BeatTheRich

No, but Marie Antoinette often talks to me in my sleep. She claims she never said "Let them eat cake." What she really said is that the blackberry almond crumble was to die for. Her words, more or less. Probably less. In French, natch. She has no opinion on Shoemaker, but did say Dobnak deserves to start.

Astudillo has plenty of fans on the board. It's just that the detractors have been more vocal. The way the team has been going, with too many stars failing to step up, I welcome seeing Willians in the lineup. He's like Star Trek's Scotty, giving her all she's got.

No, of course not. The point I'm making is that three players at the bottom of our lineup are giving us as many total hits as one good hitter. That's abysmal.

There's gotta be a Steven Wright joke in there somewhere, but I'm in the dark here.

We know that Buxton can be great, but all the time on the IL reduces him to being only very good. Paraphrasing Bogie, "We'll always have April." It's not enough. As much as I like last-month Buxton, there's no way you can give him 250-300 million. Free agent after 2022? This may be the beginning of the end of a beautiful friendship.

With Rortvedt following at .083. Murderers Row it ain't.

I liked this, but actually I hate this ;-) Get well soon, Kirilloff, Arraez, Buxton... The bottom of the lineup looks like a black hole.

Larnach batting fifth. The three guys behind him hitting a combined .350. No joke. Yikes.

Right now I'm having amnesia and deja-vu at the same time. I keep forgetting how much I like Steven Wright. Super intro.

The easy interpretation is that we need a better cobbler. Which begs the question... peach or plum? And furthermore, ice cream: one scoop or two? I say we DFA the apple pan dowdy and promote the tartarian cherry.

This I like. Not to jinx the young man, but I think he's going to adjust quickly. With no Kirilloff, Arraez, and now Buxton to watch, there has to be some reason to tune in. Cruz and Astudillo (yep, you read that right) can't do it by themselves.

I feel for Miguel Sano. The guy is trying to establish that he knows the strike zone, he's laying off the outside pitches, but he has Phil Cuzzi behind him calling balls and strikes. Pitches six inches outside are being called strikes. Better swing, Miguel, because... Phil Cuzzi.

Yes, Garlick got screwed. Back in the day, Joe Mauer got really screwed. The Overall Consistency of Phil Cuzzi sucking is 100%. If there was a God, s/he would not allow Phil Cuzzi to work Twins games.

Love how the lineup is really starting to come together. Just need Kepler to find his stroke. Sano would be icing on the cake, but maybe too much to ask. Maybe it won't matter as much anyway. I'd hate to move Kirilloff off first base. He looks comfortable there.

Brock, does the new site have a BOO button?

Classic. I hadn't seen that before. That's one way to fire up a team without anyone getting hurt.

Dobnak is a starter, not a reliever. Put Luis Arraez at catcher and see how he fares. Try Nelson Cruz as a centerfielder. Dobnak established himself as a viable starting pitcher in spring training, only to get shunted to the back of the line on opening day. Free Randy Dobnak. He deserves better.

How about management and the manager then? Might it inspire a few benchings of slumping sluggers and some early call-ups of highly regarded talents such as, say, Larnach and Duran? Joined to fewer off-days for stars like Buxton, Donaldson, and Cruz, and more innings from frontline starters (itself the subject of another thread)? The team needs a spark. I like Rocco, but I'd also like to see a little more passion and urgency from the guy. Has he ever been tossed from a game? It's the opposite of take my ball and go home. It's more like take your ball, this stinks.

Spotted last night in The Athletic: "Fans were throwing baseballs onto the field from the Yankee Stadium bleachers to the point where the officials had to stop the game with the Yankees at bat in the bottom of the eighth... It was a display of some baseball fans making an active choice to sever any future sentimentality toward a ball they could display on their office desk, because as the game played out, they didn’t want to remember the experience of watching the Yankees rack up three fielding errors, a total of three hits and allow seven walks to their most annoying division rival. They wanted their ire to be seen, and not just heard." Given the disappointing start of the Twin Cities' own local nine, is there any chance we could see something similar play out on Target Field? I'm nonviolent by nature and don't like to see childish behavior celebrated and embraced. I also worry that some unfortunate outfielder will get plonked on the head. And yet I'm also a fan. I want to see good baseball, the Twins are not playing good baseball of late, several rants on Twins Daily are currently circulating, and this little bit of street theater has caught my eye. It's certainly captured Aaron Boone's attention as well. He's said, "You kind of hate seeing that. Unfortunately, a handful of people end up doing it and it looks bad for everyone." So what say you? A pointless, childish display of lashing out? Or a heartfelt plea to see better baseball played by an underachieving team? Are there better ways of motivating the Twins? What do you suggest?

The Twins are at a real disadvantage without Nelson, but should still be 2-0. Which Kepler will we see batting cleanup? If Opening Day Max, we should win the rubber game. If Minimum Max of yesterday and all of Spring Training, we could struggle. Need all of our bats to step up without Nellie and now Donaldson. I love what Buck and Arraez are giving us. I'd love to see Sano stride into one.

That is very funny. The word-play, not the injury. I was also going to make an age-related comment, but I had no idea terry was that old. I guess "1947" just must be some randomly chosen number ;-) Terry, I hope you've made as complete a recovery as possible. As someone who runs, even the idea of knee trouble sounds awful.

Personally, I love the idea of Japan in any year other than this year. My wife is Japanese and, having lived in Tokyo years ago, I know how much the people love baseball. My wife actually cares about the Twins now because we have Maeda. She wants to stream Padres games because Darvish now pitches for the local nine. Crowd noise and enthusiasm levels would not be problems if an All Star Game was played in the Tokyo Dome or another of Tokyo's pro baseball stadiums. Transportation and accommodations either. Tokyo is an incredible city. It's not like baseball doesn't travel well either. It's hugely popular in several pockets of the world, including the Caribbean, parts of South America, and East Asia. Also, growing baseball is a current priority. What better way than taking the showcase game of America's Pastime on the road? Staging it in Japan will include some heavy logistical lifting around language, travel costs, and jet lag, but I'd love to see it happen. In the short term the Olympics are likely to muddy the waters because so costly and cursed. I could see an ASG in Tokyo maybe in 2024 or 2025. That would be cool.

Not going to happen in a year where the Japanese are not permitting foreign visitors for the Olympics.

Josh staking his claim to Cooperstown: A whole season batting 1.000, with an OPS of 3.000. Top that, Mike Trout.

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