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Linsanity 2.0? (Tzu-Wei Lin)
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Post by sibbysisti on Jun 30, 2017 7:02:27 GMT -5
Good call on the history of Taiwan. The army we supported to oppose Mao, and lost, landed in Taiwan after the fight for power in China following liberation from Japan at the end of WWII. The indigenous people of those offshore islands were isolated in those mountains, a completely different culture, and were, essentially colonized by Chiang. How isolated? More than a decade later, one of the first American GI's wounded in Viet Nam was a reconaissance photographer during an early pre-war exploratory phase. Despite a lengthy era of French colonization and modernization in cities, this photographer was shot on a remote mountain by a Montagnard arrow. Got a purple heart. Most Montagnard arrows were deadly poisoned. Fortunately, this one was not. The point is, such isolated mountain folk in Taiwan, Southeat Asia, Indonesia, Tibet resisted centuries of colonization and "progress" by Asian, European and Islamic colonizers. We don't know much about Lin's background, but it must be interesting. I concur that his new hitting mechanics may make him (perhaps with a Marrerro platoon off the bench) a very good 3B for the Sox for a while, and a very good Sox utility guy going forward. He seems to be making the most of his good fortune. Very interesting background from you and Norm on Lin. I noticed that he does not have typical Chinese features like Chen, Chiang and others. Enjoying his play thusfar. Who knows when and if Holt can return. So it's good to have a player with the versatility of Lin around to fill the void.
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Post by tjb21 on Jun 30, 2017 14:54:17 GMT -5
Seeing a prospect get called up is one of my favorite parts about baseball. Good for him!
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Post by azblue on Jun 30, 2017 15:06:05 GMT -5
there are no "typical Chinese features." China is a massive country with many ethnic groups.
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Post by sox fan in nc on Jun 30, 2017 15:33:32 GMT -5
Gotta be tough on Marrero. You can only have so many players leapfrog you in the organization before you hang 'em up. He's not even a AAAA player. I really feel for him. It's not like he hasn't gotten his shot. How many minor leaguers would kill for ONE shot.
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Post by Chris Hatfield on Jun 30, 2017 16:12:00 GMT -5
So Lin and Longhi have me thinking. Both players made significant alterations to their hitting mechanics this offseason designed to put the ball in the air more often. Now, this sort of thing has happened in the past, but I know at least with Longhi, his changes were done with a mind towards the new Statcast-type analytics - things like launch angle and such. I'm not sure if Lin's changes were that specific, but they've certainly had that kind of effect. It will be interesting, over the next year or two, how many players we hear about that do this sort of thing. I look forward to being wrong about guys because we failed to predict they'd completely change their swings. (Not in italics because I do look forward to it, implied snark in the sentence there may be. )
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Post by jchang on Jun 30, 2017 16:34:45 GMT -5
there are no "typical Chinese features." China is a massive country with many ethnic groups. true, but the Taiwanese indigenous people are noticeably distinct from the Chinese mainlanders. The same is true of the indigenous people of Japan. If you look at paintings of famous Japanese samurai, many of them look nothing like common orientals, they might have brown curly hair. City slickers might look down on hillbillies, but if there is going to be a fight, you want the hillbillies on your side.
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Post by sox fan in nc on Jul 5, 2017 13:47:46 GMT -5
Interesting quote last night from the ESPN feed (Eduardo Perez). He suggested the Sox might be "showcasing" Lin to be a sweetener in a trade.
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Post by Chris Hatfield on Jul 5, 2017 14:03:25 GMT -5
Interesting quote last night from the ESPN feed (Eduardo Perez). He suggested the Sox might be "showcasing" Lin to be a sweetener in a trade. I can't say that I agree with him. Calling a guy like Lin (i.e., not a top prospect like a Benintendi who you're calling up to hopefully take a starting job for, well, many seasons) up to MLB straight from Double-A reeks of desperation, not wanting to showcase him. This isn't a last-place team that wants other clubs to see what a guy looks like in MLB and can afford to lose games if he fails. Also, if you wanted him to look his best for scouts, you'd leave him in the lowest level possible, no? It's not like teams don't scout Double-A and wouldn't know about him otherwise. It'd be one thing if they were negotiating with a team that wanted to see what a guy looked like against different competition. I recall thinking that this may have happened with Brandon Jacobs before the Peavy trade, as he was promoted to Double-A just days before he was dealt, and the promotion seemed very oddly timed. Complete conjecture on my part that's probably wrong though.
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Post by aboynamedkimandrew on Jul 5, 2017 15:20:36 GMT -5
So Lin and Longhi have me thinking. Both players made significant alterations to their hitting mechanics this offseason designed to put the ball in the air more often. Now, this sort of thing has happened in the past, but I know at least with Longhi, his changes were done with a mind towards the new Statcast-type analytics - things like launch angle and such. I'm not sure if Lin's changes were that specific, but they've certainly had that kind of effect. It will be interesting, over the next year or two, how many players we hear about that do this sort of thing. I look forward to being wrong about guys because we failed to predict they'd completely change their swings. (Not in italics because I do look forward to it, implied snark in the sentence there may be. ) I wonder how many Sam Travis types, who when they are on have a quick swing that seems to find the plane of the ball and drives through it, will be turned into pop-up and strike out machines with more of a fly ball swing that has just a brief passing connection with the ball's path.
