John Bonnes

Geezus, but those were two awfully nice plays.

Was their any explanation on TV for what was wrong with statcast or the radar gun readings,

Freaking out has commenced behind the scenes at Twins Daily this week. Some new partnerships and the interest in the team has kicked off some stunning growth. When one starts a Twins-focused web site in 2012, just as the bottom falls out, it’s natural to wonder what can happen when the team finally rights the ship. It’s also natural that seven years later, one has completely forgotten that can happen. But we’re seeing it, so I’m going to vary the order of this week’s report to call out some exciting developments.News We started some partnerships that are leading to new visitors. The most obvious was with the digital arm of KFAN.com, where you can now find our daily recaps. We also started a partnership with a new programmatic ad partner, AdThrive, and to explain why that’s important, I need to talk about something I should talk about more. Did you know that if you submit a story to your blog on Twins Daily, and we like it enough to edit and promote it to the front page, you get paid all the programmatic ad revenue that your story generates from people reading it? Or that it also works if we ask you to write a story, or a game recap? No? That’s because I’m really crummy at remembering to tell people about it. So here’s how it works: If you write a story that appears on Twins Daily’s front page, we track the reads it has. At the end of the quarter, we pay you those reads times the average blended rate we get for displaying programmatic ads. That number is way less that our writers deserve, but it’s what we get paid, so we pass it all along to you. AdThrive seems to be generating better rates for ads than we have had in the past, and that has us pretty excited about being able to give our contributing writers a raise at the end of 2Q. Their creativity and passion is the fuel on which the site runs, and I’ve been trying for several years to generate better results in this area, so I’m very encouraged to see the results. Ok, let’s get to why we started freaking out…. Overall Traffic Last Week Users – 45,589 (up 168% from 2018)Sessions – 105,910 (up 100% from 2018)Page Views – 285,486 (up 59% rom 2018)So, yeah, that’s why we were freaking out. And even those numbers probably undersell the new traffic, because a lot of the partnerships didn’t kick into gear until Friday. Friday, by the way, was the second highest number of visitors we have ever received. (You’re wondering about the highest, right? It was back on July 21st of 2015, and you’ll never guess what the topic was that drew so much traffic. In fact, I’m going to keep you waiting until the end of this story.) Stories There were 32 stories on Twins Daily last week, and one of the reasons we had such big traffic on Friday is we had so many great stories that day: Tom wrote about Rocco Baldellig being a coddling millennial.The news about Brusdar Graterol being a Target Field break the day beforeTed Schwerzler dove into Jorge Polanco’s success.New writer Andrew Gebo recapped the Twins eight-run explosion.Nick explored adding to the Twins bullpen.Stu poked fun at Twins fans increased expectationsJeremy looked at players the Twins could trade (and got 167 comments)Of course Seth recapped the minor league performances.All of those stories were on the front page at one time this week. When we started Twins Daily, this was the sort of all-encompassing, deep-dive laden, entertaining content we hoped for. There haven’t been many days that I’ve been more proud of what this community can do. Thank you all so much. Forums Registrations – 25 (we had 42 the same week in 2018)Topics – 82 (up from 43 the same week in 2018)Posts - 3018 (up from 2424 the same week in 2018)Our forum traffic did not increase like our story traffic. It appears a lot of people visited, read one story and then left. That’s OK for now, but we’ll want to work on enticing them to join the discussion. As always, we would love to have you join the discussion, too. Just register and tell us your thoughts. Blogs A number of new writers wrote in our blog area this week, which is really encouraging. I would love to call them all out, but instead, why not head over there and check them out yourself? You won’t be disappointed. I do want to call out two for their creativity. When you see as much baseball writing as we do, it’s striking when someone does something a little different, and we had two posts that struck me. On Thursday, 33mvp, started a series (I hope) that goes through the Twins first round picks of the last 10 years. In the MLB Draft, it’s easy to criticize picks because almost nobody is going to draft the player who turns out the best. So I appreciated 33mvp’s approach of limiting the analysis to the five players taken immediately after the Twins first round pick. It requires research and a little nuance, and it’s a cool enough idea that I plan to steal it someday. The second blog post wasn’t technically written last week, it was written on Memorial Day, but I liked “Wild Bill Umpires The Game” by mikelink45. I had never heard this story before, and would love some historical links to the facts surrounding it. Thank you again everyone who tries blogging. I hope you find it rewarding, and if you read them, I hope you’ll let them know what you think. You honor all our writers with your attention and feedback. So why was so traffic so high in July of 2015? The Twins were pretty good in 2015. They finished the year with 83 wins, and going into the last weekend of the year, they were one game out of the Wild Card spot. You’ll remember that Miguel Sano was a monster that summer, generating sky-high expectations. On July 21st, the Twins held the second Wild Card spot in the American League, and the trade deadline was coming up and… Twins Daily writer Jeremy Nygaard broke the news that the Twins were in the “infant stages” of trade talks with the Rockies about Troy Tulowitzki. You can find the story here. A week later, Tulowitzki was traded, but it was to the Toronto Blue Jays, who surged, blew past the Twins in the Wild Card race, and also passed the Yankees to with the AL East. That’s it for this week. I’ve settled on the name “Twins Daily Box Score” for now, but if you have any other suggestions or feedback about the site, I promise to read then and respond in the comments below. Click here to view the article

