Darius

I’ve long been quick to criticize the way this squad operates financially. Signing Donaldson, and now this, has gone a long way in getting me to think the worm really has turned. The team should get plenty of good PR. And, you know, it’s a good thing on a human level. Keeping a lot of families from total ruin. I’m guessing part of it is confidence that they’ll be playing this year. But, whatever it takes. They’re stepping up regardless.

Not the strikeouts again. Its similar to the change in the bunting paradigm years back. Some are reluctant to give it up. But, eventually all will start to come to a consensus that you get a favorable outcome, run production-wise, when you swing hard. Disclaimer: I’m talking in generalizations here, but there are some exceptions. Obviously, Luis Arraez isn’t as effective if he’s trying to hit one into the Bud Deck on every pitch. I’m not concerned about BABIP in this case, either. Sano will carry a higher BABIP by nature. There isn’t necessarily a bubble to burst. He’s basically a three outcome guy. He K’s a significant amount, homering a ton, and striking out a ton. None of those outcomes are a ball in play. He also barrels up the ball extremely well despite that approach. Thus, when the ball is put into play, there’s a higher rate of balls hit extremely hard (aka, hard line drives). Those get caught less.

I’ll start this by saying I dislike Manfred about as much as a fan can dislike a commissioner....and beyond. The guy is as crooked, clearly. From attempting to cover for A-Roid with coercion to his imbecilic responses to the juiced ball to attempting to cover up the cheating scandal with blatant faux investigations. Just an awful commissioner and human in general. Worst thing to ever happen to baseball. He set this up by taking his own pay cut. Conveniently, I can find his exact number. I can only find that the league office is taking an “average” of 35%. So, he thought it was a brilliant idea to then say, “the people who actually generate the revenue that is used to pay my office will have to take cuts in excess of 50%.” Meanwhile, the players also have to travel and potentially expose themselves to the virus (I won’t get into personal feelings in the virus).....cut to Manfred and his cronies watching the game in opulence from the safety of an isolated MLB office somewhere. Who could have an issue with that? A real leader would come out and set an example with his pay cut, not try to minimize it and sneak it under the rug. I’d put a wager that Manfred’s salary is just supplemental to outrageous kickbacks anyway (no indication..but knowing Manfred). Also, where are people getting that owners are going to suffer if they have to pay their players a fair ratio of their salary? That’s just false. Since when is ticket revenue the main driver behind anything? Why don’t they publish the unrealized appreciation owners have benefitted from (they can leverage that value in many ways until selling and cashing in a realized gain of a billion freaking dollars). Good for the players. I’d push back too. I’m not playing a game out of charity for some of the richest, sleaziest men in the world. If I’m Mike Trout, you’re giving me my damn money that you agreed to.

Yeah, the Atlanta thing kind of defeats the purpose of limiting travel it seems. It seems to me that it’s an attempt to rig things slightly to benefit the East. They don’t want to set it up in a way that could would guarantee the exclusion of one of the Yankees, Nationals, Red Sox, Phillies, or Braves from the playoffs. If that’s the case....why not keep the same format and limit games to be within AL/NL East, etc.? That would be much less travel. This is just gerrymandering to maximize the odds of the leagues preferred playoff matchups. It has almost nothing to do with minimizing “travel.” If that were the case, you wouldn’t have teams from Texas going to the state of Washington - well over 2,000 miles. Atlanta to Toronto is less than 1,000. Atlanta to NY less than 900. It’s a much shorter distance from Texas to NY, for example, than to Seattle. If you want to minimize travel, make 4 divisions. Part of me just wants to hate this because I hate Manfred. The other part of me hates it because it doesn’t make sense, unless purely from a way to drum up excitement/playoff matchups.

On topic - getting Bauer would make this team significantly better. I still don’t trust this rotation much, and am not sold on Maeda being anything more than average to slightly above (if you honestly believe the Dodgers pulled him from the rotation to save a few million, I’m sorry, you’re wrong). This rotation will still be a massive issue come playoff time (if there is playoff time).

It has to feel good for him to be back in that environment and performing well. I’m still surprised he didn’t carve out a career of some kind in the MLB. I think the ability was there.

