Paul Pleiss

"Take your base young man, you've earned it."

Just Bombs Burton is my least favorite player on the roster.

Is four runs enogh of a lead to feel comfotable bringing "Just Bombs" Jared Burton into the game?

Teams who wait for the constantly changing super-2 deadline to pass are doing a disservice to their players and their MLB teams. An extra year of arbitration over promoting a guy who is ready to contribute to the MLB club? Hogwash! Keeping a guy down early in the season to get an extra year of service from him is smart baseball, wating for the ambiguous super-2 deadline (which can only be found retroactively), is silly. I hope the Twins find room for May and Meyer before the break if they continue to pitch well through June. Pino could come up and take a spot in the pen from Jared Burton right now. The Twins need to make room for these guys, especially guys who look to be part of the ballclub in Minnesota for the long haul.

How many underscores is too many underscores?

Nolasco would neve have been a trade chip this season. The Twins signed him to be part of this team for the next four years. The Twins are not the Miami Marlins, they don't sign players to move them. Nolasco will be given plenty of time to turn things around. I don't think he could become a realistic trade chip until 2016 or 2017. He's here, get used to seeing him every 5 days. The Twins are pressed to find room for the guys down in AAA, and those spots will come. People will get hurt, double-headers will need pitchers. Patience. If the guys in AAA continue to pitch this well the Twins will be looking to find ways to get them on the squad. Matty Guerrier and "Just Bombs" Jared Burton may may be looking for somewhere else to pitch.

I don't know how much longer the Twins can keep all of them down in AAA. Correia may not be finished, but he's certainly no better every 5 days than any one of those 5. I think moving Deduno back to the pen and dropping someone like Guerrier or Kubel to make room would make sense. Kubel probably goes down when Fuld is back, so maybe Mr. G is the next roster removal. Not much more for the guys in AAA to do besides wait for a spot.

For all of the former Twins doing big things with other clubs, I don't feel bad about Go-go's emergence with the Brew-crew. Keeping him when the Twins had Span didn't make sense, especially with Revere and Hicks coming up the system. In hindsight it looks bad, but it doesn't hurt the way other moves have.

Kurt's motorcycle shop will not be showing it's ware's at the All-Star game. The owner, as reported by the Truman Gazette, will be home visiting relatives over the break. He may be researching a new fuel injection system for the next generation 'crotch rocket'

"The draft is a crapshoot." A direct quote from a pseudo-famous Twins fan who wears an impressive mustache. The Twins have been linked heavily to Nick Gordon, and it seems that the top 5 guys go in vary orders. Can you imagine a situation where any one of Godon, Kolek, Jackson, Rodon, and Beede are available and the Twins pass for someone else? Is there anyone, aside from Nola who the Twins would be willing to take ahead of the front 5 guys? Does E Rolf go by Rolf in real life? Is it more correct to boo Aaron Hicks or Joe Mauer? Will "rolf dawg" ever have children? if so, what will he name them? Thor? Erik von Liefson? Other strong viking names? Would you consider naming your childen after Minnesota Twins greats from yesteryear?

There's talk of New Britain moving to Hartford and the Twins recently made a switch from Beloit to Cedar Rapids, but is there a chance that a MiLB team comes to Minnesota, and that team gets affiliated with the Twins?

This is a fun idea. But not fun if you are Jason Kubel's knees. But I'm not. So it's fun to me.

Anyone have any interest in writing things that are about baseball, but not really about baseball, sort of in the vein of NotGraphs? I'd love to team up and do something fun together. I enjoy this kind of fun thing. My latest is about misquoting Tom Kelly. http://twinsdaily.com/entry.php/5302-Misquoting-Tom-Kelley

You play the guys where you think gives them the ABs they need and the playing time and positional flexability to help them get to the big league ball club and succeede. Rosario's bat is the key component of his development, and if he can hit in line with his career numbers his bat will play anywhere up the middle.

If Kubel isn't sent to AAA/DFA'd/released I'm going to start listening to NPR instead of watching Twins baseball.

NoLOLasco is having a problem, somewhere, somehow. Maybe he's got a phantom groin injury like Big Pelf, but something's not right and it's not just the temperature, he got rocked down in the Trop in Tampa. BABIP may be part of it, but he's giving up a lot of hard hit balls, coupled with some bad plays defensively. A couple hits get correctled called errors and his ERA is better, but it doesn't solve his problems. I still like the Nolasco signing, was really happy when it happened. He's got YEARS left on his contract, the twins can and should give him a long leash. Hopefully he "figures it out." Whatever that means.

