ewen21

There are a lot of things that don’t come with directions. If someone makes a large detailed post, at least a few paragraphs long, I think you have to do better than a simple thumbs down. I would do that person the courtesy of highlighting what I disagree with and explain. Otherwise, to me, a simple “disagree” attached to a highly detailed post says you don’t like what was said, probably because you can’t disprove what was said. This isn’t instagram. I am not calling for anyone to change and this isn’t a complaint to the home office. It’s a statement of opinion and it belongs in a thread such as this. If not here then where?

I’m not as old as you are. I was born in 1966 so I obviously missed that 1965 season. That said, I agree with your statement above. I’ve been a teacher in the NY state public school system for over 30 years. I’ve seen my fair share of criticism and sometimes I see it as harsh and unfair, but I have to maintain my cool as a professional. Critics should be allowed to be critics, and homers should be allowed to be homers. A “harsh” comment about a player here is small potatoes. If we are going to worry about their feelings so much then perhaps we might want to step back and understand that this is a small outpost on the internet and most players have no idea it exists. I accept the praise and the criticism working in the public sector doing a highly visible job. I’d expect these players to do likewise. If something someone wrote on Twins Daily upset a player they need to man up. This is for US and not the ball players Then again, that’s my opinion and the owners have their own opinion

There are three things I can site. These are MY reasons and you may not feel they are valid reasons and that is your right. Everyone would have to remember these three things,, but I will go through it anyway..... The first time I saw Buxton act out was when he was not called up in September of 2018. He stormed off, left Rochester and didn't take calls for a while. When he came Gillette Children's Hospital in December he still harped on it and was saying "I ain't sugarcoating nothing". Oh really? He had a horrible 2018 and didn't do well in Rochester until just before callups when he had a couple of multiple hit games. He'd barely played all year and he hit terribly when he did. THere was a laundry list of ailments he went though and it made no sense to have him play meaningless games in September after a year like that. Who is he to storm off from his teammates in Rochester, go radio silent for a few months and then come back to criticize his bosses at an event at a children's hospital? Many here thought he was mistreated and screwed over, so I am guessing you felt that way as well. Whether he was or wasn't his crybaby routine didn't go over well with me. Not after that horrendous 2018 season which occurred right after I thought he figured it out. He clearly had not. Buxton says lack of September call-up 'didn't go over well'; Twins say he's starter in center field (startribune.com) The we have the batting practice banter from him. Buxton was the one who said: Why make such a proclamation? I do not care that he hits in the cage indoors. Whatever he is doing it isn't working. He cannot seem to settle on any kind of sound and repeatable mechanics. His career lifetime OBP is .298 and he isn't a good hitter major league hitter by any standard and he has to say that? He has horrible hitting mechanics and has for his whole career. Twins' Byron Buxton hasn't taken outdoor batting practice 'in probably two years' (startribune.com) From this article above: He seems to have autonomy to do what he wants. I do not like that for any player who isn't even a lifetime .240 Finally, there was that absurd Twitter exchange he had with fans last year after someone made a joke about him being careful to not get injured at the uniform reveal last winter. He had "rabbit ears" on social media with fans calling them "clowns". THAT is a clown move by a professional athlete. I am not for social media. This is the extent of my "social media" and I think it is a clown move for a pro athlete to engage with and get mad at internet trolls. Whether the trolls are clowns or not, a pro athlete has to be smarter than that. I am guessing you probably do not feel that way, but I do. I have a pretty high profile public job and I do not engage my critics online like he did because it is stupid to me. It achieves nothing and it shows that he might not have the temperament to hold up to the rigors are life in the majors. So, these are three examples where i think work ethic, mindset and commitment to the craft are questionable.

I agree with everything except the great guy part.

