BK432

I respectfully disagree. Robinson can at least play defense and run. Cuddyer has no useful skill at this point. He was one of my favorite Twins over the last 15 years, but I personally have no interest in rostering him here anymore.

No. Never. He is a negative value player, replacement level player. The Mets could pay his whole salary, not take a player in return, and I'd still be against this.

This is a good point. So I come back to the point of the article. Trevor May has done a ton to help stabilize the bullpen and has performed very well. So it's worked out well. But he belongs in the rotation. That's where, for the most part, your best pitchers go. Go out and find some bullpen options in FA. Promote those worthy from within. Build a strong 'pen and get May back to starting games.

That Duffey curve bites hard - I've seen enough to believe he has earned an extended shot. I won't be offended if he has to start at AAA next year, but he should get plenty of opportunity for an extended assignment in the big league rotation next year. Count me as a believer that he has a chance at a decently long MLB career.

Not official yet but likely. Last week of the season and we have meaningful games! Enjoy!

This is why a wild card game roster would look much different. They'd leave more pitchers off and carry Santana, Robinson, perhaps even Kepler if they can get him added.

Yep!

Pelfrey will be on in one way or another. Can I make a suggestion? Why carry Boyer? I'd be much more confident with Pelfrey/Nolasco coming in for an inning or so than Boyer. I don't see the need he fills.

It is confusing. Mine is from the official MLB transactions page, so that's what I'm going with for now. http://losangeles.angels.mlb.com/team/transactions.jsp?c_id=ana&year=2002&month=9

By the way, this is not accurate. K-Rod wasn't added to 40 man until he was called up to MLB on September 15.

Of course, since Berrios was 18 when he was drafted, I believe the Twins don't have to Rule 5 protect him on the 40 man this winter yet....but it's hard to believe he won't spend the vast majority of 2016 with the Twins anyway.

Yes - this is definitely true. So instead of trying to "special permission their way" into not adding him to the 40 man yet, just go ahead and add him and then you can figure out the roster later. I would be willing to risk AJ Achter. So they still can choose to be super-conservative, not burn MLB service time and wait and see, all the while holding him as a trump card. Just to be clear, I'd really rather they just promoted him and use him as a weapon now, but I think it's important to note that they don't have to decide that yet.

That is exactly how the rule reads. Yes. As to the 'formality'.....well, I think it's safe to say the Twins should feel assured they would get that acceptance if they try to go down this road. If they don't, then they better make a move tonight.

This may be true - a 40 man move may be required after all. Thanks for adding that info. For what it's worth, Finnegan was added to the 40 man on September 1 last year - details are in the article below. And yes, it is subject to approval from the commissioner's office, though it would be hard to argue there isn't some precedent that has already occurred that would prevent the Twins from exploiting this loophole. http://www.kansascity.com/sports/spt-columns-blogs/k-zone/article1340533.html

To my understanding - yes. Provided that JR Graham is a Rule 5 guy I'm not sure if there are any special considerations with him going on a 60 day DL, but beyond that, yes.

I'm seeing some misinformation in some of the forums, especially as it relates to Berrios and having him eligible for a possible playoff run. I thought today, being August 31 and all, would be a good time to set the record straight. I'm going to paste a portion of the article linked to at the bottom of this post, as this is the truly pertinent information: "Additionally, a club can add any player from the organization to replace a player on the disabled list. Earlier this week, the Royals called up Michael Mariot and immediately placed him on the 60-day disabled list. While this seems like a curious move, this was done explicitly for the purpose of using Mariot as a placeholder in case the Royals want to add another player to their post-season roster that wasn't on the team August 31. So technically, Brandon Finnegan can be called up September 2 and replace Michael Mariot's "place" on the active roster. This loophole has been exploited by teams for years and was used most famously by the Angels in 2002 with Francisco Rodriguez, who had as many post-season innings that year as he did regular season Major League innings." So, let's be clear here: Berrios does not have to be added to the 40 man and/or promoted today in order to be playoff-eligible. If Graham or Nolasco end up on the 60 day DL, they are replaceable at any time in September (or October) by anyone in the organization. That is anyone, not limited to being on the 40 man roster. Yes, Berrios would then have to be added to the 40 man upon promotion and the Twins would have to free up a spot - but my point is that nobody should jump to any conclusions if a move isn't made today. This isn't over, and the Twins certainly can kick the can down the road a couple weeks if they choose to make sure the Twins *really* are worth burning a Berrios service year on. http://www.royalsreview.com/2014/8/29/6078975/your-guide-to-september-and-post-season-rosters http://www.blessyouboys.com/2013/8/22/4644062/playoff-roster-eligibility-explained