Chances are, if Arraez leads the team in OPS at that point, disastrous things have happened. Good player, but very limited in the power department. A .900 OPS would require a batting avg. that is off the charts (.400 neighborhood). With so many big time hitters in this lineup (Cruz, Donaldson, Garver, Sano, Kepler), the OPS bar is set near league MVP level.

Some sort of composite calculation based on W-L record (or some average of a number of years) and player salary. Win-loss record be damned if you’re one of the 5-6 teams with a massive, massive competitive advantage

I hope one of our guys put one up near Judge’s messed up grill, if they’re going to throw at Donaldson. Give them nothing.

Jared Camp for Johan Santana in ‘99. It was a Rule 5 deal, but still a trade. Arguably #1, considering Nathan was merely a closer (great, but no multiple Cy Young winner), Liriano blew out his arm after two months, and Bonser was nothing special. I can’t imagine the Twins were anywhere near as successful in the 00s without arguably the best pitcher in team history. Edit: Hat tip to Lance. Should’ve read all the comments more thoroughly.

Ironically, people in the United States are blaming the government for testing issues. Meanwhile, it’s a side step of regulation that is being portrayed as the difference in Germany (blaming a single politician is asinine in and of itself, but I won’t continue down that road. Trusting bureaucrats with something that requires efficient resource allocation is mistake #1). One thing people also seem to lose track of: There could very well be faulty tests all over the world, including Germany, to this day. Rolling out testing just for the sake of testing may not be a good answer. Way too much hysteria around testing, IMO. There were a number of tests out there offering false positives (which tend to help recovery statistics). Do people really believe we’re bumbling idiots that can’t come up with an effective test, meanwhile there’s a stockpile of highly effective test out there from Germany that we refuse to use? It’s much more likely that their tests aren’t real accurate at this point either (but who will ever admit that, especially news outlets with an agenda). Testing for the sake of testing, without properly analyzing the veracity of the results given - which takes a significant amount of time, is in no way a solution to any problem. Testing isn’t the issue in America. Allowing tens, possibly hundreds of thousands, of people back into this country at a vital time is the problem. Liberal media shooting down preventative travel restriction policies as xenophobic at a critical time is the problem. People not adhering to stay at home orders because of conservative media minimizing the seriousness is the problem. The out of control politics in this country on both sides of the aisle, that has bled into our media infrastructure to such an extent that you can’t trust anything reported anymore, was and still is the problem (yet, we’re becoming increasingly divided on the issue - you’d think there would be a lesson to be learned). Again, won’t hear any of that on CNN, and you’ll hear the extreme the other way on Fox. The media in the country are an embarrassment, and should face massive repercussions once this is over. IMO, arguing the testing point right now doesn’t make any sense. Would it be great to have a better picture of the stats right now? Sure. But, what would that change at this very moment? We’ve already put the measures in place based on worst-case scenario modeling. The real data will come out eventually, and the way the models keep being modified, it’s almost certainly not going to tell us we’re not doing enough right now (can’t put the toothpaste back in the tube from three months ago). The main thing is we keep working to fight this thing with treatment/preventative measures. People need to be wary of doctored numbers coming from different regions of the world. People trusting, even citing, numbers from China are verifiably insane. Hell, even German and American data should probably be taken with a grain of salt to some extent (states competing against other states, political agendas, etc.). Also, what about demographic data and who is being tested? Sample sizes? Severity of cases (there are different “mutations”) in different regions? The people on this website should know better than anyone the danger of investing in faulty statistics and small sample sizes. You’re relying on batting average over the first month to determine MVP at this point. I’ll wait for some more complete metrics before determining winners/losers in this scenario.

Garver is an interesting case. As a catcher, I. could see him falling off a cliff sooner than later. But, he keeps himself in such great shape. He’s displayed superhuman healing ability with the ankle. I’m a little more worried about what being on the shelf for a year does to Cruz at age 40, even Donaldson in his mid-30s (another late bloomer as mentioned in relation to Garver).

I’m kind of torn on whether it would be beneficial for his suspension to be reduced significantly. On paper, sounds great. But, what are his odds of staying healthy? Clearly, he is more likely to be an impactful starter in the playoffs with a lighter workload in the regular season. Of course, managing him in a manner similar to last year is an option as well. But, is pitching a few weeks in between DL stints for maintenance a better option than a shortened season and no DL stints? No clue which would have him feeling better come playoff time.

