ericchri

TK is awesome in small doses. The insight into the game is a lot of fun. I think large doses would cause him to become very repetitive, though, and his style is not meant for repetition. He slipped a few times this weekend and actually called Bremer "Dick" instead of "Richard." Coulda sworn he got silence in response, I was wondering if Dick was in shock.

Some German kid, too. Though I don't know what all the Norwegians in Iowa think about that.

Yep, I wasn't actually surprised by it per se, but looking at a list like that it kinda reinforces the notion. I think in a sense that's part of why there was so much hype around Anibal Sanchez, since he was only 29 when he hit free agency. Yeah he got 5 years, but he was young enough that it didn't seem quite as big a reach. There's still a fair number of 30's and 31's on that list. And obviously guys older than that can still be really good. Depends on your goals for the player you're signing, but it's hard to see many guys you'd want to risk a lot of years on. Do you like signing guys for a year, then following it up by having to do it again next year, and the year after, or do you like taking the bigger risk on a guy you like and signing him for multiple years? (That's a rhetorical question, not addressed to anyone specifically, but just musing on GM decision-making)

The thing that jumps out at me, there were 2 names under 30 on that list, one of whom (Suk-min Yoon) I had honestly never heard of before. Such a crapshoot, free agency. You have to do it, but getting it right is an adventure.

I'll preface this by saying I've been mightily pleased with Pedro Florimon at SS this year, he's been much better than I expected and I see no need to replace him immediately. That being said, all the trade talk wants back Starting Pitchers or Shortstops as part of a trade for anyone we move. I assume that means everyone expects Eddie Rosario to eventually move in and take over 2nd Base, but that the prospects coming up as potential SS aren't half as exciting and we want better. Brian Dozier has played very good defense at 2nd this year and appears (to me at least) to offer decent hitting potential, likely better than Florimon long-term. Rosario looks like a potential mid-season call-up next year (with an outside shot being earlier, and almost certainly no later than next September), and I would assume once he's up he'll be expected to man 2nd Base as the full-time starter. Dozier was pretty poor defensively at SS in 2012, but he was also struggling with the trials of being a rookie in the majors and appearing to drag bad hitting results out into the field with him. Twins coaches also seemed to be dissatisfied with some of his positioning and decision-making in addition to poor play. What happens to Dozier at that point (when Rosario comes up)? Is there any chance he gets another chance at SS or has that bridge burned? Would his potential offensive upgrade (again, only in my opinion, yours may vary) over Florimon warrant a second chance, or is he relegated to Utility Infielder duty? An aside, the trade talk this season has focused on the obvious names, but I've seen almost no mention of either Florimon or Dozier. They seem like potential sleeper trade candidates, knowing they have plenty of folks to fill in at either spot until Rosario is actually ready. Both have shown excellent defense with flashes of good hitting such that a contender who needed to stabilize one of those spots might be interested. I haven't done any research into who needs what, but I wouldn't rule out the possibility. But to the initial topic, would you be willing to give Dozier another chance to play SS for the Twins?

Pavano? Probably not his best season, but he was pretty good for a couple years returning to earlier form before injuries set in again. I can't think of many starters we've had in the Gardy era that began with other teams. Sam Deduno? Non-starting pitchers, Josh Willingham had his best season late in his career with Minnesota. Burton seems to fit the mold of improving with the Twins. I'm honestly hard-pressed to think of a whole lot of guys we brought over from other teams. Orlandos Cabrera and Hudson certainly didn't seem to get worse with us. Rauch seemed to be a little better with us than he had been previously, but I'm too lazy to verify this by looking up his numbers. Matt Capps stayed about the same, in spite of being overrated before getting here. Mostly I just cemented in my own mind that the Twins are very devoted to promoting from within, though I'm sure there are lots of people I'm forgetting. It doesn't feel like there's a lot of evidence that the Twins somehow ruin players when they get here.

