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Otto von Ballpark

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Everything posted by Otto von Ballpark

  1. Otto von Ballpark
    Everyone: be careful when accepting a liquid beverage from someone named "Original Whizzinator".
  2. Otto von Ballpark
    And the Twins have a bunch of injured players on the 40-man roster -- Hughes, May, and O'Rourke. There is no problem adding Moya, if that is what the Twins want to do.
  3. Otto von Ballpark
    No. I'd possibly put Gee on the roster too, but not for this circumstance. I'm thinking more in case you need a long guy both early and late (i.e. extra innings). But you don't get cute with Ervin.
  4. Otto von Ballpark
    That would be pretty cool. 2 days ago, Fangraphs pegged it as a 0.4-1.1% chance (Red Sox falling to the wild card). Presumably that includes the probability of losing a tiebreaker game? In any case, now that they've lost 2 in a row, and the Yankees have won 2 in a row, it's up to 4-10%. Still a 3 game deficit with 5 to play is tough. And the Blue Jays have played spoiler to the Red Sox the last 2 nights, and they play the Yankees next weekend too. It's not like the Yankees get to face the Tigers. And while the Astros trail by only 1 game now, Cleveland has the tiebreaker advantage for home field. So the Astros really have to make up 2 games on Cleveland with only 5 to play (and the last 3 for Cleveland are home vs. the White Sox, while Houston will be on the road in Boston for 4). The next two Twins vs Cleveland games might actually be the most important in this regard, to help keep the Astros playing (mildly) meaningful games as late as possible.
  5. Otto von Ballpark
    The savvy veteran decision to fail at bunting and then get a base hit swinging away?
  6. Otto von Ballpark
    Joke all you want, but players are thinking sacrificing helps the team more than it really does. Who is ultimately responsible for managing that?
  7. Otto von Ballpark
    Although also notice that Escobar kept on trying to bunt to "help the team." I think the culture of sac bunting is ingrained, and I want to see Molitor breaking that. It's probably going to take more than calling it off at 1-1 to do it, but it is his job.
  8. Otto von Ballpark
    Mejia was injured shortly thereafter, so there could have been room for both. (And there was a case for sending him out instead of Gibson too, he wasn't pitching very deep.)
  9. Otto von Ballpark
    No one is claiming the probability percentages are perfect. But "this isn't likely" could mean 51% or 75% of 99%. Some of us enjoy seeing probability in less binary terms, grayscale instead of simple black and white. (Imagine the killjoy who says with every plate appearance, "a base hit isn't likely here" ) Feel free to disregard, if you prefer. FWIW, Fangraphs "coin flip mode" is a decent sanity check with so few games remaining -- since game outcomes are indeed binary, if you simply flipped a coin for the results, what are the odds you could make up a deficit of X flips with Y flips remaining? Twins are at 75.5% there right now. Obviously no one is flipping coins and we will all watch them play the games, but I enjoy seeing that 75% as opposed to just "this is/isn't likely", which could be equally applied to a variety of deficits right now. Also, semantics, but describing a 2.5 game deficit as a "5 game swing with 9/10 remaining" sounds like you are double-counting the numerator (5 combined Angels/Rangers wins and Twins losses) and only single-counting the denominator (since each team has 9/10 games remaining, so there are actually 19/20 events to make up the "5 game swing"). I tend to think of days, so the Angels/Rangers need to make up ground on the Twins for +3 days over the next 10.
  10. Otto von Ballpark
    Sure, but it wasn't a butt slide either. His knees, hands, and wrists were making impact with the ground, and he was tumbling over after the catch. Players should almost never risk crashing into each other at any time, and not often crashing into a wall either. But the standards are changed in a blowout -- heck, Granite himself was in the game as defensive replacement to reduce injury risk to a regular. But he's important enough (4th viable outfielder) that I think I'd still want him to exercise a bit more caution in that situation too.
  11. Otto von Ballpark
    Re: Granite's catch in the 9th -- I guess he's not a starter, but is that a smart risk in the 9th inning of a 12-1 game? If he gets hurt, we're going to need Grossman, Adrianza, etc. in the outfield in more meaningful situations...
