Game 134: KC vs. Minnesota
Posted by ubelmann on Friday, August 31st, 2007 at 12:10 pm
Kyle "Cyclone" Davies vs. Matt Garza
Normally I would be excited for a double-header, but no. All I can really hang my hat on right now is that at least we're not throwing games away in the middle of a real pennant race.
Kansas City, believe it or not, has recently been hitting worse than the Twins. Over their last 14 games, they are hitting .257/.328/.362 for a .690 OPS. The Twins are hitting .281/.351/.427 for a .778 OPS. (Granted, Seattle and Baltimore have pretty poor pitching overall.) Despite that OPS disparity, the Twins have scored just four more runs than the Royals over the same time period.
I don't have a good way of getting double situational stats for the Twins, but I feel like their hitting with RISP since the All-Star break has been even worse than their hitting overall since the All-Star break. I also don't think that's really a function of the team being unclutch or anything like that, but more a function of it being easier to have a flukishly poor performance in clutch situations if you aren't generating all that many opportunities in the first place. I can believe that certain individuals are clutch, but I don't buy that entire teams are clutch.
When the Royals went charging out of the gates in 2003, one of the things that got them there was a fluky performance with RISP and in particular RISP with two outs. Since that wasn't really a skill that the club possessed, eventually they went back to being the Royals. Eventually the Twins will stop scoring runs like the worst offense in baseball, but it will continue to be painful until they do.
Rondell White fun fact: Rondell has swung at the first pitch 18% of the time this year, far below his career average of 31%.
Nick Punto fun fact: Every time Nick Punto hits a weak fly ball, an angel gets his wings.
It's obviously more fun when the Twins are fighting for a pennant. Still, I've rooted for a lot of Twins teams that were worse than this one. It's still baseball, and it can still bring us a lot of enjoyment. So, let's have some fun at the old virtual ballpark today.
Neither fun fact player is in the lineup today. At least not for the first game.
Tyner, Bartlett, Hunter, Morneau, Cuddyer, Kubel, Heintz, Buscher, Casilla.
It took a doubleheader to do it, but at least Punto isn't in the lineup for once. I'll bet he starts tonight, though.
Punto will find a way into the lineup today...and he'll, like always, screw something up.
Is it just me, or has his VORP declined even further into the abyss virtually every day since SBG started monitoring it? I can't remember a day when it increased. You seem to have placed some type of voodoo hex on LNP; might I suggest daily monitoring of the VORP of Captain Dreamboat? Or perhaps the life expectancy of Osama Bin Laden?
There have been a few days when it went up, but the drop has been precipitous.
Actually, I was expecting that maybe he'd get to -20. But if he keeps playing and going like he is, -30 seems like a good possibility. He'll be in some rare air at -30 -- it's only been done once before.
what is the all time low VORP, maybe make the feature an ESPN style 'Chasing History'
Let's play two!
Let's start playing one.
Let's just skip the first one.
Oy vey! The game is out of reach and no one's seat is even warm.
And let's charge for two!
Heintz is just incredible.
A passed ball, and continually having to visit the mound because he has no clue how to call a baseball game.
Why is this guy a major leaguer? Oh yeah...because he's in the Twins organization.
He can get down a bunt.
Odd. I've hear that whenever Nick Punto attempts a bunt an angel actually loses its wings.
I'd feel a lot better about coming back from 3 runs down if we weren't facing Kyle Davies.
Time for a visit from the GIDP Fairy.
Or not...
I still want to find some reason to blame Punto for that inning.
No sense in piling on, he's not Kubel or anything.
Down 3-0 after a half-inning. See? That's what happens when you don't have Nick Punto in the lineup.
They can sacrifice one out of nine outs if they get his confidence in the lineup!
Twins to Dazzle: Here's the scouting report. Keep it under your hat.
I never would have dreamed it, but Hunter's been the Twins best everyday player this year. I've always said just shut up and play, Torii. He'll never shut up but he's been very good this year.
As if on cue, Torii comes through.
w00t!
Hunter now needs ten homers to tie Gaetti for sixth on the Twins' all-time list. Obviously not likely that he'll get there, but you never know.
Maybe that will give him enough incentive to give the Twins a real discount and resign.
Hunter will NEVER re-sign. Not gonna happen.
Server's being a little flaky... sorry folks!
You should be sorry. What the heck do we pay you for, anyway? Oh, yeah.....
That damnable MySQL!
More homers at the end of the year: Hunter or Morneau?
The makings of a real Twins rally: a hit batsman and a walk. Now we just need a sac bunt and an infield out.
Got the sac bunt.
Ketchup's doing the little things.
But not the infield out. Maybe a passed ball?
Chris Bertin' Heintz can execute a sacrifice bunt.
You say that like a major league player shouldn't be able to do it.
sure would be nice to have a full 3 outs during a rally inning. awful glad we sacrificed.
