Bill

I have always thought this was a source of problems... hands moving forward with the stride instead of moving back.

Anyone notice that Rodney does not seem to be warmed up when he starts an inning? First fastballs are usually low 90s. After letting on a few runners he starts to pump it up to 96 to 98. I get that he may only have a certain number of fast fastballs in him per night, but I think a different strategy might be worth a try.

Not too much. We gave up a little (slight decrease in already low chances of making playoffs this year) and in return we got a little (moderate chance new minor leaguers turn out to be solid MLB contributers).

What was up with the 0-2 semi-overhand fastball right down the middle that Hildenberger threw? That batter was toast if Hildy would have just thrown something slow a foot off the plate in the lefty batters box.

Just checked on fangraphs. 47.6% of his batted balls are flyballs. That is 4th highest among 162 qualified batters. That would be OK, except his flyballs don't usually go over the fence. I wonder if he is intentionally trying to hit the ball in the air more... If you see him in the on deck circle, he frequently practices a downward swing starting from high hands, which you might think would have the opposite effect (although I know there are different theories on this).

He has always had a low babip. Just not as low as this year. He hits so many weak fly balls to left and to center.

Too many trips to the mound. Fix that.

This game was percolating below the surface in the previous two. Scores in games 1 and 2 were close, but Twins pitchers have still not had a 1-2-3 inning in the series according to Cory and Dan on the radio. Meanwhile, with the exception of a few innings, Yankees pitching has torn through our lineup with lots of strikeouts and easy innings.

Rosario is my new favorite player!

Whenever Rosario comes up in an important situation, I usually say for the benefit of whoever is also in the room "Eddie.... please... you don't have to swing at the first pitch." His OPS on the first pitch is over 1000, so maybe I am dwelling too much on the times when he swings at some barely hittable pitch and gets out right away. I wonder how often MLB players are instructed to take until they get a strike. Is that frowned upon as something for little kids? Did Polanco have a take sign in the previous at bat? If I recall right, he squared to bunt on the first pitch... He couldn't have possibly been sacrificing (I hope, at least). Was he just taking?

Usually off balance and lunging at the ball. Torso leaning way forward. Rarely lets the ball get deep enough. Even when he makes good contact, the approach looks bad. At 0:09 of the video where they are talking about his non-kick he hits a line drive to left... on a pitch six inches outside. Then at 0:23, again lunging and pulling a pitch on the outside black to left. So: set up far away from the plate, lunge toward the plate (kick or no kick), and then pull outside pitches. Oooof. I guess this is supposed to be like Molitor, who had hardly any stride and who started far from the plate. But Molitor lets the ball get to him; Buxton does not. Hopefully this gets fixed somehow.

Bring up Mickolio!

Pressly... ooof.

According the Fangraphs, Rosario swings at 58.8% of all pitches he sees, which is tied for the highest percentage in the majors among batters with at least 100 PAs. His O Swing % is 41.7%, tied for 6th highest. He swings too much, and he swings at bad pitches too much. The Twins should give him the take sign alot.

I wonder if Rosario is ever given the take sign. Is there such a thing as the take sign?

Was at the games Sunday (with a great seat in game 2!). Adrianza looks excellent in the field. Very smooth and outstanding arm. You can really see it in person at field level. A lot of zip on the throws with an easy motion. But.. there is no reason to move Escobar. He is a decent hitter and decent fielder. Two backups for 2B/SS/3B seems right to me. Gordon will not be up until next year or maybe September, when rosters expand anyway. Plus, we might trade Dozier.

Like the baseball card pics.

It seems that hit probability is calculated based upon exit velocity and lauch angle. As far as I can tell, it does not account at all for where fielders are positioned or whether a ball is hit, e.g. to straightway center or in a gap. http://m.mlb.com/news/article/217705412/statcast-introduces-hit-probability-for-2017/

I will guess that the hit probability computations do not account for where fielders are actually standing when the ball is hit. My understanding is that the catch probability computations do account for the starting position of the fielders.

I have always thought Buxton's swing looked a little funny; kind of like was lunging at the ball with a very loopy swing. I spent some time playing amateur batting coach trying to figure out what is going on. A good site for looking at swings from the side is here: https://www.youtube.com/user/PastimeAthletics When you look at pretty much any of the swings from the side, you can really see what is going on with the "load": the hands move back (*away* from the pitcher) as the stride comes forward. In old videos of Buxton, if you look here (around 2:12): or here: you see that Buxton hands actually move *forward* as he strides (or more accurately does that toe tap). Here is a newer video from 2016: He has a discernible load here, but he is still letting his hands get dragged forward and down by his body before he really starts his actual swing. As his body weight is coming forward, his hands seem to be coming forward too soon. Anybody know where there are more recent side videos of Buxton's swing available?

That pitch looks just a little high.

In AAA in 2016, Vargas hit .283 against righties and .131 against lefties. The extreme difference is seemingly a fluke of small numbers. That said, there are some years in the minors when he hit better against lefties and some years when he better against righties. Vargas has been a consistently good hitter as he moved up through the minors, and has made a notable improvement at taking walks. I say give him significant PT against both lefties and righties and see what happens.

Maybe Vargas can catch on days that Suzuki is DHing.

Berrios totally shut down Correa!

Vargas should get at least as many ABs the rest of this season as Mauer.