Three decades ago, the Reds were the MLB affiliate of our Cedar Rapids Midwest League team so we tended to follow the players that came through town on their way to Major League careers. Reggie Sanders and Rob Dibble are just a couple of names that come to mind as having pretty memorable minor league seasons here. For the past 20 years, however, our local club has been affiliated with the Angels and I admit I haven’t paid a nickel’s worth of attention to the Reds.
So to recognize this obscure fact, tonight I’m opening up the GameChat here and then heading to the local ballpark to watch our Kernels take on the Beloit Snappers (the Twins’ MWL affiliate), rather than hanging around to follow the Twins game with those Cincinnati Reds. But for those of you who come around for the GameChat, I hope you enjoy the game!
Can you believe it!??! I got to watch half a game of Twins baseball and they WON! I know, who would have guessed!
Blackburn only went 5 innings but he still got the win because the bullpen did a fantastic job of just shutting the door once they came out. For that, the entire bullpen gets access to the pastry buffet. Help yourself boys, we’re darn proud of you.
Congrats to Ben Revere for a great outting in front of his family – don’t really know the story (maybe he’s local) but that is just because I wasn’t really paying attention. But that being said, if you can give those who care about you a good show? yeah, that is an exciting time.
But today’s BOD goes to Ryan Doumit who kicked BUTT offensively while catching the game as well. His line says it all:
4 AB,
2 Runs,
4 Hits,
1 HR
That is enough for anyone on this team lately – good for you Doum!
I’m curious to see how Francisco Liriano fares tonight against a line up he hasn’t faced, at least since spring training. Sure would be nice to see “good” Frankie, tonight.
Speaking of Spring Training, did you see that the Twins and Lee County agreed on a contract that will keep the Twins at their current Spring Training site for the next 30 years? Cool. Hat tip to TwinsTrivia.com for the news!
There was lots to like about the game tonight, not the least of which, of course, is that the Twins WON the game!
Josh Willingham scored both Twins runs, with a double and a home run. Denard Span had what turned out to probably be a game-saving diving catch in the outfield and Brian Dozier also had a web gem of his own. Jared Burton put out a fire when he entered the game and Glen Perkins notched his first save of the season.
But the Boyfriend of the Day award goes to Francisco Liriano, who gave up just one run on four hits over 6 and 2/3 innings. He walked just two (and one was intentional) while striking out six Pirates. Well done, Frankie!
If contending teams are looking at what the Twins might have to offer, Francisco Liriano showed them a little something, anyway. Those walks continue to kill, though. Then again, Matt Capps also showed his own Achilles heel giving up a home run in the top of the 9th inning to lose the game.
It sure is fun watching Trevor Plouffe hit, though, isn’t it? Two more home runs tonight. Pretty amazing.
Big Jim Thome returns to Target Field tonight, but now he’s wearing a Phillies uniform and we’re all hoping he doesn’t take aim at that flag pole on Target Plaza again.
The Twins’ first draft pick, Byron Buxton took some batting practice swings this afternoon and reportedly managed to launch a ball in to the bullpens. It sounds like he’s all but signed, pending a physical, so he’ll be getting some playing time on one or both of the Twins’ short season teams yet this summer.
Nick Blackburn takes the mound tonight against the Phils, who are coming off a couple of extra-inning losses to the Orioles in a row. Let’s hope they just keep right on losing!
Well that was an interesting game. From the moment Denard Span opened things up with a leadoff home run in the first inning to the point where Matt Capps completed the first 1-2-3 inning by a Twins pitcher, you never really had the feeling the game was in hand.
We won’t mention most of the rest of the pitchers, but there was certainly enough offense spread up and down the line up. Span walked three times to go with his HR and scored three runs. Ben Revere had three hits and 2 RBI, Jamie Carroll added three hits and a pair of RBI, as well, and added a couple of runs scored. Ryan Doumit had three hits and scored a pair of runs. Joe Mauer had a pair of hits and two RBI. And Josh Willingham added his 12th home run of the season.
But even with all of that competition, Trevor Plouffe is adding yet another Boyfriend of the Day award to his collection. Plouffe had three hits, including a double and a home run, scored three runs and drove in three more!
