This was originally posed at Knuckleballsblog.com. I’m not sure any sport has spawned more clichés than baseball. Right now, though, even clichés that are applicable to multiple sports seem to make me think of the Twins. http://knuckleballsblog.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/cliche.jpg As I’ve been following the the team lately, I keep hearing various clichés in my mind (“look the ball in to your glove, Nishi.” “Make sure of one, Nishi.”). A lot of them come to mind, however, as I r
We’ve moved one important step closer to having baseball in Cedar Rapids… the players have arrived! The 2013 Kernels roster arrived at Eastern Iowa Airport shortly before noon Tuesday. It’s pretty safe to say the weather was just a bit cooler than it was when they took off from Fort Myers. (This article was originally posted at Knuckleballsblog.com.) Manager Jake Mauer said the trip went well, though he did mention that there was a long line at the security check in Fort Myers and a coup
It has been a weird offseason for the Twins, hasn’t it? I’m not complaining. mind you. It’s refreshing to see General Manager Terry Ryan being aggressive in the free agent market to address the team’s starting pitching needs. Signing Ricky Nolasco to a four-year contract with a fifth year vesting option was more than a little out of character for the Twins.Adding Phil Hughes on a three-year deal two days later was almost downright giggle inducing. (This article was originally posted at
This article was originally published on Monday, Sept. 10, at Knuckleballsblog.com. It was with much fanfare that Major League Baseball announced a new, slightly expanded, postseason format as a part of the new Collective Bargaining Agreement. It was reportedly solely due to the will of Commissioner Bud Selig that a way was found to implement the new format for the current season, rather than waiting one more year, when the leagues would be balanced and the spacing of postseason games could more
I haven't written much lately. Honestly, I haven't even read much lately. Not about baseball, anyway. There just isn't much going on that I'm particularly interested in. Sure, spring training has started, but they haven't even started playing spring training games, yet, so there just isn't much going on to capture my interest. I'm pretty sure I'll get more interested when the Grapefruit League games get underway. I guarantee I'll be more than casually interested a month from now when I'll be a
What a great night for baseball fans in Eastern Iowa! In celebration of the new affiliation agreement between the Twins and the Cedar Rapids Kernels, the organizations combined to put on a terrific event Thursday night. Every winter, the Kernels put on a Hot Stove banquet with proceeds going to their own charitable foundation. The event combines dinner, a silent auction and induction of the new Cedar Rapids Baseball Hall of Fame members. Tonight’s event, however, also included a local stop b
I know, you’re tired of talking about Alex Rodriguez and his war with Bud Selig and Major League Baseball over his use of Performance Enhancing Drugs. Me, too. http://knuckleballsblog.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/nuke2.jpg Still, we all knew we were going to have to go through another bombardment of stories about the subject whenever the arbitration system played itself out and a final decision (and I use that term loosely, because I’m not all that convinced this decision is “
There’s a lot of chatter on this here interweb thingy lately concerning what Twins General Manager Terry Ryan’s next moves will be and should be. He came out of the gate fast this offseason, immediately setting out to shore up – if not completely rebuild – the Twins’ starting pitching rotation by signing free agents Ricky Nolasco, Phil Hughes and Mike Pelfrey. But there’s still more than a little doubt as to whether this is truly a new Terry Ryan, willing to spend Pohlad money to make th
A guy falls in to an eight foot deep hole while at work. His boss comes along and the guy says, “hey boss can you get me out of here?” The boss says, “Things are pretty tight around here so we can’t afford to buy a ladder, but we have this old shovel sitting around. I’ll throw it down and you can dig yourself out.” It takes a long time, but after a lot of trial and error (sometimes even digging in the wrong place and making the hole deeper) our guy manages to dig himself out of the ho
We’ve worked our way around the horn in the first three Parts of this series, covering the catchers, corner infielders and middle infielders that could possibly put on a Kernels uniform in Cedar Rapids this summer. In Part 4 of our series, we’ll check out a number of outfielders that could take the field for Cedar Rapids at some point during 2013. http://knuckleballsblog.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/KernelsTwins-300x168.jpg (Image: Kernels.com) Obviously, we can’t know this early
This article was originally posted at Knuckleballsblog.com. I’ve never been in favor of giving long-term contracts to pitchers. I thought the Mets would regret giving Johan Santana five years at the salary levels they paid him. I have never advocated that the Twins should get involved in a bidding war for a Cliff Lee or a Roy Halladay or any other pitcher that was obviously going to get 5+ years at a bazillion dollars per year from one of the mega-market teams. It just doesn’t make sen
Terry Ryan has been a busy boy. We may or may not be impressed by what he's been doing, but nobody can say he took an early holiday break from the office. (This article was originally posted at Knuckleballsblog.com) The Twins went in to the offseason needing starting pitching. Ryan told anyone who asked that he understood it was his job to improve the rotation. He also has, at various times, mentioned also wanting to add some bullpen pieces and someone to push Trevor Plouffe at third base. h
