Dantes929

The two pitchers I would feel most secure with are Verlander and Kershaw. Combined they are 1-6 in World Series games with a 5.5 ERA. Nick Blackburn gave up 1 run in game 163 and 1 run in the playoffs against the Yankees. Of course it is all SSS and you want the best pitcher out there. I'm sure we all thought Viola, Morris and Tapani would throw well but they were all often one pitch away from disaster. Comes down to who do you think has the best chance to throw a quality game and given that Gibson hasn't done it once since August 3rd and Perez's success rate has been well under 50% and Dobnak has been great his last two starts, at this point anyway it is a no brainer. We really probably shouldn't even call it a bullpen game. Dobnak has gone 5 innings or more both times. He should simply be our starter. The tone of your post later was that the Twins were somewhat negligent in not preparing better for this. That everyone has injuries and no one should be surprised by it. That;s true but can you really prepare for it? If Viola goes down in 1987 who steps up? If Morris and Tapani go down in 91 what was plan B? In some cases for various reasons plan B can be as good or better than plan A but that is not the norm. I can easily imagine Berrios, Odorizzi and Dobnak throwing well enough to give us a chance. Unless they blow up in their next starts I feel about as secure in that as I can be.

Well, not Viola anyway. Blyleven was 15-12 with a 4.01 ERA. In our favor we have 9 relievers with ERA's well below 4 and 4 wit ERA's well below 3. In 1987 Viola and Berenguer were the only pitchers on the entire team with ERA below 4 and Senior Smoke was at 3.94. So the Twins have 9 guys in the pen with better ERA's than the best guy in the pen in 87 plus Graterol. Even more Reardon was the only other guy with an ERA below 4.5 at 4.48.

I've been promoting this idea for a while. The only question is if it goes 5 games do you want Berrios or Odorizzi going game 1 and 5. Bullpen games do not scare me. They have actually constituted our best games lately. I consider them an equivalent of a 3.00 ERA pitcher going 9 innings. Why would you want Perez or Gibson with their 6 ERA's for 5 innings when you can have 5 pitchers with 3.6 ERA or better (except for Graterol) going 2 innings each. We have never had a bullpen like this that can arguably go 9 deep. Smeltzer is not batting practice by the way. He hits corners. While I like the stuff and fearlessness of Dobnak it does appear that a lot of his pitches touch the heart of the plate.

Yes but it gets back to my other point. If he is in the pen I want him throwing 99 or more. If he is in the rotation I would rather him settle in at 96-98 with more focus on other pitches and command. Who knows the right path? He might have arm issues in one case but not the other or arm issues regardless or no arm issues regardless. Is 70 appearances as a reliever better than 30 as a starter? Maybe, maybe not.

Everything you say makes sense especially the part about not knowing how pushing human boundaries affects health. I think it is unknowable in terms of policy. One size doesn't fit all. I hear Graterol hits 101 mph and I cringe a little bit. The potential for that one throw to do damage feels like the equivalent of 10 extra innings over the course of the year throwing 97 mph. Again, no science to refute or agree.

I haven't looked lately but a couple years ago I looked pretty hard as well. I have no science backing up my position either. Just seems that guys are just as likely if not more so to blow out their arms in ST as they are in inning 190. The intuitive sense to me is to warm up properly and focus on form and build up arm strength gradually at the beginning of the year. Its also to shut down guys or skip rotations not based on innings but based on feedback. If a guy appears to have some dead issues or some strain then ease up the burden and evaluate. Careful monitoring especially of young guys just makes more sense to me than policy. If Bert Blyleven came up today they would say lets start him off with 110 innings and then build him up to 200 innings over the next 4 years. So 110 instead of the 218 innings he actually pitched at age 19, 135 instead of the 278 he actually pitched at age 20, 170 instead of the 287 he actually pitched at age 21, and 190 instead of the actual 325 he pitched at age 22. Yes, I'm cherry picking but guys used to throw a lot more innings and SEEMED to have fewer arm complications. The guys having arm problems now seem to have their arm problems spread out pretty evenly. Some in ST, some in the 1st month, some in the 2nd month, etc. but of course when it happens at inning 140 someone can say "see, told you so. He should have been shut down after 130". You can argue that guys throw harder now but the counter to that is first yeah, so injuries are going to be unavoidable, period. Or you can say "Hey Brusdar, instead of us trying to build up your innings of throwing 102, mph why don't we just have you settle in at 97 mph and build innings from there."