This is great. Do you have any links to historical references for it? I have never heard this story.

I thought the same thing. I really appreciated the approach and methodology, and the research it required. Great idea, and well-executed.

Aaron is attending a wedding in an apple orchard, so John is joined by Parker Hageman of Twins Daily. They talk about the source of the Twins' power surge, breakthroughs in the Twins' attendance, the impact of Rocco Baldelli on the organization, how this year compares to the 2001 Twins season, and whether Joe Mauer's $23 million expiring contract is a key factor in this season's success. You can listen by downloading us from iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeartRadio or find it at GleemanAndTheGeek.com. Or just click this link.http://traffic.libsy...3?dest-id=74590 Click here to view the article

One other point in favor if acquiring a relief arm sooner rather than later: they control his usage and don’t need to worry bout him being overused.

Thanks for the great name suggestions Brandon and benji21. vavo, thank for the feedback. We might roll out an option like that. I'll spell things out in the next report, but the ad results have been encouraging, so I think we're unlikely to switch back. I'm sorry you find them intrusive. I haven't notice a whole lot of difference in my user experience, now that we got them ironed out a little. As for logging in to view the content ... that feels a little forced to me. Plus, the goal isn't to have a lot of registrations, it's to have a lot of interaction. So I'm OK with only registering if you want to comment. I guess what I'm really asking is how can we better encourage people to take the chance and share their thoughts with the rest of the community.

Note the question mark in that headline (for now) but Brusdar Graterol, the Minnesota Twins' top pitching prospect, posted several pictures to instagram that suggest he's at Target Field today, and they include one in front of a locker with boxes in it and one with him on the field. Twins Daily's preseason #3 prospect, who commands triple-digit heat, has dominated in AA this year as a 20-year-old, posting a 1.89 ERA. Is he being called up or being evaluated for something more ominous?The ominous possibility is that he is being evaluated for some problem. But there have been no reports of injuries, and he pitched four days ago, throwing 81 pitches and striking out seven in five innings. Of course, that would also mean he is due for another start somewhere on May 24th, which is tomorrow. And he certainly does not look sad in these pictures. On the other hand, there are also no reports of problems in the Twins rotation, and Graterol is a starting pitcher. So far this year, he's 5-0, with a 1.89 ERA and 46 strikeouts and 19 walks in 47.2 innings pitched. Of course, the team could also have the 6'1" right-hander work as a reliever, which is where several scouts saw his future. For instance, Keith Law, in his evaluation of Graterol this preseason, said "Scouts see no projection here and a delivery that probably points to a power-reliever role." It's also worth noting that Graterol has already been through Tommy John surgery once, in 2016. In Twins Daily's profile of Graterol, Nick Nelson talked about Graterol's two big pitches: There have also been several reports over the last few days of various minor leaguers who were brought up to throw in front of the front office. It could be as harmless as that - he's just being asked to throw in front of people, rather than bring the evaluators to the various minor league affiliates. Stay tuned for more updates.... Click here to view the article

One of the challenges of podcast/radio is you don't always know what you're going to talk about beforehand. So I've replayed that impromptu discussion a bit in my head since yesterday, and if anything, I think I wasn't vehement enough in defending Buxton's existing spot in the order. The Twins (and their fans and the media) have shown a clear bias around Buxton that has repeatedly led to the same mistake: they ask him to do too much. Batting him 3rd on Opening Day. Fiddling with his swing. Heaping on expectations. Rushing him back from injury because he plays so well in center field. That bias is understandable. We see the talent, experience the joy of watching him play, imagine the upside, and remember the expectations. But when you understand a bias, you have to try and consciously reign it in a bit. Thus, he started out in the ninth spot this year. And ... that's gone well! Given that, what is the justification from a risk/reward standpoint of pushing him up in the batting order? We know the reward - an average of 3-5 more runs for this offense over the course of the season. We also know the risk - Buxton flounders in the increased roll, and now the Twins must decide between an elite defensive center fielder who is beating himself up at the plate, or Jake Cave in center field. I don't know anyone who would have argued that Buxton should not be hitting at or near the bottom of the order when the season started. I don't know anyone who thinks if he's still sporting an 850 OPS at season end, that he should still be there. But I also don't think the coaching staff should feel any pressure to move him up the order sooner rather than later to gain three extra runs to a historically productive offense. They're closer to the situation, and have more incentives to handle this correctly, and so far they've done well. I'll trust that they are a better judge than I. In fact, I think it's ludicrous to suggest that such pressure should exist. If I had thought about it before the podcast, I would've been a lot more belligerent about it, not less.

