mikelink45

I love the chemistry, but I remember the Oakland A's dynasty and how dysfunctional they were - fighting each other, fighting their own, and beating everyone else. https://www.nbcsports.com/bayarea/athletics/swingin-highlights-dynasty-all-its-glorious-dysfunction You might also enjoy this book excerpt - https://books.google.com/books?id=2ktODAAAQBAJ&pg=PA203&lpg=PA203&dq=baseball+teams+with+dysfunctional+clubhouses&source=bl&ots=Z8KfZT_guc&sig=ACfU3U2lw6wlGvDIgSS869urYT8ibWYIvA&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjY3pntgsLlAhUD26wKHYyVBy04ChDoATADegQICRAB#v=onepage&q=baseball%20teams%20with%20dysfunctional%20clubhouses&f=false In the end good clubs win on the field no matter how bad the clubhouse is. But a good clubhouse on a good team is a great thing.

I hope not. This is a nice story, but I am not buying into him for the long run. I do want him on the roster and if he is number 5 in the rotation I am fine, but I want a World Series appearance and if the cast last year was not good enough Dobnak is not going to raise the level. Graterol has the stuff to dominate and that is what I want in the rotation. I am not big on the large FA contract - the success of those big payouts is not very good. Just for a refresher read this https://www.sportscasting.com/27-worst-free-agent-signings-mlb-history/ Pitchers usually do not age well - Verlander is an outlier in this discussion and he is a sure fire HOF pitchers. That being said I am interested in younger FAs who have shown an ability that our pitching coach can work with.

I just read this really fun article in True West Magazine https://truewestmagazine.com/article/six-guns-sluggers/?mc_cid=1c6674cead&mc_eid=b66323b9da "Two sesquicentennial anniversaries in 2019 will commemorate landmark events in the history of the American West. When gold and silver spikes were gently tapped into place in a ceremonial laurelwood rail tie at Promontory Summit in Utah Territory to symbolize the completion of the Transcontinental Railroad on May 10, 1869, it opened the West as never before. Earlier in the year, the Red Stockings of Cincinnati became the first all-salaried, professional team in the fledgling sport of baseball. Undefeated as the year progressed, the Red Stockings rode these rails in mid-September to introduce professional ball beyond the Mississippi. The West offered opportunity and adventure, attracting people from around the world who flocked to the California gold rush of ’49 and the Comstock silver lode in ’59. Now, in 1869, these professionals came west to demonstrate their wealth of baseball riches to overmatched but eager ball clubs with a hankering to be part of the Red Stockings’ historic season." This was a fun historic article - you might remember I had an earlier Blog that had Wild Bill Hickok in a baseball game and Tom Custer was a good pitcher. https://twinsdaily.com/blogs/entry/11497-wild-bill-umpires-the-game/ It took a long time before baseball moved west in the professional sense. For a long time the West Coast had a minor league team with players like Joe DiMaggio and his brothers making it almost as good as MLB. St Louis was the team of the West for a century. "In 1859, the first organized team on the Pacific Coast, the San Francisco Eagles, was established. The next February, in San Francisco they played to a 33-33 tie with the Red Rovers of Sacramento. In September, the Eagles traveled to Sacramento in a rematch for the state title, emerging victorious 31-17. In a few years, the Eagles organization had grown such that with the overflow they formed a new club, the Pacifics. Both became premier teams among more than a dozen that organized in the Bay Area. The sport was invigorating to watch and spectators might even shoot their six-guns when excited. With gamblers betting on their favorite team, it’s said it was not uncommon to have enthusiastic supporters fire into the air to shake the concentration of batters taking swings or to rattle fielders preparing to catch the ball." https://www.sfomuseum.org/exhibitions/local-nine-san-francisco-seals-baseball-1903-1957 The San Francisco Seals had a very long and successful life in the bay area. After the 1957 season - another pennant for the Seals, they moved to Phoenix and the Dodgers and the Giants began the westward expansion of baseball in MLB. Now you might think this has nothing to do with the Twins, but if you had been around then you would have seen our local cities trying to get these teams to come to us. But - "Millers were top-level affiliates of the Boston Red Sox (1936–38; 1958–60) and New York Giants (1946–57). The Red Sox actually swapped ownership of their top farm club, the San Francisco Seals of the Pacific Coast League, for the Millers in 1957, enabling the Giants to move to San Francisco." The Original St Paul Saints - "The Saints finished first in the American Association nine times, and won the Little World Series in 1924. During this period, the Saints were a farm club of the Chicago White Sox (1936–1942), the Brooklyn Dodgers (1944–1957), and the Los Angeles Dodgers (1958–1960). The Saints played streetcar home and away double headers with their local rivals, the Minneapolis Millers. When the Minnesota Twins came to town in 1961, the Saints became the Omaha Dodgers while the Millers ceased operations." Note both Dodgers and Giants had a connection to the Twin Cities. The Dodgers were going to LA, but the Giants were not sure about SF and played games with the Twin City Press. https://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/17/sports/baseball/the-giants-almost-headed-not-quite-so-far-west.html "MINNEAPOLIS, June 16 - If not for Walter O'Malley, Willie Mays might be remembered for making a leaping catch 100 yards from a grazing cow. If not for a few twists of fate, Mays could have an "M" on the cap in his Hall of Fame plaque, and the scrum for Barry Bonds's 73rd home run ball might have occurred in the upper deck of the Metrodome." "According to newspaper and historical accounts, Stoneham discussed moving here with Minneapolis officials as early as 1955, when concern over declining attendance and the decrepit condition of the Polo Grounds prompted him to consider his options. The Giants owned the Class AAA Minneapolis Millers, giving them territorial rights, and Metropolitan Stadium was under construction on 164 acres of farmland in suburban Bloomington in hopes of luring a big-league team." The west won out, but the conversations were strong enough to interest the Griffith family in moving the Original Senators to that Bloomington field and here we are the Twins! And the story of the DC franchise which has had at least three professional teams includes 108 years without winning a series.