Maybe so, talent-wise. But, his home stadium is a glorified slow-pitch softball stadium. Specifically for LH hitters, and he happens to be a right handed flyball pitcher. Additionally, how does the change in coaching/scouting staffs affect him? Clearly, the Astros have something unique when it comes to pitching. I’m not saying he’ll be awful, but he will take a step or two backward in New York. No doubt in my mind.

Very interesting. Speaking from my own experience, it sure felt like it helped. I see their point when it comes to a singular AB, but I think the conclusion, and approach to this experiment in general, are extremely faulty - in terms of framing it as a negative. As mentioned above, what about long-term? Sure, the research may show it doesn’t improve swing velocity in the one subsequent AB. But, how does it affect swing velocity over the course of the season? A person warming up with such a bat every day certainly improves wrist/fore-arm/shoulder strength (related to swing mechanics) at minimum. For example, if you participate in this exercise most every day from April to May, I would refuse to believe you would see a detriment to your bat speed in June. This is in relation to what it would have been if never picking up a heavy warm-up mechanism of some kind. It’s just like any other resistance training. Bench pressing 225 at 10 reps isn’t going to allow you to bench more in the following 10 minutes. But, doing it repeatedly, day after day, is certainly going to increase the amount of force you can generate. Overall, if done long enough, you are achieving a net gain. We’re not talking about a universe in which each player takes one at bat in their lifetime.

One of the best teams on paper in the team’s history, arguably in the MLB this year. Our best player and clubhouse heartbeat (Cruz) has one, maybe two, elite seasons left before age finally catches up. The Red Sox are down, the Indians are down, the American League favorites are rocked by a cheating scandal. Everything looks primed for a special season....and a freaking worldwide pandemic shuts down the season. Unreal. Just to be clear, there are obviously much worse things. But, in terms of first world problems, this is a big one for me.

Without actually looking at any advanced stats, I would think it’d partially related to his trajectory/launch angle (obviously). I recall hearing he struggled with launch angle up until last season, and was working on/made adjustments to attempt to correct it. BABIP numbers for a guy driving pitches in an elevated manner vs. low-line drives and ground balls look different. It also appears that a large percentage of his hard hit balls in play are to the pull side. I don’t have any data handy in terms of shifting on Max, but that could explain some of it. As he makes adjustments that should increase BABIP year after year, more shifting could be offsetting that. He also hit more HRs in 2019, which don’t fall into BABIP - not a huge driver, but a consideration. Also, when you’re attempting to hit more HRs, you’re going to hit more fly balls. The ones that don’t leave the park are more likely to end up in an outfielders glove than a screaming line drive. An increase n launch angle doesn’t necessarily mean good things, either. Maybe there’s more fly balls, and the hard hits are still lower to the ground. Maybe he needs to find that sweet spot in his launch angle. Too low results in more outs, too high results in more outs. Maybe he’s flirting with the extremes and needs to dial it down a little now after last year to really breakout offensively (as if last season was somehow insufficient). Love Max. So fun to watch hit. As someone largely of German descent (grandparents in my dads side came from the Hamburg area) who has studied the language and makes routine pilgrimages to Octoberfest (New Years Eve in Berlin is also the most underrated NYE party on earth), he’s far and away my favorite current Twin, and one of my favorite of all time. I’m not concerned about the BABIP. Stick with what’s working.

The only thing better than morning beers is the afternoon nap that inevitably follows.

My wife will buy the Andes mint chips (just the scree from the candy making process, I’m sure) and mix them in the batter. I’ve never had the alcoholic version, but I have to think the effect is similar. They’re also fantastic to eat by the handful. I need to eat all of this stuff now. I’m going to make some mint flavored stuffed peppers boiled in marina tonight.

I’ve done it for years. I mastered it in college. It’s a secret recipe only known by few. After some initiation, it was taught to me by a wise old three fingered white glove with a red nose. For some reason, its best prepared at 2 am after bar close.

