Author Archives: Jim Crikket

Be Careful What You Wish For, Twins Fans

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We got what we wanted, right? Bill Smith is history as the Twins’ General Manager. Not only that, but he’s being replaced by Terry Ryan, the man credited with turning the Twins in to a contender through most of the past decade. All’s well in Twinsville, right?

Not so fast.

Before everyone spends the next week partying in celebration, I think we should look a little deeper in to what led to Smith’s departure.

Sure, the JJ Hardy trade, itself, was probably grounds for dismissal and there were plenty of other questionable personnel decisions to build a sound case for “termination for cause.” But that’s not why Smith is no longer the GM. Not according to Dave St. Peter and Jim Pohlad anyway.

No, they essentially trotted out the, “we just weren’t on the same page,” cliche. I’m beginning to think that means Smith wasn’t going along with the Pohlad family philosophy of, “slash the payroll.”

If Terry Ryan was replacing Smith because of Smith’s failings, I’d sponsor a little party, myself. I’ve always been a Terry Ryan fan. Like a lot of Twins fans, I’ve always wondered what Ryan could have done as a GM if he had been given some money to build a real roster with, instead of having to implement a system where he had to develop all of his talent internally, fully aware that he’d eventually have to watch every player worth a crap walk away as soon as they got the least bit expensive.

But that’s not why Ryan’s taking over and, based on what he’s saying, he’s not going to be given the same payroll that Smith had to work with.

Terry Ryan

In response to questions about payroll during the press conference, Ryan alluded to potential payroll levels between $90-$100 million. Those figures would be somewhere 10-20% LESS than the Twins’ 2011 payroll. Put another way, the Twins are going to let Michael Cuddyer and Jason Kubel walk away via free agency and use the money to bring in… absolutely nobody!

And we’re all supposed to jump up and cheer because it will be Ryan overseeing this crap instead of Smith?

It amazes me how so many Twins fans take the BS that the front office hands out, without a question.

Toward the end of the season, a lot of people were talking about what the Twins could do to rebuild their roster if the Twins payroll was allowed to grow just a modest amount… say from $115 million to $118-120 million.

Then Jim Pohlad was quoted in media reports as saying the 2011 payroll was a bit higher than he was comfortable with and likely would be just a bit lower in 2012. Fans and media didn’t seem to bat an eye. Everyone just accepted what Pohlad said and started looking at what could be done with a $112-115 million payroll.

Now, not-exactly-new GM Terry Ryan says the payroll will probably be in the $90-100 million range and again it’s just going to be accepted with little question? Why?

Throughout this whole process, I’ve yet to read or hear a single member of the media ask the Twins WHY they feel payroll should be reduced. Not once. If someone can show me a link to such a question, I’d be grateful, but I’m not holding my breath.

Maybe the Twins project revenues to drop? Not likely, given that they’ve got enough of a waiting list for season tickets to more than make up for the number of people who were so disgusted by what they saw on the field in 2011 that they couldn’t stomach the thought of watching something similar in 2012 and there’s been no hint of a drop in broadcast rights fees or any other revenue source.

Is it asking too much of the organization to suggest that slashing payroll after just two seasons in a new ballpark (largely publicly funded) should warrant some sort of explanation to the fan base? Shouldn’t they at least offer some kind of reason?

Apparently not.

Some people are suggesting that cutting payroll is fine because it reflects an acknowledgment that 2012 will be a rebuilding year and the focus will be on building a team to compete a couple of years in the future.

Seriously?

You’re paying Joe Mauer and Justin Morneau a total of $37 million a year and you’re not even going to try to put a team around them to be competitive for a couple of years (by which time Morneau will be gone, by the way)? And that’s OK with Twins fans?

The Twins are just one injury-plagued season away from having won the AL Central Division. Explain to me again why the organization shouldn’t spend the money coming off their books on players that could propel them right back up in to contention if some of the health issues work out better next year than in 2011.

Because they may be losing Michael Cuddyer, Jason Kubel and Joe Nathan? Nathan wasn’t even on the field in 2010 when they won their division, while Kubel and Cuddyer both had pretty mediocre seasons, posting almost identical OPS figures at around .750.

Don’t get me wrong… the Twins have significant holes to fill. Smith’s mistakes need to be corrected.

But if Terry Ryan, Dave St. Peter or Jim Pohlad use the misguided roster moves of Bill Smith as an excuse to slash payroll, they’re doing it for one reason and one reason only… to prove that this generation of Pohlads is every bit as cheap as the last.

And from I’m reading from various blogs and other social media responses, most Twins fans are just fine with that.

I’m not.

– JC

 

Bill Smith Out, Terry Ryan In, as Twins “Interim” GM?

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Perhaps now we know why the Twins didn’t give the Orioles permission to interview Mike Radcliff for their GM position last week.

