Twins Trade Talk 2012: July 31: Deadline Edition

This continues the dialy trade talk updates for the Twins and of action around the league that influences the Twins trade moves, up until the deadline. You can find all the older updates here, in reverse chronological order. This is the last of the talk. Potential trade action will happen up till 3:00 PM today. I will post a Twins Trade Deadline Retrospect after the dust settles tonight or tomorrow (probably tomorrow because I want to look at potential reactions) and will pubish August waiver trade talk as it comes. Here is the Twins Trade Talk the past 24 hours or so:

• Jon Heyman indicates that the Toronto Blue Jays, Los Angeles Dodgers and San Fransisco Giants are interested in Justin Morneau.
• Meanwhile, Ken Rosenthal suggests that the Los Angeles Dodgers are out on Justin Monreau. because they have nothing suitable. He also suggests that the Twins are looking for a team to take his salary and want a young MLB-ready starting pitcher in return.
• Heyman also suggests that Jamey Carroll may be traded, without linking him to particular teams.
• Darren Wolfson tweets that the Toronto Blue Jays had plenty of scouts at the Twins' game last night.
• Jerry Crasnick reports that Glen Perkins is in "high demand".

Twins Trade Talk 2012: July 28

This continues the dialy trade talk updates for the Twins and of action around the league that influences the Twins trade moves, up until the deadline. You can find all the older updates here, in reverse chronological order. Here is the Twins Trade Talk the past 24 hours or so:

• Ben Goessling of the Pioneer Press reports that Twins' interim General Manager, Terry Ryan, "is making and taking calls". This is the first time that it was reported that Ryan is making calls, i.e. actively shopping Twins' players. In the same piece the names of the usual suspects (Justin Morneau, Fransisco Liriano, Josh Willingham and Denard Span) are mentioned without being linked to suitors. Also mentioned is that the Twins will be looking to get "hard-throwing arms" with a "high-upside" in return.
• Interesting article here in the Chicago Tribune from the Cubs' perspective, but suggests that it might starting to be a buyers' market for Starting Pitchers, which does not bode well for the Minnesota Twins and Fransisco Liriano. On the other hand, Chigaco's own Matt Garza is shut down with a triceps situation, which might take one pitcher off the market at the deadline.
• Phil Mackey connects the Atlanta Braves, who were shun by Ryan Dempster, with Fransisco Liriano. Over at the ESPN rumor central, they have Liriano linked to: St. Louis Cardinals, Los Angeles Angels, Los Angeles Dodgers, Washington Nationals, Texas Rangers, Cincinnati Reds and Baltimore Orioles. In other words, half the league is after Liriano.
• Jim Bowden indicates that the Cincinnati Reds are "chasing" Denard Span, among others.
• Here is a name not mentioned before: Glen Perkins. John Morosi tweets that there have been "heavy interest" and that the Twins' price is "very high"
• Jason Start reiterates that Justin Morneau is available

Any of these guys will be still be wearing Twins' uniforms for the 7:10 PM CDT game on July 31st?

Twins Players of the Week

The Twins are 2-4 in this early season, after being swept in their first series at Baltimore and winning the series against one of the AL darlings, the LA Angels at the home opener at Target Field, 2-1. This series win is very hopeful, because if they Twins win 60-70% of their series, they will be in the post-season. They stand at 50% right now and winning the Rangers' series, will put them at 66%, which is right on course.

A position player and a pitcher stood above and beyond the Twins' peers this week and they are the Twins' players of the week.

Position player: Josh Willingham:



.409/.458/1.000 4 HR, 7 RBI, 1 2B, 1 BB, 5 K, (24 PA)

Pitcher: Glen Perkins:



.000 ERA, 0.545 WHIP, 2 H, 0 BB, 6 K (3.2 IP)

Breaking down Glen Perkins' contract extension with the Twins

Glen Perkins has signed a 3 year contract extension with the Twins, which will keep him with the team until 2015. The Twins have an option for 2016. The extension is for the 2013, 2014 and 2015 seasons, so the 1 year, $1.55 million contract that Perkins has signed for 2012 still stands. The total value of the contract is for $10.3 million dollars, including the buy out of the 2016 option. There are additional incentives for games finished, which will pay Perkins more, if he assumes the closer role from 2013 on.

