this season – was not helping his cause at this point either. In fact, he threw 97 pitches and got just 4 swinging strikes (all on fastballs). At the juncture, he was giving up loud outs and hard-hit balls all over the yard.

Kevin Slowey (2011)
Split	PA	R	H	2B	3B	HR	SO/BB	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS
1st PA in G, as SP	63	7	14	2	0	4	10.00	.233	.254	.467	.721
2nd PA in G, as SP	63	12	17	4	2	2	7.00	.283	.317	.517	.834
3rd PA in G, as SP	42	11	18	5	0	1	3.50	.486	.500	.703	1.203

(via Baseball-Reference.com)

It is impossible to predict the outcome if the Twins had been able to get some of those outs.  Still, you have to wonder, if Plouffe had been able to make either play on Cabrera, the Royals would likely have not scored – certainly not in the first. Plus, making those plays would have shaved off possibly 10 or so pitches off of Slowey’s pitch count. Is it possible that that would have gotten him through the sixth?

Beyond just last night, think about that on a larger scale – How many additional pitches on the pitching staffs arms? How many runs do 25 additional base runners equate to? Could that be at least a five-win difference on the basis of the infield defense alone?

When the season ends in a few days, one of the biggest offseason priorities should be to find a way to stop the hemorrhaging in the infield.  

Plouffe has shown promise, just not in September

For a while there, given the opportunity to try on the shortstop position for next season, Trevor Plouffe looked as if it was going to fit him good.

From August 15 to September 3, Plouffe played in 20 games and hit an impressive .316/.365/.506 in 86 plate appearances. The ball was exploding off of his bat and his fielding was much improved since his early season yips. Unfortunately, since committing the cardinal sin in baseball – forgetting how many outs there are – he has fallen into the abyss. From September 4 on, Plouffe has gone a measly 5-for-43 (.116) in 49 plate appearances and has committed five errors in the field. Basically, he’s playing like a man about to lose the job.

According to 1500ESPN’s Phil Mackey, manager Ron Gardenhire had some remarks directed towards Plouffe’s recent play:

"He's scuffled lately at making plays that really we have to make. And I don't know if he's just relaxed enough, he's comfortable back up here, he knows he's going to play and lost a little bit of the edge, I don't know. Because there's been some sloppy, sloppy play out there when he was going along really, really good and really focused on it. So that just tells you a little bit about the game up here.

You can't let your guard down. You're going along, and I don't know if he's done that, I don't think so. He seems like he's intense and he's doing all of this work, but he's gotten a little sloppy out there lately, and he knows it."

Scuffling is putting it lightly. Like when your mom says "you are not fat, you are husky."

Defensively, we have witnessed some seriously lackadaisical play in the field. For example, on September 14 in Kansas City, with runners on first and third with nobody out, second baseman Johnny Giavotella chopped one towards Plouffe’s right. Plouffe gobbles it up on the move and – while still shuffling his feet and fading away from the play – he throws off-target to Matt Tolbert covering second.

Given the speed and location that the ball was hit, the likelihood that the ball was going to result in just one out was high. Plouffe had all the time in the world on this to get his feet set and make a strong throw to the bag – getting that all-important first out. Instead, he got lazy and fired one into the outfield. The Royals scored and were denied a second run on a solid throw home by first baseman Chris Parmelee (who must have practiced those oh-so-routine throws from behind the camera well in New Britain).

The defensive shortcomings are nothing new to Plouffe’s game – after all, he had a poor camp in the field and his attempts to maim spectators sitting behind first base got him sent back to Rochester for further Twins Way indoctrination – yet, up until recently, he provided a decent stick to compensate for those miscues.  

While Plouffe’s sudden offensive decline has little explanation from a data or scouting standpoint, there are some troubling trends nonetheless that suggest this isn’t just a BABIP-related slump. His line drive rate has dropped drastically in September and he is receiving more fastballs in September but isn’t fairing as well against them as he did in August (-1.4 runs above average in September versus 1.1 runs above average in August). Aside from seeing more fastballs, pitchers are targeting the same spots and mechanically he looks the same.

One of the biggest factors is that Plouffe isn’t pulling the ball as well this month. Take a look at his hit charts between the two samplings:

While spreading the ball to all fields is well and good, pulling the ball is where Plouffe makes his money. So far this season, Plouffe is slugging .679 when he hits the ball to left and six of his seven home runs have gone out that direction.

Offensively, there are signs that there may be sunnier days ahead for Plouffe. Previously, I highlighted some of the mechanical changes that he made that have given him some added power. Essentially, by stabilizing his pre-swing bat movement and incorporating a more violent leg lift/plant, he has been able to drive the ball more resulting in more fly balls and line drives and fewer ground balls. As such, Plouffe has smacked a career-high 22 home runs so far in 2011.

Meanwhile, on the field, Plouffe needs someone to help get him under control. In 2009, the Milwaukee Brewers hired Willie Randolph in part to help improve the fielding of the highly talented second baseman Rickie Weeks. Because of Randolph’s tutelage, Weeks progressed from an error-prone, mistakes machine into a…well, a somewhat slightly less error-prone player who is now capable of making the routine plays. His Ultimate Zone Rating went from a -10.3 UZR/150 from 2005 to 2008, the second worst in baseball, to a much more respectable 4.6 from 2009 to this season. Perhaps the Twins front office need to have someone like Paul Molitor on-staff fulltime to guide players like Plouffe and Tsuyoshi Nishioka which may help them reap the same dividends that it did for the Brewers and Weeks.

Since his dunderheaded play in Anaheim back on September 4, Plouffe has been the epitome of someone lacking focus and it has shown both at the plate and in the field. Perhaps starting with that mental error and compounded by the realization that he is auditioning for a starting role next year has snowballed into this two week mess for him. Whatever the reason, Plouffe, like the rest of the Twins, need this season to come to a merciful close so they can reboot and refocus for 2012.

Better days should be ahead for both.