Riverbrian

We don't have Martin to pinch hit for Larnach. Roster decisions based on... other things. Roster decisions not based on talent. Roster decisions made today that were set in motion many years ago. Erod wasn't going to be the call up.

Last Game Right Handed Starter August 31 - Jackson Jobe - Won - 11 Runs Scored Lineup Composition: 4 RH 2 Switch 3 LH Season Record vs RH Starters: 48-48 Season Average Runs Scored vs RH Starters: 4.71 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Season Record vs LH Starters: 18-24 Season Average Runs Scored vs LH Starters: 4.40

Nothing a 15 game winning streak won't cure.

I loved it. My son and I won a round trip to anywhere in the United States from Delta. A little SpongeBob knowledge on the big screen takes the edge off of 2 runs scored vs Fedde.

August 26th - Right Handed Starter JT Ginn Loss - 4 Runs Scored Lineup Composition: 4 RH 2 Switch 3 LH Season Record vs RH Starters: 46-46 Season Average Runs Scored vs RH Starters: 4.67 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- August 28th - Right Handed Starter Luis Castillo Loss - 4 Runs Scored Lineup Composition: 4 RH 2 Switch 3 LH Season Record vs RH Starters: 46-47 Season Average Runs Scored vs RH Starters: 4.67 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ August 29th - Right Handed Starter Erick Fedde Loss - 2 Runs Scored Lineup Composition: 3 RH 3 Switch 3 LH Season Record vs RH Starters: 46-48 Season Average Runs Scored vs RH Starters: 4.64 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- August 30th - Right Handed Starter (Jordan Hicks Opener Jose Urquidy Primary) Won - 5 Runs Scored Lineup Composition: 4 RH 2 Switch 3 LH Season Record vs RH Starters: 47-48 Season Average Run Scored vs RH Starters: 4.64 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Season Record vs LH Starters: 18-24 Season Average Runs Scored vs LH Starters: 4.40

Nothing a 15 game winning streak won’t cure

Congrats to Walker. These moments are huge deals for young players and their families. Myself personally. I love debuts and I'll be watching it. I'll be at the game on Saturday. Hope to see one of his major league firsts if he doesn't achieve all of the major league firsts tonight. It would be awesome to see his first major league homer while wearing one of those Spongebob Jerseys that come with the ticket.

I've seen teams sell at the deadline and get a lot better I've seen teams buy at the deadline and get a lot worse. I've seen teams sell and I've seen teams buy with only slight improvement or slight decline basically status quo. I've seen teams buy and take off like a rocket and I've seen teams sell and sink like a stone. I'm currently watching the Brewers lead all teams in winning percentage while being 30th out of 30 teams in home runs and 19th in payroll. I've seen our Twins sweep a 74-50 Braves team and I've seen the Braves sweep the Dodgers one week later. In 2026... The Dodgers with the deepest most expensive starting staff in the history of baseball winning just 16 more games than the Twins have over 134 games. That is one more win every 8 games. This is just typical baseball and it has been every single season without fail. Bottom Line: We needed bullpen help and we got some and Kramer has thus far been a decent addition. The team was 28th in team ERA with injuries throughout the starting staff. The bullpen is deeper now and it needed to be deeper. Only to watch the offense fall from the 5th most runs scored to 25th most runs scored after the deadline. Sectors fall and sectors rise. Sometimes independent from each other and sometimes in unison. It's a roller coaster. Anybody can beat anybody on any given night. Baseball seasons have always been a roller coaster for all 30 teams. Enjoys the climbs and try not to scream too loud during the drops. It is up to the players now.

His price will double in his final year of arbitration. He will be in his final year so it's prudent for the team to think about getting value back but you also don't just throw him away... final year or not. The team will also have to find room for Erod on the 26 man... maybe others. These are all valid reasons to wonder if this is indeed the last year of Larnach in a Twins uniform. However... the comments being made by posters in this thread about Trevor and the comments made about Trevor last off-season. I simply don't understand the harsh contempt. He's been one of our best hitters this season. He was one of our best hitters last season. He's one of us. The level of derision is beyond my understanding.

