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mluebker

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Everything posted by mluebker

  1. mluebker
    I think a lot of teams forget that baseball is an entertainment industry at its core. The Pohlad philosophy has long been to assemble a team that is competitive enough to make a modest profit—a small handful of stars and the rest adequate. There’s no incentive for them to use every tool in the box or spend the time working on fundamentals. Just keep the payroll low enough to make a profit on a moderately entertaining team.
  2. mluebker
    Why even have a manager if all you do is follow the analytics? Just feed the numbers into ChatGPT or Grok and let the artificial intelligence run things.
  3. mluebker
    A while ago it was why the Twins should trade pitching. Good thing they didn't. Now it's why the Twins should trade outfielders--current or prospects--for pitching. Good thing they didn't trade those pitchers before. What about maybe not looking to trade anyone unless there's a really good reason or a really good deal to be had? No sense trading away someone they might need later for the sake of making a deal. (And hey, great, now they have another surplus outfielder in a who-cares? deal for Alcala. I'm guessing that won't calm the zeal that seems to be bubbling up for making a trade, any trade.)
  4. mluebker
    “…two serious concerns. First, should a potentially outgoing front office be allowed to make win-now trades that mortgage the future? And second, could that same front office be tempted to prioritize short-term results in a bid to protect their own jobs?” And maybe a third: “Would adding a couple of key pieces to the current roster to take them deeper into the playoffs make the team more attractive to a potential buyer?”
  5. mluebker
    With the miracle of both Buxton and Correa out there again, Wallner back, and guys like Castro and France stepping up, I’m good with hanging onto the pitching and waiting to see what happens, offense-wise. Maybe someone could wake up Lewis, though. The sleepwalking isn’t working.
  6. mluebker
    Great, if he can keep it up. But the headline is right--this is unusual. Fingers crossed. Meanwhile, what will it take to jump-start the under-performing shortstop. I see he's finally hitting his weight (and a little more!), but can someone wave the magic wand over him, too?
  7. mluebker
    Paying for potential hasn’t really paid off, at least in terms of the team’s success. Having hometown guys out there is a good strategy to put butts in seats—which is great for the Pohlads—but it hasn’t won any championships. And my guess is fans are more interested in the latter.
  8. mluebker
    Most of them seem out of their depth—they simply don’t have the talent to do what’s being asked of them. And too many of the ones who do, can’t stay off the IL. It’s the front office and ownership that put this team together, so they’re the ones responsible, as far as I can see.
  9. mluebker
    Hopefully sooner.
  10. mluebker
    I’m pretty sure it won’t be Doug Mientkiewicz, but I’d sure love to see him take the helm. He’s like the Anti-Baldelli, and with this shaping up to be another lost season anyway (aka more of the same), at the very least we’d see some interesting baseball.
  11. mluebker
    Sometimes you want a manager to manage with his guts and instincts, not a spreadsheet. Unfortunately, Baldelli’s instinct is always to go with the spreadsheet.
  12. mluebker
    It's never all the managers fault. But different people have different ways of deploying the resources they're given. Meager as those may be, maybe someone can get more out of them than Rocco. Because it's pretty clear no one is going to upgrade this roster in any sort of significant way until the team gets a new owner. If then.
  13. mluebker
    Fire Baldelli and hire Doug Mientkiewicz through the end of the season with a club option for next year. Love him or hate him, he’d be the 21st century equivalent of hiring Billy Martin and would have the Twins playing a different kind of baseball, at the very least more fun to watch.
  14. mluebker
    This is what happens on Rec league teams when they’re not doing well and kids don’t want to play. The Twins probably need a team psychologist at this point.
  15. mluebker
    I probably just should have said "regulars" so we don't end up quibbling about whether we liked how they played those positions. If you could say "the Twins' second baseman," and people knew who you meant, that would be a regular to me.
  16. mluebker
    By today's standards, I think anything over 100 starts would count. If you can say "the Twins' third baseman in 1991" and people know who you mean, he was a "regular." And gotta say, I loved Gladden. I remember seeing him go up against the plexiglass in left field to grab a fly ball that actually bounced off it, then turning around and jogging toward the dugout as if it had been a clean catch. Smart play, batter out!
  17. mluebker
    I'm trying to think of a Twins team that won the pennant without having an infield made up of solid regulars at each position. You maybe could say 1965, because Killebrew was out for nearly seven weeks giving Don Mincher more time at first.
  18. mluebker
    He did, in 1967. So did Lavagetto in 1961, making way for Mele. In 1972, Bill Rigney got fired mid-season and was replaced by Frank Quilici. Gene Mauch “resigned” in a difference of opinion with Cal Griffith and company during the 1980 and John Goryl took over. He was replaced by Billy Gardner early in the 1981 season. Gardner was replaced by Ray Miller mid-season 1985, and Miller was replaced by Tom Kelly in September 1986. You all probably know the rest.
  19. mluebker
    Anyone have Doug Mientkiewicz’s number?
  20. mluebker
    They certainly keep surprising us, but rarely in a good way.
  21. mluebker
    Couldn’t agree more. They’ve got a bunch of at-best average ball players being expected to carry the team while getting no visible leadership or inspiration from management. Meanwhile, the handful of big-dollar stars are either on the IL or struggling even more. This formula doesn’t seem to be working
  22. mluebker
    First off, you missed that I was being sarcastic. Second, I coached my three kids for 13 years and ran a rec league up in Michigan for five. So don’t make the mistake of assuming something just because you and I look at the same set of circumstances and reach different conclusions, even ones intending to be exaggerated.
  23. mluebker
    Well, then let’s just get rid of the manager and coaches and let artificial intelligence run the team. It can figure out who’s hot and who’s not and make the line-ups, rotate players through the positions, and base every in-game decision on statistics, analytics, and odds.
  24. mluebker
    Near as I can tell, Baldelli basically does whatever the analytics tell him to do. So you might as well let ChatGPT manage the team. And right now, he’s got a team full of guys who either are average or below average at either fielding or hitting (pick one), and a small handful who are above average or even star-quality, but who spend way too much time on the IL when they’re needed on the field. I don’t think even an artificial intelligence can turn that into more than a .500 team.
  25. mluebker
    Nobody gets to decide what anyone else complains about--it's baseball! I'm still ticked that they lowered the mound after Bob Gibson and Denny McLain had career years in 1968! And what's the deal with wearing uniform pants all the way down to the shoe tops? How much longer will this designated hitter experiment last? And get off my lawn!
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