wavedog

I was not aware the MVP awards were named after Landis - a bit confusing because there is an AL MVP and NL MVP so two awards and it looks like they are both named after him. My first thought is that they should be named after a great predominantly AL player and a great predominantly NL player respectively. That would seem to provide a good historical recognition fit and make it more identifiable to a league. I know several of the HOF players already have other awards named for them. I would have to see who was available or maybe move the award names around - maybe Babe Ruth and Jackie Robinson? Without factoring in on the tipping point of Landis achievements versus his racism, naming it after Landis right after he left office might have made sense in the 1940's but doesn't seem to make as much sense now. I would be in favor of the Baseball writers reviewing this and making a recommendation.

A couple of meandering points: I am glad the team took the statue down before they were taken down by protesters possibly causing injury and further damage to the stadium. The team put the statue up they can take it down. Statues are put up to honor folks that made significant contributions. The Griffiths owned the Senators/Twins for over 70 years - Calvin brought the team to Minnesota and owned the team for approximately 30 years so on that side that is of some certain significance. Personally I grew up following the team under his ownership and did not like him - he was cheap, in the Free Agency era all the good players left the team, and he made countless foolish comments, one being Waseca. I was glad when he sold the team. He has been labeled as a racist - he kept the players segregated back in the early 60's until he was called on it. The Waseca comment - Carew's comment in 1979 about not being a slave on his plantation and then an offset in Carew's latest statement saying that he did not believe Griffith was a racist from his personal experience which somewhat distorts the clear picture of the first 3 items or at least the 3rd one. I read the SI article on Mike Tucker who was the loudest voice in wanting to bring down Calvin's statue for racism. In the article there was this interesting quote from Mike " Tucker says. “The minority and people of color players the Twins have had, I’ve always been the biggest fans of them.” Would you consider that comment racist or different side of the coin? If Calvin Griffith had said "The White players the Twins had - they have always been my favorites" might that have been a pretty big deal - worse than Waseca? I have seen comments that the removal of the statues is not about erasing history. In the comment from the Twins it states "We cannot remove Calvin Griffith from the history of the Minnesota Twins" so there it is stated in writing - however that comment sure makes it sound like if they would if they could. As I said I have meandered on enough - I did not celebrate his statue going up or coming down. I did not know Calvin personally, walk in his shoes or know his mind and heart. The issue of how big a racist he was may be a little more complex, clouded by his cheapness, countless stupid comments over time and unless we get a little more explanation on Carew's latest comments that contradict his comments from the late 70's.

I thought Rod Carew who knew Calvin better than most folks had a nice summation on the subject: "I understand and respect the Minnesota Twins decision to remove the Calvin Griffith statue outside Target Field," Carew said in a statement released by the team. "While I've always supported the Twins decision to honor Calvin with a statue, I also remember how inappropriate and hurtful his comments were on that fateful day in Waseca. The Twins did what they felt they needed to do for the organization and for our community. While we cannot change history, perhaps we can learn from it."

Not very impressed with Manfred as well in terms of this negotiation, marketing the game, and contracting the minor leagues as other examples. He should be able to get both sides to move to a compromise. The owners haven't really budged in their offers - but on the other-hand the players have not come off of getting paid 100% of their prorated salaries for any games they play. From their point that was agreed to in March but there is some question about if that was including games with no fans or not. That part is on the owners for agreeing to that without stipulating caveats. I put the majority of the blame on the owners but I am not letting the players totally off the hook. This is bargaining and in bargaining both sides have to give up something. Play 50 games or play none - either is fine with me. I really feel for the minor league players and minor league local ownership groups.

Posting my baseball update during this quiet time as I am home-officing: Former Twin Danny Santana just ran up and down our street with his wife. Yesterday he ran shirtless with his kids and mother-in-law while doing bicep curls. They are renting the house across the street from us. That's all I got....

Fortunately I live in Texas so I can watch the Twins on MLB.tv . It is crazy when you are better off as a fan living far away from your favorite team. Common sense will prevail soon I hope - you should be able to just buy a package with all your teams games on it. I switched to Youtube TV last July - so now I will be cut-off from all the local pro Baseball, Basketball and Hockey games but I will still keep it for now because we saved over $50 per month versus U-Verse. I just won't be able to watch the Twins play any games against the Rangers or Astros.

Dang work getting in the way - I missed that one.

Woohoo!! Celestino sure hit that one far!

Nice DP turned by Arraez and Lewis!

Maybe better to go with Buxton and Kepler in the outfield and 5 infielders. Hopefully we focus on defensive improvement in Spring training to at least try to make it to average.

Since we can't fill our rotation its for the protection of our fans when the other team is batting - the netting will extend to the outfield seats.

For the right price and contract length - sure I would bring him back. I think he will have a solid bounce-back season next year. I am guessing his agent put out that note about the interest - if there that much interest in him then the price and length may fall out of a reasonable range for us if we want to bring Odorizzi back and sign a top grade starter.

Agreed - Turner ran in a straight-line from the Right-Hand batter's box to first base. He did not exaggerated to initiate the contact. In fact, with the bad throw I think Gurriel purposely initiated contact with Turner to attempt to get the interference call. I would love to see a compilation of all the RH hitters as they run to first base and I think you would see Turner's is nothing out of the ordinary. This call should not have been made by the umpire - he used poor judgement. The throw was not from the first base line it came between 3rd base and the pitcher's mound.

Yes, particularly last night's game. If you are going to miss calls in and out of the zone at least be consistent. The strike 3 call on Robles defied explanation but was superceded by the ball call on the Houston batter that was close to the middle of the plate. The bad calls seemed to have favored Houston but that could just be because they are playing better. The other interesting call from 2 nights ago was in the 7th inning when on a 3-2 count the runner ran from first. The pitch was in the strike zone but the catcher was moving up to attempt to throw the runner out - so that movement distracted the Umpire's view. What should have been a strikeout-throwout DP instead was a walk and 2 men on. Astros ended up getting 4 runs that inning. Point being if we had an auto-mated strike zone it would not be distracted by catcher movement that the umpire is subject to.

...and here are some of the Twins specific forecasts.

Revisiting some of our 2019 Predictions.......always interesting to look back. Kudos to those that predicted the Twins to win the Central.

The Moderators had a great year - like the Twins regular season! We won't talk about the postseason. The site was great this year with a lot of nice new features. Appreciate all the hard work - it is the go to place for Twins info. Thanks!

For me personally in addition to the others mentioned I would throw 2002 in there. I think that was our first playoff appearance since the 1991 World Series win. We got past the first series with Oakland and had home field advantage against the Angels. My memories were of 1987 and 1991 when we won it all so I was expecting the same that year. Getting Rally-monkeyed was tough. This year was interesting - it was like it progressively got worse. At the start I didn't think we would win it all but I thought we would be competitive. First game we take a lead - then lose it - then tie it up - then collapse. 2nd game is over by the 3rd inning - and last night was a little bit of a tease - we seem to either flail at the plate or when we hit shots it is right at a Yankee. The fact we have lost all these games to the Yankees in a row now is of mythic proportion.

Great season - lousy Post-season

Can’t miss that one

If they are shifting on Kepler bunt down the 3rd base line for a hit?

Sweet - we just need to get Cruz and Rosario up

Maybe we are cooling Chapman off with this long inning? Trying to find anything positive

Remember the time we were up 2-0 in the first game? Been pretty much hell since then

Defensive replacement hits a homer. That about sums it up.