2008 Minnesota Twins

[soohockey15]

Not going to get into a pissing match, but if YOU watched the Twins over the course of the whole year, Morneau and Nathan are more valuable and less replaceable than Mauer. Stats don't tell the whole story about a player or his season. Poll 20 Twins fans on this site and I'd be suprised if Mauer gets 5 "MVP" votes for his own team. But again to the true baseball fan and observer, Mauer is not one of the top 5 players in MLB.

I watched nearly every Twins game this season. Look, I know what you're saying, but you really don't understand this whole thing. First off, stats give you the best picture you can get. They're tangible facts that are easily observed and measured. Second, I really don't care what Twins fans think, because those people are generally wrong.

To a true baseball fan and observer, Mauer's valuableness would seem apparent. He does the single most important thing a hitter can do (get on base) better than anyone on his team and sixth best this season in all of professional baseball. He also is the best defensive player at his position in baseball. Not to mention the fact that he has two more batting titles than every other catcher in the history of baseball combined. This = MVP. Morneau is a pretty good (not great) offensive player. He plays average defense. It would be much, much harder to find a catcher to replace Mauer than a first baseman to replace Morneau.

Also, relievers are extremely extremely overrated when it comes to talking how much value they bring. Don't get me wrong, Nathan is great, but he is far from irreplaceable.

And I wouldn't say that the Twins have zero power hitters minus Morneau. Jason Kubel hit 20 home runs this year, 3 less than Morneau.

[Oxbow6]

I watched nearly every Twins game this season. Look, I know what you're saying, but you really don't understand this whole thing. First off, stats give you the best picture you can get. They're tangible facts that are easily observed and measured. Second, I really don't care what Twins fans think, because those people are generally wrong.

To a true baseball fan and observer, Mauer's valuableness would seem apparent. He does the single most important thing a hitter can do (get on base) better than anyone on his team and sixth best this season in all of professional baseball. He also is the best defensive player at his position in baseball. Not to mention the fact that he has two more batting titles than every other catcher in the history of baseball combined. This = MVP. Morneau is a pretty good (not great) offensive player. He plays average defense. It would be much, much harder to find a catcher to replace Mauer than a first baseman to replace Morneau.

Also, relievers are extremely extremely overrated when it comes to talking how much value they bring. Don't get me wrong, Nathan is great, but he is far from irreplaceable.

And I wouldn't say that the Twins have zero power hitters minus Morneau. Jason Kubel hit 20 home runs this year, 3 less than Morneau.

We'll agree to disagree on this one. Personally, I think Mauer is overrated, but you have a man-crush on him so you can roll with that. Just as long as you don't have the sideburns and eat at Jimmy Johns every night too!

[cutter]

Joe Mauer Article

Here is an interesting story that includes Mauer. In my opinion, he is the best all around player on the Twins. I'm also aware he doesn't hit homers. Hope the link works as I am uneducated when it comes to computers.

[gopherz]

Mauer is the all-around best player on the team. Offensively that has to go to Morneau.

[soohockey15]

You do make some fair points, but I don't think it's accurate to call Morneau's defense below average. I don't know that I can agree with the statement that RBIs are a bad way of measuring player production, but I will concede that other factors can and should be considered. Yes, Mauer is the best catcher in baseball. I agree with you on that point. However, I believe that if you took Morneau out of the Twins lineup for an entire season the wins total would drop lower than if you took Mauer out of the lineup for an entire season. Obviously there is no formula to prove or disprove that theory, but that is the conclusion I have come to based on following the team day in and day out for longer than either player has been with the team. I also would agree with the other opinions stated here that Nathan in addition to Morneau is more valuable than Mauer. Obviously all three of them are among the best in the league at their respective positions.

Glad you brought it up, because you actually can measure how many wins a player is worth using a BP stat called Wins Against Replacement. Mauer led Morneau 11.8 to 9.7. Mauer also led the entire AL in this category.

I think its accurate to call Morneau's defense below average by looking at this. Its not perfect, but you can't really find any good defensive metrics that say Morneau is anywhere near the top of the league defensively. He's not horrible, but he doesn't have great range and shouldn't be winning Gold Gloves any time soon. Also, there are more defensive stats to back this up.

I read another interesting thing about RBI today. This season, Morneau had 558 men on base during his at bats. That might not mean much to you, but that's the highest total in either league since 1996. Also, Morneau drove in 18.9% of runners on base while Mauer drove in 18.7%. Morneau's high RBI totals are the direct result of Mauer being on base 41.3% of the time.

[soohockey15]

I'm sorry, but I have to question this "Wins Against Replacement" stat. What exactly is the formula?

Here is the link to the explanation of what it is, but BP is secretive about their formulas. It takes into account VORP (value over replacement player) and FRAA (fielding runs above average). I used WARP3, as it is the best one to use because it sets everyone to an equal season. Complicated, yes, but these guys know what they're doing.

[soohockey15]

Gold Gloves were announced today (yesterday for the NL). Joe Mauer won the first of many he will get over the course of his career. Congrats.

[soohockey15]

I think this obscure "wins against replacement" stat is very subjective, and I maintain my opinion that Morneau is the most valuable Twin.

The funny thing is that it isn't subjective. Everything that goes into the formula is measurable. By all objective measures, Mauer is the more valuable one.

[siouxkid12]

if you really think about it, each player is just as valuable as the next. they each play different positions and each have their own strenghts and weaknesses...Justin is a power hitter that is going to drive runs in, Joe is the guy who is going to get hits, get on base and play the catcher position very well, and Joe N is just going to go about his business and close games. so to throw in a formula to prove someone is better than someone else or to just say that one person means more to the team than the other is just plain ridiculous.