alskntwnsfn

I'm rooting more for Colabello this year than any other Twin.

This Abreu guy is going to be trouble.

They finally did it. They sold the disclaimer. Kind of impressive, but wow, that is scraping the bottom of the promotional barrel.

I do NOT support people wearing Nascar jackets in public (outside of actual Nascar events), unless they are black or navy. I can deal with that, but seriously, when was the last time you saw a Nascar jacket that didn't involve a fluorescent color scheme?

Well played.

Surprise surprise. I'm sure the auto-workers union wasn't crazy about replacing workers with robots either.

When I lived in Chicago, we used to call US Cellular Field "The Cuze". Mainly because Joan Cusak was everywhere with US Cellular ads that summer, that and it just sort of had a nice ring to it.

On Replay... We have the technology to decifer the exact trajectory of a pitch, including the number of rotations and the degree of movement. Yet, it is not used to improve ball/strike calls. I will never understand the resistance to this. Who is this silent majority that derives so much pleasure from an umpire guessing at borderline pitches?

That play isn't even close if Mauer is still catching.

FWIW, I really enjoyed the article. Great work Mr. Souhan!

And... now I can't get a thought out of my head... how many other players have collected 40 XBHs or more while striking out fewer times than the number of XBHs they had? And a follow up, how many of those players walked more than they struck out. It's really impressive just to walk more than you strike out, but to do it with power for nearly 400 PAs I would have to think is extremely rare.

I nominate this for the Absurd Statement tournament. There is almost no way this team will end up being the worst of the past 3 years. It would take a several key injuries and KC, CLE, and CHW would have to have a lot of young guys step forward.

How about Joe Dillon? He's only 39! Tongue in cheek, but still, there was a window when I have no doubt he could of been in the top half of all MLB 3B. For those of you who don't remember I launched a full scale "Free Joe Dillon" campaign on DTFC and BYTO back in the day. He had one of the most amazing minor league seasons back in 2007, it still blows my mind he never got an actual shot at a starting position even though he was in his early 30's. Joe Dillon... circa 2007: 317/405/605 at AAA Nashville 50/34 BB/K and 50 XBH in 378 PAs then he slashed 342/390/500 in 82 PAs for the big club (Milwaukee) http://www.baseball-reference.com/minors/player.cgi?id=dillon001jos I gotta think his story would make a good book or a movie, or at least an article. He battled back problems (herniated discs) for several years before walking away from the game in 2003 to coach at his alma mater, Texas Tech. With his back fixed, his friends talked him into getting back in the game. He played 6 more seasons, with one season in Japan. He put up huge numbers in the minors, OPSing over 1.000 three times but only started 30 MLB games in which he slashed 287/379/407.

I'd be fine with this too. I think its almost likely that Gibson and Deduno spend some time in the pen this year.

I don't know. He's not a guy you can bring in with guys on base because he can be wild and I think it takes him a few batters to settle in. In any event, he's not a good choice for high-leverage innings. I think its a much better approach to hand him the ball at the beginning of a game and let him do his thing for 100 pitches, however far that gets us. I did hear one of the Twins brass talking about how they don't like the fact that Deduno runs through his pitch count so fast that they worry about taxing the bullpen. Still, when he's on he is an elite pitcher so I hope they give him a chance at the rotation, and just take the good with the bad.

It's October 1, 2014 and the Minnesota Twins have exceeded all expectations to capture the AL Central title with a record of 91-71. Let's take a look at how this happened. Minnesota Twins - The Twins improved their hitting and starting pitching drastically in 2014. Joe Mauer improved to 320/420/530 while playing 150+ games, but the real difference came in the supporting cast. Josh Willingham smashed 30 HRs and slugged 530 in his contract year. Chris Parmelee, Oswaldo Arcia, and Chris Colabello combined for more than 140 XBHs. Brian Dozier and Josmil Pinto also turned in better than expected seasons. However, the starters might have been an even bigger surprise. Despite the fact only one Twins starter was named to the All-Star team, all five Twins starters (Nolasco, Hughes, Pelfrey, Correia, and Deduno) posted an ERA under 4.00 and made 30+ starts. Michael Tonkin, Kyle Gibson, and Caleb Thielbar set up All-Star Closer Glen Perkins forming a strong bullpen that was bolstered by Trevor May later in the year. Detroit Tigers - the defending division champs began the 2013/2014 offseason by trading Doug Fister for a decent pitching prospect and spare parts. They shored up the bullpen by signing Joe Nathan. However, injuries on offense to Miguel Cabrera and Torii Hunter were huge, along with Ian Kinsler struggling with Comerica Park. A slight regression by starters Scherzer and Sanchez along with a poor showing by Smyly torpedo'd the Tigers hopes in 2014. The Tigers paced the division in April and May but finished with only 86 wins. Cleveland Indians - the Indians lost two key starters in 2014 but it was their poor hitting that was their undoing in 2014. For the second year in a row no Indians regular posted an OPS over 840 and Nick Swisher and Michael Bourn actually regressed on their lackluster 2013. Although the Indians starters had an average ERA of 3.70 the lack of offense and some up/down relief work left them with only 78 wins in 2014. Kansas City Royals - the Royals were the other surprise team in the AL Central in 2014, winning 87 games. Alex Gordon, Mike Moustakas, Salvador Perez, Lorenzo Cain and Eric Hosmer all turned in fine seasons. James Shields and Jason Vargas were outstanding starters, as was Yordano Ventura but thin starting pitching down the stretch wasted the division's best overall bullpen. Chicago White Sox - the White Sox were abysmal in 2014, notching just 58 victories. Even though Jose Abreu turned in a fine season, injuries to Chris Sale and a poor supporting cast on both offense and the pitching staff contributed to the White Sox leading the AL in losses in 2014. If it's going to happen (and nobody is expecting it), that's how I see it going down. All this said, I expect the division to go DET, KC, MIN, CLE, and CHW. I actually feel pretty good about our starting pitching and I think there are enough decent arms for a good bullpen - which means we will have a chance regardless of how we hit. However, it's a much bigger stretch to project big things from the likes of Willingham, Parmelee/Colabello, Arcia and Plouffe. However, all those guys have a lot to play for (personally), so never underestimate the power of motivation. If we are going to score runs this year, at least 3 of these 4 have to post major production IMO.

