70charger

Speaking as a counter-arguer, I did find the article to be thought-provoking and well-written. I don't really agree with the conclusion, but that's okay. I'd read more articles like it.

I'm several hours ahead of you guys, and this is the rare game that I can watch live. Pretty stoked. Just hope my internet doesn't crap out on me. Plus, I get to see Miguel Sano for the first time since last spring training. Feels like baseball season!

Too much speculation for my taste. Not to mention that I find it difficult to think that Prior would have been the tipping point between losing the ALCS in 2002 and washing out in the ALDS in 2003, and winning a World Series. There's an absolutely enormous gap there; one that I don't think is filled by a single pitcher. And we shouldn't be playing for third, right?

A. Knowing that the scoreboard was showing the incorrect information makes me think it was less "asleep at the switch" and more "responding to the information given." B. He's still a professional paid to play the game. He should know what the situation is regardless of what the scoreboard says. The scoreboard is for people like me, not people like him.

Yeah, that's why I do lots of 'roids. No, wait. Wait. ...That's why I'm fat.

If you go to guest services, you can get a certificate saying that so and so just went to their first Twins game. Maybe a fun little souvenir for when they're a bit older.

I should take up baseball again. It's February and I want to be in the best shape of my life. I agree though, this is emblematic of the sports media, which is roughly 93.4% cliches. My favorite are post-game interviews: INTERVIEWER: "That was quite the game tonight, but you came away with a win. What was the strategy when you called the audible on third-and-long? Were you thinking that the blitz was coming in from the weak side?" INTERVIEWEE: "Yeah, I just want to thank God, and Gatorade, and Nike, and we played our hearts out out there tonight, and you gotta hand it to the other team, but we just outlasted them." ....what!?

Now you're changing the conversation to centerfield defense. Fine. Even as far as that's concerned, I think their plan A, Aaron Hicks, is pretty good as far as defense goes. When he didn't hit, they got caught short a fielder, but I just don't see how that has to do with belief in math. Again, I'm fully willing to leave open the possibility that the Twins lag the rest of the world in stats. What I'm attempting to do is ask whether the measurements taken by this particular study are useful in proving that point.

Don't take this as an attack, but this kind of argument presumes the sufficiency of the statement that the Twins are skeptics. I.e., as long as a team is skeptical, there will be something that they're catching up at. But what if the perception of skepticism is incorrect? What if the Twins have changed over the last several years? My point is that it will take much, much longer for that to show up on the field than it would in pretty much any other sport. Which is to say, looking at the Twins' roster right now doesn't tell you as much as you'd think about the Twins right now. It tells you about the Twins of five-ish years ago. That statement does, by the way, leave open the possibility that the Twins haven't changed. But we can't properly argue from the conclusion.

Doesn't this seem like a trailing statistic at best? For example, the Twins' homegrown pitchers that are low-K guys (and I'm including the low-K guys of the last couple of years) were drafted under a different GM regime, and a different minor league coordinator, and probably with different scouts. There's also a big element of luck here too. It seems hard to ding the current Twins on non-K pitchers when the free agents who rack up the major strikeout numbers aren't in a realistic price range (and would be a terrible investment according to advanced statisticians themselves!), and the recent draftees have been anything but high-contact soft tossers. They just haven't hit the majors (yet). Baseball isn't basketball. You can't draft a LeBron and, voila, make the playoffs. I doubt the value of this study insofar as it regards baseball teams, and insofar as it measures current on-field personnel instead of overall strategy and/or entire-system makeup.

I swam in college with a guy named Klete, who had sisters named Kelsey and Kalyn. They were all swimmers. Their parents' names were Karen and Kelly. It's a bit ridiculous...

Scalping is legal in Minneapolis. If the weather is bad, you can score some pretty great deals. I doubt it'll be sold out though, so you could always fall back on the box office.

One guy "is convinced" that they piped in noise. Doesn't sound like a reliable source to me.

I hope to see him in the big leagues, and soon. I also hope he gets a fair shake as far as beginning-of-the-year rosters go, and I think he probably will. I remember last year when everyone (including me) assumed that Gibson would be shunted into the minors just because of numbers concerns. We were trying to squeeze value out of Worley, had Diamond not far removed from a good season, and had a lot of Deduno believers. But Gibson won it fair and square. Maybe the same thing happens to Meyer this year. In any case, I don't really see him losing out to a guy like Pelfrey.

I'm so on board with this. Why is it appropriate to chant along to a song that culminates in "I want to go home"? Shouldn't we want to be at the ballpark?

Who's "they"? MLBTradeRumors? Because they're not affiliated with the Twins. Just FYI.

This isn't really fair, since I live(d) five blocks from the stadium, but my friend and I stayed at the park for a three hour rain delay, mostly just hanging out and drinking Surly. (Side note: half Bandwagon, half Bender makes a really good beer!) By the time the game started, it was 10, half the people had left thinking the game would be called, and of the other half, most had trickled out by 11 or so. My buddy and I ended up sitting directly above the dugout, and we both got baseballs tossed to us by players. We would have given them to kids, but there weren't any left. It was totally worth the hangover.

Some José Molina facts from:http://m.espn.go.com/mlb/story?storyId=12081854 How about NOT José Molina?

Andrew Albers went to Korea after his partial year with the Twins. He's in the Blue Jays organization now. As far as I know, Matt Albers was never affiliated with the Twins.

There's a lot to be optimistic about here. The outfield's still a bit of a mess, but it looks like the infield is a strength offensively and defensively, and I'm feeling so much better about the starting rotation. I also think there could be significant turnover in the bullpen starting this year, which looks like it's shaping up very well. It's been a long few years. It's nice to see things beginning to come together.

I think it's highly likely that they'll want a good deal more than Escobar. I like Escobar, but there are a few facts to keep in mind here. 1. Escobar was largely considered a utility infielder tops. In fact, the Twins seem to think of him as a utility guy by their comments on Santana who may have the upside advantage, but who also hasn't proven himself a steady shortstop. Is there is any reason to think that other teams don't think of Escobar as a utility? 2. Reddick is considered something of a star in Oakland. And for good reason. With 10.5 bWAR over the last three years, he's a damn good player. Reddick being eligible to hit free agency two years earlier (2017 vs. 2019) should even things out a tad, but there's no getting around the fact that Reddick is the far superior player. 3. Possibly the most important, especially since it goes well beyond Escobar - Oakland pushed a whole hell of a lot of chips into the middle this past year after a very promising first half. They don't have much in the way of a farm team. While BR ranks the Twins number one overall, the A's are 28th. They're going to want to replenish, and prospect trades are difficult to do. Likely the A's will ask for more prospect potential than the Twins are willing to give up, and my initial thought is that the A's will be justified in asking for it and the Twins will be justified in refusing it. On the other hand, there's a possibility, slim as it may be, that the A's think of Escobar as a bigger talent than we do. I like Escobar, and I think he has the potential to be an above average shortstop. I don't know that he has the star potential of Reddick, but maybe the A's do and won't ask for the world alongside Escobar. And there is also the possibility that the A's want to push all of their chips back into the middle this coming year and try to contend. Maybe they don't think their window is closed. We thought they gave up way too much for Fuld; maybe they'll give up way too much for Escobar plus whatever else we won't miss terribly?

Posted four minutes ago by ESPN - Tampa Bay Rays manager exercises opt-out clause, leaving the team What!?

Worth it entirely for the name.

http://i.imgur.com/5bN9AFT.jpg

What kind of politics are going on here? The Twins better have an A+ hire to replace him, otherwise this one kind of stinks.