I'm indifferent to when it happens, but I'm in the camp that believes this is his last year managing the Twins. Let him end it how he wants. If he wants to finish the year and "move on gracefully", cool. If he's just worn out with the losing and wouldn't mind "getting fired" so that it doesn't look like he gave up on this team, cool. I think the more interesting question is who replaces him? But that probably ought to have its own thread.

I like Perkins as a pitcher, as a personality, as a SABR guy, as a Minnesotan, as a guy with a great contract. I'd love to see him stay. And I think they need to trade him. He fills the make-believe position of closer. We don't need a closer right now, but he's worth a ton right now, i.e. trade him now. I'll worry about having a closer in the future when we actually do "need" one. We have a couple other people who look like they could man the position. Casey Fien's numbers (excepting ERA) are barely worse than Perkins, Tonkin looks like a future closer, maybe Burton finds his groove again. We'll survive without Perkins, but what we get back makes it a little more possible that we're building that future World Series team we're all desperate for.

Honest question: If Hicks batted something like .250/.310/.390/.700 from this point on to the end of the season, would you be satisfied with that or consider it a little disappointing? To me, that would look like a decent line for a rookie CF, but lately he's showing signs that he can do even better. A 4-hit game (with 3 XBH) as a lefty was really exciting, it's seemed to be his biggest weakness, but I do have to remind myself it was just one game.

I'm guessing Plouffe, with Arcia the next best bet. Please let it be Morneau... I still find myself surprised every time Plouffe hits a homerun. I know the camera angle has a significant impact on what you see, but most of his homeruns look like popups until they switch to the camera looking to the outfield tracking the ball. He doesn't really look like he's swinging hard either, which adds to the effect. Arcia takes violent swings. He's the most fun to watch hitting in the entire lineup right now. Every once in a while Morneau still swings like this, but I've lost my belief in him, sadly.

Oswaldo Arcia and Casey Fien would like a word with you... I agree with you for the most part though, there's almost nothing in this team to get excited about. I'm not really a proponent of blowing a whole team up and starting over normally, but I'm getting to that point with this team just so I can at least have something to care about. I'd be much more interested to see whether Josmil Pinto can hit .200 or .250 than I would to see Ryan Doumit do the same. It's not Doumit's fault, per se, but meh. I wonder if I'd feel that way if our farm system wasn't good, but then I'd probably be depressed instead of bored.

Assuming Buxton, Hicks, and Arcia all pan out, what happens if Kepler (and Walker, maybe, with various others as well) work out too? We have such a glut of outfielders. We're almost certainly trading a couple of them away long before they hit free agency. That to me seems a likely source of one of our future starting pitchers. We finally have some promising starters in the pipe, but reality says not all will live up to the hype (same could be said for the outfielders, of course), hopefully we can find a good one in a trade down the line.

My argument is more along the lines of why did Sano have to move away from short before getting a chance to play short? What if he was actually an adequate defensive shortstop? This isn't a real rating system, obviously, but if we take your example of Florimon (2 offense, 9 defense) and Sano (9 offense, 2 defense) and call it a wash numberwise, having Sano at SS might still be a preferable option as it means Harrison plays third instead of Florimon playing short. All hypothetical, of course, but if you assume similar offense and defense from Sano at either short or 3rd and Harrison can put up a 7 offense, 5 defense at 3rd, he inherently becomes "more valuable" than Florimon, 12-11 (unless we do the whole WAR positional adjustment thing, which seems silly for a fictional system). But he doesn't even play if Sano is at 3rd. Nowhere did I ever intend to suggest Harrison could play SS, this was all predicated on considering Sano as a possibility to play short. I also think it more likely that on this potential rating system that you get a 2 offense, 9 defense for the Florimon equivalent, but probably more like a 9 offense, 4 defense from Sano at SS. Not great defense theoretically, depending on what that scale actually means, but he's "better" statistically, rating 13 to Florimon's 11. It's kind of a "you can live with his defense as it makes the team much better for him to play shortstop" thing. Sort of like Jeter.

