Game Thread: Twins @ Guardians, noon:10 cdt, 0th July 2022ad

[Sutter50]

Who are these "closers" who pitch 2 or even 3 innings. I want names

[Cap'n Piranha]

36 minutes ago, SwainZag said:

Maeda finished 2nd in Cy Young voting in 2020.  Yes, Graterol would be great, but a healthy Maeda this year would make a world of difference as well.  

I'm just hoping the past week actually sparks something to be done.

I would argue that if Maeda doesn't get hurt last year, the Twins don't trade for Paddack, and still have Rogers.  That is where this all began--Falvine believed (correctly) that they needed another starter, and thought it would be better to paper over a weakened bullpen than trade prospects for Montas, or raid the lineup.

[Richie the Rally Goat]

I defended the Rogers for Paddack trade from a value stand point.

I now regret that stance, as others mentioned it weakened an already weak bullpen to bolster and already strong rotation with an injury risk. At the time with the unknowns, trading for another starter made sense, but not your best reliever, even on a one year deal.

The thing with reliever fungibility is you still need to invest in it. You can’t make relievers out of nothing and if you don’t continue to invest, you reap what you sew.

[Rosterman]

13 minutes ago, Squirrel said:

The timing was bad, but I honestly didn't mind the trade EXCEPT that they didn't then do something else (before OR after) to shore up the BP and just left it Rogers-less and not adding a QUALITY piece. That's what was wrong, imo. These losses, imo, are 95% on the FO.

We needed a closer. Clearly the front office didn't see Rogers as a closer. I don't see Rocco making Duran the closer, but he should just run with him.

Or, what would it take to pry one from Colorado, Pittsburgh, Oakland or some other team not offering many save opportunities?

[Irishman]

1 minute ago, Rosterman said:

We needed a closer. Clearly the front office didn't see Rogers as a closer. I don't see Rocco making Duran the closer, but he should just run with him.

Or, what would it take to pry one from Colorado, Pittsburgh, Oakland or some other team not offering many save opportunities?

They didn't see Pressly as closer too.  

[USAFChief]

7 minutes ago, Richie the Rally Goat said:

I defended the Rogers for Paddack trade from a value stand point.

I now regret that stance, as others mentioned it weakened an already weak bullpen to bolster and already strong rotation with an injury risk. At the time with the unknowns, trading for another starter made sense, but not your best reliever, even on a one year deal.

The thing with reliever fungibility is you still need to invest in it. You can’t make relievers out of nothing and if you don’t continue to invest, you reap what you sew.

Good take.

 

I've been wrong many times. Nice to see someone change their stance occasionally. 

 

 

[SwainZag]

42 minutes ago, USAFChief said:

It was a stupid ******* trade. It's absolutely hurting this team, as was reasonably predictable. 

People who crowed about it at the time now want to forget it?

Well sorry, but when we're watching Tyler Thornburg cough up yet another game, the performance of the front office in assembling a pen is fair game.

I am not saying forget it.  Every damn time any Twins pitcher gives up a run, someone comes in with the "shouldn't have traded Rogers" meme like it's the most creative thing they can think of.  I would like to think us as a site are beyond posts like this that belong on twitter.  I might be wrong though.  

[h2oface]

1 hour ago, operation mindcrime said:

It would've been nice to have Graterol and Rogers pitch today! And Yesterday!!!

Maybe not in June. Graterol is giving up the house this month for the Dodgers with a 5.14 ERA in 13 appearances with 1 blown save in 2 chances, and Rogers in 5.84 ERA for June in 10 outings with 2 blown saves out of 7 chances.

But make no mistake, I still would rather have those guys than all but Duran in the pen. They both had fine April and May's. I would have definitely re-signed Matt Wisler for several years, too, instead of just letting him walk. That was a no brainer and  affordable.

And the FO had David Robertson at 36 (now 37) years old, who pitched on the Silver Medal Olympic Team, available in March to sign for 3.5 million plus 1.5 in incentives. He has been killer on a bad Cubs team. They should make a deal for him now! NOW!!!!!

https://www.mlb.com/player/david-robertson-502085?stats=gamelogs-r-pitching-mlb&year=2022

https://www.cbssports.com/fantasy/baseball/news/cubs-david-robertson-signs-with-cubs/#:~:text=Robertson signed a one-year,team in as many seasons.

[wsnydes]

56 minutes ago, Richie the Rally Goat said:

I defended the Rogers for Paddack trade from a value stand point.

I now regret that stance, as others mentioned it weakened an already weak bullpen to bolster and already strong rotation with an injury risk. At the time with the unknowns, trading for another starter made sense, but not your best reliever, even on a one year deal.

The thing with reliever fungibility is you still need to invest in it. You can’t make relievers out of nothing and if you don’t continue to invest, you reap what you sew.

I don't think the FO figured that they'd be as competitive as they are in the division at the start of the season.  Or that the division would be as brutal as it has been so far.  The Correa signing flies in the face some, but the pitching staff was not a competitive compilation by any means.  I think they've gotten quite lucky with the starters to this point.  Injuries have depleted the relief corps, but that's not the whole reason that it sucks.

I still don't mind the trade, but acknowledge the risk involved with it.  I had figured that they'd be able to supplement the bullpen better than they have.  I also hoped that they had something else up their sleeve like when dealing Donaldson to free up cash for Correa.  They may have, but it didn't materialize if they did.

The offseason approach looks to me as one of a team trying to retool for the next season, making moves to avoid completely bottoming out yet not quite real.  I think that stance is still accurate.  They're good enough to win the division, but little else.  I'm not sure that Rogers moves that needle at all, frankly.  But they could certainly use him.

[Schmoeman5]

1 hour ago, Sutter50 said:

Who are these "closers" who pitch 2 or even 3 innings. I want names

Chapman has been a 2 inning closer his whole career. So was Riviera. Not saying they always got 2 innining save but were called on to do it many times.

[Richie the Rally Goat]

1 hour ago, Schmoeman5 said:

Chapman has been a 2 inning closer his whole career. So was Riviera. Not saying they always got 2 innining save but were called on to do it many times.

Chapman has played in 641 games in his career, 617.2 innings. 2 seasons over his career did he pitch more innings than games ‘12 and ‘15. I don’t think it happened as often as you remember.

Rivera on the other hand: 1115 games 1283.2 innings pitched. He did throw multi innings quite a bit, and pitched more innings than games every season from ‘97 to ‘08 and 20-50 saves per season.

[SanoMustGo]

3-5 in this 8 game stretch against CLE, and all 5 losses were giveaways.  ALL 5. Honestly, if they don't fix the bullpen(and not sure they can), this team will crumble under all these late inning losses.   Not sure they haven't already started to crumble.  This will happen over and over against every good team they play.  This is not a playoff team as constructed.  The weakness is so bad, it will ruin the season.  I don't believe the FO will pony up what will be required to fix the bullpen when every other contender will probably be looking at the same players.  It will cost too much.

 

[Schmoeman5]

2 hours ago, Richie the Rally Goat said:

Chapman has played in 641 games in his career, 617.2 innings. 2 seasons over his career did he pitch more innings than games ‘12 and ‘15. I don’t think it happened as often as you remember.

Rivera on the other hand: 1115 games 1283.2 innings pitched. He did throw multi innings quite a bit, and pitched more innings than games every season from ‘97 to ‘08 and 20-50 saves per season.

OK. I went and did more research. So the multi inning save kings seem to be Gossage, Fingers, and Eckersly. Rivera had his share as did Wettland before him. Josh Hader had numerous multi inning saves in 2019 but for the most part are rare these days. I really did think Chapman had more. Especially his Cincinnati years