It was the philosopher Yogi Berra who once said. It Ain't over until it's over. However... Yogi may have stole that one from Lenny Kravitz. Yogi is also quoted saying... "I never said most of the things that I said".

Tough Road Trip. Nothing a 15 game win streak won't cure. BTW... We are getting to the point where a double digit wins streak is indeed necessary. We haven't had one this year. We had one last year and we had one the year before that. I continue to wait patiently.

I apologize for breaking this response up but my posts are already long enough. Your 2nd paragraph. About Roden. I don't have a problem acquiring talent if they believe in that talent. I have a problem spilling talent or compromising talent like we have been doing with our left handed prospects. Roden is the latest of what is getting to be a long line of compromised left handed prospects. If they take the same course with Roden that we did with Larnach. Wallner, Kirilloff, Julien etc. Dipping them in cement by denying exposure and development with 6 years of potential service time in front of him.The best success we can hope for is that Roden becomes Larnach. I'm a fan of Larnach but by making him a specialist... it has lowered his trade value. If you want to move him... he will bring back a reliever at most. This is compromised trade value at a point when his 3rd year of Arbitration salary could be cost prohibitive and if its cost prohibitive for us... it's cost prohibitive for others. I don't want this to become a subjective opinion discussion on the abilities on Larnach, Wallner, Kirilloff or Julien. I'm just saying that we purposely capped his value to us and his value to other teams so if you need to try and reload your system like other clubs in our financial situation do. It won't be there when the time comes. We've taken our prospects and strip mined them for parts at the beginning of their career and there is a bill to pay down the line for that and we are paying that bill by not producing trade value. We are paying that bill by needing a right handed handcuff every single year that Larnach is on the roster or Wallner is on the roster or Kirilloff or Julien. This comes at 4 million a pop or we have to take another developing prospect like Martin and make him become a short side solution to the problem you create with Larnach or Wallner or Kirilloff or Julien or Roden. The Twins have a development problem... How big a role does this play in this development problem. I don't know but my personal suspicion is... Yeah... It would play a pretty big role since the only players that we have allowed to develop fully are all right handed in Lewis, and Keaschall and switch hitter in Lee. Many here want Jenkins up now. I'm here to say that how many left handed outfielders on the team shouldn't matter. Talent is what matters. If the amount of left handed outfielders is holding him back then they are about to take the same approach with Jenkins as they are doing with Larnach, Wallner, Kirilloff, Julien and Roden. There is no hope for the Twins development in the future. Situational value? That's the problem. Value is the goal and it should be all prospects. And the final point. The Twins need more than just Jenkins. They need Jenkins plus others to develop. Because we can't compete with the Dodgers and sign Schwarber talent. We have to grow it. And we need Roden to develop fully so we don't have to trade for Margot or sign the players the Dodgers don't want at 4 to 8 million a pop. Jenkins leap frogging players whose clock is about to expire like Erod can result in spillage and all eggs in the Jenkins basket. Jenkins simply can't be a lefty/righty decision. He has to be a Talent decision.

I apologize for not being clear. The entire major leagues is what I was referring to. 8 of the top ten hitters in baseball is left handed. Clemens is the only possible player who could possibly join that list because he is the only Twins player who is allowed to have enough AB's to qualify. Why is it so left handed heavy at the top of the charts. The 72% may have something to do with that. How can the Twins acquire one of those guys. We certainly won't grow one because we compromise every single prospect coming through and we certainly won't outbid other teams for one developed by other teams. We have to trip over one like we did with Clemens. Clemens is good but he isn't that good. This is a development problem.

