Cap'n Piranha

Although I'd hate to lose him for nothing, at this point Nick Gordon is fairly superfluous. If you want Cruz back next year (and why wouldn't you), there are literally no infield spots open for 3 more years or until Cruz retires. In the outfield, Gordon is definitely behind Kiriloff and Larnach, not to mention Rosario, Buxton, and Kepler who all have at least 1 year of control left. If the cost to getting a right-handed power bat to use against lefties is letting Gordon walk for free, I am all for it.

Come on man, this is just ridiculous. It's a whole new regime now. It's obviously going to be Kevin Jepsen.

I see where you're headed, but the difference here is that I have never said I don't feel it's ok to go to my job until all the concerns of 9/11 first responders are satisfactorily addressed--I understand that even if it was more than just me, and all of us making the same statement were in public and influential positions, one day is not sufficient to create the change. The same is true here--one day is not enough to create the (I assume) large amount of change the players want. I say I assume because I can't find a list of demands anywhere--if I've missed it, I would be very interested in reading it. Therefore, a better statement would have been "We the Twins do not believe we can play on Thursday due to the current state of affairs. We call for a day of thought, prayer, reflection, and discussion to start the process of healing our state and nation. While we plan to return to the field tomorrow, our commitment to fighting inequality wherever it may be remains undiminished". Release a specific and quantifiable list of demands with that statement, and it's quite clear where the team is. That being said, that is not the verbiage I was initially responding to--here is the entire statement by the OP; "I believe one aspect of this is being missed. I’ve heard many players simply say that playing in light of what is happening would send a message that things are ok and they obviously are not." Obviously, this is a poster paraphrasing players, or perhaps even interpreting them, but if this is what players actually believe, then my points stand. There is no mention of the word day, there are only absolutes. When absolute statements are being made, absolute conclusions are reached. If we're in my kitchen and I tell you I have 4 apples, and then ask you if you want me to give you 8 apples right now, you'd look at me like I was crazy. If I said I was going to buy a new car, and I'd narrowed it down to two options, one of which was red and the other blue, you'd be surprised if I told you my new car was green. In both of these situations, unless the initial situation has changed, my following statement is nonsensical and illogical. In regards to the players, their initial statement was absolute (at least as phrased by the poster); we as players cannot play because things are not ok. Not we can't play today. Not we can't play until we see some progress. Things not ok=players don't play. To point out that if this is honestly what the players think, they either would still not be playing, or they have now changed their minds on if things are ok is not unreasonable, it is following the logical process the players subjected themselves to by making an unqualified and absolute statement.

Fair enough, run free my woodland friend (if you want to run to Target Field this week and spark the Twins' bats, I wouldn't complain)

I would imagine the Cincinnati Reds still fly a 1919 WS pennant, the University of Louisville still (internally) celebrates the 2013 NCAA Tournament title, and USC fans remember Reggie Bush's Hesiman year. Win it all, and no matter what happens, the memories still remain.

