Originally published at The Tenth Inning Stretch

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Yesterday, I have written why Luke Hughes got a rotten deal but the Twins, but I think I let another reason out: this was a great way for Twins' manager Ron Gardenhire to get his consanguine Drew Butera up to majors, claiming that he could use 3 catchers.

Interestingly enough, Stealing a page from Pontius Pilatus' book, Terry Ryan, the Twins' interim GM, washed his hands from accountability on player personnel decisions in the Twins' organization, especially the Luke Hughes release, attributing those decisions to Ron Gardenhire and proclaimed that his role is "just" that of a facilitator (last paragraph in the linked article.)

So Terry Ryan's role is to "facilitate" Ron Gardenhire's personnel decisions. Yesterday, within half day after I tweeted this, my fears about Gardenhire's true intentions were confirmed by Rhett Bollinger the Twins' MLB.com beat writer... Also in the last paragraph of this writeup by La Velle Neal and in the last paragraph of this one by Rhett Bollinger, albeit a bit subdued by quotes of Gardenhire not being sure of what he wants to do and that he wants "to do the right thing" (unfortunately, the time for the latter has passed...)

Here is the reason why Luke Hughes was released:

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7124/7094507787_d053a7396b_o.jpg

When that decision will be announced, expect to hear about how that will provide the club with versatility and about how much better Drew has been hitting this season in Rochester. Meanwhile, hints like the ones I mentioned previously about Butera's ascent to the major leagues will be coming slowly and steadily...

I hope that the Twins' fans and ownership have long enough memories and hold accountable the people who are responsible for losing...

I had 1500 AM on in the background yesterday afternoon (or maybe the day before) and they had Souhan on. For what it's worth, he commented that he had heard from different sources in the organization that there was a clubhouse issue with Hughes. He said he was one of the young guys that pissed the vets off with his attitude after losing. I pararphrase, but he said something to the effect of "They thought he didn't take losing seriously enough. If they lost and he went 0 for', or booted a ball, or double clutched on a doubleplay he was upset. But, if he got a hit in the loss he was all smiles." He also said "they felt he was a bad influence on Ploufe". I personally take everything Souhan says with a grain of salt, but that's what I heard.

So maybe, just maybe, this isn't part of some evil plot by the manager to get Butera back.

I had 1500 AM on in the background yesterday afternoon (or maybe the day before) and they had Souhan on. For what it's worth' date=' he commented that he had heard from different sources in the organization that there was a clubhouse issue with Hughes. He said he was one of the young guys that pissed the vets off with his attitude after losing. I pararphrase, but he said something to the effect of "They thought he didn't take losing seriously enough. If they lost and he went 0 for', or booted a ball, or double clutched on a doubleplay he was upset. But, if he got a hit in the loss he was all smiles." He also said "they felt he was a bad influence on Ploufe". I personally take everything Souhan says with a grain of salt, but that's what I heard.

 

So maybe, just maybe, this isn't part of some evil plot by the manager to get Butera back.[/quote']

 

 

Interesting development but very predictable I said yesterday that sooner or later we will start hearing rumors about Luke. This is just their MO when a player who is liked by fans is let go or close to let go. Too predictable...

 

This is what I wrote:

 

There have been rumors recently around Luke Hughes. By now Twins' fans with an open mind know how those originate: usually when the team (read Ron Gardenhire) does not like someone, certain writers are given tidbits to spread around. Slowey and Perkins (during his grievance season) are a couple of recent examples; even more recently the manager and the interim general manager were publicly saying that they were frustrated by Scott Baker's unwillingness to "let it rip", while the guy had a torn UCL.)

 

Not too unusual to see Souhan spearheading the bury Luke Hughes effort since he played the same henchman role for the Twins in burying Kevin Slowey very recenty... Way to Go!

Yeah, it is mildly or more than mildly disgusting that you could accurately predict that about a player this year already. Souhan is such a crime against sports commentary.

I have never seen the release of a fringe MLB player spun into such a melodramatic tale of conspiracy, abuse of power, deceit and betrayal. Oh the humanity!

Luke Hughes is a guy who has played in 102 major league games, during which he it .224, was mediocre at best defensively.

He's going to be 28 in a few months, so I think it's pretty unlikely that the Twins are sitting on a gold mine of untapped potential here, don't you?

And in terms of the Souhan thing, I don't know if that's true or not but it's not like this is the first we've heard about the lack of dedication from some players last year. There was much talk of it in the local media after the season. Cuddyer said right after he signed with Colorado that he felt like he was fighting a one-man battle last year. Was Hughes a part of the problem? I don't know, but I suspect nobody else does here either. So saying he wasn't is just assuming facts to fit your theory.

Maybe you're right, maybe Gardenhire forced the next Jeff Kent out of town so he could bring up his pet third catcher that he has an irrational attachment to. But don't you think it could also be that this was just a simple case of him wanting to cut ties with a marginal player with a bad attitude?

Tell you what - I'll make you a deal. If someone else picks up Hughes and he turns out to be an asset to their team, I'll eat my words. But if his career goes nowhere, you eat yours. Deal?

I gotta agree with 1EJ, I think you're anti-Gardenhire view is blinding you to some stuff here.

I will agree with one thing - it is frustrating to often see a smear campaign against Twins players after some of these moves. I don't know if it's the Twins, or the media, or if it's justified or not. I'll also note that it isn't always consistent - for instance, we didn't hear anything like this about Revere earlier in the week, and that was at least as unpopular a move as Hughes.

The assumption seems to be that if we don't hear it, it's because it's one of Gardy's guys and if we do hear it it's because it isn't. But that's only the conclusion if you start out with it as the assumption. It could be the media likes some guys attitude more than others. It could be team leaders (or media-friendly players) conclusions. Or it could be (believe it or not) that the perceptions are accurate.

Shouldn't the Twins be considering a 4th catcher? If Mauer and Doumit both get hurt in a game, that leaves us dangerously thin.

LOL @ Teflon, not sure i get the joke?

Its between Rene Rivera and J.R. Towles for catcher #4 with Chris Herrmann and Danny Lehmann not to far behind.

If it was me, and we needed "another guy" later in the year i'd give Towles a shot and see what he may or may not do. Rather than watch Rene Rivera again, after we've seen More than our fair share of him last year.

The fans here in Minny HATE Butera in the way they wanted Punto, and Rivas out of town. (if not more so) But to me, I think it shoud be Rene Rivera that should be LOoooong gone, and have an eerily strange feeling already that the organizaton even brought him back to be in Rochester for 2012. Thats the move that baffles me. NOT Butera seeing big lg. time in 2012. Something we ALL should have expected.