So, I'd heard about Tony Pena, Jr.'s inning of pitching a couple of places and didn't think much of it at first. It's always news when a position player pitches, etc., etc. (I'm not even sure that the excitement about TPJ hitting 91 with his fastball is all that warranted--I think there are [...]

For my wife's birthday, she decided she wanted to go to a ballgame with a couple of friends (How did I get so lucky?). So once again we drove up to Wisconsin to see the Snappers take on the Wisconsin Timber Rattlers (Seattle Mariners A affiliate).
The Snappers roster this time around looks quite a [...]

AVG/OBP/SLG, since May 1st
.245/.287/.341 -- Carlos Gomez
.257/.312/.341 -- Jacoby Ellsbury
Games/Games hitting leadoff, July
15/15 -- Carlos Gomez
16/16 -- Jacoby Ellsbury
It's frustrating that Gomez isn't hitting, but it's not like the Twins are the only team making decisions like keeping a struggling rookie in the leadoff spot. If he keeps struggling and the Twins start losing, [...]

So, I didn't get to see the game today, but I did see the box score. What jumps out at me is that Scott Baker had an awesome game. 8 IP, 8 K, 1 BB, 1 HR, 1 R -- that's a great game. The HR kind of makes sense in light [...]

Padilla vs. Light Rail
So far this season, Baker has gotten 84% of his strikeouts as strikeouts swinging. That caught me by surprise. Santana, who got a ton of swinging strikeouts when his change-up dropped off the table, has 82% of his career strikeouts as strikeouts swinging. Average is 74% of strikeouts as [...]

.217/.305/.319 -- Jason Kubel vs. LHP, career
.230/.278/.350 -- Jacque Jones vs. LHP, career
Kubel's line is slightly less awful than Jacque's line, but both lines are still awful.
I like Jason Kubel. I think he can hit right-handed pitching and this team could use a cheap DH/OF to use against RHP. However, Kubel hasn't done [...]

La Velle E. Neal III reports that a trade for Beltre doesn’t look possible. Everything he writes is perfectly reasonble:
The Twins recently contacted the Mariners about Beltre’s availability, but it looks like the Mariners’ price would be too high - something like the return the A’s got in the Joe Blanton deal. The Phillies [...]

Big Mak reprises his Series Preview in Blog feature and looks at the three game series against the Texas Rangers that kicks off the second half of the 2008 season.

This was brought up by Neil in the Cup of Coffee.
My 2 cents:
It's okay for Liriano to be frustrated. He's a competitor, he's had success at the top level, and he wants to get back there. I get that. I certainly have had more irrational reactions when I was 24.
I don't like [...]

I was going to post a game log today, assuming that the Twins had a game without actually checking the schedule. But when I went to find out the pitching matchup, it turns out that there are only eight teams with games today (and only two of those are AL teams.) When more [...]

Even in the All-Star Game, Joe Nathan managed to get a lower leverage situation than he probably deserved. Though it was partially a matter of the game being a bit strange, Joe Nathan had the lowest leverage appearance of all 23 pitchers who appeared in the game.
Other notes:
- Uggla had a ridiculous -.634 WPA [...]

I probably wrote almost the same thing last year, but here goes nothing:
I like the All-Star Game. We get a bunch of the best players in baseball together and have them face off against each other. Any other game I watch during the rest of the year will have less star power. [...]

I wasn't going to post anything, but I guess Joe Vavra is pitching, so people will be intrigued. I think that the HR Derby is kind of interesting as a novelty, but it could definitely use a format tweak. I'd much rather see players go head-to-head in 3 "innings" of 3 "outs" each, [...]