You can't get a whole lot better than Dobnak's last two starts. I have always defended Gibson in the past and I was mostly kidding about Drobnak (and May for that matter) but this year Gibson has had 9 quality starts out of 30 and none since the beginning of August. The major league average for quality starts is 50%. I hope Gibson returns to health, pitches for the Twins and does great but Drobnak appears to have a lot of the same stuff so I wonder what the Vegas odds would be on who will be better going forward. As far as the studies go please share because I have searched for them, asked for them and have never found any of them. I just can't imagine that a guy throws 120 innings, takes 4 months off, builds arm strength up to pitch 100 pitches an outing and now can throw only 140 innings as if what he did a year before has built up his arm by 10%. So much throwing in between and innings and conditions alone change not to mention the difference in body types. By the way I don't necessarily believe in the 100 pitch limit thing but do believe in building the arm up slowly each season. In fact, it seems like in ST they go from 20 pitches to 100 rather rapidly. I also believe in what I see Gibson doing which is keeping the body and arm loose between innings rather than just sitting and watching until the offense is done.

Can anyone tell me why limiting innings pitched in a season has any validity at all. Of course Graterol should make the post season roster. Limit of two innings every 3 days just like a lot of the relievers. Next year Berrios, resign Odorizzi, resign Pineda, start Graterol and give May another chance. If not, I will say Dobnak has looked better in both of his last two starts than Gibson has all year. Great control, hit 95 with a great breaking ball and change up.

I have defended him over the years. He's a little like the 2nd version of Liriano. He's not as good as people were hoping for so many write him off as bad and as pointed out above and many times he was actually quite good for a long stretch. Whatever his problems are it feels like no one has needed 4 month off and the reset button pushed more than Gibson. I found myself in the unique position tonight of hoping he would get in trouble early without giving up too much damage so our bullpen can come in and give the offense time to come back. Worked out perfectly but it is not the ideal wish. No problem bringing him back. I am guessing he won't get any big offers and might be open to a smaller contract for one year to prove he can hack it.

Not a thing. I said it was one of my pet peeves and I would be fine if someone posted every time someone dogged it and then got thrown out. We're not on opposite sides here. Singling one guy out for what many many players do or have done just seemed unfair. Talk to him about it by all means. Bench him or publicly call him out? Probably not.

You can talk to him about it but go take a look at the replays of everyone that tries to take an extra base and it is close and you will see that Eddie is the rule, not the exception. If you call him out call out everyone that does it because it happens a lot. I'm fine with that too but what makes this one special? Buxton does it a lot but his coasting speed and his extra gear speed are both so fast he gets away with it.

Lets not pretend this is unique to Eddie. Its always been a pet peeve of mine whether its taking 2nd base or 3rd when a guy gets thrown out in a close play you can almost always see on the replay where they are watching the play and you can see the moment they make the decision, just like Eddie where they run in a different gear, when they could have made it there if they had been running from the start. Nothing new here. Criticize him all you want for trying to take 3rd with two outs.

After the Twins lose to any of these teams you are going to think the Twins are not sharp or not playing well but that is only ever half the story. Statistically, the White Sox are supposed to and do win at least one out of every three. They are 9-7 against the Indians, 4-3 against the Astros and 4-3 against the Yankees. I was very happy that the Twins won 2 of 3. If they only drop one in each of the next three series I will be very happy. You think its a lack of sharpness or focus. I just think its baseball. As far as how they are playing going into the playoffs that's also not a big concern to me. Its been kind of a mantra of mine over the season to respond to those either too optimistic or too pessimistic to say wait 7 to 10 days and the picture will likely be entirely different. You can't win October games in September so not being sharp now is not an indicator that they won't be sharp in two weeks. 87 Twins lost their last 5 games of the regular season. Yeah, they had the division wrapped up so how about the 2006 Tigers. They only needed to win 1 game out of three at home against a Royals team that had already lost 100 games but instead got swept allowing the Twins to steal the title. I don';t think you can end a season any worse that that but they ended up in the World Series. The high flying and strong finishing Twins on the other hand got swept by a team they manhandled during the season. I share your concern about not getting too complacent and that they have been banged up but they have earned the position that they can survive a couple clunkers. The sentence I agree with you the most is your last one. Ah, but who knows..... Answer is no one and that is what makes it fun.

I have said all along that I will be comfortable when we have X game lead with X-1 games to go but there is no such thing as a must win series when you have a 4 game lead. Twins can have 3 more dogs like last night and still win the division outright no matter what Cleveland does. I don't want the Twins playing like they already have this thing won but don't want them pressing or panicking either if they lose a couple. Its a fine line. Twins might have a must win series or game coming up but this isn't one of them. Probably not a good idea to get swept though.

You only stayed up until the final out was made? Dude, you should have stayed up longer!! After Sano made the final out Gonzo got a two run single, Arraez singled, Wade singled and the game ended when Torreyes got hit which brought in the final run. We won!!!!