The Twins will be holding a 4:30 pm CT press conference to announce that Terry Ryan will take over as interim GM of the Twins, replacing current General Manager, Bill Smith, according to Tweets from mlb.com Twins beat reporter Rhett Bollinger (@RhettBollinger).

We’ll update this post as more information becomes available, but in the mean time, if you aren’t following Bollinger on Twitter (which you should already be doing, by the way), now would be a very good time to start!

– JC

Friday Twins Baseball Oddities

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A couple of peculiar items have captured my attention today. One involved MLB as a whole and the other the Twins, specifically.

The latter was the news from Phil Mackey at 1500espn (referring to a Tweet by Roch Kubatko of MASN Sports) that the Twins have denied the Orioles permission to interview VP of Player Personnel Mike Radcliff for the Birds’ vacant General Manager position.

Mike Radcliff (photo: Minnesota Twins)

That kind of thing doesn’t happen often. While it wouldn’t be ideal to lose your VP of Player Personnel just as the free agency market opens, it would still be odd for a team to deny one of their people an opportunity to even interview for a bigger, better job with another organization. On top of that, Mackey reported that the reason was due to, “internal reorganization and promotions.”

The thing is, the Twins haven’t announced any kind of internal front office reorganization or promotions.

Typically, teams don’t refuse other teams to interview their people if the open position would clearly be a step up. One could certainly argue that Radcliff’s current position with the Twins has more authority than what the eventual Orioles GM will have, given their “hands on” owner and a manager who’s been given an awful lot of authority over player personnel decisions. It might be the worst GM gig in baseball.

But the Twins aren’t saying that (at least not publicly). They’re saying the refusal is due to internal reorganization and promotions. The only promotion I’ve read about lately is Tom Brunansky getting the Rochester hitting coach gig. Hard to imagine that affecting Radcliff’s responsibilities, isn’t it?

Could it be that there’s some sort of succession plan in place whereby Radcliff will be taking over for GM Bill Smith in the relatively near future? Stay tuned… maybe someone in the Minnesota media will track down an answer from the Twins.

UPDATE: Subsequent media reports indicate there’s no plan to change Radcliff’s title, but the Twins are looking at bringing Wayne Krivsky back in to the front office as a Special Assistant to GM Bill Smith. Krivsky had been an Assistant GM for the Twins before taking the GM job with the Reds a few years back. He lost that job a couple of years ago and has held lesser jobs in the front offices of other teams since then.

The other odd item today was courtesy of ESPN’s Jayson Stark.

We’re well aware that MLB and its players are trying to work out a new collective bargaining agreement (does this sound familiar, or what?). What little has been written about the negotiations, however, has largely focused on two things… MLB’s desire for a hard slotting system for draft picks’ salaries and vague assurances that neither party sees it as being at all likely that this process will become as problematic as the NFL negotiations were and NBA negotiations have been.

What Stark points out, however, is that the MLB luxury tax system ended with the end of the 2011 season. There’s an assumption that some sort of luxury tax system will be included in whatever new CBA is ultimately adopted, but in the mean time, none exists.

That has to make it pretty difficult for some teams to figure out what they can afford for a 2012 payroll, which in turn makes it all but impossible for some of them to get very active in the free agent market.

Big market teams won’t be significantly affected. If you were going to be paying in to the system, you can just assume you will be under the new system, as well.

If you’re a team that neither pays in nor receives significant luxury tax dollars, you really aren’t affected either. The Twins probably fall in this category.

But if you’re the Tampa Bay Rays or Kansas City Royals, you’ve got to be just a little nervous, don’t you? Even if you are very certain that there will continue to be some form of luxury tax, you can’t be sure of the amount. If you can’t be sure of the amount, it’s kinda tough to put together a budget.

Not only does that prevent you from diving in to the free agent pool (even to try to retain your own free agents), but in some cases, teams need a significant amount of luxury tax money just to be able to afford to keep the players they have under contract. In a worst-case scenario, a lack of luxury tax money could force some teams to hold some interesting fire sales.

At the very least, it seems to me that the low-revenue teams are going to have to hold off on making significant roster decisions until there is some finality on the CBA. That won’t affect the market for high-end free agents (let’s face it, the Royals were not going to be bidding for Prince Fielder anyway), but it may mean a team like the Twins would have less competition for more moderately priced free agents, such as Ramon Santiago, if they act earlier rather than later. That’s not exactly the Twins MO, of course.

Maybe these two items aren’t ultimately big deals. But with Spring Training still over 100 days away, we have to talk about SOMETHING, don’t we?

Finally, speaking of Spring Training, our friend Paul Caputo (from InterpretationByDesign.com) has started a new Facebook page that’s worth checking out. “Countdown to Spring Training” gives us one more option for discussing any manner of Hot Stove issues. Check it out!

With that, I’ll call it a day. Have a good weekend, all!

