Muppet

I'll take great pitching any day. And I'm happy to see a stacked pitching corps. But the team also needs to score runs. I played with some numbers to compare the Twins, Guardians, and Tigers. The Twins had 61 games where they scored fewer than 3 runs and only won 21.3% of those games. The Guards by comparison had 55 under 3 games of which they won 27.3%. The Tigers, who had great pitching, were in between and had 59 games with 28.8% wins. So in both cases, not only did the other two have fewer low scoring games, but they won more of those low scoring games than the Twins. Looking at just 1 run games. The Twins had 15, all of which they lost. The Guardians had 11 and lost all of theirs too. The Tigers had 21 1-run games but they won 3 of theirs. Had the Twins won just one of theirs, they would have made the playoffs (EDIT... Royals tied for second, not the Twins... whoops). A little more shockingly, the Twins had more 2 run games than the other two (25) and lost all but one of those. Meanwhile, Guardians went 5-17 and the Tigers went 7-11. Interesting that the Twins had a winning percentage of 57.1% on 3 run games, indicating that they DID have good pitching when they needed it, but a full 40 of their games -- almost 25% of games -- they gave their pitchers almost zero chance of getting the win. Bob Gibson wouldn't be able to save them in most of those cases. So... Yes, better pitching would have made the difference last year (if they were able to scrape even just one more win from a 1 or 2 run game). But had they made the playoffs, the better teams would have likely walked all them when a collapsed offense means your pitchers have to be perfect. It'll be an interesting year. Small market teams can't have it all. Hopefully they score a couple more runs AND have lights out pitching.

If all of the near rookies play up to their potential instead of their floor, there will be slightly less need for gold glove caliber infield defense. That's what winter is for: slowly forgetting the horrors of the previous year and building up that irrational optimism for the coming season.

They have had luck with some somewhat risky signings in the past several years (Michael A Taylor, Willi Castro, Donovan Solano, Gio Urshela, plus or minus one or two more). But this year's crop of free agents seems to look a little more like the Margots and Gallos. At the very least, I can't imagine that Harrison Bader is going to be anywhere as bad as Margot.

It would have been difficult, but if they really tried, they could have done a bit worse.

With Ty France (and Bader, Gasper, etc) now more than ever, that crop of youngins better all have a banner year together. This team will win if, and only if, Larnach, Miranda, Julien, Lewis, Wallner, and Lee ALL have breakout years.

Since the Twins won't be scoring more than 2 runs in most games, they are doing everything they can to keep the other team from scoring as well. Interesting strategy.

Well its not nothing. But it might be less than nothing. Look at how that dismal offensive performance gets even worse in the last couple months of the season. And he's even worse at left handed pitchers than right handers.

Bullpens are notoriously fickle. If the twins had been able to score runs last year, the bullpen might have lost them a ton more games than it did. Also, Duran was nowhere near as sharp in 24 as the year before. Jax might have to be the closer. If SWR keeps it up and Zebby and Festa improve a bit, there is no way Jax should be put up front.

This is what is so interesting about this team. Every single one of these guys (including Correa if you count his IL stint due to another foot flareup) dramatically under performed compared to their potential. If all of them have a good year, and one of them ... say ... Lewis has an MVP caliber year, then this team should make a playoff push despite the lack of spending by the old guard. Of course, it is also possible that they will have a collective .200 batting average as well. Borgschulte for MVP!

Borgschulte for 2025 team MVP. Hopefully he'll fix up this group of ruffians (except for Alcala).

If I'm Ryan, there is no way I'd sign now if I had the chance to sign with those weird twin guys from AZ in a year from now.

Here's a hot take... and before everyone comes at me with pitchforks, I'm just thinking this out... but what if Castro's great performance was a fluke. His second half was very very bad. And he wasn't All Star material back in Detroit either. Yes, he can play (somewhat poor) defense at all positions, but if we need him to fill holes like that, we're probably going to have bigger problems.

Let's wait a year. If this Matt Borgschulte guy ends up being magic and is able to fix Larnach, Miranda, Lee, Lewis, Julian, and Wallner and turn them back into the players they were when they were in the minors .... Then we can have hope that the next wave of prospects aren't going to turn into pumpkins as soon as they say "I don't do slumps." But for now, I'd hate to have any of those guys locked up for 4-6 years and millions of $s.

Anyone else watching Unstable on netflix? I'm seeing an uncanny resemblance to the twins (on Unstable, not the baseball team).

I got into baseball as a kid because I could watch it on TV. Maybe, ... put baseball games back on TV, or streaming services that kids can access.

Soooo….what’s the catch?

I'd rather see him transition into closer and wait until there is a hole in the rotation to figure out how to plug the hole.

I don't think it is a difference of opinion, I think it is a desperation. This team has no chance to replace a majority of their underwhelming underperforming players. All of their prospects are up, and there's nothing left for the next few years. For me, I don't think the talent level is there. They will ONLY win if most of the current roster steps it up several notches. They might get some good almost-ready prospects by trading away Ober and Ryan, but I don't think those prospects would lead to winning seasons in a few years unless they have big name players to replace Correa and Buxton when their contracts are up. It's a tight spot. Even with new owners they probably can't afford to buy a winning team.

Not saying it's the right move, but It is salary they won't be able to dump.

First off, other than pick the linup card, send in pinch hitters, and change pitchers, I'm not sure I really know what the manager does. I've never seen the inside of a clubhouse. I've never heard whether or not the manager forces players to work on XYZ skills or taking extra batting practices from same side pitchers throwing XYZ types of pitches. But 2 things strike me. 1. I think this team was WAYYYY overrated from the start. I think the Twins' good record early on came as they were very good at cleaning up against bad teams. I did a little calculating. They went 33 and 11 against the 8 worst teams in the league and 7 and 23 against the 8 best teams in the league. For the most part, most of those games all occurred before their slide in September. Mostly their hitting was terrible. I still hold out that while their pitching wasn't great, it wasn't their weak spot. I think if they had magically brought in Ohtanhi (as a pitcher) at the trade deadline, they'd be out of the playoffs by now. 2. Wouldn't it be the responsibility of the coaches to help batters and pitchers improve and work on their stamina to play throughout the whole year? Wouldn't it make more sense to demand their heads for allowing Julien, Lewis, Larnach, etc.. to flail away rather than getting pissed at Rocco for sometimes playing Margot instead of Larnach? Who knows, maybe Larnach had diarrhea that day. I do like how the Tigers have made it this far with a bunch of no names and rookies. For now, I'll be rooting for them. Till next year....

You think you don't like Rocco. Wait until we get a few games in with next year's new manager.

At this point I would be disappointed in Major League Baseball if the twins manage to make the post season.

The AL Wild Card is a portkey straight to Voldermort and Detroit is the only team that doesn't know this. If they find out soon, there is just enough time for them to force the Twins into the Wild Card should the Twins accidentally win one more game.

Well, now he has that complete and utter implosion on the most important game of the year out of the way. Now there's nothing holding him back.

If the Tigers continue on their 7-3 pace over the rest of the season, the Twins will only have to win 5 of their remaining 13. Can they do it? We shall wait and see.