MIN 10, KC 6: It’s a Lot Easier to Beat Bad Teams

Hey, let's celebrate. A victory is a victory!!

It would have been almost impossible for any baseball team above the D2 level to lose to KC last night. Did u say 7 walks? And how many lousy plays? Since I don't have time to post this three times this will have to suffice. (3)

It would have been almost impossible for any baseball team above the D2 level to lose to KC last night. Did u say 7 walks? And how many lousy plays? Since I don't have time to post this three times this will have to suffice. (3)

Given that the Twins kinda eaked that one out, it doesn’t say much for the level of their play.

Hey, let's celebrate. A victory is a victory!!

At this point, I'm waiting to celebrate the end of this thoroughly dreadful season. I'll say it once: man, this is one boring team. I had so much optimism at the start of the year, but following this team --- and cheering for them --- has become too much of a chore. Yeah, I suppose I should watch the handful of prospects who have been called up, or the scraps from the trades we've made, but I just can't get very excited about any of it.

GIven that he started the third, I’d assume they were trying to use Gonsalves as a typical starter.

 

But say they’d followed him with a five-inning, not-quite-quality, 3 runs in 5 innings “start” from Odorizzi (I know, the rotation didn’t line up, but I’m just using this as an example), it might have made for something like a 9-3 lead after seven.

 

If it works like that, I’m all on board for the opener approach.

 

And since I’ve gone off on a tangent now, I’ll continue. It seems to me that if a team lined up their rotation 1-4-2-3-5, they could get by with using one Opener to lead off the games for both the 4 and 5 guy. If he goes two innings in 40 percent of the games, that’s only about 130 innings for the season. WIthout any off days, his pattern would be to alternate one and two days off, but with off days scattered, some of the one-day-offs would become two and some of the twos would become threes. If he has too many one-day-offs in close proximity, they could shorten an occasional outing to one inning rather than two.

 

If Berrios and Gibson go 6 or 7 most days as the Nos. 1 and 2, and Gonsalves-Odo and Gonsalves-Mejia/Romero combine for 7 most days as the Nos. 4 and 5, and Pineda comes back as the No. 3, that seems like a pretty solid rotation that would protect a bullpen of May, Busenitz, Hildy, Rogers, Reed, Duke (do we control him?) and Magill and allow a four-man bench. As depth/injury coverage, that still leaves Thorpe, Stewart, Moya, Curtiss, DeJong, Drake, Duffey, Littell, and Vazquez.

 

Shuffle the parts if you will, but I’m generally comfortable with that mix as a pitching, particularly if there’s willingness to go after a rental mid-year (starter, reliever, or both) if they are indeed in the race.

 

Think of how much money that would leave for the Mannysota Twins to use on the hitting side!

We’re already seeing kinks in the armor of Berrios and Gibson. How that plays out the rest of the year will play a big part in determining how they slot going forward. Right now, they rank 17th and 20th in ERA, but they have both been well north of 5 since the end of July. Really shouldn’t be fatigue for either as both logged more IP just last year than they have so far in 2018.

We’re already seeing kinks in the armor of Berrios and Gibson. How that plays out the rest of the year will play a big part in determining how they slot going forward. Right now, they rank 17th and 20th in ERA, but they have both been well north of 5 since the end of July. Really shouldn’t be fatigue for either as both logged more IP just last year than they have so far in 2018.

I don’t think catcher ERA is a thing but both had better strikeout and walk rates with Wilson. Wilson was the primary catcher for these two until his early August injury.