Your last paragraph here is frightening to me, given you are an attorney. You are so convinced of the veracity of your position that you assume anyone who disagrees with you is "willfully ignorant". I assure you I am nothing of the sort. I did not initially read the decision--I was doing a number of things, and just didn't feel up to reading what I thought would be a document full of dense legal text I am not equipped to parse--it's why I was careful to state I was not familiar with the specifics of the case, and that I would absolutely change my opinion once I became familiar with the specifics if they so warranted it. This will be a long post, but after your borderline personal attack on me, I feel a need to fully explain. I went back and read not just the first 3 pages, but the first 14, and found a number of problems. Let's start with the first 3 however. This judge, lays forth 19 instances which have no bearing on this case whatsoever, other than they are black individuals who allegedly were killed by white cops. The judge has to go back to 2014 in order to list these 19 individuals. Conversely, on his twitter thread, commentator Leonydus Johnson lists 24 white individuals killed by police since the beginning of 2019 (including links to articles with details). While a number of the individuals Mr Johnson mentions certainly were killed justifiably (it would seem), let's not pretend that is not also the case with some of those listed by Judge Reeves. Specifically, Michael Brown was not killed for jaywalking--he was killed because he refused to stop jaywalking when ordered to do so by Officer Wilson, then resisted arrest, including attempting to seize Officer Wilson's firearm, fleeing, and then returning to charge the officer again. This happened after Officer Wilson recognized Mr Brown as the suspect in a robbery that had just been reported (to the best of my knowledge, it has been confirmed that Mr Brown did indeed commit said robbery). Officer WIlson has been vindicated by the legal process multiple times, notably by the Department of Justice under President Obama in an investigation overseen by Attorney General Eric Holder. Rayshard Brooks was not killed because he was asleep in his car--he was killed because he had fallen asleep in a drive-thru lane leading to employees calling the police, who administered a field-sobriety test which revealed Mr Brooks to be legally drunk. Mr Brooks began to struggle when police attempted to place him under arrest; this struggle escalated to the point where Mr Brooks seized a taser from the officers, shot one with it then punched the other, fled, then turned and fired the taser again. It was at this point Officer Rolfe shot Mr Brooks--the case is still ongoing. Breonna Taylor was not killed because she was sleeping in her bed--she was killed because she was tragically caught in the crossfire when her boyfriend fired first at officers serving a no-knock warrant (we can debate in a separate place the validity of those)--the case is still going. I don't know much about the other cases, and don't have the ability to spend enough time to familiarize myself, save to say at least 8 of the 20 individuals he mentioned (including Mr Brooks and Ms Taylor) would appear to be potentially still in ongoing legal proceedings, given the dates of the articles Judge Reeves provide come from 2020. It seems legally dubious to me to cite unsettled cases as supporting evidence in a legal proceeding, but perhaps that's commonplace (I suspect it's not). A certain amount of bias also seems present in this case. In relating the specifics of the case, Judge Reeves states that Officer McClendon and Mr Jamison have different versions of how the incident started. Officer McClendon's version is given less than one paragraph, and comes after Judge Reeves uses the word "admitted" to describe Officer McClendon's testimony wherein he states he attempted to obtain permission to conduct a search (as if an officer of the law wanting to secure the legal right to conduct an investigation for potential illegal activity is somehow morally problematic). Mr Jamison's version gets close to two pages, and as best I can tell from my parsing of the rest of the document is accepted by Judge Reeves as at least the more likely scenario, despite providing no evidence as to why Officer McClendon's testimony should not be given the same weight (if I missed where Judge Reeves did this, I apologize for my oversight. That said, I doubt it, as Judge Reeves includes a claim made by Mr Jamison about a statement made by Officer McClendon on page 9, and plainly states Officer McClendon was lying. Judge Reeves does state in a footnote that Officer McClendon disputes Mr Jamison's statement, but footnoting this detail, while providing no reason as to why Officer McClendon's assertion is less believable than Mr Jamison's, suggests to me Judge Reeves has decided on a preferred narrative, an argument which is supported by the fact that later on the same page, Judge Reeves again states unequivocally that Officer McClendon lied about the same statement). Further, if Judge Reeve's aim in this decision is to attempt to eliminate the doctrine of QI (which by the way, he did grant to Officer McClendon), it seems interesting that the only cases he cites in the beginning feature black individuals, when citing cases such as Tony Timpa or Daniel Shaver, both of whom are white, would be extremely helpful to his goal. As such, it reads to me that Judge Reeves is more interested in furthering the idea that police are disproportionately shooting/killing black men, which is not borne out by any data I've seen (again, if there is non-anecdotal data that demonstrates this, I would love to read it). Based on stats from the FBI and the Washington Post's database of police killings of unarmed people, police kill more white people annually, both armed and unarmed, than they do black. While whites are a larger percentage of the population, a key factor would logically seem to be crime rates in the two populations; as it turns out, black people commit (at least in 2019) 33.4 violent crimes per 100,000 people, compared to 11.6 violent crimes per 100,000 white people. That 2.8x disparity is essentially identical to the 2.8x disparity in the rate of individuals killed by police (5.6 black people per million, 2 white people per million). As you can see, I have spent time and effort to educate myself. I do not deny the horrific crimes that reside in this nation's history, and were directed mainly (but not entirely) towards non-whites. However, those crimes are in the past, and I do not support the idea of applying punishment for crimes to individuals who did not commit said crimes. As I've said all along, absent any proof that Officer McClendon is a racist, and my reading of this case reveals none despite what Judge Reeves appears to think, I will not call him one. I read nothing that made me believe Officer McClendon would not have stopped a white individual (indeed, it's possible Officer McClendon had no idea the race of who he was stopping, as it's rather hard to see inside darkened cars at night while they're driving at 70 MPH. There was no indication I read that Officer McClendon had any idea what race Mr Jamison was before pulling him over, and I'm aware of no data that demonstrates the race of drivers is easily determinable at night while driving on the interstate). There's further nothing I saw that demonstrates Officer McClendon proceeded in his nearly 2 hour search process based on racial prejudice. As Judge Reeves points out, the Constitution guarantees equal treatment under the law, and yet he seems to prima facie accept that Officer McClendon acted out of racial animus. With no evidence to support this, I would propose Judge Reeves' line of reasoning in essentially declaring Officer McClendon a racist to be unfair and unequal to the Officer. Racism is serious. It is hateful, evil, and a blight on our (or any other) society. Because of this, allegations of racism are also extremely serious, should not be lightly made, and should require ironclad evidence to be vindicated. While I find Officer McClendon's actions to be excessive, I see nothing that suggests a racial component, and as such, refuse to assign that motivation when there are any number of other explanations that would plausibly fit the situation. As for the statement in question of "I haven't shot you yet", I read the article provided. Based on the data there, I agree that the statement was unacceptable--so did his own department which reprimanded and disciplined him. That being said, while it appears the officer in question was the first to mention race, it is unclear why. The article states the plaintiff told the officer his neighbors should have talked to him instead of calling the police, and then states "Higgins [the officer], who was wearing a body camera, suggested they [the neighbors] did so because Vernio [the plaintiff] 'is a very loud, boisterous black man.'" From this, it is entirely unclear what prompted Officer Higgins to make this statement to Mr Vernio; is it Officer Higgin's opinion (and if so, how did he come to this assessment), or was it provided by the neighbors when they called 911? Is it not possible that Mr Vernio has continued to be a loud and inconsiderate neighbor, despite several requests to refrain? If so, it's logical the neighbors would seek intervention from an authority, and may have provided the statement attributed to Officer Higgins above as their justification for involving the police in an otherwise interpersonal affair. I'm glad Officer Higgins has received consequences for his unacceptable speech, but until racism has been proven, or all other plausible explanations ruled out (I believe that's known as reasonable doubt), I will not assign racial animus to this case, for the same reasons I outlined above. I apologize for the length of this post, but your characterization of me as willfully ignorant, defensive, and dependent on strawman arguments is not in keeping with a site wherein posters are respected for their different views. I love TwinsDaily, and love interacting with literally every poster on the site. As that is exceedingly rare for the modern internet, I would hate to see that spoiled simply because I held different opinions on current events.

