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Mark G

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Everything posted by Mark G

  1. Mark G
    I read Bowden's article yesterday and came away from it with a small yawn. Wasn't interested. But if we could get a young catcher that will be with us for several years, and can hit, I wonder if Baltimore would be willing to eat a contract and take Lopez instead. Ryan, Ober, and all the pitchers we have coming up would give a good test to the vaunted pitching pipeline the FO is so proud of and free up a bit of cash to shore up the lineup. But not until we know more about our chances to get to the post season.
  2. Mark G
    This organization breeds every infield position BUT 1st base, and it has been going on for a long time. First base and catcher seem to be our bugaboos, mainly because it is hard to develop a really good long term catcher, and we look at the first base position the same way we look at DH; just rotate people in and out, occasionally signing a 1 year stop gap. I truly hope this guy develops and gives us several decent years. If we just can't develop a good first baseman, then trade for a long term solution, but I do hope Billy can succeed.
  3. Mark G
    Enough of the "rotating" infielders between positions and DH, OK? Put the man where you think he will give you his best and let him play; that goes for everyone else on the team as well. We don't need half a dozen utility players and a handful of "regulars" doing circles around the diamond. Put him at third until he proves he sucks too much to stay there; if that happens we will move him. Not every position is so flexible that any player can just slide into it depending on what lineup Rocco's spreadsheet calls for against a particular pitcher. The players need a chance to solidify the position they play best and just play. That frees up the mind to just play naturally and let their talent take over instead of always having to overthink every play of every inning.
  4. Mark G
    And as overworked as some of us believe the pen is (count me in that group), if my memory serves me correctly we have lost 13 road games where we never pitched the 9th inning at all. That is 13 games the pen was spared at least another inning, or maybe even extra innings occasionally if tied (correct me if my memory took a nap somewhere along the line). I would like to think that maybe we are seeing a trend beginning where he is letting his top 3 starters go deeper, and if that is the case we can afford to go the route you are talking about with a couple of the starters piggy backing and saving some bullpen arms. Maybe replacing Alcala with a Festa or a Matthews who would eat innings the short guys are working now. I wonder if Rocco would start accepting my calls if I stop calling collect. 🤔
  5. Mark G
    The pecking order would never had come to that if he hadn't pulled Paddock early. Was it really a good process gone bad, or a process that didn't have to happen? There was no hindsight when he pulled Paddock; he knew in that moment he was going to use at least 4 guys from the pen, and if Varland had gotten through, who was going to take the 10th? Varland? Or one of the guys he was trying not to use in the first place? It all began with the decision to pull Paddock when he didn't need to.
  6. Mark G
    I would submit it was 2 1/2 runs (I don't give the ghost runners full credit) on 13 hits and 3 walks. Toss in the 3 doubles and we had, what, 19 total bases? Or should I add the ghost runner and make it 21? 🙄 I don't dare listen to these guys on the radio because I would want to throw the radio out the window, and I value my radio more than that. 😏
  7. Mark G
    I hope I did not leave the impression I thought it was a good plan. I haven't liked it since day 1. 🤕 It is just who he is.
