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Road trip

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Everything posted by Road trip

  1. Road trip
    I don't personally believe that a pitcher must be drafted in order to "pipeline-qualify", but the draft record hasn't been terrible. They've hit on one or two good/useful pitchers every year that remain with the club: 2016: Jax 2017: Ober 2018: Sands, Funderburk, 2019: Varland 2020: only 5 rounds, weird Covid draft, anything more recent is too soon to judge. Meanwhile, they used a bunch of high picks to grab Lewis, Jeffers, Larnach, Julien, Miranda, Kirilloff, and Wallner. Sure, there have been some misses too, but I'm reluctant to complain too much about the draft and development record of this front office. I've seen worse eras.
  2. Road trip
    That's an awfully high standard. Plenty of teams will make the playoffs with less than that. Rangers last year, top 5 starters for most of the year only had one guy with a FIP under 4 (Eovaldi). They did add Montgomery late which certainly helped. Their season turned out ok... Ryan is a solid enough starter. Not an ace, but a guy who is part of the rotation on any MLB team lucky enough to have him. Call him a 2, a 3, a 4, whatever... just give him the ball every 5 days and he will put you in a position to win more often than not. Regarding the "pipeline", sure, I wish there were more guys ready in the minors, but the caliber of Twins mlb pitching is so much better now than it was a decade ago.
  3. Road trip
    Kirilloff with another day off. Injured, or just giving him a mental breather? Margot starting again against a tough right hander. Santana at 1B against a tough right hander. A day off for Correa, which may well be needed. Not sure he's had a game off since returning from IL? So.... yeah, not exactly loving this lineup but I'll hope for the best. E Julien (L) 2B R Jeffers (R) C T Larnach (L) RF M Kepler (L) DH J Miranda (R) 3B W Castro (S) SS M Margot (R) LF C Santana (S) 1B A Martin (R) CF
  4. Road trip
    Yes, Margot is part of the problem. If he played less he would be less of a problem, but frankly he doesn't offer much under any circumstances. So it is mildly fixable if his usage is limited. The good news is that Margot is only a part time platoon problem. In my mind the bigger problem remains that Santana is playing every fricking day. Even with his recent "hot" streak in April, Santana is "hitting" .148/.250/.250 vs right handed pitching. That's unplayable at 1B, no matter how good his glove is (and he already has 3 errors at 1b). Oh, and as feared, he's a single PA short of leading the Twins in plate appearances. If anyone needs a platoon partner, its Santana.
  5. Road trip
    Yeah, you may be the only one who would prefer Rortvedt overall. Good defensive catcher, not at all likely to continue hitting. Currently sporting a BABIP over .500 - that isn't even remotely sustainable.
  6. Road trip
    Don't think the stats have any validity after an entire 10 game sample. Check back at 90 or so games. He's plenty fast. His arm is just ok, but it's not like he's Ben Revere...
  7. Road trip
    I hope it is a minor blip, and not a foreshadowing of the season to come. But that's a hope. Lots and lots and lots of starting pitchers are great for a year or two. Very few are great for a half decade. Those rare pitchers that are great for a full decade are usually Hall of Famers. The difference in those who can sustain their success??? I honestly don't know... health is certainly part of it, but other factors must be involved as well. Pablo is currently in category 1, great for a year or two. I want to believe he will reach category 2, great for a half decade. Might get there, might not. Johan hit that mark, as did Viola a few decades ago. I'd take a good half decade in a second, because it is rare. We all want to believe in his potential for sustained greatness, obviously, but only time will reveal what will play out.
  8. Road trip
    No major sport makes a mess of broadcast rights quite like MLB. The big franchises (NY, LA, Bos, etc) want to protect the current "every man for himself" local broadcast rights system because it gives them a massive financial competitive advantage. But long term the current system is extremely counterproductive. MLB is struggling to attract new fans for a variety of reasons, but the difficulty of watching the local team play in local markets is a big part of the problem. Fixing this should be a top priority, but it won't be because NY, LA, Bos, etc...
  9. Road trip
    Huh, Larnach DHing, and Kirilloff in LF again. I had always thought that Larnach was sort of average in the OF. Not great, not a liability. Kirilloff I've always considered to be well below average. Yet this lineup has been the recent trend. Wondering why... Is Larnach nursing a minor injury?