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Post by jimed14 on Jul 5, 2017 15:28:48 GMT -5
This whole swing plane thing all came from Mike Trout. It does open up a hole high in the strike zone, which pitchers are just starting to exploit. The Red Sox have been at the front of that trend. I wouldn't expect permanent miracles for all these guys who are changing their swings.
Also, as far as Lin being showcased, he's seems pretty clearly the best 3B option they have now so his playing is more about making the team better than showcasing him.
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Post by ramireja on Jul 5, 2017 15:35:01 GMT -5
Interesting quote last night from the ESPN feed (Eduardo Perez). He suggested the Sox might be "showcasing" Lin to be a sweetener in a trade. I can't say that I agree with him. Calling a guy like Lin (i.e., not a top prospect like a Benintendi who you're calling up to hopefully take a starting job for, well, many seasons) up to MLB straight from Double-A reeks of desperation, not wanting to showcase him. This isn't a last-place team that wants other clubs to see what a guy looks like in MLB and can afford to lose games if he fails. Also, if you wanted him to look his best for scouts, you'd leave him in the lowest level possible, no? It's not like teams don't scout Double-A and wouldn't know about him otherwise. It'd be one thing if they were negotiating with a team that wanted to see what a guy looked like against different competition. I recall thinking that this may have happened with Brandon Jacobs before the Peavy trade, as he was promoted to Double-A just days before he was dealt, and the promotion seemed very oddly timed. Complete conjecture on my part that's probably wrong though. I agree. Just to add on, it may very well be an unintended byproduct of his playing well that suddenly he has some enhanced trade value. Who knows, if he plays well and Brock Holt returns to form, I suppose he could be expendable. It would make even more sense next year if Brock Holt and Marco Hernandez are both healthy. There could be some redundancy there among our utility types and its possible that a trade could be beneficial to the team. All that said, the idea that his call-up was meant as a showcase makes little sense for the reasons already stated.
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Post by wcsoxfan on Jul 5, 2017 17:12:15 GMT -5
I wonder if the emergence of Lin will make Hernandez more expendable as a PTBNL in a deadline trade. There are only so many LHH utilitly players the Red Sox will need for 2018/2019.
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Post by jchang on Jul 5, 2017 17:29:44 GMT -5
I wonder if the emergence of Lin will make Hernandez more expendable as a PTBNL in a deadline trade. There are only so many LHH utilitly players the Red Sox will need for 2018/2019. Last winter, we had one more 3B than we needed. No one is expendable unless we're getting an RP who will sit the year on the DL in return.
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Post by iakovos11 on Jul 5, 2017 17:33:00 GMT -5
I just don't think there's a need to send Hernandez as a ptbnl unless a team specifically asks for him. He's good insurance for now. He can always be traded later. I doubt his value is that high right now while on the DL.
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Post by patford on Jul 5, 2017 19:08:30 GMT -5
This whole swing plane thing all came from Mike Trout. It does open up a hole high in the strike zone, which pitchers are just starting to exploit. The Red Sox have been at the front of that trend. I wouldn't expect permanent miracles for all these guys who are changing their swings. Also, as far as Lin being showcased, he's seems pretty clearly the best 3B option they have now so his playing is more about making the team better than showcasing him. Looked like Price was exploiting the upper part of the strike zone last night. If a pitcher has the control to sit high and either hit the edge or miss just off the top edge of the zone it's a very difficult area for hitters to exploit. I recall Bumgarner's long relief win in the World Series. It seemed like he was only throwing fast ball after fastball, all up in the zone or just high and the major variation being in and out not up and down. I don't think he was even throwing all that hard.
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Post by geostorm on Jul 5, 2017 21:07:13 GMT -5
Did someone say "Linsanity"?! www.weei.com/blogs/rob-bradford/looks-tzu-wei-lin-will-be-red-sox-awhile"You know what, it’s been a great boost. Tzu-Wei has injected a lot here," said Red Sox manager John Farrell. "And he’s stepped in and he’s done a great job. But I can tell you that the energy in the dugout and some of the comments -- whether it’s Linnie, Linsanity, whatever it might be – there’s a side thing that’s going on here that we can’t turn away from. We recognize it. We’ve had conversations about it as we’ve start to see who’s coming back to us on rehab assignments. Sometimes you don’t want to disrupt a good thing, and clearly he and Deven [Marrero] and what they’ve done at third base has given us a lot of momentum in that bottom third."
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Post by jmei on Jul 5, 2017 23:53:51 GMT -5
Remember, you heard it here first, folks.
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fenwayfaithful
Rookie
A prospect is fun to watch, but trading him for a sure thing in the Majors is never a losing deal.