  8. Mark G
    In basketball they run a rotation of players each game, with the starters getting the most minutes, but the reserves spelling them for a certain number of minutes a game to keep them as fresh as possible. Rocco does the same type of thing; our "starters" play more games than the others, but he runs a rotation of sorts using the bench guys to spell the starters a certain number of games a season. Everyone plays and everyone rests. Games like yesterday are simply an outcome of that overall plan. It is simply who he is and how he believes players should be used. Yes, it will keep players rested; and it will result in games like yesterday. He simply believes the former is more important than the latter. Actually, he uses the pitching staff in a similar manner, but that is a subject I get grief for pointing out, so..........😉
  9. Mark G
    "Paddock finished the 5th inning having thrown only 76 pitches, but it didn't matter. He was never going to see the 6th inning." If Steven is right, and there is no reason to believe he is not, what does that tell us? I read that as saying Rocco never considered letting him pitch more than 5, no matter what his pitch count was or how effective he was; again, plan A going into the game was to use 5 pitchers. Am I misreading this? Many years ago I had a supervisor who got extremely frustrated with a problem we were having. One day he stood up and said "we have got to have a plan; we have GOT to have a plan. I don't even care if it is a GOOD plan!" And he walked away gesturing. I think him and Rocco must have gone to the same school of management. 🥴
  10. Mark G
    My question back would be: should it be? Should that be standard? If the starting rotation was the weak link of the team and was simply not very good, your post would make sense, and I would be riding the train you are on, not the one I am on. But we are being told that our rotation is strong, very good in fact, so why do we want your stats to be plan A year in and year out? Do we really want every one of those guys pitching that often? And I still submit it is not the number of innings, or the number of pitches, but the number of appearances; the number of times in a season they need to have their stuff going for them or it can cost us a game. And when 3-4 pen guys a game almost every game parade in, all it takes is one to blow up a close game if they are off. On a team with a strong rotation, is the above usage you point to the most desirable plan? I have said this before as well, it is a debate that is worthy of having, but it cannot be won. I am just glad it is respectful and logical. ☺️
  11. Mark G
    I am not sure I would use the word destroy as my choice of semantics, but I concur with Bean5302 100% as to bullpen usage. As he stated, the number of pitches each reliever throws in each game is not the point; the point is we are playing with fire every game we use 4 or 5 (or more?) pitchers in a game, regardless of pitch count for either the pen or the starter. If a starter stays healthy and pitches his every 5 games, he will start 32 (give or take 1) games over the course of the season. That is 32 times we are hoping he will have his best stuff and can keep us in the game and give us a chance to win. When he does not have his best stuff and is getting roughed up, we take him out and hope the bullpen can keep the lid on until we can score some runs. When he does have his best stuff we should be riding that start as long as possible, limiting the number of pitchers we have to use that game. Again, pitch count has nothing to do with either the starter or the pen; it is counting on each pitcher in the game to have their good stuff to get us through and win the game. A starter only pitches in 32 games; a reliever who stays healthy all year and is used as often as we use ours will enter anywhere from 50ish games to possibly 70ish, meaning we are hoping he has his best stuff approx. twice as often as any of our starters. If any one of the guys from the pen on any given day has a bad outing, runs score and games can be lost. Why, then, would we want to average 3-4 relievers a game all season long when our starter has his good stuff? He will come out early on the days he does not, and stay in on the days he does; it will even out in the end, and the pen will not be taxed to the degree we tax ours. When plan A is to use 3-5 pitchers a game, every game, there is no way around the fact the pen will be taxed beyond what would be considered desirable. Of course we should pull the starter when he is off, but we should also ride him when he is on fire; the pitch count will even out over the course of the season. Pitch counts don't matter for relievers, nor do innings pitched, anywhere near as much as number of games pitched in, which is the number of times he can affect the outcome of the game, good or bad. And that is going to be high when we use the pen 40-45% of all innings pitched, which we will with Plan A. And round and round it goes; where it stops, nobody knows. 😉
  12. Mark G
    The article began by talking about the depth the organization has within the 40 man roster, but how much depth can there be when we have to constantly probe the DFA list around MLB to fill holes? Are we equating versatility with depth? Because they are not the same things. I know there are a handful of injured guys in St. Paul as well, but what does it say about our position player depth in our minor leagues that we feel other teams cast offs are better options than our AAA players? I am open to critique if I am missing something.
  13. Mark G
    Nice thought, and nice stat. But 13 innings in 3 "starts"? We need more than that out of our "starters".
  14. Mark G
    First point is definitely true; with 6 walks and 2 hit batters in 8 innings we should have been able to do a little bit more.
  15. Mark G
    I definitely get your point, but why is it that the only team, at least in a while, we have been able to 'make' be the White Sox has been the White Sox? 🥴
  16. Mark G
    I can picture in my mind 10 other managers in the AL asking the question "why can't I play the White Sox 13 times a year?" 😉
  17. Mark G
    Nice article; very complimentary. It was also the longest sports article I have ever read because of one play (4.4 seconds). 🙃
  18. Mark G
    I am pretty close to that 60 year point myself. The old Met stadium was one of my favorite places on earth to be; 2nd deck, just to the right or left of home plate, 1st 10 rows. We would buy tickets when they went on single game sale and go as a group. One of the things that helped attendance wise as well, were scheduled double headers on Sunday afternoons. They not only drew better crowds, but sold a lot more concessions as the day went along. You would see most, if not all the players at one time or another as some of the guys played one game or the other. There is no such experience today, the players refuse to do it. The days of Ernie Banks looking out at the field and saying "it's a good day to play two", or Cal Ripkin Jr saying "like hell I am sitting out of the 2nd game" are long gone, and baseball is the worse for it. In my mind the game began to die when the players themselves forgot that it is a game. A game they get paid to play, but only because folks like us are willing to pay to watch (and dream). Maybe an autographed ball for everyone once in a while; balls are a dime a dozen, and the players can spare the time for the people who pay to see them. Until they show us they truly want us back we aren't coming back, at least not very often. We (the fans) got them to here; it is in their court now.
