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gunnarthor

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Everything posted by gunnarthor

  1. gunnarthor
    I'm done with the turtle.
  2. gunnarthor
    My guess is that Graterol will have the better career. He's also the better talent. So in that regard, the dodgers probably will "win" the trade. But the trade made sense. Certainly not the worst move the FO made.
  3. gunnarthor
    I will say I like how fast Ryan pitches. Catches the ball, gets the sign, throws the ball. Not quite Mark Buerhle but pretty good. Hope that never changes.
  4. gunnarthor
    Nice call https://www.dailynorseman.com/2021/8/31/22650867/minnesota-vikings-trade-new-york-jets-chris-herndon
  5. gunnarthor
    He may be our staff ace but that's b/c the staff is a joke. He's getting called up in Sept of his 25th year. By the same time, Berrios was a two time all star and had made nearly 100 ML starts. I think Ryan will be a real ML pitcher and capable of staying up in the majors. But he won't be as good as Berrios. He's a solid back of the rotation pitcher. Which we need.
  6. gunnarthor
    Good news. I'm happy to watch him.
  7. gunnarthor
    Agreed, ignoring everything else, it will be fun to see Ohio State/Oregon or such during the pre-season.
  8. gunnarthor
    Eh. Doesn't really do much to pretend that the success (or failure) you want to ignore doesn't exist. We can also pretend his 2015 didn't skew his numbers down and now he averages 5.5 WAR. I think Buxton's one of the truly elite players in the game. A genuine HOF talent, when healthy. Since mid 2017, even with the total disaster year of 2018, Buxton has been put up a .272/.350/.528 .879 OPS. While this year has been his high water mark, his has shown that he can put up a constant OPS in the high .800s, play pretty good defense, and steal a base or two. You don't think he'll ever be healthy. You might be right. Baseball will be worse off for that. I think his talent is worth betting on.
  9. gunnarthor
    I'd be very happy if both got called up. Frankly, they should get their feet wet at the ML now. Nothing to lose and a lot to gain, including selling the fans on a vision of the future.
  10. gunnarthor
    Here's my thinking. First, Buxton is not just the Twins best player, he is a truly elite talent in a sport where you don't have many. For his career, he's averaged over 5 WAR for 162 games. Second, the Twins can afford him. Fans have been conditioned for years to accept that the Twins are a small payroll team, that they can only afford so much, that paying Mauer hampered their options. It's all BS. The Twins are loaded and have, like all teams, refused to share their books with the player's association. It's insulting that the management has allowed fans to believe that players should give "home town discounts" or blame players for payroll crunches. Even if we believed the FO spin on payroll, the team spent years, decades even, playing under the potential high payroll while they were reloading, rebuilding, etc. They have never spent a similar period of time over their expected payroll. Fans should demand they do. Third, historically, MLB teams that trade away truly elite talent usually lose those trades. This isn't a Liriano for Escobar trade. This is getting rid of a HOF talented level player in his prime. So I don't really understand anything other than "sign him and keep him." Sure, he might get injured. Maybe. That's the risk. But it's just money at this point. Money the team has and should be using to put the best product they can on the field.
  11. gunnarthor
    This has been a heck of a disaster for the Twins so this isn't surprising. Still, I wonder how much of certain vets struggles are because of issues that Shoemaker identified rather than then the player turning into a pumpkin. Happ has looked good in St. Louis but Robles and Berrios have struggled a bit in Boston and Toronto so I'm not sure there is something to it or not but I hope someone smarter than me is looking into it. This is, by far, the worst Twins pitching staff I've ever watched. If it's b/c every pitcher we've tried sucks, fine, bad luck, move on, get better pitchers. But is it b/c the Twins have failed to identify something and that is the reason they are relying on bad pitchers? That would be a problem.
  12. gunnarthor
    There's a lot of logic here. I hate that on TD. But generally I agree with you. I want Ober and Jax to get more starts since (to me) they aren't blocking Ryan and Strotman. But an absolutely best case scenario would be that Ryan, Strotman, and Ober could each throw 120 innings at league average in 2022 at the ML level. That's a lot of innings left for the FO to find pitchers for.