Posts: 114
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Post by fenwayfaithful on Jul 7, 2017 2:13:58 GMT -5
Lin is very impressive!!! Love this kid
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Post by wuhsi on Jul 10, 2017 17:21:15 GMT -5
Now Lin has 47 PA with the Sox, guess it's a legit timing to take a look at his number:
MLB: 47 PA, 39 AB, 7 R, 13 H, 2 XBH*, 7 BB, 10 SO, BA 0.333, OBP 0.435, SLG 0.436, OPS 0.871 (* 2 triple) AA ('17): 184 PA, 159 AB, 31 R, 48 H, 17 XBH*, 20 BB, 27 SO, BA 0.302, OBP 0.379, SLG 0.491, OPS 0.870 (* 9 double, 3 triple, 5 HR) So far, Lin has been able to replicate the same OPS at the major (0.870 -> 0.871). Lin delivered a higher BB rate (9.2 PA/BB@AA to 6.7 PA/BB@MLB), but also a higher K rate (5.9 AB/K@AA to 3.9 AB/K@MLB). Of Lin's 48 hit at AA, 17 of them (35%) are extra base hit, but Lin only has 2 triple of the 13 hit (15%) at MLB.
Lin saw 4.15 pitches per PA, a bit higher than our team average (3.95). He has been an on-base machine so far (OBP 0.435), especially with no runner on base (OBP 0.615, 26 PA), and when leading off inning (OBP 0.667, 15 PA). However, he only has a BA of 0.158 with man on, or with two strike.
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Post by telson13 on Jul 10, 2017 18:06:25 GMT -5
Now Lin has 47 PA with the Sox, guess it's a legit timing to take a look at his number: MLB: 47 PA, 39 AB, 7 R, 13 H, 2 XBH*, 7 BB, 10 SO, BA 0.333, OBP 0.435, SLG 0.436, OPS 0.871 (* 2 triple) AA ('17): 184 PA, 159 AB, 31 R, 48 H, 17 XBH*, 20 BB, 27 SO, BA 0.302, OBP 0.379, SLG 0.491, OPS 0.870 (* 9 double, 3 triple, 5 HR) So far, Lin has been able to replicate the same OPS at the major (0.870 -> 0.871). Lin delivered a higher BB rate (9.2 PA/BB@AA to 6.7 PA/BB@MLB), but also a higher K rate (5.9 AB/K@AA to 3.9 AB/K@MLB). Of Lin's 48 hit at AA, 17 of them (35%) are extra base hit, but Lin only has 2 triple of the 13 hit (15%) at MLB. Lin saw 4.15 pitches per PA, a bit higher than our team average (3.95). He has been an on-base machine so far (OBP 0.435), especially with no runner on base (OBP 0.615, 26 PA), and when leading off inning (OBP 0.667, 15 PA). However, he only has a BA of 0.158 with man on, or with two strike. In fairness, his MLB BABIP is ridiculously unsustainable, and he's had a jump in GB rate vs AA. That said, his BB and K rates are encouraging considering the jump in levels, and the guy ***is so freaking fun to watch***. I really, *really* hope that his AA batted ball profile holds up and this little slice of MLB time so far is mostly representative of who he is moving forward. He's brought some serious, sorely needed energy and defense.
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Post by Chris Hatfield on Jul 10, 2017 18:25:08 GMT -5
I think what you can take away is that he clearly wasn't intimidated by the jump, which is a definite positive. I don't think you can take much from his numbers, however.
That said, a .447 BABIP isn't unsustainable on a 37% LD rate (which is really just arguing semantics, given that the LD rate is what's unsustainable there given his career numbers). He's stinging the ball right now, but you just can't realistically expect him to keep doing that at a rate that leads the team by far.
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Post by jimed14 on Jul 10, 2017 20:13:01 GMT -5
Lin has also suffered from getting the rookie treatment on 3rd strikes. There have been at least 3 that didn't look like strikes that I remember.
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Post by telson13 on Jul 10, 2017 23:33:37 GMT -5
Back on May 1 in the gameday thread I asked if there was some evidence that Lin had changed his approach (based on his batted ball frequencies and newfound power at that time). Not two weeks later Lin made the fringe five based on continuing that batted ball trend, and jmei thankfully started this thread. Now, the news is in: spoiler alert, Lin is a new hitter. He's seeing lots of pitches as always (but now in MLB), getting INF hits, and ripping LDs. He's not striking out too much. As Chris noted, he's not going to carry a LD rate of nearly 40%, but it's looking pretty clear that his basic GB/FB mix is forever changed, and that he's looking for loft. As a short lefty, he's probably not hurt either by the move MLB is making to lower the strike zone. And as jimed noted, he's gotten some iffy called Ks. It's been my favorite thing to watch this year, beyond even Sale and Kimbrel. From signs of a guy totally changing his approach to, two months later, having a winning impact on a pennant contender in dire need. That's why I love this site and everyone who's helped me learn more and enjoy more about baseball.
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Post by benogliviesbrother on Jul 11, 2017 19:01:33 GMT -5
Nicely said, sir.
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Post by cba82 on Jul 15, 2017 16:36:16 GMT -5
Lin is now wearing #5. Good career move.
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