Willihammer

http://d3k2oh6evki4b7.cloudfront.net/req/201604090/images/headshots/5/5abcd418_mlbam.jpg Landa, Yorman. 21 year old RH reliever from Miranda, Venezuela. Ranked #34 on Aaron Gleeman's preseason prospect list. From his website: Yorman Landa | Reliever | DOB: 6/94 | Throws: Right | Sign: Venezuela YEAR LV G GS ERA IP H HR SO BB 2013 RK+ 12 12 2.78 55.0 46 1 46 29 2014 A- 13 0 2.88 25.0 18 1 30 13 2015 RK 7 0 0.00 9.0 3 0 9 2 A- 15 0 1.67 27.0 18 1 31 14 Yorman Landa signed with the Twins out of Venezuela as a 16-year-old in 2010 and has yet to pitch above [high] Single-A, but the right-hander was added to the 40-man roster in November to protect him from the Rule 5 draft. Landa's numbers have been good at every stop, including a 2.53 ERA and 174 strikeouts in 181 career innings, but he's thrown more than 40 innings in a season just once thanks to injuries. Shoulder surgery ended his 2014 season and sidelined Landa for the first two months of 2015, but he returned to throw 36 innings with a 1.25 ERA and 40/16 K/BB ratio while holding opponents to a .167 batting average and one homer. Keeping the ball in the ballpark has been a major strength for Landa, a ground-ball machine who's allowed just four homers in 784 plate appearances as a pro. Last season opponents slugged .228 off Landa, including zero extra-base hits by lefties. Landa works in the mid-90s with his fastball and generates strikeouts with his slider. His control definitely needs work, as he's issued 104 walks in 181 innings and has never walked fewer than 4.0 batters per nine innings in a season. Based on a typical promotion schedule Landa wouldn't be in the Twins' plans until mid-2017 at the earliest, but since he's already on the 40-man roster a quicker call-up is always possible.

Abad has had good results, but is obviously having an outlier season. A multi-year contract would be buying high. I really hope they trade him instead and don't bring him back in the offseason on anything more than a 1 year deal. In a broader sense, I hope the Twins are banking baseball karma this year (and the last 6 years) that they have to cash it out at some point. Hopefully next year, in the form of a deep playoff run.

Cant wait to see these guys next month!

Uber runs criminal background checks on its applicants. I understand the city of Austin has had taxi drivers charged with sexual crimes during the same time span as the uber allegations. Taxi cabs are required to run their drivers through an additional fingerprint check. Was it determined that the cab companies skirted the process? How many of the Uber drivers (assuming they're guilty) were on a fingerprint database?

I wouldn't want the owners to be like Jerry Jones either. I mean, I have a job and I know that it sucks to be micro managed. Too much involvement hurts output. But I wouldn't expect to be completely unaccountable to my boss either. I know I wouldn't do my best work if that were the case. Neither extreme is desirable.

"Line of Succession." Begins with the owners, doesn't it? Presumably Carl knew something about baseball and the Twins when he chose to purchase the franchise in 1984. But the Pohlad boys, do they even like baseball? Do they watch the games and root for the team? I mean we moan about the incompetency of TR and Molitor, but what can you really expect if the CEO and owners aren't baseball people? Is that the case? I mean, I hope that's not the case. But from where I'm sitting, 2/3 of the family is completely hands off this team. Making movies and whatnot. Jim is the only owner who even sits in the front office. And whenever there's an interview like the one Scoggins did, the man sounds ambivalent about the team. If the insularity begins with the owners, then its no surprise the rest of the front office follows suit, is it? And why should fans expect any differently going forward, as long as the Pohlads remain owners?

Haha, this will be, by far, the greatest move of Molitor's tenure if he gets a DP out of this.

Exhibit Q in the stinking Whities out-defending the Twins today.

Has anyone been to Giordano's yet? Does it live up to the hype?

That right there. That's why managers dont need to think very hard about filling out a lineup card. Just put the best hitter at the top, the very top, on down from there. So you can avoid that as much as possible.

Unlimited pitch count on Milone and Fien.

Sano positioned for Saladino like he was Jose Abreu.

Elisha: http://assets.dose.com/image/upload/v1452562547/prod/images/dd3e46b8a5554c0baf56cdfced42aa69.jpg

The Twins are 450-550 since Target Field opened. They are 1432-1604 under Ryan They are 1701-1823 under Ryan/Smith They are 91-99 under Molitor. At some point results have to matter.

Its a small sample obviously, but Statcast captured some extreme measurements in Meyer's 2 appearances. http://m.mlb.com/statcast/leaderboard#avg-pitch-velo First off, his average fastball velocity was 95.8, which was "only" good for 38th in baseball. But his average extension was measured at 6.9 feet, tied with Noah Syndergaard for the greatest value on the statcast leaderboard. This extension bumps Meyer's average "perceived" velocity to 96.4, good for 12th on the Statcast leaderboard- behind a lot of relievers mostly.

I think that's a good description for them. I mean Scully is the undisputed GOAT. KC is 2nd, then another gap, followed by NYM, Bal, SF, Chi (NL), Seattle (personal pick), AZ, then everyone else.

I missed the game yesterday and I don't know if Meyer's a starter or reliever or a bust but it sure would be nice to know whose dog Meyer killed. Jesus the Twins handling of this kid is... what's a nice word for it... maybe, "delicate."

If you want to see/hear bad, watch the Nats, Astros, White Sox, Cardinals TV broadcasts. Dickbert are definitely middle of the pack. Rex Hudler is the greatest color man in the game and its not even close. Just a sampling of his genius:

Dick and Bert know the rule. But umpires sometimes mistakenly call strikes on pitches just off the plate. So Bert, a former pitcher, jokes that every pitch "on the black" is a strike. Its been a running joke for sometime.

I'll make this easier- Mauer, Sano, and Berrios are off the table. Everyone else should be fair game.

Yeah. I tend to agree with Barreiro that it would even out, but, it would be nice to know one way or the other the scope of the problem in the first place. That research doesn't seem to exist, or at least, its not public (or my google skills are failing me).

There's no question the Twins are underperforming their talent level IMO. Distinguishing the coaching, managing, hit sequencing, clubhouse leadership (or lack of), and plain dumb luck from each other is the hard part. Bruno is an easy target, but I doubt he's the main problem. I do wonder if he gets through to the Latin players as well as the English speakers. Seems like those guys have the worst at-bats (with exceptions- Sano, Buxton).

http://espn.go.com/mlb/story/_/id/15356284/mlb-replays-drastically-far-2016-season

Barreiro ranted about replay challenge last week, and I thought he made a good point: coaches are stalling after every single bang-bang play, and it kills the pacing of the game. He thought baseball could lose replay challenge altogether, during the regular season at least, because over 162 games the blown calls would even out anyways. Thoughts?

You might have a point about Santana but I would not use Buxton to make it. For one thing, Buxton seems to be about 1000x easier to strikeout.