Riverbrian

Thats funny... Great quote... Congrats to Joe... Here's hoping for 20 fingers and 20 toes.

Swings get off at times... All in a days work I imagine... I'm sure Mauer has sat down with Vavra many times and now Bruno and Joe will get to know each other. With that said.. Dear Bruno... Don't screw it up... Joes swing is as good as I've ever seen.

66-96 in 2012. Tack on 16 more wins out of 162 games and the team is 82-80 Being on pace for 82-80 means that the roster can be augmented at the trade deadline and meaningful games in August and September are not of the question. 16 wins out of 162... That's one more win every ten games. One more win out of ten games is not impossible. One less game with a starter on the mound with a 7 plus ERA and it seems quite possible.

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And a K... Bundy won that battle.

Bundy vs. Colabello with the bases loaded and two outs.

Over the Airwaves... They can broadcast away. It's the internet streams that they are not allowed. Some stations forget to flip the switch... The station that Ultima has posted... Obviously forgot to do that.

Shhh... They are not supposed to be streaming the game... Don't tell anyone... They could get in trouble. I wanna listen and I don't want it pulled.

1-2-3 inning for Pressly

I agree that Tampa Bay has done a great job in the draft... However in Fairness: In 2005: Hellickson RHP was drafted in the 4th Round out of High School Des Moines Iowa. Also in 2005: Wade Townshend RHP was drafted in the 1st round out of Rice University (8th overall)... Chris Mason RHP was drafted in the 2nd round out of the University of North Carolina and Bryan Morris RHP was drafted in the 3rd Round out of High School in Tennessee and he went unsigned. In fairness... I'm just pointing out that they missed on the first three. In 2006: Alex Cobb RHP was drafted in the 4th Round out of High School Vero Beach Florida. Also in 2006: Evan Longoria was selected in the 1st round(3rd Overall) out of Long Beach State... Josh Butler RHP was taken in the 2nd round out of the University of San Diego... Nicholas Fuller RHP was drafted in the third round out of High School in Georgia and he was unsigned. In 2007: David Price LHP was drafted in the 1st round and Matt Moore LHP was drafted in the 8th round... Also in 2007: In between those picks... 2nd round Will Kline RHP, 3rd round Nick Bernase RHP, 4th round David Newmann LHP, 5th round Dustin Beill OF, 6th Round Emeel Salem OF and 7th Round Reid Fronk 3B. In 2000: James Shields was drafted in the 16th round... Rocco Baldelli was drafted by the Devil Rays in the 1st round... The 11 Players drafted between those two players. Only one reached the Major Leagues... That one player was LHP Mark Malaska who threw for a total of 36 MLB Innings. They missed on everyone else. I agree the Rays have done a great job... Just wanted to point out that they miss and miss a lot just like the Twins do.

You'd be able to tell... My co-workers only use an ellipsis when they are omitting stuff from sentences. I use them... cuz... one period can't stop me.

Yeah... But randomly not hot would also apply.

Perfectly reasonable. If you bring back the like button... You'd be notified of a like.

Before I got married "Randomly Hot" was a good discription of the girls I dated.

I just started flipping a quarter to test your theory... It came up Heads 3 Times and Tails once and once it landed on edge propped up against my phone... I did a do over and it rolled under my desk. I tried to find it but it was gone. I had to leave my office for a second and I came back to my office and saw a co-worker who is always short of change drinking a coke. I'm now suspicious of him. I think this means the Twins will win on Saturday!

You have to qualify for the Playoffs first... That's Obvious... Once in the playoffs anything can happen but I don't know if Random is the right word. It's a fresh start and you gotta play ball. Season Records going into the playoffs only matter for seeding purposes but they don't carry over to the playoffs. In 2001... The Seattle Mariners finished 116-46... Led By Freddie Garcia... Jamie Moyer and Aaron Sele on the Mound. It's the best baseball season (record wise) in the somewhat modern day. During the course of that incredible Mariners 116-46 Season: From April 29th to May 8th... The Mariners went 3-5 From May 18th to May 22nd... The Mariners went 1-3 From June 17th to June 28th... The Mariners went 4-7 From July 4th to July 7th... The Mariners went 1-3 From August 16th to August 20th... The Mariners went 2-3 From August 26th to August 31st... The Mariners went 2-3 From September 20 to September 23... The Team went 0-4 7 stretches of games that would have knocked them out of the playoffs at that time if it were the playoffs. BTW... In the actual playoffs in 2001... The Mariners 116-46 record during the regular season... Did not reach the World Series... They just got past the Indians 3 games to 2 which included a 17 to 2 loss to the Indians before being knocked out by the Yankees 4 games to 1 in the ALCS The Yankees lost to the D-Backs. in 2012... The Minnesota Twins finished with a record of 66 and 96. From May 28th to June 12th... The Twins went 10-3 A winning streak that was long enough to put the team in the World Series if the World Series was happening at that time. From July 27 to August 7... The Twins were 9-3. Which would have also gotten them to the World Series. Yes I know... The Opponents for the Twins were not World Series caliber for all of those games... But they were not World Series Caliber teams that the Mariners lost to during their down periods in 2001 either. The point of it all... Baseball is a streaky game... Once the Playoff starts... It's a clean slate and the 1st team to 11 wins... Gets the title. Your regular season record doesn't apply to anyone anymore. Who is playing the best baseball at that moment will win. It ain't so much random... It's who's hot... But you gotta get in... so... getting into the playoffs is always going to be the most important goal. I just picked the 2001 Mariners because they had the best record and I picked the 2012 Twins because we know them so well. Pick any year... Any team... And you will find stretches where anybody was hot enough to win it and cold enough to lose it.