– JC

Three “Golden Era” Twins on HOF Ballot

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On the heels of Bert Blyleven’s induction in to Baseball’s Hall of Fame, three more former Twins have renewed chances to join Bert, Harmon Killebrew, Rod Carew and Kirby Puckett in Cooperstown. Tony Oliva, Jim Kaat and Luis Tiant have been nominated for consideration by the Baseball HOF’s new “Golden Era Committee”.

Tony Oliva

The Committee, made up of 16 voters consisting of executives, veteran media members and existing HOF members, will be choosing from among ten players and executives that made their greatest contributions to the game of baseball between the years 1947 and 1972.

The committee will be meeting during MLB’s winter meetings in December and each member can vote for anywhere from zero to five candidates. It takes being included on 75% of ballots cast to gain election. This committee will be holding similar elections just every three years, so anyone who doesn’t gain election this year will have to wait another three years just to find out if they’ll be considered again. Given the age of most of these guys, that could literally be a lifetime.

Jim Kaat (photo: S. Grile/Palm Beach Post)

Oliva, Kaat and Tiant are joined on the ballot by Ron Santo, Buzzie Bavasi, Ken Boyer, Charlie Finley, Gil Hodges, Minnie Minoso and Allie Reynolds. For a fan in his mid-fifties like me, those names bring back a flood of memories and it’s hard to believe that none of them are in the HOF already.

Luis Tiant

Interestingly, the three former Twins all played together, along with Blyleven, Carew and Killebrew, on the 1970 team that won the AL West Division. Think of that for a moment… it could very well turn out that the 1970 Twins included SIX future Hall of Famers!

At a time when many of us are trying to figure out how the Twins should rebuild their roster in an effort to regain some level of competitiveness, take a look at some of the numbers that members of that 1970 team put up:

Tony Oliva: .325/.364/.514 .878 OPS, 23 HR, 107 RBI in 157 games.

Harmon Killebrew:  .271/.411/.546 .957 OPS,  41 HR, 113 RBI in 157 games.

Rod Carew:  .366/.407/.524 .930 OPS, 4 HR, 28 RBI, in just  51 games.

And just to prove they weren’t the only guys hitting the ball…

Cesar Tovar: .300/.356/.442 .798 OPS, 10 HR, 54 RBI and 30 stolen bases in 161 games.

The pitchers had some pretty decent seasons, too:

Jim Kaat: 14-10, 3.56 ERA, 34 starts, 4 complete games, 230.1 IP

Bert Blyleven: 10-9, 3.18 ERA, 25 starts, 5 complete games, 164 IP

Luis Tiant: 7-3, 3.40 ERA, 17 starts, 2 complete games, 92.2 IP

Not bad, but not one of those pitchers was even the ace of that staff in 1970. That honor went to…

Jim Perry: 24-12, 3.04 ERA, 40 starts, 13 complete games, 278.2 IP… and a Cy Young Award.

Congratulations to Tony-O, Kitty-Kaat and El Tiante on their nominations and here’s hoping the voters recognize that all three of these guys are deserving of the honor to stand with their peers as among the best to ever play the game.

– JC

JC’s Offseason 2012 Twins Blueprint

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This is my second swing at trying to tell the Twins what to do this offseason. Actually, it’s my third, if you want to get technical.

Back while the season was still dragging to a painful close, I posted a multi-part series on changes I thought the Twins needed to make before 2012, which included specific names I thought were worth pursuing. Already a lot of things have changed, so that turned out to be just a premature exercise in futility.

So, now that the season is actually over and with the benefit of the TwinsCentric 2012 Offseason GM Handbook, I’m prepared to publish my “official” offseason blueprint to bring the Twins back not only to respectability, but to a level where they should be able to contend within the AL Central Division.

Of course, the Twins have so many needs this offseason, that it’s difficult to address all of them in a single blog post. That’s why this is actually my third shot at doing so. Not only did my in-season effort take several posts to complete, but my first draft at THIS blueprint was something close to 4,000 words. That’s too much. But, damn, there’s a LOT of stuff to fix this year!

To keep it all in one post, though, I’m going to focus on the players I’d like to see Bill Smith go out and get. If I feel compelled at another time to go in to greater detail as to “why” these players and not other players, I’ll do that another time. It’s going to be a LONG offseason, so there will no doubt be plenty of days with nothing better to write about.

First, let’s talk payroll. There’s been a lot made of owner Jim Pohlad’s comments to the effect that we shouldn’t expect an increase in the $115 million payroll that the Twins opened 2011 with and, in fact, the Twins may not be able to even meet that level.

That’s crap… and I can’t believe the media and so many fans seem to be buying in to that line. There is absolutely no justification for the Twins to try to sell fans on a need to cut, or even just maintain, payroll. If GM Bill Smith doesn’t get at least $120 million to spend for his Opening Day Major League payroll, fans should bury the front office in mail, email, phone calls and any other manner of communication (“Occupy Target Field”, anyone?) to let the organization know how full of crap they are.

