Myth Busting: The Rich Anderson Legacy or the Twins' pitching in the 00s

I think that a lot of the Minnesota Twins' fans have been frustrated with the way the Twins have been performing this and the last season.  Some of us have been frustrated even longer, since the Twins have last won a World Series in 1991.  That was 21 seasons ago.  Kids who were born then they can now buy booze.  Not good.

Anecdotally, there have been a lot of remarks and thoughts about the Twins trying to create cookie cutter pitchers, about Ron Anderson (who was named the pitching coach when Ron Gardenhire was named the manager in 2001) wanted everyone in the whole organization to throw the 2 seamer and pitch to contact.

But gut feelings and all, this blog is about substantiated evidence and numbers.  So here is what I did, and here is what I am presenting:  I looked at all pitchers who wore a Twins' uniform this Millennium and compared how they did while with the Twins vs. how they did after they left the Twins. I went as far as 2009-10 (but some of the latest losses have inconclusive numbers).

And here is the honor roll.  A list of 20 pitchers who did better after they left the Twins, when they were older, when they were past their prime.  Not one or two (like Jose Reyes who did phenomenally while with the Twins) but 20.  It cannot be a coincidence.   And I am not even including pitchers like Sergio Santos and Peter Moylan on whom the Twins gave up before they ever gave them a chance.

Here is Rick Anderson's (ok a couple are before his time) Honor Roll:

Luis Ayala:

Twins 2009 (age 31) : 4.18 ERA, 1.423 WHIP, 5.8 K/9, 2.63 K/BB (was cut)
Yankees 2011 (age 33) : 2.09 ERA, 1.268 WHIP, 6.3 K/9, 1.95 K/BB
Orioles 2012 (age 34) : 1.82 ERA, 1.054 WHIP, 5.1 K/9, 2.80 K/BB

Grand Balfour:

Twins (2001-2004 ages 23-26) : 4.63 ERA, 1.456 WHIP, 9.8 K/9, 1.95 K/BB
Rays (2007-2010 ages 29-32) : 3.33 ERA, 1.212 WHIP, 10.4 K/9, 2.6 K/BB
Athletics (2011-2012 ages 33-34) : 2.78 ERA, 1.145 WHIP, 8 K/9, 2.52 K/BB

Joe Beimel:

Twins (2004, age 27) : 43.20 ERA, 6 WHIP, 1.2 IP (was cut)
LA Dodgers (2006-2008, ages 29-31) 3.04 ERA, 1.336 WHIP, 4.9 K/8, 1.53 K/BB
Nationals (2009 age 32) 3.40 ERA, 1.336 WHIP, 5.4 K/8, 1.6 K/BB
Rockies (2009-10 ages 32-33) : 3.56 ERA, 1.385 WHIP, 4.7 K/9, 1.68 K/BB

Craig Breslow:

Twins 2008-9 (ages 27-28) : 2.89 ERA, 1.132 WHIP, 7.3 K/9, 1.72 K/BB (was cut)
Oakland 2009-11 (ages 28-30) : 3.14 ERA, 1.199 WHIP, 7.6 K/9, 2.34 K/BB
Arizona 2012 (age 31) : 2.13 ERA, 1.026 WHIP, 7.8 K/9, 2.2 K/BB


Jesse Crain:

Twins 2004-10 (ages 22-28) : 3.42 ERA, 1.257 WHIP, 6.2 K/9, 1.87 K/BB
White Sox 2011-12 (ages 29-30) : 2.37 ERA, 1.180 WHIP, 9.8 K/9, 2.42 K/BB

Jack Cressend:

Twins (2000-2001 ages 25-27) : 4.59 ERA, 1.480 WHIP, 6 K/9, 1.66 K/BB
Indians (2003-2004 ages 28-29) : 3.53 ERA, 1.381 WHIP, 5.5 K/9 1.89 K/BB


R.A. Dickey:

Twins: 2009 (age 34) : 4.62 ERA, 1.617 WHIP, 5.9 K/9, 1.4 K/BB
Mets: 2010-12 (ages 35-37) 3.08 ERA, 1.193 WHIP, 6 K/9, 2.65 K/BB

Willie Eyre:

