Friday, August
13, 2010
Friday Links and Thinks
I think I would like to make this “Friday Links and Thinks” a regular occurrence.
First and foremost, there are a lot of Twins bloggers who work hard and deserve
to be noticed. Second, there is some great content. Hopefully this is something
that you enjoy. I’ll post a few links below to Twins blogs, and to some other
events, but first, the question of the day (I heard Doogie Wolfson and Jim
Schmit discuss this on 1500 ESPN’s Twins Wrap,
which is on about 30-40 minutes after the conclusion of weekday night Twins
games:
The Twins/White Sox series was quite
intense. The Twins did a great job and won two out of three games. They had a
great road trip. There has to be a fear of a let-down against the Oakland A’s.
What would you consider a let-down against the A’s? The A’s are a good team
(57-56) with a very good, young pitching staff (Look at those Gonzalez and
Cahill numbers!). I mean, if they lose a couple of 4-3 games, would it be
because of a letdown, or because good teams lose sometimes? I would be
disappointed if the Twins were blown out or played sloppy (like Wednesday
night. But what are you looking for in this Twins/A’s series, and what would be
a letdown? Here are the pitching matchups:
·
Friday
night - Carl Pavano (14-7, 3.28 ERA, 1.08 WHIP, .245 BAA) vs. Gio
Gonzalez (10-7, 3.51, 1.32, .235)
·
Saturday
night – Brian Duensing (5-1, 2.27, 1.11, .235) vs Trevor Cahill
(12-4, 2.56, 0.98, .192)
·
Sunday
afternoon – Kevin Slowey (10-5, 4.45, 1.27, .281) vs Vin Mazzaro
(6-4, 3.86, 1.38, .265)
Here is a look
around the Twins blogosphere. A good site to find 66 Twins blogs is Newsbobber’s Minnesota
Baseball Blog site. I’ve only included blogs that have been updated in
the last few days (let me know if I’m missing any sites that I should add):
·
Bus Leagues Baseball posted a Q&A
with Kyle Gibson.
·
Aaron Gleeman posted his
Friday Link-O-Rama.
·
Twin
Cities Spark posted an interview with
Nick Nelson of TwinsCentric
and Nick’s Twins Blog.
·
Nick also wrote a blog saying that Glen
Perkins is not a LOOGY.
·
On Saturday, you’ll want to read Roger’s new Minor League Report. Here is last
week’s version.
·
You’ll definitely want to check out the Twin Geek’s Magic article today!
·
Over at Stick
& Ball Guy (WGOM), they have a ton of stuff going on.
·
Parker (Over the Baggy) and DiamondCentric have
released their newest t-shirt, Frankkkkkkie! Get yours today.
·
Twinkie
Talk’s Fetch asks if JJ Hardy has
been a disappointment.
·
Coffeyville Whirlwind takes a look at
the 1990 Twins roster.
·
Lipgloss
and Baseball takes a look at some of baseball fans’ etiquette.
·
Ed
Thoma of the Mankato Free Press
in his Baseball Outsider
Blog called Liriano’s performance last night Inelegant
effectiveness.
·
For
the Love of the Game had a Bear-y interesting experience on Thursday.
·
Hitting
the Foul Pole wrote a tremendous blog showing just how incredible
Francisco Liriano’s 2010 has been, and how unlucky. “You may not be impressed by his 3.26 ERA, but what
about his league-leading 2.14 FIP?”
·
Besides great nightly
GameChat’s, Knuckleballs
Jim Crikket posted video of many Beloit
Snappers players that he saw in a four game series over last weekend
·
North Dakota Twins Fan co-hosted the
SethSpeaks.net Weekly Minnesota Twins podcast with me on Monday night. He also
posted a link to video
of Orlando Hudson on Jim Rome.
·
I coached Cory
Hepola in Little League baseball and into Babe Ruth levels. Now, he’s a
famous sports anchor for a big TV station in Rochester, New York. Tonight, you
will want to follow him on
Twitter as he will Tweet about Kyle Gibson’s AAA debut.
Here are the links to the StarTribune.com
TwinsCentric blog postings for this week:
·
Tuesday – Seth Stohs – 50
Game Season Begins Tonight
·
Wednesday – Nick Nelson – All
About Pitching
·
Thursday – John Bonnes – Bitter
Aftertaste
·
Friday – Parker Hageman – (Coming Soon to the TwinsCentric
Blog)
·
By the way, the next TwinsCentric (and Sooze) Viewing Party will head out of the
Twin Cities Metro and up the road to St. Cloud. The lovely and talented Sooze is running the
show on this one. On August 28th from 2:30-6:30 at Howie’s in
downtown St. Cloud, there will be drink and appetizer specials as well as some
give-aways. Those in the Metro, it’s not too far away, and those in the
outstate, come on down! These events have been a lot of fun and a great opportunity
to meet some of your favorite bloggers.
·
And I’m assuming you’re probably already reading Sooze’s STrib blog,
as well as her great work on Babes
Love Baseball.
·
And then you’re also probably reading the other Twins
blogs at StarTribune.com: LaVelle E. Neal’s Twins
Insider, Joe Christensen’s Around
the Majors, and Howard Sinker’s A
Fan’s View.
John Bonnes is on The
Power Trip Morning Show on KFAN Tuesdays and Friday’s during the 7:00 hour.
(Podcasts
available here.) I am on KFAN with Paul Allen each
Thursday morning at about 9:20. If you would like to listen, the podcast
is available here.
This past week’s
events:
·
On Monday night, I was joined on the SethSpeaks.net
Weekly Minnesota Twins Podcast by Cody Christie from the North Dakota Twins Fan blog,
and from the White Sox
writer for Examiner.com JJ Stankevitz. We previewed what would happen in
the Twins/White Sox series.
·
On Tuesday
night’s Twins Minor League Weekly, I was joined by voice of the Ft.
Myers Miracle starting pitcher, Bruce Pugh, and discussed his season,
philosophies and more. Later Jim Crikket of Knuckleballs joined to discuss
what he saw from the Beloit Snappers in four games over last weekend.
·
On Wednesday night, I hosted a Live
Twins Chat and answered questions throughout the Twins/White Sox game.
·
Later that night, Fanatic Jack asked me to be his
co-host on his
weekly podcast. It was a lot of fun. We were joined by Louis Schuth
from Hitting the Eephus,
and Dez Tobin of Dez Says.
Any thoughts on the Twins or the Twins blogosphere? Feel
free to leave
your questions and comments here.