twinbythebay

The Dobber is down! I didn't see that coming, but considering Odo is back and Dobnak is the only starter with options left, not to mention his recent performance, it makes sense. I was hoping they'd keep Blankenhorn up and option Astudillo instead, but I'm guessing they're still wary of Avila's back and want another guy on the roster who can (sorta) catch.

I think the Twins wanted to keep Rowson around, and I believe they would've promoted him to bench coach had Shelton been hired away by the Pirates before Rowson was hired away by the Marlins. I don't think there would be any way to get him back at this point short of offering him the manager position. Personally, I would be very hesitant about making any personnel decisions based solely on the results this short, bastardized season.

This is simply not true. The run being scored has a lot to do with the batter, but the baserunner(s) and the defense play a big role in the outcome as well. As someone else argued above, you're gonna have a much easier time collecting an RBI on a groundout when Byron Buxton is on third base as opposed to Nelson Cruz.

I believe the bubbles are only for the Division Series and beyond, but the first round is still played at the higher seed's ballpark.

I predict we will be seeing multiple inning from Caleb Thielbar tonight... And the way he's pitched this season, that's not necessarily a bad thing.

I'm not saying the past 2 months should be ignored, I'm just saying that I feel like these guys have earned a longer leash than 2 months before they're written off, especially considering the unusual nature of this season.

It's baffling to me how many people are ready to write off Garver, Kepler, Rogers, and others on this team based on a rough 1-2 months after 6 months of elite play.

This is a completely different, much diminished bullpen without Rogers anchoring it. I know a lot of people have been convinced that he sucks now for some reason because of a 17 inning sample, but he's been way too dominant over the past two seasons for me to just write him off. I know that they can only keep going to him for so long while he's pitching like he is this season, but they need to keep putting him out there over the next couple of weeks to see if they can get him right before the playoffs.

The key series are coming in about two weeks. The Twins are in a very good position to secure home field advantage, and they should be using every game from now until the playoffs to get as many players right as possible.

I don't think it's necessarily bad to consider RBI as an important piece of offensive contribution, it's just that RBIs are dependent on a lot of factors and provide an incomplete picture of a player's offensive skill. There are a lot of other stats that tell a more complete story of a hitter's contribution and are more predictive of future success. But RBIs are still an important part of the story, as was painfully illustrated tonight.

Ugly game, but those will happen from time to time. Cruz had about as bad of a game as a hitter can have, but it's tough to complain too much about a guy who's having the season that he's having. I think Rogers built a lot of trust over the past couple of seasons with how he's handled high leverage situations, and in a normal year I think you keep putting him out there to hopefully work through this rough patch, but this is very bad timing for that... I think this bad streak started with some bad luck, but now it seems to have gotten in his head. He was just plain bad tonight. He hardly ever gives up walks, and he was throwing far too many non-competitive pitches. The good news is that there's still two weeks to get him right before the playoffs, but time is running out quickly.

Pretty slick recovery there by Berrios to make the play on Robert.

Yuck. It's hard to downgrade from Gonzalez this season, but Adrianza has definitely been worse. Especially since it looks like Gonzalez may be on the verge of one of his patented hot streaks. Looks like Rocco isn't putting much stock into winning the division this season, which, if I'm being honest, I don't really have a problem with.

Sano, Rosario, and Jeffers all out of the lineup tonight. Given the mismatch in starting pitchers tonight, I'd still give the Twins the edge. Sad fact of the day: even after his big weekend, Marwin Gonzalez has the exact same slugging percentage this season as Lamonte Wade

This is an awfully definitive statement considering he's a 22 year old who OPSed .750 at AA last season and has never played at a higher level than that... Color me skeptical.

I think the FCC may have something to say about this...

How about we wait at least until he's OPSing over .600 before we make any declarations of Marwin's greatness.

Eddie just can't help himself. He comes up big last night, and then makes a rookie mistake on a throw in the first inning today. This is exactly the kind of play leads many of us to question whether he's worth $10mil next year...