Twins 2006 (age 27) : 5.31 ERA, 1.635 WHIP, 3.9 K/9, 1.18 K/BB
Texas 2007-9 (ages 28-30) : 5.02 ERA, 1.558 WHIP, 5.2 K/9, 1.32 K/BB
Baltimore 2011 (age 32) : 3.44 ERA, 0.927 WHIP, 4.9 K/9, 2 K/BB

Aaron Fultz:

Twins (2004, age 30) : 5.04 ERA, 1.460 WHIP, 6.7 K/9, 1.61 K/BB
Phillies (2005-6 ages 31-32) : 3.38 ERA, 1.239 WHIP, 7.3 K/9, 2.27 K/BB
Indians (2007, age 33) : 2.92 ERA, 1.324 WHIP, 6.8, 1.56 K/BB

Matt Garza:

Twins 2006-7 (ages 22-23) : 4.47 ERA, 1.602 WHIP, 7.1 K/9, 1.91 K/BB
Rays 2008-10 (ages 24-26) : 3.86 ERA, 1.251 WHIP, 7.1 K/9, 2.32 K/BB
Cubs 2011-12 (ages 27-28) : 3.51 ERA, 1.237 WHIP, 8.8 K/9, 3.00 K/BB

LaTroy Hawkins:

Twins: (SP/RP 1995-2003 ages 22-30): 5.05 ERA, 1.523 WHIP, 5.9 K/9, 1.83 K/BB
Twins: (RP: 2000-2003 ages 27-30): 3.09 ERA, 1.271 WHIP, 7.1 K/9, 2.31 K/BB
Cubs: (2004-2005 ages 31-32) : 2.76 ERA, 1.099 WHIP, 7.3 K/9, 3.9 K/BB

Livan Hernandez:

Twins 2008 (age 33) : 5.48 ERA, 1.632 WHIP, 3.5 K/9, 1.86 K/BB
Nationals 2009-11 (ages 34-36) 4.17 ERA, 1.363 WHIP, 5.0 K/9, 1.82 K/BB
Atlanta 2012 (age 37) : 3.68 ERA, 1.389 WHIP, 5.8 K/9, 2.38 K/BB

Phil Humber:

Twins 2008-9 (ages 25-26) : 6.10 ERA, 2.032 WHIP, 6.5 K/9, 1.07 K/BB
Royals 2010 (age 27) : 4.15 ERA, 1.338 WHIP, 6.6 K/9, 2.29 K/BB
White Sox 2011-12 (ages 28-29) : 4.14 ERA, 1.219 WHIP, 6.8 K/9, 2.55 K/BB

Mike Lincoln:

Twins (1999-2000 ages 24-25) : 7.70 ERA, 1.825 WHIP, 3.9 K/9, 1.08 K/BB
Pirates (2001-2003 ages 26-28) : 3.50 ERA, 1.362 WHIP, 6.2 K/9, 2 K/BB

Kyle Lohse:

Twins 2001-2006 (ages 22-27) : 4.88 ERA, 1.447 WHIP, 5.6 K/9, 1.94 K/BB
Reds 2006-2007 (ages 27-28) : 4.58 ERA, 1.361 WHIP, 6.1 K/9, 2.52 K/BB
Cardinals 2008-2012 (ages 29-33) : 4.18 ERA, 1.332 WHIP, 5.4 K/9, 2.33 K/BB

Jose Mijares:

Twins 2009-11 (ages 23-26) : 3.16 ERA, 1.315 WHIP, 6.9 K/9, 1.9 K/BB
Royals 2012 (age 27) : 2.49 ERA, 1.200 WHIP, 6.6 K/9, 4.0 K/BB

Mark Redman:
Twins (1999-2001 ages 25-27) : 4.86 ERA, 1.469 WHIP, 6.6 K/9, 2.21 K/BB
Detroit (2001-2002 ages 27-28) : 4.29 ERA, 1.307 WHIP, 4.8 K/9, 2.05 K/BB
Florida (2003 age 29) : 3.59 ERA, 1.222 WHIP, 7.1 K/9, 2.48 K/BB

JC Romero:

Twins: (1999-2005 ages 23-29) : 4.35 ERA, 1.482 WHIP, 7.4 K/9, 1.61 K/BB
Philies: (2007-2011 ages 31-35) : 2.73 ERA, 1.406 WHIP, 7.3 K/9, 1.14 K/BB

Brad Thomas:

Twins (2001-2004 ages 23-26) : 9.89 ERA, 2.155 WHIP, 3 K/9, 0.85 K/BB
Tigers (2010-2011 ages 32-33) : 4.59 ERA, 1.606 WHIP, 4.1 K/9, 1.06 K/BB








That is a lot of opportunity lost.   A lot of adverse results.  And this does not even include the current pitchers.  It is not one or two or 3.  Twenty.  The Twins can just not ignore this  any more...

Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde: Who really is Scott Baker?

Scott Baker had a career high 10 strikeouts yesterday, in a home game against the Cleveland Indiands; he pitched 7 innings, allowing 2 ER and 6 Hits while walking only 1. He has a no-hitter into the 4th inning. His WHIP is the lowest of all Twins' starters at 1.240 and his ERA almost dropped a whole point after his appearance yesterday. Earlier in the season, Scott Baker was plagued by multi-home run games and even allowed a home run (the first career hit of Chris Gimenez) in the 7th inning.

Is there anything that transforms Scott Baker, the Strikeout Maker to Scott "Home Run" Baker?

Lets start here:

Three weeks ago I indicated that Baker is tipping his pitches by having a higher release point for his breaking stuff that his fastballs and changes. The image I used (PitchFx data from Brooksbaseball.net) was this visualization of Baker's release point on each of his pitches broken down by pitch type from his 5/19 game vs. the Chicago White Sox:



you can see that there is a baseball difference in the height of the release of his breaking stuff (sliders and curves) vs. his fastballs and changeups.

Let's see how he did yesterday through out the game.

Here is Baker's release point on each of his pitches broken down by pitch type yesterday from innings one through five:



Much better. Only two sliders are released higher than the core of his pitches and everything is mixed up. If you look at the height of his release point (Y-axis), Baker did not move the higher breaking release point lower down to match the lower fastball point, but instead, it looks like he is pitching in between, which means that he raised his release point for his fastballs (which are his bread and butter) by standing taller when delivering, and apparently are more effective.

Let's look at his release point through the sixth inning (an additional inning of pitches added to the previous image: )



Still the core is tight with one change up (yellow) additionally thrown from the high release point.

Here is his release point through 7 innings (final for the game) :



Now you see a couple more sliders added to the high release point. When exactly were those high released sliders thrown? Guess when?

Here is Baker's release point during Chris Gimenez's AB in the 7th innning, which resulted to a home run:



Gimenez's home run came on the fastball (green), which was the third pitch of the plate appearance and was released about 7 inches lower that the previous 2 pitches. Since the data was there that Baker tips his pitches and the ball was obvious to the batter that was released from a lower point that the two previous breaking balls, guessing "fastball" was probably easy and right on the mark...

So, it seams that Scott Baker the Strikeout Maker is transformed into Scott "Home Run" Baker, by inconsistent mechanics on his fast ball delivery. It could be fatigue. It could be something obvious to Rich Anderson.

But here is a question that begs to be answered: The pitchfx data isfreely available in the internets and updated by every pitch. Why doesn't the Twins' pitching coach, instead of using a 19th century clicker to keep track of his pitchers, use a laptop to look at pitchFx data? Believe me the pitch count is there. A variation to Baker's release point should be a leading indicator for an upcoming disaster, warranting a visit to the mount and if it continues, replacement. The clicker cannot tell that. This is the 21st century Mr Anderson; welcome to it.

If you want to look at what kind of information is displayed in a pitchfx data page, here is the data from his start yesterday from Brooksbaseball.net. Make sure that you look at the different pull down menus because there is a lot of information there... More than in a clicker...

What's up with Frankie (and Andy) ?

Fransisco Liriano had another unfortunate outing today, pitching only 4 innings, surrounding 4 ER to further diminish the Twins record in day games to 3-12 and on the road to 5-16, dropping the Twins a full 6 games behind the Tigers in the loss column.

Liriano's return last season after his time in Rochester made a lot of Twins' fans hopeful about good things to come this year, based on his successful outings. Has anything changed with Liriano between last season and this season? The answer is yes.

If anything, his velocity is higher this season (average FB 91.5 mph vs. 90.9 mph in 2008, average slider 85.7 mph vs. 83.7 mph in 2008, average change up 84.1 mph vs. 82.1 mph in 2008).