We agree!

I am not sold on Buxton, in fact I am willing to accept the label of being the least enamored of TD readers, but this is not about the player and in the economics of the game I am sympathetic to Buxton's case against the team. I was so blatant.

Yes and in this case I will take potential. Kershaw and Price are on their downside. I am betting on Graterol.

Yadier Molina is 37 and still playing great ball as a catcher. We cannot just assume that a player is going to have to move from catcher at a young age. From Fangraphs in 2013 "Good 34 year olds don’t regularly become bad 35 year olds. In general, you should expect players to decline at something like +0.5 per season. If they’re especially injury prone and their bodies are breaking down, limiting future playing time, maybe you knock off +0.75 WAR per season. A reasonable aging curve should return a decay of something in that range, for nearly any set of years. Whether a player is 30 or 35 should not drastically change the amount of aging you expect in the future. And whether a player is a catcher or not should also not greatly affect our expectations for his future performance. In general, catchers age about how we’d expect any other position player to age. They get worse, but they don’t fall apart without notice. Expect decline, not collapse." https://blogs.fangraphs.com/catcher-aging-is-a-curve-not-a-cliff/

Graterol has the potential to be better than all of them - yes. This is not vintage Kershaw. This is Kershaw on the down side of his career and no one knows how he will adapt. I will take our player with huge upside.

Hy Kershaw. We already know how to lose in post season. We do not need him. Graterol is better than all of them. No to any trade that has him in it. Archer? Why? Forget him and all but the first one on the list. No

I think that my problem was the AMEX card. I finally got to pay with a mastercard.

No - his value is at Catcher. He gives us an advantage over other teams at that position and he has worked hard to improve his defense there. He has had one really good season there in MLB - give him a few more. If you want to find someone to fill a position, 1B is a lot easier than Catcher. In two years our minor league catchers will be pushing to take over, let the process play out.

I am excited about signing a stud pitcher, but I have to say there is only one Verlander - he is great.