CDog
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Everything posted by CDog
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Agreed. I would have said second best at season's start, and I'm still holding some hope that it'll turn around for Liriano...but...well, we know the buts. I could see Pavano, Marquis, and Blackie having really similar lines for the year, but I've got my money on Blackburn to pull to the front.
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Againts my norm, rather quickly I felt pretty strongly that The Hammer was a "mistake killer." I haven't changed my mind yet. He just crushes mistake pitches and he hasnt' missed many so far. As pointed out, naturally his average is going to fall to earth (I don't think the 0.395 BABIP is quite sustainable!). But I was surprised to see how much he walks (a little over league average throughout his career), so that helps get him on base when he doesn't get that mistake to send screaming against or over a wall. He reminds me of a mini-Thome a little...lower average (probably directly related to the big power swing), fair amount of walks with a good eye for strike zone, lots of strikeouts (again, that big power swing), and obvious strength when he hits one on the screws. All to slightly less extremes than Thome.
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Except the 7 position players with numbers well below their career. Or the 4 pitchers. Or the ten...yes ten...pitchers with xFIP values wayyyyy below their ERA.
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On page 3 I listed more than 18. I even mentioned then that it's obviously the right order. Asking someone else's opinion right here where I can read it? Just a slap in the face! Haha.
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I don't think that's up for debate much, is it? The question is more about whether trading that current skill is worth it for some other player's future set of skills.
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See...those two bits are just it. It IS about you. The "why doesn't he swing when I want/expect him to?" mentality is about the frustration and impatience of the observer. Thinking he "doesn't want to hit" (and this was expressed not just by you in this specific way in this thread, and in addition the sentiment is rampant...I used your post to quote because it had both elements rather explicitly) because that's how YOU felt is a jump I just can't get behind. He's better at hitting baseballs than 99.99999999% of all humans ever created (and that's probably conservative). If people can't enjoy watching that, whether it's because he's from here and moved away, because he gets paid too much money (which I also think is part of the "local" backlash...you DON'T take too much when you're from Minnesota!), because he doesn't pull as much as you want, because he takes the first pitch more often than you'd like, because he doesn't throw his bat or beat up a cooler when he strikes out, or because your girlfriend likes his sideburns and you get jealous, or whatever other reason it is...well I jut can't understand what makes you a baseball fan. And if it makes you boo for nothing other than he makes outs 60% of the time (less often than, you know, almost everyone), I can't understand that either.
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Thanks. After I typed that question in a bit of a hurry, I thought it may have ended up coming off more condescending than it was intended. So I appreciate an actual answer instead of puffing out your chest and getting defensive. Not that that would ever happen on the interwebs! And to be more clear, more of my questioning was with the part wondering if he was the only. I think it's easier to establish that someone is a leader through the ways that you mention than to determine who is not. People here (and even more so elsewhere on the web) seem to love to rail against people that aren't "their" type of leader, and especially like to tear down the big contract guys. Yet if you actually read and listen, you do hear about those guys taking on those roles. And even if we don't hear about it, that doesn't mean they don't.
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Thank you for that ^, sir.
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Article: A Spantastic start to his season
CDog replied to Parker Hageman's topic in Twins Daily Front Page News
I'm gonna jump out on a limb and say there's a pretty direct correlation and causation between that statement and the fact that you don't, in fact, manage the team. -
Here's my question when it comes to trading Span. He seems to be one of the most valuable Twins in the sense of how good is he compared to how much he makes. That makes him quite sought after. But isn't that the exact type of guy you're trying to GET when you make a "rebuilding" trade? The other part of it then is, "For how long will he be better than his pay rate" combined with "For how long will he be the best center fielder in the organization" combined again with HOW LONG IS THE REBUILD going to take. The first two are answered by the pieces that go into that are his age (28), the expected progress of the homegrown replacement (whoever it ends up being), and the expectation of Span's longevity. I also know his contract starts to escalate a little here, but I don't have the time right now to look up when or how much. I don't know enough to be able to answer some of the other questions. But I think my main point is that it seems like a "rebuild" trade is more of older guys making more money than they're worth (that can be afforded by a contender more than a rebuilder), and that Span still seems to have value as part of that rebuild.
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Not to sound like a broken record, but how much time have you spent in the clubhouse or even talking to people who have?
