Friday, August
20, 2010
Friday Links and Thinks
I think I would like to make this “Friday Links and Thinks” a regular
occurrence. There are a lot of great Twins blogs that deserve to be noticed.
QUESTION OF
THE WEEK
The other part of the Friday Links is the Thinks. Today, I’m going to
throw out who I think that the Twins will send to the Arizona Fall League this
year, and you can add your thoughts or selections. Normally the Twins send
three pitchers and three hitters (and then usually one more). The players must
be from countries that do not have winter leagues, and they must have played at
AA or AAA. Teams have been able to send one person from Hi-A Ft. Myers, and
last year, they were allowed to send two. Typically the Twins don’t send guys
back two years in a row. Here are my seven picks:
·
Alex
Wimmers – I think that they will want the 2010
top pick to get some more innings.
·
Kyle
Gibson – Although his innings will be monitored the rest of this season, as
long as Gibson is healthy, they may want to have him throw another 20-25
innings in Arizona.
·
Carlos
Gutierrez – Might as well get the 2008 first-rounder there too, right? I think it’d
be a great environment for him to continue to work out of the bullpen.
·
Liam
Hendriks – I’m not 100% certain if Australian players
are able to play in Arizona, but after his appendectomy cost him more than a
month of an incredible season, it would be good to get him some innings.
·
Ben
Revere – OF – if he is cleared to play after his eye injury, the team would
like him to play in Arizona.
·
Joe
Benson – OF – It’s been a breakout year of sorts for Benson, and it would be
good for him to get more at bats in the Fall League.
·
Danny
Lehmann – C – It’s always good to have extra catchers in Arizona, and Lehmann,
defensively, is excellent and would work well with the pitching prospects.
What do you think? Who would you send?
WEEKEND AHEAD
The Twins won two out of three at Target Field against the White Sox and
increased their division lead to four games. Next up is a weekend home series
against the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim. Torii Hunter will return to
Minnesota and make his Target Field debut. He will get to make his first
attempt against the right field wall. The Angels are seven games behind Texas
Rangers in the AL West, a position they share with the Oakland A’s, and a
position they are not accustomed to this decade. The Twins will see the Angels
best two pitchers in this series, but hey, the Angels get to see the Twins best
pitcher of late (Duensing), and maybe Kevin Slowey will throw another seven no-hit innings, and
this time get a chance to complete it… maybe?
Here are the pitching matchups:
·
Friday
night – Brian Duensing (6-1, 2.00, 1.05, .223)
vs Dan Haren (1-3, 3.44,
1.31, .269)
·
Saturday
night – Kevin Slowey (11-5, 4.22, 1.23, .270)
vs Trevor Bell (1-3, 5.40, 1.70, .333)
·
Sunday
night – Scott Baker (10-9, 4.85 ERA, 1.34 WHIP, .284 BAA) vs. Jered Weaver (11-8, 3.11, 1.10, .221)
TWINS BLOGS
Here is a look around the Twins blogosphere. A good site to find 66 Twins
blogs is Newsbobber’s Minnesota Baseball Blog site., but you
can also look on the left side of this page for many. 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):
·
Nick
Nelson wrote about The Crain Game,
a look at the interesting story and timeline of Jesse Crain.
·
Inept Ullger takes a look at the pitch selection for
Jim Thome’s walk-off on Tuesday night.
·
Andrew
Kneeland wrote a tremendous blog post called Matt
Capps and the Immediacy of Twitter. It’s terrific!
·
On the
road with Shawn… adds another stat to the blogosphere by contemplating
the effect of the double play.
·
North
Dakota Twins Fan writes about Five
Goals for the rest of the season.
·
Target
Field: No Longer Where Joe’s Balls Go to Die is the creative
title of For the Love of the Game’s
most recent blog post.
·
Babes Love Baseball went Under
the Bleachers with Jeff Manship.
·
Emoeby gets to raise the flag at the Twins game.
·
Aaron
Gleeman posted Twins
Notes on Thursday.
·
Erin from Twinkie
Talk wrote about Francisco Liriano’s Home Run rate and puts it into historical
perspective.
·
Coffeyville Whirlwind posted its All
Franchise Team for 1981-1990.
·
Baseball
Outsider Ed Thoma blogged on the splits
of Jason Kubel.
·
Check out the Jim
Crikket rant on Knuckleballs.
TWINSCENTRIC
STUFF
Here are the links to the StarTribune.com TwinsCentric blog postings for this week:
·
Monday – Sunday’s
Game: One right decision, another questionable
·
Tuesday – Seth Stohs – Admitting
is the first step…
·
Wednesday – Nick Nelson – If
the playoffs started today
·
Thursday – Seth Stohs – Twins
2010 draft update
·
Friday – Parker
Hageman – Behind
Mauer’s second-half surge
·
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 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.
PODCASTS AND
MORE
·
On Sunday night, I was joined on the SethSpeaks.net
Weekly Minnesota Twins Podcast by co-host Travis Aune
from Travis Twins Talk, We
were joined by Phil Mackey of 1500ESPN and from the White Sox
writer for Examiner.com JJ Stankevitz. We
discussed the A’s series, the decision to remove Kevin Slowey
from a no-hitter, Justin Morneau, and
previewed the Twins/White Sox series.
·
Last night, Travis Aune
asked me to be a guest on his
podcast. It was a lot of fun. We discussed a lot of Twins minor league
topics, the Twins and White Sox, and even a little about the Vikings!
Any thoughts on the Twins or the Twins blogosphere? Feel free to leave
your questions and comments here.