gunnarthor

I don't want them to sign a shortstop. They have Royce Lewis. They have a ton of bats. They should be able to produce a reasonably good offense again next year. They need pitching. Every penny has to go to pitching.

It's funny. I watched Hikaru's video on the Yoo game after I responded to you and he was completely dismissive of the game, saying both sides kept making mistakes. Oh well, I loved the game while it happened. It looked fun and was exciting to figure out the attack.

Also, relooking at this thread, I was completely wrong when I said Magnus would absolutely defend his title. Oh well. Other fun related chess channels - https://www.youtube.com/c/AnnaCramling Anna Cramling is a strong woman's player (her mother was a WGM and top woman's player in Switzerland, I believe. Her dad was also a GM and was coach of the Woman's Olympiad). Anna's videos are usually short but she's popular enough to have had on Super-GMs, like MVL. She also explains things pretty well for us lay-persons to understand. https://www.youtube.com/c/CoffeeChess - fun channel about a bunch of chess players, usually talking smack (total PG smack, but still). Very family friendly. Sometimes they'll have big time players show up and you can see the difference between Super GMs and normal, good chess players. https://www.youtube.com/c/GothamChess - gotham chess. Levy Rozman is an IM and chess coach. I think he has the most popular chess YouTube channel but it's at least one of them. Some people don't like him, and he's a bit hit-or-miss but he usually has good coverage of big chess events and chess news. I know there are a lot more but those are some fun ones.

I think it's pretty straight forward. He cheated a lot more in online games than he admitted to and chess.com showed him up on that, which made Hans look really, really bad. But I also think he legitimately beat Magnus at the Springfield Cup and his game the other day against Christopher Yoo was a true masterpiece. I don't think he's cheating now or in any over the board game. I think what happened is that he cheated b/c he wanted 1) to play the better players and didn't want to wait for his ratings to go naturally up; 2) he wanted money. I also believe him when he says that chess is all he does and he's been studying chess for 12 hours a day since COVID. His rise isn't shocking even if it's a bit unusual. And COVID probably stunted a lot of development. He's only 19 and everyone agrees his natural talent probably puts him in the 2650-2700 range. Looking at super GMs describe his game against Magnus and none saw anything suspicious. Magnus played bad. Hikaru had a nice video of a game where Hans beat Fabiano and noted that g4 was a strange move it was also the wrong move. Fabiano just reacted poorly and then got into a position where any super GM would win. Don't have the link off the top of my head right now. I'm probably a bit forgiving of Hans because he was a kid when he cheated - I don't think he's cheated as an adult and the big report by chess.com (covered by the WSJ) also never found evidence of him cheating as an adult or ever in an over-the-board match. Second, I think Magnus is absolutely punching down on someone and Hans is dealing with it about as well as anyone could. I can't imagine the emotional pressure and stress that happens after you beat the best player in the world straight up and he accuses you of cheating. Third, I think Magnus' subsequent retirement after two moves in a game a week later was extremely immature. Lastly, I like what Hans is doing right now. The g4 move was a strange move but an incorrect move. But he might be making strange moves because chess has become a bit over reliant on "the right move" and a bit less about the positional game. Super GMs tend to talk poorly about past greats like Tal b/c his games are judged poorly by computer play. But that's what playing Tal did - he made so many strange moves and strange attacking chances that opposing players never found the best moves against him. So I'm thrilled to see new positional chess come back. Like I said, the game against Yoo was wonderful, even though Hans got in time trouble.

Absolutely. Having "average" ML players isn't a bad thing, sorry if that's how it came out. In 06, for example, the Twins had Santana and Mauer being all-world but Cuddy also managed a solid 2.7 WAR season out of RF. Miranda can be that type of player. Not a bad thing at all.

Miranda, Lewis, and Wallner are the important ones. Miranda is probably the safest bet to be a solid ML player but he'll be - at best - average. Among first baseman with 400 PA, he was 23rd in fWAR. His bat is comparable to guys like Naylor and Seth Brown now and he could improve a bit more but he's likely a 1.5-2.5 WAR player over a full season, depending on how his defense grades out. I don't think he'll be a 30 HR threat but a consistent "professional hitter" with bad defense. I liked Wallner and thought he should have been brought up earlier. Again, his upside is limited by his defense but at this point, the Twins should just roll with him, trade Kepler, and give him RF from opening day. He's too old to be sent back to AAA. His defense could be bad enough where his offense doesn't matter but he could also hit 30 HR at TF. But it makes sense to give him a chance to show us what he is. Lewis is the best player and the highest ceiling. Looked great in limited action. My hope and guess is the Twins let him start the year as our shortstop and live with him there until they can't. Hope that his bat is real. He's still young and talented enough where we can dream a bit.

