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Kirby_waved_at_me

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Everything posted by Kirby_waved_at_me

  1. Kirby_waved_at_me
    Is that a Yogi Berra Quote?
  2. Kirby_waved_at_me
    it's counting stats rather than rate stats - I expected Rasmus to do essentially what he's done, but played more often. He's entering his prime, so I was optimistic that he'd have a breakout season. He's been good this year. For Hunter, I expected Bret Boone / Tony Bautista / big dropoff. The Rate stats I think were about where I thought, but I didn't think he'd make it this far into the season healthy and relatively productive.
  3. Kirby_waved_at_me
    The rate stats for Hunter are about right, maybe a bit higher than I thought. It's the fact that he's played as much as he has and already passed his 2014 total in HRs that is surprising to me. If the Twins signed Rasmus instead of Hunter and Rasmus put up exactly the stats he has put up, would the Twins have the Astros record right now? I think Rasmus has had the best season of the three (as he should have) , but I don't think it would turn around the Twins' season the way I would have envisioned it over the winter...
  4. Kirby_waved_at_me
    I'm starting to lean towards "I told you so" on Rasmus. But at the same time I think Hunter, for all his faults, could have been a lot worse. I guess that's the bigger takeaway for me - Hunter exceeded my expectations, while Melky and Rasmus have had less impact than I thought they would for their respective teams...
  5. Kirby_waved_at_me
    Rasmus has been the best of the three, no doubt in my mind about that, it's more a question of how much better. The defensive side of the equation still burns a bit - though having Hicks come back and little bit of Buxton sprinkled in has lessened my angst about CF. Rosario has done well in LF. is 10 OPS+ points a lot? Hunter is the HR and RBI leader of the three for what ever that might be worth. Cabrera's only hit 7 homers, which is much less than I thought he'd have to this point in the season.
  6. Kirby_waved_at_me
    He's got my Vote! I don't actually have one, but if I did, he'd be a guy I would vote for in a heartbeat.
  7. Kirby_waved_at_me
    During the offseason, there were a lot of players that the Twins could have signed via free agency. There was plenty of lively debate about Center Field and Left Field, as well as how the Twins might solve issues in the bullpen and Starting Rotation. Two guys I recall mentioning several times were Melky Cabrera and Colby Rasmus. Here are three batting lines avg / obp / slug: Player A: .238 / .310 / .452 Player B: .245 / .300 / .432 Player C: .285 / .325 / .405 That's Rasmus, Torii Hunter, and Cabrera in 2015. I wanted either of those two guys over Torii, but over the course of the year, Hunter has hung in there. Can't really shout "I told you so" about that one, I expected better numbers from both of those guys, who have been just slightly better than Torii (looking at OPS+).... Can anyone say they had the Twins going after a particular free-agent player this off-season that has ended up being a difference maker?
  8. Kirby_waved_at_me
    I think this is a good way to approach the issue. Namely, what do the Twins need in 2016 that they can't get from their own system? Catcher seems to be the biggest need with the least appealing internal options. I'd say they should be looking to add a ML Starter for 2016 and another catcher that can start 2016 in AA or AAA with the idea of having that catcher replace Suzuki once that contract is up, either to back up the ML guy or to leapfrog. Shortstop might need a two or three year bridge to Nick Gordon. Relief pitching - lots of internal options - so far the twins haven't tested the right ones yet, or haven't tested them long enough to have a solution. 2016? They might have it covered if things break well for the young guys and/or they add a couple free agents that can stick. The second part - where do the Twins have Organizational Depth from which they can get a long term solution behind the plate? on MLB Roster - Starting Pitchers, Trevor Plouffe, Brian Dozier, Rosario, and Hicks are the guys most likely to have value to someone else. Perkins has value but I don't think the Twins consider him a trade chip (because reasons) in the pipeline - Starting Pitching (no more Hu, but there's Gonsalves, Thorpe, Kohl Stewart, others), Relief Pitching (the Twins drafted all those guys, but maybe some other team wanted them real bad and think they can develop them better), Arcia, ABW, Vargas, Danny Santana, Travis Harrison - there are enough guys that losing one or two doesn't ruin the depth. I'm hoping the Twins can address the Catching problem in the offseason.
  9. Kirby_waved_at_me
    Just for context... Rank Player Strikeouts Year 1. Bobby Darwin 145 1972 2. Carlos Gomez 142 2008 3. Harmon Killebrew 142 1962 4. Josh Willingham 141 2012 5. Jim Lemon 138 1956 (* with the Washington Senators) 6. Bobby Darwin 137 1973 7. Harmon Killebrew 135 1964 8. Rich Becker 130 1997 9. Michael Cuddyer 130 2006 10. Brian Dozier 129 2014 Jacque Jones 129 2002
  10. Kirby_waved_at_me
    Unfortunately, Suzuki doesn't "catch to the score" like Jack Morris allegedly pitched to it.
