Kevin Slowey (xFIP 4.03)
Scott Kazmir (xFIP 4.27)
The roller coaster ride continues. After Thursday nights exhilarating victory the Twins put up a total stinker last night. As per the season it seems.
As of this morning the Twins pitching staff has already given up 33 home runs this month. To put that in perspective, the only month [...]

After getting rained out on Friday night, I again made the trip from DC to Baltimore to see the Twins play in person on Sunday. Although they lost, it was a fun game to watch. Being at Camden Yards always gets me excited for outdoor baseball in Minnesota. I've posted some pictures [...]

Is that a Royale with Cheese?

We won't be using the Metric System for this game, thankfully. Toronto remains in the rearview mirror. Although, I must say that the blood spatters I see in that mirror are heartening. Thank you, Bluebirds of Destruction. Thank you very much. Keep up the good work.
First pitch is at [...]

Thirteen down, one to go. Not much to say about tonight's game. After the game, the Twins record on this road trip will either be 5-9 or 6-8, and based upon how people voted in the WGOM poll before the trip started, either record is a disappointment. For what its worth, the [...]

Game Time: 9:05 CDT
Scheduled Starters: Kevin Slowey (22nd Start, 127.7 IP, 4.07 xFIP) v. Jeremy Dan Meyer (3rd Start, 8th Appearance, 19.7 IP, 5.55 xFIP)
I don't have a lot of time to prepare a fancy game log tonight. I suppose there are a ton of things I could write about if I had [...]

Game time: 7:10PM
Scheduled Starters: Sean Gallagher (17th start, 19th appearance, 88IP, overall, 7th start, 7th appearance, 29.3IP 5.48xFIP for A's) v. Kevin Slowey (20th start, 114.3IP 4.28xFIP).
You can't win them all, I suppose, so last night's loss can't really be considered that big of a problem. On the spectrum of teams that must be [...]

Rasner vs. Slowey
I have become comfortably numb? Not sure if it's still shell shock from that 10-run inning, but I'm having trouble caring much right now about the team or finding anything worthwhile to say about the team. All of these guys were with the team in spring training. My opinion of [...]

My teeth are gritted and I'm strapped into my chair. Time to read a week's worth of columns from the six columnists in town and summarize them for you. I do it because I love you and believe me, it hurts me more than it hurts you.

[Note: our guy ubelmann is taking a break from posting game logs at the WGOM for a while. He's got family in town and for some reason he thinks that's more important than communicating his thoughts to you about this game. The nerve, I tell ya! So, I'm filling for him.]
Game 110: [...]

Buehrle vs. Slowey
Top 6 VORP, 2008, Twins:
37.0 -- Morneau
33.6 -- Mauer
12.6 -- Casilla
11.6 -- Kubel
9.6 -- Delmon
9.2 -- DSPAN2
If you claim that you had that group picked as the six most valuable players this far though the season, I claim that you're a liar.
Top 6 VORP, 2008, White Sox
35.1 -- Carlos Quentin
34.8 -- Dye
30.0 -- [...]

Slowey vs. Rasner
Slowey's got an edge of about 0.3 xFIP on Rasner.

Slowey vs. Rogers
More day baseball in an attempt to completely halt the nation's economy.
Things more surprising to me than the outcome of yesterday's game:
This last Sunday, I found out while playing cards that one of my friends had never heard the Kenny Rogers classic "The Gambler." But don't worry, I've reported this suspicious behavior [...]

BushSheets vs. Slowey
The older I get, the faster time seems to go by. I can hardly believe that we're already to the second half of the season.
Double play rates for Twins hitters (as of June 23rd):
3-10, 30% -- Tolbert
3-13, 23% -- Punto
2-10, 20% -- Redmond
10-52, 19% -- Delmon
11-60, 18% -- Mauer
13-78, 17% -- Morneau
7-50, [...]

Slowey vs. Peavy
Going into the series, team leaders in VORP:
30.1 -- Adrian Gonzalez
18.5 -- Brian Giles
9.2 -- Jody Gerut
6.5 -- Edgar V Gonzalez
5,4 -- Kevin Kouzmanoff
22.4 -- Joe Mauer
19.8 -- Justin Morneau
7.7 -- Alexi Casilla
7.5 -- Jason Kubel
2.9 -- Nick Punto (this is not a typo)
I heard someone recently say that Adrian Gonzalez might be [...]

Jason Bergmann vs. Kevin Slowey
Inanefforttospeeduptonight'sgamelog,Ihavedecidedtowritewithoutspaces. Clearly,thingsweren'tmovingalongfastenoughbefore.
Ican'tbelievejustcan'tbelievethattheTwinshavebeenfinedforplayingtooslowly. ShouldDelmonstartswingingwhilethepitcheriswarmingup? CouldGomezpossiblybuntmoreofteninorder
toendhisplateappearanceinoneortwoptiches? Ijustdon'tgetit. Andwheninstantreplayisinevitablyenacted,
Iamquitesurethatthatwillreallyhelpspeedthingsup,too.
Butthankstothewholeordeal,IlearnedthattheAstrosaremanagedbyCecilCooper. Honestly,IhadnoideaNOIDEAwhomanagedtheAstros. So,thanksforthat,MLB,Iguess.

Kevin Slowey vs. Dave Bush
Interleague play annoyance: hearing about how much more interesting baseball is without a DH. (It's not.) It's impossible for double-switches (which are completely predictable anyway) to be exciting. Thought-provoking, perhaps, but not exciting. Certainly not exciting the way that a showdown between David Ortiz and Mariano Rivera [...]

Kevin Slowey vs. Gavin Floyd
Unicorn boy again. Seems like we've seen him a lot already.
PECOTA projects an ubelhangover and a lot of cleaning to do today.

Radhames "Thin Lizzy" Liz vs. Kevin Slowey
For the second year in a row, Thin Lizzy is making his Orioles debut against the Twins. This is what I had to say last year:
Well, it looks like the Orioles have hopped on the where-can-we-find-a-soft-spot-for-our-prospect-pitchers-to-land? Hey-let's-pick-on-the-team-without-an-offense! train. Radhames, or Thin Lizzy as I like to call him, [...]

Kevin Slowey vs. Luke Hochevar
This pitching matchup could wind up repeating itself quite a bit in the future. (Mainly since we play KC about eleventy billion times per year--seriously, I like an unbalanced schedule but 19 games against an opponent in a season just gets tedious after a while. Variety, spice, etc.)
Slowey has [...]

Kevin Slowey vs. Jeff Francis
Don't let the ERAs fool you--this could still turn out to be a pretty decent pitching matchup.

Jesse Litsch vs. Kevin Slowey
Litsch has been pretty good so far this year. Slightly above average in ground balls, average K-rate, and outstanding walk rate. All combined together, he's sporting a 3.69 xFIP.
I'm not really worried at all about Slowey so far. 6.9 K/G, 0.0 BB/G, and 37% GB% are all better [...]

Kevin Slowey vs. John Danks
The phrase "numbers can't tell you (something that numbers can probably tell you" gets thrown a lot in baseball coverage. Well, I'm here to tell you that numbers can't tell you whether or not Kevin Slowey's bicep is pain-free, or whether his bicep is fully healed. But I sure [...]