Thursday, September 22, 2016

Contemplating Trevor May

Trevor May's '"pars
defect" was missed
repeatedly over the
past 13 months.
Trevor May, it turns out, has been trying to pitch for more than a year with a stress fracture in his back.

That had to hurt. It certainly didn't work. He had a 5.27 ERA in 42.2 innings. He gave up seven homers. He was charged with 10 wild pitches. His walk rate rose sharply.

As did his strikeout rate. The Twins had counted on May during the offseason to be significant part of their 2016 bullpen, and when he was relatively pain-free (which wasn't often) he was effective.

I wrote recently of Kyle Gibson that his regression this year was one of the biggest reasons for the failure of the 2016 Twins. So was the bullpen collapse. The late innings foursome of Glen Perkins, Kevin Jepsen, May and Casey Fien was expected to be a strength. It was exactly the opposite.

The plan now is for May to return to being a starting pitcher. Whether that plan survives the arrival of the new regime is, obviously, unknown.

1 comment:

  1. Whether it was a regeime problem or colossal bad luck that have put the Twins in the hole they are in now may never be known.

    I do not think Ryan got stupid over night.

    When teams get old they fall in the standings.

    Except for the Yankees or maybe the Dodgers none climb out of the doldrums very quickly.

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