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I will be traveling this weekend, and it's unlikely I'll be able to post a breakdown until at least Saturday night. I will make sure to get caught up ASAP. Sorry about the inconvenience
http://assets.podomatic.net/ts/19/ad/da/paulpleiss/1400x1400-440x440+176+22_9939660.jpg Welp, we made it to 100 episodes. Thank you to everyone that has listened to us ramble over the past two years. We've come a long way from Episode 1 and we're happy to have you along for the ride. Along the way we picked up a couple of hitch hikers in Cody Christie and Jay Corn, and we have fun every week talking Twins baseball. This week we talk about Trevor May, Phil Hughes and Ricky Nolasco, who all
You've probably heard the news by now that the Twins are out, and the Colorado Rockies are in, as New Britain's class AA affiliate. It's been a strange few months here in Connecticut on the baseball and political fronts, culminating with yesterday's news. Back in June, Rock Cats managing partner Josh Solomon triumphantly (and surprisingly) announced from the steps of Hartford City Hall that the Rock Cats would be moving from their longtime home of New Britain to a brand new stadium in Hartford
"To win the game, you've gotta score more runs than the other team"--- Ricky Henderson, baseball's all-time running scoring leader Baseball can be a very simple game but it always comes back to scoring more runs than the other team. This has always been the case and teams are challenged by how they should go about accomplishing this task. Should a team try and out slug the opposition to win in a high scoring fashion? Should a team use small ball to try and poke their way back into a game?
http://i.imgur.com/ClHrTds.jpg Rough start to the game, followed by a few solid innings and a huge gift from Torii Hunter by not running home on a ground ball with the infield back, leading to a double play to get Gibson out of a jam. Wasn't sharp tonight though, as he only threw 61% of his pitches for strikes. He was particularly bad with his slider command. You could tell that early on, Detroit just wasn't offering at it. He threw the slider 11 times in his 26 pitch first inning. 7 tim
Danny Santana is the Twins best player. Twins will make room for him wherever..problem....Twins have a terrific shortstop....(who can not play cf) The best chance for the Twins to win...is to play both Santana and Escobar...and there aren't many options. Trade Dozier? Now thats a possibility...but Dozier had a very good year...but so did Escobar and Santana. Play Escobar at 3b? Plouffe actually had a good year...(lead the league in Doubles) So Shafer has earned a chance not a 4th outf
Ricky Nolasco, Mike Pelfrey, and Tommy Milone have all had disappointing seasons for the Twins. Glen Perkins is having a rough finish to his season. The four pitchers named have all had injuries disclosed after they struggled. The cynics among us would all be of the opinion that perhaps the pitchers were using injury as an excuse for poor performance. Pelfrey started the season in the Twins rotation. He had a couple outings where he looked sharp, but would lose it and not be able to battle
http://i.imgur.com/QkdrT0E.jpg My write up is going to be very brief. Spent all night in the ER with a child and just don't have the drive to write a lot about this. It was a great outing. 5H and 1BB against a very potent Detroit line up. Again, hovered right around 65% strikes. Swinging strikes were at an expected 9.2% (Detroit's season average is 9.3%). Very little hard contact was made. Had hitters off balance. I particularly love the Curveball/Slider mix.
It has been a year of good and bad performances in Minnesota. Unfortunately, there has probably been more bad than good. On the positive side of things, Phil Hughes has put together the best season of his professional career, Danny Santana has done some good things as a rookie, and the duo of Kennys Vargas and Oswaldo Arcia seem to be able to mash the ball out of any park. There have been some players that haven't lived up to expectations for various parts of the year. Those players are try
http://i.imgur.com/wNmXavJ.jpg If you just looked at the ball and strike totals on this graph, you'd probably think that I had accidentally posted a graph for Phil Hughes in the wrong article. But low and behold, with reports of Phil imparting some words of wisdom to the young hurler, Trevor May came out and put together probably his best outing of his short major league career. With the exception of a four hitter stretch in the 4th, May was very impressive. He gave up 5 hits, walked zero,
The Minnesota Twins' front office is going to be faced with making some difficult decisions this offseason - decisions they are woefully ill-prepared to make. http://knuckleballsblog.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/GardenhireBrunansky2012.jpg Ron Gardenhire and Tom Brunansky (photo: Knuckleballs) Many professional sports organizations change their on-field management at least as often as they change accounting firms. It's just part of the way they do business. When you lose more games tha
http://i.imgur.com/Bj0y0pZ.jpg Another quality start, but who knows who things may have changed had Mauer not booted the ball early in the game which lead to the two run home run. Hughes' control was working as usual, though he did walk his first batter in 140 innings in the second. Many were surprised that it occurred against a team like the White Sox who walk so rarely (24th of 30 with a 6.9% BB%), but I figure it's a matter of Phil knowing the White Sox are aggressive, so he has to work the