But I thought I'd throw it out there:
.309/.397/.436 -- Aaron Hicks, 18, GCL (13 games)
For reference:
.400/.488/.491 -- Joe Mauer, 18, APP
.322/.385/.538 -- Delmon Young, 18, SAL
.325/.388/.461 -- Ben Revere, 19, GCL
.276/.355/.451 -- Michael Cuddyer, 19, MWL
.293/.342/.439 -- Torii Hunter, 18, MWL
.281/.303/.407 -- Carlos Gomez, 18, APP/GCL
.302/.327/.396 -- Justin Morneau, 18, GCL
.282/.364/.372 -- Jason Kubel, 18, [...]

Joe Pos, with another Gardy’s a Genius column.

Jerry Crasnick devotes his whole column this week to the Twins. This has been talked about a little bit already, but I wanted to post it separately. It's a pretty good piece and more remarkable in that someone from ESPN actually got their nose out of the collective NY/BOS ass and wrote about [...]

Bill Smith: Hey, Seattle's pretty bad this year, huh?
Terry Ryan: Yeah man, they suck. We might have had Jason Tyner DH for us, but at least we didn't trade two prospects for him, sign him to a multi-million dollar contract, and make it the plan for him to DH.
Bill Smith: Do they have [...]

42 bunts, 21 bunt hits -- Carlos Gomez, 2008*
So Gomez has been successful (and by successful, I mean successful in reaching base, not successful in the productive out sense) half of the time he's bunted this year. What happens if we divide his plate appearances into bunts and non-bunts?
.235/.276/.352 -- Gomez, 2008, not bunting
.500/.500/.500 [...]

Twins Bullpen By 2008 FIP, Entering Monday's game:
1.54 -- Craig Breslow
2.33 -- Joe Nathan
3.71 -- Dennys Reyes
3.76 -- Matt Guerrier
3.90 -- Boof Bonser
4.09 -- Jesse Crain
5.20 -- Brian Bass
Gardy had a bad night with the bullpen management, I'm afraid. Hopefully he bounces back tomorrow.

So, I just started on a rather ill-advised internet journey, and even though I should go to bed, I feel strangely compelled to complete that journey.
My first mistake was to check LEN3's game report to see what everyone had to say about Carlos Bunty McBunterson vs. Cliff Can't Be Bothered To Field His Position Lee.
"I [...]

Some facts:
.284/.344/.419 -- MN vs. RHP, 10th best OPS in baseball
.266/.332/.413 -- AL vs. RHP
.262/.334/.404 -- AL vs. LHP
.261/.309/.375 -- MN vs. LHP, 28th best OPS in baseball
This might lead one to believe that the Twins have a ton of left-handed hitters on the team, making them especially susceptible to left-handed pitching, but that's not [...]

Alexi Casilla has been great so far this year for the Twins, but can he keep it up?
First, let's look at what he's done in the minors:
.270/.346/.348 -- age 19, Rk/A
.311/.378/.383 -- age 20, A/AA/AAA
.318/.385/.398 -- age 21, A+/AA
.269/.345/.344 -- age 22, AAA
.219/.350/.250 -- age 23, AAA (2008)
.293/.367/.366 -- overall
Since Casilla came up and got [...]

ubelmann takes a look at the performance of leadoff hitters from the last 20 World Series Champions.

ubelmann examines the run scoring environment in the 2008 American League as compared to recent past seasons.

ubelmann takes another look at how those pitchers who are eating the most innings for the Twins are faring.

I saw that Garza had a pretty good start tonight, and I remembered the start of his season being pretty mediocre (or even bad depending on how you looked at it.) But of course he had an injury to overcome, so I thought I'd check to see if he's just throwing better now:
37 IP, [...]

Casilla vs. Robertson

I don't know if this was meant to be sensationalistic or what, but really? I mean really? Lohse has a few wins and all of the sudden he's an All-Star candidate?
At one point I think I may have been the only guy in Lohse's corner in the entire state of Minnesota. (I [...]

But if you can find a way to watch it, Johan Santana and Felix Hernandez are pitching in the same game at 6:10 central. That's a lot of pitching goodness concentrated in one spot.