With that said, let’s fix this baseball team.

I can only find 11 players from those currently on the Twins roster that I feel relatively certain will be on the Opening Day active roster. Here they are, along with their projected 2012 salaries (where estimates are needed, I am using the estimates the TwinsCentric guys used in their Handbook, just to be consistent with what others are using… and to keep me from having to do as much independent thought):

Joe Mauer (23 mil), Justin Morneau (14 mil), Carl Pavano (8.5 mil), Scott Baker (6.5 mil), Francisco Liriano (6 mil), Nick Blackburn (4.75 mil), Denard Span (3 mil), Alexi Casilla (2.5 mil), Glen Perkins (1.8 mil), Danny Valencia (500K), and Brian Duensing (500K).

In addition, while I don’t necessarily believe he should be presumed to have a spot on the roster Opening Day, the Twins will be on the hook to Tsuyoshi Nishioka for $3 million.

That adds up to $74.05 million, leaving us almost $46 million to spend if we assume a reasonable $120 million cap.

First, let’s fix the rotation. One new starting pitcher is not going to do that. I want Mark Buehrle and Rich Harden added to Pavano, Baker and Liriano. Buehrle is not an “ace”, but I don’t even put CJ Wilson in that category and there really is no “ace” on the free agent market. Buehrle gives you 200+ innings of effective left-handed work every season and could be even better in Target Field than he’s been in US Cellular, if the Twins can put a decent defense behind him. Harden misses bats, when he’s healthy. Yes, I know he doesn’t stay healthy often, but that just means he’ll fit right in with the Twins. TwinsCentric projects Buehrle and Harden to get $10 million and $3 million, respectively (with Buehrle getting a multi-year deal).

If I can’t get Buehrle and Harden, a combination of Edwin Jackson and Paul Maholm would cost about the same, but I don’t like those options nearly as well.

The addition of two starting pitchers moves Blackburn and Duensing to the bullpen, where they join Glen Perkins. I really like the idea of Duensing as a strong lefty set-up/LOOGY option. We need four more bullpen arms, though.

People seem to think Joe Nathan would return for a 2 year deal at $7 mil a year. I have doubts that (a) he’ll sign for that little, and (b) that he’s really all that interested in returning to the Twins. If I could get him for $7 mil a year, I’d do it, but I think he’s gone.

So here’s the rest of my bullpen: Jonathan Broxton ($4 mil), Todd Coffey ($2.1 mil), and… wait for it… Matt Capps (3.1 mil). The last spot is opened up to competition among what’s left of the arms in the organization. Maybe it’s Alex Burnett, maybe it’s Anthony Swarzak, maybe it’s someone else. I’m not fixating on any of them, so let’s just pencil in Burnett.

Coffey could be the innings eater the Twins have missed since losing Matt Guerrier and I still believe Matt Capps had some health issues last year that played a role in his disappointing results. I think he still has some value in a set-up role at a reduced rate. Broxton, before his arm trouble, was awfully good over a number of years. Between he and Perkins, I think you’d find your closer.

You’ll note I did not mention Kevin Slowey. He’s projected to get $3.3 million if the Twins offer him arbitration. I don’t think they can do that unless they’re very sure they can trade that contract, along with Slowey, for something of value in return. You also don’t see Jose Mijares. It’s time to move on from Jose.

With the pitching staff patched together, here are the position players I’d go after:

DH: Derek Lee. Right handed and can play 1B well enough to be a legitimate fall back option if Morneau’s situation requires him to primarily DH.

Shortstop: Ramon Santiago. Just makes sense on so many levels. Improves the positon offensively and defensively, while being very affordable. Smith needs to move quickly on this acquisition, though. The Cardinals need a SS, too. If they lose Pujols, they will possibly go after one of the premier middle infield options on the market to try to offset some of Pujols’ offense, but if they re-sign Pujols, they’ll be looking for inexpensive SS options, like Santiago.

Back-up catcher: I thought about trying to get creative here. Cincy apparently has a bit of a surplus of highly touted catching prospects that are ready or near-ready for the Big Leagues and they need pitching. Maybe a Liriano or Baker deal for a catcher would be interesting to pursue. But in the end, it just seems so unlikely that I’m taking the easy way out and sticking Jose Molina. If I can get him for the $1.1 million that TwinsCentric projects, I sign him and be done with it.

As for infield back-ups, add me to the list of people who would be just fine with bringing Nick Punto back for $750K. I’d also keep Trevor Plouffe around in a bench role for the league minimum. On the other hand, if it turns out Luke Hughes is a better option than  Plouffe, fine, keep Hughes instead.

