The Minnesota Twins Pitching Staff Is a Buzzsaw

[NYCTK]

14 hours ago, Fire Dan Gladden said:

Gunnar Henderson is probably as untouchable as players get in today's game. What you are proposing would not get that deal done.

 

It'd have to be Walker Jenkins and Pablo Lopez to start the conversation. 

[Rod Carews Birthday]

20 hours ago, bean5302 said:

The pitching staff has has basically been universally at their career bests when the lineup was a catastrophe. A bunch of career years lining up can happen (see 1987, 1991) over a full season, but I feel pretty confident the batters are going to need to figure it out and score more runs steadily for the Twins to make the playoffs, let alone win 100 games. I find the second option there to be pretty far-fetched right now.

You never know.  Calling the 1987 Twins a team where a bunch of career years lined up isn't really accurate.  Hrbek was awesome.  Bruno and Kirby were very good.  But the rest of the offense was pretty blah.  On the pitching side Viola had one of his best years, Blyleven was OK, and after that, the best starter was Les Straker -- Randy Dobnak anyone?

The team was good, but mostly they put it together in time to get hot for the playoffs (and had less rounds to go through).  This year's pitching staff is miles ahead of that one.  If the bats can find reasonable consistency, they could be good. One hundred wins good? Not sure, but hardly impossible. 

[bean5302]

16 hours ago, Fire Dan Gladden said:

 

Other than Santana and Liriano (who were basically automatic wins, SP3-5 were not good in 2006. The total SP WAR for the season for that group was 11th in MLB. The BP in 2006 was light years ahead of the rest of MLB, that is what kept them in things.

Their hitting was average, but they had the league MVP (Morneau), 6th in MVP voting (Mauer) and peak Cuddyer and Hunter. They were almost guaranteed to score runs through the heart of the order. The 2006 lineup was about 10 spots higher in MLBN runs scored than this team.

The last 25 or so games for this team have been buoyed by great pitching, but also Kody Clemens and his 1.137 OPS, Harrison Bader's 122 OPS+, a resurgent Jeffers, Buxton playing almost every day, and an effective Paddack. If you believe all of those things will continue (along with Wallner coming back hitting like pre-injury, and Lewis doing something) then sure, 71 wins is possible.

Radke was lights out in the 2nd half. Pitched to a 2.84 ERA in his last 10 games. Bonser was very good in the 2nd half after he was recalled as well, but not as good as Liriano who Bonser was tasked with replacing in the rotation. That 2006 team was absolutely loaded. If Liriano doesn't go down, the Twins had a good shot at winning the World Series.

[bean5302]

3 hours ago, Rod Carews Birthday said:

You never know.  Calling the 1987 Twins a team where a bunch of career years lined up isn't really accurate.  Hrbek was awesome.  Bruno and Kirby were very good.  But the rest of the offense was pretty blah.  On the pitching side Viola had one of his best years, Blyleven was OK, and after that, the best starter was Les Straker -- Randy Dobnak anyone?

The team was good, but mostly they put it together in time to get hot for the playoffs (and had less rounds to go through).  This year's pitching staff is miles ahead of that one.  If the bats can find reasonable consistency, they could be good. One hundred wins good? Not sure, but hardly impossible. 

Hrbek, Gagne, Brunansky, Puckett, Viola, Berenguer all had the best or close to the best years of their careers. I think you're way overestimating the talent level of this rotation based on recency bias.

[Rod Carews Birthday]

9 minutes ago, bean5302 said:

Hrbek, Gagne, Brunansky, Puckett, Viola, Berenguer all had the best or close to the best years of their careers. I think you're way overestimating the talent level of this rotation based on recency bias.

The 1987 offense was better.  The pitching wasn't close.  OPS+ of 99 in 1987.  Current OPS+ of 126 in 2025.  The 1991 offense was excellent and their pitching, while better, still wasn't in the same class as the current pitching staff.

The 1987 team wasn't a juggernaut.  I still remember everyone thinking that they were going to fade away at some point, but they didn't.  Tom Kelly definitely had all of his smoke and mirrors working in 1987.  Don't misunderstand, I always have been and remain a huge Twins fan, but I think you are waxing nostalgic about that team and Tom Kelly's zebra striped Zubas (and who doesn't!).

 

[bean5302]

46 minutes ago, Rod Carews Birthday said:

...The 1987 team wasn't a juggernaut...

 

That's an understatement. They're considered one of the weakest teams to have ever won a World Series. I'm not saying the 1987 Twins team was great, just that a bunch of good luck and unexpectedly great seasons all together can result in a championship. Just not something anybody should expect.

Now the 1991 team was great. It also relied on a bunch of career years together. Tapani, Erickson, Morris, Aguilera, Mack, Knoblauch, etc etc etc.