Right now I have as much or more faith in Sashak than Gibson and Perez. I would feel a little sorry for them but I think Gibson does not make the cut unless he shows some thing better than he has for the last two months.

You absolutely have to break instantly on that. If you have to take time to consider whether the third baseman is in position or anything else then you cannot go. You have to rely on instinct and I believe he thought that ball would go farther than it did so I think his instinct was wrong. I'm glad he went, we probably don't tie if he didn't go but it needs to be a 80-90% chance and I think it was more like a 20% chance. I'm not speaking for everyone but I am pretty sure if the catcher grabs it cleanly, the 3rd baseman isn't sleeping and the throw is decent then Wade gets thrown out easily and fans aren't saying stuff like great hustle or great play. Sometimes good decisions turn out poorly because the other team makes a fantastic play (think Rosario's throw last week) and sometimes poor decisions turn out great because the other team did not execute. I think that play was leaning heavily in that direction.

I don;t have both Perez and Gibson on my playoff roster and if Dyson were healthy I probably wouldn't have either. Gibson has a 2nd half ERA of 5.82 and that is with a good July so his August and September have been extremely bad. His only quality start was on August 3rd against the Royals. Otherwise his results against mostly losing teams are littered with 4 or 5 innings with 4 or 5 runs scored. HIs ERA in the last two months is well above 7. Perez hasn't been a whole lot better. He hasn't had a month of below 5 ERA since May and his 2nd half ERA is 5.92.. If Dyson were healthy I would not have either on my playoff roster and play bullpen games in games 2 and 4 which would be plenty doable with days off. Even without Dyson, statistically its not even close. Do you want Gibson or Perez throwing 4 or 5 innings at a 6 ERA or would you rather have two relievers throw 2 innings each with their 3.5 ERAs? For once in forever I have more confidence in all 10 of our top relievers than I do in our #3 or 4 starter. Only makes sense to use that to our advantage. I know most here, including me don't really believe the true quality of all 10 relievers is below 4 ERA but am pretty sure we all view Gibson and Perez as 6 ERA guys right now.

So maybe score early, often and continuous. I know we scored 5 runs in the 3rd but there is a reason Smalley and Morneau say you have to change the number when you score big early.

I know you said it as a pun but I gotta defend Straker. In 87 he had the 4th best ERA on the team, starter or reliever. The only ones ahead of him were Viola, Blyleven and Berenguer. His 4.37 ERA (3.92 in 88) made him the 3rd best starter by a really big margin. The next best starter had an ERA of 5.94 and it got really bad (as if 5.94 wasn't bad enough) for the 5th best starter and beyond. He did throw a 6 inning shutout in game 3 of the World Series. I know we all think of it as Viola and Blyleven but without Straker the rotation would have been the equivalent of throwing Viola, Blyleven and the 2019 version of Kohl Stewart, Fernando Romero and Ehire Adrianza.

Evil, shameful, wrong, disgrace, outrage, atrocity, injustice, affront. Sounds like you're on board.

I guess its all well that ends well but if the catcher doesn't double clutch or makes a good throw then Wade gets thrown out fairly easily, we lose the game and we would all be complaining about another base running mistake. I don''t think it was a good play but we got lucky and I accept lucky.

Ok, I know he doesn't deserve the win and that he didn't pitch well but my old coach used to preach that you never knew how many runs you needed to score or how many you needed to limit the other team to until it was all over so you just need to keep plugging. That two run homer hurt but Harper hung in there and battled to keep it at just two runs. As it turns out that was exactly what was needed.. I won't give him a lot of credit but i will give him some.

I have made the case on a different thread that Gibson and Perez shouldn't be on the postseason roster but I would not be opposed to Gibson coming back next year. He started out the year horribly and I don't think he was every really at top strength. I don't think he is going to get top dollar in free agency because of the way he has finished this year. So bring him back and evaluate if he can help the team at ST time. If he gets a great multi year deal somewhere else then goodbye and good luck. I don't know why people have no faith in rookies and 2nd year guys. Very few rosters have 30 year veterans with all star appearance up and down their rotations. New guys have to come from somewhere. Of course I don't want Berrios and 4 rookies but I would be ok with Berrios and bring back Odorizzi and Pineda, see what the market has and otherwise rely on two of the system guys to fill out the rotation. As far as the 1st paragraph goes, you can put E Santana in there as a success story. Certainly Odorizzi was successful, Phil Hughes was pretty good for a while, Lynn was a great signing as we have seen from him this year but for whatever reason didn't succeed for us. Correia was ok and Pavano was quite good so when you say never work out I think you meant sometimes works out and sometimes doesn't .