Friday, May 11, 2007
Discussion Day
Good morning everyone! I don't really have a lot to discuss today. The Twins are playing fairly poorly. The bats just aren't working. The pitchers are doing pretty well. The bullpen is really pitching well. So, for today, I am just going to allow for some discussion. Open-ended discussion on players, rumors and more. So, please participate. It should be fun. Feel free to provide stats, stories, and opinions on what they have done so far or what you expect them to do from this point on...
#1 - The Starting Pitchers -
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#2 - The Bullpen
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#3 - The Lineup
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#4 - The Defense
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#5 - The Pitching Prospects
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#6 - The Hitting Prospects
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#7 - The AL Central
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There you have it. I will be very interested to see where these Comments go. Which section or topic will have the most comments, and which will have the best comments. What are some of the controversial topics or discussions. The topics are very open-ended, and that is intentional. Let the comments flow.
Don't forget to check out the Minnesota Twins Fan Network podcast today.
TWINS THOUGHTS
The Twins lost 3-0 to the White Sox yesterday. Shutout. The offense is struggling. Now the Detroit Tigers come to town for three games this weekend. Here are some Twins thoughts:
Carlos Silva has been shockingly good so far this year. He had another quality start yesterday giving up three runs in six innings. A 3.00 ERA after seven starts is excellent for anyone, much less someone who was horrible last year and this spring. From time to time, we hear a Twins commentator (radio or TV) say something like, "Apparently Terry Ryan and Ron Gardenhire saw something this spring that the rest of us didn't see." Believe me, that is not it! They saw the same horrible, easy-to-hit pitcher that we all did. They also saw the $4.3 million that they guaranteed him last winter by picking up his option. That was the determining factor. To this point, the fact that Silva has been good is a surprise to us all, Terry Ryan and Ron Gardenhire included.
And yes, count me in on the "Let's see if we can steal Edwin Encarnacion from Wayne Krivsky and the Reds" bandwagon.
The first thing I noticed when I saw the starting lineup for yesterday's noon game was that Chris Heintz was not in it. Mike Redmond was again in the lineup, again catching. How many times does the same catcher catch the day game after a night game? Not too often. And they shouldn't. Not in such a long season. If they don't have the confidence in allowing Heintz to catch the day game after a night game, then the Twins need to make a deal for a catcher that they feel can. I like Mike Redmond, but he needs to be able to play over the long-haul too. And, Heintz isn't going to hurt anyone with the bat, and he has played enough catcher in his long minor league career to be adequate behind the plate too.
Three more innings of shutout relief pitching between Dennys Reyes and Pat Neshek. They also struck out five hitters.
Five hits off of Jose Contreras. That is not good. They also struck out 12 times. How happy was I to see Jason Kubel double in his first at bat and get another single later in the game. Howard Sinker has some interesting thoughts on Kubel and got a bunch of comments.
Torii Hunter's 23 game hitting streak came to an end with his 0-4 game.
Lew Ford should be up this weekend for the Twins. My assumption is that Josh Rabe would be sent down. Could it be someone else?
Friday night - 7:10 p.m. - Johan Santana (4-2, 3.40, 1.16, .235) vs Mike Maroth (2-0, 5.35, 1.78, .328)
Saturday afternoon - 2:45 p.m. - Sidney Ponson (2-4, 6.42, 1.87, .338) vs Chad Durbin (2-1, 5.45, 1.33, .256)
Sunday afternoon - 7:05 p.m. - Boof Bonser (0-1, 3.96, 1.55, .257) vs (Jeremy Bonderman is scheduled but because of a blister likely will not start.)
MINOR LEAGUE REPORTS
Wednesday SethSpeaks
Player of the Day – Matt Allegra,
New Britain Rockcats
Wednesday SethSpeaks Player of the Day –
Kevin Slowey, Rochester
Red Wings
Rochester 1, Toledo 2 - Kevin Slowey gave up a lead off home run to Toledo's Ramon Santiago. He did not allow another hit until the seventh inning when Ryan Raburn's (remember, he's the guy who destroyed Jason Kubel's knee in the Arizona Fall League) double was followed by an RBI single by former Gopher Jack Hannahan. All told, Slowey pitched all nine innings. He gave up two runs on three hits. He walked none and struck out seven. He falls to 3-2 with a 1.51 ERA. Of the 104 pitches he threw, an incredible 80 of them were strikes. Another terrific performance! Unfortunately, the Red Wings managed just four hits. Trent Oeltjen had a double. Lew Ford hit a solo homer in the 9th inning.
New Britain 3, Trenton 2 - Brad Baker had a nice start to improve to 2-0. He gave up two runs on two hits and two walks in six innings. He struck out three. JP Martinez then struck out two in two shutout innings. Jose Mijares pitched a perfect ninth, with two strikeouts, for his fifth save. David Winfree hit his sixth double and first triple. Matt Allegra hit his fifth double and his fourth homer and drove in three runs. Garrett Guzman went 2-4. Trevor Plouffe went 0-5 and is now hitting .253.
Ft. Myers 4, Brevard County 7 - Zach Ward finally made his first start of the year for the Miracle. He gave up three runs (2 earned) on four hits and two walks in five innings. He took the loss and falls to 0-5. Kyle Aselton then gave up four runs on four hits and a walk in just one inning. Frank Mata gave up two hits in two shutout innings. Steven Tolleson led off and went 2-4 with his four double. Luis Ugueto, who apparently is listed as a player-coach, went 2-5. Edward Ovalle hit his third homer.
Beloit 0, South Bend 7 - Steve Singleton had two of the Snappers four hits. He hit his third and fourth doubles in his short time with the team. The big story in this game was the first bad start of the year of Jeff Manship. The righty gave up five runs in four innings. He gave up eight hits and two walks, and he struck out just one. Danny Vais then came in and gave up two runs on two hits. He walked one and struck out three. Armando Gabino and Dan Leatherman each pitched a scoreless inning.
Seth Prediction - I fully expect that this will be Manship's last start at Beloit. Having followed the Twins minor league system and box scores for three or four years, I have learned a few tendencies. One is that if a pitcher is dominating a level, the Twins like to wait until they have a bad start. Once they do have a bad start, they promote them to the next level. I don't really know if this is the case, or just something that I have noticed several times. If it is the case, maybe they want the player to realize that it is not as easy as they are making it look, and they have to continue to get better.
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