Otto von Ballpark

"So you see, Mr. Pohlad, a 10 year, $300 million deal right now would actually save you money!"

36 years ago today, Twins fans had a frightening experience at the Metrodome. And Ron Davis hadn't even entered the game yet! It was a Saturday night in April 1986, and the stadium was unusually crowded with fans for that era, with an announced attendance of 31,996. I'd like to report that a mass of Twins faithful had shown up to support a young, exciting team building towards a World Series championship the following year, but Howard Sinker in the next morning's Star Tribune likened it to a timeshare presentation instead: 125 vacations were being awarded to fans that night. As the Twins built a 5-1 lead in front of that captive audience inside the Dome, a severe thunderstorm was happening outside. Roads were flooded and trees were downed in the metro area, but thanks to the Dome's roof, the Twins and Angels played on in comfort. That is, until Mickey Hatcher stood at the plate in the bottom of the 8th inning, when the roof began to undulate, heavy light banks to sway, and rainwater to pour on fans in several places. The next day's KARE 11 newscast likened it to "a scene from a horror movie." Caught in the turmoil were these two Chippendales dancers, apparently: Home plate umpire Ken Kaiser halted play and called the players off the field, while public address announcer Bob Casey told fans to remain calm and evacuate the upper deck. Despite the drama, fans were never in any danger, the Metrodome operations crew was quickly able to adjust the air pressure to stabilize the roof, and the game resumed after a 9 minute delay. How did it happen? Jay Weiner broke it down in the Monday April 28 Star Tribune: When play resumed, Hatcher scored Steve Lombardozzi with a sacrifice fly to extend the Twins lead to 6-1. Unfortunately, that is when the real disaster began. Frank Viola started the 9th inning by allowing a double and a home run to cut the lead to 6-3, and the Twins brought in the aforementioned Ron Davis to try for the save. Davis had begun the 1986 season with 5 scoreless appearances, but his previous outing was a five-run shellacking at the hands of this very Angels ballclub. As might be expected, Davis was greeted with a single and home run to further cut the Twins lead to 6-5, before finally recording the first out of the inning. A Reggie Jackson pinch-hit walk and another out followed, to bring the Twins within one out of victory. But eventual Rookie of the Year Wally Joyner clubbed a two-run homer to put the Angels on top 7-6, and the Twins went down in order in the bottom of the 9th to end the game. This game turned out to be the penultimate 9th inning save opportunity of Davis' career; remarkably, he was still able to be traded to the Cubs in August 1986 with a 9.08 ERA for the season. This game proved to be the final Twins weather delay at the Metrodome, according to Stew Thornley. Even after being wind-battered, the Dome further proved it was not broken by hosting the Twins and Angels again the following afternoon, although the final outcome wasn't much different: an 8-7 Angels victory, this time without the help of Ron Davis.

Twins fans experience a scary scene as a storm wreaks havoc with the Metrodome roof during a game. KARE 11 news also runs down four previous roof-related incidents at the Dome. Watch the rest of KARE 11's coverage of that storm here. Presented in partnership with TC Media Now. View full video

Here are a few things I've always wanted on the Twins official roster pages: - Shading the player rows to reflect their status -- primarily to recognize the 60-day IL guys who don't count against the 40-man limit, but if a second additional shade wasn't too intrusive, you could do one for the non-active roster guys too (minors or 10-day IL). - Total counts above each positional group would be nice. For example, if the heading said something like "Pitchers (23 + 3)" or "Pitchers (23 / 26)" to indicate that there are 23 pitchers counting against the number 40 at this time, and an additional 3 beyond that. Same for catchers, infielders, and outfielders.

Great point — that play was really all on Abreu. I think he could have done a better job blocking Anderson’s offline throw in the first place (or at least managed to keep his glove on ), but Abreu’s throw home after that was simply pointless.

Celestino would be eligible to be recalled immediately from optional assignment if Buxton (or anyone else) were to go on the IL. As it is, neither Buxton nor Celestino is playing tonight.

This got me thinking -- I plugged Radke's stats through 2001 (before he started missing time due to injury) into the "Favorite Toy", a Bill James tool to estimate the chances of a player reaching a certain statistical milestone. It had him at 0% chance of reaching 300 wins, but did forecast a career total of 187 (Radke would actually finish with 148): https://www.espn.com/mlb/stats/billjames/_/age/28/careertotal/93/yearone/15/yeartwo/12/yearthree/12 Right after his 20 win season, it gave him a 4% chance of reaching 300, but his forecast was only 181 wins at that point, so it was probably an extremely wide range of possible outcomes due to lack of sample size.