No, in my estimation, for a few reasons: 1). Players don’t play everyday like they used to. Especially under managers like Baldelli. 2). Sacrificing is a thing of the past. It used to be that the lead off guy would get on base, and the two hitter would move them over to give the 3-4 hitters a chance with RISP. That’s not happening anymore. The best hitters are (or should be) hitting in the two hole now. 3). Similar to above, guys aren’t stealing themselves into scoring position anymore. 4). Hitting philosophies are different. With runners in scoring position and less than two outs, players aren’t merely trying to put the ball in play. They’re not shortening up to get one run....they’re going after multiple runs. 5). Again on hitting philosophies, the slap hitters aren’t there at the top of the lineup anymore. Everyone is trying to hit the ball out of the ballpark. The bottom line is that lineups just don’t revolve around one or two guys in the heart of the order like they used to. I’m not saying that’s a bad thing. I just get the feeling that it’s less likely than it used to be for a single player to get the volume of opportunities. Could be way off base, here. Case in point, the Twins just had one of most prolific offensive seasons in baseball history. They didn’t have a guy exceed 110 RBIs.

I don’t think bwar does justice to Joe’s season. The physical and mental rigors of catching just doesn’t get reflected in any statistics. Not only was it a historically great season offensively, but he was partially responsible for understanding every hitters tendencies in the other dugout, and every pitchers repertoire in his. Catchers make situational calls, adjust the alignment of fielders. Oh, and they do it all while getting absolutely shredded physically (no other position compares even remotely, in terms of mental/physical stress - it’s the only position on the field that has to be 100% situationally engaged on every single pitch), which derailed what certainly would’ve been a 3,000+ hit and HOF career. I’m sorry, but 40 HRs with awful defense isn’t even in the same universe as Mauer’s season. Carew’s is closer, but still a distant second. Mauer’s season is easily the most impressive in my book, and it should be undisputed. It gets me thinking again - what could have been. The numbers Mauer could’ve put up offensively if he played first base his whole career are likely astronomical in terms of hits/average (especially before the shifting craze). Could he have had a .400 season? Not a crazy notion. He’d likely still be playing and working on hit 3,500+. By various accounts, he was injured constantly, he just never complained about it. He didn’t voluntarily recuse himself from the lineup like many would/do. It’s insane to me how underrated Mauer was/is by the majority of Twins fans. First, I don’t think most truly understand the rigors of catching (I likely don’t either, but I caught through High School and College - incredibly demanding - try sprinting down to back up first on every ground ball in full gear when the heat index with humidity is over 100...after squatting for an hour....the dehydration alone is enough to break most). Second, I think many of these others (Killebrew, Carew, Olivia, etc) are so much more highly regarded because many fans today didn’t see them play everyday. They are only aware of the highlights....whereas we all saw Mauer’s lows first hand. If the FO would’ve actually made an attempt at going all in at any point from 2000-2010 and brought home a World Series (or even an AL pennant), people would feel differently, which is a shame.

If they continue to hit in the minors, I just don’t see a good rationale for not finding ABs for them in some way as the season progresses. Not only from a transcendent talent standpoint. Rosario, Buxton, Kepler, Cruz, Marwin, Arraez, etc all suffered significant injuries. Chances are, they’ll be needed at some point. Playing someone in a lower tier, talent-wise, for the sake of service time would be disappointing.

Should’ve hit the reset button on the console before it saved.

Thank you, mlhouse. After reading the article, I had planned on commenting, “Sandy Koufax is the most overrated baseball player of all time.” You beat me to it. I hate comparing MLB players from different eras, anyway. It’s all relative to your competition, which is wildly different. The best players right now are the best players of all time. Period. Drop Johan Santana as he was in his prime back into the Koufax era, and he may not give up an earned run over his entire career. Take Babe Ruth how he was in his prime in today’s game, and he would never even step foot in an MLB ballpark as a player (hyperbole, but I think the point is conveyed). It’s like comparing one of today’s super cars to a Model T in terms of racing. Sandy Koufax is not a better baseball player than Johan Santana, he just played against worse baseball players. Pitchers in today’s era especially are screwed if you’re playing that game. The physicality and skill of the hitters isn’t even in the same ballpark. It’s like playing against a different species of human. Shouldn’t those things be considered, instead of just comparing ERAs (which is widely considered a useless statistic now, anyway)? Is a no hitter really that impressive when you’re facing a lineup with nobody in it? Just a quick search reveals that there was a 20+ point differential in league wide OPS in 1955 vs 2010. Also, equipment differences (juiced balls), technological differences (endless scouting), smaller strike zones, smaller ballparks, differences in approach (people giving up more outs via bunting, etc.)