Nine of twelve

This is what the ignore list is for. I would not be on this site at all if it wasn’t for that feature.

Or it could simply be that he’s injured.

New start time for Friday as well: 7:03 PM, CDT.

In Paddack's case I try to give the benefit of doubt because it could be autocorrect making the error. Sometimes I have to try really, really hard.

The reason I favor robo umps has nothing to do with Twitter-based scorecards, which I think are indeed based on questionable assumptions. I favor them because they do a statistically significantly better job than humans at calling strikes according to the strike zone as specified in the official rules of the game. Before this season I felt the same way about the pitch clock and related rules, although I didn't think the changes would be subtle. I now feel that the impact of those rule changes has been overwhelmingly positive. When this change is implemented I'm confident that you will similarly admit you were wrong, and I'm confident about that in two ways: one, that the change will be overwhelmingly positive and, two, that you will be man enough to accept and embrace the overwhelming positivity of the change.

Or is it 10 days? Twins web site doesn't say.

Hey everyone, it's nitpick time! Kirilloff. K-I-R-I-L-L-O-F-F. Kirilloff. Try it. It's easy.

I believe this means Kirilloff is out for 10 days. Can anyone confirm that?

Both are important, and robo umps are better at both than humans. Moreover, humans will never experience an improvement in performance and robo umps will.

I'm going to use this thread as an opportunity to address postseason qualifications and seeding. There have been critics saying the Twins didn't deserve a berth in the postseason because Seattle had a better record. (Even though it was only by 1 game.) Meanwhile, Miami and Arizona both entered the postseason with worse records than the Twins, and with negative run differentials to boot. I think it's certain that the Twins were a top 12 team in the regular season, even considering playing in the AL Central. Whether Seattle deserved to be in the postseason instead of Miami and Arizona is a legitimate related question. Another criticism is whether the Twins should have been given the 3 seed. Personally, I think the winner of each division should advance. But I would have no problem seeding the teams in each league by overall record instead of automatically giving the top 3 seeds to the division winners. Beyond that, I would have no problem reseeding the teams by record within each league for each round of the postseason instead of keeping the brackets intact. To put all this together, having the two leagues separated in the postseason until the World Series has become an anachronism. (IMHO, of course.) I would have no problem completely eliminating the separation between the two leagues. I think it would be fairer and in the long run good for baseball and for the fans. 52 games within the division and 22 games against each of the other 5 divisions. For the postseason seed the 6 division winners and the 6 wild card teams by regular season record, reseeding after each round. And if (when) it turns out 2 teams that historically were in the same league wind up in the World Series, so what?

Whit Merrifield says hi. Is Rooker the next Nolan Jones or Evan Carter? No. Was rising star a bit of an overstatement? Could be. But many of us here were optimistic about him before he was traded, and few players go into decline at age 28. My point is that he's not nobody and could easily become somebody.

That's an acceptable top five, IMHO, but we all know that at least 7 starters are needed to contend in this day and age. If not Gray, who else could we entice? Can someone already in the system step up? And if it's not too much to ask, can we please find a good left-handed starter somewhere?

The fact that San Diego DFA'd Rooker doesn't matter. To make a comparison, The Twins acquired David Ortiz from Seattle for Dave Hollins. Since Ortiz never realized his full potential until after the Twins released him, does that trade become less unfavorable from Seattle's perspective? Of course not. And I didn't say that Rooker was a rising star, I said that he may be one.

The still from the video shown above shows the ball left the thrower's hand before contact would have occurred between Lewis and the catcher. A fielder has the right to field the ball and since the throw was on its way to the catcher I doubt obstruction would have been called either on the field or upon review. Had Lewis initiated contact he might have been called for interference. So I think we simply accept the play as it was made by all involved, including the umpires.

This is regarding the question of whether Verlander starts on three days' rest. For the 2023 Verlander, maybe if Houston is down 2 games to 1, and not if Houston is up 2 games to 1. If we were discussing the 2011 Justin Verlander I would change those guesses to definitely and probably.

In a postseason series the objective of the visiting team during the first two games is to take home field advantage away from the opponent. Mission accomplished.

First, this is not accurate. In addition to Rogers the Twins traded Brent Rooker for Paddack and Pagan. Rogers has been so-so during the last 2 years. Rooker may be a rising star. Pagan rebounded from a poor 2022 to have a good 2023. Paddack has been essentially a non-factor for the last 2 years. I think if anything the Twins may have come out a bit behind up to this point, but that could easily change depending on how these players perform over the next few years.

95%.

No comment because no comment, no jinx.

That's baseball. It's not considered unusual for a bad team to win 6 in a row, and it's not considered unusual for a good team (or division) to lose 6 in a row. Winning the World Series can be accomplished by going 13-9 or 11-8, and just about any team is capable of that, even over a difficult stretch in the schedule. When one thinks about it that way, winning the World Series might be the least meaningful championship of the four major North American team sports.

Never tempt the baseball gods.

Oh, my. When will you learn? Look what happened when you did this the first time.

For Pete's sake don't say such things!

Moving to FS1 when the Tex-Bal game ends.

The game is on FS2. Fortunately our cable carries it.