You're probably right. Even still, I hope TR/Antony have thrown out something like that out there.

If they'd take Willingham and Mastro for Brad Miller (or Kyle Seager), we should do it. Seattle has too many SS. I like Danny Santana but Miller or Seager could handle short and provide a lot of offense. I'd even eat half of Willingham's salary to do the trade if I were the Twins. Willingham will be better than last year when he was battling knee problems for most of the year that sapped his power.

It's all context. You can show some attitude if you're a really good player or you play on a good team. It's like in football. Say a team is up by 21, and a DE hammers a back for a loss then showboats after the tackle, we all say "Go ahead and enjoy it, you're crushing them". But doing the same thing if you're down by 21 is a big no-no. Gardy's probably just excited to have some players who can back up their attitude. Time will tell if they can do it in the show. However, there's no way this coaching staff should NOT have been brought back after last year. Gardy continually ripped on players for mental mistakes but offered no examples of what the coaching staff was doing to fix the situation. And the hitting! When Tony Oliva has to call Colabello to tell him he's too far off the plate to cover the outer half of the plate, something is deeply wrong with your coaching staff. That shows that the staff was not going back to the tape to identify problems and fix them. I remember before the AS break seeing Justin hit, he was starting to keep his head more still, I said to my friend "watch, he's going to get hot" and he did for awhile. That's always been Justin's problem. These things are on the players as much as the coaches, they're grown men too who should know their bad habits better than anybody. But still... Tony O calling in hitting advice on a struggling hitter that was so obvious? I heard on the radio yesterday about how Bruno lost a lot of sleep because guys were striking out so much last year, maybe he should have used that time to watch some film or breakdown how opposing pitchers were attacking our hitters. Questions I'd like to hear reporters ask this year: "What types of things are you doing in spring training to improve the baserunning this year?" "Do Twins hitters have the ability to view swings from their past (successful stretches) side by side with current footage, is that something that players/coaches review on a weekly or daily basis?" "This year Target Field will be equipped with new technology allowing a much better understanding of batted balls and defensive outcomes. This data stream could be a big advantage since its only available in a few venues in 2014, which should give the Twins an advantage over other clubs in understanding their own players. Specifically, how will the coaching staff use this and Pitch f/x data to improve our club?"

The more I thought about this the past couple days, the more my anger over it subsided. If Sano was opposed to it in November and Dr. Andrews recommended rest, there was no way they were doing the surgery. I still don't know why there was no MRI last year in New Britain since it was reportedly bothering him then too. I think Sano has way too much pride to let this set him back, assuming all goes well with the surgery and he doesn't try to rush back. Given the timing, he won't be under any pressure to rush back to playing the field this year. And as many other's have commented, we'll be heading into 2015 with Buxton and Sano ready to go (hopefully). Even though I still think this could have been avoided (by doing the surgery in August or September) Sano and his doctor decided to try rest first. It will probably end up costing Sano a half year to a full year in service time, but it was his call.

Anybody else getting crappy audio? I sounds like the mic is bad, or they're talking too close. Anybody else?

They wouldn't have had to force anything. If they would have communicated the fact that they were not going to put Sano in the show without being able to make certain throws, he would have gladly had the surgery. Doing it in August or September would have been good for the player and good for the organization. You should always try to miss the fewest games possible, now he'll miss the most possible. Way to go Twins. I really don't see how this reasoning is so provocative. Maybe this really is about the service clock... there's (potentially) 25 million reasons for waiting until just before he gets to the show to do it.

There's a big difference between a sore elbow and a partially torn UCL. Yeah, I'd say any 3B with a significant UCL tear should get it taken care of at or near the end of the year. Based on the interview with Miguel, he was surprised by the "decision" and didn't appear to have much of a say in the matter. This kid has been directed by handlers for most of his life, so I don't think he makes many decisions about his future yet. Furthermore, Antony made an interesting comment about how he didn't injure it any worse, it just hasn't gotten any better. So basically, the Twins were not going to put that elbow in the show. I wonder if they told Miguel that last year?

Raise your hand if you've played third base. I have. You have to make throws from odd angles all the time. That puts a lot of stress on your elbow. This was an issue last year. They knew about it. So given the demands of the position, why wait? Antony say's he doesn't regret waiting a few months, but doing it in August or September would have been a totally different thing.

What's invasive about fixing a partially torn ligament you're going to need healthy for the next 18 years?