However, there are 2 things different:

He is throwing his changeup less
Last season, Liriano threw 20% changeups. This season just 13.1% of his pitches have been changeups. For comparison purposes: the last three years, Johan Santana threw change ups for about 29% of his pitches and in his Cy Young years Pedro Martinez threw change ups for at least 20% of his pitches. Frankie needs to forget about going to Hollywood and start throwing his change up more.

His release point is all over the place

Here is Liriano's release point from this game (courtesy Brooksbaseball.net) :



as you can see his release point is very inconsistent and their is a good two feet horizontal difference among the release points of all his pitches. Fortunately, unlike Baker, Liriano is not tipping his pitches. Sliders, Fastballs and Change ups are released from all over the place, but they are mixed.

Let's compare this to Liriano's release point from one of his successful outings last September against the Tigers. This is his release point from an early September game, when he pitched 7 innings, walking one, stiking out 9 and having 2 ER:



Even though a few pitches were way off to the right, the main core was fairly consistent.

Let's superimpose the two images:



the release point cores of the successful Liriano (black) and unsuccessful Liriano (red) are hereby circled. As you can see, not only the successful Liriano release points are tighter, they are closer to his body. When he throws further away from his body, bad things happen.

What does need to be done for Liriano to be fixed:

a. Get him throw more change ups and
b. Correct his mechanics so his release point is i. tighter and ii. closer to his body.

Simpler said that done, but Andy is the guy with the supposed magic wand that can fix every ailing pitcher.

But is he?

This season,

Let’s see:

Liriano has been “atrocious”
Perkins has been “atrocious”
Baker has been “atrocious”
Crain has been “atrocious”
Breslow had been “atrocious”

do you think it might actually mean that Andy is the “atrocious” one here? This is a massive drop of performance in more than half of the pitching staff. Last time that happened to a team, the pitching coach was fired (see: Tigers, Detroit, 2008). Who can fix this.

My choice is one of the best pitching coaches available, who happens to be in the Twins' organization (and by coincidence is fully bi-lingual in English and Spanish, thus filling up another void in the team) : Bobby Cuellar.

Why Cuellar?

Cuellar was the pitching coach of the Mariners from 1995-96, the Expos from 1997-2000 and the Twins' AAA teams from 2002-2005 and is now the Red Wings' pitching coach.

Let's look at his track record with different pitchers:

Johan Santana
Before Cuellar: 4.74 ERA, 1.511 WHIP, 5.8 K/9, 1.75 K/BB
After Cuellar: 2.99 ERA, 1.228 WHIP, 11.4 K/9, 2.80 K/BB

Perdo Martinez
Before Cuellar: 3.70 ERA, 1.195 WHIP, 9.2 K/9, 3.17 K/BB
After Cuellar: 1.90 ERA, 0.932 WHIP, 11.4 K/9, 4.55 K/BB

Randy Johnson
Before Cuellar: 3.19 ERA, 1.186 WHIP, 10.7 K/9, 2.83 K/BB
After Cuellar: 2.48 ERA, 1.045 WHIP, 12.3 K/9, 4.52 K/BB

Jeff Nelson
Before Cuellar: 2.76 ERA, 1.299 WHIP, 9.4 K/9, 2.20 K/BB
After Cuellar: 2.17 ERA, 1.081 WHIP, 11.0 K/9, 3.56 K/BB

Norm Charlon:
Before Cuellar: 7.36 ERA, 1.727 WHIP, 4.9 K/9, 0.80 K/BB
After Cuellar: 1.51 ERA, 0.818 WHIP, 11.0 K/9, 3.63 K/BB (same season trade from PHI to SEA)

So, if you were the Twins' brass, who would you rather have as a pitching coach:

the guy who straighten up to Randy Johnson in ‘95 resulting to an 18-2, 2.48 ERA and 192 K season and started the streak of his Cy Young years,

the guy who taught the change up to Pedro Martinez in ‘97 resulting to a 17-8, 1.90 ERA and 219 K season and started the streak of his Cy Young years,

the guy who taught the change up to Johan Santana in ‘02 while in the minors, resulting to an
‘04 20-6, 2.61 ERA and 182 K season and started the streak of his Cy Young years,

or

Andy?

Hard choice?