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Friday, May 12, 2006
Top 40 Minnesota Twins: #26 Eddie Guardado EDWARD ADRIAN GUARDADO | SP/RP | 1993-2003 | CAREER STATS Guardado began the 1993 season at Double-A and went 4-0 with a 1.24 ERA in 10 starts, posting a fantastic 57-to-10 strikeout-to-walk ratio in 65.1 innings. Combined with his work at high Single-A the previous season, Guardado was an astounding 11-0 with a 1.41 ERA and 96-to-20 strikeout-to-walk ratio over the span of 17 minor-league starts. The Twins had seen enough, promoting Guardado to the big leagues, and his major-league debut came on June 13, 1993. Starting against the last-place A's at the Metrodome, Guardado's first inning was an interesting one. His first pitch was to Rickey Henderson, the greatest leadoff hitter of all time, and he got the future Hall of Famer to ground out to second baseman Chuck Knoblauch. The second batter Guardado faced was native Minnesotan and former University of Minnesota star Terry Steinbach, who officially welcomed Guardado to the big leagues by homering. Brent Gates, another former Gophers star, stepped to the plate after Steinbach and flied out to right field. Guardado then got out of the inning by inducing a fly out to left field off the bat of Ruben Sierra, who like both Steinbach and Gates later went on to play for the Twins. After facing Oakland's assortment of Hall of Famers, former Gophers, and future Twins, Guardado quickly learned that there's a huge difference between Double-A and the big leagues. The A's knocked him out of the game in the middle of the fourth inning, having scored three runs with two more runners on base. Reliever Mike Hartley came in and got Henderson to ground into an inning-ending double play to get Guardado off the hook for any additional runs, and he ended up with a no-decision. Guardado went on to appear in a total of 19 games for the Twins in 1993, making 16 starts, and went 3-8 with a 6.18 ERA in 94.2 innings. That earned him a trip back to the minors in 1994, and Guardado went 12-7 with a 4.84 ERA in 24 starts at Triple-A before the Twins called him up again in early July. Guardado went 0-2 with an 8.47 ERA in four starts before the players' strike ended the season in mid-August. Guardado began the strike-shortened 1995 season as a long reliever, but was moved back into the starting rotation in late May. He once again struggled as a starter, going 0-5 with a ghastly 9.28 ERA in five starts. Combined with his numbers from 1993 and 1994, that gave Guardado the following career numbers as a major-league starting pitcher: GS W L ERA IP H SO BB G W L ERA IP H SO BB Guardado was initially used as a LOOGY, combining to throw 233 innings in 294 games from 1996-1999 for an average of just 0.8 innings per appearance. Then in 2000 the Twins started using him as a more typical one-inning setup man and that's when Guardado really began to thrive. He went 7-4 with nine saves and a 3.94 ERA in 61.2 innings, posting a 52-to-25 strikeout-to-walk ratio while holding opponents to a .238 batting average. The Twins began the 2001 season with Hawkins as their closer and Guardado as his primary setup man, and it worked well for a while. The team shocked the baseball world by leading the division at the All-Star break and Hawkins had 23 saves with a 3.48 ERA. However, as the entire team fell apart in the second half so did Hawkins. In 17.2 post-break innings he gave up 21 earned runs on his way to a 0-3 record and 10.70 ERA. It was a complete implosion and very painful to watch, and while it didn't occur until it was too late the Twins eventually took away Hawkins' closer job and handed it to Guardado. Guardado converted nine of the 10 save chances he was given down the stretch to finish the year 7-1 with 12 saves and a 3.51 ERA in 66.2 innings, and never looked back. He entered the 2002 season as the full-time closer and the Twins began a string of three straight division titles. Unlike Hawkins the year before, Guardado was fantastic from April to September. He converted 14 straight saves to begin the year and ended up saving a league-leading 45 games with a 2.93 ERA while making his first All-Star team and finishing 15th in the AL MVP balloting. Trusted with ninth-inning duties again in 2003, Guardado put together a great, nearly identical year: YEAR G IP ERA SV OAVG After 14 years in the Twins organization, including 11 seasons in the big leagues and two great years as closer, Guardado became a free agent in the winter of 2003. Both Guardado and the team spoke of wanting him to return, but the Twins used the money they would have needed to re-sign him (and Hawkins, who also left) to bring back Shannon Stewart, and then brilliantly found Guardado's replacement in Joe Nathan. Guardado signed a three-year deal with the Mariners worth $13 million and the Twins used one of the draft picks they received as compensation to select former Gophers ace Glen Perkins. Guardado pitched well in his first two years in Seattle, but struggled through injuries on two last-place teams. This season he lost the closer job during the first week of May after blowing three early saves, and at 35 years old may be nearing the end of the line. His 36 wins and 4.52 ERA in a Twins uniform aren't particularly impressive-looking, but after moving to the bullpen Guardado was one of the most consistent, durable, and valuable relievers in the league for nine years. Removing his horrendous numbers as a starter from the equation, Guardado had a 3.98 ERA in 572 innings as a reliever while pitching at a time when the league ERA was around 4.75. Plus, those chants of "Eddie! Eddie! Eddie!" were sure a lot of fun. TOP 25 ALL-TIME MINNESOTA TWINS RANKS:     
Thursday, May 11, 2006