The issue is (specific to this group of players only) that the rationale for not playing was because everything is not ok. The rationale was not, we need to reflect as a society. It's like if I tell my wife I can't go to the local coffeeshop because it's closed for the next week for renovations, but then tell her on the very next day I can go to the coffeeshop. Either it's no longer closed, or the previous day I wasn't being totally honest about my motivations for not going to the coffeeshop. I'm not saying these players are dishonest per se, I'm saying if they truly think they can't play while things aren't ok, then they can't possibly with a straight face decide to play any time soon.

That's not at all the point I'm making. The statement the original poster attributed to the players, something along the lines of "we can't play right now because things aren't ok" is what sets the logical bar. I'm not setting it--the players did when they made that statement. Calling my logic flawed, and saying I have an impossible threshold for raising awareness is immaterial, because the statement the original poster alluded to has nothing to do with raising awareness; it has to do with things being ok. If the players had said, "we can't play today, because we need to raise awareness about what's happening", I can be convinced that they truly believed a one day hiatus was sufficient to raise awareness. But as I stated, raising awareness is not the bar this particular group of players was setting. The logic is not flawed, the requirements being subjected to it are.

Depends on the circumstances. A black guy minding his own business, or peacefully complying with an officer's orders being told that is obviously problematic. A black guy screaming "don't shoot" while waving a gun in the air, or holding a knife to the throat of a hostage he took is a totally different animal. In those latter scenarios, the officer's words can be construed as a warning, not a threat, that is "if you don't surrender now, I will have no choice but to shoot you in order to ensure public safety." The yet in this situation is representative of the officer's forbearance which is now running thin. I don't know the specifics of this case, so I can't directly comment, although I am inclined to believe the situation in question was probably not similar to the last two scenarios I described. That being said, I'm completely confused as to why an officer telling a black person "I haven't shot you yet" is worse than an officer saying the same thing to a brown/yellow/red/white person. Absent additional evidence of racism (again, not being familiar with the situation, I can't comment on this point), I am loathe to declare an officer racist based solely on one severely threatening statement made to one individual with a different skin color. Am I to believe he either says this to every black individual he interacts with, or that this is the first black person he's had a situation with? If not, it seems more likely to me there were other extenuating circumstances responsible that are not justification for the statement (if, as I suspect, the statement was not warranted), but are not racial in nature. As for QI, I believe that police should have a different set of standards, for the simple reason that we daily ask police to be ready to deal with the absolute worst elements of society. Situations most people would run from, police are obligated to run towards. Police are required in these situations to make split-second decisions, almost always based on incomplete information, and on occasion, inaccurate information. We bemoan when it appears police acted too quickly, but do we ever reflect when police react to slowly, and innocent bystanders become victims? In the specific example you shared on QI, I of course view that as reprehensible, and would hope that after a fair trial, that officer, if convicted, would be remanded to prison for the rest of his natural life, with no chance at parole. I believe QI can be examined, perhaps re-worked, but a starting point of we can no longer have it seems a dangerous place.

