* Quick prediction before it's too late: Boof Bonser ends his abysmal losing streak tonight in Baltimore against the O's (weather permitting).
* How sad is it to see the Strib continue to list the Twins in their "Wild Card Race" box between the standings and the probable starters? This morning, it showed the hometown nine tied with two other .500 teams at nine games out with 36 left to play, behind three other teams, who are, of course, behind the three division leaders in the playoff chase. Got that? In terms of playoff viability, the Twins are better off than five AL clubs, tied with two others, and behind six, with four ultimately earning a chance to play in the postseason. Put simply, they are dead. Dead. DEAD. I hope to conduct the autopsy with Brad Zellar and David Brauer in another roundtable around Labor Day, but until then, one quick whine: Why didn't Terry Ryan deal Torii Hunter two months ago, when he would have fetched a quality prospect for 2008 or 09 batting order that right now looks mighty thin?
* On the bright side, the Twins have a bevy of promising young arms, and perhaps an entertaining parlor game for a diehard Twins fan is to rank them in order of how you perceive their value over the next five years. Here's my list, including only those who have spent enough time in the bigs to create a viable impression.
1. Matt Garza
2. Glen Perkins
3. Boof Bonser
4. Francisco Liriano
5. Kevin Slowey
6. Scott Baker
I imagine most fans would have Liriano much higher, but the whip-snap motion he throws with now puts enormous torque on that elbow and shoulder and I don't think he can last without a major overhaul in his delivery. Likewise, Bonser is probably higher than most would put him, especially after his dreadful past ten weeks, but there is something about his makeup that makes me intuitively think he's going to be fine, as in a middle-rotation guy, for quite a while. And Perkins is a sleeper, a lefty with loads of confidence. Yeah, I know he's been dinged too, but I don't see the windup as being an accident waiting to happen the way it is with Liriano. I don't have a good reason for dumping on Scott Baker, other than he just doesn't look like he has good stuff to me, and is consequently prone to the home run ball. Now Baker has been brilliant more than once this season, and this after last year's abomination. I'd love to be proven wrong about him, because from the outside looking in, he seems like a competitor and a stand-up guy, the kind of pitcher teammates are pulling for. Anyway, let's hear your half-dozen.
* The Tribe beat the Tigers in the rubber game of their big Central Division series this afternoon and the good news in Cleveland is that Jake Westbrook pitched another gem, locking up with Nate Robertson in a scoreless duel over nine innings before Cleveland took it, 3-1 in 10, on a two-run single by perpetual utility man Chris Gomez (!); this after another late season pickup, Kenny Lofton, knocked in the game's first run. Bottom line, with C.C. Sabathia, Fausto Carmona and now Westbrook all wheeling, Cleveland has a playoff rotation to rival the Red Sox trio of Beckett-Dice K-Schilling, whereas the Angels can only go two-deep reliably (Lackey-Escobar). The Wild Card, in more ways than one, is the Yankees, who should lead with Wang as their ace and then have a guy, Andy Pettite, who has won them a bunch of games in the postseason, followed by Clemens and/or Mussina, with the ultratalented Phil Hughes as an intriguing long reliever should one of the starters spit the bit and Torre needs a stopgap while his bashers eclipse the deficit.
* And yes, I think the hated Yankees are going to be the Wild Card out of the AL. Seattle has been a fun story, currently own a two-game lead, and are playing like they have nothing to lose. Once they realize they do, in fact, have a playoff spot to lose, can they keep their composure. Up until now, they have been extremely lucky, going 71-53 despite outscoring their opponents by a mere 624-603, due mostly to timely hitting from a balanced order (among the starting lineup, DH Jose Vidro is last with a respectable 49 rbis, four ahead of Kubel and three behind Mauer) and a great bullpen led by closer JJ Putz. But Putz has shown signs of fatigue and I still suspect that good pitching can throttle everyone but Ichiro in this lineup. Of course Seattle could also be kindred spirits to the 1987 Twins, and win it all on sheer luck and gumption. I'd love to see it.
