Article: MIN 1, HOU 0: Let’s Go Crazy

[jokin]

 

That homer by Adrianza was a no doubter, a bomb, spanked tater.... a Thome Blast! Just what we needed, just what he needed. 

 

Hopefully, Odorizzi will inspire Pineda. We need him to really step up. 

 

Et tu, Adrianza?

 

At the current rate of HR production spilling out onto Knock-A-Thome Plaza, that area is going to resemble a lunar landscape by September.

[Dman]

I had this game penciled in as a loss before it even began.  I kept waiting for Odo to have one of his Odo innings in the 5th then the 6th then the 7th and it never happened.  Then I waited for the bullpen to mess his great pitching performance up and it never happened.  When the game was over I sat in quiet disbelief wondering if what happened really just happened.  Baseball is a crazy game.

[Tom Froemming]

 

I could be wrong, but I remember reading somewhere that those improvements actually started last year, and that you could see a nice trend on him last fall.  

 

I'm beginning to think he's turned a corner. If so, great find by our front office. 

His last two months of the season were weird. It was almost as if he was trying to go back to more of a pitch to contact approach. The first four months he gave up an .802 OPS but his K% was 24.0 and his swinging strike rate was 11%. That produced a 4.58 ERA.

 

Then those last two months he limited opponents to just a .610 OPS, but his strikeout rate dropped to 20.0% and he was only getting swinging strikes 8% of the time. He had a 4.30 ERA over those final 10 starts. So it certainly appears after the team raised the white flag at the trade deadline Odorrizi started working on some things. Not all of those adjustments yielded great results -- he had a 5.06 ERA in September -- but maybe he discovered some things to build upon.

[Riverbrian]

I had this game penciled in as a loss before it even began. I kept waiting for Odo to have one of his Odo innings in the 5th then the 6th then the 7th and it never happened. Then I waited for the bullpen to mess his great pitching performance up and it never happened. When the game was over I sat in quiet disbelief wondering if what happened really just happened. Baseball is a crazy game.

It is a crazy game. That’s why I never pencil in losses.

[bird]

 

So who do we start in WS Game 4 against the Dodgers, Pineda or Perez?

 

no

[KFEY93]

 

AND WE CAN BUILD THIS DREAM TOGETHER

This is not Reddit, please dont. 

[MMMordabito]

 

Was that the best game Odorizzi has pitched as a Twin?  I seem to remember one very good outing last year, but not the details.  And wasn't it fun watching a real pitchers duel?  Loved it!

 

Late last season he had a no-hitter through 7 against the Yankees and ended up being pulled in the 8th after losing the no-hitter ... Twins still won, but the game was late enough in the season, that it didn't matter.

 

I think last night was a bigger deal ... "To be the best, you gotta beat the best" and all that good stuff

[mikelink45]

This was the most satisfying game of the year for me.  Being old school a 1 - 0 game was significant.  No late inning collapse, tight games are the ones that lead to championships.  The bombs in Baltimore series was fun, but lets build off this one - two good teams playing toe to toe.

[woolywoolhouse]

A 1-0 pitcher's duel may be boring for some casual baseball fans who just want to watch homeruns... for someone who works many games at Target Field, a 2 hour-15 minute game is wonderful (particularly when the Twins win.)

[Brock Beauchamp]

Jake Odorizzi:

April 10: 0-2, 6.35 ERA

April 29: 3-2, 3.34 ERA

Even that doesn’t tell the entire story. He had an excellent start to open the season, a kinda bad 4.2 IP start, then a disaster start.

 

So really, he has been okay to great in all starts except one.

[PharmerJack]

Damn that was fun to watch!

 

This might be the type of game that people point to as "boring" because there aren't gobs of homers but man that was great. The two starters throwing slime in a tight game was great to watch but Jolly Rogers coming in and keelhauling through the 8th was fantastic.

[Dantes929]

I know it doesn't work this way statistically but doesn't Adrianza deserve about half a WAR for this game?

[Aerodeliria]

1-0. This is one of those games you look back near the end of the year and remember with fondness.