  19. Mark G
    The bullpen is not burned...........yet. And I have looked at the projected innings; the only thing keeping them as low as they appear right now is the fact the pen has not had to pitch the 9th innings of the games we lost on the road, which I seem to recall being 10. Those projections would be a lot higher if we had to pitch those innings, or even tied the game and went to extras. But my overall concern, projections or not, is the continued use of the 7th and 8th guys, along with the shuttle bus guys to and from St. Paul. That is what is keeping the numbers down on the guys we really count on to win the games out of the pen, and how often do we really want the bottom layer of the pen out there? I have always believed that your best starters going deeper is better than your bottom relievers pitching more often, but that is just me, I guess. As of right now the pen has worked just under 43% of the innings pitched this season. Again, that is only because of the games we never saw the 9th inning, or it would be just over 45%. The pen may not be burned yet, but last year should have taught us that continued usage at that pace did burn the pen out and may very well do it again unless those percentages change as the season goes along. And that is solely on the manager.
  20. Mark G
    The manager's job is also to manage the coaches he is given. And, considering the manager usually gets to select the coaches he wants working with him, he could very well be responsible for everything involving the coaching staff. He can't ever just assign them a role and walk away assuming they will succeed; he must be reviewing everything all season long.
  21. Mark G
    While all of the above article is true, and it sticks in my craw as well, for me, personally, it is more about the product year in and year out that is highest on my list. I simply don't care for the style of ball this team plays. From the players the FO pursues to the way the manager plays them, I just don't care for the way the team approaches the game. I accept the fact I am old school, and I don't give a rats rear end about all the expanded stats (give me the triple crown numbers every day and twice on Sunday), but the over emphasis on these, and others, just don't excite me the way the game used to. I have said many times on this site that the game has not changed; only the way it is managed has, and I simply don't care for the way it is managed anymore. And this organization is married to the trends, so it is no longer as much fun to watch anymore, Add to that everything in the article above, and as much as I love the game, and as much as I have been a Twins fan for close to 60 years, I will follow my team every day and root for the guys, I will not pay to see this team play the style it does and give to this ownership money that I have earned and that they have not. I am not naive enough to think that new ownership automatically brings back everything I love; I accept that they may be new age, so to speak, as well, but hope springs eternal when it comes to my sport and my team. I just want to see a good game of baseball as I know and love it, win or lose, and what I see today just isn't it. I don't want to see strike outs all day long, either by my pitcher or my batters. See the ball, hit the ball, catch the ball, and run like hell until you are out (or until you are safe). Baseball. That's the game I played and that is the game I want to see. We don't play that way anymore, not because the game has changed, but because that is the way we manage it (along with others, I know). Anyway, if you actually read all of this, I thank you, and apologize for making you. 🤭
  22. Mark G
    I genuinely love the sentiment, but it is like the article saying if the umpire had just not missed those two strikes........
  23. Mark G
    Those teams had Tom Kelly as their manager. We have.............
  24. Mark G
    I am going to guess that LambchoP is talking about overall usage; yes, each individual pitcher is not in imminent danger of being overly taxed, but we shouldn't want to use all 8 (plus the train to and from St. Paul) as much as we are. My latest arithmetic says that the pen is pitching just under 43% of all innings pitched in the season (yes, I know it is only 23 games). And that is only because we lost to the home team I believe 10 or so times, meaning we never pitched the 9th or the pen would have theoretically pitched over 45%, and some of the guys you project out would have more innings, and a higher projection. I would prefer the train riders and our 7th and/or 8th best not pitch as often as they are going to have to at this pace. Saying the starters will stretch out come May or warmer is a nice thought, and of course they should, but that has not exactly been our MO in recent years. 42, 43, 44% or so seems to be more our norm than not, and if last year didn't show us the danger in that, well, I know the definition of insanity. If you are right, and the starters stretch out and give us more, I give you permission to reprint this post and say I told you so. 🤭
  25. Mark G
    And Ryan lost today. 😒
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