Time is short, but there are a number of small developments in Twins Daily’s community as stories, interaction and new visitors all seem to be trending in positive directions. Let’s jump in. Stories Good lord: there were 30 stories last week on Twins Daily. I love you all.I especially love Tom Froemming, our editor, who absolutely hit it out of the park last week. Besides managing all of that content, he wrote a good chunk of it, leading all authors in page views. Our top 10 list for the week also includes several recently productive writers like Matt Braun, A J Condon, Thieres Rabelo, Andrew Thares & Andrew Gebo. When you see their byline in some of the stories you’re writing, perhaps take a little time to comment, even if it’s just to tell them a portion you liked, or even a part you didn’t. Let them know you heard their voice. It matters. Forums Registrations – 6 (we had 13 the same week in 2018)Topics – 83 (up from 45 the same week in 2018)Posts - 3054 (up from 2171 the same week in 2018)Huh. Fewer registrations? For some reason we had nine people register in one day this week a year ago, so that’s why the decrease, but six isn’t many. If anyone has ideas on good ways to increase registrations and discussion, feel free to pass it along in the comments below. But there was a LOT of discussion. I don’t think I’ve ever seen us clear 3000 comments in a week, and the 83 topics seems like the highest number I’ve seen, too. Usually, I’d like to call out some of the top posters, but I’m pressed for time this week. Sorry. By the way, did you know that you can “Like” comments in our forums? That’s a nice low-key way to let people know that you appreciate their contributions to a discussion. Just look for the little “Like This” red button in the bottom right-hand corner of their comment. Or if you want to wade in a little deeper we would love to have you register and tell us your thoughts. Blogs There were six great blog entries in our blog area this week. Honestly, if you’re coming to Twins Daily regularly, you might want to make a point to stop by there. It’s like seeing the bands before they get big: you get to know the writers as they grow, it’s a little more intimate, and there is often some encouraging give-and-take feedback in the comments. I wish I had time to call out all the great topics and stories, but I must point out we had a new voice join the chorus. The “Original Twin” Blog was started by thephilomath this week, and his first topic was about batting order with respect to Byron Buxton. Check it out, and thank thephilomath for sharing! Remember, when you’re ready to start your own Twins blog on Twins Daily, we have a whole bunch of people who are ready to read it. It looks like thephilomath got 500+ readers already. I think I was blogging for seven months before I got 500 readers to stop by a story, and that was only because Rob Neyer linked to it. News We really appreciate your patience at the beginning of last week as we worked through all kinds of issues with our new ad provider. I know there is a lot of anti-ad sentiment in general, but it’s an important source of revenue for the site and also for our contributing writers. If you contribute a story to Twins Daily, and we promote it to the front page, we pay you all of the ad revenue that comes from that story. That rate has been stalled out for a couple of years now, and we’re hoping this change can allow us give more back to our contributing writers who give so much to the community. Overall Traffic Last Week Users – 29,643 (up 71% from 2018)Sessions – 73,316 (up 48% from 2018)Page Views – 231,094 (up 37% rom 2018)Our users and sessions dipped slightly from the previous week, but our page view went up, which suggests more interaction, which is a great sign. And we saw a similar dip between the same two weeks a year ago, only much more pronounced, so this week was actually very encouraging. I don’t think we’ve seen a 71% increase year-over-year of any traffic metric since I’ve been doing these reports. That’s stunning. I’m sorry about the briefness of the report this week, but the length of it depends on how much time I have to produce it, so some weeks I’ll be able to go a little more in-depth on the stories, blogs and comments, and some weeks I can’t. It is more important to me that it be done every week than that it have certain elements every week. Writing it fires me up about the community, even if I can’t dive into every story, blog or post. Finally, I’m still looking for the right title for this series, so if you have a good one, please add it to the comments below. We got a decent suggestion last week, but I’m sticking with the “Community Report” for this week. But seriously, let’s get something a little slicker. Thanks again for reading and contributing so much to the community! Gratefully, John Click here to view the article