Agreed in principle, the only problem being it means 3-4 times as many starts for Thomas as Hicks due to the lack of left-handed starters. Thomas has probably earned playing time by actually being pretty good compared to everything else they've run out as a leadoff hitter, but he's not a long-term answer like Hicks might be. Hicks needs to get at-bats, whether Thomas is better right now or not.

Last night was the perfect example for why I hate saves and closers as a role. One-run lead, top of the 8th. 3-4-5 hitters for the other team coming up including the other teams' clearly best hitter and another guy who's been a homerun hitter in his career who are left-handed. That situation screams to me, "put in Perkins." Not Thielbar, not Duensing, but Perkins. Get through the meat of their lineup with your best pitcher who is also the best matchup by handedness instead of handing the ball to the wronghanded pitcher that's struggling at the moment. Let somebody else clean up the ninth against weaker hitters instead of awarding stupid statistic to somebody so that his pricetag can go up in the future.

With all the talk of late as to who might be our "shortstop of the future", one thought keeps popping back into my head. It's a thought that probably has about as much chance of happening as my winning the lottery twice in my lifetime (and since I haven't won it once yet, unfortunately...) but I can't shake it. Thinking about it a little more has caused me to think about a few other things, like what you want in a shortstop, not just who should be playing the position. I'll start with the ridiculous notion first, so everyone can laugh and skip on to the more useful information located elsewhere on the site. Our shortstop of the future should be: Miguel Sano. First off, where this idea comes from: A quote from Terry Ryan. I don't feel like digging up the exact quote at the moment, but I don't think it's so controversial that anybody is going to challenge it. Essentially it was a quote from Ryan about Sano saying in effect, "he still thinks he should be playing shortstop." And that part of me that wonders about things like this got rolling. Actually that wasn't exactly the foundation for the idea, as I've wondered a bit about moving shortstops to third base previously, but this finally made me interested enough to formalize ideas worthy of putting down in print. A positional glance at what the Twins have coming up through the farm shows a large number of extremeley intriguing prospects, covering most every position except shortstop. Yes, we do have a few names attached to the position, but none of them are making the kind of noise many of our other positional prospects are. Niko Goodrum may have the highest ceiling of the group, but he's more raw athleticism than polished product at the moment. Jorge Polanco looks to be a decent hitter, but may not have the arm you'd want to be the full-time shortstop. Levi Michael was once listed as the best defensive infielder the Twins have (BaseballAmerica.com: Prospects: Rankings: Organization Top 10 Prospects: 2013 Minnesota Twins Top 10 Prospects), but his hitting has never been very impressive nor consistent. Danny Santana has shown flashes of talent but not much consistency. James Beresford is great defensively but has no power to speak of. Any of them might be fine, but none seems to have "future All-Star" vibes. We have more potentially great outfielders than we know what to do with. 2B has Eddie Rosario looking the part, and Polanco profiles a little better there than SS. 1B has Kennys Vargas and Dalton Hicks in addition to being a potential fallback for hitters who struggle in the field. Catcher has Josmil Pinto currently ripping up his league and Joe Mauer should still have a few more good years in him. Sano currently plays 3B, as does Travis Harrison and now Amaurys Minier, all looking to be plus (likely even better) bats. So, we have a potential surplus of really good bats at 3B. How did that happen? Because we decided that Miguel Sano was going to outgrow the SS position. I couldn't help looking at that and thinking, "Why?" I'll grant that he is going to be a big man, that's obvious. What is it about being large that inherently means he should move to a new position before even getting to try, though? Cal Ripken played the position at a solidly-built 6'4". Alex Rodriguez was a much better defensive shortstop at a muscular 6'3" than Derek Jeter but Jeter got to keep his spot anyway, moving A-Rod to 3rd. Heck, Jeter (6'3") has always been more "shortstop who can hit" than good defender, undeserved gold glove awards aside. Troy Tulowitzki is listed at 6'3", 215 lbs. Why could they do it but others can't? When I think about traits you want in a SS or 3B, a strong arm is obvious, and is possessed by Sano already. In fact he's believed to have an incredible arm, easily good enough for either position. That's part of why Cal Ripken could play the position, he could play a half-step deeper and gun people out anyway. Couldn't Miguel Sano do that as well? Okay, what other traits do