Twins Week(s) in Review: 6/6-6/19
Where do the Minnesota Twins rank in myriad statistics over the last two weeks?
Welcome to The Minnesota Twins Week in Review. On Access Twins, we’ll take a deep dive into the week that was for your Twins (or in this case, two weeks since we got tied up last week). We will (usually) post on Mondays, and look back from the previous Monday to Sunday since that’s how MLB lines up its schedule.
If you have any ideas for stats to be added, please feel free to let me know in the comments, on Facebook or on Twitter!
And now, let’s talk to it:
General Team
Record: 6-6, .500 (t-13th) — 3-3 at home, 3-3 on the road
Current Fangraphs Record Projection: 84-78, .521 (1st place, no change in wins)
Current Fangraphs Division Chances: 37.3 percent (-6.3 percent)
Current Fangraphs Playoff Chances: 57.6 percent (-1.3 percent)
Baseball Prospectus PECOTA Record Projection: 86-76 (1st place, no change in wins)
Baseball Prospectus Division Chances: 45.1 percent (-8.4 percent)
Baseball Prospectus Playoff Chances: 68.4 percent (-1.2 percent)
FiveThirtyEight Record Projection: 87-75 (1st place, no change in wins)
FiveThirtyEight Division Chances: 37.0 percent (-9.0 percent)
FiveThirtyEight Playoff Chances: 61.0 percent (-2.0 percent)
Baseball-Reference Record Projection: 85-77 (2nd place, -1 win and -1 place in division)
Baseball-Reference Division Chances: 31.3 percent (-18.2 percent)
Baseball-Reference Playoff Chances: 56.6 percent (-7.7 percent)
Breakdown: Slow and steady might usually win the race, but not when the Guardians — who invade Target Field starting Tuesday — go 15-5 over their last 20 games. The Twins, by comparison, are just 9-11 in that stretch, which is not egregiously bad but certainly going to fail to stand up to just how red-hot Cleveland has been.
The best way to get in the way of someone’s hot streak is to stop it yourself. With eight of the next 11 games for the Twins coming against the Guardians, it’s “put up or shut up” time.
Hitting (with MLB rankings)
Batting Average: .268 (5th)
On-Base Percentage: .330 (10th)
Slugging Percentage: .447 (8th)
OPS: .777 (8th)
Strikeout Percentage: 19.3 percent (9th)
Walk Percentage: 8.4 percent (9th)
wOBA: .339 (8th)
wRC+: 124 (7th)
Runs Per Game: 4.67 (t-13th)
Batting Average (w/ RISP): .273 (11th)
Avg Exit Velo: 88.9 mph (7th)
Breakdown: This is a perfectly reasonable two-week run for this offense and one I could see them sustaining over the long haul. I’ve hit a lot of turbulence on Twitter when I’ve said I wouldn’t be opposed to the Twins adding hitting at the trade deadline — think Nelson Cruz or Trey Mancini — but honestly, if the prices on hitters are going to be much, much lower than pitchers (and they will) a team might as well get better in whatever way possible.
This is a good enough offense to make some noise in October if the pitching can just carry its own weight. I have a feeling we’re about to find out that neither side did so all that well these last two weeks, though.
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Starting Pitching (with MLB rankings)
IP: 57.1 (28th)
IP/GS: 4.78 (26th)
Pitches/Start: 80.0 (25th)
ERA: 5.18 (23rd)
FIP: 5.66 (28th)
xFIP: 4.82 (26th)
SIERA: 4.69 (25th)
Groundball Rate: 41.4 percent (17th)
HR/9: 2.04 (29th)
K/9: 6.12 (29th)
K%: 15.7 percent (28th)
BB/9: 2.51 (13th)
BB%: 6.5 percent (12th)
K-BB%: 9.3 percent (9th)
WHIP: 1.33 (16th)
Opponent Batting Average: .267 (19th)
Opponent On-Base Percentage: .317 (14th)
Opponent Slugging Percentage: .480 (22nd)
Opponent OPS: .797 (19th)
Avg Exit Velo: 87.3 mph (7th)
Breakdown: This is pretty much as disastrous as one might expect. The Twins need to tighten things up in the rotation, or they’re toast.
The tightrope act can work over the short term, but Cleveland is playing too well for Minnesota to be able to keep this up in the near term. On the bright side, Sonny Gray and Joe Ryan returned during this time frame and didn’t pitch enough to sway the numbers that much, and hopefully Bailey Ober and/or Josh Winder can come up and slot back into the rotation, as well.
But for now, this is a M*A*S*H unit.
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Relief Pitching (with MLB rankings)
IP: 47.2 (12th)
Innings Per Game: 3.97 (9th)
Pitches Per Game: 67.0 (6th)
ERA: 4.15 (19th)
FIP: 4.24 (18th)
xFIP: 3.83 (11th)
SIERA: 3.57 (16th)
Groundball Rate: 46.4 percent (9th)
HR/9: 1.32 (20th)
K/9: 9.82 (6th)
K%: 26.0 percent (7th)
BB/9: 4.15 (24th)
BB%: 11.0 percent (25th)
K-BB%: 15.0 percent (15th)
WHIP: 1.28 (16th)
Opponent Batting Average: .219 (12th)
Opponent On-Base Percentage: .305 (14th)
Opponent Slugging Percentage: .376 (15th)
Opponent OPS: .681 (14th)
Inherited Runners: 17 (t-10th)
Inherited Runners Scored: 1 (t-3rd)
Inherited Runners Scored Percentage: 5.9 percent (3rd)
Breakdown: I’m really not sure how to break this all down. That is, I’m not sure if this is more good than bad, or bad than good? Honestly, I think it’s fairly uninspiring but could be acceptable if the starting staff could come close to matching these marks.
An average pitching staff paired with a solid offense can take the Twins a long way this season, but right now they aren’t even getting that.
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All research is done via Sportradar’s r360, Baseball-Reference or Fangraphs unless otherwise noted.
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