stringer bell

It's possible. See 2016.

Pretty sure there are 3-4 "no" votes among the Republican senators. Attaching this to another bill of some type would be the only way it passes and goes to a conference committee. Still, it is one step closer to being law. I wasn't a huge fan of the ACA, but it beats the snot out of this abomination.

I missed Mauer's homer , I'm catching the light rail going home, but up until then, none of 'em were cheap.

Rosario ruined it.

What's our BABIP in this game?

The Twins finished April of 2017 with a 12-11 record. They had one winning month in 2016 and only two in 2015 when they finished over .500. Here's my take on a decent first 23 games: Sano--The single biggest reason the Twins are above .500 is the hitting a fielding of Miguel Sano. He's been fine at third base and he's been a force with the bat. He crushed it on the recently completed road trip and was mostly responsible for both wins against the Royals, hitting two homers and driving in nine runs in two games. Defense--There has been an overall improvement. The starting outfield of Kepler, Buxton and Rosario covers a lot of ground and they all have good throwing arms. There hasn't been much time in the outfield for Grossman or Danny Santana. As mentioned above Sano has been more than OK at third and Jorge Polanco has been very good at shortstop. Brian Dozier and Mauer have been about was expected at second and first, so overall the infield has been pretty good. Catching defense has been upgraded with the twosome of Jason Castro and Chris Gimenez. All in all the Twins have gone from one of the worst defensive teams in MLB to pretty good and beside one notable botched rundown, they have been fundamentally sound. Starting pitching--Ervin Santana is a candidate for Pitcher of the Month. He's been beyond outstanding. Hector Santiago has also pitched over his head in April. The rest of the rotation? Blech! Supposed second starter Kyle Gibson is winless and hasn't reached six innings in a start. Phil Hughes looks like an end-of-the line veteran getting by on substandard pitches with the help of fast outfielders and pretty good command. Fifth starter A. Meija didn't make it through April although it looks like he has enough stuff to stick in a rotation eventually. Bullpen--While most of the numbers don't look gaudy, the Twins have survived with a bullpen full of question marks. "Closer" Brandon Kintzler has been fine and for the most point the setup guys have held the lead. Ryan Pressly got knocked around early, but seems to be coming out of it. There isn't a lot of talent or upside in the bullpen, but so far they've been OK, although just about every reliever has had a bad outing that skews their stats. Disappointments--The aforementioned Kyle Gibson has been bad nearing brutal. "Established" players Brian Dozier and Joe Mauer have done little in the first 23 games and Byron Buxton is far below the Mendoza Line. Buxton seems to be coming out of his early season funk and Dozier had a slow start last year before exploding for the final four months of the season. Mauer doesn't even walk that much anymore. It appears Mauer's decline is continuing. In summary, the pitching staff looks ripe for regression (a bad thing for the team), but quite a few things have gone well and would appear to bode well for the future. Sano, in particular, looks like he has taken the leap to star or superstar. There should much more to cheer for and talk about in the coming months and years.

Isn't on the player to report an injury? If Shaggy didn't report any problems, then it would be on him. Managers and pitching coaches are not mind readers. A misdiagnosed injury OTOH, would be grounds for him to grieve for his service time. It was certainly justifiable to send him down based on performance in the spring.

Sounds about right. While Hughes is 4-1, there have been plenty of well-struck balls hit on him. Right now, the reliable starters are Santiago and Santana, both pitching well over their head.

Let's see if I can sum up my thoughts in a paragraph or two. Rules changes and hitting adjustments have made Gibson's bread-and-butter pitch (sinking two-seam fastball) more and more hittable. Kyle has tried to adjust and the results have been dreadful. He also has a major league slider, but he hasn't had sharp command of either of his best pitches. I think any pitcher with Gibson's mix needs great command to thrive. The Twins likely won't contend this year mostly because of bad pitching. There is not much help down on the farm and the question is whether to give up on Gibson. In a system stacked with high floors and upsides, that decision would be easy. Not so much for your Minnesota Twins. The comparisons to Nick Blackburn seem apt, but Gibson has a little bit better pedigree. I don't think there is much to lose to see if Gibson can "find it" with better command and a bit better pitch mix, but there's limited trade value and upside.

