Playoff Prospectus: Oakland Athletics vs. Minnesota Twins
by Derek Zumsteg
This is my favorite playoff series, if only because it's going to finally put
the lie to Bud Selig's constant lament that no team in the lower half of payroll
has ever advanced beyond the first round of the playoffs. The Twins and the A's
were respectively 27th and 28th in ESPN's Opening Day payroll tally. I'm
surprised that the right Honorable Commissioner didn't intervene and 'fix' the
matchups in what he might see as the best interests of baseball. One of these
teams will win three games and advance, only to be immediately heralded as an
aberration, no matter what happens when they face the Yankees.
DH-B Ray Durham (.289/.374/.450/.296)*
Minnesota Twins
LF-L Jacque Jones (.300/.341/.511/.287)
Feel free to swap Mientkiewicz into #3 and Koskie to #6. I won't mind.
The A's have a better offense than the Twins do. Sure, if you're making a
player-by-player comparison, you can say "oh, but Torii Hunter's better than
Long, so that's one for the Twins, and then A.J.....". No. The A's field three
guys better than the Twins' best hitter.
Both teams have offensive holes, certainly. The A's would love for this
post-season to be played under America's Cup rules, where the winner can take
the loser's hull, for instance, and use it in the next race. The A's could take
A.J. Pierzynski and Torii Hunter to replace Hernandez and Long (both of whom got
overly generous multi-year deals in the off-season), along with most of a
bullpen (we'll get to that in a minute). Meanwhile the Yankees would beat the
Angels and pick up nobody.
The Twins have a couple of similar holes this season in Guzman and Rivas (when
healthy). They're both being played for their gloves along with Mientkiewicz,
while the A's are more willing to punt those positions for the bats they so
easily turn up, like Scott Hatteberg.
The story, of course, is going to be two low-budget teams defying baseball, one
of them slated for destruction so their quadrillionaire owner could make an
extra $250m. You've got your choice of young, scrappy heroes: the blue-collar,
working-class little-ball offense of the Twins against the swaggering,
working-class blue-collar baseball of the A's. Will scrap and grit overcome the
three-run homer? Oakland's team line is .261/.339/.431, while the Twins put up
a .272/.332/.437. Looks pretty even as long as you ignore the Metrodome being a
hitter's park while the Al Davis Reconfigurable Hole plays as a pitcher's park;
the respective ballpark effects on run-scoring from 1999-2001 show up with the
Metrodome clocking in at 110, and the ADRH at 90.
The real key here is that the Twins are going to see Hudson-Mulder-Zito the
first three games, and they suck against lefties. The Twins put up a bad
.252/.318/.411 line against southpaws this season. If you're into even smaller
sample sizes, they hit a pathetic .234/.279/.383 against the A's this year. The
reverse is interesting -- the A's hit .267/.337/.430, almost 60 points of OPS
goodness. Yeah, I know, that's not fair because the Twins have been patching
their rotation together with seaweed and snot. But there it remains. Even if
Hudson fails, Mulder and Zito are going to eat this offense like so much
delicious clubhouse nigiri.
1B/OF-L John Mabry (.276/.324/.526/.292)
Minnesota Twins
OF/1B-R Michael Cuddyer (.257/.305/.431/.261)
Here's a bold prediction, the kind you can only get with the kind of in-depth
analysis you get on Internet web sites that offer playoff preview coverage: If
this series ends up an epic battle of late-inning pinch-hitting dramatics, it
will be a surprise.
With three starters, Oakland's probably going to go in with six relievers, which
leaves room for six guys on the bench, although they're not much help. As much
as I'm a card-carrying member of the Billy Beane fan club, was that really the
best bench he could hook us up with? Couldn't he have ripped off the Brewers
for Matt Stairs and Israel Alcantara? Sure, Mabry's hit well, but... John Mabry
has hit well? I mean seriously, come on now. How long before he turns up on
Fox's "Wildest Alien Autopsies Gone Wrong" (coming this fall, narrated
by Jonathan Frakes)? What's interesting to me is that Mabry/Saenz offer two
almost-identical pinch-hitting options: guys who can get the ball in play and
hit for decent power. Potentially Art Howe could burn them in every game with
amusing on-deck antics, announcing one and sending the other up if they put in a
new reliever, or sending one up in the other's uniform. Seriously, how many
people could describe John Mabry or Olmedo Saenz well enough for a police sketch
artist, not including Chris Kahrl and other people who are professionally
obsessed with bench depth and the 11th man in the bullpen? Four? Five?
Restovich is only wishful thinking on my part. You name Mike Duvall, who's on
the 60-day DL, to the playoff roster, and then replace him with Restovich, using
the Seattle Mariners Memorial Playoff Roster Loophole. Cuddyer and Restovich
could be worth some runs against Mulder/Zito in tight late-inning situations.