Filling in the outfield around Denard Span isn’t all that difficult to figure out. I’m not sold that Ben Revere has a long-term future in MLB, but after watching almost everything hit to the outfield off of Twins pitchers last season fall in for hits, I sure like the idea of Span and Revere covering 2/3 (or probably more accurately 3/4) of the Target Field grass. Rene Tosoni deserves a shot at the 4th OF spot and, yes, he’s still cheap to keep.

In RF, I want Michael Cuddyer back. $11 a year on a multi-year deal is more than his baseball skills are likely to warrant over the length of his contract. I know. I don’t care.

The Twins organization has touted loudly Cuddyer’s willingness to be an active presence on behalf of the team in the community. I guess I would argue that, if that’s the case, they should cough up a few bucks to compensate for that. If he’s worth $8 million a year as a player (which is what he was reportedly offered by the Twins during the season), write off the extra $3 million as PR expense.

It would be great if guys like Mauer, Morneau and maybe even Baker would take real leadership roles in the community and, perhaps more importantly, in the clubhouse. But since they haven’t at this point, there’s not much of a chance that they’ll do so going forward either. Someone needs to provide the intangible clubhouse “presence” that builds and maintains some level of team chemistry.

I know a lot of people laugh at that concept, but all you have to do is take a look at what happened in Boston this year to see that it can be an important factor. I think it will be even more critical in the Twins clubhouse in 2012, given that there are going to be so many new faces. Someone has to be the guy who says, “this is how we do it here.”

Maybe that should be Mauer or Morneau or even Gardy, but the fact is those guys DON’T do it. It appears that Cuddyer does.

Here’s my final “blueprint”. Even if you count Joe Nathan’s $2 million “buy-out” against the 2012 payroll (which you shouldn’t), I’m spending just $119.6 million. I don’t care what Jim Pohlad says, that’s not an unreasonable increase given the Twins current circumstances. They spent unwisely last year and there’s a price you pay for making bad decisions. Pony up, Mr. Pohlad. I think this roster could win some games. – JC

PLAYER Salary ($ mil)
C Mauer 23
1B Morneau 14
2B Casilla 2.5*
3B Valencia 0.5
SS Santiago 1.5*
OF Span 3
OF Revere 0.5
OF Cuddyer 11
DH Lee 5*
C J Molina 1.1*
4thOF Tosoni 0.5
UtIF Punto 0.75
Bench Plouffe/Hughes 0.5
SP-L Buehrle 10*
SP-R Baker 6.5
SP-R Harden 3*
SP-R Pavano 8.5
SP-L Liriano 6*
RP-R Broxton 4*
RP-R Coffey 2.1*
RP-L Perkins 1.8*
RP-R Capps 3.1*
RP-R Blackburn 4.75
RP-L Duensing 0.5
RP-R Burnett/Swarzak 0.5
Nathan (option buy-out) 2
Nishioka (Rochester) 3
  Total: $119,600,000 *estimates

Do You Trust the Twins?

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These are interesting times to be a baseball fan.

The nature of Major League Baseball has always been unique because of the almost daily scheduling of games and its rich history of publishing at least basic statistics about each of those games, whether they be in box scores in the local newspaper or on the backs of baseball cards. Even going back to the days of my own childhood during the 1960s, I can recall friends who seemingly could recite the stats of all of our favorite Twins. That attention to detail came in handy when it came down to one of our favorite pastimes, trading baseball cards. We all wanted to assemble the best collection and we all thought we were better at making those swaps than anyone else.

But that didn’t mean we were smart enough to run a ballclub. Same Mele and Cal Ermer and Billy Martin were much better at managing a team than we were (well, maybe not Ermer, so much) and until free agency changed the entire business model, most of us thought Calvin Griffith and his organization were among the best baseball minds in the country when it came down to evaluating and acquiring talent.

We could watch most of the Twins’ road games on television, but for home games, we saw the games only through the eyes of the radio broadcasters. Any detailed accounts of the games came only through the words of the beat reporters for whichever Twin Cities newspaper your family happened to subscribe to.

Through most of the first decade that the Twins spent in Minnesota, corresponding with my youth, no matter how one season ended, we just trusted the Twins would be good the following year. There was no reason to think otherwise.

How times have changed.

Now we’re all experts. And as experts, ourselves, we simply don’t trust the people running the Twins to put a competitive team on the field every year.

Because we have access to so much more data than anyone dreamed 50 years ago, we can confidently “prove” that Ron Gardenhire is clueless when it comes to managing a baseball team (despite the fact that he’s arguably had more success as a Twins manager than Mele, Ermer and Martin, combined). Then again, we don’t just know better than Gardy, we also know better than Hall of Fame caliber managers who have their teams in the World Series. (Be honest… you and I both have been wondering what the heck Tony LaRussa’s been smoking through most of the current WS.)

With the help of those same statistics (and a healthy dose of selective 20-20 hindsight), we can “prove” that Bill Smith is overmatched by his fellow GMs, as well as players’ agents, when it comes to making deals to fill out the Twins roster.

