Brian Dozier: A Current and Future Bright Spot

Let's be honest, this past season was a complete disaster for Twins fans. It's never a positive sign when the top off-season headline concerning an organization is whether or not to fire its manager. When I was originally developing this blog I went to google's image search to try and find a few pictures I could use within my posts. Things are so gloomy right now that when I searched for "Twins Celebrating" I had to cycle through roughly 5 pages before I found an image that wasn't of a birthday party for young identical twin siblings, or of something meant only for eyes 18 years or older. Yeah times are rough right now. However, as the overall season was an utter failure again, not everything about this years' team followed suit. Two major Minnesota Twin bright spots stood out this season as something to be proud of and something to look forward to. The first, was the tremendous, year-long performance by a young and relatively inexpensive Twins bullpen. The second, was Second Basemen Brian Dozier.

As the season progressed and the Twins continued to fall further and further behind in the standings, Brian Dozier began to climb the rankings in nearly every statistical category. He gave a quiet and mostly unproductive lineup a little shred of light each game. In fact, its hard to argue there was a better second basemen in the American League the second half of the 2013 season. Dozier lagged behind in the more popular measures of success among players, batting average and on-base percentage, but still reached a very content .253 and .313 respectively. Dozier was able to express his tremendous value to the team in several other areas, with probably the most prevalent area being power. Following last year's All Star Game, Dozier led all American League second basemen in Home Runs, Extra-Base Hits and Isolated Power, he ranked 2nd during the same time frame in Total Bases, Doubles, and Slugging Percentage, and also had the 3rd most RBI. Dozier's power surge was a sight for sore eyes among Twins fans last season, but also came as a surprise to most. Many people close to the game seemed quick to say "Where is this coming from?!" and failed to acknowledge that 2013 was the 26 year-old's first full season in the big leagues. Trust me, Dozier's power, and more importantly his overall value to the Minnesota Twins is very real and something that I hope to see in years to come.

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Quite frankly, as a Twins fan, I am sick and tired of the word "potential". I have seen far too many quality players sent off to different organizations to make room for young prospects with great "potential". I look forward to covering this entire issue in a future post, but currently want to narrow my efforts. I fear that Brian Dozier is one of those quality players, and that Twins second base prospect Eddie Rosario is one of those youngsters dangerously smothered in that three syllable word, potential. Don't get me wrong, Rosario is already a very talented second basemen, with enough (cringe) potential to be considered very valuable. He can hit for average and power, to all parts of the field, and has great speed. But Dozier has already surpassed the point of potential, and has now proved that he is truly capable of becoming one of the most valuable second basemen in baseball, and in a very underrated fashion. Some teams need Robinson Cano at second base, the Twins need Brian Dozier and a lot of starting pitching. In Eddie Rosario, I see a great opportunity to have both. Instead of always being that team that trades talent for potential, Lets try the other side for once! Think of it this way; Brian Dozier is a hundred dollar bill, and Eddie Rosario is a twenty dollar savings bond. There's a serious chance that in the future that savings bond could be worth more than 100 bucks, but its going to take a long damn time, it might not even get there, and if it does get there it likely won't end up being worth very much more anyway. And now what if I said that you could trade that savings bond to a savvy investor for another hundred dollar bill!? One that can pitch!

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All analogies aside, Brian Dozier is a great player. Still only 26 years old, Dozier established himself last season as a serious talent at second base. He is patient, seeing 4.17 pitches per plate appearance in 2013, ranking 2nd in the AL among second basemen. He has great power, hitting 18 home runs and 55 extra base hits last year, both also ranking 2nd among AL second basemen. He pummels left-handed pitching, batting .324 in 2013 and leading all AL second basemen in Slugging percentage and .OPS. He is clutch when it counts, batting .315 with runners in scoring position and 2 outs, also ranking 2nd in the AL among second basemen. And, something that I have ridiculously failed to mention yet, Dozier has arguably the best glove at second base in the Majors. He finished 2013 with only 6 errors, a fielding percentage of .992, and led the entire position in Assists, Total Chances, and Range Factor. So yes, on top of everything else, he's a gold glove waiting to happen. The Twins have second base covered, and if Eddie Rosario is not dealt to a new organization in exchange for an improvement in starting pitching this off-season upper management will be making a large mistake. Minnesota already has a future at second base, Brian Dozier.