Twodogs

In my opinion the Royals Ace was their bullpen.

You mean like Curt Schilling and Randy Johnson? Then I don't know what they had after those two, but who cared after that?

He is hitting .220, kinda like last year.

Do you guys think that Gibson can expect a higher K rate going forward after today's start?? I know he had a decent K rate in the minors but it seems to have completely disappeared up in the bigs. Can he keep it up? or was this an abberation?

Madison Baumgartner

Howard has proven to be able to stay on the field?

At least if Howard strikes out a lot he wont be hitting into DP's. It would look nice to see Howards name in the lineup, I mean the guys at ESPN would get all excited about it, but would it help the Twins win? I don't think so. Actually it seems as though the Twins are doing an ok job of scoring runs, the real trouble is in the Bullpen. I would like to see the Twins go after a couple of hard throwing no-name bull pen guys to help bridge the gap from the starters to Perkins. Just my take I mean playoff baseball is usually about limiting the other team from scoring, not so much about out-scoring the other team. I mean yeah you need to outscore them to win, but in the playoffs usually everyone has good pitching and the team the limits the other team has the best chance of winning. The chance of Ryan Howard hitting a home run to win the world series is a lot less likely than having two different guys come in during the 7th and 8th innings and shut down the opposition with hard throwing strikes. So I say scour the non playoff contenders for hard throwing relief pitchers that they wont need and that no one that isn't a fan of those teams really cares about.

Well it seems like he had a stretch with the Twins where he did quite well also, but I also remember the crappy months too.

Well why the hell wasn't he taking them when he was playing for the Twins! I would have loved to see a couple of 40 homerun seasons. It would have been much more fun than watching Dougie hold runners on first base.

I remember TK sent a message to Ortiz and sent him down for a whole year, I think he got a couple of MLB at bats that year. TK made fun of his swing saying he looked like a softball player, I wonder if Ortiz has made fun of the Twins for the last 13 or so years?? Im not saying there aren't times when you have to punish these guys to show them how to do things right, but I sure hope if that is the case, that they don't hold a grudge and be stubborn, I mean if the dude starts smacking the ball around he should be up and playing.

Personally, I'll take great pitching. Especially when you factor how much the Twins have paid him.

I could get used to this winning stuff.

Hunter is doing a very good job, I am glad because he is one of those Twins that brought this club damn near out of extinction. I am sure he will have some more ups and some downs, but if he can hit at about the clip he hit last year he should be a good influence in the lineup. Defensively he will hold it together, he is not the guy he once was but neither is Mauer or a lot of other players, but my personal opinion is that he will be good for the Twins this year.

Well let's see, do you think that the Twins would have given Santana all of that money if they had already known that he was a cheater?? I mean look at the situation now, even if the guy is good you are adding more risk to the money you are spending. Twins free agents need to be guys that should be reliable because they can't throw money around like the Yankees or the Dodgers, If the Yankees get burned on a free agent they can just go get another guy, Twins are stuck with Santana now, who knows how long he's been dirty and maybe he can't come back from this the same player as the one the Twins thought they signed. I'd bet Cruz's history played a role in everyone's mind that were thinking of going after him.

money ball!!

Isn't Nelson Cruz like one injection away from being banned for a year? Maybe I'm thinking of someone different?

Yeah this makes sense, and for all of those that are so much against it then they should also have been against the Paul Molitor signing or the Terry Steinbach signing etc... because those were almost identical, two players on the backside of their careers brought back to Minnesota to sell tickets and basically be a transition period between those crappy teams of the mid 90's to the pretty good teams of the 2000's. It's probably a good thing that they could find a guy that only needed a 1 year deal. Could you imagine if they had to sign a guy to a 3-4 year deal and what that would do to someone like Buxton and Rosario. If those guys do develop then there would be some ok guy basically in their way. Once this season is done then the spots open up for those young guys if they are deemed ready. If not, then they will probably sign some other guy to a 1 year deal hoping to get those young guys ready and in an everyday role soon.

Hunter has been a big part of the Twins organization. I really hope that he can put up some decent numbers for the Twins this year, which it seems like he has started to do. I don't think that people truly dislike Hunter, at least I hope not, I think that if the Twins had say, Carlos Gomez, and Ben Revere as the other two outfielders to go with Hunter instead of Schaffer and Arcia, I think people would be more accepting of the Hunter signing. I think die hard Twins fans were looking for a signing that was going to improve all facets of the Twins dynamic and to tell the truth that guy just wasn't out there this year to sign for a low price of a one year contract anyway. So Hunter is who the Twins got and I like him and hope he hits .270 with 17 Hrs 75 Rbi with a .330 on base. That would be a good final year for him as a Twin. I know people bring up things like WAR and if he is even a 0 or a +1 or so then that means to me that he is average. That to me would be better than running collabello back out there or some other guy that is way worse. I as a Twins fan have been looking for a way to pry Van Slyke away from the Dodgers, he's a 5th OF'er for them but would be nice corner OF'er for the Twins, I think.

I was at the Rancho Cucamonga Quakes California League high A ball game against the Inland Valley 66'ers and low and behold, Denny Hocking is the manager of the 66'ers. San Bernardino is not the best place in the world to live however, so it might be kind of like sort of a penalty to be there. Ha ha Quakes are the Dodgers affiliate and the 66'ers are the Angels affiliate.

That is exactly correct. I mean if a team starts out 10 - 0 and plays just .500 the rest of the way then they finish 10 games over .500. 86 - 76 is probably pushing for a wild card. So when a team starts out hot, they can stay up their pretty high by just not falling apart.

as i say that tied up!!!

Jeez it would be nice to beat Detroit!

"Straight ball, hit very much!" "Curve ball, bats are afraid."

If he is still producing better than what the Twins have on Memorial Day, I'd say that is about when he should be called up. But if he hits any extended slumps between here and there, then I think July 1st has to be the next goal. But I think he needs to get a lot of confidence, to the point where he knows that no one can handle him in AAA, once he gets there, he will know, the Twins will know and we will all find out if it is true. I remember Morneau was held down for about a month or two too long, at least that was what it seemed like, then he had some struggles for about a year or so and then exploded.

I wonder if the New York Yankee fans think Hughes is an ACE? Is Scott Erickson an ACE? It would seem to me that an Ace is an Ace no matter where he is, stick Clayton Kershaw on any team and he is good. Hughes like Erickson in his rookie season had an Ace like season. For one season they pitched like an Ace, now if Hughes does that over and over and over again? Hell yeah then he will be known as an Ace. But right now he had one Ace like season.