First off, I'd like to mention that I had a great time at the Convention on Saturday and I really wish I could have spent more time there, as I would have liked to chat with everyone more than I did. Special thanks to SBG for arranging the whole thing and to Banjo [...]

Definition of EQA
Players with 100+ PA:
.311 -- Joe Mauer
.303 -- Justin Morneau
.287 -- Alexi Casilla
.264 -- Jason Kubel
.260 -- League Average
.251 -- Delmon Young
.249 -- Carlos Gomez
.243 -- Michael Cuddyer
.226 -- Craig Monroe
.222 -- Brendan Harris*
.203 -- Mike Lamb
*Adam Everett, career EQA -- .230 (I figured it was worth mentioning that our no-glove SS [...]

This quote made me laugh out loud:
"My only message is simple. The National League needs to join the 21st century," Steinbrenner said in Tampa, Fla. "They need to grow up and join the 21st century."
The "growing up" part of the comment aside, I actually think that Steinbrenner has a point here. The National League [...]

Identify these players based on their performance from May 13th to June 12th:
.224/.281/.336 -- Player A
.257/.313/.419 -- Player B
Noting that while both players have been pretty bad, Player B has held a significant edge over Player A during that period.
Additional clue: Player B has a season-to-date OPS+ five points higher than Player [...]

...because the Twins are in the middle of a blowout loss and you don't really want to pay attention to all of the gory, Bass-filled details, you might want to go cast some All-Star votes for Joe Mauer. He's the best catcher in the AL, and while it is so much fun to dwell [...]

How much can they eat?

IP
Hungry, Hungry Hippo

86.3
Livan Hernandez

80.0
Nick Blackburn

72.0
Boof Bonser

43.7
Kevin Slowey

41.0
Brian Bass

39.3
Glen Perkins

38.0
Scott Baker

But what does the food taste like?

xFIP
Hungry, Hungry Hippo

3.25
Scott Baker

4.30
Nick Blackburn

4.35
Kevin Slowey

4.53*
Brian Bass

4.58
Boof Bonser

4.81
Livan Hernandez

4.92*
Glen Perkins

I added a couple of seats to the table since I have been unable to post the buffet table immediately before Livan's turn in the rotation (which [...]

Rounds 7 through 50.
From 1992-2001, Twins drafted after the 7th round who made the majors:
1992: Dan Naulty, Scott Watkins
1993: Kelly Dransfeldt (not signed), Kevin Ohme, Alex Cora (not signed), Ryan Radmanovich, Danny Kolb (not signed), Shane Bowers, Rob Radlosky
1994: David Dellucci (not signed), Corey Koskie, Brandon Puffer
1995: Mike Moriarty, Jeff Harris
1996: Chad Moeller, Mike Lincoln, [...]

The key to a successful drafting strategy is simple to state, but difficult to execute:
Draft the best available player that you can sign.
Don't worry about position. Really. Don't worry about position.
If the Twins happen to have 5 major league average centerfielders in 2010 or 2012 or whenever, then someone is going to need [...]

I sort of talked about this before, but having put some more thought into the matter, the answer to the Twins' roster crunch right now is really quite easy: designate Juan Rincon for assignment. (Though I'm certainly not the first person to take this position. Howard Sinker, for instance, has recently written about [...]

Every year, I decide that it's not worth caring about the All-Star vote--voters just clearly value players differently than I do, so whatever. But I looked at the current voting totals, and I just can't help but comment.
If the polls closed today, this would be the AL All-Star team:
C -- Varitek, Red Sox
1B -- [...]

Walks per start, Francisco Liriano, 2008:
3 -- April 8th
5 -- April 13th (MLB)
5 -- April 18th (MLB)
3 -- April 24th (MLB), 0.2 IP
5 -- April 30th
4 -- May 5th
2 -- May 10th
1 -- May 15th
1 -- May 20th
1 -- May 26th
1 -- May 31st
It's just 4-5 games, and he's only been over 5 strikeouts once [...]