I am getting the overwhelming sense that far too many so-called Twins “fans” are actually rooting against the team right now. Why? Because they’re apparently afraid that if the Twins continue to win games at their recent rate, they’ll pull themselves up out of the AL Central Division cellar and perhaps even within shouting distance of whatever sorry excuse for a Division Leader happens to be sitting atop the Division as July nears. These “fans” think that might cause General Manager Terry Ryan to exercise undue restraint when other GMs come calling to inquire about the availability of current Twins players on the trade market.
Yes, that’s right… a significant segment of the fanbase doesn’t want to see the Twins win TOO much because they think the Twins can get significantly better in 2013 or 2014 by trading veterans for prospects this summer and they don’t give a damn how bad the resulting product on the field is for the rest of 2012.
My goodness, how things have changed in Twinsville.
Luis Castillo
I could have sworn we all (both fans and Twins players, themselves) spent most of the early to middle part of the past decade complaining that the front office was always looking toward “next year” when it came to making mid-season deals. Does anyone else remember the reaction from fans and the clubhouse when Luis Castillo was dealt to the Mets in 2007 with the Twins only a handful of games out of the Division lead? The players and many fans believed Torii and Johan and the others still had another run in them, but Terry Ryan dealt the team’s leadoff hitter anyway. Many people felt Hunter and Santana eventually left via Free Agency after that season in part because they didn’t believe the Twins would ever play for “now.”
With the limited revenue that the Twins’ Metrodome lease allowed, Terry Ryan always had to have one eye on the bottom line as he crafted his roster from one season to the next, but the promise of a new ballpark and the additional revenue streams that would come with it changed that perception. Finally, the Twins would be able to afford to pay for enough talent to make a run whenever they were on the edge of contention at mid-season.
So here we are, mid-way through the third season in that new ballpark and fans want Terry Ryan to hold a fire sale?
There are two reasons for teams to trade away veteran ballplayers at midseason. One is because someone who needs instant help this year is willing to give up prospects that the selling team believes will play key roles when they’re finally able to turn things around and contend themselves. The other is to shed payroll, which is often necessary because a bad team is not generating attendance and other revenue streams as had been hoped when the roster was built in the spring.
I hope we can all agree that the latter simply is not an acceptable reason for the Twins to trade anyone. There’s no shortage of cash in the Twins checking account right now. They did their payroll slashing before the season even started and that economizing, rather than paying to bring on better starting pitching, is the main reason this team isn’t living up to hopes this season.
That leaves the only reason for “selling” being to bring in high upside prospects that can play critical roles later. But how realistic is that, really?
I’m afraid some of these people clamoring for the Twins to sell off parts are significantly overestimating what Ryan can get for those parts. Remember the return he got for what was still a very productive leadoff hitter and second baseman in 2007? Castillo was batting .304 with 9 stolen bases, 54 runs and a .356 on-base percentage when he was traded to the Mets… for Dustin Martin and Drew Butera. How do you think people are going to feel if THAT’S the kind of return the Twins get for Denard Span? I, for one, will be pissed!
The Twins’ primary need, in their efforts to rebuild a competitive team, is starting pitching. Their hitting is fine. Their defense could be better, but it’s improved over last year. Their bullpen has been surprisingly solid. They need good starting pitching.
Does anyone really believe there are contending teams out there with such a surplus of good starting pitchers that they’re going to be willing to trade one of them for a Denard Span, a Ryan Doumit, or even a Justin Morneau? I don’t believe it for a heartbeat.
I also believe people are underestimating how competitive this team could be over the next year and a half. The biggest need is for better starting pitching and, unfortunately, that’s something that’s just not easy to come by. It’s certainly unlikely to be something acquired in a mid-season trade with a team looking to improve their ability to contend this season.
That being the case, I simply do not believe that you tear down other areas of your roster when you’re unlikely to improve the area most in need of help… not when there’s no economic reason to do so.
If there’s a GM out there willing to part with a high-ceiling starting pitcher that’s likely to contribute to the Twins at the Major League level in 2013 or at least by 2014, fine… see what it takes to get that player. But I don’t think it’s likely. More likely, potential trade partners will be offering up more of the Dustin Martin/Drew Butera level of prospect or simply offering to take on contracts without giving up any kind of prospects at all.
If that’s the best Terry Ryan can do, I’d rather just keep watching the guys wearing Twins uniforms right now for the rest of the season and see what they can do if a couple of these young pitchers keep getting hitters out the way they have been lately.
I know many fans disagree. But for those who are prevailing on the Twins to trade their veterans over the coming weeks , I have just a small bit of advice. Be careful what you wish for. Based on Terry Ryan’s history, you may just get it.
