Vanimal46

Is it bad that I want to believe the Anglin brothers and Frank Morris made it to land and found a way to get to Mexico? That story has a better ring to it than succumbing to the cold San Francisco Bay water...

Oh man... Hope it doesn't do any damage to your car or home!

ANNND Welcome Back! To Minnesota Twins Whine Line on a Sunday. How neat was that game yesterday?! The International Space Station captured Vargas' HR leaving our atmosphere yesterday! And Berrios did his best Catch Me If You Can impression to get the win. Today is Nik Turley day! Maybe you're like me and haven't heard of this guy until a week or so ago. We did some digging to learn more about him to prepare you for today... And we discovered he has a sharp looking beard who throws a bender! That's about it... Before we get into more debauchery, let's talk weather and lineups. Bring your jackets to the stadium again, because it's a chilly one. 63 degrees at first pitch, and a GNARLY WNW wind of 20 MPH. Gusts up to 28 MPH! Minnesota Twins (32-26): P - Nik Turley - We all want to love you Nik, let's start today! San Francisco Giants (25-39): P- Matt Cain - Coming off a 5 IP 5 ER loss to the Brewers! Game threads are supposed to have the same feeling as sitting in the nosebleeds shooting the breeze. Which got us wondering.... What would we be talking about at AT&T Park right now? Road Trips: The Twins are nearing the finish line on their 11 day road trip. Living out of a suitcase is never fun... And hotel beds have to start getting uncomfortable after a while. Wouldn't people start getting on your nerves after being away from home that long? Fortune Cookies: FUN FACT! Fortune cookies were invented in San Francisco. I'm not sure who creates the generic sayings and predictions inside the cookie. I've been promised wealth and good fortune, but my number is never called for the Powerball... Alcatraz: FUN FACT! This was the only federal prison to offer hot water showers in order to prevent prisoners from acclimating to the cold San Francisco Bay. There's also the mysterious escape story from 1962 with the Anglin brothers and Frank Morris. Do you think their makeshift boat made it across the bay? Streaks and Debuts: Jason Castro of all people is entering the game with an 11 game hit streak. Keep it up! And Nik Turley gets his first chance to pitch underneath the big lights after 10 years in the minors. This has to be right up there on his list of scariest firsts in his life. We'll be rooting for you today Turley! Summer trips: We're getting into the meat-grinder of summer trips and activities. Maybe you have that "cabin" up north to get away from the hustle and bustle. Maybe you're planning a tropical get away. I'm leaving for Cancun next week, and can't wait!! Do you have any trips planned soon? Let's get a win Twins!

ANNND Welcome! To Minnesota Twins Whine Line: The Thing That Should Not Be Edition. I am your host for the next 2 days, Vanimal. The Twins face off against the Giants, in a city where you can rent the equivalent of a closet for $3,500 a month! Before we get into lineups and weather, let's jam out to the only concert ChiTown and I would agree to see together. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ihv3OgzkYsg It's the best of both worlds! Chi enjoys the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, and I enjoy the HEAVY guitar solos! Bring your jackets, because it's a cold one in the bay. 63 degrees at first pitch. VERY breezy winds out of the W at 16 MPH. Becoming more windy during the afternoon. Minnesota Twins (31-26): P - Jose Berrios - 81 overall on MLB The Show! San Francisco Giants (25-38): P - Jeff Samardzjia - There's one misspelling here. Guess where it is! The Whine Line team has been extremely busy this season producing a new MOCKumentary, and you're all special little snowflakes who get to read it! We're calling it.... Miguel Sano: The Thing That Should Not Be Date: September 30, 2009 This is a story of 3 physicists in the Dominican Republic looking to CHANGE the world! Their names were Dr. North, Dr. Chief, and Dr. Chi. All three physicists were sent to the Dominican by Professor Glunn, who was hellbent on pushing the limits of the human body. One afternoon, Professor Glunn mixed up one of his physics books with the comic book Incredible Hulk. Ever since that day, he's BELIEVED that it could be done! I mean, he read it in a book! For the past 2 years, Dr. North, Chief, and Chi were testing this hypothesis on different creatures, with a mixed bag of results. "Look! This iguana is angry, and now it can lift a 100 pound rock," Dr. Chi shrieked in joy! "Unfortunately the ant stopped being angry, and got crushed by a 2×4," Dr. Chief explained. "Aren't you guys tired of testing on everything BESIDES humans? Let's take it to the next level," suggested Dr. North. Dr. Chief and Chi were intrigued... "What do you propose?" Dr. North faces the team and gives a devilish smile. "Well, the Twins just signed Miguel Sano. Why don't we pay him a visit?" All three give the look of approval and laugh maniacally together..... NEXT MORNING: There's a new buzz at the lab, as the three get prepared to trick Sano to come inside. "Chi, do you have the trap set?" Dr. North asked. "Yes, 10 batches of warm pebernodder cookies are waiting for him outside," Dr. Chi replied. Excellent! You would think the hard part is finding Sano, but not for these 3 geniuses... Luck found them. Dr. Chief yelled Sano is outside! Hurry! Dr. North whistled him over to test their cookies. As soon as Sano took the first bite, Dr. Chief SNEAK attacked him, knocking him out cold. The experiment is ready to begin.... Sano wakes up in confusion, strapped to a chair and overhears the conversation going on. "Is this bomb big enough to turn him into the HULK?" "According to Professor Glunn's calculations it is..." "Ah, what the hell. Let's do this!!" 3 hours later Sano wakes up again... "How are you feeling, Miguel?" Dr. North inquired. "A little strange. My head hurts. And my biceps are twice the size now." "Don't worry! This is all PERFECTLY NORMAL," all three doctors said in unison. "Now, let's see what it looks like when you're angry. What makes you angry?" "Whenever a columnist claims I'm overweight and need to grow up." "GREAT! Channel that anger and let's see what happens. Dr. Chief, hand him a bat and toss him a curveball," Dr. Chi said. Dr. Chief wound up and threw the best bender he could... And Sano crushes it! "I think we have something here... Let's report back to Professor Glunn." After reporting back, Professor Glunn is ecstatic! He also warns the physicists to keep their goddang mouths shut so the MLB commissioner doesn't find out about this. All three concurred, and didn't speak a word about it to anyone.... UNTIL NOW! Let's Win Twins!!