you want in your SS? Range, quickness, agility? Well, the range thing is hard to quantify as I'm not a professional scout, nor am I even an amateur scout who watches Sano play. I just read about him on the internet. Judging range gets back to the notion of arm strength somewhat, though. The deeper you play, the more range you have, you get that extra fraction of a second to move to the ball by playing deeper. Quickness? Again, I'm not a professional scout, but I can read boxscores to see that Sano hits triples and steals bases. He's not the second coming of Jim Thome. Agility? Sure, a big guy is going to suffer in that category, but the SS is rarely going to make acrobatic plays to convert double plays, that falls more on the 2B to make the crazy turn-and-throws as they come across the bag and have to throw back to first. And how many people really want to go full out in a takeout slide at a big guy who might take their head off with a throw? With 3B it seems to me like the primary trait you want after arm strength (maybe even before) is fast reflexes. You're closer to the plate, the ball is usually hit a touch harder as it's being pulled more (by righties), the ball just gets on you much faster at third than at short. So to be good at 3rd, you want someone with fast reflexes. Wouldn't you want to determine what kind of reflexes someone has first before making that switch? It's easy to say, "well, he could manage shortstop where only the best fielders can play, he can manage 3rd," but is that really true? What if the guy managed short by having good positioning and a strong arm, not by having lightning reflexes? And wouldn't a large frame be just as likely to struggle with the fast reflexes needed to play 3rd as they would to have the range needed to play short? Sure, with a strong arm, he can play deeper to give himself more time, but that's exactly what he'd be doing to play short, too. I find myself wondering if it isn't an issue where the positional bias is actually working incorrectly. Shortstop is considered the most important defensive position, arguably catcher might be as well but it's a lot harder to judge than shortstop. And because of that tons of light-hitting slick-fielding players over the years have manned the position to allow for their glove to at least be viable on the field. Thus somehow all these little guys who've played short because it was the only position they could play and not be a complete liability may have skewed the notion of how big you can be to successfully play shortstop. Somehow we've got the notion that "shortstops have always been small so you have to be small to play shortstop" stuck into our thinking, overlooking the possibility that it might not necessarily be the case. Magic Johnson was a point guard at 6'9" because he was a great passer and ballhandler. LeBron James can guard other teams' point guards because he's a great athlete and can use his size to give himself a cushion smaller players can't, not because he's the same size as other point guards. Sometimes guys just do things a little differently and their size makes them look a little out-of-the-norm. That doesn't mean they can't do it, just that somebody let their talent and athleticism determine what they could do, not making an arbitrary decision that their size meant they should do something else. Do I truly believe he could play an adequate shortstop in the major leagues? Actually, I kind of do. I don't necessarily think he'd be a gold-glover, and might in fact be a little below average. But I think his bat would be so plus-plus-plus for the position that it would be worth it. Especially as it would mean Travis Harrison or Amaurys Minier might have a position to move into when they're ready as they look to potentially be much better hitters than anything we'll produce to fill our shortstop hole. What if he keeps growing to be 270 lbs. you ask? Well, what if getting to play the position he wants to play leads to him working on his conditioning more than playing a position where he can just get big and not worry about the consequences, meaning he would have prolonged his career by a few years if he'd stuck at short? I don't have these answers, but I like thinking about it and going , "what if?" Imagine that lineup: CF - Buxton 2B - Rosario C - Mauer SS/3B - Sano LF - Arcia 1B - Vargas 3B/SS - Harrison or Florimon DH - Pinto/D.Hicks/Walker RF - A.Hicks/Kepler Doesn't the thought of Travis Harrison (or eventually Amaurys Minier) sound better than the next Pedro Florimon? How bad would Sano's defense at short have to be for you to not want to trade Harrison's bat for Florimon's? And what if he could actually play it well due to the cannon he has for an arm? Well, there you have it. The reason I read about baseball on the internet instead of working in baseball. As is my wont, I've rambled on longer than necessary. I've already acknowledged this is never going to happen, but I think it's a fun idea regardless. That lineup just makes me drool if Sano could put up his presumed monster line from short instead of 3rd.

