Brananorama

LORD BYRON APPROACHETH!

I want to see a spread of where his hit balls go when the bases are empty and where they go when there's runners on. With the new pull-approach he and Bruno were working on, he may have it in his head that he should try out the new approach, swing earlier, and hook it into right when there's nobody on and he has "nothing to lose" and can't hurt the runners -- it's his time to experiment in-game. But when there's baserunners around, he wants to do what he knows how to do and get them home, and reverts to a more Mauer approach. I wouldn't be surprised if he has mostly pulls with nobody on and a more sprayed-out spread with runners on base/specifically in scoring position.

Third homer in as many at-bats for Vogt, apparently.

I'm beginning to think he's not as ready for this outing as he's been made out to be.

Son of a...

None so far. Jesse Chavez tomorrow is the only righty we'll see for the rest of the set, for what that's worth.

Psh, if we can't sweep a bunch of sub-.500 scrubs, what are we doing anymore? But really, though, exciting things to come in this series. I think we have a shot at taking three from the A's and really making an improvement on the W/L record. Eddie will be fun to watch. (Also, I just got around to seeing Moneyball for the first time over the weekend. Great movie. I gave it a solid 8/10 in my movie-watching spreadsheet, so all your references were really topical.)

The interesting thing about the endless Sano+Plouffe conversation is that Sano will be up sooner rather than later and neither guy is getting taught a different position.

Fantastic write-ups throughout. Rickey truly is the only choice for this position. Did a lot of research on him and Jackie Robinson a couple years ago and was really impressed at everything I learned.

I haven't finalized my AL Central predictions yet, and that's the only division in which I have yet to make a hard-and-fast call. I think the White Sox are going to finish second place if Detroit plays out like they look on paper, but if the Tigers begin to fall apart for a moment, I think Chicago can win the division. The thing about Chicago is that they had such a systematic offseason. They addressed every single one of their major problems last year in a really efficient way, and got GOOD talent in each of those spots. As much as it pains me to say it, we'll probably be watching the South Siders get some postseason ball this year.

The Tigers' owner has demonstrated that he'll spend on his sports teams mostly because he's 85 years old and wants to win one more before he goes out! Ilitch is a great guy, too, and he hasn't seen a championship while he's been the owner. He got them a new park, an All-Star Game, two World Series appearances...and he owns Little Caesar's, so you can't hate the guy. But, I agree. I think if the Tigers aren't in a position to make a push around the deadline, they will begin the rebuild NOW and start selling off important pieces while they can still get some value out of it. I think both the Indians and White Sox have a better shot at the division this year.

Should be a fun series. There's not much here that hasn't already been said about why the Royals aren't going to repeat their success, but I think that this year the AL Central might be the #1, #2 toughest division in baseball. I have the Twins lined up for about 78-to-81 wins, and the Royals for 82-to-84. I think Chicago and Cleveland will be third and second in the mid-80's. In order for the Twins to leapfrog the Royals I think it's going to come directly down to head-to-head competition between the two clubs. In a tight division where the Twins and White Sox are improving, Detroit and K.C. are regressing, and Cleveland being Cleveland, we're all going to fall around the same W/L. If we can firmly beat the Royals in the season series fourth place might be ours.

I'm mostly over Aaron Hicks. I think he could potentially figure it out, but that's what we've been saying in each of the last two years. I'm more interested in sticking Jordan Schafer out there until something goes wrong enough to warrant a replacement for him. Above all else I want Danny Santana playing shortstop a lot more often than he did last season. If he's going to be in that position over the next couple years while we wait for guys like Polanco and Gordon, I'd like him to start building up some experience there and showing us what he's got.

I doubt he will, we still need outfield depth on the bench.

That all, of course, depends on whether or not he's with the club come August.