Nik Turley has a blurb in The Fringe Five: Baseball's Most Compelling Fringe Prospects

I'm jumping on the Gore Hype Train... All aboard!

What family would let him in their house when he's pitching in minor league ball? People do very stupid things as teenagers, myself included. This is a different level of awful, and he admitted to doing it for a couple of years. I hope the Twins are one of the teams that took this person off their draft board entirely.

12:23 sn4k3rjaker: Minnesota is still… not terrible? Think they can hang around the wild card discussion? I’m having a hard time keeping my expectations down 12:24 Eno Sarris: 6th in batting, worst pitching staff by WAR in majors though… mostly driven by a turrible pen.

Anyone catching your eye on this list? It's not a great class of free agents.

Concur with Oldgoat. Nothing has changed in the 2B market since last winter. Dozier is falling back to Earth with his .741 OPS. The Twins may have to start looking at Polanco and Gordon as trade bait in order to acquire top-tier pitching prospects.

For those that haven't, it's..... not great. Arrieta, Darvish, Cueto (if he opts out) and that's about it.

This one is my favorite...

Not sure whether to put this in the Trump or Random Funny Stuff Depository Thread.....

His response to being incoherent? "I get the tense from Twitter that my line of questioning today went over people's heads. Maybe going forward I shouldn't stay up late watching the Diamondbacks night games," he said in a statement. Source

Just catching up on the fivethirtyeight blog... Some of these Republican Senators, namely Blunt, Risch, and Rubio and their ability to pretzel interpretation of words Trump said is mind.boggling.

An entire article dedicated to the Twins on FanGraphs! A Glove Story in Minnesota

Could be a win-win for both parties. Kepler gets a guaranteed long-term contract and could be a FA entering his age 32 season. That's still young enough to get another big pay day before he hangs it up. The Twins know exactly what they're paying Kepler for the long-term and make additional plans around that.

Couldn't agree more. He may be projected to be a top 5 pitcher in the organization soon. He's not one yet. We love to scout stat lines and read the recaps about players on here. It seems like what's lost in translation is the level of competition these guys are at. On a typical AA team, there's what... Maybe a half dozen players who could be considered MLB caliber? He's doing well against his level of competition, but in the MLB there is no place to hide if you're not ready for it.

6 pitches that will most likely be cut down to 3 pitches by the time he reaches the upper levels of the minors...

Perhaps he can be paid similarly to Yelich too.... 7/$49 MM. Who says no?

I found this article to be fascinating, because I'm certainly not going to put in the effort to put this together. Jeff Sullivan compiled data from the last 17 drafts, and plotted a few graphs showing how many players were drafted, signed, and made the majors for each team. As well as how they performed via Baseball-Reference WAR. The Giants had the most amount of players that were developed and made the majors. The Twins are tied for last. Jeff Sullivan admits that he's not sure how to interpret the results. "Everything is part draft pick, part player development, and part luck. In theory, a team could have drafted all the right guys, and then the organization could’ve messed them all up. That shouldn’t fall on the drafting, but it’s impossible to create separation. Think of this as just a retrospective summary."

Just like Dinger, I was too young to see Kirby Puckett in action. First game I remember going to was in 1998 when Bob Tewksbury was tossing beach balls down broadway. As far as the best players in my fandom, Sano is top 3 for sure, and slowly creeping to #1. - Johan Santana - Joe Mauer the catcher - Miguel Sano

The Twins have three good pitchers?! Ervin Santana is #1 for sure Jose Berrios is #2 - mainly because I'm a glory boy and want him to do well #3 is tough.... For me it's a toss up between Brandon Kintzler and Tyler Duffey.

Gotta keep throwing darts at the board... Good luck to Tepesch.

Awful news. My condolences to his friends and family... Especially his wife and three children.