Aaron and John talk about Nelson Cruz and Mitch Garver getting hurt, Miguel Sano and Willians Astudillo taking their place, calling up Luis Arraez for the first time, demoting Trevor Hildenberger to Triple-A, killing the win, saying goodbye to Addison Reed, and Byron Buxton's spot in the batting order. You can listen by downloading us from iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeartRadio or find it at GleemanAndTheGeek.com. Or just click this link. Click here to view the article

If you have to ask, you're old. I honestly couldn't believe Vogelbach when I saw him last night. He's Willians Astudillo if he ate Willians Astudillo.

Traffic climbed again, we had several new writers in the blogs, contributing writers topping our charts, and an increase in comments in the forums. Here’s last week’s community report. Stories That’s another 24 stories on Twins Daily this last week, which is three or four per day, and that’s fantastic. I would be re miss if I didn’t call out our number one contributing writer, Cody Christie, who topped everyone including the founders, in reads this week. You would think it would be depressing to see eleven names, including EIGHT contributing writers above mine on the page view list this week. It is not. It is beautiful. So congrats gang. You rock.Forums Registrations – 10 (we had 9 the same week in 2018) Topics – 79 (up from 43 the same week in 2018) Posts - 2274 (up from 2207 the same week in 2018) Since I started writing these community reports, this is the first week we’ve increased comments year over year. That’s pretty encouraging. It was driven by our top ten commenters: Mike Sixel, ashbury, Brock Beauchamp, Don Walcott, milldaddy35, Mr. Brooks, Aggies7, USAFChief, Gibby, and Vanimal46. If you didn’t make the list, don’t sweat it, but maybe check out the forums a little more. Nine comments per day would get you into the top 10. Fortunately, there are a lot of topics about which to talk. Just look at that increase from last year. Turns out, people can find topics for a good team as easily as they can for a bad team. Outside of our writers and game thread moderators, we had multiple topics started by milldaddy35, darin617, diehardtwinsfan, sampleSizeofOne, Blake, goulik, and psturnbloom. If you have a question, or find a story somewhere you want to share, just register and tell us about it in the forums with your own topic. We rarely bite. Blogs Oh, wow. We had SEVEN new blogs in our blog area of Twins Daily last week. That’s outstanding! What’s more, FOUR of those I haven’t mentioned in previous posts. One of those was more of a comment (that probably should have been under a story) but let’s touch on the others quickly (with apologies this week to the veterans): We got a post from stringer bell, who also kicks off several of the game threads, about the Twins start in 2019, giving an optimistic view on the future.Agebo wrote a bit setting up the trade deadline and providing some hope on Eddie Rosario getting past some of his bad luck by looking at his BABIP.Finally, Hosken Bombo Disco did a great story comparing the 2019 Twins to the 2018 Twins. It is pretty encouraging.Remember, when you’re ready to start your own Twins blog on Twins Daily, we have a whole bunch of people who are ready to read it. Overall Traffic Last Week Users – 30,963 (up 60% from 2018) Sessions – 77,690 (up 40% from 2018) Page Views – 229,229 (up 26% rom 2018) Traffic is still way up from last year and increased both week over week AND Increased by more than it did in the same week last year. Of course, it was a great week. But thanks for continuing to stop by and talk to your Twins friends about Twins Daily. As someone who remembers blogging for months with no more than two dozen readers, we won’t ever take that attention for granted. Here’s this week’s challenge for the comments section: what should I name this weekly report? I want to keep it far away from “weekly review” since that is close to Nick’s “Week in Review.” I’m going with “Community Report” this week, but it feels like we should be able to find something a little snappier. So have at it, and of course, questions, feedback and thoughts about the site are also always welcome. Gratefully, John Click here to view the article

Aaron and John talk about the Twins boasting the best record in baseball, Willians Astudillo's return, Miguel Sano's impending return, what to do about a struggling Trevor Hildenberger, Mitch Garver refusing to stop, smart ideas to improve Target Field attendance, and breaking down the Twins' vastly improved defense. You can listen by downloading us from iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeartRadio or find it at GleemanAndTheGeek.com. Or just click this link.http://traffic.libsy...3?dest-id=74590 Click here to view the article

“But baseball has these unwritten rules....”

Aaron and John record a live podcast with 150+ listeners at First Draft Taproom and Kitchen.You can listen by downloading us from iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeartRadio or find it at GleemanAndTheGeek.com. Or just click this link. Click here to view the article