How many times have we heard someone say, “The Twins need to get back to emphasizing the Twins Way?” Or, perhaps just as often we hear, “the Twins need to forget about the Twins Way crap… it doesn’t work.” Either way, “The Twins Way” has become a cliché and a pretty tired one, at that. But what is The Twins Way? We have some vague idea that it’s about playing good defense, running the bases intelligently, moving runners effectively and, yes, “pitching to contact” (how’s that for using on
This article was originally posted at Knuckleballsblog.com. It’s been difficult for me this offseason to, on the one hand, listen to and read Terry Ryan’s comments about what his plans are for addressing the Twins’ obvious needs, while bearing in mind the Twins’ historical approach to offseason roster building. In fact, it brings to mind the “Bizarro World” introduced by DC Comics back in my younger (much younger) days. http://knuckleballsblog.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/Bizarro1.j
It’s Opening Day! http://knuckleballsblog.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/openingday2013-600x375.jpg Alas, we still haven’t elected a President with the balls to do the right thing and make Opening Day a legal Federal Holiday and mandate that everyone who doesn’t work in a sports bar must be given the day off (and those who do work in sports bars must be paid double-time just for putting up with the rest of us who would spend our entire day drinking beer and watching baseball at said spo
I typically take a little business trip to the Tampa/St. Petersburg FL area in December and did so last week. After years of hearing about how interesting baseball’s Winter Meetings are, this year I found myself within reasonable driving distance of those Meetings when they officially opened up. That being the case, I decided I would check the situation out for myself. http://knuckleballsblog.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/dolphinresort-600x400.jpg The Dolphin half of the Swan &
It took me longer than usual to really study the BBWAA Baseball Hall of Fame ballot this year. I don’t know why. However, there remains a pretty interesting storyline this year with so many of the most high-profile steroid era superstars in their first year on the ballot. It’s not like we’ve had no discussion of the HoF at all though, as the Pleiss boys covered the topic in one of their “Talk to Contact” podcasts earlier this month. (This article was originally posted at Knuckleballsblog.com
This article was originally posted at Knuckleballsblog.com. Baseball is a great game. Almost every game has some sort of unique situation arise, allowing fans to try to get in to the minds of the players and managers. Is the starting pitcher beginning to lose his stuff or can he go another inning? Is the centerfielder cheating a bit by playing shallow to keep a runner from advancing or to cut off a short line drive and will the hitter be able to get something past him in to the gap? Yes, almo
This was originally posted at Knuckleballs By this point, everyone knows the variables that will determine whether the Twins will have a successful 2012 season, right? Mauer, Morneau, Baker and Span have to stay healthy and the bullpen needs to be vastly improved over last year. We know all of that because every beat writer, columnist and blogger has pointed at those issues over and over again since October. Sure, if the established veterans all return to the level of productivity we’ve come
In the aftermath of the HOF voting today, a lot has been written about how broken the voting system is, to the point where some even suggest voting should be turned over to the fans. I posted the following in the comment section of the "Jacque Jones" forum thread, but then realized it got to "blog post length," so I'm re-posting it as such. I think fan voting is a lousy idea. I don't think anyone wants to hold up the AllStar Game voting process as one to replicate. I think the following,
Over the past couple of months, a number of smart, informed people who spend a lot of time analyzing young baseball players have been publishing their lists of top Twins prospects. Since I’m not nearly as smart or informed about these players as others are, I’ve held off on publishing my own rankings. (This article was originally posted at Knuckleballsblog.com.) But I’m going to put my rankings out there today, for two reasons. First, I’ve now had time to read and consider the opinions
Now that we’ve had a day to absorb the news of the Twins trading Ben Revere to Philadelphia, it’s time for us to get to know our newest member of the Twins MLB family, Vance Worley… aka “Vanimal.” http://knuckleballsblog.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/vance_the_vanimal_worley_by_timokreations-d478foc1-295x300.jpg (Image: timokreations)
Almost two weeks ago, I posted my take on this year’s Baseball Hall of Fame ballot. I listed the 10 players I would have voted for and then I predicted that none of the players on this year’s ballot would garner the necessary 75% support to be elected to the Hall by the actual voting members of the BBWAA this year. Wednesday afternoon at 1 pm CT, we will find out if I was right. (This article was originally posted at Knuckleballsblog.com.) http://knuckleballsblog.com/blog/wp-content/upload
This article was originally posted at Knuckleballsblog.com. I’m constantly struck by how so many otherwise intelligent people suddenly sound like idiots when discussing issues related to money. A number of these people are certainly not idiots… they’re accomplished business owners and/or people who have achieved considerable success at running businesses. So if they aren’t as stupid as the words they’re saying makes them sound, one can only assume that they think the people hearing/readi
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