The death march to 90 losses continues today with another doubleheader, this time against the South Side Sox. Sixteen games remain in this frustrating season which produced one, maybe two, rotation pieces and some optimism that the Twins can score enough runs to be competitive. For the record, the Twins need to win 11 of 16 games to avoid 90 losses. Actually, if they did that it would be a bit more than cosmetic, since they are playing playoff contenders in ten of the last 16 games. My tho
Well guys, I hate to break it to you.. but next year will be just as bad...and that is a reason to keep Gardy believe it or not.... First of all Gardy will be back if he wants to be back..Twins wont burn 5mil especially looking at next year and realizing..more of the same is coming... Why next year just as bad? Simple .....Pitching.... Hughes had had a career year...will he be as good next year..I think he will be close.... Now what do we have? Nolasco is showing why we signed him..and with the
http://i.imgur.com/jZp6Vma.jpg This is the type of appearance Twins fans hoped they were getting when he joined the club this year. An innings eater who can go deep into a game and keep you competitive. With 117 pitches, he reached a career high and the most he's thrown in a game since 2012. At 61.5% strike rate, it'd be incorrect to say he pounded the strike zone, but that really isn't his profile. However, he didn't walk any body, and the only big mistake he made was a splitter to Carlo
http://i.imgur.com/7Cz3DBi.jpg Part one of the twin billing didn't go as hoped. Gibson looked lack luster, and Cleveland took advantage to the tune of 7H, 7ER, 2BB 0Ks and 2HR in only 3IP. He only threw 57% of his pitches for strikes and only one swing and miss. His changeup was particularly futile. It fooled no one, getting not a single swinging strike, and was put into play 10 times, on only 14 pitches! In fact, the only time it ended up a strike was if someone offered at it (10 BiP and
Here we are, at the tail end of another lost season. This season, in the beginning, was a different season. The team fought, there was some urgency, and the team was able to keep its head above water for the first two months. After Kyle Gibson pitched a gem in Detroit in early June, I, along with many others in Twins Territory, were starting to become optimistic that something decent may become of this season. That lasted all of half of a week, as the team fell into disarray immediately and have
http://assets.podomatic.net/ts/19/ad/da/paulpleiss/1400x1400-360x360+32+0_9920149.jpeg There hasn't been a lot of good things to talk about with this ball club. That doesn't mean we don't have things to talk about, and we even got into a couple of spirited conversations this week, most notably about the coaching staff and their uncertain future in Minnesota. Mike Trout and the league leading Angels came to town and swept our hometown heroes, but at least Target Field faithful were reminded what
Bud Selig is set to retire this off-season after 22 years at the helm of Major League Baseball. Rob Manfred has already been voted in as his successor, a position he has been groomed for over since starting to work for MLB in 1998. The 55-year old Manfred will have a variety of issues on his plate as he takes over from the 80-year old Selig. During Selig's tenure as commissioner, baseball has been marked by a variety of ups and downs. A large growth in attendance has increased revenue across t
http://i.imgur.com/IioT54T.jpg Is it just me, or does Trevor May rely to heavily on his fastball? Maybe it is because he does use the fastball so heavily, but he always seems to get great swinging strike rates on his off speed offerings, and that trend continued tonight. Four walks in 5 innings is still a lot, but he did a good job of working out of trouble tonight, something that he had struggled with earlier. Another thing of note is that his average fastball velocity has gone up over a
This is the third post in a series looking at different story lines in relation to the Twins as the season comes to a close (Part 1: Starting Rotation, Part 2: Prospect Promotions) September has been a rough month over the last three seasons and this year is continuing to follow that trend. The moto of the month might be "Wake Me Up When September Ends" but there seems to be a small glimmer of hope on the horizon. This could give you a reason to still pay attention over the final weeks. At the
The Twins have just been swept by the Angels. They were competitive for three games, but got beat up on Sunday. The fact is that, despite a fairly good offense in the five games, the Twins had no chance because the Angels are superior in all facets of the game. At least some of the young guys are playing and a few are thriving. Kennys Vargas is hitting and slugging and Danny Santana is established as a good hitter who has played center field more than his natural position of shortstop. In
http://www.twinsandlosses.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/30c5ebfa57730257176efea5450657cd.jpg Originally posted on www.twinsandlosses.com @TwinsAndLosses No, this isn’t a post about the recently demolished Metrodome (R.I.P. and screw you, Zygi), this is a post about something near and dear to my heart: The Twins’ “M” logo. I’m a huge fan of the “M” logo the Twins have used since 1987. It seems that every year past 2010, the Twins have made small steps in moving closer and closer to the fa
On Saturday, Tait went 2-for-4 with a walk and his 17th double. The 19-year-old is hitting .219 with 17 doubles and 15 home runs at High-A Cedar Rapids.
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