Hosken Bombo Disco

Very tough crowd. Although I'd say Ryan's in a situation of his own making and he's going to have people on edge (including Pohlad) until he lands the big fish.

Gosh I hope so. Too bad the secret's out he can't field worth a… It's definitely possible he could get on a streak and at that point get anything you can get for him.

I think and hope the Twins are happy with Florimon for now. We've had multiple mid-season tryouts at short since Bartlett was traded, and it's been ugly.

will they throw in Duke Welker?

I liked Baker, he was certainly a success story, but he left the team on bad terms and won't be back. Garza won't be back. Santana might be fun--- wait, you REALLY REALLY REALLY want to get the band back together, don't you!

Agree. Any way to segregate data on OPS across parks for balls hit off the fence/wall? My eye test tells me that TF produces single-base hits (not even a double sometimes) off the granite outcrop that a few feet higher would be home runs.

see what 90 loss seasons do?

To get away from statistical arguments for a moment... These Twins teams feel much worse than the sum of their parts. The 2011 roster loses 99 games are you kidding me? Now multiply by 3. "Yeah but injuries yeah but prospects…" There's an intangible badness right now. That's part of why we see battle lines being drawn, why some people propose "fire the manager" (me) or "sign Pierzynski" (not me) or "rush the prospects up" or some other sexy but unquantifiable idea that the other side scoffs at. Or as Terry Ryan himself let it slip, "we've got to try something." Well one thing he can try, and we all pretty much agree, is he can somehow lure a top pitcher to come here, who by himself can win us some games, draw some fans back, maybe keep us around .500 going into the ASG, get that winning feeling back. Also it might create a nicer clubhouse atmosphere for the young whippersnappers to come into later in the year to save the day.

Agreed :-)

You, Dave, myself and others, we are talking right past each other. You don't sound like you're trying to hear anyone out - clarify if I am wrong. And you touched a nerve. Need to question how you handle Marquis's personal tragedy here. If you need assurance that a sentinel event like that can really affect an athlete in unpredictable ways, then I will assure you that it can. A comparison of Marquis's stats may or may not be appropriate here but the accident isn't. It's a relief that his story ended well. Background for anyone unfamiliar: http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/story/minnesota-twins-jason-marquis-daughter-serious-injury-reflect-on-importance-of-family-040312 In any case I'm talking about individual guys as part of a broader recent pattern. Twins aren't competently managing their player personnel anymore. Period. Give Ryan credit for the bullpen, otherwise the rest of the team is mostly a wreck. Standing by Humber. He was no good. I didn't think he was good. You didn't think he was good. We agree! I get what you're saying - he regressed. The point is, another organization got something out of him we couldn't. I double checked for you and verified that 2011 wasn't strike shortened to three months. A whole season of solid starting pitching. But get this: Humber had a rough patch that year - go figure. Irrelevant that he didn't become Steve Carlton overnight. Irrelevant that other teams passed on him. Dickey same thing. Most organizations passed him over. Twins took a flyer then let him go. Another team picked him up and got something out of him. Did that not happen? JJ Hardy, he of the nagging injury, goes to Baltimore and has been healthy for three years. Bad timing, bad luck? Maybe the Orioles are getting Valencia figured out too, maybe not. Cuddyer succeeds in Colorado without even having to play second base. Twins still teaching Plouffe to play third base. These are recent examples of Twins mismanaging their personnel. Do the right things and you make your own luck. Dozier and Florimon are bright spots so let's leave them alone right? Yet I feel like there's another trade or middle infield shake up coming. Revere plays well here, goes to Philly, struggles. I'm not claiming it's all one sided. Most guys who come and go are in the middle, I get that too. I'm willing to give your side a little ground though. Are you? Worley and Diamond regress. Deduno pitches well. Albers was off everyone's radar. Gibson, Hicks are the first wave of prospects to underachieve. Bigger pattern trending in the wrong direction. Yasiel Puig shows poor sportsman ship, the Dodgers line is "he's a great guy, he just get's excited and expresses himself poorly." Dodgers got the memo it's not 1960 anymore. Meanwhile, Miguel Sano shows poor sportsman ship, the Twins show him who's boss with a proudly publicized four game benching. Anyone see a problem with that? Right or wrong, that's not how you treat people anymore. It's not rocket science either. Then you got Gardenhire showing up Hicks in the dugout in view of the cameras. To Hugh's point about Bobby Cuellar speaks Spanish so that's good enough, there are articles all over the web praising the presence of Latin-American born coach/player/mentors on big league rosters. Search KC on mlb from April 2013 for a good story. This is not a strange new concept. Twins have no one. The thing is, when a team is winning, no one really bothers about side issues like that. When a team is chronically losing, then it's worth taking a look. Some people here are trying to do that. Not everyone but some. Have a good day and hug your family. Lot's of names still in the hat too. Maybe another time.

Again, the hat is full of names. Let me reach in for another… Oh you'll love this one: Philip Humber. For the Twins, he plays 2 seasons, 6.00+ ERA in 13 relief appearances. Then he was gone. Patrick Reusse called him the very worst pitcher on a 40-man major league roster. Two years later Humber shows up in Chicago and Don Cooper gets an entire good season out of him, 9-9 3.75 ERA ERA+ of 116. Did the White Sox turn Humber into Ron Guidry? no. Did Humber regress after 2011, yes he did, spectacularly. Did anyone on TD predict Humber would ever be a solid starter after he left? Doubt it. Were guys like Anderson or Gardenhire able to figure out Humber, even for just one season? Apparently not. Was another organization able to get something out of him? Apparently so. And that's the point. I'm not talking about guys like Lohse or Big Poppi from back in the day. I also doubt Liriano can duplicate that last season ever again. But Liriano is part of the pattern that's developing that the Twins refuse to acknowledge exists. We had what 8 ex-Twin all stars this year for goodness sake and people notice that. Want to keep going?

