SomeGuy

Yeah extreme lengths to discount a 1.75 ERA......he did exactly what you want a reliever to do for the entire month of May. He can't control what the situation is before he enters a game. I even pointed out that he out pitched his expected outcome. But there is no way you can spin that into anything but a great month.

Seems like you are going to extreme lengths to discount Colome. Might there be a bias? He gave up 3 runs (2 earned) the entire month and 2 of them were in one game. Tremendous month!

When you lose more games than you win then you will not be given a ton of "high leverage" situations. It seems his entering while losing games are occuring after a few days off. It could be he is being scheduled to pitch on days regardless of the outcome. I look at who he enters the game to face in many of the situations he was called on to pitch when their mid order guys were due up. Either way to say he was personally responsible for 4 loses in May was not a good take. He deserves to be on a list of 5 best Twins in May.

His Ground ball rate has risen quite a bit in May, over 49%. His career is 41.7%. His line drive rate seems to be what took the hit as it dropped to 7% in May down from his usual 20-22% he has been having with the Twins. I believe it is the wrist more than old age. His exit velocity and hard hit% were not off his career marks by this much for the first month. Injuries are way up this year, probably to be expected with the short season last year. League wide offense is also way down this year. I don't think he would fall off this much from old age in so short of a time. If you add up all the offense for all of MLB, the stat line is .236/.312/.393. I don't think anyone would consider that when talking about the average MLB player.

I disagree with the "low leverage" categorization. The closer is a dying role. Personally I'm glad we don't save a pitcher for a moment that may or may not be there for a save situation. 5/19 against the White Sox he entered in the 7th inning trailing 2-1 to face their 2,3 and 4 hitters That was the not low leverage at all. There aren't many instances where he was called on for a blow out game, I count three where the difference was 5 or more runs. 5/30 KC 8th inning losing 5-3 5/25 BAL 8th inning winning 6-3 5/24 BAL 9th winning 8-3 5/22 CLE 10th inning tied 3-3 5/19 CHI 7th losing 2-1 5/18 CHI 7th inning losing 4-2 5/15 OAK 8th inning losing 4-1 5/12 CHI 7th losing 13-7 5/7 DET 7th inning winning 4-3 5/5 TEX 7th and 8th inning losing 3-1 5/1 KC 9th inning losing 11-3

Colome gave up 2 earned runs and was credited with 0 blown saves in May. His Left on base% was 97.2%. He allowed 0 inherited runners to score besides the runner on 2nd rule for extra innings which happened once. He was responsible for 1 loss which was a walk off homerun in the 10th inning against Cleveland. He was our best bullpen pitcher in May.

On the plus side Mitch Garver had a tremendous May. .281 ave/.428 On base%/.579 Slug%/1.017 OPS Also shout out to the new bullpen additions Hansel Robles and Alex Colome. Even though both were outperforming their underlying numbers in May. Robles 2.51 ERA 10.05 K/9 (horrendous 6.28 walks per 9, 3.89FIP 4.54 xFIP) Colome 1.74 ERA 9.58 K/9 (4.67 FIP, 3.98 xFIP)

Eliminate the runner at 2nd in extra innings. Eliminate the minimum batter requirement for pitchers. I would like to have the same rules between AL and NL regarding DH. I would prefer no DH for added strategy but I realize that very few people share that view. My desire for parity between the leagues is strong enough to be on board with universal DH. Go back to the previous rules of expanding the roster in September to the 40 man roster. Basically undo the Manfred era rules.

IL placements are up 30% compared to this point of 2019 excluding covid IL trips according to Baseball Prospectus. Ken Rosenthal compared the first month of 2021 to the first month of 2019 a few weeks ago and found that there were almost twice as many soft tissue injuries like hamstring, quad, oblique injuries than the first month of 2019. Arm and elbow injuries were up 19%. Rosenthal has the IL placements for the first month of 2021 being 19% higher than the first month of 2019 so the Baseball Prospectus data would indicate injuries are happening more often as the season goes on. I guess the good news could be that maybe this isn't typical Josh Donaldson (or Buxton) is always injured and more of a everyone is struggling to stay healthy after the crazy year.