Well Done Grover!!! Grade A... Plus 1... Applause... If the Like Button was still here... You'd be getting a Notification in your inbox that Riverbrian liked this post.

I am aware that the A's won the West and after reading this I'm really not sure if we are talking about the same thing anymore. I'm really not comfortable making a definitive statement on how the Twins front office comes to conclusions and executes... I'm not on the inside. I don't believe that Terry Ryan runs the squad like we run our fantasy baseball teams. There are many departments and directors and coordinators who run each department and many employees who are knowlegeable baseball people employed in each department. In other words... Many people... Who would be a complete waste of employment... If their opinions carry no influence at all... The GM has to handle a bunch of departments from medical to scouting. I think it's entirely possible that Terry Ryan has signed players that he has no or very little knowledge of... on complete trust of someone working under him that is making a recommendation. I think it's possible that Rob Antony has completed player deals with Terry Ryan's proxy. Ron Gardenhire is the head of a rather important department as the field manager. It would awfully strange if he had no influence at all. If he didn't... Gardy would have left a long time ago I assume because people tend to want to have a say in their own destiny. I'm willing to bet (not my life) that they trust each other and efforts are made to address Gardy's wishes and therefore he has influence. You said that Gardy's influence was who he didn't want on the team(Lohse)... And what type of player he does want(supposed closer). Well if that's the only input he gets and I don't know how you can say with definition that you know the boundries of Gardys input.... but if thats all he gets... That's still influence. Unless you are on the inside... I won't assume you are not... Unless you are on the inside... You can't say that Gardy had no knowledge of the Ramos Capps deal and you can't say that if he did have knowledge that he didn't say I need a closer now and Ramos cant help me this year... Just like I can't say it did or didn't happen... We don't know. With the many people employed to gather information... I think it's quite possible that someone else besides Bill Smith supported the Ramos Capps trade. It would be pretty rogue and gutty for the GM to not only ignore everyone's advice working below him and add payroll at the same time when he has to justify that increase to his Boss the CEO. I don't know... I just have a hard time believing that Gardy has no influence and that was how the discussion started. Actually... I just wanted to comment about "betting your life". I thought it was funny.

Moneyball was a book that was turned into a movie. The screenplay was written by Aaron Sorkin. In real life... Billy Beane was introducing a new way of thinking surrounded by traditionalists. Heads butt every time in those situations. In Baseball, In Schools, in every work place. Art Howe and Billy Beane were estranged and Art Howe was released from his contract despite a winning record. The same thing would happen with Gardenhire and Ryan... If Gardy wasn't allowed to participate in the discussions and its safe to assume that Gardy and Ryan have learned to trust each other working together this long. I would be very surprised if Gardy didn't have a lot of input on roster decisions.

Dont get me wrong... I HATed that trade with a Capitol HAT. But if memory serves me... Rauch was doing Ok but he was starting to wear a bit. Nathan was out and Rauch was given the role by default. His saves were never comfortable saves. Regardless... I was excited about Ramos... I was reading Seth's blog and Seth was very Pro Ramos and I was reading Tom Kelly's assessments and Kelly wasn't really the type to glow about young players but his comments were glowing about Ramos. And I wasn't a Capps fan at all but he did close as we reached the playoffs.

I agree... None of this is Capp's Fault... However, I'm not sure that you can insulate Gardenhire from front office decisions. The GM has the final say... I'm sure... but... it would be kind of a disfunctional operation if you didn't get input from the manager on team needs going forward. I don't know for sure but I would be very surprised if Gardy's input was shut out of any or all discussions. Bill Smith: "Gardy... We are in a playoff race... What do we need" Gardy: "We need a closer to get us to the playoffs" Bill Smith: "I could bring in Capps... The Nationals are shopping him... They'd like Ramos" Gardy: "Ramos won't help us much this year and the playoffs are in our grasp... I need a closer". I'm sure that the assistent GM and scouts are asked opinions... The Owners with the budget... All of it gets run together and the GM filters it and makes the final decision. All in All... I'd be shocked if Gardy's input isn't a very large part of roster construction. I assume that sometimes Gardy will have to swallow some stuff he isn't comfortable with but I also assume that most of the time the GM tries to get Gardy what he asks for. All assumptions on my part.

lol... What happened to the "Like" button... I don't want to post anything... I just want to like this comment!

Yeah... Think about that... Betting your life over Matt Capps. It just doesn't seem like a noble end.

C'mon now... That's the silliest thing I've ever read... Thome is a 40 plus DH who can play an occasional 1B if needed. It should be Doumit at 2B... Thome at DH... C'mon... You know better!!!