karcherd

Duran needs to pitch the ninth in a save situation, that is a mindset. Rocco has to quit overthinking everything, Ober should have stayed out there anyway.

Because he is on the bench.

Considering he has over 100 AB's more than anyone else other than Castro, he should have more RBI's. His OBS against RH pitching is well below league average, is his defense worth the offense we are giving up.

There have been comments that Lewis is hurt, is he hurt or have the Twins told him to throttle it down so as not to risk injury. I saw him go first to third in the Cardinals series and he sure didn't look like he was having any issues. The Twins are notorious on being conservative with injured players and we never really know their true status. Also Lewis even though he has been injured, he is a first overall pick and should be a cornerstone for this franchise. You need to give him a position and let him learn, get comfortable and coach him up. I thought they told him he was moving to 3B, let him play there and learn. If you want everyone in the lineup move Miranda to 2B if you are going to insist on playing Santana every day, even though he be a platoon player and defensive replacement at 1B. This philosophy that you can play anyone anywhere only works so often, you wonder why we keep seeing sloppy play and plays not being made. This comes from players playing out of position and not learning from reps that are needed. Choose a starting 8 and if someone gets injured call up someone to replace that position. We have 3 utility players, 4 if you consider Farmer an utility player. That is way too many and makes your bench moves unproductive, because the moves are based who can play a position instead of what is our best move possible to get the most production out of the particular move.

Since 2020 Rocco is at .500 and one playoff series win. Not terrible but after 5 years I would hope to have a better record to build off of 2019. So what is he doing that is so great, he has been basically been an average manager the last 4 years.

My only change to this is Julien at 2B now, Lewis 3B, and Miranda at 1B. Santana is not an everyday player just because Rocco puts him out there doesn't mean he is. This puts the best available players at their best positions. If you want to move Lewis do it in spring training.

I agree this is the analytics nerds driving baseball decisions, I want to get 2 outs for 1 run. They play in almost every time there is a runner on third and less than two outs regardless of score and situation. Live to play another inning.

But they had the play on to throw home, he should have turned the double play, but they were playing in to cut down the runner at home. Would have been out of the inning with only 3 runs,

So now Lewis is our new utility player. Put him at SS and Lee at 2B, where he is more comfortable. You can't keep moving players around like a chess board.

Larnach was a high draft pick, you need to develop him and give him a chance along with Wallner. And that means play them every day, quit yanking them at the drop of a hat. Or else you need to improve the roster. When you have Margot, Farmer, Vasquez pinch hitting or guys like Garlick and Luplow in prior years, there is no reason to try and develop him and give him a chance. Or else quit drafting LH hitting outfielders if you are going to turn them all into platoon players. Even Kepler has been platooned this year, he didn't start against LH pitching until Buxton went on the IL and they ran out of RH hitting OF's to play. Last night is a great example of their obsession of not letting a LH hitter play against LH pitching. You have a player make his debut in a position that he is not familiar with, all so you don't have a LH hitting OF.

Absolutely platooning is the problem. Because of the situational changes, you end up expecting your end of the bench players to be successful in clutch situations. Play your best players and have the end of the bench players have a role that plays to their strength like pinch running for Santana.

This loss was due to this team's slavish devotion to analytics and shows what will happen in the playoffs. Roster construction is devoted to position flexibility so you end up having three infielders playing the outfield. Stolen bases are not valued on defense or offense according to the analytics or is the sacrifice bunt. The team refuses to develop players and make them full time players. You sit two of your hottest hitters and when they do come in you pinch hit for one with Vasquez. By sitting Wallner and Larnach, you then have no bench players to fill the role of pinch runner for Santana in the 9th inning. We need regular every day players and fill the bench with specific roles in mind. And if someone goes down call up somebody that can actually play that position. We don't need three utility players on the roster. When Castro and Santana lead your team in AB's, you are not going to win consistently. Even without injuries they still would have been in the top 5 in plate appearances. They can't just keep dismissing the running game, teams are starting to take advantage of this. Putting runners in scoring position so easily is leading to runs and not helping the pitcher out. We need to start to being a little more aggressive as well, sometimes just starting a runner keeps you out of the double play. Why not have Lee bunt the runners over, you then have two runners in scoring position and put pressure on the pitcher and defense. I probably would bunt more than a lot of people on this board would, but how can you not bunt in that situation. Rocco's explanation basically just confirms that he was playing for the home run again. This team will have some success with their philosophy in the regular season because the odds say if you do x action so many times it will have success x percent of the time. But you can't do that in the playoffs, you need your best and regular players to step up and win the game. Last night is what a playoff game would be like, they will keep trying to playing the odds and in a short series you will lose. Are they going to turn ERod and Jenkins into platoon players if they continue to develop as they have been.

This is what happens when you only value versatility, just because the player can go out there doesn't necessarily mean he will make the plays needed.

There is your Gold Glove first baseman.

Three converted infielders playing in the outfield, induce a lot of ground balls

Wow one run he gave up, proves the point it is about runs given up.

Actually if you are getting outs, that is good, I didn't know they gave runs for the hardest hit balls.

Rocco also not a helper to Larnach.

Exactly, just because a player can play a position doesn't mean he can play it well. There is a reason we see some of the sloppy play that happens, players are not playing in familiar positions.

And now we have the famed power hitters Farmer and Helmen left to pinch hit.

Put Royce at short and move Lee to second, at least he would be more comfortable there. Stop thinking this is Little League.

Helmen is up here because the Twins analytics nerds think this is Strat-o-matic. Just because a player can go to different positions doesn't mean he can play them well. How many utility guys do you need. Play your best players at their best position. Having one utility guy is not a bad thing but you don't need a roster full of them. Helmen may do ok up there but I just wish for once they would bring up the best player regardless of where they play.

I personally would rather see Wallner out there every day regardless of who is pitching.

That is on Rocco and the analytics because they don't 4 seam FB's as well so they decided to go away from Zebby's strengths.