Yep - manage those Sept innings. Let him work out of the 'pen a bit. Give him a start or two at the end of Sept. And if you believe in miracles, maybe he's in our October rotation. Caveat - he doesn't *have* to be on the 25-man before Sept 1. Don't forget the injury replacement rules, which would allow them to kick this down the road for at least a couple more weeks should they choose. Next 4 games will dictate a lot I think.

I'm going to go ahead and offer this up right now. I was flat out wrong about Aaron Hicks. I gave up on him before this season, and I said something to the effect of "he's a fourth outfielder at best, no need to keep him at AAA, use him as a defensive specialist and pinch runner at MLB." So I just wanted to publicly shame myself and say, once again, I was wrong. Thrilled to see him seemingly making the jump. And I have learned, though I am generally patient, to continue to exude patience in guys who are 25 or younger. They deserve it. Anyone else?

Have to agree this seems far-fetched. But hey, I love that you asked the question. Better than reading the same old hypothetical trade threads, Mauer sucks threads, and bullpen answers threads. So, thank you. You got me to read it!

LINEUPS: Twins 2B Brian Dozier CF Aaron Hicks DH Joe Mauer 3B Miguel Sano 1B Trevor Plouffe RF Eddie Rosario SS Eduardo Escobar C Chris Hermann LF Shane Robinson (Cy Young) Indians 2B Jose Ramirez SS Francisco Lindor LF Michael Brantley DH Carlos Santana C Yan Gomes CF Abraham Almonte RF Jerry Sands 1B Chris Johnson 3B Giovanny Urshela Ahem. Well, I got the 4 runs right. If you read yesterday's thread, I predicted a 4-1 Twins win. Missed that by a tad. This Indians lineup isn't a very good one. But yesterday, they were able to take advantage of subpar pitching performances from Ervin Santana as well as the bullpen, especially Ryan O'Rourke and AJ Achter. And they crushed the Twins 17-4. Luckily, none of that matters today. Today is a new game. Let's have some fun in more of the standard "Riverbrian's 5 Things" format today. Because I'm feeling a bit over statistical analysis for the weekend, and we're facing Corey Kluber anyway, which has the chance to make all else moot. 1. BK432: 0-4 on the week. Yes, your least favorite game-thread starter has written 4 game threads this week, and they've all been losers. Today is #5 - please, Twins, please get me a win. I'm going to start to get a complex! The powers that be will never let me write again. 2. Shane Robinson: Throwing mostly what pitch data categorized as ~80 MPH "changeups", Robinson walked one guy and then retired the next 3 batters in order, including Jerry Sands on what was the weirdest, loopiest knuckleball one will ever see. 2 of the runners he inherited from AJ Achter scored, but still, his official line goes down as 1.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 1 K. Better than most of the Twins' relief pitchers yesterday. Is he playing the wrong position? Okay, perhaps 80 MPH "changeups" wouldn't provide a lot of promise in Robinson sustaining a big league career in a bullpen role, but as these things go, it was mildly entertaining to watch. 3. Staying To The End: I had a friend who went to the game last night in Cleveland. He's a Twins fan, and man, what a tough draw. But, he was tweeting and sharing pictures all the way to the end. How many Twins fans watched all the way to the end, either in person or on TV? It's one of the toughest things to do as a fan. If I'm in person, I'm more apt to stick around and enjoy the park and the people. But on TV? Way to easy to find something else. I admire all those who watched to the very bitter end last night. 4. Hughes vs. Kluber: It gets no easier today, with Kluber on the mound for the noon game. He's not that different a pitcher this year versus last - K rate slightly down, but all in all very good. He has however been worse with his strand rate - %LOB is significantly up versus last year, and his run support hasn't been very good. As a result, his W-L has suffered and nationally the perception is that he is a lot worse this year. He's not. Still very good, and the Twins will have to work every at bat to find enough opportunities to score runs today. 5. Get Away: Finally time for a day off tomorrow before starting a homestand on Tuesday. I would guess these Twins need to get home about as bad as any other time during this season. It's been a very tough road trip. Hopefully they can get to Kluber early and Hughes has his 'A' stuff, and the Twins can end this miserable voyage away from home with a win. Get ready to cheer them on!