With all the talk of late as to who might be our "shortstop of the future", one thought keeps popping back into my head. It's a thought that probably has about as much chance of happening as my winning the lottery twice in my lifetime (and since I haven't won it once yet, unfortunately...) but I can't shake it. Thinking about it a little more has caused me to think about a few other things, like what you want in a shortstop, not just who should be playing the position. I'll start with the ridiculous notion first, so everyone can laugh and skip on to the more useful information located elsewhere on the site. Our shortstop of the future should be: Miguel Sano. First off, where this idea comes from: A quote from Terry Ryan. I don't feel like digging up the exact quote at the moment, but I don't think it's so controversial that anybody is going to challenge it. Essentially it was a quote from Ryan about Sano saying in effect, "he still thinks he should be playing shortstop." And that part of me that wonders about things like this got rolling. Actually that wasn't exactly the foundation for the idea, as I've wondered a bit about moving shortstops to third base previously, but this finally made me interested enough to formalize ideas worthy of putting down in print. A positional glance at what the Twins have coming up through the farm shows a large number of extremeley intriguing prospects, covering most every position except shortstop. Yes, we do have a few names attached to the position, but none of them are making the kind of noise many of our other positional prospects are. Niko Goodrum may have the highest ceiling of the group, but he's more raw athleticism than polished product at the moment. Jorge Polanco looks to be a decent hitter, but may not have the arm you'd want to be the full-time shortstop. Levi Michael was once listed as the best defensive infielder the Twins have (BaseballAmerica.com: Prospects: Rankings: Organization Top 10 Prospects: 2013 Minnesota Twins Top 10 Prospects), but his hitting has never been very impressive nor consistent. Danny Santana has shown flashes of talent but not much consistency. James Beresford is great defensively but has no power to speak of. Any of them might be fine, but none seems to have "future All-Star" vibes. We have more potentially great outfielders than we know what to do with. 2B has Eddie Rosario looking the part, and Polanco profiles a little better there than SS. 1B has Kennys Vargas and Dalton Hicks in addition to being a potential fallback for hitters who struggle in the field. Catcher has Josmil Pinto currently ripping up his league and Joe Mauer should still have a few more good years in him. Sano currently plays 3B, as does Travis Harrison and now Amaurys Minier, all looking to be plus (likely even better) bats. So, we have a potential surplus of really good bats at 3B. How did that happen? Because we decided that Miguel Sano was going to outgrow the SS position. I couldn't help looking at that and thinking, "Why?" I'll grant that he is going to be a big man, that's obvious. What is it about being large that inherently means he should move to a new position before even getting to try, though? Cal Ripken played the position at a solidly-built 6'4". Alex Rodriguez was a much better defensive shortstop at a muscular 6'3" than Derek Jeter but Jeter got to keep his spot anyway, moving A-Rod to 3rd. Heck, Jeter (6'3") has always been more "shortstop who can hit" than good defender, undeserved gold glove awards aside. Troy Tulowitzki is listed at 6'3", 215 lbs. Why could they do it but others can't? When I think about traits you want in a SS or 3B, a strong arm is obvious, and is possessed by Sano already. In fact he's believed to have an incredible arm, easily good enough for either position. That's part of why Cal Ripken could play the position, he could play a half-step deeper and gun people out anyway. Couldn't Miguel Sano do that as well? Okay, what other traits do you want in your SS? Range, quickness, agility? Well, the range thing is hard to quantify as I'm not a professional scout, nor am I even an amateur scout who watches Sano play. I just read about him on the internet. Judging range gets back to the notion of arm strength somewhat, though. The deeper you play, the more range you have, you get that extra fraction of a second to move to the ball by playing deeper. Quickness? Again, I'm not a professional scout, but I can read boxscores to see that Sano hits triples and steals bases. He's not the second