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mikelink45

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Everything posted by mikelink45

  1. mikelink45
    The Key for us is giving them steady time at one position - it took the Twins a long time to figure that out, and when they field good they are in a comfort zone that impacts their hitting too. This is the best since Zoilo and Killebrew were on that side or Gaetti and Gagne.
  2. mikelink45
    This should really be about more than Tonkin - I am not his fan, but I remember the anguish on TD when we wanted him to be given a chance. He has not risen to the challenge once he got it and I do not know why, but I do know we have a miserable bullpen. Kinzler seems to holding his own, but there isn't much else that gives me confidence. The real request I have is for them to start some mix and match tests and put in some young arms and see what we got. What do we have to lose? Does anyone still have spring training rosy glasses that put us in the playoffs?
  3. mikelink45
    With the recent implosion of relief pitchers on the Twins it is time for Melotokis and Burdi to be up. We have four relief pitchers with eras over 5 including Pressly at 9. Relief pitchers should have lower eras than starters. They are short stints, if there are men on base the previous pitcher gets charged. This is a seriously flawed pen and now that we basically have one month in we should try something new. After starting 5 - 1 we have gone 5 - 10, this is not a good team and we need to develop our talent. Last month fangraphs rated our bullpen #27 http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/2017-positional-power-rankings-bullpen-16-30/ And they had Pressly and Belisle with good years last year listed to be contributing 0.9 WAR to what they expected to be a total bullpen WAR of 2. That does not look like a good prognostication at this point. This is not to say that some might not get turned around, but if we have players who might succeed rather than just compete I want them on the MLB team.
  4. mikelink45
    I am glad all of you can participate in this conversation. As an old guy still guiding hiking trips in my 70s and trying to pay for my daily expenses I watch and read about baseball until the adding machine comes out. When players are making more than I make in a lifetime - average players - how can I relate? Here are the salary milestones: http://www.baseball-almanac.com/firsts/first9.shtml None of it makes sense to me. After all I bought gas from Bronko Nagurski - arguably the greatest football player of all time (my choice) from his standard oil station in International Falls. I hope the Twins do all they can afford to do to keep Sano and Buxton and Kepler. I hope we get a winner again and I hope that with all this funny money circulating people will quit obsessing over Mauer's contract. But what do I know, I still like batting averages and win-loss records. http://onthelake.net/connections/nagurski.htm
  5. mikelink45
    Is this about the trade (not good) or a statement on the teams ability to coach the talent they are given? Again the Twins - not good.
  6. mikelink45
    If Falvey and Lavine are creative as some reported with the Bosher up and down call why not get creative and pull some of these pitchers up for a look - I would love to see us go through a sequence like this one time - what do we have to lose - and if it does not work, are we really worse off? This was a fun pitching day and we do not have a lot of these to obsess over in the Twins world.
  7. mikelink45
    In the fifties we had junkball pitchers on every roster - pitchers like Stu Miller who had a windblown balk https://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/07/sports/baseball/stu-miller-dies-at-87-blown-off-mound-in-all-star-game.html?_r=0 He won 105 games and accumulated a 27 WAR. "Stu Miller never threw a pitch more than 60 miles per hour, yet he enjoyed a 16-year career that saw him save 154 games and may have had the best changeup that baseball has ever seen." http://bleacherreport.com/articles/1159429-mlb-the-30-quirkiest-pitching-deliveries-in-baseball-history I thought this article on who throws the slowest fastball in 2015 was instructive http://www.sportsonearth.com/article/125659856/mlb-slowest-fastballs-masterson-vargas-lincecum-haren-weaver-buehrle because we would take Buerhle results and two of the pitchers on the list included one former Twin and one Twin at the time. Finally this article from 2014 on how to survive without a fast fastball has some interesting pitchers on it https://www.numberfire.com/mlb/news/1666/how-to-pitch-in-the-major-leagues-without-a-90-mph-fastball All of which leads me to say that Hughes might figure it out and extend his career yet even if he does not get his fastball back. Although this list of the slowest fastballs in baseball in 2016 has only one pitcher that you might want in your rotation http://www.masslive.com/redsox/index.ssf/2016/05/who_throws_the_slowest_pitch_i.html
  8. mikelink45
    Molitor's quote is the key to the criticism Polanco received and the most important thing the new FO can do is get the minor leagues in tune with the Twins major league club. We have had awful adjustment issues.
  9. mikelink45
    well done. I like your research and data. It does not make Buxton shine, but it certainly gives us some perspective. I am so anxious for him to get this horrible period behind him. Yesterday I posted the worst starts for HOF players. We love baseball because it is filled so many variations, but sometimes they can also drive us crazy.
  10. mikelink45
    Now that Tepesch instead of Berrios is coming up I expect the team to soar. (Sarcasm alert).
  11. mikelink45
    3.2 War came in his career year. That leaves 1 for the other four years. Still not excited by this. http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/g/gibsoky01.shtml Wins above Average Adjusted - 0.4 I am glad Gibson has one fan - but it would take a lot to get me to join you. From last years horrible year his strike out per walk is down, his WHIP is way up (I value this stat a lot), his FIP is up. He is building off a horrible year with a worst year. I hope you are right and it turns around and he is great, but if so I will be very pleasantly surprised and wrong.