[jmlease1]

Odorizzi was terrific last night, really fun to watch. I'm really happy for him to have gotten through 7, and not having one of his "cruising along, until we hit the 5th, which takes 35 pitches to survive, oh great, now he's at 94 pitches starting the 6th" outings. He really did a nice job finishing off hitters last night.

 

Twins hitters battled against Verlander, and didn't get a lot of great results for it but you have to think that a lot of those balls they were fouling off are the sort of swings resulting in hard-hit balls against other pitchers. No problem with the approach.

 

And Marwin may be still scuffling at the plate, but he sure doesn't take it with him into the field. That play he made hustling into RF for a sliding back-to-the-plate catch was fantastic.

[rdehring]

 

Late last season he had a no-hitter through 7 against the Yankees and ended up being pulled in the 8th after losing the no-hitter ... Twins still won, but the game was late enough in the season, that it didn't matter.

 

I think last night was a bigger deal ... "To be the best, you gotta beat the best" and all that good stuff

Thanks, that was the game I was thinking of, just couldn't recall the details.  Which is best, flip a coin.  Now, lets see him back this up with more starts like last night.

[rdehring]

 

A 1-0 pitcher's duel may be boring for some casual baseball fans who just want to watch homeruns... for someone who works many games at Target Field, a 2 hour-15 minute game is wonderful (particularly when the Twins win.)

 

Do you get paid by the hour?  Or by the game?

[Hosken Bombo Disco]

So who do we start in WS Game 4 against the Dodgers, Pineda or Perez?

Game 1 starter goes in Game 4, like all the other Twins World Series

[woolywoolhouse]

 

So who do we start in WS Game 4 against the Dodgers, Pineda or Perez?

 

Preferably a pitcher we trade for at the end of July?

[Otto von Ballpark]

 

A 1-0 pitcher's duel may be boring for some casual baseball fans who just want to watch homeruns... for someone who works many games at Target Field, a 2 hour-15 minute game is wonderful (particularly when the Twins win.)

Time of game was actually 2:31, although it started 30 minutes earlier than usual (6:40) so it probably felt shorter.

 

Loved the game last night (especially the result), but it sort of highlights the modern pace of play / game length problem, from my perspective. No replay challenges, no mid-inning pitching changes, lots of strikes, very few baserunners (Astros just 6 batters over the minimum, Twins 5), home team didn't bat in the bottom of the ninth -- absolute perfect conditions for the quickest game reasonably possible -- -yet the game still took 2:31.

 

That's the baseline for why the average game is 3:04 and can feel like it's dragging at times -- because the baseline pace/time is already stretched so far, it can't really tolerate any further stretching. And that's why I'd love to finally see a pitch clock in MLB, rather than a 3 batter minimum or other more complicated changes. If we could pull this baseline down to 2:15, I think the average game would feel a lot crisper (and those 7:10 game starts would end by 10:00 on average). Pull the baseline down to 2:00 and that would be even better, of course, but I'll take what I can get.

 

Sadly, it seems like the pitch clock is just a negotiating tool between MLB/MLBPA, rather than a likely implementation, at this point.

[Doomtints]

I knew the Twins would win this game. Why?

I saw some pundits/journalists on CBS Sports saying yeah the Twins are good, but the Astros are better, and Verlander is the best, thus predicting the Twins would lose this game for sure.

[Dman]

 

It is a crazy game. That’s why I never pencil in losses.

 

Well at least I didn't mark it in permanent marker.  Using a Pencil I can still erase it and put the proper team in the win column. 

[Buddy Holly]

Get Back in the Car Kids! Until the Twins beat the Yankees they are average. Then there is Boston, Toronto, Tampa Bay, and Cleveland. It's April, stay in the car and enjoy the ride, but I wouldn't schedule vacation for October yet unless you like to duck hunt.

When the Twins start showing they can score runs without HR, it will be a good sign. Chris Russo said the other day, Hey can the Yankees keep it going and then he looked at the schedule and said the Twins are coming to town!  I agree last night was good baseball, but I want to see more against good teams. Beat the Yankee's next week!

[Clear]

Get Back in the Car Kids! Until the Twins beat the Yankees they are average. Then there is Boston, Toronto, Tampa Bay, and Cleveland. It's April, stay in the car and enjoy the ride, but I wouldn't schedule vacation for October yet unless you like to duck hunt.