Yeah, I still think this team can finish the year as a top 20 team but it's so hard to watch this offense at times. The defense played better than the final score indicated. And, while I like Fleck, he made some stupid decisions. It's good that he's so emotional - I think it's an overall benefit - but it does have real downside. Also, that dropped TD in the endzone that became an interception was a backbreaker.

Every team had injuries. The Twins designed a pitching system that would ensure they needed 30 pitchers to pitch a full season. Six of those pitchers managed to top 70 innings. To blame this on injuries is nonsense. Bailey Ober on the DL didn't wreck our season, the plan of needing two dozen pitchers to create a pitching staff ruined our season. Re: age. First 30 isn't really the cutoff. Players are (usually) what they are by 25 and start declining by 30. There are tons of exceptions but it's probably a really bad plan to expect 29 year old Polanco to better than 28 year old Polanco. Second, the Twins are in a really ugly weird spot where they need to start relying on a bunch of young guys who aren't really that young anymore but haven't really shown much at the ML level yet - Lewis, Kiriloff, Larnich, Wallner, Jeffers, Miranda. That's not a completely useless core but a lot has to go right to be just solid. They amassed 3 WAR in 1100 PA as a group. To be fair, I think the Twins could have a top 10 offense if things broke right and still finish under .500 (similar to this year). But the pitching is the far, far bigger problem. Lastly, I've been pretty consistent with my concerns about this FO's inability to make solid plans and their reliance on unrealistic expectations and hope v. facing reality. And I've been pretty consistent with pointing out that they failed to do the obvious when they were hired - supplement the core they inherited and extend the window of opportunity they had. The Twins are a bad team. Some of that was hidden because we play in the AL central.

Honestly, I don't know how they can without becoming a new FO. The twice through the batting order thing is tiresome and stupid but the potential danger is that none of the pitching prospects they've had are showing anything. And is that because we are just in a bad development spot (it happens) or is it because the philosophy of twice through the order permeates throughout the organization so minor league pitchers aren't taught third and fourth pitches like they should be? I have no idea but I'm very worried. The Twins had three players this year and three players last year get even 500 plate appearances. That's a stupidly low number but also shows either a problem of philosophy - we have to rest guys more often - or a problem of training. But it means that lesser players get more at-bats then they should. Good teams should give the majority of bats to good hitters. The Twins were more like a pee-wee team, making sure everyone got at-bats. And at the end of the day, there isn't a lot of hope left. Even in 2014, a pretty bad year, Twins fans could see how this young group of superstars in the minors were coming along and they'd be here and we'd be better. Now, we have no real pitching in the minors (and perhaps that's not an accident but a by-product of a really bad philosophy) but even the best hitters aren't going to be difference makers. (Although I loved the Lee pick)

At the end of the day, the Twins have underachieved the last few years and they aren't fun to watch. Maybe it's not his fault but he certainly isn't part of the solution. Move on, try something new.

Twins staff pitching bWAR by year. 2012 0.7 (29th by fWAR) 2013 7.8 (21st by fWAR) 2014 10.1 (14th by fWAR) 2015 16.3 (11th by fWAR) 2016 3.9 (23rd by fWAR) (Ryan fired) 2017 9.0 (24th by fWAR) 2018 9.2 (22nd by fWAR) 2019 16.8 (4th by fWAR) 2020 5.7 (3rd by fWAR) (COVID year, not a normal number)* 2021 -0.1 (25th by fWAR) 2022 9.4 (20th by fWAR) The way baseball has changed slightly and the fact that we play in a pitcher friendly park has really hidden how utterly bad our pitching has become. Essentially, with the exception of 2019, the Twins have struggled to reach the standards of the 2014 pitching staff despite having huge payroll advantages. And the Ryan v. Falvine is a strawman. Ryan ain't coming back. We can get a new FO that is better than the current one. The current one is very bad. * No. They get zero credit for 60 games against no name competition in a year where the SSS made Maeta seem like a viable Cy Young candidate.

