DaveW

Um, nope. I disagree with Garza being an "ace" lite and in a league that values wins this high he is basically a middle rotation guy. Also, he is basically having his career average season this year. Haren is on the wrong side of 30. I would give up a prospect package for either one, but I'm not going to give you Harvey, Meyer and Martinez for one of them, all three of which are somewhere near the top 20-30 pitching prospects in all of baseball.

His fastball is up 3 MPH, and he is now throwing his slider 30-50% more than he was prior to demotion (example: he threw 39 and 28 in his last two games vs 20, 18 and 22 in his 3 starts leading up to the demotion) Those two things alone seem like "proof" that he has changed something. Whether that is mechinical, mental or coaching is is TBD.

No they aren't.

Over his last ten starts he is basically mimicking his 2010 performance with: Speed, # of pitches thrown,% of breaking stuff thrown. He hasn't had any real injury issues since coming back from Tommy John surgery, if he gave us 191.2 IP in 2010 without any arm issues, and hasn't hard any arm issues this year there isn't some reason to assume he will suddenly develop arm issues again. Of course the risk is still there as it is with every other pitcher, but I don't see him as some "high injury risk" just because he is throwing hard again like he did in 2010. Also I added an edit to my previous post which shows his velocity has kicked up about 3MPH from his last start before demotion to currently, obviously something was tweaked, I am not a pitching coach nor do I pretend to be an expert in mechanics, I would be interested to see someone do a thorough analysis on it to see what/if anything was changed. From my purely "eyes" only approach it seems apparent to me the staff found something, worked with Liriano and fixed it thus leading him to pitching more effectively.

He is throwing the slider quite a bit more recently then he was in the early year and in 2011. His current slider usage percentage is basically even with his 2010 year, in 2008/09 his slider % were pretty low as well. So maybe that is one explanation? His fast ball velocity has averaged 93.2 MPH his year, in 2011 it was 91.8, in 2008/2009 it was 90.00 and 91.5 In 2010 his Fast ball averaged 94.2 In Liriano's last start before his demotion to the pen he averaged 90.4 MPH on his fastball (topped out at 91.7) in his latest start he averaged 93.7 MPH on his fastball (topped out at 94.1). Clearly something has changed for him. Also his 2012 stats still show his ERA is over a run higher then his xFIP and FIP (this includes his horrific start as well), his LOB% is a little lower then normal as well so it can be said that Liriano has actually been somewhat unlucky this year.

He is posting the 2nd highest k/9 rate of his career, that is what has changed thus far, if he can manage to keep it around the 9.9 rate he has now, while keeping his bb and hr rates constant he should be able to stay an effective starter and possibly even an "ace" type guy. Is there a chance that he falls off a cliff again? Of course there is, if there wasn't that good chance we'd be talking about a much much much larger contract then a 2/20 or 3/30 deal. I'd rather pay that money to the risk that is Liriano over the next Carl Pavano who is going to give you pretty standard #3/#4 numbers. Every year fans bash the front office for signing guys like Marquis, Hernandez etc over high risk/high reward guyes like Harden, Bedard, etc, at this point we have a guy who has a solid track record, has been on fire since he was sent down to the pen (adjustments?) and according to that latest Star Tribune article enjoys his time with Minnesota and wants to stay a Twin.

Bert's 5 IP 3 ER quality start stat is complete Rubbish and doesn't even warrant a response. Giving up 3 ER in 5 Innings is quite terrible IMO. Give me a starter that goes 7-8 IP and gives up 4 ER any day of the week. The problem with "what Blackburn did last night on a regular basis" is that through 100+ years of baseball statistics it is near impossible for a guy like Blackburn (not great stuff, doesn't strike anyone out) to throw gems on a regular basis. Is it to much of a stretch to say Liriano has the highest upside of anyone in the Twins system? If that is the case or he is close to that then you have to keep him around.

Revere for Shields straight up. Boom.

Montana really doesn't count.

I'd be interested in Haren or Garza to be honest.

God no. The Royals playoff appearances before the Brett era:0 The Royals playoff appearances after the Brett era: 0 The ownership/management is clueless there, yes they have a nice looking farm system because eventually when you draft in the top 5 year in and year out some of those guys will end up being top prospects.