I agree... it's a problem if it results in spillage. I don't believe it has to result in spillage but yeah... it will with our current methods. Situational Value? I don't want situational value. I want value. Everybody should be able to agree that it's talent we need but how are you ever going to get maximum value on your players when purposely limiting them and the Twins are limiting them. Let's take talent out of the discussion for a bit. Don't get me wrong... talent is the discussion but let's remove it entirely for a bit. Left handed hitters should be worth more... a lot more. Take the talent out of the discussion and here are the league average OPS numbers produced from all MLB hitters in 2026. Left Handed Hitter vs Right Handed Pitcher: .743 Right Handed Hitter vs Left Handed Pitcher: .730 Right Hander Hitter vs Right Handed Pitcher: .697 Left Handed Hitter vs Left Handed Pitcher: .671 There are slight variations from year to year but the numbers are consistent. The platoon split is real. The question is... How does anyone become so focused on the .671 that you ignore the .743? In order to focus on avoiding the .671 which occurs 28% of the time and you have to ignore the .743 72%. of the time. Why are we not focusing on the .743 and ignoring the .671. Still keeping talent out of the discussion. If you do the math on this. The optimum roster construction would be 9 left handed hitters and 4 right handed hitters. You would stuff the left handed batters box with 9 players and be on the plus side of the platoon advantage 72% of the time. You would suffer 28% of the time with only 4 right handed hitters. I invite everyone to do the math on this... it checks out. Is it reasonable to staff your team with 9 left handed hitters? Probably not because there is a left handed hitter shortage. Only 25% are left handed and only 10% are switch hitters. You have to let go of situational value? We all need to focus on value... We all need to focus on that .743 OPS... 72% of the time out of 35% of players who swing from the left handed batters box. The left handed hitter value compared to the right handed hitter value should be more than 3 to 1. And what is baseball doing to the 25% out of the 35% that holds the platoon advantage 72% of the time? Platooning it. Protecting it from exposure to the .671... not even trying to grow it. Therefore limiting the development of the potentially most valuable. The Twins have been the worst practitioner of this out of all 30 teams. No team has compromised every single developing left handed hitting prospect in this fashion. We have done it to every single one of them. Larnach, Wallner, Julien, Kirilloff and now Roden and we have no reason to assume that Jenkins or Erod will escape this same fate. Every single left handed hitter the Twins have developed has been compromised in this manner. Compromise here today... pay the bill later when you are trying to trade Larnach for maximum trade value. It's not Larnach's fault... the fault belongs to the Twins front office because they capped his trade value. We have had regime change and this policy toward developing left handed hitters is still alive, executed to a higher degree than any of the other 29 teams. OK... Now lets plug in the talent. This is after all... A talent discussion. The Twins lead all of baseball in the number of PA's from the Right Handed Batters Box against left handed pitching. I've said this for three years now. There is no team in baseball that fears the lefty lefty matchup in baseball as much as our Twins do. 1282 PA's in total which has resulted in being 22nd in baseball with a .701 OPS. Compare this to the league wide .730 and then consider the lower 28% of pitching that is left handed. Standing in the right handed batters box against right handed pitching. The Twins are 2nd ranked in all of baseball in Team OPS with a .753.... Compare this to the .697 League Wide and consider the 72%. 1521 total PA's and this ranks 15th in baseball. The Twins are ninth in total PA's (2803) from the Right Handed Batters Box with a combined .730 OPS and that ranks 8th. Led by RIGHT HANDED HITTERS. We are 21st ranked with 2260 PA's from the left handed batters box with a combined team .716 OPS that ranks 19th. We have 264 PA's from the left handed batters box against left handed pitching. This ranks 28th. Surprisingly the Angels and Reds have less. You wouldn't think that was possible. For Comparison sake... the Yankees lead the league in PA's from the left handed batters box against left handed pitchers with 816. Our Team OPS is ranked 20th with a .645 in those miniscule 264 PA's. And finally... Standing in the left handed batters box against Right handed pitching. Which is statistically the most profitable platoon split historically at .743 and the most utilized platoon split in baseball despite only 35 of the league capable of actually standing in the left handed batters box. We are 15th in total PA's with 1999 of them and we rank 20th with a .726 team OPS. If You look at what is happening in the right handed batters box with our Twins in 2026 and how it compares to what is happening statistically around the league in 2026 which also match historical platoon split numbers. Hopefully turning the platoon advantage on it's head makes more sense. They have found success against the larger 72 percentage using the historically 2nd worst platoon split. How can anyone look at what is actually happening and say... we need to make decisions on what batters box they stand in. TALENT IS THE DISCUSSION. If Jenkins has talent... it shouldn't matter how many left handed hitters are in the OF and it needs to be pointed out that we only have 3 left handed hitters on the 26 man roster when the smart play is more of them. If the platoon matchup is influencing your decisions. YOU ARE SCREWING UP. Then I ask everyone... what is the actual statistical platoon advantage in a per AB basis? What is it in an actual per game basis. The leaguewide 2026 splits that I posted take a lot of players and a lot of time to show the separation that we see. What is the advantage of the 2026 platoon splits on per BA or Per Game basis. The time it takes to establish the advantage is also development time that we are sacrificing, compromising. This is why this subject is stuck in my craw.