No, they just took over a team with a competent nucleus that was ready to go the playoffs. Something we don't have now.

I think what is particularly damning of the current FO is that, after six years, is that the Twins are in worse position then when they took over. I don't think anyone can credibly say that the 2023 Twins team is likely to be a playoff team and the farm system is worse now as well. Utter failure by the FO. But it seems like we'll need a few more seasons to clean house. In the meantime, the Twins blame you for ****** attendance.

It's time to move on. I don't think he has huge trade value but someone might take him so long as we don't expect a great haul back. I'd happily move him for a lottery ticket and let Wallner play RF next year. If we keep him, I'd agree with lukeduke that he should be a 4th OF from here on out.

I love Ohtani but if Judge doesn't win it, it'll be a travesty. He's having a historic season.

There's not a lot of reason to expect success next season without the Pohlads opening the checkbook and us signing several real starters. And this FO has utterly failed to do what they were hired to do - mimic the 2000s Twins success. So, not sure why we need another season to wait on what is clear - they aren't capable. We need to move on.

Anyone watch the Gophers? Other than Penn St, all the other games are winnable from here on out. Really exciting season.

Anyone watch the reboot of Quantum Leap instead of the second half of the Vikings disaster? I really enjoyed it. Made my kids watch it with me. Good times.

Looking at my posts, I'm a bit concerned that they are too negative. I would be very, very happy to be wrong on Ryan. He seems like a good guy, works hard, has stayed healthy. He's easy to root for and I hope to eat crow when he's an all-star next year.

No. Sorry, but no. There's too much kool-aid going around TD on our pitching. It's a bad, bad staff. As a staff, both starters and relievers are in the bottom third in baseball. Ryan is a back of the rotation pitcher. While he's a rookie, he's already 26 years old. He' not going to improve much more. He's made 30 ML starts so we have a decent idea of what he is over a full season - 30 starts, 160-170 innings ERA+ around 100, 2 WAR. That's not bad but it's a back-end arm but not what a playoff team wants to throw out in a make or break game. He's not top 50 in any stat right now. Ober hopes to be this good. And the rest of the pipeline looks to be more of this. I like healthy Mahle and Gray. Both are in the 2/3 range although Gray will be 33 next year so that's a problem. But it would be silly to expect Gray to better than he was this year and Mahle is a big question mark. Maeda is 35. His last season, he managed a 91 ERA+ and .3 WAR. He's coming back from TJ. He'll be a bullpen arm. This season has pretty clearly shown we don't have the horses to pitch us to a 90-win season - heck, probably not even to a winning season. We need an overhaul of the system. Barring that, we need several real starters, and simply hoping that another year of experience and getting healthy is a really bad plan. The lineup will be fine.

I'm sure they won't do that but shoulder injuries are usually much, much worse then elbow injuries. 100 innings seems like a reasonable over/under to me.

I'm still a big fan of Martin and think he'll right the ship. Balzovic will pitch in the majors, I'm not sure how well though. I was hoping he'd be another solid Joe Ryan-type. I'm sure he'll get a chance next year.

The 2023 Twins will face the same issues the 2022 Twins did - bad pitching. Sonny Gray is a real ML pitcher and easily our best one. Joe Ryan is a solid back of the rotation starter but wouldn't be a starter on a playoff caliber rotation. Mahle has shoulder issues so we can hope he's healthy but should probably plan on only getting 100 innings from him. Maeda is 35 and coming back from injury. His last season with us, he produced a 91 ERA+ and .3 WAR. We should probably expect more of that production then any SSS. So the Twins need pitching. Tons of it. The pipeline is a failure. The pitching philosophy is boring and a failure. So, lots of work to do in the offseason.

I'm higher than most on both Martin and Julien. Love them both. I know Martin's bat is struggling but he can still take a walk, he looks like he absolutely knows the strike zone. Those are my favorite type of hitting prospects. The hits will come, as will the power. Julien was a nice steal. He'll be a solid MLer.

That was a rough loss. Still, four more games can turn things around. Hope Springs Eternal!