Dissecting the Bill Smith Era: Other trades of 2011

Jose Morales hit .297
in his three partial
seasons with the Twins.

When: Dec. 16, 2010
What: The Twins sent catcher Jose Morales to Colorado for left-handed pitcher Paul Bargas
Value: Bargas not only hasn't reached the majors, he didn't pitch at all in 2011 because of a brain tumor. Morales opened the season as the Rockies' No. 2 catcher but had only 71 plate appearances (-0.1 WAR, 1 win share). He was nontendered this offseason and signed with the Pittsburgh Pirates.
Twins motivation: Open a spot on the 40-man roster

The Twins traded Morales because they needed roster space to re-sign Jim Thome and Carl Pavano, because he was out of options and would have to clear waivers to be sent to the minors, and because they had decided they prefered Drew Butera's defensive chops to Morales' batting average.

Bargas reported to camp with an obvious health problem and was quickly found to have a brain tumor. Chip Scoggins of the Star Tribune earlier this month wrote about Bargas, who expects to be in camp this spring. (As a sign of how much I like the piece, I link to it despite the Strib's paywall). I don't know enough about Bargas' talent to be optimistic about his future as a pitcher, but I sure will root for him. (Update: Fixed the link.)

When: Jan. 26, 2011
What: Claimed left-handed pitcher Dusty Hughes off waivers from the Kansas City Royals
Value: Hughes was awful with the Twins (9.95 ERA in 12.2 innings; -0.4 WAR, 0 win shares)
Twins motivation: What I call Craig Monroe Syndrome: He had gotten Twins lefties out while with K.C., and the Twins took this as an indication of his talent.

I still remember seeing one particularly wicked breaking ball Hughes threw in a spring training game to freeze Carl Crawford; that single pitch had me briefly convinced he was a shrewd pickup (and a silly discard by the Royals). He didn't throw enough such pitches, however.

He was outrighted in May. He has signed a minor league contract with Atlanta.

Rob Delaney wasn't
even deemed worthy
of a draft pick as an
amateur player

When: Jan. 28, 2011
What: Lost right-handed pitcher Rob Delaney on waivers to Tampa Bay
Value: Delaney made four appearances for the Rays with an ERA of 10.80; no win shares and -0.2 WAR
Twins motivation: Created a spot on the 40-man roster for Hughes.

Delaney, like Anthony Slama, put up good numbers in the minors for the Twins, but the Twins were unwilling to give him a real chance in the majors. The Rays designated Delaney for assignment in September to open a spot for phenom Matt Moore; it's unclear to me if Delaney is still in their system or if he's a free agent he signed this month with Miami.

When: March 20, 2011
What: Lost right-handed pitcher Pat Neshek on waivers to San Diego
Value: Neshek worked 24.2 innings for the Padres with an ERA of 4.01; more tellingly, he walked 22 (and struck out 20) in those 24.2 innings. He had 1 win share and 0.0 WAR.
Twins motivation: They wanted to open a spot on the 40-man roster.

It was significant that the Twins dumped Neshek even though he still had an option left; that indicates that the organization either had concluded that he was unlikely to regain his pre-injury effectiveness and/or didn't want him around.

He was up and down with the Padres, and he is currently a free agent.

When: Aug. 25, 2011
What: Lost designated hitter Jim Thome on waivers to Cleveland
Value: He had 13 win shares total for the season, 0.5 WAR with the Indians.
Twins motivation: Cleared his salary off the books for the last six weeks or so of the season, gave him a chance to be at least in the fringes of a pennant race and an opportunity to make amends with the fans of his first major league team.

Jim Thome pretended
to play third base for
one pitch against the
Twins in a September
game.

Big name, exceedingly minor deal. It was originally announced as a player-to-be-named trade, but once it was obvious that the Indians weren't making the postseason they changed it to straight cash and not much of it.

Thome has signed with Philadelphia for 2012, and the Phillies are making noises about playing him at first base on occasion. Good luck with that.

When: Sept. 27, 2011
What: Claimed right-handed pitcher Esmerling Vasquez off waivers from Arizona
Value: The Twins did not add him to the active roster for the final week of the season.
Twins motivation: He's a power arm bullpen possibility.