Glen has proven to be one of the most reliable relievers in the majors in 2011 and the Twins are getting a great bargain for 4 years of his service covering his age 29-32 seasons (2012-15) for a total of $11.85 million plus incentives.

His annual salaries are:

2012: $1.55 million
2013: $2.5 million
2014: $3.75 million
2015: $3.75 million
2016 (option) : $4.5 million with $300K buyout

Meet and greet Carl Pavano

This morning the Twins acquired Carl Pavano from the Cleveland Indians for a player to be named later (probably a minor leaguer).

A few days ago here, I identified Pavano as a real trade target for the Twins' rotation; however, I had reservations that the Twins will trade within the division. As I indicated in the above liked post, Pavano is one of the two potentially available pitchers (the other being Aaron Harang of the Cincinnati Reds) who is pitching much better than the average AL pitcher. His PE this season is 17.52, second to that of Scott Baker (24.72) among the current Twins' starters. His xPE (factoring in his high .328 BABIP) is a very solid 19.82.

Of, course, his ERA (5.37) does not tell the story. Looking at his FIP (which is flawed by better than ERA), his 4.26 FIP is ahead of both Glen Perkins' (4.63) and Fransisco Liriano's (4.78)

This season, Pavano is: 3-0, 1.93 ERA, 23.1 IP, 5 ER, 1 BB, 13K against the Tigers and 2-1, 2.42 ERA, 22.1 IP, 6 ER, 2 BB, 15K against the White Sox. Like Orlando Cabrera, he has post-season experience and a World Series ring. He was the main player in Boston's package to Montreal, which put Pedro Martinez in a Red Sox' uniform in 2003.

Let's look closer at the 33 year old version of Carl Pavano. He has 4 pitches: A fastball averaging 90.5 mph, which he throws about 60% of the time, A slider averaging 82.7 mph, which he throws about 16% of the time, a change up averaging 81.0 mph, which he throws about 24% of the time and an occasional split-finger fastball. What is making the 2009 version of Pavano more effective than the 2008 version?

• His velocity is higher in 2009. All his pitches are about 3 mph faster on average


• His least effective pitch is his fastball (-1.47 runs above average per 100; wFB/C), his slider (2.02 wSL/C) and change up (0.59 wCH/C) have been effective and been thrown often (40% of the time)


• He is striking out more batters (3.9 K/9 in 2008 vs. 6.3 K/9 in 2009) and walking fewer (2.6 BB/9 in 2008 vs. 1.3 BB/9 in 2009) resulting to a great 3.83 K/BB in 2009 (vs. just 1.50 K/BB in 2008)

To make room to the 25 man roster, the Twins optioned R.A. Dickey to Rochester. As a result of the trade either Fransisco Liriano or Glen Perkins will move to the pen. Based on their performance as starters this season, Perkins would be the logical choice to move to the pen; however, Liriano might be the emotional choice.

All in all it was a great move by Bill Smith that is helping fill a true need in the system. I expect at least another arm either from outside or inside the organization in the 25-man roster and the eventual move of Duensing and Keppel to the minors.

Pavano started against the Tigers last Sunday pitching for 8 innings allowing just one run on six hits. He struck out four and walked one. His turn is today. Will he take the mount against the team he recently dominated tonight?

He should, if not tonight, at least in this series.



Update: To make room for Pavano on the Twins 40-man roster, Boof Bonser moved to the 60 day DL, which means that any potential comeback this September is probably unlikely

Update:. The Twins' payroll responsibility for Carl Pavano:

From Cot's Baseball Contracts:

Base contract: 1 year, $1.5 M (about $600K left)

$5.3M in performance bonuses:

starts:
$0.1M each for 18, 20, 22;
$0.2M each for 24, 26, 28;
$0.25M for 30;
$0.3M for 32;
$0.35M each for 33, 34;
$0.4M for 35

He has 21 starts. If he gets to 32, the Twins will be responsible for $1.05 M

innings:
$0.1M each for 130, 140, 150;
$0.15M each for 160, 170;
$0.2M for 180;
$0.25M each for 190, 200, 210;
$0.3M for 215;
$0.4M for 225;
$0.5M for 235

He has 125.2 IP; based on projected 32 starts and his average 6 IP/start, that will give him 192 IP and the Twins will be responsible for another $1.05M

Total projected cost for the Twins: $2.7M

A Blast from the Past

After Glen Perkins' last start, I posted an entry suggesting that this is a new and improved Glen Perkins because this season, unlike 2008 when he was the weakest link in the Twins' rotation, he managed to keep the hitters off balance by changing speaks.