No, what I meant was that the Yankees are unlikely to get home field advantage in the playoffs, given the current standings. I want no part of the Yankees in the playoffs, particularly if they're able to get healthy by then. This is another reason why I don't think it makes a lot of sense to make a big push to win the division this season. If the Yankees stay in the 7th or 8th spot, they'll be playing one of the division winners in the first round. On the other hand, if the Twins can snag that top 2nd place spot (#4 seed), they'd be in line to host the Blue Jays in the first round.

Like many Twins fans, this year's results have certainly led me to have far less confidence in Rogers than I had last year. That being said, I think he still has the best overall "stuff" in the bullpen, and I don't see any obviously better options to replace him as closer. At one point this season, I may have suggested Duffey, but he has been knocked around quite a bit lately as well (his hard hit rate this season is 50%! That's bad). May gives up far too many home runs, and I think it's very likely the Twins let him walk after this season. Romo and Wisler have been effective this season, but they just aren't the type of pitchers I'd be comfortable trusting to close games on a regular basis. I know people are sick of hearing this, but Rogers really is being stung by quite a bit of bad luck this season. His BABIP is .413, his walk rate is lower than last year, his K rate is only down slightly, his FIP and xFIP are about 1.5 runs lower than his ERA, and according to Statcast, his expected ERA is almost a full run lower than his actual ERA. His hard hit % and barrel % are definitely way up from last season, but his hard hit % is still much lower than Duffey's. Given that he's only pitched 15 innings this season and none of his underlying numbers are raising any obvious red flags, I still think his stellar performance since 2018 has earned him the benefit of the doubt. I guess this is just part of life with relievers. They're going to have their ups and downs, especially when you're only looking at 15 inning samples. I would hope that the Twins aren't as reactionary as many of their fans in this regard and are basing their decisions on solid evidence instead of the somewhat random results of a small sample. Edit: One possible theory that just occurred to me is that maybe he's being hurt by pitching almost exclusively to AL Central teams this season, who have all seen a lot of him over the past couple of years? If this is part of why he's having issues, he may be much more effective in the playoffs against teams that haven't seen him nearly as much.

Spoken like a true MN sports fan As punchless as the Twins' offense has looked for much of the season, Cleveland's bats have been so, so much worse. If they could cobble together even a league average offense, look out.

Details, details... Can't we just take some time to irrationally point and laugh at the big bully who just fell and skinned his knee, even though we know we are likely in store for a beatdown from said bully in the near future?

I think we can be pretty certain that they will setup their rotation to have Maeda, Pineda, and Berrios in line to start the first three playoff games. None of those guys will be pitching in the last couple of games, as the importance of winning the division or getting a certain seed pales in comparison to the importance of the playoff games. I think Dobnak is currently in line to be the fourth playoff starter, but if Odorizzi dazzles in the couple of starts he should get before the end of the season, it's possible he could jump ahead of Dobnak. I wouldn't be too worried about playing at Yankee Stadium this season, unless the Yankees somehow win the rest of their regular season games. They're closer to being out of the playoffs than they are to having home field advantage in the playoffs. Also, after the first round, it sounds like the rest of the playoffs will be played in a bubble in either CA or TX anyway.

Who's ready to laugh even harder?? Gerrit Cole in 2020: $13.3 million adjusted salary / 0.6 fWAR = $22.22 million per fWAR Kenta Maeda in 2020: ~$3.1 million adjusted salary (including incentives) / 1.6 fWAR = $1.97 milion per fWAR BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Are we watching the same team? Since the beginning of 2019, Kepler has gotten on base at a higher rate than Rosario and hit for more power than Rosario. I think it's more likely the next few seasons will look much closer to 2019-2020 in terms of their offensive production rather than 2017-2018, when Kepler was still figuring things out at the plate and Rosario outperformed him. And that's not even taking into consideration that Kepler consistently grades as one of the best defensive corner outfielders in the game, while Rosario grades as well below average defensively. There's a good reason why Falvine prioritized locking up Kepler long-term instead of Rosario, and I'm very glad that they did.