Not only that, but thanks to the internet in general and social media in particular, even a guy who writes for the 44th ranked blog in Twinsville can voice his concerns loudly enough that thousands of readers (OK, maybe just 100 or so this time of year) will know just how little faith he has in the Twins’ front office being capable of making the myriad of tough choices facing them this offseason.

Sometimes, it hardly seems fair to the Gardenhires and Smiths of MLB to have to put up with all of us “experts”. We should trust these people more, right?

Then again, they make it so difficult. Often, too difficult. Sometimes, impossible.

Just when we want to believe Bill Smith “gets it”… when we hear that he acknowledges that he needs to find an everyday shortstop (understandably glossing over the fact that he HAD such a shortstop a year ago and traded him away to the Orioles for a handful of magic beans) and needs to strengthen the rotation and accurately recites many of the club’s obvious deficiencies, he follows that up with a comment that makes you wonder if he either slept through half the season or really believes all the muscle strains and pulls and “weaknesses” that landed most of his team on the DL in 2011 were all caused by “collisions”.

Maybe he was just trying to put a brave public face out there to justify the club’s announcement that their entire training crew was being retained despite that particular segment of the organization having every bit as bad a year as the Twins pitching staff. Then again, the pitching coach is keeping his job, too, so I suppose it’s all fair.

Our friend k-bro made largely the same point this week in her blog (hey, I never promised I’d be original when I started doing this blogging thing). At some point, you really just want to see the Twins acknowledge what everyone who paid any attention this year could see. When they don’t do that, it’s difficult to trust them to fix problems they can’t even acknowledge exist.

Despite my frequent rants here, I don’t really believe that I know more than the people the Twins employ to run their organization, either in the front office or on the field. But, as I’ve mentioned too many times already, it’s frustrating that this organization seems to almost take pride in their unwillingness to use modern analysis to their benefit.

Yes, I’m once again referring to the apparent lack of serious attention the Twins pay to advanced statistical analysis. I get that they will never be an organization that makes all of their decisions based on so-called advanced metrics. I’m actually happy that’s the case. But when so many other teams DO make many decisions based on those metrics, it just makes me nuts to think the Twins seem to almost completely ignore them.

It brings to mind a scene in the classic movie, Patton. About to face off with Germany’s Erwin Rommel in North Africa, the camera shows Patton’s bedside table with a copy “Infantry Attacks,” authored by Rommel. After defeating Rommel’s Afrika Panzer Korps in battle (albeit absent Rommel, himself), Patton exclaims, “Rommel, you maginficent bastard…I read your book!”

Did Patton read Rommel’s book because he thought the German Field Marshal was smarter than he was? Unlikely. Even if he did pick up a kernel or two of strategic knowledge he hadn’t considered before, he’d likely never admit it. But that’s not the point.

The point is, if there is a way to get in to the minds of your opponents and get insight in to their strategies… what they believe… what they feel is over or under valued, you are a fool not to do so.

The Twins, under much of the current leadership, had considerable success over the past decade and the organization has earned a bit of leeway from fans. Injuries, more than any other factor, were responsible for the team losing the number of games they lost in 2011. But that doesn’t mean the front office can stick its head in the sand and pretend that doing everything the way they’ve always done things in the past will be good enough to restore the team’s competitive standing.

They’re smart enough people to know that.

I wish I trusted that to be the case.

– JC

GameChat – 2011 World Series Game 5, 7:05pm

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With the Series all tied up at two games each, we go back to the Game 1 pitching match-up with Chris Carpenter of the Cardinals facing off with Texas’ CJ Wilson.

I know it’s a 7-game series, but it sure seems to me that the winner of this game becomes the heavy favorite to take home the hardware when it’s all over with. Josh Hamilton looked to me like he was getting better cuts at the ball Sunday night and if that’s indicative of him feeling healthier, I like the Rangers’ chances. Then again, I predicted the Rangers to win the Series in 7 games, so I could just be reaching for some kind of basis to ultimately prove me right.

It should be a good game, despite all efforts of Joe Buck and Tim McCarver to ruin it with their horsecrap announcing.

CARDINALS

@

 RANGERS
Furcal, SS Kinsler, 2B
Craig, RF Andrus, SS
Pujols 1B Hamilton, CF
Holliday, LF Young, M, DH
Berkman, DH Beltre, A, 3B
Freese, 3B Cruz, N, RF
Molina, Y, C Murphy, Dv, LF
Schumaker, CF Napoli, C
Punto, 2B Moreland, 1B
  _Carpenter, P   _Wilson, C, P
  1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 R H E
St. Louis 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 7 1
Texas 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 2 x 4 9 2

And now we go back to St. Louis with the Cardinals needing to win both games there in order to dig themselves out of the hole they dug. I’m not sure who’s more to blame for the loss in game 5, the players who collectively went 1 for 12 with runners in scoring position or their manager who seems intent on proving how smart he is… and failing miserably.

