Teflon

Elijah Price now looks like the better draft pick.

Guessing it's not really this guy from the story link, right? It would make his recent performance all the more incredible, though.

If I was the Twins FO, I'd be willing to move Sonny Gray for a high-end prospect. I kinda like that Petty kid pitching for Daytona in the Reds organization. We could throw in another arm in the deal. - maybe someone like Francis Peguero.

Martin and Lewis are one of my favorite duos!

Being the worst sports "city" should be a blessing for sports blogs, though, right? A cornucopea of content from the discontented.

Over a 7-year career ending in 1979, Twins DH Craig Kusick came to the plate 1461 times, compiling an unremarkable slash line of .235/.342/.392. Kusick may have had a briefer stay in the bigs, however, if it was not for his uncanny ability to hit Frank Tanana of the California Angels who was the most intimidating strikeout pitcher in the American League not named Nolan Ryan or Vida Blue. Kusick ended up facing Tanana more than any other pitcher over his career – 59 times - which was about 4% of all his plate appearances. In those at-bats, Kusick went 16 for 42 (.381) drawing a Bonds-like 16 walks for a .542 on-base percentage. He also took Tanana deep 4 times in those 42 at-bats and drove in 11 runs. Three of those home runs came in consecutive games against Tanana in 1976, after which Tanana walked Kusick 7 times in the next 5 times they met – twice intentionally. While Kusick was certainly not a Twins great, his inextricable linking to Tanana suggests an interesting related topic. Thanks to the Batter-vs-Pitcher data on Baseball Reference we can now ask and answer who were the opposing players Twins greats faced the most and who owned whom? * * * * * * * * * For the first "Who Owned Whom?" we look at a recent Twins great, Joe Mauer. Over his 15-year career, Mauer played in 1858 games and had 7960 plate appearances. He batted .306, had an on-base average of .388, slugged .439 with 143 home runs, scored 1018 runs and drove in 939. His most frequent opposing pitcher over his career was none other than Detroit’s Justin Verlander who faced off against Joe in 97 plate appearances. Verlander, who has a career .228 batting average-against and OPS-against of .652, was definitely "owned" by Mauer as Joe finished with a slash line of .317/.423/.537 on 26 for 82 hitting with 15 walks. The 26 hits are the most by Mauer against any pitcher and the first one came in his first at-bat against Verlander in the second game of a Saturday double header versus Detroit on July 23rd, 2005 as Joe hit an 0-2 pitch deep to left field in Detroit for an RBI double. The other pitchers Joe faced frequently were Rick Porcello –who fared better than his Tigers teammate - (75 plate appearances, .243/.293/.329) and the unfortunate John Danks of the White Sox. (71 plate appearances, .381/.451/.476) Coincidentally (or not), Danks is the only pitcher to have beaned Mauer more than once. CC Sabathia is the pitcher that struck Joe out the most -17 Ks in 52 plate appearances - and, along with another lefty, Mark Buehrle, most “owned” Joe. Joe only managed .196/.269/.239 against Sabathia and .197/209/.303 against Buehrle. Sabathia was also the first pitcher Mauer faced in the big leagues in his debut versus Cleveland in the Season Opener at the Metrodome on April 5th, 2004. Mauer, batting 8th, walked on 4 pitches against Sabathia in the 3rd and struck out swinging on a full count in the 5th. Sabathia pitched through the 7th and left with a 4-0 lead. The Twins rallied to tie the game, 4-4, in the 8th inning and Mauer's first big league hit would come on a single to center off Rafael Betancourt leading off the 9th. The game went to extra innings and Mauer got his second hit on a one-out, one-on single to right in the 11th off Chad Durbin, moving Nick Punto (running for Matt LeCroy who had walked) to third. After a Christian Guzman strikeout, Shannon Stewart lifted a Durbin fly ball deep to LF for a game-winning 3-run homer, bringing in Mauer and Punto and blowing 49,584 Metrodome fans from the exits hoarse and happy. What a memorable game to start a career! Watch for another installment of "Who Owned Whom" coming soon.