If Liriano continues to strike out 10.9 batters per nine inning(assuming his bb/9 rate stays the same) he will not return to his April/May self, he will be pitching like a top of the rotation type guy. It's disingenuous to not inlcude 2010 in any discussion of Liriano's talents, I know what you were trying to do (claiming that Liriano is only good a for a stretch each year and terrible the rest) if you would have included the 2010 stretch it would have shown that Liriano posted a 9.4 k/9 rate throughout the full season, in 2006 Lirianos best year he had a k rate of 10.7 This year he has a 9.9 overall and 10.9 in his past 10 starts, its pretty easy to surmise that Liriano is a damn fine pitcher when he is striking out a lot of folks, when he isn't he is somewhere between medicore and bad. The real question is: Do we think Liriano can keep up his current k rate? And from watching his starts over the past couple months I don't see any reason why he can't. I know it's super against the grain here to give Anderson or any coach credit for anything, but perhaps he is the reason why Liriano is dominant again? They put him in the pen, Anderson had more time to work with him and he comes back up and starts to dominate. Make no mistake about it, the Twins won't have another starting pitcher who even approachs 9k per nine for at least 2-3 years if they dump Liriano for some C+ prospect.

That's cute that you completely left 2010 off. Also his k/9 rate of 10.9 is the big difference...................

It would be fun to have the team in Las Vegas.

Where did I ever compare Liriano to Mauer?

Nobody is denying he is a Braves fan, it was just the notion that Wisconsin is "Braves territory" Also the Rams and Raiders moved within the past 20 years and the Raiders still play relatively close to LA. (not over 1500 miles away). The Braves moved almost 50 years ago and ended up getting new team in the area a short time later.

You know what, for some reason I totally blanked on Hendriks as he hasn't reached the 50 IP threshold. I would probably have him replace Goodrum as #7. I really think he can put it together and become a solid #3.(Legit number 3, not Carl Pavano #3) I'm curious why you put Rosario ahead of Arcia at this point? Is it strictly positional wise? (not arguing or anything as prospect lists more than most thing in sports can vary quite a bit due to certain peoples preferences and ideas) I guess the only reason I put Goodrum that high is because I really like his ceiling. Even though his average isn't the best it is super encouraging to see him taking a ton of walks 20% BB/rate! and hitting for some decent power (3 HR, 6 3B, 5 2B). If he can stick at SS he could be a special player. I haven't given up on Benson, I just drop him quite a bit due to his early struggles, if he can come back strong and play like he did pre 2012 I think he slots somewhere right behind Hicks and Gibson. Either way the way it stacked up now the Twins have 10-12 prospects we can be very, very excited about in the minors. It seemed to me the largest criticism the Twins received for their farm system was the lack of upper minors talent. 2013 should change that as Hicks, Arcia and Gibson should all be in AAA to start the year (if they don't make the team out of spring training) and Sano and Rosario should be less than 2 years away from the bigs as well. It's not a perfect system by any means and they still have a ways to go, but at this point they should be close to the top 10-12 in all of baseball prior to 2013.

Can we please, please, please stop blaming the Twins for letting Dickey go? It holds no water.

We did it for Punto.

Good point, I hate it when players preform well in a given period of time that completely matches their production in an earlier body of work. i.e. Liriano is pitching very well the past 10 games, he also had the lowest FIP in the AL in 2010.

Revere should not be in RF..wow.

Mauer is now hitting over .380 since May 20th and has an OPS somewhere around .975

That is one thing I won't miss when we trade Span.

Harrison and Goodrum with 2 hits each. Harrison with his 16th error though. As mentioned above Arcia had a great game 3 hits, 2HR, 1 2B, 6 RBI Hicks had a nice game as well 2 for 4, 1 triple, 2 walks. OPS now at .815 Sano 0 for 4, 33rd error on the season, ouch!

Fien has been a nice bright spot lately for the Twins, if he can somehow keep it up the Twins have a nice cheap bullpen heading into 2013 with Perkins, Burton, Fien and Duensing.