LINEUPS: Twins 2B Brian Dozier 1B Joe Mauer DH Miguel Sano 3B Trevor Plouffe RF Torii Hunter LF Eddie Rosario CF Aaron Hicks C Kurt Suzuki SS Eduardo Escobar P Ervin Santana Indians 2B Jose Ramirez SS Francisco Lindor LF Michael Brantley 1B Carlos Santana DH Yan Gomes RF Lonnie Chisenhall 3B Giovanny Urshela CF Abraham Almonte C Roberto Perez P Trevor Bauer ---------- WARNING: QUICK SATURDAY EDITION! SATURDAYS WITH A TODDLER WHO DECIDES NOT TO NAP WILL DO THAT TO A GAME THREAD STARTER. I BEG YOUR FORGIVENESS. Remind me never again to breathe a sigh of relief when we take a 6-0 lead. It took just 1/2 an inning for Mr. Pelfrey to let the Indians back into the game in the 4th inning and, with the help of AJ Achter, actually trailed 9-7 after 5 innings. Fortunately, the Twins bullpen actually outdueled the Indians 'pen the last 4 innings. Torii Hunter's solo blast in the top of the 9th gave the Twins the 10-9 lead and Perk took care of business to earn the save. So, yeah, 1-game winning streak! 55-54 feels a heck of a lot better than 54-55. So we march on and hopefully can give ourselves a bit of a .500 mark buffer with another win tonight. The Indians Made A Trade In a "almost purely for financial reasons" deal, the Indians acquired Chris Johnson and his bad contract from the Braves for Michael Bourn, Nick Swisher and their bad contracts. Indians sent some money too. Not any vital parts traded, but I suppose Johnson could swipe some time from Chisenhall and/or Urshela, especially against LHPs. He won't be playing tonight against Ervin Santana, but should be available off the bench. Pitching I'll admit it, I'm nutty for Trevor Bauer. Has a good mix of pitches but gives up a ton of flyballs. He has just a .259 BABIP against this year but is also striking out 8.8/9. What's holding him back? Too many HR. 1.3/9 with his flyball tendencies has allowed the ball to fly over the fence against him with too much ease. We get Ervin Santana again tonight. He'll have to right the ship. Games 3 and 4 for Santana gave Twins fans hope that we could ride him until October. But the last two games haven't gone as well, giving up 4 HR and 9 earned runs and King just 5 in 11.2 IP. It's fair to expect a better outing tonight; the Pirates and Blue Jays have clearly superior lineups to that of the Indians, as they were able to tag Santana for an over 20% HR/FB ratio. More of those balls should stay in the yard tonight against the weaker Indians, and he should be able to take advantage of at-bats against Perez, Almonte, Urshela and others to up that K rate. Psychological One-Game Swing. Let's be honest, as I stated earlier, 55-54 feels tons better than 54-55. At this point in the season, to have fallen under .500 would have felt awful. Instead, the squad is over .500 with a good shot at getting to 56-54 by the end of the night. That psychological swing of coming back to win last night (after squandering the big lead) means more than it probably should on paper. It should be a good night for a Twins victory. Santana has the stuff to shut this weak lineup down, and has already shown that ability in limited starts this year. Twins will score enough off Bauer and the Indians' bullpen to win; 4-1 or so feels about right. Go Twins!