Today at Cleveland, Glen Perkins converted to his old ways. This is a graph of pitch number vs pitch speed from his appearance today, from Brooks Baseball:




As you can see, there was a series of 21 pitches all within 4 mph of each other with the exception of two pitches (red circle). This is not good and it coincided with his 3-run third inning (red bar below.) Perkins just cannot do that if he wants to be effective. He cannot throw 19 out of 21 fastballs in a row and survive in the bigs. I think that his problem is clear, he should know it, Anderson should know it, the catchers should not it and he just got to stop doing it. Otherwise, I am afraid, that he will be the Perkins of old, who is not that good...

Pitching Checkpoint

This off day I was planning or writing something about the catching situation, but since there were a few new developments on the pitching side, I decided not to ignore those. Since it looks like there will be a rain out tomorrow, I will discuss catching tomorrow.

It is old news by now, but Jesse Crain has been placed at the 15-day DL retroactive to a couple days ago and Jose Mijares has been called up from Rochester to replace him. LEN3 was the first to break that story. Mijares after an awful spring when he showed up in camp looking like Pat Williams and pitching in a way that made Kevin Frederick look like a Cy Young candidate, seems to have found parts of his last September in Rocherster, where in five games he amassed these numbers: 6.1 IP, 2 H, 1 BB, 4 K, 0 ER (0.00 ERA, 0.47 WHIP.) Crain did get overused so far this season. It was inexcusable for Gardy to put him in the 9th inning to close a blow out game. That is done, it cannot be corrected, but I hope that Gardenhire realizes his mistake and does not repeat it. Speaking of repeating mistakes, when Gardenhire was asked about who the set up man will be now, he answered that everyone who is rested except Morillo who is still "a project". Wrong answer. He should select one (even pull names off a a hat) and go with him. The worse thing about a reliever is not knowing what his role is. Pitchers need to get ready to pitch. I hope that Crain gets healthy soon and that he returns effective because he showed signs of brilliance so far this season.

A lot of people are climbing on Glen Perkins' bandwagon this season and with a good reason: he has been the most effective starter on the staff. Yesterday in the Angels series' review I wrote the following about Perkins:

The Perkins of 2009 so far is different than the Perkins of 2008: He apparently worked on his change up and slider this off-season and unlike last year, he has complimentary pitches to his fastball. His slider still needs work, but his change up is very effective. And when he is down on the count he does not throw fastballs in the middle of the plate like he did in 2008. This allows him to get through innings with fewer pitches and pitch deeper into the games



And because a picture is supposedly worth a thousand words, I will save myself two thousand and present you with these two from one of the great baseball sites out there, Brooksbaseball.net, to illustrate my previous point.

Exhibit A:



This is a graph of pitch number on the X axis and pitch velocity on the Y axis. This is Perkins pitching in yesterday's game against the Angels. As you can see, it is rare that he is throwing more than 2 fastballs in a row and there is a great mix between fastballs and off-speed pitches.

Exhibit B:



This is from a typical Perkins' outing in 2008. The 8/14 game in Seattle: He throwed a series of only fastballs four times (red circles-me-Bert), very few off-speed pitches, and when he got in trouble towards the end of his outing he threw 10 straight fastballs. This was not the way to pitch successfully and I had indicated ad noseum last season, that if this continues, Perkins does not belong in a major league rotation.

I am very happy that this has change and I hope that Glen keeps it up and when in trouble does not revert to bad habits.

The general opinion is that the Twins' starters have struggled last season:

here is a little known fact: The Twins (co-lead the majors) with 9 starters going more than six innings. I hope this makes the Twins' fans feel a little better.