Well, to be fair, the chances of Heintz getting a hit aren't very good, so you might as well have him advance the runners with his out. Of course, that begs the question of why Heintz is in the lineup, or on the roster.
It was a "successful" sacrifice.
No, that would involve Punto and a bone knife.
Clearly, Davies is the AL Cy Young frontrunner. What other explanation is there for this ineptitude?
Punto would have turned the double play there.
Somehow, hearing someone described as having a "wide stance" will never be without other connotations for me again.
Does he tap his foot too?
Which hand did you see, anyway?
I see you guys went with the airport incident. After last night's episode of My Name Is Earl I had a different image in my head.
With the way Buscher & Casilla looked, I am wondering if they are trying to fill in for Punto.
Punto would have had it.
One hit through three innings vs. Davis.
"One god damn hit!?"
Yeah, I know. It's better than I expected the Twins to do, too.
Come on, guys, we're only three runs down, and we have six innings to go. That's not impossible, is it? Is it? Guys?
*crickets chirping*
What color is the Dome sky in your world, Jeff A??
If Jason LaRue and Nick Punto had a hitting contest, there wouldn't be a winner.
Today is a prime example (at least to this point) as to why the Cleveland series was of no consequence. Even a series win would have left the Twins 5 games out. That's way too much to expect this club to overcome because we have had way too many games like this one.
Sure, the game is only in the fourth inning, but it feels like g&d, g&d, g&d, Jessica Alba.
They should have traded Carlos Silva at the deadline. Torii? Listen to offers. The team was going nowhere and they weren't going to do anything to get better at the deadline. They chose the worst possible route -- piss of the team by cutting salary without addressing any long term needs.
Blecch, TR. Blecch.
I'd agree, although I don't see Jessica Alba entering into it. Unfortunately.
But this game would have gone differently if they'd won the Cleveland series, because they'd have had momentum. You know, like after they swept Baltimore and then---never mind.
Silva's - going nowhere. Terry Ryan loves him like his own son.
Ryan owes him too much from eating contests. Needs Carlos back for a "double your LDL or nothing" contest.
From Joe C.'s blog:
Update: The Twins just announced that LHP Jason Miller has been outrighted off the 40-man roster and assigned to the Class AAA Rochester roster. They now have 38 players on the 40 man. This means they could add up to two players currently not on the roster (RHP Nick Blackburn? C Jose Morales? INF Matt Tolbert?) for September callups.
Joe C. is wrong though...the Twins now have 37 on their 40 man roster, opening up three possible roster moves.
a hit for morny!!!!
Another Twins rally: a hit batsman and an infield single. What can we do with it?
triple play??
We've already seen that one. The Twins are way too creative at making outs for something like that to happen again.
Nah, they could have an unassisted triple play, or a 5-4-3-2 TP. There are ways to innovate within the confines of the triple play result.
Come on Kubel, make me proud!
Just like that.
I still think Gardy should have sent the runners though.
runners on 1st & 2nd, no outs. Twins' run expectancy? Too depressing.
hot d@mn! there we go
Runs? Kubel!
It's Kubel's fault we didn't get three runs there!
Perhaps a lynching is in store for Mr. Kubel.
Now I think you ask Heintz to bunt again.
Way to go, Kubel. Not only did you drive in a run, you gave Heintz a chance to bunt again!
I'm confused. Exact same situation as before... why no bunt this time?
Nevermind. I got confused by "no outs"
Because there was a haze lifted and Gardy saw that the guys behind Heintz make a lot of outs, so maybe giving one away here doesn't make sense.
Or maybe he forgot to put the sign on.
Must have been the sign thing. Because there it is again.
*Punto taking notes in the Twins dugout*
That one apparently wasn't so good. Error on the catcher for missing the popup. Perhaps Heintz sat too close to Punto in the dugout... could have mebbe been a TP if catcher catches it? I don't know, just guessing.
I'm here. I had to reconfigure the wireless router. I was without internet access on my laptop and I have no idea what my SBG password is so I can't log-in from any other computer.
Great moments in Mound conferences.
Larue: "Why you shaking me off, Meat?"
Davies: "I want to announce my presence with authority."
Larue: "What?"
Davies: "I want to announce my presence with authority."
Larue: "This is one of the three guys on this team that can hit the ball out of the infield."
Davies: "I think..."
Larue: "Don't think, Meat. It can only hurt the team."
brianS, do you moonlight over at The Dugout?
think of it as an homage to them
What is the deal with the "network" gamecast providers? ESPN doesn't even have it, and CBS is in the top of the first still, 3-0 Royals.
mlb.com is far and away the best.
Did you ever think how many more runs the Twins would have this year if baseball was played on a triangle rather than a diamond?
That'd be great, because they wouldn't need a 3B then. One fewer out every time through the lineup!
Mebbe they could send Punto back to Rochester to learn how to catch and keep Heintz to be designated sacrifice bunter?
This whole game is fake, just like the moon landing.
and whatever you do, don't spill your pepsi on the keyboard!