If there was something there that you said in the other post that was unreasonable, I didn’t see it. It’s not what people want to hear, but then that’s reality. By the way, anyone who missed the last two games should feel lucky. They looked much the roll over and die version of this team we’d get in NY when Gardy was on the bench. Count your blessings that your Twins addiction is cuffed for this series

I don’t think that statement was meant to be taken literally. It’s more a statement where he is as an offensive player. He is oneon the low end of average offensively. He strikes out a ton and gets on base less than 30 percent of the time. The article was totally warranted, but he has always been this player. He has his hot streaks and these deep chasms where he couldn’t hit water if he fell out of a boat. He’s not “one of the best” and he really never was

I liked this post for its honesty, not for how his career unfolded. He’s vastly overrated. Simple as that.

If you look at his lifetime numbers what is different this year from his past seasonal average? This year is almost the median of what he is at this time of year. We are seeing pretty much the most accurate representation we could have expected. 230something, 3 homers and 15 runs batted in on June 5th? Sounds like the OVER/Under

He doesn’t have to, because he never actually said that.

Not surprisingly, Buxton goes into a tailspin about a week after the 2 home run game in Washington. He’s obviously not working at the craft because he looks horrendous

I live in upstate NY, far out of market, so I’ve not been affected. Those who can’t watch don’t sweat it for the remainder of this week. This team has reverted to “it’s hopeless” mode. I’ve seen this rerun a million times. I’ve taken the two hour trip to the Bronx well over a dozen times in the last twenty plus years and I seem just TWO wins. One those wins was in May 2001. Eric Milton was pitching and Dougie Mint was hitting over .400. Since that game they’ve gone something like 1-13 at Yankee Stadium and it’s beyond pathetic that this team seemingly is in the mindset of simply assuming they can’t win in NY. And don’t give anything about payroll. The Rays do just fine against the Yankees. Cleveland and Detroit beat them in the playoffs multiple times and the Marlins beat the Yankees in the series back in ‘03 I watched the game last night and it reminded me of one of the many playoff games I’ve watched them play in NY. Part of me started to wish I was Riverbrain. I’m so hopeless that I watched that garbage because I can, and I’ll watch tonight and tomorrow. Does that make me better? That’s the question I had for myself when that games wrapped up and I set my alarm for 4AM. For those of you upset about not being able to watch? Be happy you don’t have a choice for the next couple of days. Do something else with that time. Don’t waste a second while I watch them on the YES Network laying down like lambs.

This isn’t hindsight. He was an excellent player for the money. In many ways the dual GMs have done well with FA (when compared to TR), but they made a mistake with him and Polanco. We can quibble about infield defense, but when you have a roster so thin on offense like this one it’s like worrying about a broken finger when quadruple bypass surgery is needed. Building a solid lineup needs to be priority number one next year as far as I am concerned. I like Ryan, Lopez and Ober. Maybe add a FA arm

This team is last in baseball in team batting average. We are also in the bottom five in OBP, SLG and OPS. I think more emphasis needs to be put on that. The main reason isn’t that this lineup is slumping. It’s that these GMs grossly overestimated what we had offensively. There isn’t a single player other than Correa (apart from a 38 year old Santana) with a track record for being a solid offensive player. They should have known that going into the winter and they should have done something about it. infield defense is only an issue if we are looking to make hay in the playoffs. It’s nice to have it, but if your offense is as bad as this one has been then that ought to be the main concern

You said what a lot of people don’t want to hear, but this offense is brutal. I saw someone say it’s early and there are a lot of low batting averages around the league. All I have to say in response is that this team is at the bottom for team batting as of today. Dead last. I don’t see many guys with track records to make me feel optimistic either. Good analysis here by Nick, but we’ve seen this show before. This is a guy with a lifetime battling average under .240 and a lifetime OBP of .300. He doesn’t save nearly enough runs with his glove with an offensive history like that. This is a guy openly admits he doesn’t like batting practice. That would be like an accountant saying he doesn’t like math. With Buxton, I think he has a questionable work ethic when it comes to the offensive part of the game. It’s like he’s learned nothing over the last five or six years. Maybe that’s harsh, but then maybe he needs to start learning how to deal with negative feedback and commit to improving an obvious weakness

What is a successful season for Buxton? I guess it depends on how low you want to set the bar. The fact that threads like this keep getting written and that we have had discussions like this for years says a lot about him. The guy has played in more than 92 games once and he is now 30 years old. In his last six seasons he has had more than 75 hits ONCE. What are we really talking about here? I predict he has about 250 at bats and hits .221 with an OBP under .300. That is what he is.