  13. gunnarthor
    Who? Strotman and Ryan are nice arms but they aren't front of the rotation types. We don't have any of those in the system unless you squint really hard on Woods-Richardson. I'm convinced the Twins hope to create a staff where the starter goes 4-5 innings and then we turn it over the bullpen. Every night. As you said in another thread, that's really bad for baseball.
  14. gunnarthor
    There were a few who were didn't like the Ynoa trade at the time, Ben being the biggest, IIRC. I was ok with Gil for Cave but I expected the Twins would be able to make more starters. I was wrong.
  15. gunnarthor
    I'm not sure people realize how bad the pitching the Twins have this year has been. -5 WAR from the staff. Berrios will lead the team in innings pitched by a substantial amount. We might only have two pitchers top 100 innings this year. And not a lot of immediate hope on the horizon. Unless the FO buys 5-6 impact arms in the offseason, this team won't compete next year.
  16. gunnarthor
    I suppose I'm just venting but I really hate that the Twins are just doing the five inning start thing. I really hate that type of baseball.
  17. gunnarthor
    Yeah, not a lot to disagree with here. The offense is, or at least very close to, playoff caliber. The Twins 108 OPS+ is fourth in the AL and fifth in MLB. But the pitching. There really isn't a lot of encouraging news here. I really think the only way they can compete is to buy a pitching staff through FA next year. Which I don't think we'll do.
  18. gunnarthor
    IIRC, there was some talk about bringing him up in 2016 but he might not have been on the 40 man? And then there was more talk in 17-18 but control issues kept him down? (they also might have kicked around the idea of using him as an opener?) I remember he was exposed to the rule v and no one took him. I'm not sure this is a "mistake" on the Twins staff. Reed is 28 and has 10 ML innings. I'm glad he's getting his chance. Reed was always a guy on the cusp of being on the 40 man, probably a classic AAAA-guy for many. It's hard for those guys to get a shot, especially if they have a demonstrable issue at AAA (in his case, control). I think the obvious times to bring him up would have been sometime in 16-18 (just by looking at his stats). In 15, he had been bumped up to AA where he struggled. He did better in AA in 16 and was promoted to AAA near the end of the season, which I assume was why he didn't get to the majors in a lost season. In 17, he had some good numbers in AAA but (IIRC) he also missed some time with injuries and the ML team's bullpen was solid enough. In 18, he was off the 40 man (IIRC) and control issues became more apparent. And then in 19, our pen was outstanding without him. Hard to bring him up.
  19. gunnarthor
    Looks like the Big 10, Pac 12, and ACC are working together to stop the SEC from stealing more teams and also try to get an understanding on the changing nature of amateur athletics. The SC's ruling on athletes pay is going to change college football a lot, I think, although the obvious reason is the destruction of the Big 12 by the SEC. From googling, it looks like the alliance will lead to one less Big 10 game each year but the Gophers (and everyone else) will have a rotating schedule against both a Pac-12 and ACC team each year, which I like a lot. But the alliance also says that the three conferences will focus on issues like social and racial justice, academics, structure of the NCAA, and diversity. I wonder if they'll flex their muscles and force big changes in some of those areas. It could be pretty interesting.
  20. gunnarthor
    Yeah, it's a pretty rough indictment of Rocco's staff.
  21. gunnarthor
    Why is it reasonable? These guys are old, they've had success at AAA. What are we waiting for? There is still a big learning curve ahead for them in the majors. Why shouldn't they start now? Berrios had 400 ML innings in by his 24 year old season. The way the Twins work, these guys will be lucky to get 30 ML innings in in 7 starts.
  22. gunnarthor
    Honestly, there is no reason that Strotman and Ryan aren't up right now (unless there's an injury I don't know about). Strotman's 24, Ryan is 25. They should be in the majors and learn at that level. None of the pitchers currently getting starts in the majors have better upside. The longer they stay down, the more we should consider it another huge mistake by the FO. And, frankly, Balazovic should be at AAA to end the season.
  23. gunnarthor
    I'm positive the FO will trade him this offseason but I really don't want them to. He's one of the few difference makers talent-wise in the game.
  24. gunnarthor
    This is a good example of what I'm worried about! ??
  25. gunnarthor
    That's what I'm worried about. People already forget how much 2018 was a "total system failure" because we finished on that 6 game win streak. I have no interest in people forgiving the FO for 2021 down the line.
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