The Diamondbacks needed to clear space on their 40-man roster, and lopped Vasquez, who has pitched in 141 major league games for the D'backs (137 innings, 80 walks, 120 strikeouts). Good arm, uncertain control. The Twins are collecting a bunch of this kind of arm and hoping one of them can figure it out.

When: Oct. 31, 2011
What: Claimed right-handed pitcher Jeff Gray off waivers from Seattle.
Value: Has not pitched for the Twins
Twins motivation: Another bullpen option.

I'm including this transaction and the following one with the 2011 season because they came just before Bill Smith was removed from the general manager's job, and they ought to be included.

Gray is a knock-around reliever who has been in the majors with Oakland, the Cubs, the White Sox and Seattle. I'm not particularly enthused about him, and would expect that Vasquez and Lester Oliveros (and others) are ahead of him on the totem pole, but Gray is on the 40-man roster, so he's got a chance to make the team this spring.

When: Oct. 31, 2011
What: Claimed left-handed pitcher Matt Maloney off waivers from Cincinnati
Value: Has not pitched for the Twins
Motivation: Provides some depth for the starting rotation.

Maloney hasn't established himself as a major leaguer, and his stuff isn't all that impressive, but he's put up good numbers in Triple A. Maybe he's what's derisively known as a Quadruple A pitcher, but I suspect he'd be an improvement over Nick Blackburn if given a shot. Of course, Blackburn has two more years and some $10 million left on his contract, so he's got dibs on the rotation berth.

Dusty Hughes and the incompetency of the Kansas City Royals

Dusty Hughes: The
Royals had bigger
problems, but they
didn't recognize it.

The Kansas City Royals lost 95 games in 2010. This was not a fluke; they have lost at least 93 games in six of the last seven seasons.

The Kansas City Royals have Joakim Soria, which means they have the single best relief pitcher in the American League Central. But a dominant closer does not a strong bullpen make, and the rest of the bullpen was essentially an atrocity.

Late this winter, the Royals signed Jeff Francis, once the ace of the Colorado Rockies and now a rehab project, as a free agent — a totally defensible move, since the Royals' projected rotation after the Zach Grienke trade was even more an atrocity than the bullpen. They needed a spot on the 40-man roster.

They waived Dusty Hughes, arguably their second-best reliever in 2010 and certainly no worse than their third most effective bullpenner. They dumped him even though

• He has options left;
• They now have no established lefty relievers on the 40-man roster;
• They were keeping the worthless likes of Kanekoa Texeira and Jesse Chavez around.

Hughes isn't a great pitcher; he may not make the Twins roster. But he was — and remains — better than the options on hand for the Royals. They had four or five bigger problems in their bullpen than him last season.

And now — wait for it — the Royals are scraping for lefty arms for the bullpen. Of course they are.

Even sillier than valuing Chavez over Hughes is that they were/are seriously considering the likes of Danny Duffy for a relief role. Duffy is one of the reasons the Royals farm system is about as highly regarded as any in the game — not just currently, but ever. It's not a surprise that he's not quite ripe for the majors yet; he has less than 40 innings in Double A, none in Triple A.  But when he is, there is no way that the Royals should be assigning him to LOOGY duties.

It's fairly simple, really. When Duffy's ready for the majors, start him. If he's not ready, leave him in the minors and start him there. Don't waste him in the bullpen.

Handling his development properly would be a lot easier if they had kept Hughes around. But the Dayton Moore regime has never been very astute at roster management, and this is just another example.
 

Bullpen candidate profile: Dusty Hughes

The Twins picked up
Dusty Hughes on
waivers in January.

Pitcher: Dusty Hughes
Throws: Left
Age: 28
Roster status: 40-man roster; at least one option left
Chances of making team: Better than they ought to be, but probably only fair.

Option status may be key for Dusty Hughes, who is in a competition with fellow southpaws Glen Perkins and Scott Diamond for one, possibly two, spots on the roster.

Perkins is out of options and would have to clear waivers to be sent to the minors; Diamond is a Rule V player and would not only have to clear waivers but be offered back to Atlanta. Perkins and Diamond are use-or-lose; Hughes can be stashed away for future use. (I base this on a Kansas City Star article last summer on the problems in the Royals bullpen, one of which was that their most effective relievers had options left and the more incompetent ones didn't.)