LINEUPS: Twins 2B Brian Dozier 1B Joe Mauer RF Torii Hunter DH Miguel Sano 3B Trevor Plouffe CF Aaron Hicks LF Eddie Rosario C Kurt Suzuki SS Eduardo Escobar P Kyle Gibson Blue Jays SS Troy Tulowitzki 3B Josh Donaldson RF Jose Bautista DH Edwin Encarnacion C Dioner Navarro 1B Justin Smoak CF Kevin Pillar 2B Ryan Goins LF Ben Revere P Mark Buehrle ------ Sigh. I gotta be honest, I'm having a difficult time getting excited to write this post today. 3 days of watching bomb after bomb from the Blue Jays will do that to a man. But, we persevere. Heck, we expect that of the Twins, the coaches, the ownership. Wouldn't be fair not to expect that of ourselves, right? So, let's find the talking points and maybe any positives together, shall we? Let's start here: Happy Birthday, Mom! 62 years young today, and she gets a public shout-out. Now perhaps on to the more Twins-relevant. The Twins can avoid the sweep and slipping back to .500 today by letting Kyle Gibson go out and do his thing and getting after the hard-throwing Mark Buehrle (don't worry, that's just a joke). So let's focus on that outcome as we script this thing out. Wild Card Race As tough as these past few games have been, the Twins are just 2 games out of a wild-card spot and can pull to within 1 with a win today. It's clear that since the trade deadline passed, an aggressive team like the Blue Jays have performed very well, while a team that preferred to mostly sit out the deadline (at least based on actual trades made) like the Twins have struggled. Is there a correlation there? Personally, I don't really think so. There's way too much variance in player performance in six games to make any vast conclusions. I think it's fair to say that over the long haul in 2015 and into possible playoffs, the Blue Jays helped themselves more than the Twins did. Does that mean the Blue Jays were right and the Twins were wrong? Maybe. Maybe not. I think it's possible that both teams did what was right for them, and strangely, the Blue Jays were below the Twins in the standings. But the talent level on the Jays was so clearly better, even before getting Price and Tulo. It's a tough pill to swallow for a fan base on the backs of 4 90-loss seasons that basically sitting tight was the right move for 2015. And one can definitely make the argument that an aggressive deadline approach could have changed the complexion of this team enough that the 'banked' wins could have now been owned by a team situated to compete. But the price in doing so was in my opinion too high and carried too much risk. I personally did prefer the "wait until 2016" approach....but I don't think wanting more aggressiveness is indefensible. Anyway.....pitching Mark Buehrle. He throws his fastball 85 MPH. He's throwing it more now in 2015 than any year since maybe 2009. He continues to reinvent himself and keep opposing lineups off balance. There's nothing extraordinarily odd about his 2015 performance; BABIP against him is slightly down against career norms, K rate is down, walk rate is down, and ground ball rate is a bit up. As a result his ERA is outperforming his xFIP (3.32 vs 4.10) but his ERA always outperforms his xFIP (career is 3.79 vs 4.19). While he won't overwhelm anyone with power (obvious) he will work fast and hit his spots, which should get a lot of outs. We know what we have with Kyle Gibson. He gets a lot of groundballs, won't K a lot of guys, and with that recipe has had a decent amount of success this season. His ability to keep the ball on the ground will be greatly appreciated with all the launch pad shots that have taken place this series when Toronto has been at the plate. He has a chance to keep the runs at a minimum and the Twins in the game. Rest of the World No MLB pitching debuts tonight after 4 in the last 2 night. But a couple of young arms to watch and one old and ineffective one. Aaron Brooks makes his 2nd start of 2015 for Oakland. Was very impressive 5 days ago - he looks to keep it rollling against Houston. Joe Ross, the unheralded rookie pitcher in Washington, makes another start tonight, this time against Arizona. Just 22 years old, the kid has put together a string of nice starts. The Nats can't keep him out of the rotation. And poor old CC Sabathia. The Yankees owe him about $32 million through 2016 and will have to buy out his 2017 for another $5 million. That being said, what do they do with him for now? He's been awful for 3 years now and, being unexpectedly in the mix for a playoff spot, the Bronx Bombers have to be considering using him out of the bullpen in October. I'm not sure you can expect to win a playoff game in 2015 with Sabathia starting the game on the hill for you. In any event, the Twins are the main event tonight. Two pitchers starting with ERAs under 3.40....all signs point to a bit more of a lower-scoring affair tonight. Let's just root for the Twins to be a bit more successful at the plate than the Jays. A win, and things feel at least a little better here in Minneapolis with Cleveland up next.

Well, I personally have no idea.....but I would guess it's just a planned day off. The dude is 40 after all...

