The Great Hambino

So Austin Martin is physically capable of hitting a RHP after all

I guess everyone in the bullpen needs a save before anyone can get their second

Congrats to Junior Junior for finishing his Doctor of Education education Also, thanks in advance for jinxing the Wild

He does a great job of not revealing the dirt he has on the front office

The shiznit? Good work Chief, I like this new feature

If Outman is sent down/out, his call-up replacement doesn't necessarily have to just assume his role. Especially with Kreidler around to offer cover in CF in a pinch (which has to be the only thing keeping Outman on the roster at this point), roles could be reshuffled in a way that results in the callup sharing time with Martin, Larnach spending more time at DH (or RF if Wallner needs his playing time scaled back), and Bell can play more at 1B. Clemens is the one whose playing time takes a hit. We can deal with what to do when Lewis is healthy when he's healthy. Are they still thinking he'll be back early next week? I haven't read or heard anything good or bad

It's important for the rotation to steal innings and outs from the bullpen whenever they can. You don't get to plan when you're inevitably going to get hit with back-to-back short starts that strain the bullpen. You can't pass up opportunities to balance that ledger. Especially when your bullpen is highly suspect

I'm seeing 16 steals of home for Rod Carew as a Twin instead of 14 (plus one as an Angel) Either way, that's about as untouchable as it gets. I'd be shocked if anyone in their career can touch the 7 he had just in the 1969 season

BBRef has a measure called game leverage index (gmLI) for all relievers. This measures how high or low the game leverage is relative to league average when a reliever enters the game - a lower number means lower leverage. So far the Twins are currently dead last in the AL in this figure, which means the bullpen hasn't really been put under too much stress. This tracks as they've only had one one-run game and one extra-inning game (they lost both of those games). So unless the Twins can continue to bludgeon teams offensively (only the Astros have scored more runs in the AL), the bullpen is going to have to step up in these high leverage situations in order to maintain their success. The sooner they can transition some potential high leverage weapons to the pen, the better

Beyond spending money to replace what was lost, teams like Milwaukee that have stayed at least moderately successful have someone internal ready to step up when they trade away a Corbin Burnes or a Josh Hader. Varland seemed to be potentially that guy for the Twins after Duran/Jax were sent away ... but then he got traded too. For me, that - not his place of birth - is what bothered me about his trade. It signaled to me that they were punting on competitiveness for the duration of the Lopez/Ryan contracts. So when they signaled their intent to remain competitive while not committing any real resources - internal or external - to replace what they lost in the pen, it got extra frustrating. They still haven't committed any internal resources to replacing the top end of the bullpen - the only relief outings made by anyone that could've been considered a starting pitching prospect at any point during 2025 have effectively been piggyback starts by Abel and Morris. Maybe they will do so as the season progresses with Festa or Zebby or Morris or others. The fact that the pen has been able to smoke-and-mirrors their way to some success so far has bought them some time, but I'm not sure how long that can hold up. I hope it does, and I'll enjoy it while it lasts, and I can at least see a path to competitiveness this year that I didn't see in the offseason, but I'm still wary of seeing a short-term payoff from last year's trades if they're not willing to do what's necessary to reinforce the top end of the bullpen. As @mickster noted above, there as of yet has been zero benefit provided to the major league roster from the Varland trade. Long-term payoff from the trades, on the other hand, is looking very very promising. Bradley looks like the best version of himself and Abel looks like a keeper too. And by sheer volume, someone from the haul currently in the minors is bound to break through as a valuable piece in the future

In seeing the consensus reaction to this, I'm glad that the idea that buying a ticket gives you carte blanche to say whatever you want as if the players are characters in a TV show - not to mention the effect it has on other fans who bought the same ticket you did - is becoming more and more of a minority opinion. You do not exist in the Independent Republic of Yourself.

Well that certainly was the infielding equivalent of putting out a fire with gasoline

Hey, playing the infield in worked!

Q: How does a last place team lead all of MLB in runs scored? A: By also being the team that's allowed the most runs in all of MLB. Congrats, Houston. You're weird.

This might be the start of one of Buck's Mario-Star-esque hot streaks

That was basically the original ending of the film! There's a version out there where she congratulates the team and tells them that all the cuts/threats to move/etc were just a motivational ploy. Thankfully test audiences sent that BS into the 13th row like Mutombo, and we got the infinitely-better ending that made it to the final copy.

Not a bad guess, but apparently it was Kepler

If you don't want to bring up Emma into a role where he isn't playing every day, then bring up Roden instead. Kriedler can do the things you're getting from Outman, and Roden fits more naturally in a timeshare in the lineup with Martin than with Clemens, who doesn't really give you anything if he can't hit righties (small sample, but a 79 OPS+ and 40% K rate when you're supposed to have the platoon advantage is a mighty low bar for Roden to clear). He's also 26 with what's likely 4th outfielder upside, so it's not some tragedy if he's not playing every day. So give Roden Outman's roster spot and Clemens' playing time. The supposed boost to 1B defense that Clemens was supposed to provide hasn't really been there, so I think it's a win all around. This also creates space for Larnach to DH more (and play LF less) as well with Bell/Caratini at 1B more often. You could also just let Martin sink or swim in a full-time role. But they don't seem like they're gonna do that, so letting him split time with Roden where you let Martin face some righties could be a happy medium, and definitely preferable to improperly treating Clemens like a strong-side leadoff platoon

Congrats to Buxton becoming the all-time Target Field home run king. But I gotta be honest: thinking back to the early days of Target Field, I'm kinda surprised it's not Jose Bautista

I'm not ready to eat crow yet - they entered the day only three games above last place in the AL, after all - but I have started bookmarking some recipes online. Crow a l'orange sounds intriguing

Ober should get some tips from him for how to deal with dropping velocity

Impressive, they were able to turn a 1-6-3 without anyone hurting themselves

Buck was not about to let Kreidler out-homer him

Give him the hook

Kreidler going upper deck on the reigning Cy Young runner-up? I picked the right week to start sniffing glue