Twins vs Mariners, 08-27-2012, 7:10pm

[Ultima Ratio]

Bleh.

[mike wants wins]

Great stat for Hendriks. That's the key takeaway for me from this game.

[ashburyjohn]

And tonight is a fine example of why the W-L record is the most useless stat in sports.

You don't think Hernandez earned his win?

[ashburyjohn]

Wtf is Morneau swinging at the 1st friggin pith for!?!?!?!?

How is mastroiani even possibly going to steal 2 if you hit I the 1st pitch?

That is the type of crap that pisses me off.....

Well, it's a cat and mouse game. Decoy that you're going to play for one run, hope they lay one in the strike zone for Morneau to whack at. I'm not saying I endorse it, but against the best pitchers you sometimes feel like you have to go against the book because the book hasn't done anything for you in the first eight innings.

[Top Gun]

Twins are just hopeless.

[snepp]

At least it was one of the more stomachable losses, if that's even possible.

[MightyMpls]

At least it was one of the more stomachable losses, if that's even possible.

Not sure if my stomach approved the stranded leadoff triple, or the fact that Roy Smalley proceeded to say, "that was a great at bat" when referring to Plouffe's ground ball right at the second baseman. o_O

[COtwin]

It looks like Liam can put it together up here.

[MightyMpls]

Couple things, Hendriks did pitch surprisingly well, but can we please temper the expectations a bit until he at least repeats this kind of effort another time or two. He doesn't have to throw a CG, but at this point, I'll take a QS from him the rest of the year to give me the hope that he is starting to "figure it out" at the MLB-level.

Two, Bremer's over-the-top calls of some rather good, but not great plays, is really starting to bug me. We're going on close to two straight seasons of pathetic baseball and when he loses his **** when Mauer makes a foul catch like he just parted the red sea is rather hard to stomach. Please Dick, I implore you, just a little bit of objective play-by-play? Please?

[StormJH1]

Anybody else bothered by Gardy's comment that he didn't advance Morneau to 3rd on the Plouffe grounder in the 7th inning because of Justin's "injury/concussion history"? I mean, I get the precaution, but that was a huge run. How many other in-game precautions do they have on Morneau like that?

[jokin]

Anybody else bothered by Gardy's comment that he didn't advance Morneau to 3rd on the Plouffe grounder in the 7th inning because of Justin's "injury/concussion history"? I mean, I get the precaution, but that was a huge run. How many other in-game precautions do they have on Morneau like that?

To paraphrase Jim Morrison, given Morneau's "fragile eggshell mind", I'm surprised at how agressively Justin has been allowed to run bases this entire year, the play at 2B that knocked him out for two years seemed innocuous enough at the time it happened. If anything, after that triple by Morny (am I the only one that holds my breath a little bit each time he slides into 2B, 3B or home?), that's the time and place where Gardy should have strongly considered inserting Mastro to pinch run, moving Doumit to C and Mauer to 1B.

[StormJH1]

To paraphrase Jim Morrison, given Morneau's "fragile eggshell mind", I'm surprised at how agressively Justin has been allowed to run bases this entire year, the play at 2B that knocked him out for two years seemed innocuous enough at the time it happened. If anything, after that triple by Morny (am I the only one that holds my breath a little bit each time he slides into 2B, 3B or home?), that's the time and place where Gardy should have strongly considered inserting Mastro to pinch run, moving Doumit to C and Mauer to 1B.

That would have been an option. I'm not AT ALL suggesting that Morneau's issues aren't real or that the Twins shouldn't be careful with him, I'm simply pointing out that this was a surprising revelation to me. On the one hand, we see Morneau playing almost every game and doing well in the field. We're told he's symptom-free and the team is so optimistic about him that they apparently didn't have much interest in moving him off a non-competing team at the deadline, or making a Los Angeles Dodgers type deal. Presumably this is because the Twins see him as a big part of their future.

But then we learn that there are also certain plays that Morneau can NEVER do as a baseball player. For example, Justin Morneau can never try to advance to 3rd on a groundball to the right side of the infield, even in a 0-0 game against a stud pitcher. And since Morneau will never be "cured" of his brain trauma, it's safe to assume Morneau will never be able to do that again. I just took it as a subtle reminder that Morneau is not viewed as a fully healthy ballplayer like anyone else, and you have to keep that in mind (along with his age and other injuries) going forward.