Twins are going for the sweep today (gosh, that’s fun to type!).
We’ll find out whether Francisco Liriano can put together three good starts in a row since returning from his temporary exile to the bullpen. Ryan Dempster goes for the Cubs, so the Twins will need to make sure the assbats remain deep in storage to complete the sweep.
Speaking of returns from exile, word from the media is that we’re likely to see Liam Hendriks back with the Twins in time to start next Saturday’s game with the Brew Crew. The Aussie has been almost unhittable recently in Rochester, which makes him the logical choice to fill the fifth spot in the rotation.
But for now the focus is on today’s game with the Cubs. And if you happen to be in the mood for a little scoreboard watching, you might want to keep an eye on the score of the Royals’ game with the Pirates because a combination of a Twins win and a Royals loss will elevate our guys out of the AL Central basement for the first time in… well… I don’t know how long, but it’s been a LONG time.
Sometimes you just have to tip your cap to an opponent and let’s be honest, Ryan Dempster can pitch a baseball really well. The Twins had no answer for Dempster and while Liriano threw pretty well through his first five innings, his sixth didn’t go well.
The Phillies, fresh off of losing two straight extra-inning games to the Orioles in Baltimore, are up next for the Twins. It will be good to see Jim Thome again… though I hope we don’t see him trotting around the bases the way he was known to do with the Twins.
It turns out all of the Knuckelballs were AWOL last night, so we didn’t get a GameChat post up. Our apologies to anyone who came around looking to hang out during the game.
Maybe the most unfortunate part of not having a GameChat is that we missed an opportunity to award Josh Willingham a well-deserved BOD designation for his 10th inning walk-off heroics! So, we’ll make up for that right now by passing on that honor to Willy. A day late is better than never, right?
Josh Willingham
Now, on to today’s game.
The good news is that we see the return of Joe Mauer and Denard Span to the line up. Mauer has been out of action for almost a week with a sprained thumb, while Span has missed a couple of games with the flu (although he did make a cameo appearance as a pinch runner in the 9th inning Friday night).
We all know the Twins have been winning more regularly the past couple of weeks and that certainly makes their games more fun to watch. But here’s something you may not realize… the Twins are now 23-34 for a winning percentage of .404. This is the first time that Twins players are waking up to a day where they’ve won at least 40% of their games since the morning of September 14, 2011.
I realize that the reason for this stretch of wins has a lot to do with playing some pretty bad teams. But I’m also a baseball romantic so forgive me if I indulge myself, just for a little while, with the fantasy that it really does have something to do with the ‘M’ caps they’ve been sporting.
And they just beat the Cubs last night. For those of us who have to live amidst way too many Cub fans, that makes today a pretty good day.
I gotta say, Nuke LaLoosh was right when he said, “I love winning. It’s like… better than losing!”
The Twins put another W on the board, this one in far less dramatic fashion than the game Friday night. The built up an 11-0 lead before the Cubs put up some meaningless runs late in the game off of Jeff Gray. Six different Twins had more than one hit, led by Joe Mauer who had three hits, and seven different hitters drove runs in. That’s a pretty balanced offensive attack. Jeff Manship (with his name spelled correctly on his jersey today) pitched a final shutout inning in the 9th.
But Boyfriend of the Day consideration really came down to two players. Scott Diamond threw six scoreless innings, spreading out 7 hits, while striking out five Cubs without issuing a single walk. Trevor Plouffe continued his hot hitting, with a double and a home run, totaling four RBI and scoring a couple of runs himself, and racking up five assists from his 3B position, just for good measure. For those performances, Scott and Trevor, you are our BODs.
Remember the old days when the Twins used to have double digit hits and even double digits runs? Yeah… that was yesterday. Today, they’re back to getting shutout by soft tossers. Too bad, too, because Francisco Liriano (and his support in the bullpen) pitched beautifully. Losing 1-0 really, really sucks.
To a certain small degree (very small, actually), I find the discussions about the MLB draft entertaining. Sure, it will be mildly interesting to see who the Twins draft with the #2 pick overall tonight in the first round of this year’s Amateur Draft and it will be much more entertaining to read the inevitable explosion of comments from the self-anointed “experts” in online Twinsville, all telling us how badly the Twins screwed up with their pick.