The Twins apparently see more in Hughes than I do. He was OK for the Royals last year, but nothing impressive. He did get outs against the Twins, however -- a slash line against Minnesota of .209/.288/.279 -- and I fear a case of Craig Monroe Syndrome at work here. The Twins struggled to get Monroe out when he was with Detroit; they overpaid to get him; and once they had him, they discovered that the rest of the league could get him out. Which they'd have known if they had merely compared his numbers against the Twins to his overall numbers.

Hughes had a .209 batting average allowed against the Twins in 43 at-bats; his overall BA allowed was .273 (216 at-bats). Which strikes you as the better gauge of his ability?

They said, I say

Twins nuggets in the news and my reaction:

* Joe Nathan, preparing to test his reconstructed pitching elbow in spring training, invites manager Ron Gardenhire to step into the batter's box during a throwing session and says: "I wasn't afraid to come inside and brush him back a couple times."

Autograph time at Twins fest for Ron Gardenhire and
Joe Nathan, presumably after Nathan's throwing session.

I say: Pitchers coming back from ligament replacement surgery frequently find that command is an issue. This story implies that Nathan is comfortable enough with his command — the ability to locate the pitch where he wants it — to buzz his fastball off the plate inside on his manager. (It also implies that it matters to Nathan that he not hit his manager; I suspect there are pitchers who would privately love to bury a fastball in their boss' ribcage.)

* LaVelle Neal's blog has commentary on new lefty reliever Dusty Hughes from anonymous team officials:

... they really think Hughes can help. Hughes throws four pitchers — fastball, curve, slider and change — and they think he can be more than a specialty lefty.

``He's Craig Breslow, with crisper stuff,'' one said of Hughes.

I say: I'd be more impressed with this if the Twins had attached any real value to Breslow when they had him. Perhaps it was just Gardy who didn't think much of Breslow, but Breslow was seldom used in game situations and jettisoned rapidly when he hit a rough patch; since the Twins waived him, Breslow has pitched 130 innings with a 2.84 ERA and 115 strikeouts.

The four pitches thing is intriguing, though. It implies that Hughes has a starter's repertoire. That sounds better than it is for a reliever; a starter with four average major league pitches can work with that, but a reliever is better off with one or two quality offerings. Still, it worked for Matt Guerrier.

The trees behind the wall?
Going, gong ...

* The Twins will retire Bert Blyleven's Number 28 this summer, about a week before he is inducted into the Hall of Fame.

I say: No surprise there. I've figured for years that he needed to get into the Hall for his number to be retired. Unlike non-Cooperstown honorees Kent Hrbek and Tony Oliva, Blyleven spent a good portion of his career with other teams.

* The spruce trees behind Target Field's center field fence are to be removed because hitters found the movement of branches in the breeze and the shadows distracting.

I say: As a fan, I liked the trees, but if there were legitimate concerns about visibility, they had to go.

Another bullpen candidate added

Just when we figured the Twins had finished tinkering with their 40-man roster this winter ... they add Dusty Hughes, a LOOGY candidate with experience.

The initial reaction to the news is: If the Kansas City Royals waived him, what's the point in claiming him?

And that may be the final reaction as well. But it's not that difficult to see the appeal here. The Twins had three left-handed bullpen candidates on their 40-man roster -- Jose Mijares, who has repeatedly reported to camp out of shape; Glen Perkins, who does not have a track record of getting left-handers out; and Scott Diamond, a Rule 5 draftee.

The Twins waived Rob Delaney to make room on their 40 for Hughes, and it's a lot easier to imagine a scenario in which Hughes makes the 25-man roster than one in which Delaney makes it.

I don't know if Hughes has options left, and I certainly don't know why the Royals picked him to dump to open a roster spot for Jeff Francis. They would seem to have bigger bullpen problems than him. Which isn't to say he's a good pickup. His stats suggest his control isn't up to Twins standards, and he wasn't all that effective against left-handers last year (.261 batting average allowed).

He's left-handed and breathing. He adds to the Twins' options in their bullpen reconstruction project. If the Twins saw something there they can use more effectively than the Royals did, great; if he bombs, they invested little in acquiring him.