  10. Road trip
    "Does anybody out there have a player to them like Randy Johnson was to me, someone who made a distinct impression upon you that made you think he was better than he actually was?" A long list of young outfielders from the late 70's/early 80's fit the bill. After Cal let Hisle, Bostock, and Ford leave via free agency we wanted to believe in the youngsters, and Herb Carneal tried to play them up, but boy they just didn't make the grade. Bombo Rivera, Rick Sofield, Hosken Powell, Willie Norwood. Great names, but in retrospect not great players. Looking at their stats now, I don't know why we ever had hope for them.
  11. Road trip
    Increasingly, I don't understand a reason to keep Margot. I was pretty skeptical when the Twins acquired him and he has shown nothing since getting here. Margot had value when he could play CF and steal some bases. Both of those skills seem to be gone... no surprise, he'll turn 30 later this year and is a pretty big guy (no way does he still weigh in at 180 lbs like he's listed). It appears he's now a below average hitting corner outfielder. Those are a dime a dozen, if you want to pay anything at all. He was supposed to be a lefty masher, but he hasn't even done that effectively since 2022. His tenure with the Twins is very short... he's going to get paid by the Dodgers regardless... trade him, designate him, do whatever with him, because he doesn't appear to have a skill set we can use. I'd rather keep Miranda and Martin. Miranda will likely hit better, Martin has positional flexibility and speed. Margot might even accept a minor league assignment as I don't know that there is a MLB team that would give him a roster spot.
  12. Road trip
    Difficult decisions, for certain. I suspect it might be Miranda who goes down instead of Martin. With Correa at SS that kind of creates an excess of infielders if they keep Miranda up. We know Buxton is going to need regular days off and management seems to prefer Martin as the primary backup CF... because it appears Margot has lost something defensively.
  13. Road trip
    ?? He's listed 5'11", plenty tall for a power hitter. (See Aaron, Mays, Mantle, Yaz, and of course Kirby P). Now he's extraordinarily unlikely to have a HOF career like any of the above, but "too short" isn't going to hold him back from making the majors. Reached his max? He's 20. He'll get stronger. He'll mature mentally and emotionally. His skills have room for development. I've never met or seen anyone, barring injury, who maxed out their skills and physical development at 20 years old. Yes, he's a corner outfielder at best defensively, but that's hardly a problem. He's a very good prospect, nothing more or less. He could flame out or get hurt, but I'd say it is highly likely he makes the majors at some point. Nearly all top100 prospects do, even if many don't ever develop into regulars, much less stars.
  14. Road trip
    Polanco was one of my favorite players the past few years, but at this point it seems clear that the Twins needed to make room for Julien. Julien OPS: .854 Polanco OPS: .588 Julien was the better hitter last year too. I wish we had gotten more for Polanco, but the Twins are better off just by opening up 2nd base for Julien, even without considering the large salary savings.
  15. Road trip
    Ryan Jeffers *might* just be the best hitter on the roster. He's in the discussion at least. The other possible answers to the "best hitter" question are either frequently injured (Correa, Kirilloff) or have a too short track record to confidently get that title (Lewis, Julien). Jeffers had a 134 OPS+ last year, and thus far is improving on that number this year. He's 27, just entering his prime. He can't be a free agent until 2027. In my mind, the question is not should Jeffers catch more games. Rather, it is "should Jeffers move off of the catcher position entirely?" 1b? Dh? His bat is getting too valuable on this bad-hitting squad to risk at catcher, and he's mediocre there defensively anyway. Catchers get hurt, frequently. They age quickly and badly, almost always. Only a few are still hitting well into their early 30s. Even the best of them can only catch 130 games a year, and most catch far fewer. I'm starting to ponder that Jeffers might be worth more to the team by largely eliminating his catching duties and getting him into the lineup every day. It's too late to make the change this year the way the roster is constructed, but next year? If he continues to hit well I think I'd pencil him in at 1b or DH.
  16. Road trip
    They aren't playing him because if they played him, and he somehow got a few hits, they would have to keep playing him. 🙃 Rocco's plans are written on stone tablets, and shall not be changed! Can't afford to risk messing with the preseason plan to share catching duties between Jeffers and Vasquez.
  17. Road trip
    I sure do wish Vegas would hire you to set odds... but they are too smart for that.