- I'm feeling a bit for Boof right now. He works his ass off in the offseason to lose weight, because he's essentially been promised that losing weight will help him pitch better (even though there's not really a whole lot of evidence that that would be the case), then he winds up pitching [...]

As SBG notes on the sidebar, the Twins have picked up Craig Breslow. According to Joe Christensen, the Twins are planning on adding him to the bullpen to bolster their left-handed relief. Reyes has actually been doing a pretty decent job so far, and I think the problem with the rest of the [...]

Last Saturday, my parents were coming into town, and, since Beloit is pretty close to on the way from Marshall to Chicago, we figured why not take in a game to kick off the Memorial Day weekend? After checking the schedule and noticing the unusual start time of 5 PM, I took off from [...]

First off, Joe Posnanski's blog about last night's game totally blows whatever I could possibly write out of the water. So do yourself a favor and go read it. I especially like the detail about how David DeJesus had to leave the game due to hives--and those hives could very well have cost [...]

My reaction to statements like this one:
Next, we needed Delmon Young’s thoughts, and some interviews with him can be like pulling teeth.
Is usually just a headshake and a sigh. I can't really blame the media for wanting to interview players who give them nice articulate quotes, but at some point I think they have [...]

Oh yeah, that guy:

Where were preseason expectations for Boof?
First I'll note that the league ERA is 4.12, compared to 4.51 last year, so I'll adjust all ERA expectations down by 0.39, since no one was really anticipating this much of a dip in offense. (Though April run scoring this year (4.24 ERA) wasn't that much different than [...]

It's hard to believe that the 2008 Twins have plowed through fifty games in their schedule so far, but they have and hey! they are hanging tough with a 25-25 record. If you would have told me at the beginning of the season that the Twins would have a .500 record after fifty games, [...]

Situation: Game tied, top of the 10th inning, 2 outs, bases empty, Hamilton batting.
Count: 3 balls, 2 strikes.
Pitch location: Wheelhouse.

I went up last weekend on Sunday to see the Snappers take on the Peoria Chiefs (the Chicago Cubs A-level team). The Snappers won to complete the 3-game sweep and move to two games over .500, which was their high-water mark for this season to that point.
Final Score: Beloit 5, Peoria 4 (box score [...]

Top Jimmy has a column out with an embarrassing mistake in it(1), but he points out that DelMON Young has been, um, powerless so far. The story, though, isn't that a young player is struggling, it's this at the end of the column:
Young has played in 205 consecutive games. Might he require, or deserve, [...]

Head-first dive into first is costly to Tolbert. You know, if Gardy would have fined the Hell out of anyone who did this over the last couple of years, maybe the message would have gotten across.

Apparently, Jason Tyner really wants a chance to get back at the Twins for letting him go. Seriously.
“I thought I had earned my stripes (in Minnesota),” said Tyner, who signed a minor league contract with the Indians this offseason after the Twins elected not to re-sign the outfielder, following three years of service. “I [...]

Rochester Red Wings
.327/.387/.584 -- Darnell McDonald, 2008, 101 AB
Congrats to McDonald for having one of the best stretches of his professional career, but he's been kicking around AAA so long that he was playing for the Red Wings when they were an Orioles affiliate 7 years ago. At age 30, his early season success [...]

How much can they eat?

IP
Hungry, Hungry Hippo

51.7
Livan Hernandez

50.7
Nick Blackburn

46.0
Boof Bonser

33.0
Scott Baker

23.7
Brian Bass

But what does the food taste like?

xFIP
Hungry, Hungry Hippo

3.06
Scott Baker

4.41
Nick Blackburn

4.42
Boof Bonser

4.47
Livan Hernandez

4.85
Brian Bass

To a certain degree, Blackburn, Bonser, and Hernandez have all been approximately league average pitchers who have made every start and given the Twins innings. Baker's the closest thing they've [...]