coming of Jim Thome. Agility? Sure, a big guy is going to suffer in that category, but the SS is rarely going to make acrobatic plays to convert double plays, that falls more on the 2B to make the crazy turn-and-throws as they come across the bag and have to throw back to first. And how many people really want to go full out in a takeout slide at a big guy who might take their head off with a throw? With 3B it seems to me like the primary trait you want after arm strength (maybe even before) is fast reflexes. You're closer to the plate, the ball is usually hit a touch harder as it's being pulled more (by righties), the ball just gets on you much faster at third than at short. So to be good at 3rd, you want someone with fast reflexes. Wouldn't you want to determine what kind of reflexes someone has first before making that switch? It's easy to say, "well, he could manage shortstop where only the best fielders can play, he can manage 3rd," but is that really true? What if the guy managed short by having good positioning and a strong arm, not by having lightning reflexes? And wouldn't a large frame be just as likely to struggle with the fast reflexes needed to play 3rd as they would to have the range needed to play short? Sure, with a strong arm, he can play deeper to give himself more time, but that's exactly what he'd be doing to play short, too. I find myself wondering if it isn't an issue where the positional bias is actually working incorrectly. Shortstop is considered the most important defensive position, arguably catcher might be as well but it's a lot harder to judge than shortstop. And because of that tons of light-hitting slick-fielding players over the years have manned the position to allow for their glove to at least be viable on the field. Thus somehow all these little guys who've played short because it was the only position they could play and not be a complete liability may have skewed the notion of how big you can be to successfully play shortstop. Somehow we've got the notion that "shortstops have always been small so you have to be small to play shortstop" stuck into our thinking, overlooking the possibility that it might not necessarily be the case. Magic Johnson was a point guard at 6'9" because he was a great passer and ballhandler. LeBron James can guard other teams' point guards because he's a great athlete and can use his size to give himself a cushion smaller players can't, not because he's the same size as other point guards. Sometimes guys just do things a little differently and their size makes them look a little out-of-the-norm. That doesn't mean they can't do it, just that somebody let their talent and athleticism determine what they could do, not making an arbitrary decision that their size meant they should do something else. Do I truly believe he could play an adequate shortstop in the major leagues? Actually, I kind of do. I don't necessarily think he'd be a gold-glover, and might in fact be a little below average. But I think his bat would be so plus-plus-plus for the position that it would be worth it. Especially as it would mean Travis Harrison or Amaurys Minier might have a position to move into when they're ready as they look to potentially be much better hitters than anything we'll produce to fill our shortstop hole. What if he keeps growing to be 270 lbs. you ask? Well, what if getting to play the position he wants to play leads to him working on his conditioning more than playing a position where he can just get big and not worry about the consequences, meaning he would have prolonged his career by a few years if he'd stuck at short? I don't have these answers, but I like thinking about it and going , "what if?" Imagine that lineup: CF - Buxton 2B - Rosario C - Mauer SS/3B - Sano LF - Arcia 1B - Vargas 3B/SS - Harrison or Florimon DH - Pinto/D.Hicks/Walker RF - A.Hicks/Kepler Doesn't the thought of Travis Harrison (or eventually Amaurys Minier) sound better than the next Pedro Florimon? How bad would Sano's defense at short have to be for you to not want to trade Harrison's bat for Florimon's? And what if he could actually play it well due to the cannon he has for an arm? Well, there you have it. The reason I read about baseball on the internet instead of working in baseball. As is my wont, I've rambled on longer than necessary. I've already acknowledged this is never going to happen, but I think it's a fun idea regardless. That lineup just makes me drool if Sano could put up his presumed monster line from short instead of 3rd.