I'm not trying to make anyone jump through hoops, I'm saying if you make a far-ranging statement, you are then bound by the principles you established. If I said I could never work for Nike because they utilize sweatshops, but then accepted a job with Nike, there are only two conclusions to be made; 1) Nike stopped utilizing sweatshops 2) I was not serious about my initial statement That's what I'm saying here about the players; if they are truly saying "I can't play because it wouldn't be right to play while things aren't ok", the minute they resume playing, we must either assume that the players who said that now think things are ok, or they didn't actually mean what they said. It's certainly possible they were being grandiose or hyperbolic in their initial statement, but the point remains the same. If you didn't play Thursday because things aren't ok, you certainly can't play Friday, or Saturday, or anytime in the near future, for the simple reason that the swath of people who think things aren't ok right now are unlikely to think things are ok anytime soon.

I'm not sure what you mean by QI, can you define it for me (no sarcasm, I seriously want to know). The case you mentioned about the person of color being told he hadn't been shot "yet" being called racism is troubling, and one of the roots of the issue. What proof do we have that the officer said this out of racial animus? A white person doing something bad to a black person is not an open and shut case of racism, yet that seems to increasingly be the bar being set these days. That being said, if there is supporting evidence of the officer's racism, I obviously withdraw my argument.

The logic is fine; Statement A: If everything is not ok, players choose not to play as scheduled Statement B: The Twins' players chose not play as scheduled Conclusion: Everything is not ok If Statement B is flipped to, The Twins' players chose to play as scheduled, you cannot logically conclude that everything is not ok; the condition in statement A has not been met. If it is not ok to play because things are not ok, then by that statement, you cannot resume playing until things are ok. A more accurate summation of what the players are saying is "I don't feel like I can play today with everything that's going on". That's a far cry from "Things aren't ok so we can't play".

So since the Twins were all set to play today, it means everything became ok overnight? If this truly the reason, that baseball should not be played until the vague and unquantifiable list of demands is met, baseball will never be played again.

Except we're not here talking about the reason they chose to sit, we're talking about the fact that they sat. Thus, The Conversation has not been furthered. This is the problem with the protests over the past few years--the protest itself ends up being the topic, not what is being protested. I would argue it's because the current style of protest, which to some extent involves at some level inconveniencing/aggravating others is not conducive to building bridges. As for the piece around consequences, I think the point that's being made is not that people should suffer or their action is meaningless, it's that when an action costs someone nothing, it's hard to determine to what extent that person truly cares about that action. They might really really care; they might just be going with the flow. So I think the question on some people's mind is if Taylor Rogers would have suggested not playing, and been met with universal agreement, if game checks would be lost, or the playoffs would have been missed, or roster cuts would have been made. Maybe nothing would have changed. Maybe everything would have changed. The point is the lack of sacrifice leaves open the possibility that this is simply a meaningless gesture, done to check a box/keep from looking out of line.

Correct, that is what I meant to say. Rogers rested is death on the opposition--any opposition. Rogers not rested is death on the Twins, particularly against quality opposition.

This is the entire point I'm making; pitching on zero days rest, Taylor Rogers is no longer one of the Twins' best players. Continuing to treat him as such is ignoring statistical data, and is costing the Twins games.

Last year, 4 of his 17 appearances on no rest cam against teams that made the playoffs. He had 1 against Detroit, 2 against KC, 2 against the Angels, 2 against Miami, 1 against the White Sox and 1 against Baltimore. Take those out, and you have 8 appearances--2 against Cleveland, 2 against the Brewers, and 1 each against the Yankees, the Phillies, the Rays, and the BoSox. In those 8 outings, spanning 7.1 IP, he had 4.9 bb/9, 6.1 HR/9, a .308 BAA, a 2.18 WHIP, a 12.27 ERA, and a 10.99 FIP; this would suggest Rogers should absolutely unequivocally not be used against good teams on no rest. This is borne out by the fact that in 11 appearances against those same 6 teams (7 against Cleveland, 1 against everyone else except the Brewers), he pitched 15 innings with 0.6 bb/9, 0.6 HR/9, a .185 BAA, 0.73 WHIP, 0.60 ERA, and 2.01 FIP. He only gave up one run in those 11 appearances, and that was against Cleveland. Now; it's certainly possible this is small sample size--except for the 15 innings he pitched last year on no rest were almost 22% of his total innings--it's like saying if a pitcher is bad for 6 weeks that it's just a small sample. In a normal season, you could maybe make that case. This year, 6 weeks is close to 2/3 of the year. At this point, maybe we follow what the data suggests, which is that Rogers is much less likely to be effective on no rest, and stop trying to increase the sample size to see if the results stick. It's like wondering if you'll get hurt crashing your car at 45 MPH, and deciding the only way to find out is to just go ahead and crash. Maybe you'll be fine, but the downside is not worth it.

