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Neal: Who Pitchers On Opening Day?

John Bonnes

By John Bonnes
in Minnesota Twins Talk

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John Bonnes

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Neal runs through the options for Opening Day starter, stating a case for each. If I had to guess right now, I'd go with the dark horse - this guy....

 

Righthander Mike Pelfrey, 29, has 896 1/3 career innings under his belt. And there are no restrictions on him as he comes back after missing most of last season and undergoing Tommy John surgery -- no restrictions for now.

 

Who pitches for the Twins on Opening Day? | StarTribune.com

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snepp Ft Myers Mighty Mussels

snepp

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And could give the fans a chance to see most of the bullpen pitchers if he gets lit up and goes 2.2 before getting the hook.

 

There's an off-day between the first two games, perfect time to empty the pen.

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LoganJones Prep Ball

LoganJones

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I am hoping that Worley earns this honor. He seems to have the most upside of the likely candidates.

It makes more sense to line Worley up against a second or third starter. You want to try and get as many mismatches in your own favor. Let a guy like Correia deal with the Verlanders of the world. Last year, KC gave up 0-2 Runs in 50% of his starts. The others were 3-6. If we cut that to 3 runs, it's 22 starts. Verlander had 26 starts of his 33 result in 3 or fewer runs. Verlander often went deeper into many of these games and is head and shoulders a better pitcher. He will be better than every one of the Twins pitchers. Why waste the best outings the team's going to get from their younger pitchers, when you can let a vet take his lumps on days when the team was gonna lose anyway (so to speak)? Particularly, if when you do line it up right and JV has a bad day, and KC has a good one that's a win you weren't looking for?

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roger GCL Twins

roger

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It makes more sense to line Worley up against a second or third starter. You want to try and get as many mismatches in your own favor. Let a guy like Correia deal with the Verlanders of the world. Last year, KC gave up 0-2 Runs in 50% of his starts. The others were 3-6. If we cut that to 3 runs, it's 22 starts. Verlander had 26 starts of his 33 result in 3 or fewer runs. Verlander often went deeper into many of these games and is head and shoulders a better pitcher. He will be better than every one of the Twins pitchers. Why waste the best outings the team's going to get from their younger pitchers, when you can let a vet take his lumps on days when the team was gonna lose anyway (so to speak)? Particularly, if when you do line it up right and JV has a bad day, and KC has a good one that's a win you weren't looking for?

 

Kind of like matching lines in hockey. Get the diggers and bangers out there against the visiting teams top line.

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nicksaviking All-Star

nicksaviking

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I'd go with Worley seeing as it is such a toss up. He's under team control until 2018, might as well go with the guy you have a chance to build some loyalty with as opposed to the short term guys. That being said, if Harden somehow manages to make the rotation, it's probably going to be him. He actually has the pedigree and I'd have to think he would need to look really good to make the opening day roster, and if he's looking really good, he will be the one generating all the spring traing buzz.

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twinsnorth49 St Paul Saints

twinsnorth49

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It makes more sense to line Worley up against a second or third starter. You want to try and get as many mismatches in your own favor. Let a guy like Correia deal with the Verlanders of the world. Last year, KC gave up 0-2 Runs in 50% of his starts. The others were 3-6. If we cut that to 3 runs, it's 22 starts. Verlander had 26 starts of his 33 result in 3 or fewer runs. Verlander often went deeper into many of these games and is head and shoulders a better pitcher. He will be better than every one of the Twins pitchers. Why waste the best outings the team's going to get from their younger pitchers, when you can let a vet take his lumps on days when the team was gonna lose anyway (so to speak)? Particularly, if when you do line it up right and JV has a bad day, and KC has a good one that's a win you weren't looking for?

 

There will be very few pitching mismatches in the Twins favour this year I'm afraid, certainly none in the opening series.

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Alex Draft Eligible

Alex

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Neal runs through the options for Opening Day starter, stating a case for each. If I had to guess right now, I'd go with the dark horse - this guy....

 

 

 

Who pitches for the Twins on Opening Day? | StarTribune.com

 

I think it's a relatively telling state that the worst pitching staff in the league has one pitcher go down and has no clear answer to this question despite having a full offseason

 

I've predicted Worley, but I could see the Twins giving it to someone like Correia.

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Guest USAFChief

Guest USAFChief

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It makes more sense to line Worley up against a second or third starter. You want to try and get as many mismatches in your own favor. Let a guy like Correia deal with the Verlanders of the world. Last year, KC gave up 0-2 Runs in 50% of his starts. The others were 3-6. If we cut that to 3 runs, it's 22 starts. Verlander had 26 starts of his 33 result in 3 or fewer runs. Verlander often went deeper into many of these games and is head and shoulders a better pitcher. He will be better than every one of the Twins pitchers. Why waste the best outings the team's going to get from their younger pitchers, when you can let a vet take his lumps on days when the team was gonna lose anyway (so to speak)? Particularly, if when you do line it up right and JV has a bad day, and KC has a good one that's a win you weren't looking for?
Your opening pitching matchups last through the first series, maybe. After that, off days, injuries, promotions, demotions and a bunch of unknowns make lining up pitching matchups impossible. Worrying about who Detroit has going on opening day is sort of silly.
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ashbury Cooperstown

ashbury

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For the Twins to compete, better be Harden :)

 

I find it hard to embrace the hope that he can be what he once was. But I don't know any of the fundamentals about what it takes for a pitcher to come back from his injuries.

 

I attended his first home start when he was with the A's in 2003 and his changeup was absolutely killer - the Indians stood there unable to pull the trigger, time after time after time.

 

But if he's lost something off the fastball, permanently, can he replicate the old magic? Could be that batters now can say that if it looks like a fastball, treat it like a change up and try to pull it, and if it happens to be a fastball then you may end up going the other way for a base hit instead. As I said, I need someone with better grasp of hitting than I have, to tell me. And if he tries to win with something else than a changeup, then he's not the same pitcher and the previous track record wouldn't count for a lot.

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