diehardtwinsfan

Oh, wholeheartedly agree. He didn't get lucky. I do think, however, that time can pass you by.. Lucas hasn't done much well of late. I think he works better in his current role having some ability to shape the franchise but letting more talented writers do the heavy lifting.

Makes me wonder how many times Giants fans get to hear articles about AJ for Nathan/Bonser/Liriano...

This. I'd much prefer May in the rotation. Hopefully, he gets a shot. Perhaps he and Berrios force it and they dump Nolsaco and trade Milone.

I do believe when it came out that there were some posters out there about "Another franchise ruined." I firmly blame Lucas personally. He did a bad job with Star Wars 1 and 2 and he had to hire outside help for 3.

given how bad the bench was last year, having a guy like Nunez who actually might put the ball in play isn't a bad option.

I think Murphy should OPS around .700, which isn't bad for a catcher. The kid still has some upside, and was above average in his minor league career every stop of the way, while being young for his age. He may never have an .800 OPS, but he should be a solid backstop for this team the next few seasons. I do think that Suzuki would benefit from less PT. .700 is probably pushing it for his OPS though.

I'm not quite sure I get the parallels here between Ortiz and some of the guys listed in this thread. There was never a doubt about Ortiz's hitting ability. His issue was health and salary, so much so that TR couldn't trade him for a bag of balls that winter and ended up releasing him. Polanco has yet to show he can hit consistently at higher levels of the minors. Arcia hasn't shown he can hit consistently in the majors. Walker has yet to take a pitch in AAA. All of these guys could end up being good hitters, but none are at the point where they can claim Ortiz's pedigree at the point at which the Twins released him. Likewise, fear of the past will likely keep these guys in MN longer than they should have been. At the moment, they should all be there. It will be interesting to see how things play out for them. I suspect that at some point, some are traded.

Like it or not, Nolasco is being paid 12M to play for the Twins, so I suspect, baring a collapse, that he beats Duffey.

Crap... DD2 and House of Cards... I've got some Netflix to watch.

I think the shipping costs might be too expensive.

TCB, I'm thinking you have this backwards. Perhaps the TD community should collective choose to shave our chest and back hair, and mail the contents to 1 Twins way.

Fair enough, though if memory serves me right, he was regardless quite the proponent of not making that nomination in the election year.

That would be funny, though I think you guys are being a bit presumptuous about November's election. I don't think Clinton can win, even against Trump. That said, I heard an interesting conspiracy the other day that actually made a ton of sense. My friend posed the idea that Obama would sick the justice department on Hillary about these emails right before the convention, forcing her out of the picture and a 'reluctant' Joe Biden stepping up and winning a brokered DNC convention... thought that was kind of funny. Not sure Obama has the guts to do something like that, but I think Biden is probably the Dem's best shot at 2016.

I think at this point, the country loses as long as Republicans and Democrats are in control. I think it's time we kicked them both to the curb.

Joe Biden begs to differ... just saying. I'm not a fan of the Reps, but there's some pretty serious hypocrisy on both sides of the aisle.

I'm really not sure where the idea that Polanco is better than Dozier is coming from. Even with his second half swoons, Dozier was an above average 2B, something Polanco will only strive to be over the next couple seasons. He may get there eventually, but he isn't there now, and likely won't be for a year or two. Side note, defensively, in my limited sample size seeing him this spring, he was pretty bad.

Personally, I think it was the wrong decision. I'll leave it at that and encourage everyone else to maintain said respect.

for what it's worth, what I saw on Sunday was one inning of pitches where hitters were squaring up on him quite nicely (though he didn't get help from his defense) and 2 innings where he was pretty good. He was for what it's worth, throwing a bit faster in those 2 innings too. I want to believe he was just working on something, but truthfully, only the coaching staff knows that. I do think though that he needs to start showing it sooner than later. I'd like to see May force his way on to that rotation talk, b/c I think the Twins are far better with May in the rotation than in the pen.

Just a few nits to pick here. I agree on 1, 3, and 5 (though I don't agree on how he's going to get to this one). But 2 and 4 really bug me. 2) Yeah, the guys at the top succeed more, but I don't think we can say that they rarely fail. We all saw the failure that was Delmon Young. He was number 1 on a few lists for a few years. Yes, injury can get in the way, but there are a lot of intangibles that don't show up in a box score and a lot of baseball skills that need to be learned. We (not necessarily you in this case) tend to chalk much of that up as 'luck' and write off what constitutes real skills and real adjustments since all major leaguers make, while not understanding that there was an actual change that drove that low BABIP into something a bit bigger. 4) I hear this argument with every prospect, and it's often an excuse to justify an action that many people are questioning. It's really a dangerous argument in my opinion. Aaron Hicks was not Carlos Gomez and Buxton is not Hicks. Yeah, they are different people, but that doesn't mean we should use that as an argument to justify the mistakes that were made with (in this case) both of them. Just because Buxton ranks a bit higher on a BA list doesn't mean that we should put him in the majors if he's not ready. I don't necessarily care if he's 'better' than say a Ryan Sweeney if we have to sit and watch him flail away at major league curveballs only to see him sent down to AAA after he's beaten. People handle that type of frustration differently, and while we can say that we see more natural talent in Buxton than say Gomez or Hicks, we know absolutely nothing of his (and their for that matter) character. If the Twins decide to send Buxton to Minneapolis this spring, I hope that is not b/c they forced themselves to select the lesser of two evils but because they think he's ready to hit major league pitching. What I know from last season was that he wasn't. Has that changed this offseason? Perhaps, but if he continues to be rather subpar this spring, then I really think it's best for the Twins and Buxton to let him spend some time in AAA honing those skills. As an added bonus, he will most likely be a better player for the Twins when he actually is ready. He really doesn't have much in terms of at bats in the high minors. That's largely due to injuries. Trying to force a Mike Trout timeline on him while forgetting the amount of time that he's missed really misses the point... Heck, trying to force a Mike Trout timeline on him is just silly. Trout's career thus far has the makings of a first ballot HOF. Buxton needs to be ready for the show before we can make that type of comparison.

This a thousand times. The court is not conservative leaning. Conservative is a misnomer these days as it's really just another form of liberal politics. True conservatism died long ago. If the court was conservative leaning, the individual mandate would have been struck down simply because the only powers the constitution grants the federal government is to regulate interstate commerce, of which it was not. That said, Scalia was one of the more conservative justices on the court, so if anything, this allows Obama to appoint someone who will tip the balance on items associated with his administration the last few years.

Moderator Note: This thread is about ST velocity readings and the OP of this thread has already chimed in asking it remain on that track. Out of respect for that poster, let's keep the discussion framed around spring training velocity and not let this turn into an argument about Tyler Duffey's worthiness as a starter (or anyone else for that matter).

Ricky hit 94 on his first K yesterday. His first inning he was generally under 90. His second and third innings he sat in the 91/92 range a bit more consistently. Melotakis was sitting around 92. Chargois was sitting around 95. Burdi was hitting 98 on Friday. Pressly was sitting around 95.

He looked pretty bad in his strikeout yesterday too, so there's definitely some refinement needed. On the flip side, as said by others, his double was a thing of beauty. I think some time in AAA would serve him will personally, but you're right in that there isn't exactly competition. Sweeney might be that darkhorse guy, but Buxton is clearly being given every opportunity to win the job. The team clearly wants Buxton to win it. Though at this point, I'm not sure he has. Hopefully he improves on his early numbers over the next week or two.

I don't think he was referring to gators fans

. I haven't really noticed them. But it is very windy. According to bob Sacramento, the wildlife you should be concerned about are bears, panthers, snakes, and gators