LINEUPS Twins CF Aaron Hicks 2B Brian Dozier 1B Joe Mauer DH Miguel Sano 3B Trevor Plouffe RF Eddie Rosario SS Eduardo Escobar C Eric Fryer LF Shane Robinson P Tyler Duffey Blue Jays SS Troy Tulowitzki 3B Josh Donaldson RF Jose Bautista DH Edwin Encarnacion 1B Chris Colabello C Russell Martin 2B Ryan Goins CF Kevin Pillar LF Ben Revere P Drew Hutchison -------- Well, well, well. Isn't this fun. The Twins, with yet another loss Tuesday, dropped to just two games over .500 and, for the first time in over a month, out of the playoffs (were they to start today). And to boot, we still have another two games to play at the place where baseballs get smashed to smithereens, Rogers Centre (By the way, I've hated Rogers Centre ever since one of the most disappointing regular season games I have ever watched on April 1, 2011. Yeah, you know the one. Opening Day 2011. The one that signaled that 2011 would surely be nothing like 2010. Or 2009. Signaled what the next four years would be like. Awful. Remind yourself here.) And while we have a pitcher making his MLB debut tonight for the Twins, his is hardly the most-hyped of the night. Luis Severino will be making his debut at Yankee Stadium against the cellar-dweller Red Sox. I'll be watching a couple innings of that game tonight alongside the tilt in Toronto. In any event, here we are. A season that has felt so fun and successful at times, now at a crossroads and feeling perilously close to the proverbial cliff. A win tonight would go a long way toward righting the attitudes of many Twins fans, at least for a few hours anyway. 1. National Press Sure, the Twins start losing, the national articles start coming. Hey, I'm a big Will Leitch fan but any article that contains the phrase "Glen Perkins has been the best part of a bullpen that's probably the team's strength"....well, it tells me you really aren't paying that much attention. There is literally no metric by which one could argue that the bullpen is a strength of the Twins team in 2015. So I think the takeaway here is that the Twins probably will garner very little attention until they make a playoff run. Which quite honestly is just fine - that will be coming soon enough. 2. Pitching Matchup We have Tyler Duffey making his MLB debut tonight for the Twins. A converted reliever, he has been a bit of an unexpected revelation, improving each year since being drafted in the 5th round of the 2012 draft. After rookie ball in his draft year, he played two levels (A and A+) in 2013 and three levels (A+, AA and AAA) in 2014. After beginning 2015 in Chattanooga, he was promoted quickly to Rochester and has pitched very well there. In 132 IP this year, he's given up 1 HR. That's not a misprint - he's sort of the anti-Phil Hughes. He's sporting a fine 8.0 K/9 this year with an ERA of 2.66 and a WHIP of 1.12. Nothing screams out that he's not prepared to have some level of success in the majors and, at just 24 years of age, some improvement can still be expected. Tonight could be the start of a several year major league career. The same was definitely expected of Drew Hutchison, but the youngster has struggled in 2015. Blessed with a good slider and a good changeup, he had good K rates in the minors and debuted in 2012 at age 21. But despite the ability to miss bats, he seems to have been snakebit by opposing BABIP, which could be bad luck, or could point to a fairly flat, hittable fastball that runs about 91 or 92 MPH. His xFIP of 4.02 for 2015 is quite a bit better than his actual ERA of 5.42, which is pretty incredible and screams out that the kid has been unlucky. But for his career, including the minors, hitters have hit .312 on balls in play against him - so while this has maybe been somewhat unlucky, it may be time to face the fact that when players make contact against Hutchison, they are able to square up well and drive the ball. Can the Twins take advantage? Well, that's the big question, isn't it? 3. Slump Buster 5 games. 7 runs. That ain't good. Someone needs to help this team step out of this funk and put some runs on the board. That said, the whole team has been pretty soft at the plate the last 5 games, so it's difficult to envision who that might be. If I'm Molitor, I just mix the hell out of the lineup. Bat Mauer first. Bat Dozier 2nd and Sano 3rd. Get guys out of their routines and shake it up a bit (I'm writing this before lineups come out, so I know my suggestion likely won't be in place). If there would be a potential feel good game in place, this would be it. Hittable pitcher in a hitter friendly park. I'm calling it - 6+ runs tonight. If Duffey can keep them off the scoreboard, the Twins could be back tied for a playoff spot before the clock strikes midnight. Once again, enjoy the game.

Hmm....I think you may be unnecessarily sensitive. "Up there" refers to the country, as in the country of Canada being generally north of the United States. Two of my favorite cities in the world are Montreal and Toronto, so I personally don't mean to slight them. I think you kind of need to give people a break.