ashbury

The scouting report in OOTP agrees regarding his fastball but seems to think more highly of his off-speed stuff. It concurs regarding control.

You get credit for honesty.

You may have Griffin Jax in your bullpen and not even know it.

Chuck Knoblauch scored 140 runs in 1996, a figure not approached by a Twin before or since. Greatest Twins individual offensive season ever and unlikely to be matched in the future.

Cleveland lost.

Willi Castro's "unique" skill set is that he's a competent shortstop who doesn't hit well enough to be a regular for a contending team. Sending him further and further down the defensive spectrum (CF, 3B, LF??!?) only highlights the below-average bat more sharply - there is no way a 91 OPS+ is an asset when used in left field on a frequent basis. He's currently 6th on the team in plate appearances, which means that injuries have riddled the roster and, like MAT, he is playing more than his substitute role should have called for.

Unless Henriquez can maintain the very low .238 BABIP that he's put up in those 8.1 innings, and few pitchers can, his gaudy ERA won't hold up when he hits the majors. The majors will hit back.

I can never tell them apart, myself.

An arm in the outfield is nice but doesn't determine big pay days. Home run hitters drive Cadillacs. -- Ralph Kiner Singles hitters drive Fords. -- Ralph Kiner Guys with great arms but hit like neither of the above drive Ubers. -- me I like his chances to hit homers for a nice car, by the way. / no offense intended to Mr Dobnak

With this monster game, I believe* Joey Gallo now leads the Twins in OPS. OPS, that is, for situations where his team is already in the lead. When the Twins are behind, his OPS of .574 is ahead of only Nick Gordon and (in very small sample) Jordan Luplow. In tie games, his OPS is an uninspiring .634. Don't get me wrong, because I like insurance runs. Every additional run has the probability of moving the team closer to a win. Also, it's not his "fault" that in tonight's game someone else pushed across the first run and the team never trailed. But I don't believe I've ever seen an aggregate OPS near .800 that was more misleading. And the seasonal trend has intensified. Perhaps it's is just a statistical blip, and not predictive of future performance. But I'm not so much interested in forecasting, as in looking back at the season so far and trying to understand the disappointment in the face of seemingly positive batting stats. * I haven't done the math and will wait to see the new totals when sites update tomorrow. / confirmed - his OPS when the team's ahead is now 1.041, passing Julien who dropped to .923 with last night's o-fer.

CORREA!!!!

Gallo! Meh.

WALLNER!!!!

You enjoy Kipling?

Wanted to mention that sons Bashbury and Crashbury are in attendance at the game tonight. Below is a photo of pre-game festivities with an unnamed co-conspirator.

"on the 40-man roster, giving him a chance to be a call-up" does not equate to "Players Who Can Still Help the 2023 Twins". It only means "can help the major league team not forfeit games due to not enough rostered players." 7 Major League Players Who Can Still Help the 2023 Twins Correa, Buxton, Vazquez, Polanco, Farmer, Winder, Floro. Come on, guys.

Those are 3 good stats. My 3: .438 OPS with the bases loaded. This has been mentioned to death, and when you slice and dice data this way you end up with the dreaded Small Sample Size - and yet, bases loaded very often represents a key opportunity in the entire game, because if you're behind it's a chance to catch up in a hurry, if the game's close it can tip the scales your way, and if you're ahead it can ice the victory. They've had 97 such opportunities this year, so about once a game, about on a par with the league, and no team has a worse OPS than our Twins, nor fewer RBIs. If you want to define 2023, this stands out to me. Michael A Taylor leads the team with 100 game appearances, but is only 6th in Plate Appearances. This is mostly just a way of saying we miss a productive Byron Buxton in CF, but it also points up the gyrations the manager has to make with his lineup to hide MAT's bat as much as possible while trying to reap the benefit of his good glove. Byron, get well! Minnesota has 3 of the top 40 in terms of pitching starts across the majors, with 22 apiece. There are other teams with this distinction, and Washington and Toronto both have 4. But the 2023 Twins are defined by being founded on starting pitching, and for the most part the plan for the starting staff (and keeping them healthy) has proved sound. Joe Ryan going on the injured list is a potential crack in that foundation, however.

We joke about them as "FalVine" but they are not conjoined Twins. Assuming this season ends without a playoff win to show for it, change at the top could be made without firing them both. Two scenarios: 1) Falvey fires Levine on the grounds of accountability for 3 consecutive seasons of subpar results. This outcome assumes that Levine has had more input to the overall "vision" than we know, and for instance was the architect of the major trades and signings of the past few seasons, with Falvey merely providing budgetary approval when they happened. 2) Joe Pohlad (or Dave St Peter acting with his approval) fires Falvey and elevates Levine to the big chair, perhaps with a title only of Executive VP of Baseball Operations rather than the redundant President. This is if Falvey has been completely hands-on with every important decision, and Levine has been in effect a glorified assistant GM who ownership feels is suited to the big job. (I want to stress, Levine is a decade older than Falvey.) In either scenario we have a new GM who comes in, and Rocco's job hangs in the balance depending on whom they hire and how much decision-making power the new GM is given. New GMs tend to like new managers. Of course, Rocco could be fired if FalVine both stay on, but this thread is about change at the top. I tend to think either of these scenarios is more likely than firing both Falvey and Levine. If it works, it has a ripple effect of accountability everywhere down the org chart, without throwing the organization into months of chaos from complete turnover. Firing both means Joe Pohlad is saying, "this is my baseball team now," and I just don't foresee that. But the guesswork involves our not knowing with real certainty what the working dynamics currently are at the top, Pohlad included, and how decision making is split. Anything could happen. If we win a playoff game, probably the FO maintains the status quo. Otherwise I might split the chances into: status quo - 35% Levine fired - 30% Falvey fired - 20% both fired - 15%

Not good enough to invest further resources on. Not bad enough to sell off as spare parts. But don't worry. They "inquired" on any number of players. And pundits deemed them "good fits" for some others. Some serious tire-kicking must have occurred, too. Ladies and gentlemen, here is the poster franchise for sustainable, championship-caliber team-building, your 2023 Minnesota Twins! "The goal here is straight-forward and measurable," Falvey said on Monday. "It's to build a sustainable, championship-caliber team, an organization that Twins fans will be proud of." -- Derek Falvey, November 2016 https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/mlb/2016/11/07/new-twins-front-office-hits-the-ground-running/93452688/

Sell.

Donaldson could be out for the rest of the year. 60 days for certain, as he's on that IL. Farmer's a placeholder on a contending team. Rendon is underperforming by a lot, a below average player over the last three years as a whole, and his whopping contract is locked in for 3 years still to go. The Yankees can afford anything they want - do they want this, though? I don't see this trade happening on the part of either of the other teams.

The Twins have their own analytics team, but we can play along at home. Florio has a below-average OPS-against this season, with a BABIP that suggests either his "luck" will improve, or batters are tattooing the ball for high-percentage opportunities. Lopez has an even worse OPS-against, and a BABIP suggesting he's actually been a bit fortunate, at that. Of course one partial year's numbers on any reliever qualify as Small Sample Size, so who knows what our FO's analysis ultimately was. It's a "challenge trade," involving two players with similar roles. A low-stakes challenge, but still, one that can be directly compared from this point forward. I don't rule out that Lopez could have requested a trade.

Yep. If there aren't two teams with even this minimal level of interest, to play one off the other, just cut him and move on. Time spent negotiating a trade for rather low return probably could be more productively used in other ways.

FalVine: "Hold our beers."