I’m sorry to have to go there, but enough already.. Besides all the trips to the DL, I’m not sure if he has the temperament for the game. Major League Baseball is a grind and the true pros play it for about 7 months every year. This guy does not even get in half the games his team plays. There is no WHY for that any longer, in my opinion. Availability might be the most important skill and he just doesn’t have it. He’s given us sufficient evidence for me to say that. If anyone wants to “think positive” and dream of a best case scenario go ahead and be my guest. It’s just I am not going to expect something different from him when he hits 30. Could he have another 2017? Yeah. Just as well as he could repeat last year’s performance. The cold reality is we signed him long term so we are stuck for at least two or three more years. if we learned anything Buxton isn’t essential to the Twins having success. It’s best that we just think of 2024 without him in the picture. He’s not a central player in this and that is just kinda sad. it is what it is

I hear you, but we are on the hook with Buxton for five more seasons. The guy is still up on a pedestal for a lot of people and some whom still insist "if not for injuries" he'd be a Hall of Famer. A mere critique of the guy sets off anger in some people and I find that kind of amusing at this point. Where does that anger come from? I have no idea. I for one never saw him as an elite player. I think he is a very spotty offensive player and that is easily more than half of a position player's game, save the catching position. He had elite speed and yet he was not a good base stealer. He strike out a ton and his lifetime OBP is under .300, which is kind of pathetic for someone who is supposed to be "elite". His defense, while great, reached mythically stupid proportions. No, he was not saving boatloads of runs...not ever. He made a lot of good plays look spectacular and there are never more than several plays (maybe) in any season he made that no other center field could make. There aren't large ranges on the field where Byron Buxton or any other centerfielder only makes the play and no other centerfielder does. The average CF makes about 2 put outs a game and Byron Buxton is not the only one who makes great plays. The Twins overvalued his speed and defense and ignored his offense and inability to stand up to the rigors of major league baseball even when it was obvious. We signed him and I thought it was a stupid signing from a baseball standpoint. So many people had drunk the Kool-Aid (including teammates) that we literally had to sign from a PR/marketing standpoint. So much was already bestowed upon him and he didn't deserve it. The Twins need to learn a lesson here. Now the guy can't even play the field and he is exposed for what he is. He never was a good hitter. He had moments where it looked like he was turning into a better hitter, but we had a center fielder that was a whole lot better than he is and that man is Torii Hunter. Give me Torii Hunter ten times out of ten over Buxton and I have said this all along. Buxton is a mirage. He simply is not wired to play a full season of major league baseball. You can chalk it up to whatever you want, but that is a proven fact. If we could hit the eject button and launch him into baseball outer space we ought to. Then again, we are committed to him for another five years so we have no other choice than to hope for the best for at least another two years while he gets paid to remain in limbo while people speculate about his availability. At this point it is hard for me to care much about whether he is in the lineup or not. He doesn't help very much anyway.

No offense, but I had to use my first disagree ever on your post right here. Delmon Young is a playoff hitter and Max Kepler is not. This goes way beyond their performance. The overall vibe and body language of both in playoff situations says to me Delmon is a "playoff hitter" and Max is not. There idea of "there is no clutch" is completely absurd. These are humans and they care about how they perform. Some are like Kepler and go completely catatonic. Others are like Delmon and they wake up and are dialed in. I respectfully disagree 100% with your opening sentence. Outcomes in baseball are not random samples. It takes a heart, a brain and talent. There is a psychology behind it and they psychology of it is a big reason while this organization lost 18 games in a row. It was not because the other team was THAT MUCH better. A good percentage of it was mindset.

We need to give up the ghost. Buxton is an illusion. The thought of him reaching his potential is an imaginary thing. He just wasted his 29 year old season. I watched a video of an interview he had with Mad Dog Russo over the off-season. He kept saying he couldn’t control injuries. If he can’t, how can the Twins? It’s a waste of time even discussing him at this point.