[kydoty]

And tonight is a fine example of why the W-L record is the most useless stat in sports.

You don't think Hernandez earned his win?

Do you really think I was talking about Hernandez with my post?

[snepp]

Do you really think I was talking about Hernandez with my post?

Liam just isn't a winner like Gray.

[SRP]

Wtf is Morneau swinging at the 1st friggin pith for!?!?!?!?

How is mastroiani even possibly going to steal 2 if you hit I the 1st pitch?

It is hard to argue with that. That was bad fundamental baseball.

[CDog]

Anybody else bothered by Gardy's comment that he didn't advance Morneau to 3rd on the Plouffe grounder in the 7th inning because of Justin's "injury/concussion history"? I mean, I get the precaution, but that was a huge run. How many other in-game precautions do they have on Morneau like that?

I didn't see the post-game, but yes I would think it's kind of out of the blue to be hearing about Morneau's concussion in relation to a baserunning situation since we haven't much (ever?) all year. BUT...Morneau led off the 7th with a triple, so the situation was a play at the plate, not advancing to 3rd.

[StormJH1]

Anybody else bothered by Gardy's comment that he didn't advance Morneau to 3rd on the Plouffe grounder in the 7th inning because of Justin's "injury/concussion history"? I mean, I get the precaution, but that was a huge run. How many other in-game precautions do they have on Morneau like that?

I didn't see the post-game, but yes I would think it's kind of out of the blue to be hearing about Morneau's concussion in relation to a baserunning situation since we haven't much (ever?) all year. BUT...Morneau led off the 7th with a triple, so the situation was a play at the plate, not advancing to 3rd.

My bad - I was going off the quote as I didn't actually see that portion of the game (but might watch it later on MLB At-Bat app recap). The fact that he could have scored, however, would have made it even more concerning. Granted, Morneau isn't all that fast. But I remember going to a game in the Dome around '07 or '08 where Morneau got sent home and basically went out of his way to murder Baltimore's backup catcher on the play. Remembered thinking it was kind of a d-bag move. And later that same season, he tried the same thing against a much larger catcher (I believe it was Miguel Olivo), and Olivo CLOBBERED him. These were both prior to the 2010 concussion, but obviously after his 2005 concussion when he got hit in the head in Seattle. Goes to show how much times have changed.

But yes, as the earlier poster said, if there's a critical situation where Morneau is on 3rd late in a close game and you're going to be too fearful of sending him for ANY type of close game, I'm sorry, but he needs to be substituted then. He should be treated pretty much how Gardy handled Thome anytime he got a double late in a game - baserunner subbed in right away.

[CDog]

My bad - I was going off the quote as I didn't actually see that portion of the game (but might watch it later on MLB At-Bat app recap). The fact that he could have scored, however, would have made it even more concerning. Granted, Morneau isn't all that fast. But I remember going to a game in the Dome around '07 or '08 where Morneau got sent home and basically went out of his way to murder Baltimore's backup catcher on the play. Remembered thinking it was kind of a d-bag move. And later that same season, he tried the same thing against a much larger catcher (I believe it was Miguel Olivo), and Olivo CLOBBERED him. These were both prior to the 2010 concussion, but obviously after his 2005 concussion when he got hit in the head in Seattle. Goes to show how much times have changed.

But yes, as the earlier poster said, if there's a critical situation where Morneau is on 3rd late in a close game and you're going to be too fearful of sending him for ANY type of close game, I'm sorry, but he needs to be substituted then. He should be treated pretty much how Gardy handled Thome anytime he got a double late in a game - baserunner subbed in right away.

Yeah, I don't think it changes the conclusion much that it was a weird thing for Gardy to say all of a sudden. I guess there's more collision potential sending home rather than to third. But the reward is obviously a tad higher in getting a guy to the plate rather than third, too (see how smart I am to have figured that out!). On the particular play, he was dead meat had he gone (infield in, hard hit right to 2B, even though it was bobbled he still would have been out by a lot, probably). But that's a place where the Twins have used the contact play a lot in the past, so there definitely SEEMS like there was some reason not to have him going. Really kinda sucks to think it would be concussion related at this point.