Monkeypaws

Contgrats J.O.

BTW, another ex Twin had an epic pitching line last night, Drew Butera. 1/3 of an inning, 2H, 2R, 3BB, 0K. He was throwing the ball up there, and his poor control played in his favor, although he changed speeds

Losing 4 straight to the Twins probably will raise the heat on the Machado trade. What a catch of Dozier's dinger Dude almost fell to his death!

LoMo beats the shift with a sweet bunt - if there gonna be an unwritten rule retaliation for that, up 4-0 in a meaningless minnow game?

That package for Thor would be highway robbery. He's only a couple years older than Gonsalves, and had already been an All-Star by Gonsalve's age. Two good prospects, but for a stud who doesn't hit free agency until 2022? You'd start with Lewis, than add as much as you could stomach Edit: kinda rough that the guy the Twins drafted about 17 slots ahead of Syndergaard now pitches for the Sugar Land Skeeters of the Atlantic League of Professional Baseball.

I guess the Twins get some credit for converting him - too bad it was a case of the minor league clock running out. He was gracious to the Twins on leaving for SF per a quote in the STrib: The Twins way gets an upvote. BTW, the SF crew interviewed Ivan in the stands as Derrick was pitching - he looked like he could still slot in behind the plate as the Twins #1 catcher.

I watched a bit of that game - Rodriguez works fast, and has a nice mix of pitches, and got ahead of most the batters.

I'm reading the same stuff. His star has tarnished.

•Regularly field a guy who can barely hit .100 •Put the Mendoza back in the Mendoza line •Inflate other team's pitchers' stats •Make .250 batting average the standard of excellence •Take 'er easy on the baseballs edit •Oh, and generate sustainable wind energy with our bats.

In spite of a thread called "front office flop," these guys boss the draft. They've gotten great value in their top ten the last 2 drafts by playing slot values. About Smith - 6'2", 200 - won't turn 18 until September. Nice "international" signing.

MLB reported a bonus of 2.5 from a slot of 3.12. Hopefully that will be enough to wrap up the 5th rounder

Gibson has a fairly fresh arm for a 30 year old, and he keeps himself in shape. The odds of him having another 5 good years is >> than the chance any prospect you trade him for will ever be close to what he is now. Getting rid of every decent player, which is all Gibson is, how can you develop a team with that as your mantra? All decent players of Gibson's stature get are hit/miss prospects. We can plug up the system with Palkas, Littells and Moyas until there is no room for any more. Treadmill. Get rid of the chaff - keep decent MLB level players like Escobar and Gibson and build around them.

Ship off the sad sacks: at least you open up roster spots for prospects, if only we would give 'em a chance. Try to keep the keepers. I'll leave it up to you to decide who.

Easy answers: Wilson, Cave, Motter, LaMarre, Petit, Astudillo, Grossman(and some of them not as bad as regulars). Who saw that coming? 24 pitchers used. Subpar Sáno, Buxton, Kepler, Dozier, Morisson, Mauer. No Santana or Castro., and up til now Polanco. Funny stat that thumbs its nose at sample size tonite. Twins top eleven hitters for BA: 1. Gibson 2. Astudiilo 3.Rosario 4. Petit 5. Escobar 6. Lamarre 7.Garver 8. Adrianza 9. Mauer 10. Grossman 11. Cave 1.000-.233 Mmmm, yah! Train wreck it is.

a. I agree with maximizing value. b. I also agree that one should trade from surplus not weakness; this is not surplus. c. I agree that rewarding success with trades for prospects = more losing years. As the core we were supposed to rebuild around flails away, hard to argue with a. However, I'd rather be done with the recently acquired, the Lynns and Morrisons, rather than Gibson. Falvine's strategy was good, but the nucleus of "budding stars" let the whole team down. Dump the whole bunch of FAs acquired from last off-season and try again next year. Gibson has some long-term value. Lynn, Morrison, Duke, even Reed, they could probably be replaced internally, even though the pitchers have be at least not a wholesale disaster. I am among those who believe that Gibson has arrived, and wouldn't trade him before any of the aforementioned, and certainly not for futures. If Buxton and Sano turn it around, right back where they started from with a clean slate and bunches of money to spend next year.

Watching him leg out a triple made me laugh out loud yesterday. Made an excellent play at 3rd as well.

In 9 years of minor league ball, Astudillo has 76 whiffs in over 2000 at bats. Garver and Wilson have 56 this season in 212 ABs. Yeah, minors ain't majors, but this guy has bat control. In the year of the whiff, go for it.

If I ran an organization, I would reward good players with market-level contracts. I would weed out deadwood. I would not reward success with trades. You'll never have a cohesive team if you ship out good players like potato chips. Trade at deadline is a pure loser mentality. Even if they are going to be free agents. You make an honest effort to keep such players.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3JG-ZnnqSWw

The Twins were 7th in all of baseball last year in runs scored, 4th in the AL. They added a guy who hit 38 home runs to DH. With a young core of up and coming players, I don't think too many people expected the team would drop to 23rd in runs scored at this point. I do suppose if they had foresight they would have traded Buxton, Sano, Kepler, Santana, Castro, Dozier, Polanco, and Mauer for better players. Yep, clearly their fault....

The Twins made the Wild-card last season. Everybody agreed that their pitching needed a major boost, and the front office delivered. Hard to say Lynn, Odorizzi, Duke, Reed and Rodney are the root of the Twins problems this season. They've all been performing about where they were expected to. Can't blame them or the front office when the offense does a 180 into the gutter.

College World Series Champion Trevor Larnach! Joins Mark Redmond and Todd Walker in that club, and perhaps others.

If the Twins go full sell mode, I'll be looking forward to my $5 stub hub seats right behind home plate

Syndergaard is only 25 - can't imaging why the Mets would even consider trading him. Still young enough to be part of a quick rebuild.

Long-term, in an ideal world, Sano comes back and retakes 3rd, Polanco locks up short, Gordon slides into 2nd, and Adrianza continutes to play the way he has lately and locks up the utility role. In this scenario EE becomes expendable. However, in this far than less ideal Twins team, getting rid of the most popular guy in the room and one of a handful of productive players would leave a large void on and off the field.