Hosken Bombo Disco

Word on the street has it that the Pohlads had their fingers in pretty much everything, including the Tyler Mahle trade, the Joey Gallo signing, and even when to send up Manuel Margot to pinch hit. I have it on good authority that Jim Pohlad himself was writing the lineup cards during that late season collapse.

I can stomach a Yankees-Dodgers World Series this year because I think they are far and away the two best teams. And Ohtani.

Radio guys: “both managers pressing all the right buttons” I am trying to imagine Rocco managing in the ALCS and pressing all the right buttons lol

well then

Forgot about that. 17 innings here we come!

I’ve been saying all season— he is due

I just want there to be a game five for when we are grilling late Saturday afternoon 🙂

I don’t think the Guardians have a chance in the 10th, but you never know

this sport

Home run lol

Well, it did happen in the blink of an eye in real life, too,..

On the other hand, last year's World Series participants seem like the type of cookie-cutter teams I was minimizing earlier in my post. So there's that.

This discussion has been music to my ears! lol My defense of Rocco, such as it is, is that Rocco doesn’t look much different to me than a bunch of other managers in the game right now. Same with this front office, I guess. I think we are in a period where fundamentals have been downplayed, in favor of data, and maybe we are exiting that cycle now. I don’t know. This is very anecdotal, but a few times during the last few seasons, I have seen a player on the other team look frankly no better than a typical minor leaguer (still very good I might add) batting and fielding, and think to myself, how is this guy in the majors? And then I check his exit velocities, and they are very high. The Twins have players like this too. Carlos Correa is very good and has very high exit velocity, which maybe played a part in his signing. Luis Arraez, terrible exit velocity. Traded. And we see many teams maybe think they are going to be the real innovators, to use the wonderful example above, but are all really doing the same thing. I don’t know. Maybe that makes them really to be codifiers or exploiters. That old Far Side cartoon comes to mind, of the single penguin among thousands, shouting “I’ve got to be me!” The Twins are one of the penguins who look like all the other penguins to me. I have been waiting for some smart baseball writer out there to publish that seminal essay of our time about Why The Game Has Changed, but have yet to see it. Because in the StatCast era, I really think it has. However, this does not explain the massive collapse at the end of this season, which interests me. The teams we see in both league’s championship series this season (or at least 3 or them) strike me as strong in many or most of the fundamental things teams traditionally have worked for—scouting, development, coaching, culture, yes analytics, taking the right risks, and yes money plays a role. The Dodgers and Yankees are not where they are solely because of their market or payroll, not in my opinion.

Meanwhile, the business office is already making preparations for this year’s TwinsFest:

Not to pick on you specifically… but, as has been noted elsewhere, the Detroit Tigers “traded everyone” at the deadline this year, and it actually supercharged their performance to the point where they made up ten games in the standings on the Twins, made the playoffs, and are now one win away from advancing to the ALCS. (Where they would probably get their butts kicked by NYY, but still) this came as a surprise to everyone, even the manager and young quant guy GM in Detroit who executed the moves to clear the way for the young guys. So, bottom line, we don’t really know what effects trading away Royce Lewis would have. 🙂

Shaping up that way. This has been an incredible postseason so far.

Detroit/KC in ALCS -- who's with me

Now we get ready for the next game; I heard the umpires will be sporting different umpire shirts tonight. Tired of living a lie, they will just openly admit to it

Turns out that he bleeds, and surrenders earned runs, like any other man

Didn’t realize Skubal was getting squeezed…. Following from work I feel like both teams deserve to win this game.

You got it

Skubal retired the first 13 Cleveland hitters, then got a needed dp ball in the 5th

Correa for Baez, straight up, and the Twins save $9 million a year for the next three years that they can apply to other free agents 🙂 (but also lose a gold glove fielder)

Falvey sounds like a guy unburdened by what has been, and what can be 🙂

When removing the Viking losses, Vikings opponents so far have a record of 13-7. What they said about the difficult early schedule appears to be true.