He doesn’t have the makeup to be a full time major league ball player.

You are not being ignorant, but this team isn't going to bunt its way to the WS. Sadly, it is a lost art. I can recall Dave Kingman being a good bunter simply using the element of surprise and his above average speed. Correa likely cannot lay down a decent bunt in live action. This kind of thing just isn't part of the game anymore and a big reason why is sabermetrics. I honestly do not know why any lefty with speed doesn't drag bunt. I do not think Buxton (and some other Twins with speed) are capable of learning how to do it at this point. It just isn't something coaches teach anymore

Another upstate NY guy here. I am surprised to see a few of us here. My story won't make much sense, but it is the only way I know how to explain it because it is all true. I grew up in a small town in between NYC and Albany. My dad was a Yankee fan, but my dad's brother, my uncle Matt, part-owned a small warehouse in Queens and had an in with Mets tickets. We were not a rich family so when my dad could get tickets from uncle Matt he'd pounce. My first Mets game attended was September 23, 1972 when the Mets beat the Phillies 5-3. Too bad it was not the September 24th game. That was Seaver vs. Carlton and a player name Lute Barnes got a couple of key hits off Lefty to win. 1972 Steve Carlton was nasty. Wish we could have seen that one....Anyway the next year the Mets went all the way to the WS on a wild ride which I was there for as a seven year old. I can recall one day during the summer watching the Mets get destroyed in Montreal like 19-7 and I was seething. I think Bob Bailey drove in like 8 runs and hit a ball into the swimming pool outside of Jarry Park. I cried when Wayne Garrett flied out to shallow left to make the last out in the WS. I was all in with baseball by then and was playing midget baseball the next summer. In 1974 and 1975 the Yankees played at Shea Stadium and I did see one Yankee game there. Jim Bibby pitched a one hitter and my uncle left my brother (born Christmas 1964, my cousin Joe born December of '65 and me, born April '66 unattended for about seven innings). Sometime around the second inning he bolted and he came by sometime after the 7th inning stretch. He had "a thing", I guess. He is 94 now and living in Florida. He doesn't remember that. I remained a Met fan until about the early 90s, but I always had the Twins in me. For starters, my first favorite player was Rod Carew. My older brother and I had Baseball Digest delivered from about 1977 to 1982 and we had a paper route in from 1977 to 1979. I followed Carew and watched him whenever the Twins played the Yankees. That was when I read the sports page and became obsessed with baseball stats. The Sunday Edition of the papers showed batting averages! I vividly remember reading about Carew in a 1977 Sports Illustrated and I felt bad for the Twins when he went to the Angels. Since I was a Mets fan I was not against teams beating the Yankees. I'd quietly root for the Twins whenever they played the Yankees (so as to not upset my dad)! I loved Bob Casey and the old Met. Loved the way he'd announce a player called Jim Holt. First base! Jim! Holt! 🤣🤣 Sadly I can recall Danny Thompson dying. It was a Monday Night Baseball game and Howard Cosell announced his loss. When I collected baseball cards I always looked for Twins. By the time I was playing pony league baseball in middle school I was following Roy Smalley and oddly enough my pony league team was THE TWINS! We played some real barn burners against a team called The Brewers! They were undefeated, but we had them on the ropes twice! Some of the Twins at that time wore their stirrups low so I tied my stirrups around my foot to wear them low. I even saw the Twins play at Yankee Stadium in 1980. They won 1-0 in 11 on a Ken Landreux single to center ( I should also say he hit a kid right in the face with a line drive during batting practice. Literally happened ten feet from me and it is one of the sickest sounds I ever heard). On that trip, I think I heard the song "Cars" by Gary Numan about 4 times in my dad's '72 Galaxie 500 on the way to and from Yankee Stadium. Shocked we stayed for the whole game but I guess my dad figured we were in high school now so.... Being a Mets fan and in college by 1986 I saw the Mets win it all in Oneonta. What a party that was. Obviously, the Twins in '87 played the Cardinals the next year and I absolutely HATED those Cardinal teams because the Mets struggled so bad with them. I was all in with the Twins by then, but still mostly a Met fan. I have to tell you there was a play at the plate where Don Baylor was called out and I went completely bonkers. That was about where I was a dual fan and plus the 1980s teams had so many likeable players. Cut to the early 90s and my interest in baseball started to wane for various reasons and the Mets were plain dysfunctional and awful. Then the strike happened and I pretty much switched to being a hockey fan and said F-baseball for a few years. It was not until 2000 with the Subway Series where I got back into watching baseball, but I honestly couldn't stand the Met/Yankee dynamic in NY state. I also wasn't partial to big payroll teams any longer. To be honest, I was posting regularly on the Twins page at the ESPN cite in 2000, but no real in depth stuff. That was the season I followed them every day. By 2001 I was crazy into it and posting up a storm on the ESPN Twins page, hating on Guardians fans. Brock B was Rocketpig and he probably was my favorite poster. When Chad Allen broke his leg some moron Indian fan came over to take a dump on our page. I was not having that! On ESPN I chose a stupid name: Haljaliakakik (how'd you like a kick?). That 2001 team doesn't get enough love, in my opinion. My brother, who is a huge Yankee fan took me to a belated birthday night game at Yankee Stadium in May of 2001. Eric Milton pitched a three hitter and we won, Dougie Meintkiewicz was hitting about .400. By 1998 I had moved to a place closer to the city (only 75 miles and my brother even closer). I still teach in a school maybe 50 miles north of NYC and then 9/11 happened and I stopped posting on ESPN like that. Snap your fingers I was gone from posting until the 2002 season started. Sadly I did not go the series in NY in 2002 (probably because of 9/11, I am not city guy). I would say from about 2004 to pre-COVID ( I do not care for NYC anymore) I would make the hour and a half train ride to Yankee Stadium from Poughkeepsie (often alone wearing Twins gear) and watch us lose about 10 in a row, all the way until 2015. I saw no less than three blown saves, the worst being Joe Nathan in 2009. I was at the first game at Target and went to about six or seven games at the Dome from 2004 until it closed. Not sure if this makes sense to anyone and congratulations for getting this far. I see lots of parallels with the Twins and Mets and the number of pitchers who pitched for both teams in unbelievable. That could be a thread all on its own

