mikelink45

I am loving this look backs - the offense really did this team in and yet they had so many bats - Mauer, Morneau, Cuddyer who would be known for their hitting in the future. It is all about timing. And second base - what a morass -

Nicely done - the late 1960's were the best from many standpoints - pitching and hitting, but of course you did not have playoffs.

According to historian Jim Leeke, author of “From the Dugouts to the Trenches: Baseball During the Great War,” approximately 38 percent of active Major League players went on to serve, and eight current or former players were either killed in action or died of illness during the war. - library of Congress blog Teams played short handed, players paid a price for their heroism. The great Christy Mathewson did not get to action on the front - the war ended - but he was exposed to mustard gas in training and it was the cause of his early death. In WWII the leagues were short of players and scrambled for players to fill the rosters regardless of talent. 500 served, two died, and the record book was changed in many ways https://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/26/sports/baseball/remembering-the-major-leaguers-who-died-in-world-war-ii.html Yogi Berra was at Omaha Beach, Wilhelm and Spahn at the Battle of the Bulge, and Bob Feller lost four prime years. Put those years on their resume and they become even more immortal in the baseball world. In Korea Whitey Ford, Willie Mays, and Don Newcombe served and Ted Williams flew 39 combat missions - how many hits and home runs is that worth? Players served in Vietnam War and have been part of every conflict. We do not have a baseball game to attend this year, but lets remember these men along with out relatives and neighbors on memorial day.

I do not share your Reds enthusiasm, but I enjoy it. I would have the Cardinals over the cubs because that franchise always seems to produce more than expected and the cubs seem to have a large amount of chaos. It has been interesting to watch them since the World Series victory because they do not seem to know how to handle their potential and expectations. I have a hard time with Cleveland at number 2, but I do not have any good reason not to have them there. 2 - 4 are interchangable parts to me.

Too many catchers - even for a position where more rest is needed they have Garver, Avila, Astudillo - add Jeffers and we are fine. The idea of having a large taxi squad is good if it provides enough for two teams and a couple intramural games a week for development and sharpness. So I would look at the make up of the squad to cover the positions and the pitching. If it is 20 players you have 16 position players and four arms.

These might be the outliers, but what is interesting to me is that the other pitchers routinely threw 150 - 200 innings, what we now consider a full load. For example - 1965 Twins. Mudcat Grant pitched 274 innings and Jim Kaat 264. The Other two starters were 167, 154. The next year Kaat threw 304 innings, Grant had 249, Perry 184, Boswell 169. In 1967 Dean Chance threw 283 innings, Kaat 263, Merritt 227, Boswell 222 In 2019 Berrios threw 200, Perez 165, Gibson 160, Odorizzi 159, Pineda 146 - a striking difference with our own old timers - not the outliers like you called my examples.

I think 10 rounds might have made sense, but 5 rounds is just a measure to reduce the money paid to the prospects

I am really enjoying this series, but I know we keep losing in the playoffs and that was really hard on Twins fans. 2002 we at least got to round two.

"Ryan, 69, has been outspoken against the idea that pitch counts and innings limits are a deterrent to injuries. “I’m not a doctor and I’m not a scientist. All I am is a guy who threw over 5,000 innings,’’ he said. “I know what pitchers go through and I know what it takes to do that and I real ly believe we don’t condition our pitchers for what they are asked to do. And because of that, I think we increase our chances of injury on them. “I believe when an organization puts those kind of random restrictions on their pitching staff, they don’t take advantage and utilize the talent that they have. I think everybody has a pitch limit, but I think also you can tell when a guy’s reached his pitch limit by watching him. That’s what pitching coaches used to do. Now they look at the number of pitches and at around 100, they get somebody up and that pitcher comes out of the game no matter whether he’s having an exceptionally good game or if he struggled. Obviously, they put pitch limits to try to protect people, but I think it’s worked just the opposite.’’ Ryan is fifth on the all-time list of innings pitched with 5,386. Asked if his record seven no-hitters would have occurred under the current climate of safeguards, Ryan said: “I used to average 150 to 160 pitches a game because of the nature of pitcher I was. Would it have impacted my effectiveness? Yes. I think it probably would.’’ "Cardinals broadcaster Tim McCarver, who caught Hall of Fame pitchers Bob Gibson and Steve Carlton, has railed against pitch counts. “How can people be so sure it’s the same for Don Drysdale and Chris Short?’’ he said. “How do people throw these numbers around like it’s wisdom? It’s not wisdom, it’s foolish. Who’s to say it’s 120 pitches, 140 pitches. Juan Marichal in 1963 in that famous game against Warren Spahn threw pitches’’ in 16 innings." Most career innings pitched, with seasons played in parentheses 1.Cy Young (22)7,356.0 2.Pud Galvin (15)6,003.1 3.Walter Johnson (21)5,914.1 4.Phil Niekro (24)5,404.0 5.Nolan Ryan (27)5,386.0 6.Gaylord Perry (22)5,350.0 7.Don Sutton (23)5,282.1 8.Warren Spahn (21)5,243.2 9.Steve Carlton (24)5,217.2 10.Grover Alexander (20)5,190.0 https://www.baseball-reference.com/leaders/IP_leagues.shtml The record of the annual most innings pitched really calls to question the durability of pitchers and todays theory on limited innings.