When the Twins start showing they can score runs without HR, it will be a good sign. Chris Russo said the other day, Hey can the Yankees keep it going and then he looked at the schedule and said the Twins are coming to town!  I agree last night was good baseball, but I want to see more against good teams. Beat the Yankee's next week!

 

Winning via the long ball counts all the same in the standings

[Doomtints]

We don't know yet if the Yankees are a good team this year. They had the second easiest schedule in the league so far, twice as easy as the Twins who also had a very easy schedule.

 

We will have a better picture in another six weeks.

[KFEY93]

 

Get Back in the Car Kids! Until the Twins beat the Yankees they are average. Then there is Boston, Toronto, Tampa Bay, and Cleveland. It's April, stay in the car and enjoy the ride, but I wouldn't schedule vacation for October yet unless you like to duck hunt.

When the Twins start showing they can score runs without HR, it will be a good sign. Chris Russo said the other day, Hey can the Yankees keep it going and then he looked at the schedule and said the Twins are coming to town!  I agree last night was good baseball, but I want to see more against good teams. Beat the Yankee's next week!

Boston is playing like garbage, not worried about them yet. We will win the Toronto series, we have already proven we can beat Cleveland. Tampa is the only ones that scare me, with their pitching but their offense is not great. We can compete and beat all the teams you listed. Just have to go out and do it. 

[Otto von Ballpark]

 

Winning via the long ball counts all the same in the standings

Obviously, but we're probably not going to finish with 312 HR for the season like our current pace suggests. I think the poster is saying that eventually we'll need to find other ways to score if we want to maintain this winning percentage -- but I think we should be capable of doing that. Our BB% is low, but so is our K%, and we're not getting any BABIP luck right now either.

[Otto von Ballpark]

 

We don't know yet if the Yankees are a good team this year. They had the second easiest schedule in the league so far, twice as easy as the Twins who also had a very easy schedule.

I think the Yankees series will be a bit of a test, beyond team quality. It will be interesting to see the mindset/approach/attitude of this team vs the Yankees, under Baldelli as opposed to Gardenhire and Molitor. Although it might be hard to tell right away -- we actually rocked the Yankees in Molitor's debut against them, and almost won the next game too until Glen Perkins met John Ryan Murphy...

 

Of course, the next 3 games with Houston might set the tone entering the Yankees series too!

[Circus Boy]

 

I think last night was a bigger deal ... "To be the best, you gotta beat the best" and all that good stuff

Golly, not to brag or anything, but I coined that saying in a lede for an AP story on a Big Sky basketball game in 1991. It was picked up by West Coast TV guys in a hurry, then was an ESPN catch phrase that spring and summer. It became the team version of Ric Flair's signature saying, "To be the man, ya gotta beat the man!"

 

I still get royalties, by the way. 

[Dantes929]

 

Get Back in the Car Kids! Until the Twins beat the Yankees they are average. Then there is Boston, Toronto, Tampa Bay, and Cleveland. It's April, stay in the car and enjoy the ride, but I wouldn't schedule vacation for October yet unless you like to duck hunt.

When the Twins start showing they can score runs without HR, it will be a good sign. Chris Russo said the other day, Hey can the Yankees keep it going and then he looked at the schedule and said the Twins are coming to town!  I agree last night was good baseball, but I want to see more against good teams. Beat the Yankee's next week!

Given the choice I would bank a 3-3 record in the next 6 games and I don't care if it came via a sweep of the Astros and getting swept by the Yankees or vice versa.      Go .500 against the good teams and beat up on the bad teams.   Its a formula but it bloody well works.

[Otto von Ballpark]

 

Golly, not to brag or anything, but I coined that saying in a lede for an AP story on a Big Sky basketball game in 1991. It was picked up by West Coast TV guys in a hurry, then was an ESPN catch phrase that spring and summer. It became the team version of Ric Flair's signature saying, "To be the man, ya gotta beat the man!"

 

I still get royalties, by the way. 

"If this is anyone but Ric Flair, you're stealing my bit!"