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Berardino: Tough Talk from Rob Antony

JB_Iowa

By JB_Iowa
in Minnesota Twins Talk

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JB_Iowa Ft Myers Mighty Mussels

JB_Iowa

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Twinsights: Twins exec Rob Antony wishes somebody would do something to win a job

 

 

http://blogs.twincities.com/twins/2014/03/19/twinsights-twins-exec-rob-antony-wishes-somebody-would-do-something-to-win-a-job/

 

 

I'm sure we all wish they'd step up and earn a job, too.

 

It seems to me that the lack of luster doesn't apply only to those mentioned in this article. Starting pitching aside (for now), the whole team has seemed pretty lackluster.

 

edit by Brock Beauchamp:

This thread is getting out of hand. If this tone continues, we're going to start issuing infractions and warnings. This thread is not an open invitation to start whipping the front office for the umpteenth time.

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Craig Arko Wichita Wind Surge

Craig Arko

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At least you didn't say Mark Antony.

 

Gibson and Deduno have taken steps. Hicks looked a lot more confident at the plate today against the Cards. Pinto showed some smarts behind the plate, I thought.

 

Willingham and Plouffe are the ones I'm concerned about. Gotta have right-handed power at TF.

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JB_Iowa Ft Myers Mighty Mussels

JB_Iowa

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Willingham and Plouffe are the ones I'm concerned about. Gotta have right-handed power at TF.

 

Interesting that its the ones "competing" for a job who got called out but nothing about some of the "regulars".

 

I know that they are expected to perform to a certain level regardless of how they look in the spring. On the other hand, they could provide some leadership for the guys who are "in competition".

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jokin Wichita Wind Surge

jokin

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At least you didn't say Mark Antony.

 

Why not? Look what he's done for the Dolphins with his Latin Community outreach.

 

http://cdn.ph.upi.com/pv/upi/7f30d54d323371a707a83dd96664d2fb/Marc-Anthony-becomes-part-owner-of-the-Miami-Dolphins.jpg

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Dman Ft Myers Mighty Mussels

Dman

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I have to agree with Anthony for the most part. Kind of nice that he isn't glossing over it. There are some guys that are performing pretty well at least at the plate. CC is batting 400, I think Herman and Pinto are batting in the high 300's.

 

It is interesting to me that the young guys seem to be doing so much better at the plate than the more experienced guys. I know it is only spring training but you would think they could go up blind folded and do better than one or two hits.

 

Pretty much every poster on this board thought that offense was going to be problematic this year. I am not sure what Mr. Anthony expected?

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jokin Wichita Wind Surge

jokin

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Still kind of hoping that Antony does something to earn his job...

 

Well, he could give a kick in the tail to some of the guys who already have a job guaranteed. (I have enclosed a couple tools he could use to motivate, if not embarrass):

 

Kubel ST slash: .080/.233/.200/.433

Willy ST slash: .080/.172/.120/.292

Bartlett ST slash: .037/.133/.037/.170

Butera ST slash: .182/.400/.545/.945

 

Drew says: "Suck on that, my former Homies, I'm better than all you guys, combined."

 

 

http://i.cdn.turner.com/si/multimedia/photo_gallery/1206/mlb.poll.best.catcher/images/Drew-Butera.jpg

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TheLeviathan All-Star

TheLeviathan

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Interesting that its the ones "competing" for a job who got called out but nothing about some of the "regulars".

 

I know that they are expected to perform to a certain level regardless of how they look in the spring. On the other hand, they could provide some leadership for the guys who are "in competition".

 

The unfortunate par for the course. The Twins have always been awful about this. On the plus side, at least these are veteran fringe players they are beating on for a change.

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nicksaviking All-Star

nicksaviking

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Still kind of hoping that Antony does something to earn his job...

 

I've questioned Antony's qualifications before, but he gets a gold star in my book for calling out these guys. Now if he started calling out the guys who continually signed underperforming players....

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jimv2 Prep Ball

jimv2

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Well, he could give a kick in the tail to some of the guys who already have a job guaranteed...:

 

Kubel ST slash: .080/.233/.200/.433

Willy ST slash: .080/.172/.120/.292

Bartlett ST slash: .037/.133/.037/.170

Butera ST slash: .182/.400/.545/.945

...

 

I REALLY hope you're wrong and that Kubel/Bartlett don't have guaranteed jobs. But the bigger question is who in their right mind is walking Butera all the time? And will any pitcher doing that have a major league job? I am much higher on Butera than most people here, but this is baffling.