The Seattle series in review

The first series of the year is over. The Twins tied 2-2 with the Seattle Mariners and are in second place in the AL Central, half a game behind the Kansas City Royals, half a game a head of the Chicago White Sox, a game ahead of the Detroit Tigers and a game and a half ahead of the win-less Cleveland Indians.

This series concluded with a classic pitcher's duo in which Jarrod Washburn, outlasted Glen Perkins to lead his Mariners to a 2-0 matinee victory. A few observations from this series, in a random order:

• The Mariners are not as bad as they look on paper. The addition of Guterriez and Chavez in the outfield will help them win several games (one could argue that today's was one of them) with the glove. With the Angel's rotation a huge question mark and the Rangers and A's unpredictable, it could be possible that the Mariners might contend this season, if they get the right bounces like they did in this series. A split with the Mariners at home might sound discouraging, but lets not forget that the Twins last season spit a home series with the Rays and we all know what happened to the Rays...


• There were a lot of nerves at the starting rotation, but Perkins and Liriano performed very well pitching 8 and 7 innings of 0.88 and 0.57 WHIP, respectively. As a matter of fact, that was Perkins' best start with the Twins.


• Having Crede at third base will be a huge factor for the Twins, even if his bat is slow to wake up. Just in this series Crede made at least 5 plays that Buscher could not make in his dreams.


• The biggest surprise as far as the bats go, was Denard Span who followed an awful spring with a .308/.438/.538 performance, one home run, a team leading 4 RBI and 1 SB. Other than Span, Morneau, Kubel and Harris (who owns Washburn) had good series with the bat.


• Nathan was perfect in his single save opportunity and Guerrier, who gave only one hit in 2.1 innings (0.43 WHIP), showed promise that last season might have just been a fluke

First Series MVP:

Denard Span



First Series Best Pitcher:

Glen Perkins




Next series: 3 games against the White Sox in Chicago. Probable Starters:

Friday: R.A. Dickey vs. Jose Conteras
Saturday: Fransisco Liriano vs. Bartolo Colon
Sunday: Nick Blackburn vs. TBD

On another note, Rochester beat Syracuse 7-4, powered by home runs by Martin, Plouffe, Winfree and Hughes. Interestingly, Tim Lahey was the closer today.

The New Britain game in New Hampshire just started and the Rock Cats are winning 1-0 on the top of the 1st after a Rene Tosoni home run at the first AB of the game. Jay Raiville is pitching.

Spring training week 1 summary.

The first week of spring training passed and found the Twins within 2 runs of a perfect record. I will be giving weekly recaps of the cumulative performance of players in Spring training, focusing on the roster battles.

Here is the summary of week one:

Position Players:

Outfield Starter Battle:

Young .857/.857/1.000, 1 SB (7 AB)
Gomez .222/.300/.556, 1 HR, 1 BB (9 AB)
Cuddyer .167/.167/.167 (7 AB)
Span .111/.200/.111 1 BB (9 AB)

Spot on the Bench vs Rochester Battle:

Buscher .600/.600/1.100, 1 HR (10 AB)
Hughes .333/.333/.333 (6 AB)
Machado .200/.200/.200 1 SB (5 AB)
Tolbert .167/.231/.167 1 BB (12 AB)
Macri .000/.200/.000 1 BB (4 AB)
Plouffe .000/.000/.000 (5 AB)

Battle for Rochester vs. New Britain:

Valencia .800/.800/.800 (5 AB)
Martin .600/ .667 /.889 (5 AB)
Peterson .200/.429/.800 1 HR (GS) 5 AB

Other notable starter stats:

Kubel .500/.714/1.500/.500 1 HR, 3 BB (5 AB)
Morneau .429/.500/.714/ 1 BB (7 AB)


Position Player of week 1:

Delmon Young



Honorable mention: Brian Buscher, Jason Kubel, Danny Valencia, Dustin Martin


Pitchers:

Best Starter Performance:

