The Numbers Game

When Joe Mauer returns, as early as a week from today, a spot should open on the 25-man roster to accommodate him. I think that there are three potential candidates for that spot, in alphabetical order: Brian Buscher, Jose Morales and Micheal Redmond.

Here is how they have been performing this season:

Brian Buscher: 18 PA, .200/.333/.333 (.667 OPS). He swung at 37.5% percent of the pitches he faced, making contact on 66.7% of those, so he made contact with 25% of the pitches he saw

Jose Morales: 26 PA .250/.308/.333 (.641 OPS). He swung at 56.3% percent of the pitches he faced, making contact on 81.6% of those, so he made contact with 45.9% of the pitches he saw

Mike Redmond: 31 PA .214/.290/.250 (.540 OPS.) He swung at 41.1% percent of the pitches he faced, making contact on 89.7% of those, so he made contact with 36.9% of the pitches he saw


As far as plate performance goes, Morales has been making more contact with the ball than Redmond and Redmond has been making more contact with the ball than Buscher. One might argue that it is a small sample size, but Buscher's career contact% on all pitches he saw is 35.3% far bellow Morales' and still below Redmond's.

At this point, Morales and Buscher are playing at replacement level, Redmond below replacement level.

Redmond brings veteran leadership and clubhouse presence. Morales brings a live bat, upside, a spanish-speaking catcher who can communicate with Ayala, Liriano, Mijares and Morillo better than Redmond or Mauer. He is a switch hitter. Buscher brings in a left hand bat from the bench. Both Morales and Buscher still have minor league options.

Redmond and Morales are adequate defensively. They will not throw runners out but will not make errors. Buscher is a defensive liability who does not belong on the field in a major league stadium.

There is more than one way to make that decision and it will be a hard decision to make, since there are advantages and disadvantages to all 3. I think that Morales' bat and the fact that is adequate defensively as a catcher, as well as Redmond's veteran leadership should be chosen over Buscher's LH bat off the bench. Morales has a better LH bat off the bench (as a LH hitter he is batting .300/.333/.400, .733 OPS in 21 PA) than Buscher, anyways, and he is more versatile. If I were to rank the 3 in order of who should stay, it would be: Morales, Redmond, Buscher.

What do you think? Feel free to comment and vote on the poll at the upper left hand side of the blog.

Catching up

Not many news are expected this weekend (a travel weekend for many officials and reporters to the Winter Meetings in Vegas). A couple of interesting notes (and I am not going to harp on the the Gardy foot in the mouth situation and potential Delmon Young trade rumors or why the Twins should not give 3 years to Blake):

• The Twins made the first blunder this off-season, releasing Randy Ruiz to reportedly open another spot on the 40 man roster. Readers of this space know who I feel about Randy Ruiz. It is bothersome that this comes from a team that has 5 catchers on the 40 man roster, re-singed the AARP-eligible Redmond as the back-up catcher for next season, and having several older career minor league non-prospects in that roster. Good luck Randy, you deserve a 25 man roster spot and you'll get it, but unfortunately not with the Twins. There are strong rumors about Ruiz going to Japan; we'll have to wait and see.


• Apparently the shortstop market has become a buyer's market after the singing of Rentaria by the Giants and the trade for Greene by the Cardinals: The A's pulled off the table their offer to Furcal ($35-40M for 4 years). The Tigers are looking at Jack Wilson and Adam Everett, Orlando Cabrera is still out there as they are the lesser free agent shortstops (Alex Cora, Juan Uribe, Cesar Izturis et. al.). The Twins do have 2 internal options (3 if you add Plouffe), Steven Tolleson, who supplemented a great season in AA last year with a phenomenal AFL performance and Alejandro Machado who in his first year with the Twins' organization, after sitting all 2007 out with injuries, hit .338/.376/.472 in Rochester, primarily as a second baseman. Depending how the market goes, I would not be surprised if the Twins wait until late and if Furcal is available come January/February make him a 1-2 year contract offer. The Furcal situation also affects the Blake situation, because if the Dodgers sign Furcal, they will probably be out of the running for Blake, making the Twins the only team with an offer on the table.


• I have been updating with signings my Minor League free agent potential target list. A couple of players have already singed with other clubs.


• Meanwhile, it looks like, finally, the names "Wigginton" and "Twins" are being placed in the same sentence. Earlier (time flies, it has been almost 2 months), I suggested that Wiggington should be one of the 4 real targets for third base help this offseason. Speculation is that Wigginton might cost just prospects of the caliber the Padres received for Greene.