Twins NotesJust over a month into the season, veteran Juan Castro is doing exactly what the Twins had hoped he would do in his first season as an everyday player.It's one thing for the reporter--in this case Jason Williams--to quote Ron Gardenhire saying laudatory things about Juan Castro without calling him on it. After all, as a reporter it's not Williams' job to inject his own opinions into a story. However, not only does Williams buy into the company line about Castro, printing Gardenhire's praise like it's fact, he goes a step further by adding in his own editorialization that "Castro is doing exactly what the Twins had hoped he would do." I get scolded at times for taking local mainstream writers to task, and behind the scenes I hear from people who know the writers that they don't appreciate it. I can understand that, but I think you're pretty much asking for it when you report the silliness that comes out of the manager's mouth and then add your own two cents in agreement with a guy hitting .222/.255/.267 "doing exactly what the Twins had hoped he would do." All I ask from the people covering the Twins in the mainstream media is that they remain objective and critical, and avoid drinking the kool-aid when it comes to things like Castro doing anything but dragging the team down. It's sad that so many of them can't meet those very simple standards and even sadder still that the people in charge of bringing baseball coverage to the mainstream audience are incapable of recognizing that someone with a .500 OPS could be part of the problem. When you combine a lack of objectivity and the inability to criticize the people you rely on for information with shoddy analysis and misguided attempts at editorializing ... well, it's the reason non-mainstream sites like this one are popular, I suppose. Still, I'd rather just have some good Twins coverage in the newspaper. (For the record: This is the first time I've specifically criticized Williams in this space. Just something to consider before all the inevitable cries of me having some sort of ax-grinding agenda towards him come rolling in.) Plus, Castro was taken off the hook for as many as three additional errors by a very "friendly" official scorer at the Metrodome earlier this month. Add those in and his fielding percentage would drop to .937. Let's see Williams put that in the newspaper. The Twins have the option of bringing Hunter back for $12 million next season, which doesn't appear likely to happen. If he's worth $12 million it's certainly not to a team will a $70 million payroll, and rather than lose Hunter for nothing this offseason the Twins would be smart to entertain offers. In fact, if the Twins hold on to Hunter throughout an 80-win season they will have compounded the error of paying him too much by letting him walk for nothing. In Sunday's New York Post, Joel Sherman offered up this completely unsubstantiated tidbit about Hunter's potential availability: An AL official said if the gap remains wide between Minnesota and the front group of the White Sox, Tigers and Indians, "I can definitely see the Twins putting Torii Hunter on the trade market."A Cardinals blogger recently heard ESPN's Buster Olney on local radio talking about who St. Louis might go after via trade and reported the following: Buster Olney was on KFNS' Morning Grind and mentioned that [Cardinals general manager Walt Jocketty] has been hot to trot on 2 Twins: Torii Hunter and Shannon Stewart.Similarly, the Los Angeles Times' national baseball writer, Tim Brown, speculated that the Dodgers may be a potential suitor for Hunter and/or Stewart: The Dodgers have their eye on a pair of Twin outfielders, Torii Hunter and Shannon Stewart, who are in the final seasons of their contracts and probably will be dealt as the suddenly pitching-thin Twins plummet in the American League Central.Despite a hot start, Shannon Stewart's .295/.352/.384 hitting line is close to the .274/.323/.388 he hit last season. In other words, the days of Stewart hitting .300/.375/.450 are pretty safely in the rearview mirror. Toss in increasingly shaky defense and his always-present rag arm, and what you have is a 32-year-old pending free agent who is a below-average left fielder. Hunter and Stewart will combine to make over $16 million this season and in all likelihood will both be lost for nothing as free agents this winter. By trading them the Twins would clear a huge amount of money to potentially be spent next season while also bringing in some younger players who can be a part of the team's future. Any realistic long-term view of the team that doesn't have them winning close to 90 games this season will show that trading Hunter and Stewart makes sense. Rangers rookie John Koronka pitched 6 1/3 innings, allowed three runs and earned the win in Texas' 6-4 victory against Minnesota. Over the past two seasons, rookie starting pitchers are 10-4 with a 3.11 ERA against the Twins. That's the highest winning percentage and lowest ERA for rookie starters against any American League team over that period.Wonderful. With [Carlos] Silva throwing sinkers, we're trying to get a little more movement in the infield, especially on the left side. I know Luis moves around a little better than Batista side-to-side, and he always seems to throw out better at-bats, too.So Rodriguez has more range defensively and has better at-bats, yet Batista made his triumphant return to the lineup yesterday. After going 0-for-4 while grounding into a double play with the bases loaded, he's now hitting .238/.292/.362 with two homers and nine RBIs in 29 games. I'd ask for about the millionth time why exactly Batista is on this team, but it's not like anyone could have possibly seen this coming.