You can download the new Talk to Contact (@TalkToContact) episode via iTunes or click here you can download the new episode, and if you want to add the show to your non-iTunes podcast player, this is the RSS Feed. This week's episode is highlighted by a lengthy interview with Jim Callis (@JimCallisMLB, MLBpipeline.com) who talks about the draft and a whole mess of Twins topics. The Baseball Pirate makes his return from defending the homeland and the whole gang is back together for the first time in a long time. The show starts out with a rousing discussion of which coach is the most important coach in baseball, and whether or not any of the players on the 25-man roster could be more important than the most important coach. Interesting things are happening. http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Y3uaMqgFpc8/U4gTaWvzjbI/AAAAAAAAAMw/WvkeIrl6KMM/s1600/0.jpg Brian Dozier continues to impress, the Twins pitchers continue to distress (except for Punxsutawney Phil Hughes), and Eduardo Escobar continues to mash extra-base hits like it's his job (because it is). Is Eddie Escobar playing over his head? Probably some, but could this also be the natural maturation of a player who's been in the big leagues since his age-22 season? Eddie Rosario makes his return from his drug suspension, Ben Revere hits a real life, honest to god, over the wall home run and Carlos Gomez says "It's sexy batting clean-up!" All this and more on this week's episode of Talk to Contact. Enjoy the show. Thanks for the download. You can follow Cody on Twitter (@NoDakTwinsFan) or read his writing at NoDakTwinsFan, and you can find Eric on Twitter (@ERolfPleiss) and read his writing at Knuckleballs, and you can find Jay Corn on twitter @Jay__Corn! __________________ Follow me, @BaseballPirate, on Twitter. Check out the Talk to Contact Podcast (@TalkToContact) or email the show: talktocontact@gmail.com

Thanks, I like having fun with silly literature and baseball together.

http://assets.podomatic.net/ts/19/ad/da/paulpleiss/1400x1400-330x330+40+7_9626439.jpg This week's episode is highlighted by a lengthy interview with Jim Callis (@JimCallisMLB, MLBpipeline.com) who talks about the draft and a whole mess of Twins topics. The Baseball Pirate makes his return from defending the homeland and the whole gang is back together for the first time in a long time. The show starts out with a rousing discussion of which coach is the most important coach in baseball, and whether or not any of the players on the 25-man roster could be more important than the most important coach. Interesting things are happening.Brian Dozier continues to impress, the Twins pitchers continue to distress (except for Punxsutawney Phil Hughes), and Eduardo Escobar continues to mash extra-base hits like it's his job (because it is). Is Eddie Escobar playing over his head? Probably some, but could this also be the natural maturation of a player who's been in the big leagues since his age-22 season?Eddie Rosario makes his return from his drug suspension, Ben Revere hits a real life, honest to god, over the wall home run and Carlos Gomez says "It's sexy batting clean-up!" All this and more on this week's episode of Talk to Contact. Source

Oh, Jarod Burton and the 6+ ERA, he sounds like the right guy to put in against an offense that he surrendered 3+ runs to in his last implosion of an outing... Great work JB!

What if, instead of cake balls, they were given frosting balls. seems it might be easier to make a ball out of frosting that aproximates a baseball. Or frosted balls, from a Minnesota Moose. Which would just be his regular balls, but they would have to have been nipped while it was still below freezing.

A Lament By Percy Bysshe Shelley 1792–1822 Retold by Paul Pleiss O world! O life! O time! On whose last steps Jarod Burton doth climb, Trembling at that where he had stood 66ft 6in before; When will return the glory of your prime? No more—Oh, never more! Out of the day and night A joy has taken flight; Fresh spring, and summer, and winter hoar, Move my faint heart with grief, but with delight No more—Oh, never more!

[h=1]A Lament[/h]By Percy Bysshe Shelley 1792–1822 Retold by Paul Pleiss O world! O life! O time! On whose last steps JB doth climb, Trembling at that where he had stood 66ft 6in before; When will return the glory of your prime? No more—Oh, never more! Out of the day and night A joy has taken flight; Fresh spring, and summer, and winter hoar, Move my faint heart with grief, but with delight No more—Oh, never more!

Today's outing goes to show that you can't just cherry pick stats to make a player look good. Yes, Burton had a nice stretch after an afwul start, but that awful start is part of who he is as a player. And we're seeing him be ineffective again today. Jarod Burton, stick a fork in this guy.