Since we are playing the second half of the season this year - how would those teams of the past finished using second half records?

Milton and Mays seemed to have so much promise. But we have had a number of pitchers in our history go over the cliff - Roger Erickson, Tom Hall, Jim Hughes, Decker, Schrom, Allen Anderson are other examples. It also makes me think of the great potential we saw and wrote about with Banks, Trombley, Hawkins, and Mahomes ready to come in and lead the staff. Pitching is so volatile and projection long term value so difficult.

Now try a draft for a one year team - a team you want to take you to the top right away, no matter what age, what contract. Then Donaldson and Cruz become valuable and give us star power. The rookies and the minor leaguers lose their projection and must have immediate value or they fall off the list. Or do a draft of 30 and over. This is a fun exercise and obviously has me thinking about players and their value.

Just remove the deadline - trade anytime.

Very good essay - to have all this time to plan it seems a waste to not open the half season with a new contract that guarantees the future of the game will go on without further interruption.

Milwaukee too low, White Sox too high, and Cincinnati too high.

So we have run out of topics and its back to Eddie bashing. Yet the smart stat heads and metric based manager and front office was content to keep Rosario batting fourth. Someone is seeing something quite different - what is it?

Now there will be a scramble for players who go undrafted and because of the limit on signing bonuses many might go elsewhere if they have a good degree and a job prospect. I would have thought they would have 10 rounds. Its not like the NBA and their two rounds - they see their prospects in the NCAA tournament and know who the one or two players are that can move into the rotation. Baseball is filled with low pick stars and first round flops.

Berrios should be #2 - his rookie year era balloons his career record, but should not be held against him. Hard to believe now but Liam Hendricks was a Twin and was 1 - 8 with 5.59 in 2012 as a starter - now he is an all star with Oakland. Kintzler needs to be considered for reliever work over two years and an honorable mention to Bartolo Colon! Once again I can't help but look at some of the names that did have starting roles Cole De Vries Sam Deduno Pedro Hernandez Yohan Pino Aldalberto Mejia Then there are the veterans we actually traded for: Kevin Correia Mike Pelfrey Rickey Nolasco Hecter Santiago Martin Perez Matt Belisle

Sano at third - break your rule and put Cruz at DH or Thome at DH. I was trying to find a CF to replace Buxton who is the biggest what if on the team - more than Mauer and Morneau who had a concussion to explain their time away and performance shift. I looked at Span and Hicks but Span was not here long enough in this decade and Hicks did not take off until we traded him. But Byron is responsible for having Jake Cave play 91 games at CF in 2018. So okay Buxton gets it, but I am not happy with that. I got to thinking about the challenges you faced in these decade postings which I am loving and that made me think about the challenge of a _WHAT HE PLAYED HERE TEAM. So here is my decade team of you're kidding starters. I will make my rule - they had to have played the most games at a given position in at least one year of the decade. C Drew Butera 1B Chris Callabello (He never had the most in a year, but he had a 55 game 2013) 2B Orlando Hudson 3B Brendan Harris (I do not have a good alternative - but he had 43 games 2010) SS Tsuyoshi Nishioka LF Delmon Young of Robbie Grossman CF Jake Cave or Danny Santana RF Chris Parmalee or Oswaldo Arcia DH Ryan Doumit or Kennys Vargas or Byung Ho Park