Wednesday, May 10, 2006
Now That's a BoxscoreApparently the Twins' lineup is allowed one big game every two weeks. They dropped 13 runs on the Blue Jays in the second game of the year, scored 12 runs against the Angels on April 19, and then exploded for 15 runs against the Rangers last night.After scoring six runs in the first inning and knocking starter Kevin Millwood out of the game in the second, I expected the Twins to get shut down by the Rangers' relievers as they so often are. Instead, they kept pounding out hits--19 in total--and scored at least one run off each of five Texas pitchers until they had put together the following gorgeous boxscore: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 R H E Michael Cuddyer continued his hot hitting with doubles in each of his first three at-bats, giving him a remarkable 10 doubles in 67 at-bats on the year to go along with a .343 batting average and 1.054 OPS. Justin Morneau homered once off a righty and once off a lefty, driving in a career-high six runs to take over the team lead from Hunter with 23 RBIs. Even Rondell White got into the action, collecting two bloop hits in a season full of line drives that have found gloves.  In one night the Twins' offense went from averaging 4.1 runs per game to 4.4 runs per game, moving from 13th in the league to 10th while the team batting average rose from .257 to .264. And unlike the lineup's mini-outburst last week, the damage lasted all game and most of it came against an actual major league-quality pitcher (pictured below wanting to kill himself).  It was the most runs the Twins have scored since crossing the plate 16 times on June 1, 2004. To put into context how long ago that was, Doug Mientkiewicz, Alex Prieto, Jose Offerman, Henry Blanco, and Cristian Guzman appeared in the game. Looking at those names, it's a wonder they scored any runs at all. The lucky pitcher that day was Carlos Silva, who also happened to be on the mound for the heavy dose of run support last night (and he needed it, giving up five runs on 11 hits in six innings).
Tuesday, May 09, 2006
Rangers 6, Twins 4Last night's game was broadcast on ESPN, which gave me a chance to listen to friend of AG.com Jon Sciambi do the play-by-play in his always excellent style. It also gave color commentator Rick Sutcliffe a chance to show that he hasn't kept very good tabs on the Twins of late. After Torii Hunter made a horrible decision on the bases to get doubled off of first base, Sutcliffe said it was "not something you expect to see from the Minnesota Twins."While true at some point in the last decade, that's clearly no longer the case. The Twins routinely make bone-headed plays on the bases, often look sloppy in the field defensively, and frequently fail to run hard on ground balls and pop ups. Whatever mandate on hustle that Tom Kelly left with the Twins stuck with Ron Gardenhire for a while, but has gradually lessened to the point of being almost non-existent. Later, when discussing the Twins' problems preventing runs this season, Sutcliffe opined that "you can't blame it on the Twins' defense, because they're the best in the league." Of course, what Sutcliffe failed to mention is that the Twins being "the best in the league" is based solely on their low error total and completely ignores the fact that they've been horrible at actually turns balls in play into outs all year. True to form, balls were blooping in and bouncing past fielders all game. Moments later Sutcliffe quoted Tony Batista's prior RBI totals as evidence that "he's been a very good player," which is like quoting McDonald's "millions served" totals as evidence that their food is good for you. I'm not Sutcliffe's biggest fan, but I don't mean to pick on him specifically. Rather, listening to someone unfamiliar with the team spout such hogwash really helped explain why so many people have trouble spotting the Twins' current problems. The defense, particularly on the left side, is horrible. Because of Batista's miniscule range moving laterally and Juan Castro's circular routes to grounders in the hole, anything hit more than a foot to Batista's left ends up rolling into left field. Similarly, anything hit in the air to left field is an adventure, as Shannon Stewart tracks the ball like he's on skates with his eyes closed. And whether by ground or by air, once Stewart picks a hit up off the grass his rainbow throws to the cutoff man allow runners to consistently take extra bases. Regarding Stewart's shaky defense, here's an interesting note from the Minneapolis Star Tribune about Torii Hunter's sprawling catch to preserve Johan Santana's no-hitter Sunday: Magglio Ordonez led off the fifth inning with a drive toward the left-center field gap. With his team leading 3-0 and Santana still perfect, Hunter was shading Ordonez to right field.The infuriating stance that the defense is great as long as no one makes errors ignores the fact that you literally can't make an error when you don't actually get in position to field the ball. If you just let it roll past you or fall in front of you, there's no danger of hurting the team's fielding percentage. That Sutcliffe doesn't realize how misleading the Twins' error total is doesn't surprise me, but that people who watch this team on a regular basis are unable to look past the errors to see a horrible defense is astounding. A few other thoughts while watching the Twins drop to 13-19, including 3-13 on the road ... vs LHP vs RHP Cuddyer has looked good in right field despite playing third base for much of last season, displaying decent range and a top-notch throwing arm, and is hitting .323 with a 1.002 OPS on the year. Since May 1 of last season he's batting .281/.350/.475 with 14 homers and 29 doubles in 412 at-bats. Yet for all the Twins' offensive struggles Cuddyer has yet to receive as many as even 425 at-bats in a season and has just 62 at-bats in 32 games this year. Gardenhire pinch-hit Luis Rodriguez for Batista leading off the ninth inning, which brings up the obvious question of why Batista starts over Rodriguez in the first place. Then Gardenhire let Punto hit with one out while Lew Ford sat on the bench, despite Gardenhire spending much of last month saying that Ford was one of the team's best hitters. As usual, the lack of consistency and logical thought in Gardenhire's decision-making is depressing.