  11. Kirby_waved_at_me
    yeah - there's a clarification missing from the quotes. I'd love to ask a follow up question about what he means about getting certain calls. It's implied that he's saying that pitches that are borderline should favor the side of the veteran player. If I give Suzuki the benefit of the doubt, I'm assuming he means if it's a pitch that is close to being call one way or the other, it should favor the player that has had experience and judgement to know the difference. Can't say I agree with that, but it's a bit less nonsensical. Molitor, on the other hand, had a statement early in the season that he hates the term "borderline pitch" - he has said that a pitch is either a strike or a ball, the job of the umpire is to know the difference.
  12. Kirby_waved_at_me
    The outtakes article is a bit less damning of Suzuki - after reading that he obviously understands that pitch framing is a real thing. He makes a good point though, that the pitcher's performance should somehow be included in determining pitch framing. I think that a pitcher that can't consistently hit his catcher's target gets fewer strikes called than a guy that can throw a pitch that moves a glove more subtly. My guess (without asking anybody) is that horizontal glove movement is more noticeable to the plate umpire than vertical movement. I'd be interested to see some data on pitches that break to the left or right vs pitches that mostly have downward break.
  13. Kirby_waved_at_me
    No time like today to turn things around - the Twins have been embarrassing to watch since the all-star break. They've played some hot teams, sure, but that's no excuse for the completely flat play they've displayed the past few weeks. I miss Kennys Vargas and Oswaldo Arcia. I didn't mind the strikeouts as long as they crushed 2 or 3 out of the park per week. Gallardo hasn't won two consecutive starts since the month of May - let's keep that streak alive, Twins!
  14. Kirby_waved_at_me
    I would love love love it if the OF was Buxton CF Hicks/Arcia RF, Rosario LF, Hunter bench-moral support-occasional DH. I don't think that's ever going to happen.
  15. Kirby_waved_at_me
    If Hicks hadn't gotten that weird batting practice injury earlier in the year, Buxton might not have been up at all to this point - I think he's going to be back up in September. Hicks and Rosario have earned their playing time, and Hunter has been, ahem, Grandfathered into his position. So, that leaves Buxton waiting for playing time at the MLB level. He can rake at AAA for a month and then he'll be up before you know it.
  16. Kirby_waved_at_me
    It made a bit more sense when they took on Arroyo's contract from ARZ and also acquired Touki Toussaint... Maybe they think Bourn has something left in the tank. Swisher was just $$$ that won't necessarily turn into a player on the field for ATL. Looks like CLE is sending some money as well.
  17. Kirby_waved_at_me
    Cleveland just traded Swisher and Michael Bourn to Atlanta for Chris Johnson... must be another piece to this deal for ATL to take on that much payroll....
  18. Kirby_waved_at_me
    For that matter, Nick Blackburn is well rested... although sinker ballers need to be tired to pitch well, or something. Speaking positively for a moment, hopefully that 40th spot is put to good use.
  19. Kirby_waved_at_me
    The thing that bugs me the most is that acquiring Jepsen is worse than doing nothing at all. He's not much better than promoting one of the AAA guys in favor of Duensing/Boyer/your pick.... I wasn't hoping for Price, or Tulo, or Lucroy, Derek Norris, or anything extravagant. Leading up to the deadline all I wanted was for the Twins to be open to making a move if it made sense and addressed a need. Technically Jepsen improved the bullpen because he was better than the worst arm in there, but it only made sense to go after guys that were much better than the current crop, not just slightly better. It would have been fine if Jepsen was the 2nd (or 3rd) guy the Twins added in July, but to be the only move feels like doing something just so they can pretend like they tried.
  20. Kirby_waved_at_me
    I think there was a typo - they were 54-51 when the post was written as a blog - it transferred to the forum a couple days later, when the Twins were 54-53 . . .
  21. Kirby_waved_at_me
    If there's a 40-man spot available (is there or did I just miss who was added for Fryer), maybe the Twins are going to try to pick someone up off waivers?
  22. Kirby_waved_at_me
    The Twins can get more for Plouffe dealing him in the offseason, anyway, right? There's a larger pool of players eligible to be traded then compared to today...
  23. Kirby_waved_at_me
    I don't think trades work like that - would you like the Twins to call all the other teams to see if they can beat the Twins' offers to acquire new players? The Rockies and Blue Jays didn't need to call anyone else to make this deal. The Twins need bullpen help, a Catcher, some offense (LH power) and maybe a Shortstop, in that order. Tulo is a great player and certainly would have made the Twins' offense better. I don't think he's on the Twins' radar right now, though. I think Hawkins was the guy the Twins missed out on in this deal.
  24. Kirby_waved_at_me
    No mention of Duensing in this MLB Trade Rumor article? They must not read TD... he's in 90% of the tongue-in-cheek proposals here... http://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2015/07/trade-market-for-relievers-2.html
  25. Kirby_waved_at_me
    Save some hits for the rest of the series, guys!
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