I would be happy with a deadline similar to 2018. I doubt we get any true difference maker for who we are going to trade but probably some decent value. The main question for the deadline is how young are the returning prospects going to be? We might not be improving the 2022 or '23 team with this deadline if we maximize our returns. Cruz to the Blue Jays would be fun to watch. That would be a powerhouse offense. I seriously doubt there is any chance to get Nate Pearson or Alek Manoah from them. Toronto might be interested in Pineda too but I still don't see them parting with a great prospect. We will probably have to settle for younger or less talented prospects.

Runners in scoring position this season .296 batting average and .382 on base% 11 RBI

Toronto would be a great fit for Cruz.

Not predicting a WS win just saying its not over 30 games into the season. If this were a football game there would still be time left in the 1st quarter. First 25 games Division winners after bad starts 9-16: 2015 Rangers (finished 88-74) 9-16: 2006 Twins (finished 96-66) 10-15: 2006 Padres (finished 88-74) 10-15: 2005 Yankees (finished 95-67) Wild Card winners 8-17: 2001 Athletics (finished 102-60) 10-15: 2014 Pirates (finished 88-74) 10-15: 2009 Rockies (finished 92-70) 10-15: 2007 Rockies (finished 90-73)* First 50 games Division winners 22-28: 2013 Dodgers (finished 92-70) 22-28: 2012 Athletics (finished 94-68) 22-28: 2007 Cubs (finished 85-77) 22-28: 1996 Cardinals (finished 88-74) 23-27: 2018 Dodgers (finished 92-71) 23-27: 2015 Blue Jays (finished 93-69) 23-27: 2012 Tigers (finished 88-74) 23-27: 2006 Twins (finished 96-66) 23-27: 2006 Athletics (finished 93-69) Wild Card winners 18-32: 2005 Astros (finished 89-73) 19-31: 2019 Nationals (finished 93-69) 20-30: 2009 Rockies (finished 92-70) 21-29: 2007 Yankees (finished 94-68) 21-29: 2003 Marlins (finished 91-71) 21-29: 1995 Yankees (finished 79-65) 23-27: 2014 Pirates (finished 88-74) 23-27: 2008 Brewers (finished 90-72) 23-27: 2007 Rockies (finished 90-73) Add to the fact that our division still looks pretty weak. The Indians look really weak on offense(26th in offense just ahead of Baltimore and Seattle). the good 2/3 of the White Sox outfield are going to miss most if not all of the season. I think the Twins are better than they are playing and I don't think anyone is capable of running away with the division.

The rebuliding Marlins no less, in the middle of gutting their lineup...

On this date in 2019 the Washington Nationals were 14-21 with the worst bullpen in all of baseball. They went on to win the World Series.

It has only been 30 games....I wouldn't write them off yet. I'm in the bad luck camp especially on offense. Donaldson BA .262 XBA .337 Slug .426 xSlug .602 Polanco BA .206 XBA .271 Slug .304 xSlug .465 Kepler BA .200 XBA .247 slug .343 xSlug .398 Arraez BA .291 XBA .324 Slug .372 xSlug .494 Garver BA .205 XBA .220 Slug .493 xSlug .540 Pretty low BABIPs Donaldson .275 (career .298) Cave .262 (career .344) Polanco .247 (career .310) Kepler .245 (career .252) Garver .243 (career .299) Kirilloff .192 Sano .148 (career .334)

2020 team OPS .713 (22nd) wRC+ 92 (22nd) OBP .312 (23rd) 2019 OPS .832 (2nd) wRC+ 116 (3rd) OBP .338 (6th)

It is 104% of the pro rated salary. They will get paid for slightly more than 60 games. So they are still losing more than half of their yearly salary. The big hangup was the players wanted as long of a season as possible because the prorated salary would go up for each game played. They felt the owners were asking for a shorter season for the exact opposite reason. Since no tickets are being sold, they don't make any money by having more games, they only lose more by paying players more. I wouldn't view 104% as a big win for the players. 80-100 games would have been a win for players.