Monday, May 08, 2006
Minor-League Notes (Hitters)The homer is particularly good news for Span, because while he is considered a very good defensive outfielder with a ton of speed and good on-base skills, he hit a grand total of one homer in 453 at-bats last season.Unfortunately, Span has gone homerless in the 24 games since then and now sports the following season totals at Double-A New Britain: G AB AVG OBP SLG HR XBH BB SO When you have almost zero power, the key to becoming a quality hitter is getting on base. A big part of that is drawing walks, but because pitchers aren't going to pitch around a guy who goes deep once a year you have to make outstanding contact to fight off tough pitches and work long counts. This is how Luis Castillo walks 60-70 times per season and gets on base at a .375 clip despite the fact that no one is afraid to throw him strikes. The same is true for guys like Dave Roberts and Juan Pierre, left handed-hitting center fielders who are better comps for Span than the switch-hitting Castillo is (especially since Castillo has plenty of power from the right side). Span has been able to draw a fair number of walks in the minors, but that he's struck out in 16 percent of his at-bats at Double-A over the past two seasons is not a great sign (although Roberts struck out at a similar rate in the minors). G AB AVG OBP SLG HR XBH BB SO If the Twins ever hope to assemble a quality lineup without bringing in a power hitter from outside the organization, Moses and Jason Kubel are huge keys. Both guys have the potential to be middle-of-the-order hitters, but both also have major question marks at this point. If Moses can continue to hit like this while remaining at third base (he has eight errors already), he's got a good chance of starting for the Twins next spring. G AB AVG OBP SLG HR XBH BB SO G AB AVG OBP SLG HR XBH BB SO
When what you've been doing is deemed not good enough and you can see your prime years being squandered, it's not surprising that patience at the plate goes right out the window. Restovich and perhaps now Bartlett are reminders that prospects aren't like bottled water or tomato sauce--you can't just stash them away in the same place for years and then expect them to be just as good when you're finally ready for them. The Twins tried to address the system's lack of middle-infield talent by drafting several of them in early rounds recently, but thus far none of them have impressed. The biggest disappointment in the group is Trevor Plouffe, the 2004 first-round pick who hit .223/.300/.345 at low Single-A last season. At high Single-A Fort Myers this year Plouffe is batting .232/.361/.283 with zero homers, five total extra-base hits, and 21 strikeouts in 27 games, although he has walked 18 times. Paul Kelly and Drew Thompson, who were both taken out of high school in the second round last year, are hitting .273/.339/.382 and .229/.315/.344 respectively as the double-play combination at low Single-A Beloit. From Guzman and Rivas to Castro and the current crop of young middle infielders, the Twins appear to be stuck in a different era when it comes to evaluatating and developing shortstops and second basemen. Somehow most other organizations are able to find guys who can play capable defense at an up-the-middle infield spot while also hitting with some power, yet the Twins draft, develop, and give regular playing time to punchless glovemen on an annual basis. All of which wouldn't be so bad if the team was getting big-time offense from the corner spots or had a ton of power-hitting prospects on the horizon, but obviously that's not the case either. G AB AVG OBP SLG HR XBH BB SO Rabe's Isolated Discipline is in line with his career numbers and his .096 Isolated Power means that he's actually hitting for significantly less power than in the past. In other words, unless he's suddenly become a .340 hitter after years of hitting in the low .200s, Rabe is going to come back down to earth once a few of those singles start finding gloves. He is no more of a prospect or long-term option in the Twins' outfield than Michael Ryan was, although the fans in Rochester surely aren't complaining.
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