I don't honestly expect him to go any farther this year than Ft. Myers, and I'm fine with that. But I just couldn't help wondering if there'd be any way playing the "help our affiliates out" game could potentially cause him to get another promotion this year when he might not otherwise.

Seems like a RH complement to Mauer would work out really well to start him out in the bigs, getting the limited starts against LH pitchers. But looking at his numbers this year, he's beating the snot out of righties (.321/.436/.520/.957) as opposed to only hitting extremely well (.295/.368/.492/.859) against lefties. That's even more encouraging about his future prospects to be a legit big leaguer. It's interesting every year, but the trade deadline this year almost feels moreso, as it determines which of the young guys are going to get their chance when. I don't expect Doumit to get traded mostly due to them just signing him to the extention, but it would be interesting to see who would get the call if they did.

I know this has been stated before, and RiverBrian was essentially implying this earlier in the thread, but putting a little effort into building the lineup by Gardenhire (or maybe Steinbach as rumors are the bench coach actually does something to assist the manager) could easily find fairly consistent playing time for everyone. You have Willingham, Arcia, Doumit, Morneau, Parmelee, and Mauer (6 players) to hold down Catcher, Left Field, Right Field, 1st Base, DH (5 positions). How hard is it to basically rotate the one person who isn't playing each day such that all those guys are playing 5 out of every 6 games? Willingham has a bad knee, Doumit is terrible defensively, Arcia is a rookie who seems a little shaky in the field, Morneau seems to have lost his power stroke, Mauer needs days off from catching. Outside of Mauer, none of them are tearing the league apart, why is it Parmelee who only gets to play once or twice a week?

Another young guy to watch, finally. These are the guys that make watching in off years fun, dreaming about what might be in the future. Good luck Kyle!

Cedar Rapids is already in the playoffs, Ft. Myers is already in the playoffs. New Britain didn't make it first half, and it looks like they have their work cut out for them to make it second half. Honestly, if Buxton hits well at Ft. Myers for a month and it looks like New Britain needs help, could he get a call to play there for a month in hopes he could spark a playoff push? Regardless, good luck to Buxton at the next level! As a Twins fan I'm a little happier right now.

Dozier showed he had a little pop in his bat last year (6 HR in 300ish AB), so his little binge recently doesn't come as much of a surprise to me. Last year he showed he couldn't struggle offensively and defensively at the same time while being a rookie. It just seemed to be a bit too much. I was worried the slow start offensively this year was going to end up washing him out, but he managed to play good defense throughout, and hopefully that has allowed him to relax enough that his offense may finally be coming around. He's probably also somewhat lucky that Carroll's offense has been terrible this year. He needs more than a good month to get his place on the team solidified for the future. But things look more promising right now.

Like many, I expected the Twins to be a little better this year, but not great. Around 72 wins. I figured the offense, defense, and bullpen would be fairly comparable to last year and the starters would improve slightly from absolutely putrid. Honestly, though, it seems like the offense is down, the starters are maybe a hair better than last year, but really not much, and the defense is still pretty shaky. I think the bullpen is probably improved a bit, though Burton's recent outings are a little scary. It's hard to identify how the Twins are putting up a better record this year than last. That's just how baseball is sometimes. Most surprising team? Maybe, if you bought into that Vegas line of 64.5 wins on the year. Record-wide they're a touch better than I expected but not enough that I personally would consider it terribly surprising.

I was wondering the same thing. It certainly couldn't hurt, knowing you'd have somebody to pal around with when you move across the country without family at 18 years old.