He shouldn't survive. All this hand wringing over Gallo because Falvey and Levine just cannot square the idea that that he's been an disaster. The saving grace is that Gallo is only a one year deal. Once he is gone more attention will be on Buxton. What in the world are we going to do with him? If Falvey and Levine can't pull the plug on Gallo imagine how bad it can get with Buxton?

This veneer of mystery as to what’s up is important to note. Talk of the knee didn’t start until he went into a slump. Even as he entered this slump he was stealing bases and doing his thing. Remember, DH thing was a way to keep him healthy. He stole a bunch of bases in May and there was talk about CF as the slump progressed. Once that talk got to be too much Rocco spouted off saying “he can’t play CF” Then talk about the knee intensified. Patterns are sometimes hard to fathom, but in the case of Buxton when he slumps usually he goes on the injured list. It almost feels to me like the knee isn’t the issue as much as it his between his ears. His uncanny lack of consistency and deep deep slumps are problematic. When he goes into these deep valleys the speculation starts The assumption becomes: he must have some physical ailment. What if that isn’t the case? Since there is nothing concrete from Buxton himself or the doctors it leaves the door open for speculation and that’s on him. The 10 day for the hammy is genuine, but I’m not so sure about the knee. Rocco is the type of manager who’d run cover for his guy. Falvey and Levine openly admitted in early 2019 that they needed to repair the relationship. Rather than actually get to the bottom of this Buxton and the Twins just won’t get specific and leaves room for an excuse. I hate to say it, but that might be what’s happening here. Would not surprise me I have officially become suspicious. It is highly possible the Twins are running cover and Buxton is going through something personally.

Not sure how this applies to anything I’m saying. Joe was pretty extreme in his inability to launch balls into right field. Nearly everything he pulled was on the ground. Most right fielders shaded about 30 to 40 feet toward CF, giving him the entire right field corner. Is this not a fair comment?