MauerState7

I have some cousins that live in a house with a large unfinished basement. They moved to this house from one that was considerably larger, not so much in an effort to downsize, but more to find a residence that was more affordable. The problem with this was my Aunt is a longtime suffer of “I might still need that syndrome.” She will fully deny it, but it is a debilitating illness that has hampered the functionality of said basement, and more obscurely, her lifestyle in general. She attaches fond memories with items that were once a mainstay in her life, and because of those memories, has an intense affinity with holding on to them. I fear that my Aunt and the Pohlads suffer from the same affliction. When Terry Ryan was fired last season many of us hoped for the “clean house” take when rebuilding the front office. We hoped that names like Rob Antony, Deron Johnson, and (maybe this one is just me) Jack Goin would be sending resumes to other organizations or maybe jumping into a different line of work all together. We hoped that with the hiring of Derek Falvey and Thad Lavine would come a new era of analytics in Twins baseball that would return us to glory days of being hated by the White Sox for our piranha-esk qualities and our “right way” idealistic of how a baseball team should be run. Many of us were disappointed. But what I failed to see at the time is that the Pohlads have this pack-rat nature that was not quite blatantly obvious. Like my aunt, they have fond memories associated with some of these people and hold to the ideas that what we once found so useful could be just as useful once again. With a younger and more Beane-like view on baseball, I find this shortsighted. Personally, I am not a pack-rat. I throw things away hoping that they will never be needed again, sometimes to my down fall. I risk that chance because I am a firm believer that the future holds greater value than the past, and to fully harness that value, we need to embrace it. Enter, the duo that some of us affectionately call, Falvine. Falvine is like showing your aunt a Property Brothers-esk rendering of what her basement could be like. They are the people that will hopefully update this franchise to its full potential, restoring it to the glory days that the Pohlads are so desperately holding on to. But the two different factions disagree with how to do that. The most effective way to clean out my begrudgingly stubborn aunt’s basement is to send her on a week’s vacation and make executive decisions on what to keep and what to sentence to the landfill (or send her away for two weeks and find out how to properly recycle everything…). Falvine does not have this option available to them. The other way to clean the basement is to introduce new things, to slowly change the functionality, until my aunt realizes that her old items are no longer useful and the pipedream of them once again becoming mainstays in her life is unrealistic. This is what Falvine is doing. Many of us were disheartened by the roster that the Twins appear to be headed north with. Danny Santana on the bench, Mauer (love the guy to death by the way and will always be my favorite player) appearing to be slated for 162 starts. Hughes and Santiago in the rotation. 13 pitchers because of the mortal fear that the aforementioned starters will have a hard time completing more than 3 1/3 innings. I believe that these are all carefully calculated decisions that Falvine has made to show the Pohlads that the way the Twins of a decade ago were so successful is no longer sustainable. It is their way to slowly normalize to the Pohlads that Falvine’s way of doing things is the way of the future. None of us realistically expected this team to compete for a championship, a pennant, a division title or heck, even a winning record, this season. To me that makes this way of doing things justified. Because in a few short years, many of us hope to be talking about who will be the pinch runner when we get a man on first in a tied game 3 of the ALCS. And when we have that conversation, I want Carl Pohlad’s opinion as far from the realm of consideration as possible.

Flavine is playing politics with the Polads and by virtue of extension, Molitor. I Feel like the new front office wants nothing to do with Hughes, Santiago, Danny Santana, or Grossman, but the competing voices still within the clubhouse are getting too much time on the debate floor. By letting those voices win temporarily they are going to be able to expose the flaws in that way of thinking and gain more power and influence with the owner. Is this they was a successful organization is operated, no way, but this is a way of moving the power of influence from the old guard to the new one so that when this team is in the conversation to win the division, and a contender for the pennant, their voices will have full control of the debate. It may be dumb to those of us that are on the analytics bandwagon, but it may be most effective to stop the bandwagon to help the holdovers onto the bandwagon than to ride off into the sunset with half the organization stranded on the side of the road.

Thats a good point, but I also envision Buxton hitting 3rd, Dozier Second and Polanco Leading off. I know I am being overly optimistic, but that is what this time of year is for. Buxton will be in the 70 range in terms of XBH and although he is a good runner, I don't see him stealing more that 25-30 bags. I also see a scenario where Dozier comes back down to earth and returns to his leadoff role, moving everyone up.

This is definitely a pipedream, but I recall LaVell mentioning that Joe had found a flaw in his swing the week before the strained Quads. He corrected it, and was on fire that week hitting like old Joe (or should I say young Joe, Metrodome Joe even). What if that flaw had to do with shifting his weight properly, which is where power hitters get their power from. He strains the Quads because he was not in proper shape because he hadn't been using those particular muscles in that way all season. It is rather odd to strain both of your quads at the same time, unless it is a fundamental difference in his swing that changed. Morneau won the batting title with the Rockies three years after his concussion, and I don't believe it was just a Rocky Mountain High. He did show a better eye at the plate last year three years removed from the concussion. I would predict Joe is once again over .300 and slugs 18 homers. Molitor will have to bat him fourth and the twins will keep Dozier as they contend for the division with an injury riddled Indians squad.