It's OK... Most people don't understand. I know that I'm against the wind on this. All teams platoon and I believe that roster decisions are being made on left right instead of talent or the development of talent. In order to understand... you have to at least momentarily let go of any left or right reasoning. When I say "turning the platoon advantage on its head". I'm not saying that it was some unprecedented breakthrough or even suggesting that this was intentionally done by the front office. I'm saying that we have 7 Right handed hitters, 3 switch hitters and 3 left handed hitters on the current 26 man roster and I'm saying that is the roster composition for the majority of the season. I'm saying we are not even close to over stuffed with left handed hitters to the point where we need to find an 8th right handed hitter. I'm saying that Derek Shelton just like Rocco Baldelli before him are setting the starting lineup primarily based on the splits of the pitcher. I'm saying that we are typically stuffing 8 or 9 hitters into the right handed batters box against left handed pitching and typically stuffing 6 hitters into the left handed batters box against right handed pitching. Despite this consistent disparity... the Twins have been weak against left handed pitching despite 8 or 9 guys in the opposite batters box. And the Twins have been successful against right handed pitching with less batters in the opposite batters box. That disparity... that success with less and failure with more should make everyone question exactly how much the platoon is helping this team right now. And if it's not helping us right now... I'm pretty sure it isn't helping us in the future. I'm saying talent should be the reason for a call up and not what batters box they stand in. You talk about the switch hitters. I want to be clear that I have no problem with Brooks Lee getting AB's against left handed hitting because Brooks Lee is still developing. However... if the platoon split matters... why is Brooks Lee second in AB's against left handed pitching with a .587 OPS over 150 AB's. Yeah I know injuries to others and defense is always consideration in the amount of playing time. If Caratini is struggling against left handed pitching... why is he frequently used against left handed pitching? And here is another point. If it is so important that we try to math our offensive lineup together using the platoon advantage as a primary reason for lineups. If we are so concerned about a lefty facing a lefty. Why don't we have more left handed pitchers if we are so afraid of them offensively why don't we get more of these weapons for our ourselves. If you look at the historical splits. Left handed pitchers have a collective 3.84 ERA. Right Handed pitching has a 4.16 collective ERA. Get more left handed pitchers if the left handed batter is concerning you. Give other teams the problem you are fighting. I'm saying don't fight it. Find Talent!!!

Last Game Left Handed Starter August 25 - Gage Jump - Loss - 2 Runs Scored Lineup Composition: 6 RH 2 Switch 1 LH Season Record vs LH Starters: 18-24 Season Average Runs Scored vs LH Starters: 4.40 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Season Record vs RH Starters: 46-45 Season Average Runs Scored vs RH Starters: 4.68

No I'm not I'm saying the Twins are below average in terms of left handed hitting human beings on the 40 man and we are way below average in terms of left handed hitting usage on the 26 man. Mainly I'm saying to the front office to you to everyone. Stop making left or right handed a reason or the focus point. You just call up your best players and you don't strip mine them for parts when you do. I'm also saying that if you are going to choose a hand to be successful against. Being good against right handed pitching is where you would choose because of the 72 to 28% advantage... And here we are... better against right handed pitching with RIGHT HANDED HITTERS and we are WORRIED about another LEFT HANDED HITTER because we lost our part time right handed sacrificial lamb Austin Martin. The Twins are basically turning the platoon advantage on it's head right in front of us by being better against right handed pitching with primarily Right Handed hitters.