I'd go farther than that and look to replace one of the lefties with
Cuddyer/Restovich in the starting lineup. However, the Twins have already made
their decision, sending Restovich away to the AFL.
Denny Hocking may not have a huge impact on the way the series breaks, but he'll
certainly make our lives more entertaining with his post-game quote antics. If
Denny Hocking came to my town as a stand-up act, I'd be there with bells on.
There should be a post-season roster spot available for hilarious bench jockeys
who would still get a full share of the winnings.
RHP Tim Hudson (3.5, 2.98, 238 1/3)
Minnesota Twins
RHP Brad Radke (-0.2, 4.72, 118 1/3)
RHP Kyle Lohse (0.7, 4.23, 180 2/3)
What kind of playoff rotation features Rick Reed as its highlight? Ladies and
gentlemen, your 2002 Minnesota Twins playoff rotation. It's subject to change,
obviously. Their rotation was decimated and it appears that they've decided to
take their chances on these guys being healthy, rather than go with the horses
they know. And there you have them, dice rolls.
You can see they've all lost some time to injuries, and there's the huge
gamble/wild-ass guess that Joe Mays is getting better, although that's not
really the case.
Since coming off of the DL in late July,
Mays has gone four for 13 in disaster starts (1+R/IP) and has struck out more
than four only once. At least he's kept his walks down. He's relying on his
defense, and that's the sort of thing that could bite him in the ass pretty
quickly if his luck, such as it's been, runs out. Anyone who traded for Eric
Milton in their keeper fantasy leagues to get a top-flight left-handed starter
and gave up a prospect like Austin Kearns must feel pretty stupid right
now.
Since coming back from his
trip to the DL, Milton's gotten socked around too.
It should seem obvious that the Twins should start Kyle Lohse, at least over
Mays. He earned it, while Mays is a huge and dumb gamble. Milton I can accept,
because he makes some of those Oakland lefties mortal or forces Saenz-type
players into the starting lineup, but Mays? Earl Weaver liked to say that you
can screw around with getting guys playing time and seeing what they're up to,
but come September, you pick the guys who had played well that year, and you
take them into the post-season. Earl Weaver won a lot of games. Fortunately
for the Twins, none of these guys have to go too deep into the game, because of
their strong bullpen. But a disaster start in a five-game series is almost a
ticket home in itself.
Oakland's pitchers? Yeah, these guys can pitch some. I don't buy Art Howe's
excuse for the three-man rotation, "that we've been bit by going the other
way before" or some such nonsense. If this decision isn't driven from
research and careful thought, I'm a scratch golfer.
RHP Billy Koch (12.2, 3.01, 93 2/3)
Minnesota Twins
LHP Eddie Guardado (13.1, 2.93, 67 2/3)
This is where the Twins really shine. That Twins bullpen is shockingly good.
Sure, we've all watched their progress, seen them up at the top of
Michael
Wolverton's Reliever reports, but to line them up like that... it's a beautiful
thing. Even better, having a balanced bullpen with three lefties like this--and
quality lefties, we're not talking Doug Creek--is that this means the
Twins have a huge amount of in-game flexibility to bring in a reliever to face a
couple of guys and not run out of guys who pitch from that side.
The Twins nominal closer isn't even the second-best guy in that bullpen.
Guardado is the fourth-best guy the Twins bring out late in games. The A's
might actually be relieved to see him.
J.C. Romero, I've been informed, is not the second career of failed game
designer John Cameron Romero of Daikatana
fame, so kindly refrain from taunting
him about turning once-cute-and-interesting Killcreek
into a generic, vapid,
Barbie to satisfy his whim for a commodity girlfriend. This is Juan Carlos
Romero, and he has talent.
Mike Jackson's post-season trip with the Twins is just another way station along
his storied career, fitting into some pens with great results, getting shelled
in others. If you're an Oakland fan, remember that Mike Jackson's had some
traumatic post-season outings lately that might come back to him. And try and
forget that Billy Koch has had some really Isringhausen-esque save appearances
this year.
Lidle moves to long relief after being bumped from the rotation as they go to the
three-man. I'm guessing (again) on Ted Lilly as a non-specialist lefty. The
A's will want to bring two left-handers against the Twins lefty-heavy lineup,
and between Lilly and Mike Venafro, I flipped a coin and came up Lilly.
Chad Bradford looked great early in the year and had a particularly rough
September where he gave up a run an inning, but he's still an extreme
groundballer and exactly the kind of guy you bring in with a guy on first and
one out, trying to start the double-play.