Prince may be gone, and Josh Donaldson too, but there's still a place for controversy here. Image courtesy of Twins Daily Prince may be gone, and Josh Donaldson too, but there's still a place for controversy here. Temperatures are finally rising at Target Field and also in the Twins Daily forums, as the community contends with a non-contending start. Our resident shock jock @Vanimal46 proved he can still stoke the forum fires by soliciting Your Most Controversial Baseball Opinion. The result is a crowdsourced compendium of scorching hot takes that is just waiting for your input, if you haven't shared it already. At least the Twins got back in the win column Thursday, and @Linus showed some appreciation for the stars of the game: our strike-throwing de facto ace and strike-throwing fill-in centerfielder Joe Ryan and Nick Gordon. No baseball discussion can be complete without a closer controversy, and the Twins obliged by swapping a Taylor for a Tyler (among others) on the eve of opening day. @alexthegreat puts the Duffman under a microscope by asking, Tyler Duffey: Too early to panic? Perhaps early detection is the key to preventing another Colomé conflagration. Like Garfield hates Mondays, @Number3 casts aspersions on a whole calendar month by claiming April is a waste, and advises the Twins to just hang in there, baby, like the proverbial cat on a clothesline, at least until May 1st when "the real season will begin." No one is running away with the division yet, so they could be right. Finally, broadening our horizons beyond baseball, we look across the street from Target Field toward Target Center, as @Bad Loser Blog asks of the Timberwolves, How far can this team go? Even if you don't know a three-second lane violation from a fifteen-minute oil change, breaking a basketball curse could bode well for busting a baseball one too. The return of the White Sox to Minneapolis this weekend is expected to inspire more great discussions, so be sure to follow along in the forums and join in the fun and/or frustration. View full article

Medina hasn't pitched outside of the Arizona Complex League and the Dominican Summer League yet. I don't think he's even at a point where you can project a "floor" for him. That's not a knock on him -- these players all have to start somewhere -- but I feel like we're getting ahead of ourselves here.

What's the "pedigree" here exactly? It's not in the statistical record yet (although to be fair, Medina is still young). MLB ranked him 19th in the 2019-2020 international class, although I'm not sure what that's worth 2+ years later. FWIW, Medina's $700k bonus would put him between Malfrin Sosa and Yonardy Sota on the Twins international signing list that year -- do those names connote a "pedigree" right now? MLB ranked Medina fairly well on their Padres prospect list this winter, but that seems a bit of an outlier compared to BA and Fangraphs -- and it's about the only thing that suggests Medina isn't a fairly standard lotto ticket for this type of trade.

MLB.com ranked Medina 14th for the Padres, but per MLBTR, BA only had him 26th last year. Fangraphs lists him at 35+ FV right now, and had him 27th on the updated Padres list last season. Until they revise it, that Fangraphs FV grade would rank Medina in the 31-40 range in the Twins org, with the following guys: 31 Sean Mooney 24.2 A+ SP 2023 35+ 32 Will Holland 23.9 A 2B 2024 35+ 33 Yilber Herrera 17.2 R SS 2027 35+ 34 David Festa 22.0 A SP 2025 35+ 35 Christian MacLeod 21.9 R SP 2025 35+ 36 Jovani Moran 24.9 MLB SIRP 2022 35+ 37 Steven Cruz 22.8 A+ SIRP 2023 35+ 38 Yennier Cano 28.0 AAA SIRP 2022 35+ 39 Francis Peguero 24.6 A+ SIRP 2022 35+ 40 Juan Mendez 23.4 R SIRP 2025 35+

I've got a controversial opinion: Blackouts are actually good! Thanks to blackouts and the T-Mobile sponsorship, MLB.TV is virtually free to anyone who wants it.

I tend to agree that money isn't much of a factor here, although 40-man guys in the minors don't necessarily make the full MLB minimum, and guys with less experience (for example, Blayne Enlow) tend to make less than vets in such situations. (The exact amount can be based on how many years you've been on the 40-man, and what your previous year's salary was.) So depending on the players involved, there could have been a modest salary cost for a team to cut someone in favor of Jharel Cotton.

In what is now a rare occurrence, the Twins beat the Yankees behind the offensive and defensive contributions of centerfielder Darrell Brown (soon to play Wally Pipp to Kirby Puckett's Lou Gehrig), per this WCCO Noon Report from the following day. New acquisition Mike Smithson improves to 2-0 while Ron Davis nails down the save. Watch the full newscast here. Presented in partnership with TC Media Now. View full video

Waivers are not revocable — there is no working out trades from waiver claims. The player is simply awarded to the claiming team with the highest priority at the end of the waiver period. (You may be confusing them with the old August “trade waivers” but these are outright assignment waivers.)

When DFA, a team has up to a week to decide what to do with the player. They probably put Rodriguez on waivers immediately, but may have waited with Cotton. (The waiver period is now 3 days, so they’d have to place him on waivers no later than 4 days after the DFA.)

A few days ago, we got shut out with 14 strikeouts. Baby steps!

Here is a free article at Baseball America with early data about the effects of new 2022 pitch clock rules in the minors: New Rules Dramatically Speeding Up MiLB Games Some kind of pitch clock is supposed to be implemented for the 2023 MLB season too, per the new CBA agreement between teams and players in March. Would you like to see this minor league pitch clock carried over to the majors next year? Why or why not?

It may be that they view one multi-inning outing as less risky for Duran’s health than multiple shorter outings. Roles are fluid and the season is long, so he could still transition to a multi-inning piggyback starter role, setting up a full-fledged return to starting in 2023 even if he doesn’t get there in 2022.

“A week or so off”? Will be interesting to see if they put him on the 10-day IL. Would miss 9 games before he is eligible to return Tuesday April 26. Could do minor league rehab games before then — Saints will be in Toledo next weekend while the Twins g̶o̶ ̶t̶o̶ host Chicago.

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