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Source for these details?
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Let's go with impossible instead of hard, but also add "if true." Fair? I would agree that the "tussle" seems to be minor and well below on the seriousness scale. I'd also add that if I were inolved with the Tigers in any way that the "extremely intoxicated" and getting in after 2:30 in the morning wouldn't thrill me. I'm sure it happens a lot in that world, but that doesn't mean I'd think it's awesome. Especially in light of the Cabrera incidents of the last couple years.
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The usatoday online article also includes an embedded video of the bat-throwing incident (not to take away from this serious incident). I'd never thought to look for it, but there it was right there for the clicking. I had sorta wondered if that story had gotten blown out of proportion or been sensationalized, so it was interesting to see it (although Young is offscreen when the bat comes back into the frame, so it's still hard to tell exactly what happened, but certainly a better idea than before).
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What Would It Take To Question Your Own Fandom?
CDog replied to LimestoneBaggy's topic in Minnesota Twins Talk
Seinfeld has a bit about why we cheer for the home team. The players are always changing, they typically don't have any real connection to the area or the team other than circumstance. His punchline is that "essentially we're just cheering for laundry." That is, the guy in the home-town clothes versus the "same" guy in the visiting clothes. I really try not to fall into that trap. Along those lines, somewhere I stopped being invested in the Vikings as they paraded criminals, jerks, and punks through the roster. The Timberwolves have twice gone through phases that basically made me unable to cheer for them. Neither of those had anything to do with wins and losses. So I suppose a similar situation could happen with the Twins that would turn me off to some extent. But I don't think there's an amount of losing that will bring the fandom into question. -
It's a slightly different topic, but I've been mulling a blog post about all the flat-out falsehoods that seep into conversations over and over again regarding the Twins. Not stuff that is opinion-based where people could reasonably have different views, but the concrete facts that people get incorrect so often. This thread seems too similar to that, so I'll have to wait a while just to seem more original. So on that front, this blog post has been a huge success, simply by stopping me from writing an annoying one of my own...for now!
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Compare relative payroll before Target Field to after. How are they not competing financially? Just because the team isn't good right now, doesn't mean it's because they're not spending enough. And as for the drop in payroll, I don't think anyone but a few people in the world have a really clear idea of all that goes into the team's financials, but isn't it possible that they were 15% over-budget last year and simply fell back to where they were shooting for?
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How much time have you spent in the clubhouse or around the team or around Mauer or other players on the team?
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To start, I think the "complaints" or confusion about why we would care if he's a hometown guy are rather strange. Isn't picking the team close to you the same thing? Isn't that why nearly everyone across the country cheers for the USA in the Olympics? Isn't that why people from Wisconsin are the "border rivals"...but then if they come play four "our team" they become "local" guys? I don't think this is a phenomenon at all unique to Minnesota, although there may be differening degrees in various regions (and if there are, I'd guess the midwest ranks high on that list...wait, did I just...?). As for booing...Mauer or anyone else on "your own" team...well, it's a subject that gets me pretty riled up. Maybe I should just move on to the next topic. But here I go... I'd say with some exceptions, if you're booing someone on your team for failing, it pretty much makes you something that rhymes with brass bowl (apologies to Simmons for stealing that). The first rebuttal to that is usually, "I/they pay their money, they have the right to boo anyone they want." I agree. Just because something is your "right," doesn't mean you're not a brass bowl for exercising that right. As I said, I think there are exceptions: clear lack of effort (and probably repeated) might be one, something like that. I could go on and on, but I'll just end up ranting...
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I'm kinda mad I didn't get to that first.
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That's become one of the biggest reaches I've read here. Instantly. Of course he should have. Of course he's upset he didn't. The comments I believe you're referring to were in response to comments about his general success.
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Which pitch? Or do you will them to throw one?
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It's not 1935. Ticket sales and ticket prices aren't exactly the whole revenue stream.
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So your suggestion is calling up someone from another organization's farm system?
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From a post I mostly agreed with, I took out the part I didn't above. I think a lot of people have said that "as they go, so go the Twins." For me personally, it wasn't quite that cut and dry. But that's really semantics. The part I would actually argue is that Mauer's numbers are quite a bit below both his career averages and where I expect he'll finish. I think most of that is based on a slow start, and after those first four or five games he has done about what is expected.