We talk about all the stats and analytics like we are working with computers and not human beings. But that is not the case and thus we can look at players who have been mishandled by the team and wonder what would have happened if the club had been a little more intelligent in the personal needs department. Oswaldo Arcia is one person who really jumps out at me his minor league slash was 296/368/530 then he came to the Twins and his world and his potential fell flat. What happened. I know he
So we whiffed in FA and now we have the feeling that we never really had a chance and no one wants to come here! Boo hoo! People say trade the prospects. Wait a minute - they have to come here. They have no choice. For six years they are ours. So lets play them. Cleveland where our FO was trained moved their prospects up to their team and have had a good winning record for a few years now. Forget where they were in the minors - many teams are now running players out at a much younger age - see
Don Larsen, age 90, passed away and with him goes the honor of being the only man to toss a no-hit perfect game in a World Series (1956). Pitching to Yogi Berra in that classic Larsen rose to heights that exceed his career 81 - 91 record. His last out was a strikeout of Dale Mitchell. In Casey Stengel's unorthodox method of random pitcher selection, Don was shocked that he was called on after a poor game two. “I must admit I was shocked,” Larsen wrote in his autobiography. “I knew I had to do be
I have been inspired by the many postings about the year and the decade, the optimism for signings like Hill and Bailey, the continuing hope for signing Donaldson, and the general sense that we will be better this year despite having lost some good players and signing some possible good players. But that is what New Years are about - out with the old resolutions and in with the new. So I will let the TD experts look at this coming decade, I want to look at the past ones. 1960 we were still the
Hubert Humphrey coined the term "cold Omaha" when he said that the Twin Cities would be a Cold Omaha without professional sports. I believe the Blue Jays must have thought they did not want to be a Canadian Minnesota if they did not sign some players and make the club interesting. Well the Twins are interesting and last year they were winning. Now we do not have Schoop and we hope (and I expect) that Arraez will not regress. We do not have CJ Cron and we hope we have someone to replace his bat
Well the White Socks are looking like they have completed their laundry list and the Twins might want to look over their shoulders. Here is there roster http://m.whitesox.mlb.com/roster/ and this is before adding Kuechel for three years and $55m. Yes they began with a catcher and added a pitcher (and then Gonzales too) with Kopech and Giolito on their starting rotations too. The Chicago Tribune wrote, "The Sox re-signed Jose Abreu, signed switch-hitting catcher Yasmani Grandal, acquired a fron
As I read our reactions to each missed free agent and the excitement of the winter meetings I have come to the conclusion that the FO really is concerned about readership and postings on TD. I mean we have had a "why we should sign him" article about every FA that has been signed so far. Just to be clear - not signed by us. We went from everyone with an arm that has not fallen off to all the hitters who can add to Bomba mania. We debate, we anguish, and we hope. Well at least we read and post.
Yup, we could lose a lot. Our guys are really good. The rest of the MLB teams are salivating to get the Twins prospects! Rule V happened today - Wander Javier did not happen today. None of the players we had available went anywhere until the second round of AAA Rule V when 24. The Tigers took 2B Brian Schales (Twins). So, yawn, another big Rule V day went by and the overall impact was zilch. There were a number of pitchers taken by poor clubs with nothing too lose. Good luck to them and
When the best is off the table, then the second best is swept up, do we get desperate and jump at the left overs? If we cannot get what we want is it reasonable to say we should get what is left? I cannot buy into that theory. If Bumgartner does not sign with us I can understand. Does that make Kuechel suddenly desirable? The real question is how does he compare with Dobnak, Graterol, Thorpe, Smeltzer. I hate buying out of desperation. The same with Ryu. Why would he sign with us.
I join others with regret that we continue to move down the the next pitcher on the list essays. If I was more motivated I would go back and see how many "sign this pitcher" essays have been on the site since Thanksgiving. But the essence of so many comments is - why would they come here, not what they would sign for. I do not think that it is money that is winning. If you or your girlfriend are from Philadelphia you want to go home, if you have had your career in warm cities or are tired of
Judging the fielders in the age of shifts is a difficult challenge. As I read about Sano – should he move to 1B I am constantly trying to evaluate what the qualities are for those two bases. 3B – quick reflexes (believe me the ball gets to 3B quick) and a strong arm. 1B – reflexes of a different type, not grabbing missiles, but rather erratic throws, short hops, flexibility to stretch and grab, and still a range for fielding the position. 1B have that strange responsibility for “covering the bas
When the Twins Bombas broke the MLB record for HRs there was elation - and rightfully so. It is fun to see records fall and even to have some marks like 56 straight game hitting streaks seem to be impossible to break. When I was young (1950s) I got hooked on baseball and my little transistor radio would sneak under my pillow at night so I could follow the Milwaukee Braves. I loved the way baseball connected me with my dad and Grandpa, the way it related to the old town teams my relatives playe
In one of the discussion entries I saw the question - what will happen to catchers when the Robo ump is put in place and the quick hands ability to steal (frame) a strike is no longer a vital skill. This got me thinking about what are the other attributes of a good catcher. My first thought is the ability to call a good game, to put the pitcher in a better position to fool the batter. Of course the Houston Astronauts are pushing for a change there too. Maybe we will have head phones on the cat
I am not advocating trading him, but I have read so many trade Rosario scenarios I began to wonder what would happen if we took another of our players and put them out there. Admittedly Betts is the FA RF that will dominate all discussions, but what would Kepler bring us? Here are his basic stats for the MLB career and a comparison with his MIB stats. The first note is that he had not matched his MILB stats in the first three years, but he did last year - OBP/S/OPS. Is this his next platform