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LaBombo Wichita Wind Surge

LaBombo

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I will say this about Terry Ryan: he takes responsibility for the product on the field. I have never heard him blame players by name like this before. Unbelievable. I hope this isn't our GM in the waiting.

Yeah, bad policy usually, and especially for a guy like Hicks who's not doing poorly and needs all the confidence he can get if they're going to throw him into the fire again.

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jokin Wichita Wind Surge

jokin

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I REALLY hope you're wrong and that Kubel/Bartlett don't have guaranteed jobs. But the bigger question is who in their right mind is walking Butera all the time? And will any pitcher doing that have a major league job? I am much higher on Butera than most people here, but this is baffling.

 

I fear the worst. Bartlett is Gardy's new Super-UTIL guy and Kubel gets the spot because he's good in the clubhouse, and the Twins would never reneg on a handshake agreement. But hey, at least they stopped the pretend-game with the offseason Eric Fryer-crush- so maybe there's hope.

 

Re Butera, the Dodgers seem to have brought out his inner-Mike (Scioscia or Piazza, take your pick). NL pitchers beware.

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Bark's Lounge Ft Myers Mighty Mussels

Bark's Lounge

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The good thing is that it is only spring training. The bad thing is that almost everything is built on hope and player development with the Twin's line-up.

 

I cannot think of one player, other than Joe Mauer, who does not have question marks attached to them.

 

The front office is going to live or die by the sword on their hope philosophy.

 

I hope it works out or this will be an awful season of Twin's baseball to watch... I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

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Mr. Brooks Cedar Rapids Kernels

Mr. Brooks

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I think Barrerio was spot on regarding this today.

It's a little phony to assemble a roster full of poor to mediocre players, and then complain when they play poorly or just average.

What did you expect when you put together this roster? Did you expect mediocre players to suddenly be someone they are not?

Here's an idea, Mr. Antony, go out and spend some of that Target Field money (don't tell me about Nolasco and Hughes, all they did was spend the money that came off the books, nothing more) and put some better players on the field.

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Brad Swanson First Round Pick

Brad Swanson

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Who's stepped up? Deduno, Gibson, Pinto and Colabello, they have earned their spots

 

Exactly, and I'd guess two or maybe three of those guys will be in Rochester on March 31, meaning the whole "stepping up" conversation is a load.

 

Also, ripping Hicks is just insane to me. He was hitting .269/.269/.462 when the comments were made. He went out and "won the job" last year and what good was that.

 

For all the ripping of mediocre and washed up players (Hicks being the only guy he ripped who has any shred of true, current MLB talent), where's the vitriol toward Josh Willingham and his .080 batting average or Trevor Plouffe's 9 strikeouts in 31 at-bats? Is it ok for those guys to suck because they've already been handed jobs? Deibinson Romero has outplayed Plouffe this Spring, has he stepped up and won the third base job?

 

I also thought it was convenient that he didn't say anything good about Gibson ("he's going today" - hey that's true!) and he found a way to rip Escobar. That makes it a lot easier to send Gibson to AAA and to keep Pedro Florimon and his inevitable sub-.200 Spring Training batting average in the lineup. If only Gibson and Escobar had just stepped up and won the jobs by outplaying their competition!

 

I almost never get this fired up about sports, but his comments feel very disingenuous to me.

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LaBombo Wichita Wind Surge

LaBombo

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What did you expect when you put together this roster? Did you expect mediocre players to suddenly be someone they are not?

Here's an idea, Mr. Antony, go out and spend some of that Target Field money.

That was the most irritating thing about the article, but it was also disappointing to see that Gardenhire is apparently only now waking up to the fact that the offense will almost certainly be bad this year.

 

A big chunk of that hole was dug when the team exchanged the best offensive catcher in baseball with one of the worst, but there were plenty of other signs that runs would be in short supply this year. Arcia and Hicks struggled to make contact last year. Plouffe, Florimon, and Parm apparently just can't hit much. And if the Twins really are planning on getting 140+ games in left from Willi, then there's very little evidence in the team's roadmap for 2014 that they know the DH position exists.

 

The Twins moved forward on the rotation this year, and that was what pretty much everyone felt was the highest priority. But they resigned themselves to the waiting game and offensive mediocrity at best in 2014 when they made no greater effort to improve the offense than auditioning the mummified remains of the Jasons.

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jokin Wichita Wind Surge

jokin

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That was the most irritating thing about the article, but it was also disappointing to see that Gardenhire is apparently only now waking up to the fact that the offense will almost certainly be bad this year.

