Can we really afford to lose Willingham's premier defensive prowess or mess with the great outfield chemsitry even for a game? This probably falls in the obvious category, but I remember hearng someone who has been to a lot of the games and seen Mauer play in person, say he can tell when Mauer has to consciously think about how to respond to a play and how much smoother it is when he can just react off of his instincts. He thought, while he still has a way to go, more of his first base skills are starting to become more reflexive and that it will come, but it just won't be that instant perfection of a switch people just took for granted would happen. I do agree that it is very possible some of the stiffness in motion is due to the back and knees being in a crouch for ten years (combined with having to reprogram his mindset as someone mentioned earlier). Since I have to listen to most of the games on the radio, it is hard for me to judge things like this and have to rely on things like the Twins Daily game threads to get a better picture (although that often leads to picturing things I would rather not).