eastsidekate

This. Provus is pretty good.

Hopefully I'll be over missing Dick Bremer by the time Lewis is back. IDK, tho.

Back when I started watching baseball in the 80s, pitchers who couldn't routinely protect a multi-run lead weren't a thing. Well, they were (I was a Twins fan), but we just called them bad pitchers. I'm tired of hearing about "leverage situations." Pagan isn't failing to protect a one-run lead against McGuire and Conseco. He's coming in with big leads and issuing multiple walks and hits. He's bad. He's being a paid to do a job he can't do. I don't want to hear Baldelli saying that all his [good] pitchers are unavailable. Either get better pitchers or manage your bullpen better. TK would never. I told myself a week ago I'd be happy with a 2-4 road trip. I am. But Rocco and the FO have to stop tolerating failure.

I'm begging the Twins to understand that they're not the only organization with an analytics department and advanced scouts. We're obsessed with not giving players too much playing time. Rocco religiously plays the rightie-leftie matchups, and makes substitutions as soon as possible to maintain those matchups. All nine guys are aggressive and try to hit everything 450 feet. That's the easiest thing in the world to gameplan against: 1) Don't throw strikes, especially on the first pitch. Make the hitters prove they're willing to take walks. 2) Don't change tactics when there are runners. The lineup/strategy isn't conducive to manufacturing runs. If there's a guy in first, though, the garbage you throw should be low to get the double play 3) If you use an opener, you can get the Twins to empty their bench (assuming they have one that day) by the fifth. Lather, rinse, and repeat. The Twins need to use their analytics and scouts to make adjustments. That's just not happening, though. Making adjustments is one of the main parts of coaching! Simply put, we need to hire an actual coaching staff.