GameChat – World Series Game 3. 7:05 pm

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Jayson Stark Tweeted today that, in the past 60 years, there have been only three World Series that have started out with three straight games decided by just one run (1972, 1974, 1995). Will we see another such event tonight?

It has been a great Series so far, but I suspect that we’re going to start seeing more runs scored now that the venue has moved to Arlington, Texas.

Glancing at the line ups, it appears that Cardinal Manager Tony LaRussa has implemented a limit of just one former Twin in his starting line up for any one game. Thus, with Kyle Lohse on the hill, Nick Punto rides the pine.

CARDINALS

@

 RANGERS
Furcal, SS Kinsler, 2B
Craig, RF Andrus, SS
Pujols, 1B Hamilton, CF
Holliday, LF Young, M, DH
Berkman, DH Beltre, A, 3B
Freese, 3B Cruz, N, RF
Molina, Y, C Napoli, 1B
Jay, CF Murphy, Dv, LF
Theriot, 2B Torrealba, C
  _Lohse, P   _Harrison, P
  1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 R H E
St. Louis 1 0 0 4 3 4 2 1 1 16 15 0
Texas 0 0 0 3 3 0 1 0 0 7 13 3

In a game that brought back some chilling memories for Twins fans (Kyle Lohse’s evil twin “Lyle” made an appearance in the 4th inning for the Cardinals), the big story was Albert Pujols hitting not one, not two, but three home runs. You KNOW somewhere in the back of his mind, he’s thinking, “Wow, it might be fun to play half my games in this bandbox.”

Anyway, worst case scenario now for the Cardinals is that they’ll get to play more baseball in St Louis, even if they drop the next two games to the Rangers… and I think we can dispense with all of the “these games are too low scoring” crap.

.

Congratulations, Babs and Andrew!

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It was awfully considerate of Major League Baseball to schedule an off-day in the World Series schedule so that CapitalBabs could get married tonight, wasn’t it?

I’m having some internet connection issues at home so I’m not sure how much I’ll be around through the rest of the World Series anyway, but I would be remiss if I didn’t take this opportunity to congratulate Babs and Andrew on their wedding this evening. I hope the weather is holding up and that everyone in attendance has a great time. I have no doubt that such will be the case.

For the rest of us, who are not able to attend the festivities in person, please join me in wishing the happy couple all the best as they embark on their journey through life as one.

For my part, I will wrap up this post with this little quote from one of my favorite authors:

You know you’re in love when you can’t fall asleep because reality is finally better than your dreams. – Dr. Seuss.

Much happiness to both of you from all of your friends here at Knuckleballs.

A View of Minnesota Sports From Below 43.30

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You all know by now that I’m not a Minnesotan, right? I lived in Albert Lea for 10 years as a kid growing up, but that’s almost not even Minnesota. I just do this Twins blogging thing because I happen to be a Twins fan, not because I feel any particular affinity for the state.

It occurs to me that perhaps not having any particularly strong ties to the state, much less the Twin Cities area, gives me a somewhat different perspective on Minnesota sports. I feel that disconnect even stronger during these idle times when there’s pretty much nothing Twins-related going on.

I follow about 50 people on Twitter. A few of those are Hawkeye writers/fans and some I follow because I find their takes on political issues of some interest (or at least they’re entertaining). But most Tweeters I’m following are on the list because of a shared interest in the Twins. At least some of those people seem to be at least semi-regular readers of this blog (you know who you are).

The thing is, when there’s nothing to Tweet about the Twins, y’all Tweet about other Minnesota sports teams. I am a Vikings fan, so the discussions about them are of some interest.

But the Wild… the Gophers… the Lynx… the Timberwolves (OK, I don’t see so much about the T’pups, really)… I just have so little interest in those teams that I start to pretty much ignore Twitter. My high school teams were “Lynx”, so at least those Tweets about the WNBA team cause me to flash back to some memories of my teenage years and I confess that I enjoy making fun of the Gophers, but otherwise, I just don’t care about any of them.

I know, I could unfollow all of you. But that just seems rude. I don’t want to communicate to you that I don’t care about you any more. I just don’t care about what you care about this time of year. Besides, I’d just have to try to remember who all I unfollowed so I could re-follow you in a few months, anyway.

So instead of unfollowing you, I’m going to take this one opportunity… when there is absolutely not a damn thing worth stringing 1000 words together on related to the Twins… to tell you all exactly what I think of Minnesota sports. I’m sure you’ll give my opinions all the weight that you typically give to everything else you hear from an Iowan.