 

A big chunk of that hole was dug when the team exchanged the best offensive catcher in baseball with one of the worst, but there were plenty of other signs that runs would be in short supply this year. Arcia and Hicks struggled to make contact last year. Plouffe, Florimon, and Parm apparently just can't hit much. And if the Twins really are planning on getting 140+ games in left from Willi, then there's very little evidence in the team's roadmap for 2014 that they know the DH position exists.

 

The Twins moved forward on the rotation this year, and that was what pretty much everyone felt was the highest priority. But they resigned themselves to the waiting game and offensive mediocrity at best in 2014 when they made no greater effort to improve the offense than auditioning the mummified remains of the Jasons.

 

Auditioning mummies? I tend to demur with your conclusion. I have a sneaking suspicion both Jason's are about to be re-animated, and that they already have their chosen crypts in place, stenciled in with their names and numbers in the Target Field Locker Room (and Mausoleum).

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Mike Sixel Cooperstown

Mike Sixel

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I think Barrerio was spot on regarding this today.

It's a little phony to assemble a roster full of poor to mediocre players, and then complain when they play poorly or just average.

What did you expect when you put together this roster? Did you expect mediocre players to suddenly be someone they are not?

Here's an idea, Mr. Antony, go out and spend some of that Target Field money (don't tell me about Nolasco and Hughes, all they did was spend the money that came off the books, nothing more) and put some better players on the field.

 

amen.

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Major League Ready Ft Myers Mighty Mussels

Major League Ready

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If they would have spent every penny of the 52% that people cry about constantly they still would not be a 500 team. Man, it gets tiring to hear this constant squaking about them not spending money. Why don't the other rebilding teams spend every available dollar. Is there ownership cheap and their FO incompetent?

 

A win in free agency cost around $7M. So, someone is going to have to explain to me how we pick-up 30 wins through free agent spending.

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A win in free agency cost around $7M. So, someone is going to have to explain to me how we pick-up 30 wins through free agent spending.

I would start by stating that since I put little stock in WAR, I don't necessarily believe "a win in free agency costs around $7M" just because some people throw that number around.

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Mr. Brooks Cedar Rapids Kernels

Mr. Brooks

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If they would have spent every penny of the 52% that people cry about constantly they still would not be a 500 team. Man, it gets tiring to hear this constant squaking about them not spending money. Why don't the other rebilding teams spend every available dollar. Is there ownership cheap and their FO incompetent?

 

A win in free agency cost around $7M. So, someone is going to have to explain to me how we pick-up 30 wins through free agent spending.

 

A) I never claimed that spending the money would equate to a contending team. But in that case dont criticize the players for being EXACTLY who they are. I'm just saying don't fill the stadium full of trash then complain about the smell.

 

B) Do the other "rebuilding teams" go out and sign guys like Kevin Correia and Mike Pelfrey to multi year deals? Do they fill out their roster with guys like Jason Bartlett and Jason Kubel?

For all this talk about rebuilding, there is a chance we start the season with not a single rookie/2nd year guy on the team. Gibson, Hicks, Pinto, Tonkin could all easily join Meyer, Buxton, Santana, et al in the minors.

Tell me what other "rebuilding" team is looking at possibly starting the season with no rookie or 2nd year players on their 25 man roster?

You can talk all you want about rebuilding, but looking at their actions I don't see much rebuilding, I just see a perennial bad team.

Players can only learn so much in the minors.

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Seth Stohs GOAT

Seth Stohs

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Actually, yes. Teams bring in veterans all the time in an attempt to make sure young players are ready when called up. I don't get the Pelfrey signing, but it's not the end of the world. Correia was just fine. Nolasco and Hughes are good signings.

 

Who cares what Willingham or Mauer or Plouffe or Dozier are hitting this spring. Antony is talking about guys who know they're in a position battle.

 

Antony absolutely should be the heir-apparent to the GM job. He's been in the organization and worked his way up. He's been in the upper front office levels for probably a dozen years. He's absolutely ready to take over.

 

Bartlett's been out for almost two years, so I think he's got a lot of rust, but he's done it before in the big leagues and could handle being a 2nd utility infielder. Kubel was terrific just two seasons ago and was not healthy last year. He hasn't forgotten how to hit. He's just 31.

 

I don't have a huge problem with what Antony said. He'd like to see someone step forward and win a job. Nothing wrong with that.

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The Wise One First Round Pick

The Wise One

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Antony called out the players who had a chance to seize a job and have not done so. That has been terribly obvious so big whoop that Antony called them out.

Bartlet and Kubel are on minor league contracts. Why they were not called out is becuase they are not on the major league roster. Antony's comments would indicate the Jasons might have to produce in Rochester before being added to the roster.

These players have a chance to win a job. It would be nice if there was no doubt they belong.

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