And what does it say that Duensing was the one left over to start the playoffs that year?

Nobody predicted Dickey would win a Cy Young. I get it. But hey we had young arms and needed a guy who could give us 180+ innings, ERA be damned.. I liked Dickey to be that guy and dug up a link from someone else with better reasoning than me who felt the same: http://martinandrade.wordpress.com/tag/ra-dickey/ Possibly Dickey didn't have his knuckler perfected and would have busted and we would have released him anyway. That's why there are debates. btw this would get a like from me too. But back to the point. There's a whole hatful of names you can pick from, ex-Twins finding success, and fewer and fewer success stories here at home.

It can be nitpicked. The bigger point is that the Twins are managing their personnel so poorly. A guy like Dickey has no value to us, but to another organization becomes quite effective. We're in 2013 and this is now a regular pattern. Don't blame the players!

R. A. Dickey. I am the Dickey police and love picking up Dickey speeders. Dickey happens to be a knuckle ball pitcher otherwise IMO he is the perfect example of Gardy and Andy not knowing what they're doing. Sorry, with all due respect we can't let this one rest. So, there's Bill Smith, in his spare time between negotiating Santana, Hunter, Mauer and Morneau contracts. He signs Dickey to eat a ton of innings. Probably as a starter because you dont see many knucklers who are late inning relievers. (the google tells me we even signed Dickey prior to 2008 but sent him to Seattle). So it's April of 2009 and Dickey is a Twins pitcher. He gets one start and is sent to bullpen. As a situational reliever, brilliant! I guess to face the righties. And Dickey actually pitches pretty well, never getting back in the rotation however. There is an anecdote in Dickey's book about Gardenhire coming out to the mound once to bring Dickey into a tight spot and when Dickey gets out there, Gardy tells him "don't throw your knuckleball because we don't want any passed balls." Don't throw your knuckleball? The guy doesn't have any other pitch. That was part of the whole "Dickey" thing from the start. He's a knuckleballer. By July/August Gardy was twisted into knots over this knuckleball reliever Bill Smith gave him, and Dickey is optioned, never to be heard from again until the following year when he gets another chance to start. With his knuckleball. Also, Cy Young and stuff. Needs to be said. We will have this conversation again.

I love how you take a chance with this post.. another parable I see is Emperor's New Clothes

Great work. A lot of points that raise even more questions which is good. I'm also curious about your selection of pitchers for evaluating Anderson. At some point everything does get subjective. Pavano adored pitching to Butera so maybe Anderson can't take as much credit? I also think Liriano is a TBD until he repeats 2013 which all Twins fans know he won't. Dickey goes in the "Gardy=fail" column which I won't get into here. Scott Baker was pretty good here (injury confusion and departure aside) so mark one for Anderson. This is what it boils down to to me too. You feel like all Anderson ever says anymore is "attack this guy" or "be careful with this guy." Now that's not being completely fair, but results matter. There's no indication that Anderson really deeply studies his pitchers mechanics, studies subtle tendencies of the opposing lineup, can impart that knowledge during a game, or has any advanced insight on how pitchers really feel about their 2nd best pitches, on the pitcher-catcher relationship, on how a game develops, and so on. Some guys (Duncan, Maddox) seem to intuitively take it all in at a glance. You feel like when Anderson leaves the park after a game he just wants to go home and have a beer and not think about it. Lots of us can empathize with that. It's a hard job. Few of us here could do it. But there are people who know they can do it and haven't had the opportunity yet. Dick Such took a lot of heat but Kelly swore by him. But Kelly and Such also had those two rings. They were together about 15 years and they were done. Kelly had talked of burnout. We burn out at different rates. It's doing nobody any good to leave someone in a job they know they need a break from.

Unbelievable glove. Bat him 8 or 9 and start him 150 games at second, third or short if necessary.

Welcome! but I disagree. :-) ....but not necessarily... It would depend on AJ , is he ok being a part time player? Is he asking something reasonable? On its face it makes no sense so there must be a back story or bigger plan in the works. He's had a remarkable and injury free career and I loved the guy, no doubt. I also want to see what Herrmann and Pinto can do though.

Totally agree, but the only thing at stake next year is player development, so shopping for a second veteran catcher seems like such a waste of the front office's time and energy, considering the cost of playing time from Pinto/Herrmann, additional roster decisions, salary, etc.

One of the best ever.. tip o' the cap and many more good years to come. http://www.nj.com/yankees/index.ssf/2009/05/new_york_yankees_brett_gardner.html

Bueller? I'd like to see Herrmann and Pinto slug it out (maybe not the right metaphor) compete and Doumit would be just fine to catch for a free agent pitcher, if that's what the Twins think they need. Pinto will not be a career .340 and Herrmann's average will lift and Herrmann 's D measures up favorably against Pinto's. Herrmann did call those Albers shutouts. Herrmann, Pinto, Doumit are the catchers on this team.

If the Twins really want a stop gap veteran catcher for a year, what's wrong with Doumit?

Agree. A team looks for long-term stability at short and Bartlett was becoming that guy. One of Smith's biggest mistakes. If he's healthy I have no problem with Bartlett coming back as a utility guy, late inning SS/3B type.

I agree. I love the guy too. The Morneau-Presley trade made sense in baseball terms but not so sure as a business decision (it falls on its face as a "honorable" or "right thing to do" or Twins Way decision). People still came to the park to cheer Mauer & Morneau. The losing has stained the good young players we do have. So we are now a Mauer injury away from having a lineup of names that no one cares about and can't win games. I guess they weighed this consideration this summer and rolled with it anyway.