Slowey ERA 0.00, WHIP 0.00, 0 BB, 1 K 2 IP
Blackburn ERA 0.00, WHIP 0.00, 0 BB, 0 K, 2 IP
Perkins ERA 0.00, WHIP 1.00, 0 BB, 3 K, 5 IP

Battle for set up man:

Crain 0.00 ERA, WHIP 0.00, 0 BB, 0 K, 2 IP
Ayala 0.00 ERA, WHIP 0.50, 0 BB, 0 K, 2 IP
Breslow 4.50 ERA, WHIP 1.00, 0 BB, 2 K, 2 IP
Guerrier 4.50 ERA, WHIP 1.50, 2 BB, 0 K, 2 IP

On the bubble; battle for the last 1-2 spots:

Dickey 0.00 ERA, WHIP 1.00, 1 BB, 3 K, 2 IP
Henn 0.00 ERA, WHIP 1.50, 1 BB, 0 K, 2 IP
Mijares 0.00 ERA, WHIP 1.50, 2 BB, 3 K, 2 IP
Jones 3.00 ERA, WHIP 2.00, 2 BB, 3 K, 3 IP
Goslin 0.00 ERA, WHIP 2.50, 2 BB, 1 K, 2 IP
Humber 18.00, WHIP 2.50, 0 BB, 0 K, 2 IP

pitcher of week 1, spring training:

Kevin Slowey





honorable mention: Nick Blackburn, Jesse Crain, Glen Perkins, R.A. Dickey

Some flaws in the Twins' 25 men roster

The 25-men roaster is all but set with the only question marks being whether Liriano and/or Baker will make the trip up north or stay in FL for extensive spring training until they build their endurance. Regardless, I think that there are some flaws in the 25 men roster that can be proven painful for the Twins this year:

• There are too many pitchers on the roster, leaving some serious deficiencies in the lineup. Historically, teams had 10 pitchers and 15 batters on their rosters. During the nineties, especially after expansion. The standard became 11 and 14. Now several teams are starting the season with 12 pitchers. This tactic, even though would lead to a fresher pitching staff, does not allow the manager to make appropriate substitutions in situational pinch hitting and running as well as in a day-to-day injury, unless the 4-man bench is set up correctly.


• The Twins have issues with their 4-man bench because Redmond is not very versatile; whomever from Monroe or Kubel does not start at DH can only play corner outfield positions successfully; Punto and Tolbert have pretty much the same skill set (infielders) and they are practically a duplication. A versatile outfielder (such as Pridie) could have been a better choice than one of the Punto/Tolbert duo


• Tolbert could be a potential pinch runner in late innings as could be Punto, but when Monroe is starting, there are no power righty bats of the bench.


• Another issue: Gomez is injury prone. He showed that yesterday. It that game, Gomez had a leg cramp and had to leave the game after the forth inning. With Monroe starting at DH, Gardernhire substituted Punto as the CF replacement, a totally inadequate substitution. A better course of action (albeit not ideal) would have been to move Young to CF and insert Kubel as the LF. This problem would be an issue if Gomez is day-to-day and out for a couple of days. This is why Pridie would have been a better choice... The only other position without good backup plan is 1B (the best case scenario if Morneau gets a minor injury would be to put Cuddyer on 1B with either Kubel or Monroe taking the RF position and again have no OF on the bench...


• The pitching staff itself is too righthanded with potentially (if Liriano is not ready) only 1 lefthander (Reyes) on the staff. This is not an issue against primarily righthanded lineups, like Detroit, but it can hurt in the long run. Neshek has a good record against lefties but he is the set up man. Perkins or Keisler should have probably taken Bass' spot (even though the later is out of options.)


• LH relievers are a rare and expensive fruit but the Twins should probably package a few people for a trade. There is a surplus of righthanders and it maybe time to see what a package such as Punto+Bass+Rincon can bring. Would it be enough for a situational lefty? Possible. Additionally, it would solve the bench Punto/Tolbert duplication issue. In such a scenario, Pridie would take Punto's spot, Humber Bass' and the new lefty Rincon's. I think that the Atlanta Braves might be an ideal trade partner, resulting to someone like Royce Ring or even Will Ohman coming to the Twins (with or without the inclusion of Bass in that trade...)

just some food for thought...