I’ll try to be nice. After all, for most of you, the only reason you aren’t Iowans is that you happen to live in a part of the old Iowa Territory that nobody down here wanted to fight for as part of the statehood process a few generations ago. It is understandable that you’d still be somewhat bitter about being left behind back then, but at some point, you just have to get over that kind of thing. (Yes, I know, those of you whose forefathers lived on the wrong side of the Mississippi River were actually Wisconsinites, rather than Iowans, but that’s hardly something to brag about!)

Anyway… let’s talk Minnesota sports.

Since I do care a bit about the Vikings, let’s start there. There’s really only one Vikings-related topic worth discussing at this point and it has nothing to do with who the poor SOB that has to try to play quarterback behind that crappy excuse for an offensive line. It’s all about the stadium, folks.

I’m so tired of reading about this. Most Minnesotans apparently don’t think public money should be used to help the team build a stadium. I understand that. But that’s how it works, these days. To heck with the “referendum” bunk. You think the issue should be decided by voters because this is a democracy? You should have paid more attention during 7th grade government class. We don’t live in a democracy, we live in a republic. We elect people to make these decisions. It’s their job. If they don’t want to make tough decisions, they’re being cowards and have no business serving in a legislature, on a counsel or on a commission.

The model for the new NFL stadium in LA has purple seats. Coincidence?

So I hope your elected officials will just tell the Vikings right now whether they will or will not participate in building a new stadium. Then the Vikings can either get busy actually building it or go find a new city to play football in that will do what Minnesotans won’t. I honestly don’t care at this point. I’ll be a Vikings fan whether they play in Minneapolis, Arden Hills, Los Angeles or London, for that matter. If I owned that team, I’d have told Minnesota good-bye long before this. Then again, if I’d owned the Twins in the 1990s, I’d have done the same thing and they’d probably be the Raleigh-Durham Twins by now.

Now that I have that off my chest, let’s move on to something more pleasant. Let’s talk about the Lynx.

I know nothing about the Lynx, except that they’re a WNBA basketball team and they apparently won their league’s championship this season. I don’t particularly enjoy watching women play basketball, but when that’s the only decent team in town, you damn well better celebrate their accomplishments. Congratulations!

Speaking of basketball, you still have an NBA franchise, right? Then again, Minneapolis might be the only NBA city that won’t even notice if the NBA labor issues result in the entire season being cancelled. I care very, very little about the NBA, in general. I’ve been to two NBA games in my life. I saw the Spurs play in San Antonio in about 1984 when I was down there over the Holidays and went to a game. I also saw the Knicks and Lakers play at Staples Center a few years back. It was fun watching Jack Nicholson and Spike Lee on the video board, but don’t ask me who won the game… I have no idea. I don’t bother watching NBA games until at least the second round of the playoffs and, let’s be honest, that means I never watch Minnesota play.

And then there’s the Wild. I care even less about the NHL than I do the NBA. I’ve been to twice as many NBA games as NHL games and the city I went to that one NHL game at doesn’t even have a team any more (go Whalers!). That said, you would think the Wild would at least serve as some sort of example to the local populace concerning the Vikings situation. Most Minnesotans I know seem to think hockey was invented there and that it’s the only place where anyone plays really good hockey. Yet for years you had no NHL team! Why? Granted, there were a number of reasons, but it had a little bit to do with not being willing to help get a new arena built. So the North Stars became the Dallas Stars. Think about that… you lost your hockey team to TEXAS! Then years later, the state paid half the cost of a new arena to get a new NHL team. (Think about that in a few years when a new bunch of legislators are falling all over themselves to spend twice what’s currently being debated, just so you can lure the Jaguars to move north.)

Then again, most Minnesota hockey fans I’ve known have been much bigger fans of college hockey than the NHL version, anyway. If the Tweets I’ve seen are any indication, however, it doesn’t sound like all’s well with the rodents on skates, either. Still, I can understand a preference for the college game. I feel exactly the same way about college football and basketball.

Speaking of which… how about that Gopher football program? Yes, I’m quite aware that Floyd of Rosedale is having to endure a year of being stuck in Minnesota, but that will be remedied in less than two weeks. I really thought that, once they got an on-campus stadium, it wouldn’t take long to turn the Gopher program around. I can’t say I’m disappointed, though. I’ve got tickets for the Iowa-Minnesota game up there on the 29th and I really am anxious to get my first look at the the new stadium (which I hear is very nice). After the game, I doubt the Hawkeye players will even have to cross the field to get Floyd… the bronze pig will be so happy about returning to Iowa that he’ll run across the field to meet them halfway.

Maybe if the whole Big Ten football thing doesn’t work out up there, TCF Bank Stadium would be kind of a cool place to play outdoor hockey?

If my Minnesota friends think I’ve been a little rough on you and your sports teams here, I apologize. It’s all in good fun, right? It’s not like I flat out hate your other teams with the heat of the very fires of hell.

I save that level of distaste for Wisconsin teams… oh, and Chicago teams… and of course New York teams.

– JC