Max Kepler didn't do anything wrong. You are still allowed to support police officers with things like the thin blue line. This doesn't mean you don't want justice for George. I think you will find police officers themselves are baffled and appalled by what happened. And Kepler claims he doesn't know what that mask means (I still don't think he knows what it means) and was just wearing a freebie. That is fine too, he is a foreign citizen after all. The thin blue line has nothing to do with race.

Offseason trades are an interesting topic if the season is cancelled. Teams acquiring major league talent with the intention of winning in 2020 got hosed (luckily the Twins had multiple seasons in mind with their big trade). Remember when the Red Sox were laughed at for the Betts trade. It is looking like an absolute steal now. If the season is canceled, The Dodgers gave Alex Verdugo, Jeter Down, Conner Wong and took on about 75M for the 35 and 36 year old seasons of David Price.

Seems like a stretch to say they are "chasing history" by saying they might be the best in a single hitting category that is also being manipulated with a threshold. But there were some great 1b/3b combos that I don't think they compare to. Just a few of my favorites from the last 20-25 years Pujols/Scott Rolen Adrian Beltre/Kevin Youklis Miguel Cabrera/Prince Fielder A-Rod/Mark Teixeria A-rod/Jason Giambi Jason Giambi/Eric Chavez Chipper Jones/Fred McGriff Chipper Jones/Andres Galarraga

People know Tom Brady and Lebron because they win. Mike Trout does not win. The All star games aren't what make Tom Brady or Lebron James marketable because no one cares about the Pro Bowl or NBA All Star game either. I don't think the All Star break is the marketing fix that will bring celebrity to MLB. Comparing a QB or NBA player to a baseball player doesn't really work because it is impossible for one baseball player to contribute as much to a team's success as in those sports. Like the Mike Trout case, the best player of all time cannot make the post season alone while Lebron James would take the Wolves or any other team to the playoffs every season. With Aaron Rogers, the Packers are a good team but without him they are flat out bad. One of my favorite things about baseball is that there is a unique balance of individual and team performance. Do your job and rely on the next guy to do his job. (I also think if someone follows any major sport other than baseball they will still have an idea of who Mike Trout is and could probably name the team he plays for.)

I took "Flimsy at best" as pretty far from concrete but maybe that's just me. And Maeda is still probably seen as a health risk as well. Just because he made it four seasons doesn't erase what they saw before signing him. The Dodgers would still be correct if he requires Tommy John at some point. How will his elbow hold up if he is leaned on for more than the 137 innings he has averaged over the last 3 years?

The Red Sox have actual doctors looking at actual medical charts and scans. We only have his past injury history (which is bad) to make our assumptions off of. Saying that the doctors didn't find anything is based on nothing. Journalists and fans have no idea what is in his medical scans. There is no way that they had an accurate description of his health before the physicals portion of the trade. No one on the Twins said they disagree with the Red Sox opinion.

So whatever concerns arose in Boston's eyes when they looked at Brusdar Graterol's medicals, causing them to sour on him and back out of the original trade, were flimsy at best. Not sure I agree with this logic....You are comparing someone who was seen as a risk for future elbow issues to someone with past elbow and shoulder issues. Someone with "irregularities" in the elbow to someone who has a repaired elbow and past shoulder injuries. Someone who might someday tear his UCL to someone who has torn it. Someone who might at some point miss significant time but never has to someone who already has missed significant time multiple times. The Dodgers were able to sign Maeda to a risk free deal. They were not giving up an annual MVP candidate when they signed him. I think the Red Sox did the smart thing by getting more. They took on Verdugo knowing that he currently had a back injury, I think whatever they found was concrete. Notice how the Dodgers or Twins never publicly disagreed with the Red Sox assessment. The Red Sox came to the same conclusion the Twins did, he is most likely a reliever.