Doctor Gast

Here we need long relief

Oh boy.

Poop. one got thru the right side

That's more like

We have to have better ABs

I like the lineup

The most lauded catching FAs we basically had the very expensive Contreras, Vazquez & Narvaez who had a pretty good season with MIL. STL hated Contreras & wanted to kick him off catcher. Narvaez didn't really pan out & Vazquez had a problem hitting.

To tell you the truth I was more in favor of signing a cheaper (LH hitting) Omar Narvaez, they probably thought Vazquez was a better defender & someone that CC could better work with. But no matter, Vazquez is the one that the Twins chose to sign for $30mm, so we are stuck with him. If we choose to DFA him next year it'll be expensive to replace him besides picking up his bill.

Absolutely agree with you that Vazquez brings intangibles & leadership. Buck brings leadership to the OF, CC brings leadership to the INF & we need leadership at catching. Maybe Vazquez isn't taking Jeffers under his arm to mentor him. But Jeffers is watching how he handles pitchers, & how he commands the position. After Correa's relay to home & Vazquez made a lunging tag. Jeffers mirrored that same play. Back when we had Tanner Swanson as the catching coach you always hear from the players Tanner helped me with this or helped me with that & you see the development in the catchers. With Conger you hear nothing, which makes that much more important the need for mentorship as well as leadership. After the total disaster at catcher in '22 in all aspects of catching, Vazquez's presence totally transformed the position. Vazquez took all the burden off Jeffers' back & gave him room to thrive on both sides of the plate. I hate to think what would happen if Vazquez got hurt or he's DFAed next year or even when his contract is up because we'll be losing our defensive safety net & like '22 Jeffers could crash & burn again. We lack quality catching depth & poor future catching pool especially defensively.

Very true, it was perfect collaboration of all 3 to get the speedy runner. Who would have stolen 2B & kept the rally going w/o that great play

Twins loved Cave's bat but what the Twins needed was a glove to sub Buxton. The Twins made up their mind that Cave was going to be their CF backup. Wade was a better CFer but was never really given the chance yet he didn't stick in the OF after leaving MN. We suffered many years with Cave's many innings backing up the injured Buxton. We lost Gil & Wade's OBP & better fielding. Here again is an example of Twins blinded by a bat & losing out because of it.

Twins wasted money on Santana at 1B while we have healthy, economical & need more playing time there AK, Miranda & Julien where he's destined to be. Vlady has the power potential but is he worth the risk of him coming here? I don't think so.

You look at SWR & his stats & you can be unimpressed but he keeps on winning with grit. His sweeper & 4seam FB were impressive last night. Lot of people like to rag on Vazquez & dislike giving him any credit but w/o him we probably wouldn't have won that game last night, Margot had a good night, 3 underdogs who had a pretty good game. Great job by the BP again, Alcala needs to be more involved in the Twins plans. A critical win, let's keep on winning!

That play had been worked on since spring training between Correa & Vazquez. If Vazquez hadn't thrown the ball where he did the runner would have been safe. These defensive plays is the difference between a winning team & a losing team & they go unnoticed by many who can't appreciate the art of fine defense,

Martin's OBP potential is very high, it's there on the MiLB level but not MLB. IMO MLB pitchers have the book out on us & HRs will be harder to come by so we'll have to start to play some small ball. Arraez fit very well into our plans in the past but IMO Martin will fit better in the future.

Santana was playing so far in on that

Yeah, knee to knee & Buxton came out on top

Castro looked safe

Great job Miranda! you're not going down

Margot leading-off really grinds me the wrong way. That's not the way we want to start the game or batter we want the most AB. Especially when we're playing a team ahead of us.

Keirsey is well overdue for a call-up. We know his glove will make it & I think his bat will too. Love Martin to bring that OB machine up to MLB & be that lead-off hitter we need. Emma is ready for AAA but I give him more time there to refine his approach before bringing him up.

I can see all but Raya & definitely not Severino make the team this year. None will make much of an impact except Lee. IMO Emma will have some problems with MLB pitching because he'll be well scouted. Even though Keirsey isn't on the 40-man he'd make more of an impact than Emma in '24. Festa will get his feet wet & that's all unless there is a big problem with injuries. If injuries become a bigger problem then Raya could become an opener but I don't see that happening.

#1 Twins can't afford it. #2 He's not worth it, sorry #3 if Twins offer it, he'll accept (he'd be crazy not to) because he likes the Twins & it's more than what gets on FA- So that blows the compensation draft pick. Not going to happen.

I've always seen the potential of this lineup especially with Lewis leading it. That's why I was against going out & acquiring new players, we had the players to light things up inhouse. The new acquisitions took up our young player's playing time & roster spot. In the beginning of the offseason, I had faith in Miranda, Kiriloff & Julien to take care of 1B/ DH the positions where they'd really thrive at, 1B with Santana we are 28th, with our trio we can be much higher. Due to pitcher's adjustment on Julien's swing style & the Julien's added focus of being overstretched at 2B contributed to Julien's high regression. A reset at AAA is in order for Julien so he can adjust his swing & have him focused on 1B where his long term future is at. Margot is our black hole that trade should not have happened. Our young OFs need that playing time & Keirsey needs his roster spot. We have to see what Keirsey can do at the MLB level & Emma needs to get promoted to AAA to get him one step closer to the show. Lewis can carry this team even with the old hitting philosophy but now with a better hitting philosophy, we are a better team. So in a way, his injury has been a blessing in disguise, in that we could see the great hole in that old hitting philosophy sooner & change it. Resetting for Wallner & Julien might take a while but at least they're on the right track. Lewis will be great when he returns, Correa, Miranda, Castro, Jeffers & Kepler have been steadily good, Buxton has been streaky but can be very explosive, Larnach, Kiriloff & Martin have shown signs of being very good but appears something is holding them back at times. Vazquez & Farmer have been terrible but we still need their defense off the bench.

Baseball is a weird game, We have a difficult time against CLE but teams like CWS & CO do not.