Your triple emphasis sounds like Rocky from the latest Andy Weir story. Intentional - question? If not, must read.

The Kansas City road trip used to be a necessity back in the Metrodome days. Originally, the fountains ran for a larger expanse in the outfield and there were no other features or seating out there - so they were a more integral part of the design. Also that stadium can get insanely hot (worse when they had synthetic turf) and the fountains seemed to take some of the edge off that. I love the location of the park and the fact that KC had the foresight to build separate dedicated baseball and football facilities in the 70s that share common infrastructure. Cities were building multi-purpose stadiums back then but KC really had the right idea as both are still viable venues to this day. The placing of the ballpark away from KC proper and all the adjacent parking that location has made possible foster one of the best tailgating atmospheres imaginable. The original plan called for a rolling roof structure that could be moved on rails over either stadium or parked over a plaza between them. The stadiums were built with the required alignment but the roof never came to be. For lodging, there are two hotels right across I-70 that are within easy walking distance that will be populated with scores of fellow Twins fans down for the series if you are looking for some camaraderie. Some attractions I would add in Kansas City are: Negro League Baseball / Jazz Hall of Fames - located in the 18th & Vine neighborhood. You can see both HOF's with one admission. I enjoyed each very much as well as learning about the history of that historic part of KC. American Royal Barbecue Contest (in conjunction with rodeo/horse show/livestock competition) - I went down once in late September when the contest was going on and remember the whole town smelled like barbecue! They used to hold the barbecue contest at the old Kemper Arena but it's out at the Kansas Speedway now where there's more room.

I think the Saints play 30 games against the Iowa Cubs this year, don't they? Shoeless Joe and Midnight Graham would probably draw the line at having to be in Iowa that much.

There should be a standard on Twins Daily that Wind Surge must always be written in italics.

They could visit the famous Crisco Court where Mary Tyler Moore once threw up a hat or the site of the old Metrodome which is now a bank, I believe.

While I didn't hear Coach Jim talking, listening to the game broadcast on the radio in the empty Metrodome taught me a little something about the speed of sound compared to the speed of light. The crack of the bat picked up by a microphone 70 feet from home plate got transmitted to the WCCO antenna and broadcast back to my radio before the actual sound from the bat could travel the 430 feet to where I was sitting.

Half of the Saints 142 game schedule will be played against just two teams - Iowa and Omaha (36 games each).

Will making better contact and trying to exploit the areas defensive shifts leave untended become a thing?

Agreed. This was undoubtedly the Twins' worst move ever. This catastrophe of a trade was not only bad on the field but it crushed that team's soul. Brunansky's removal was like a death among brothers who had all struggled and fought and laughed together since '82. And it wasn't just the loss of Bruno. The Twins chemistry was further damaged with the lobotomy-like change of its most raucous leader following the acutely impressionable Gaetti's born-again conversion and buy-in to the same rapture crap Herr had been proclaiming. Hrbek said it was like Gaetti had passed away.

Maybe they could catch up with former Twin Jeff Holly.

Brad Hand is five times better than Rollie Fingers.

Not signing Cruz just means Miguel Sano moves to his destined position one season earlier.

After the Twins won the World Series in '91 we had a friggen' blizzard. It's just Minnesota, man. Try not to read anything into it.

A truer comparison of worth to the Twins would be game-by-game outcomes. How often was each each successful at their intended jobs?

I think they made this deal because they still had a surplus of "Vargas" jerseys sitting around because the old clubhouse guy saw "Kennys" and thought there were two of them. Sure, they'll have to take them in a bit...

Unfortunately sports are a de facto religion for a lot of folks. Even though it's an innocuous change, mess with their holy icons and see how fervently they will respond. I personally like the change and would probably reminisce on teammates Harmon and Rod or Herbie and Puck or Joe and Torii when I look at it. PS - Minnie and Paul are NOT practicing safe distancing.