  12. mikelink45
    And I believe we specialize in the Blackburn/Slowey types.
  13. mikelink45
    Gibson, Hughes, Pressly, Tonkin, Mejia - the list is too long. We will only move upward with pitching and pitching is something we do not seem capable of developing (not that we are good at developing Buxton either).
  14. mikelink45
    I put this up on another essay in TD, but I feel it belongs here: Kyle Gibson - fifth year - record - 32-41 4.72 era 1.42 whip. His third year was good, his trend is not. -0.4 WAR for his career. Mejia did not deserve to stay up on a good club, on this club he was outperforming Gibson and we need to try something new. Of course I want Berrios, but based on the luck Twins have in bringing up their superstar MiLB players and converting them to MLB my expectations remain low. http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/g/gibsoky01.shtml I would love to see Gibson prosper, but I am getting the sense that he has peaked and as our #3 rotation guy we are hurting. Of course the question is - beyond Berrios, who is ready to make the jump, especially in this organization that seems to have a "Wall" between MiLB and MLB and we have not done well at getting players over it. I have tried to look at comparable statistical starts to see how Buxton compares. Since we have touted him as a superstar I looked at the worst starts of HOF careers and found this article: http://www.azsnakepit.com/2012/4/11/2938842/worst-starts-to-hall-of-fame-careers-cooperstown Even though the WAR figures are the same for Buxton and the worst of the starts - Brooks Robinson, the batting lines are so far apart that Buxton would have to start a new category of his own. Is he pressing? Is he unconcerned? Who is working with him? This is painful to watch.
  15. mikelink45
    Kyle Gibson - fifth year - record - 32-41 4.72 era 1.42 whip. His third year was good, his trend is not. -0.4 WAR for his career. Mejia did not deserve to stay up on a good club, on this club he was outperforming Gibson and we need to try something new. Of course I want Berrios, but based on the luck Twins have in bringing up their superstar MiLB players and converting them to MLB my expectations remain low.
  16. mikelink45
    Today another source said Vargas and Boshers. Then I looked at their stats and wondered why. It would seem to me that Palka is showing a lot more plate discipline at this point and Vargas does not seem to be gaining traction in AAA. The article said Bosher has not had many innings and is =7 era does not seem to indicate that he should get them. Explain the "new" thinking of the FO and management? Please. Seth had a really good article with lots of options, but this seems to be another questionable move.
  17. mikelink45
    Tell me why. They are not on my radar, what makes them first line call ups?
  18. mikelink45
    How fun is the speculation and how full will the postings be if Vargas and Berrios are not on the roster. Please give us more. Make the large scale shifts we need if we have any hope going forward.
  19. mikelink45
    Am I the only Pressly hater? What has he done? 8.44 ERA? Relievers are not even charged with inherited runners. Whip 1.31 what is to like about that? Batting .286 against him. MLB Career Stats 14 14 3.67 179 0 1 213.1 157 1.33 - replacement level. This is a 6th inning reliever, not a stud. Its time to test some minor league arms.
  20. mikelink45
    Nice to get these thoughts. I would love it if you listed the top four or five at every Twins position for this year. Not their potential, but their current ability to be in the bigs. I keep reading about all these players and try to think who comes up if Dozier or Sano or anyone else goes down. I do feel bad for Garver and would love to see him get a chance.
  21. mikelink45
    As much as I enjoy these minor league summaries, I hope I do not have a season in which I have to find more pleasure in these than in the major league results. It seems like we have been doing so well in the minors for the last five years (or more) and that does not translate to the majors. What must be done?
  22. mikelink45
    Thanks for the enjoyable opening. If you did not have to state a few Twins facts the entire article might have been fun, but with the Twins reality eventually surfaces. We have 40% of our starting rotation functioning, we have 25% of our bullpen functioning, 33% of our outfield, 33% of our lineup batting over .250 and we are in last place - I am shocked.
  23. mikelink45
    Reality can be so depressing. The mirage that was the first week created a massive balloon and when it popped the casualties among fans who wanted to believe was devastating. This is the same rotation plus Mejia, this is a patchwork bullpen with one FA signing that was not even a closer and we expected what? It was so fun to been over 500. But now we are three times through the rotation - a magical moment in my assessment and we are have lost the glow. The bats are weaker than we thought and the arms are delivering what was expected. Something needs to happen and a lot of creativity would be welcome.
  24. mikelink45
    Wonderful thought exercise. I have been frustrated by the love of Pressly who demonstrated again today why I do not love him. MPH is not the measure of a relief pitcher. I always thought that the relievers ERA should include the runs scored by any of the runners that they inherit. They can be charged to the starter too, but the job of a reliever is to put out the fire and if all the runners score and then they get the batters out I am not counting that as a 0.00 era. I am also amazed by the Hold stat. Yikes is that perverted. We have not gotten a good measure for relievers and, like you, I think the save is ridiculous.
  25. mikelink45
    Lets see them be more creative. Three weeks and then make some major shifts - starting rotation, bench, and bullpen. There is a lot of room to move a lot of bodies around and it would be refreshing if they did. We have half of a bullpen and have our rotation that could be replaced and should be. We have a strange bench and its time Santana moved on and one less pitcher was on the staff so two players could move in here and give Molitor some strategic room. And I bet I am not the only fan who would like to see some creative chopping and moving.
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