Sure, Torii Hunter makes Terrence Long look really bad.... really, really bad
(and I'd like to take this opportunity to point out that Mike Cameron, in turn,
lords over Torii Hunter this year. Go look up the stats, I'll wait here.). And
Jacque Jones makes David Justice look like Glenallen Hill. And Dustan Mohr
makes Jermaine Dye look like an injured Paul O'Neill.
But Miguel Tejada's been better than Christian Guzman this year. Eric Chavez
whips Corey Koskie. Mark Ellis has looked much better than Luis Rivas, who may
still be recovering from that broken bone in his arm. Okay, Mientkiewicz is
better than whoever the A's trot out at first.
In fact, if you look at our delicious
Defensive Efficiency Report
you'll see the two
teams are neck and neck. Now, DER is not to be taken too seriously--it's a big
simplification and not the kind of fine-tuned sabermetric tool we'd use for
player evaluation. What you see in their proximity is that the A's advantage in
the infield, where they see a ton of chances, makes up for their poorer outfield
defense. It makes sense. A defensive upgrade at shortstop is hugely more
important than a defensive upgrade in left field, for instance, or first base.
His opponent is Ron Gardenhire, who claims to be big into the Tom Kelly school
of managing, but isn't. The Twins ranked 8th in the league in steals, but was
second in being caught stealing, which put them dead last in stolen base
percentage. He's managed his bullpen well, which doesn't bode well for the A's
in the late innings. Gardenhire's going to run against the A's--he's got a
contact team that hits doubles and triples and is good on the basepaths, and
he'll be trying to maximize that strength by having guys on second to score on a
contact hit. A's opponents are only getting caught 41% stealing against them,
(68 SB, 46 CS), which is more than enough to encourage a guy who runs with so
little success normally. Look for the Twins to run themselves out of some
chances.
Derek Zumsteg is an author of Baseball Prospectus. You can contact him by
clicking here.
1B-L Scott Hatteberg (.280/.374/.433/.292)
SS-R Miguel Tejada (.308/.354/.508/.300)
3B-L Eric Chavez (.275/.348/.513/.296)
RF-R Jermaine Dye (.252/.333/.459/.281)
LF-L David Justice (.266/.376/.410/.289)
2B-R Mark Ellis (.272/.359/.394/.277)
CF-L Terrence Long (.240/.298/.390/.245)
C-R Ramon Hernandez (.233/.313/.335/.241)
* combined season totals
SS-B Cristian Guzman (.273/.292/.385/.236)
3B-L Corey Koskie (.267/.368/.447/.286)
DH-L David Ortiz (.272/.339/.500/.290)
CF-R Torii Hunter (.289/.334/.524/.294)
1B-L Doug Mientkiewicz (.261/.365/.392/.276)
RF-R Dustan Mohr (.269/.325/.433/.265)
C-L A.J. Pierzynski (.300/.334/.439/.271)
2B-R Luis Rivas (.256/.305/.392/.246)
1B-R Olmedo Saenz (.271/.350/.465/.289)
UT-R Randy Velarde (.227/.327/.333/.251)
OF-R Eric Byrnes (.247/.294/.430/.264)
OF-R Adam Piatt (.237/307/.407/.256)
C-L Greg Myers (.224/.343/.385/.267)
INF-R Frank Menechino (.200/.309/323/.236)
DH-R Matt LeCroy (.260/.303/.448/.257)
OF-B Bobby Kielty (.289/405/.474/.312)
UT-B Denny Hocking (.251/.311/.324/.229)
C-R Tom Prince (.226/.319/.395/.250)
OF-R Mike Restovich (AAA: .285/.353/.542; major league EqA: .251)
LHP Mark Mulder (2.4, 3.47, 207 1/3)
LHP Barry Zito (4.4, 2.78, 223 1/3)
RHP Joe Mays (-0.5, 5.38, 95 1/3)
RHP Rick Reed (1.0, 3.78, 188)
LHP Eric Milton (0.0, 4.84, 171)
LHP Ricardo Rincon (9.5, 4.18, 56)*
RHP Chad Bradford (9.3, 3.11, 75 1/3)
RHP Jim Mecir (6.0, 4.26, 67 2/3)
LHP Ted Lilly (3.6, 3.69, 100)*
RHP Cory Lidle (0.8, 3.89, 192)
*combined season totals
LHP J.C. Romero (25.5, 1.89, 81)
RHP Tony Fiore (19.6, 3.16, 91)
RHP LaTroy Hawkins (16.3, 2.13, 80 1/3)
RHP Mike Jackson (10.0, 3.27, 55)
LHP Johan Santana (9.0, 2.99, 108 1/3)
(RHP Kyle Lohse listed with the starters)