  12. Otto von Ballpark
    Interesting that the Rangers have pulled even with the Angels. They have 7 of 10 with Oakland, but 3 with Houston too. The Angels have 3 with Houston starting today, then 4 with the White Sox, and 3 with Seattle who will almost assuredly be mathematically eliminated by then (odds down to 0.3% at Fangraphs). Interesting to compare the 3 projection models at Fangraphs: Projections: Angels 14.7%, Rangers 5.4% Season to date stats: Rangers 12.4%, Angels 9.8% Coin flip: Rangers 10.3%, Angels 9.6% Twins odds are 73.3%, 75.5%, and 76% by those 3 models, respectively. Looks the Fangraphs "projection" has Adrian Beltre missing the rest of the season, but he homered yesterday playing through a hamstring strain, so we'll see. Hamels and especially Cashner have both out-performed their FIP so far too, so we will see how they finish (Hamels tossed a gem last night).
  13. Otto von Ballpark
    And now your correction is outdated too -- we have a 2.5 game lead for the 2nd wild card.
  14. Otto von Ballpark
    Fangraphs has the Twins odds at 61-65%. They could still miss without an "epic collapse", it's just 2 games (and only 1 loss difference right now) in 10 days. FWIW, Rockies have roughly the same odds in the NL right now, with a 1 game lead on the Brewers. Per 538, the Cardinals had a 62% chance last year on Sep. 22 and missed. They were tied with the Mets and Giants that day, and finished 6-4 -- but both the Mets and Giants finished 7-3.
  15. Otto von Ballpark
    Yes. A game 163 would guarantee 1 extra game at home, but it would lower our chances of winning the wild card game and the guaranteed home postseason game that would come with that. Not to mention, since we already have a lead, a game 163 would likely mean we blew that lead, which would be a bit of a sour taste before we even played the game. (The 2008-2009 Game 163's were pretty much us coming from behind to force them.)
  16. Otto von Ballpark
    We have gotten a lot more from the $4 mil we are paying Nolasco this year, than from the same amount we are paying Jaime Garcia, that's for sure.
  17. Otto von Ballpark
    True, that is the shortest path to perhaps getting this monkey of our back.
  18. Otto von Ballpark
    The Cuzzi call was terrible, but no, it was not responsible for even one loss. Consider that Nathan had already blown a 2-run 9th inning lead that game, Mauer's phantom double was only leading off the inning, it was replaced by a Mauer single, and we still managed to squander a bases loaded, nobody out opportunity that inning. Oh, and Teixeira homered to lead off the bottom of that inning, so even if Mauer had scored to give us a 1 run lead, it wouldn't have lasted very long.
  19. Otto von Ballpark
    Based on recent Twins history, this offer is not valid vs NY, or in the postseason.
  20. Otto von Ballpark
    I've called it the curse of Mike Trombley, because this was Gardy's first game in NY as manager: https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/NYA/NYA200205170.shtml But actually we had been swept in the Dome by the Yankees a week prior to that. Maybe it's the curse of Chuck Knoblauch? The fulcrum isn't on the trade, but rather on him leaving NY. He was still on the Yankees the last time we beat them in a season series (2001).
  21. Otto von Ballpark
    Actually 2-12 vs New York in the playoffs (four ALDS losses). The last 9 losses in a row.
  22. Otto von Ballpark
    They're almost old enough to drive. In 5-6 years they will be old enough to legally drink!
  23. Otto von Ballpark
    No thanks! Not in a pennant race, unless someone gets hurt. Tonkin has had enough chances, and he was effectively "cut loose" a few months ago when he was put on waivers (and went unclaimed). There's virtually nothing he could do in the next 2 weeks to convince me he's worth effectively guaranteeing a 25-man spot for next spring, 6 months in advance. We can make him a minor league offer just like anyone else, in case he really enjoys the Rochester area.
  24. Otto von Ballpark
    Agreed. As much fun as 2015 and the return to relevance was, Molitor leading a Gardy-esque performance against the Yankees left me with a bit of a sour taste in my mouth and some extra pessimism about the future.
  25. Otto von Ballpark
    Should we have added a reliever on July 31st? Washington was able to get a guy that day for a lower-level prospect, and he's been pretty effective since.
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