  18. Road trip
    I'd largely agree with this. Wallner has options, this might be a good time to send him down for a month. Rocco has shown he won't play him regularly, so getting 4 ab's every day in St Paul might get Wallner back into rhythm. I'd give some of the playing time to Martin. Let's see if he can hit at this level. Same with Miranda, see if he can return to 2022 form. Larnach... I'd like to believe, but at this point I'm getting skeptical. I'd love to be wrong. Hopefully he takes this chance and breaks out, because this may well be his last chance.
  19. Road trip
    The important part is bolded. Wallner has been very bad, in the smallest of small sample sizes. His playing time has been very irregular at best which probably hasn't helped his timing. Two at bats here, one at bat there. He might need a AAA trip to get right, but it is way to early to question his potential to adjust. On the other hand, Rocco is playing the 38 year old Carlos Santana for a full game EVERY SINGLE DAY. Wallner's OPS is .513, which is bad. In twice as many plate appearances Santana is at .378, a number that many pitchers could achieve when they were allowed to hit. Santana is done. Dumped by the Royals, Pirates, Mariners, and Brewers, everyone in the league knew it, but our genius front office on a tight budget gave him $5 million when they could have just resigned Solano for a fraction of that cost. Wallner is one of many problems in the Twins offense. Unfortunately he is nowhere near the top problem.
  20. Road trip
    Calling balls and strikes perfectly is not possible for the human eye. I've done it many times at the youth level. I can live with blown calls that are at the top of the zone plus/minus an inch or two. It's a judgement call based on the varying height of the batter. The same is somewhat true on the low strike. The outside corner is simply a "best guess" if we are being honest. Calls are blown here all the time because umpires set up on the inside corner. It is physiologically impossible to catch that angle perfectly. What should never happen, ever, is a badly missed call on this inside corner. This happened on consecutive pitches to Wallner on Saturday. It was umpiring malpractice of the first rank, and it happens too often. I turned the game off shortly after that at bat. I didn't need the tv overlay box to see how bad those calls were. Yes, MLB should fix this. I'm quite ready for robo umps calling balls and strikes. It will be a better and fairer game, will cause the game to move more quickly, and will end the perceived injustice that so many fans nurse regarding ball and strike calls.
  21. Road trip
    Absolute incompetence behind the plate. Bring on the robo umps.
  22. Road trip
    It is not unique to the Twins organization or to Twins players, but MLB players as a whole spend far more time on the injured list now than they did a (half) generation ago. It isn't even close. And, no, I'm not talking about the medical dark ages.. From 1998 to 2015 MLB player days on the IL gradually rose from 22,000 to 30,000 days. 536 players spent time on the IL in 2015, a number that had been very gradually rising from 413 in 1998. Then the big jump came. Last year 821 MLB players spent time on the IL, and missed 44,661 days. Something has changed. It is fair to ask what, even if pinning down the answer(s) is difficult at this point. I'm sure the GM's, trainers, nutritionists, agents, doctors and everyone else involved in MLB is searching for answers because injuries benefit no one, and keeping a roster healthy is a key to winning and increasing revenue at both an individual and team level.
  23. Road trip
    I think it is because bad weather for opening day is very common, especially in northern climates. This gives MLB the ability to have a backup "opening day" for all the fans that bought tickets for the opener (often a sellout, always a big crowd) instead of making the scheduled game 2 the accidental default opener (rarely even close to a sellout except in baseball-crazy fan bases). You'll notice that Philly and the Mets delayed their home opener yesterday due to weather, and are playing it today. Meanwhile, the warm weather/domed stadiums were safely scheduled for game 2 of the season today, as game 1 was pretty much guaranteed to happen on schedule (Tampa, Houston, Seattle, etc).
  24. Road trip
    On the bright side (and I have to hunt pretty hard), Buxton is able to play center, and I do like him in the lead off spot. A worse scenario would be Buxton DH'ing with Margot in CF.
  25. Road trip
    I'll echo this. I've been four times now, and it is an experience every Twins fan should try to take in once. The actual spring training game is less interesting than what you experience on the back fields. Show up early, well before the game starting time! I made it again this year and was right on the chain link fence behind the plate watching Farmer, Kirilloff, Santana, Julien, and several others take live batting practice off of Balazovic and Thielbar. Several years ago I got to watch Rod Carew work with hitters on bunting, all from about 15 yards away. And as Riverbrian noted, you get to see a lot of minor leaguers at work, everything from top prospects to guys even rabid fans haven't heard of.
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