Nice first Gibson.

Welcome Kevin. I recognized the name, but couldn't remember if you were only BYTO or if you migrated to Twins Daily.

Santiago pitched his butt off IMHO. Gibson would have been done in the second inning. Too bad about Gomez's blooper and Odor's hit, but going 5 when he might have been distracted and didn't have good stuff is pretty good.

I suppose Hector is good for one more inning.

Tough luck for Polanco.

I like Gibson, but I think I am finally seeing the wisdom in Chief's comments last year, that he is utterly hittable, at least right now. When he works in, batters don't move and he seems to most often get outthought by the hitter. I wouldn't support demoting him now, but another tough outing or two and I see no other choice. There is something there. He gets good sink on the ball and movement, but when he's behind in the count, he is well.......very hittable. Finally, Gibson seems to have a mental block right now. When he is in some trouble, he unravels. The Gibson of two years ago managed to work out of a lot of jams. Yesterday, Kyle didn't get much help from his fielders, but the Tigers lineup didn't have their Miggy, had two fresh callups from AAA and had a slumping V-Mart as the cleanup hitter. He gave them seven runs and benefitted from a runner thrown out at the plate.

Will it be Buddy's year to be on the AAA-MLB elevator?

Well, I had things to do anyway. Thanks Kyle!

Not so much that Santiago is great, but having a major league pitcher to fill one of the five spots instead of trying to develop a youngster or reinvent a veteran is pretty valuable IMHO. The Twins don't have many acceptable options for depth and then we're looking at the Andrew Albers and Pat Deans of the organization. Even though Santiago isn't noted for going deep in games, at least he doesn't have to have three visits an inning.

Hughes hasn't pitched well since his first start, Gibson hasn't gotten through 6 innings yet and Mejía just got sent down. I'm surprised they are going with four starters, but if they do, they really need to have a full bullpen until they can have some trust in more of their rotation. Personally, I don't think Hughes is going to cut it, so Gibson really needs to come through. There isn't much starting pitching depth that is near ready and the club can't have more than one starter that they coddle through outings (as they have with Mejía and would with Berrios). BTW, where are those that thought Santiago should have been non-tendered?

I'm in favor of Vargas from the position player side, especially since Park is injured (still?). Berrios for Mejía is probably the right call. Mejía has enough stuff, but needs to learn to be a pitcher. If Berrios does in fact join the rotation, I hope he can provide the innings to maintain a 12 man pitching staff.

Frustrating day at the ballpark for me. I found a good seat, but my phone ran out of juice, so I couldn't post. The first half of the game was loooong, so many visits to the mound, a challenge and a rhubarb. I finally tried to charge my phone and none of the chargers worked. Finally, snuck back into my seat and then got booted so I had to find a new home (this is on the spring pass). I like Mejía, but I think he needs more time in Rochester. The long innings, too many pitches and short starts are too much to put up with for a guy with an upside of middle-of-the-road starter, and he's making it so that eight relievers are required.

At this rate, the game is going to take 5 hours.

I didn't see today's performance, but Pressly has had plenty of velo. He looks super impressive for one hitter and then gets pounded. He was lousy at the end of ST and he's had three straight tough outings and counting.

From what I can see, the new strike zone and new catcher both help Santiago. He works up in the zone (so did Phil Hughes during his fine 2014) and has a lot of balls hit in the air. The good defensive outfield the Twins can put out there helps greatly, so does the weather if the fly balls aren't carrying that much. It is an oversimplification to say pitches at the top of the zone are mistakes, particularly fastballs. Last night, Bert criticized every well-hit ball by the Tribe with "he got that one up", more accurately the pitches were up in the zone and over the heart of the plate. Movement can allow a high strike over the middle to be a good pitch, too.

That is a tremendous turnout for an off-year first round special election. Given the fundamentals, I'd rate Handel the favorite, but Ossoff was close to getting 50% and I doubt the turnout will get that much higher in two months. The district's view of Trump might be totally different in 62 days.