Written By Brandon Warne
The Twins’ pursuit of Torii Hunter in free agency is a contentious thing for the team’s fans for a number of reasons — some good, some bad.
A number of folks are willing to file it in the same folder as the Jason Kubels, Matt Guerriers and Jason Bartletts of the world. That’s not particularly surprising. In the same vein, there’s a Venn Diagram of those people overlapping with some people who think it’s a money grab from an ownership group desperate to sell tickets for a team whose top prospects made little headway last year, and for a stadium that no longer has an All Star Game looming upon which to let its laurels rest. Miguel Sano and Byron Buxton aren’t going to be on the 2015 roster from day one, so the team needs a little extra ‘boost,’ these folks might argue.
Some just don’t think Hunter is a good player anymore. They aren’t necessarily wrong.
But let’s break down exactly what the Twins’ pursuit of Hunter could, and perhaps should, mean.
Torii isn’t the player he used to be. He hasn’t played center field since 2011 — and that was a whopping 8.2 innings. He hasn’t played more than 100 games in a season out there since 2009, which was just his second year after leaving the Twins.
When Hunter left the Twins he was heading into his age-32 season. His defense had slipped, but his bat was as good as it ever was. People predicted doom for that 2008 Twins team after Hunter and Santana left, but instead the Twins won nine more games and missed the playoffs courtesy of a Game 163 home run from Jim Thome. But anyway, as someone who takes great care of his body, Torii has aged quite gracefully. Even at 38, Torii’s .286/.319/.446 2014 batting line doesn’t look entirely different than his career mark of .279/.334/.465. Even less so when you consider last year he had a 111 OPS+ — identical to his career mark.
But Hunter has gone from bad in center, to pretty good in right, to bad in right with nary another corner to (reasonably) move him to. The bat is decent enough — among 55 qualified outfielders his .335 wOBA was 29th — but the defense really does bring his value down. Hunter isn’t really a classic designated hitter option, and honestly the Twins don’t need (another) one of those anyway.
Hunter really has little in common with Bartlett, Kubel or Guerrier. Bartlett hadn’t played at all in 2013 and was last an effective big leaguer long before that. Kubel was coming off a terrible 2013 after a pretty good 2012, but there were already whispers about his bat speed. And Guerrier has never been anything more than a decent reliever. Given the league’s landscape and reliever value on the whole, little should have been expected from him. Perhaps that was the case.
Hunter was still an effective big leaguer this season, and a marriage with the Twins makes sense on a couple fronts.
The Twins realistically have two openings in the outfield. Danny Santana should play shortstop regularly, pushing Eduardo Escobar into a role where he can be one of the better utility options in baseball. That leaves center and left, with more or less just Aaron Hicks and Jordan Schafer as in-house options. Regardless of how you feel about those two, neither is deserving of handling a starting job alone. A platoon there makes some sense, with Hicks’ tendency to hit righties a bit better and Schafer’s relatively strong showing after arriving in Minnesota — September notwithstanding — meriting a possible deeper look. But one or the other will serve as the fourth outfielder. It’s almost certain the Twins will have a need for a starting outfielder.
The market has a few starting options who are intriguing. Colby Rasmus is still under 30, and is a former top prospect who has fallen on some harder times. In that respect, he’s almost like this year’s version of Phil Hughes. But the Twins have an up-and-coming crop of outfield prospects the club may not want to block long term. Center is Buxton’s from the minute he is ready, and it’s not likely anyone will knock Oswaldo Arcia off right anytime soon. Filling left field long-term with an outside free agent leaves players like Hicks and Eddie Rosario with an uncertain future positionally. Right or wrong, that’s something the Twins will need to consider.
Rosario is squarely back on the map after a solid stint in the Arizona Fall League, and as one might expect that has a number of Twitter folks ready to give him left field from the get-go in 2015. But it is still worth noting that he missed significant time due to suspension in 2014, and once he did get going hit just .237/.277/.396 at Double-A in his second go-round. Baseball Prospectus’ Craig Goldstein noted in a recent conversation that the breaks need to be pumped a bit regarding Rosario, and that while he was put back in the discussion among the team’s best prospects, probably needs some time at Triple-A.
So the Twins have a very temporary need in left field. Hunter will be 40 in July. Free agent outfielders rarely sign for one year unless the circumstances dictate, for whatever reason, that they really ought to. Rasmus isn’t signing for one year, unless he really wants to rebuild his value and cash in. That probably isn’t happening as a left-handed hitter at Target Field. Alex Rios isn’t signing for one year, most certainly.
So the discussion comes full circle to Hunter, who is apparently willing to come back home, so to speak. Given the number of teams expressing interest via media reports that have circulated the past few weeks, it wouldn’t be surprising if it takes a one-year deal at $8 million to secure his services. Pioneer Press Twins beat reporter Mike Berardino insists that Hunter would have to take a bigger pay cut — closer to $5 million — but that would be a significant hometown discount. That certainly doesn’t mean it’s impossible, but it would be quite surprising.
Hunter’s homecoming would no doubt fill some seats, but that’s no reason to begrudge the Twins for making such a move. There’s no shortage of theorizing on what effect Hunter could have on the up-and-coming Twins as a leader. There is, however, a shortage of really knowing how that tangibly affects a team. Sirius-XM’s Mike Ferrin from MLB Network Radio insists that Austin Jackson speaks glowingly of Hunter’s influence. That may be true, but it’s worth noting that Jackson’s best season as a hitter came the year before Hunter joined the Tigers. It’s not impossible that Jackson felt Hunter showed him how to be more of a professional off the field — though that would seem awfully hard to prove — or maybe he helped him with his routes in center, or something that hasn’t necessarily showed up statistically. If a player says he feels something, one ought not write it off one way or the other.
The Twins need Hunter to be a good player as much as or more than being a leader. Otherwise, it just makes more sense to send Hicks, Schafer or even Chris Parmelee back out there. If the team is playing out the string before bringing up another crop of prospects, there’s really no reason to overexert in order to placate the absolute lowest denominator of fans. They’ll be back when the team is good again.
Ideally, a Hunter move comes as part of an offseason that shows the team is committed to supplementing the up-and-coming core, even if it isn’t in ways that are blatantly obvious. Signing another solid pitcher, getting creative to find guys like Trevor May and Alex Meyer innings, trimming fat and just flat out being innovative are steps that can win back fans from all across the spectrum, from those who boo Joe Mauer heartily to those who wonder whether Santana can sustain his BABIP from last year.
And that should really be the goal.
Brandon Warne is a sports writer for SportsData LLC in downtown Minneapolis, and covers the Minnesota Twins for Cold Omaha and 105 The Ticket. Previous stops for Brandon include 1500 ESPN, the Minneapolis Star Tribune and Twinkie Town of SBNation.