But, frankly, I just don’t care that much who they pick. Make that, I just don’t care AT ALL who they pick. Once the pick is made and the young man, whoever it is, signs with the Twins, then I’ll be interested in following his progress within the organization’s minor league system.
But all the people who are going on and on about how this pick is some kind of turning point for the organization or how they need to be drafting the next “face of the franchise” need to just take a chill pill. The MLB draft is a lot like playing roulette. There is absolutely no certainty that any specific draft pick will eventually even play in the Majors, much less become a star.
The first round is comparable to picking red or black on the roulette wheel. At best, you’ve got just below a 50-50 shot at your choice being a winner. After that, it becomes more like putting your money on increasingly smaller groups of numbers, making your odds longer and longer, until you get to the point where your chances of hitting on a late round pick are worse than just putting your hard-earned money on a single number on the wheel.
In fact, despite the draft going 50 rounds prior to this season, when it’s been cut to 40, you seem to see just about as many non-drafted players beating the odds as you do guys who were drafted pretty much anywhere outside the top few rounds.
For a case in point, let’s take a look at a couple of young pitchers that Twins fans may recognize.
Pitcher A was drafted not once, but twice. He was drafted in the 20th round by the Dodgers out of high school in 2006, but opted to pitch for a big-time college program. In 2009, he was drafted in the second round by the Twins.
Pitcher B is a year older than pitcher A, but was never drafted. After pitching for Binghamton University in NY, he signed a contract with Atlanta after his junior year of college in 2008. Just before the opening of the 2011 season, this young pitcher was traded to the Twins for Pitcher A.
Today, Pitcher A is sporting a not-too-nifty 1.714 WHIP for the Braves’ AA team in Mississippi, where he’s giving up 7.7 hits per nine innings and is walking an identical 7.7 batters per 9… which is actually more hitters than he’s striking out in each nine innings of work.
Sunday, Pitcher B pitched seven strong innings for the Twins without giving up any earned runs, dropping his ERA to below two earned runs per nine innings. His WHIP is 1.190 and while he’s giving up a few more hits than we might like to see (9.8 per 9 IP), he’s walking less than one hitter per 9.
Scott Diamond (Photo: Genevieve Ross/AP)
By now, pretty much everyone still bothering to read this knows I’m writing about Scott Diamond, who the Twins acquired in the Rule 5 draft before the 2011 season and subsequently traded second round draft pick Billy Bullock to the Braves for, in order to be able to send Diamond to the minors before the 2011 season started.
It’s still far too soon to tell what the future holds for these two young pitchers’ careers. Diamond is still 25 for a few weeks and Bullock turned just 24 earlier this year. They’re still young enough for us to debate “ceilings” and “potential” if we want to get in to a discussion about whether the trade was good or bad.
Billy Bullock (Photo: Tim Casey/GatorCountry.com)
It could also be argued that I’ve cherry-picked a bit to make this comparison… that there are just as many examples (and probably many more) available that would demonstrate that high draft picks are much more likely to contribute at the Major League level than players who were never drafted. I’ll plead guilty to the cherry-picking, too.
But my point is simply this… go ahead and follow the MLB draft tonight and over the next few days and feel free to express your views about how the Twins coulda-shoulda-woulda been better off drafting this guy over that guy. But realize that in the grand scheme of things, nobody has a friggin clue who the “right” picks are… and we won’t find out for years.
But hey, if you’re one of those people who really don’t mind watching the little silver ball go round and round the roulette wheel for 3-4 years before it lands, knock yourself out!
Let’s see of PJ Walters can keep up the good work he’s been doing since arriving in Minnesota. The Twins are going to need all the pitching help they can get, as it appears that Carl Pavano could be headed to a stay on the Disabled List.
Whew. The Twins finally get a win this season over the Tribe. Scoring four runs in the first inning was a great start, but PJ Walters couldn’t hold that lead and it was all tied up after five innings. Fortunately, the Twins weren’t done scoring, while their bullpen successfully shut out Cleveland over the final four innings.
The BOD award came down to a split vote, so tonight we have three winners sharing the award. Brian Duensing relieved Walters with two out in the fifth and kept the inherited baserunners from crossing the plate and went on to pitch 2 perfect innings. On the offensive side, Trevor Plouffe and Joe Mauer not only both homered, but also each drove in three of the Twins’ 7 runs. For their efforts, Brian, Trevor and Joe are our Boyfriends of the Day.
