Bradfoot

The bottom half is good though. It means less injured players. 19th most injured players means 11th fewest. It was only 2022 that we ranked high with reds, pirates, cubs.

Deep dive into number of players injured each of last 5 years. Seems like 2022 was an outlier. MLB 2022 Injured Reserve Tracker | Spotrac 2022 - Twins ranked 3rd with 32 players injured (team) (number of players) (number of days) (amount of money on injured list) Cincinnati Reds 37 2,638 $33,712,787 Pittsburgh Pirates 34 1,730 $10,499,570 Chicago Cubs 32 2,158 $45,160,984 Minnesota Twins 32 2,363 $32,712,075 San Francisco Giants 31 1,462 $39,365,278 2021 Twins ranked 16th most injured players with 28 2020 Twins ranked 19th most with 14 players 2019 Twins ranked 16th most with 19 players 2018 Twins ranked 19th with 18 players

Should be interesting watching the Sano critics who obsess over batting average react to Gallo this year.

The mega deal makes more sense to me for the Mets. The Giants don't seem to be ready to capitalize on the first few years of this deal like the Mets are. At the same time, I wonder what the Mets will look like in 5 years when all these expensive players are hitting their mid 30's. The Mets will probably be able to stomach all these deals even if/when the players have fallen off but it certainly seems like they are all-in now and will deal with the consequences later. Sounds like the Giants got cold feet and were looking for an out. Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle tweets, the “Giants flagged something in [Correa’s] physical and doctors disagreed.”

The White Sox seem to be hitting their stride. This can still be a very scary lineup. I'm starting to see them as the favorite. Since August 1st Eloy Jiminez .366/.444/.565 190wRC+ Jose Abreu .329/.377/.401 124 wRC+ Elvis Andrus .303/.340/.528 147 wRC+ Lance Lynn 1.81 ERA 10.51 k/9 Dylan Cease 2.18 ERA Cueto 2.87 ERA

I think pointing out that the odds are against them is a lot different than saying they should not try at all. I did say I hope they make the playoffs which should imply that I want them to try.

So it's not important to look at our record against opponents outside the AL central when we (if we make it) would be the only AL central team in the playoffs? It's also not important to look at our record against teams over .500, or playoff caliber teams? I really don't expect an announcer to quote the under .500 records when comparing a playoff matchup.. "Houston has a much better record than the Twins but let's not discount how well the Twins did against Royals and Tigers."

Where did I say give up? We are being propped up by a horrible division though.

IKF hit one off of Verlander 7/28/18. (I spent way too much time looking that up.)

Take away our AL Central games and the Twins are 37-43 on the year. We are 31-41 against teams at or above .500. But someone needs to represent the prestigious AL Central in the postseason, and it might as well be us. It would sell a few more tickets this year and season tickets next year. It would also make us slightly more attractive for free agents. There is also that small chance of an underdog run. If we forced a game 3 in round 1, could we declare a "went the distance" moment or would we need to make it further to start throwing around Rocky 1 references?

The article says Lucas Gioloto has a 75.27 ERA. I expect some more offense today.

It remains to be seen how the season will finish, a lot of games left against the Central division where we have a 30-20 record (13-11 since June 1st). But my overall point being that the Twins have largely outperformed the expectations up until now. Instead of placing blame, it might be better to just realize that this was always a roughly .500 caliber team.

Comparing this season to what preseason expectation were, I would say this is pretty much what we should have been expecting. Fangraphs had a preseason prediction of 82 Wins for the Twins and a 40.4% chance of making the playoffs. Pretty much right on the nose with where we are now. That would still be a 9 game improvement from last season.

yeah that was a sneaky signing by the Giants, 2 years $20M and a 10M option on the 3rd season.

Isn't this going to be apparent for all pitchers? They are always going to be more likely to be forced out of the game by the top of the lineup. If the 2,3,4 hitters get on base you don't assume he will get the next 3 out just because they are 5,6,7 hitters. The top of the lineup is more likely to do damage and pitchers are more likely to be pulled when they run into trouble. If anything this supports pulling him sooner. He shouldn't be asked to get lit up by the top of the order to get to the bottom of the order a 3rd time. I admit the 8.25 this year is a small sample size and I try to use his 4.88 career as a better indicator.