I've been tracking all season results against left handed starters and right handed starters. When I find the time... I will take my research and break it out by how many in the starting lineup are standing in the opposite batters box of the hand. How did we do when we had 9 batters in the opposite side... 8... 7... 6... 5 and 4. I haven't seen 3 2 or 1 yet but if I do... I'll include that.

Yeah... I threw the 10 points together quickly so 5 is the opposite. I'll nutshell my 10 points real simple. Stop trying to math this together. Weather we have 13 left handed hitters or 13 right handed hitters doesn't matter. We need hitters. End of story... If Jenkins is one of our best players. It shouldn't matter if Larnach, Wallner, Roden or Bob Bobberton is also left handed. The platoon split is real... it is mathematically proven over time. But, Development is also real and development is desperately needed and it's a crime to rob them of development at a young age as you strip mine them for parts for the now. They need opportunity and exposure. Hiding young players from the same hand And I ask anyone to do the math of what this platoon advantage actually gets you in a per AB basis or per game basis. If you want to play the platoon split correctly. In the case of tiebreakers... focus on the 78% and choose left handers over right handers. But... Really it comes down to hitting the baseball. Teach, Coach, Develop.

I don't know about most but 8 of the top 10 in OPS are left handed hitters.

First off... the first graph you use includes Outman and Julien who are no longer on the roster. 2nd... 7 players on the current 40 man roster are pure left handed. That's 17.5% 3rd... If you look at all major league teams -- 25% of major league hitters are pure lefty swingers. 4th... Despite 25% of players being left handed - 48% of at bats are handled by someone standing in the left handed batters box. 5th... 28% of major league pitching is left handed (Edit) 6th... Left handed hitters vs Right Handed pitchers is the best matchup amongst all platoon splits and it occurs 72% of the time. 7th... Left handed hitters vs left handed pitchers is the worst and it occurs 28% of the time. 8th... More left handed hitters is how to play the split correct because of 3 to1. 9th... The platoon splits become thin margins on a per AB basis or per game basis. Platoon splits only stabalize over time... in the meantime... time can be used for development. 10th... STOP TRYING TO MATH THIS THING TOGETHER with platoon splits with lesser players. Find talent regardless and quit caring what side of the plate they stand. Develop them fully.

On July 28 The Twins were 54-54 with 54 games left to go. The ole' adage... Every Teams wins 54 and every team loses 54... It's the other 54 games that matter. We are 10-14 in those games that matter. Nothing a 15 game winning streak won't cure.

The Padres are pretty experienced. The current 26 man roster has only 10 players who are under 3 years experience. They started the season with 10 players under 3 years experience. 5 of those 10 reside in the bullpen (Miller, Bradgely, Estrada, Matsui and Hart). 1 in the rotation (Vazquez), 2 offensive starters (Merrill and Fermin) and 2 offensive players who don't play (Bowen and Harris) Is it better? Offensively the Padres rank 23rd in team OPS. 21st in Runs Scored. On the mound... The Starters rank 23rd in ERA. The Bullpen ranks 5th. The Padres have 7 more wins than the Twins do over 132 games.

They are both defensively Fine At least with Lewis at 1B. We might not spend 4 to 7 million on the position like we've done every year. We will just spend that on Royce himself.

Last Game Left Handed Starter August 24 - Jeffrey Springs - Won - 9 Runs Scored Lineup Composition: 6 RH 2 Switch 1 LH Season Record vs LH Starters: 18-23 Season Average Runs Scored vs LH Starters: 4.46 ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Season Record vs RH Starters: 46-45 Season Average Runs Scored vs RH Starters: 4.68