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With Burton struggling, Fien has been good in the 8th. He can get strikeouts in key situations as well.

With maybe the exception of Burton I kind of hope we hang onto our relievers. It is one of the few areas that seem solid on this team right now. Don't want to mess with a good thing.

Fien's from California, and when I attended an A's game last year Fien was chatting with a bunch of people in the stands during pre-game, hugging and so forth, presumably friends and relatives. My main memory, though, is that I couldn't figure out who he was for a long while, I guess until he turned so I could see his number. He just looked like a regular Joe, so that I wasn't even certain he was one of the players. maybe just a clubhouse guy. Reinforced one of the pleasures of baseball, that people of ordinary stature can play this game at the top level. (Except... his b-r.com stats are 6'2" and 205, making him not a giant but certainly of athletic build. Teams sometimes inflate those numbers.)

I saw Fien in ST of '12 and was impressed. Not at all surprised when he was recalled sometime in midseason. He's been very good since. That said, if he can bring back a haul, he's not young and he does have extreme fly ball tendencies.

With Burton struggling, Fien has been good in the 8th. He can get strikeouts in key situations as well.

 

I hope Burton's struggles are over. He was over used pitching 12 times in a three week stretch at the end of May. That lead to a string of poor outings in June. He hasn't given up a run in his last 6 outings. Those were lower leverage outings, but you still need to make pitches and get guys out.

 

Fien has given the Twins reason to be confident in using him in high leverage situations. Hopefully, they will be able to mix both in the higher leverage late inning situations and keep both effective.

It's interesting that he doesn't give Rick Anderson any credit at all or anyone on the Twins major leaguecoaching staff for that matter (Bruno doesn't count in this case).

Personally, if they can get a nice haul for Perk, I'd install Fein as closer and try to repeat that next year... Given the age of both, I don't see them continuing production when the next wave really gets going.

I like the guy's moxie. Back in May, against the Tigers he threw a couple of close ones that Miggy and Torii both barked at him for. He just didn't give a ****. That's my guy out of the bullpen these days....

Can we give Terry Ryan credit for this?

Can we give Terry Ryan credit for this?

 

No. He is signed for the pre-arb rate so Ryan didn't spend enough money and the Pohlad's get more profit.

No. He is signed for the pre-arb rate so Ryan didn't spend enough money and the Pohlad's get more profit.

 

That jerk! If only he signed for more!!

Can we give Terry Ryan credit for this?

 

Has anybody not? As far as I can tell everyone that has stated an opinion on the subject believes TR is very adept at picking out very nice, cheap, bullpen pieces. As a matter of fact people have such confidence in his ability they want to trade Perkins so that Burton/Fien can be slotted into the closer role and then be flipped during the offseason or next July, at which point TR would presumably look for another nice bullpen find.

No. He is signed for the pre-arb rate so Ryan didn't spend enough money and the Pohlad's get more profit.

 

He only gets credit if he overpays.

 

I think most here would admit that Ryan is generally pretty good at building bullpens. Definitely not one of his flaws.

Can we give Terry Ryan credit for this?

 

Absolutely, Ryan's dumpster diving works very well when it comes to bullpen pieces. Mostly because complementary pieces are very erratic and inconsistent in production. So it's easier to get lucky on short term deals.