I put this loss squarely on Rocco--Rogers has no business pitching on no days of rest; see the breakdown below for his 2019 stats split by whether or not he got rest. Total: 69 IP, 278 Batters Faced, 58 hits, 11 BB, 1.00 WHIP, 11.7 k/9, 1.4 bb/9, 1.0 HR/9, .209 BAA, 2.61 ERA, 2.59 FIP With rest: 54 IP, 201 Batters, 38 hits, 4 BB, 0.78 WHIP, 11.5 k/9, 0.7 bb/9, 0.5 HR/9, .189 BAA, 1.33 ERA, 1.60 FIP With no rest: 15 IP, 77 Batters, 20 hits, 7 BB, 1.80 WHIP, 12.6 k/9, 4.2 bb/9, 3.0 HR/9, .260 BAA, 7.20 ERA, 6.15 FIP With rest, Rogers is basically the best reliever in baseball. Without it, he might not even be a 4A guy. Falvine needs to tell the equipment manager to not issue Taylor a uniform the day after he pitches.

JaCoby Jones turned 28 in May--he's not exactly young. He's had only one season with over a .400 SLG. This year one third of his flyballs have turned into HR, which is not at all sustainable, nor is his .421 babip, given his barely 40% hard hit rate. Cabrera's HR/FB rate is even higher at 42.9%, Schoop is making almost as much soft contact as hard contact (21.4 to 28.6), while Cron is actually making more soft contact than hard (41.2 to 35.3). All of this is of course SSS, but none of it suggests the Tigers all the sudden have a lineup that's going to mash; if anything, they got lucky with multiple hitters running into homers all at the same time. Despite this, the Tigers are still scoring less than 4 runs a game, and are 21st in the league in runs. I'm in no way worried about the Fightin' Gardies.

Covid-19 cannot affect you when seated at a baseball game. Just ask Dr Fauci.

I don't know how many people realize this (I certainly didn't until I looked it up), but going only by offense last year (using wRC+), Mike Trout in his prime season (he spent more of 2019 as a 27 year old than a 28 year old, birthday is 8/7) was only 10% better than Nelson Cruz in his age 38/39 season (almost an even split since his birthday is 7/1). That's almost impossible to put into context, other than to say, Nelson Cruz is really really good at hitting baseballs.

I believe a closer needs to use "Blind" by Korn. The buildup is awesome, and you could exit the bullpen right when Jonathan Davis screams "Are You Ready?" Goosebumps. Chills. All the Feels.

Completely agree with this. Pointing out there are holes in Rosario's game is not hating him, it's acknowledging the reality that the Twins are not the Yankees, and can't throw $10M-$12M at a player who's only kind of performing. I also hope Eddie gets a big payday, and if it happens with the Twins, I'm ok with that. That's because I trust Falvine, so if they're giving Eddie 5 and $100M, it's because he probably OPS'd close to 1.000 while playing much improved defense. I just really doubt Eddie has that in him.

Let's talk about clutch hitting, but use career numbers to get a bigger sample size. I also restricted the PA/RBI number to only RISP situations; using it overall is misleading, as Cave only got 11.8% of his PA's hitting 5th or higher, while Rosario got 99.3% of his hitting 3rd or 4th. Rosario: RISP: .271/.306/.448 .754 OPS -- 239 RBI in 668 PA's, 2.8 PA's per RBI (Also, a 90 wRC+, and only 32.7% hard contact) Cave: RISP: .305/.379/.552 .931 OPS -- 49 RBI in 125 PA's, 2.6 PA's per RBI (wRC+ of 143, and 49.4% hard contact) Clearly, Rosario had a knack for hitting with RISP last year, that is not in keeping with his historical baseline. If you want to argue that Eddie's 173 PA's with RISP in 2019 is sufficient to change the narrative on him, keep in mind 173 is not that much more than 125 (Cave's career PA's with RISP), and Cave for his career has been better with RISP in almost every statistic than Eddie's outlier of 2019.