I have had the good fortune to be with Mark Harris, a former minor leaguer who threw batting practice for the Twins in the sixties. He once threw Home Run Derby to Aaron and Killebrew and has their autographs! He proposed a question to me that I flunked on, but it was too fun not to pass on. Name five pitchers who had a Cy Young and were convicted of a felony. https://dcbaseballhistory.com/d-c-baseball-history-assorted-videos/1960-home-run-derby-washington-players/ Good luck
I just read this really fun article in True West Magazine https://truewestmagazine.com/article/six-guns-sluggers/?mc_cid=1c6674cead&mc_eid=b66323b9da "Two sesquicentennial anniversaries in 2019 will commemorate landmark events in the history of the American West. When gold and silver spikes were gently tapped into place in a ceremonial laurelwood rail tie at Promontory Summit in Utah Territory to symbolize the completion of the Transcontinental Railroad on May 10, 1869, it opened the West
Why am I seeing shots at Eddie Rosario all over TD? No, he is not our best player, but he is a good player. He gets 1.6 WAR this year according to Baseball Reference. He had a line of .276 /.300/.500/.800 this year and in the little aside on the MVP for this year he sounds like he should be LVP. Last year he was .288/.323/.479/.803 and the same site named him MVP. Now we want to trade him for a broken bat and one of the regular season rabbit balls. What is going on. He is not HOF, but he is go
This is a short Blog - kind of a reaction blog set off by the St Louis Cardinals (my favorite NL team). Did you see the headline - 10 runs in the first inning. The Braves were in never never land! What happened. A really good team beat another really good team and did it with fire! The articles say that the pre-game talk by the Cardinal Manager (who the hell is Schildts?) was angry, it pushed the limits and for a while was available on video. ESPN had this article - "In a video that surfaced o
Michael Powell wrote - "There was a mellow quality to conversations with the Twins after their postseason finale with the Yankees on Monday night, a wistful pride at what they had accomplished before that 18-wheeler from New York City flattened them." Wow I can feel that! "Rocco Baldelli, the Twins’ young manager, slid into his seat Monday night, having come out on the wrong side of a 5-1 score in the deciding game of an American League division series. He shrugged. His team had just lost
I wondered how the New York Press would describe game 2 - here are some key quotes - and I cannot disagree with any of them: "Dobnak’s short outing was fairly predictable. A recent Uber driver against this lineup? Rather optimistic of the Twins. The last Twins rookie to start a game in the postseason was Brian Duensing at Yankee Stadium in 2009. Duensing gave up five runs in four and two-thirds innings and his father was hit by a car outside the stadium (he was O.K.)." "The Yankees did not h
Third and last in my series on the conundrums of protecting players from Rule V, getting rid of deadwood, choosing what to do about free agents and lining up trades. The Outfield and Infield had a lot of names and decisions, but nothing like the pitching staff. Here we have our Ace – Berrios – who has worn down in August as an annual ritual letting others that the Ace spot until he recovers – and hopefully he can. Looking at performance is not just a calendar event – we might also look at who
I started with the outfield as I look at the Twins current 25 man active roster, 40 man overall roster and the crush of players who are on the field, plus those needing to be added to the 40 man and the potential free agents, and possible trade candidates. The current Major league infielders and catchers (who ocassionally move to a base): Cron Schoop Polanco Sano Arraez Gonzalez Adrianza Castro Garver Astudillo Cron and Schoop are FA - do we resign them? Schoop has been terrific thi
Reading the blogs and comments I see a lot of people looking at the outfielders and whether we should trade Rosario for starting pitching, put Jake Cave on the roster for Post Season and how to handle the surplus in the minors. September is a big audition month and a time to give some players a little rest. We have too many players who need to be added to the 40 man and not enough room. Do we trade, do we DFA, do we get rid of players already on the roster? Do we allow free agents to leave? So
I could not resist putting up this Home Run Derby between Harmon Killebrew and Rocky Colavito. In this contest the two who had tied for the HR championship of the AL faced off.
It is preceded by Harmon taking the crown from Mickey Mantle -
And followed by a contest Harmon lost to Ken Boyer - a third baseman who belongs in the
Ken did not last long - his next challenge was Hank Aaron who took over the program. It is so amazing to see these greats playing for $2000 - chump change
If the playoffs started today – these are the teams and their top three-man rotations. Which would you choose? I have them listed as I would rank them. Starting three for the playoffs 1. Houston – Verlander, Cole, Greinke 2. Cleveland – Bieber, Clevinger, Kluber 3. Tampa – Morton, Chirinos, Glasnow or Snell if he returns 4. Yankees – Tanaka, Paxton, German or Happ 5. Twins – Berrios, Pineda, Odorizzi Houston has Aaron Sanchez and Wade Miley, Cleveland has the two rookie pitchers we just sa
I really hold back what I would like to say about then payroll arguments here. The fact that people don't accept the amount taken in dictates the amount going out requires one of two things. Extreme financial ignorance or fanatical bias that prevents the acceptance of something some basic. I did not change the argument. It's the same idiocy over and over. Do you really want to be on the side that suggests revenues does not determine spending capacity?
At this point in the pre-season, I’m just so happy to be seeing games again, I don’t care about the Twins record in 2023. I think they’ll win it all, unrealistically speaking 🙂
I really hold back what I would like to say about then payroll arguments here. The fact that people don't accept the amount taken in dictates the amount going out requires one of two things. Extreme financial ignorance or fanatical bias that prevents the acceptance of something some basic. I did not change the argument. It's the same idiocy over and over. Do you really want to be on the side that suggests revenues does not determine spending capacity?· 0 replies