In the National League, there's a glorious clusterfuck of the sort that should make Bud Selig wet his pants. Only the Mets seem to be a sure thing, and six teams are within 3 and half games of either the division lead or the wild card berth, not counting the three division leaders. That's more than half the NL franchises with legitimate hopes for the postseason on the weekend before Labor Day. I've been pulling for the Brewers and D-backs, two squads loaded with burgeoning young talent, all season, and Arizona currently owns a 3 and half game lead on the Padres. As of now, I think San Diego's superior pitching pulls out a third straight division crown, leaving Arizona to battle it out with Atlanta and the Dodgers for the wild card. The Phillies suffered a huge loss with their only solid starter, Cole Hamels hitting the DL (a bigger blow than the Pads' Chris Young likewise going down, because SD has superior depth and a more forgiving ballpark). Milwaukee? Hard to see how they stay with the Cubs, who have better pitching and a superior starting lineup. And the slapstick pennant race has given the snakebitten Cardinals enough oxygen that the old vets might stitch it together to surmount the Cubbies, the Cubs being the Cubs and all.
* Last, and probably least, isn't it time for all the haters to give it up for Carlos Silva, the much, much, much derided Twins starter who has a decent shot at eating up 200 innings by season's end? Joe Christensen said as much in today's paper, another good piece following on his article last Sunday on the silver lining of the Twins pitching prospects getting seasoning this year. It almost makes up for his tireless advocacy to re-sign Torii Hunter. Of course in that he is hardly alone, with Jimmy Souhan being the biggest Hunter booster. If I had a ballot, I'd vote Hunter the Twins MVP for 2007. But that doesn't mean I want to see the organization paying him $12 to $18 million, minimum, four years from now.
Well, the "comeback" has officially started. We're riding a 5-game winning streak into Cleveland. As predicted, my boy Rondell has hit a homerun, proving that the universe has regained its balance. We take 2 of 3 in Cleveland, lay a smackdown on KC, then clean up with Cleveland again and we're on top of the division. You read it here first. (yes, I'm concerned about our inability to figure out Cleveland pitching though)
I don't think I'll ever really understand the Castillo trade - I thought he was a great leadoff hitter, with his ability to draw walks and hit for a .300 average. But I think the non-trade of Torii is also a clubhouse issue...from what I've read, he's a very popular player, and you don't just trade guys like that, and I don't believe it to be a foregone conclusion that he's wearing Yankee colors a year from now.
Oh, and only because it came up on another message board, my actual name is Anton, hence the "antonymous"....ya know, like anonymous, except different. Not very creative I know, but at the least somewhat unique
First off let me say the "poor little small-market team" argument no longer garners much sympathy from me--not only do the Twins have one of the richest owners in the sport who could easily spend more money if he wished, they are also getting a new stadium (a good chunk of the cost of which is not being borne by the team but by unfortunate local residents such as myself), which will shortly be providing them with much additional revenue. And in fact even right now the Twins' payroll ($74 million is the number I've heard--correct?) is larger than that of the divison-leading Cleveland Indians, who stand at about $61 million. So to cite a lack of money as the limiting factor in the team's performance this year is simply not correct.
But on to the standings. Oddly enough, the Twins' best chance to make the playoffs would be by winning the division--the current leaders, Cleveland, currently have a worse record than either the Yankees or Mariners. When you consider all the remaining games against the Tigers and Indians, along with those two teams' lackluster play of late, you'd have to figure the Twins have at least an outside chance of sneaking another last-minute title like they did last year.
I'm with midlife crisis, though--if you're going to punt on the season by unloading Castillo, you need to finish the job by also trading Hunter. If you want to try to contend, you keep Castillo and bring up the kids earlier, as it was obvious pretty early on that the Ortiz and Ponson experiments weren't working out; that could have given us a mighty interesting three-horse race to handicap down the stretch. But this half-assed kinda-rebuilding, kinda-not stuff satisfies no one.
I don't think I'll ever understand why castillo was traded instead of Hunter. If you are pulling the plug on the season, don't you trade both? ... for that matter, don't you send Santana as well? Instead of getting some really serious prospects, the Twins are only returning to the small market team that could. That certainly fits better with their marketing scheme and is a whole bunch cheaper. It's just a bummer to be in a town that looks more like the Expos every day. Where will our Pedro be going at the end of the year?
And in favor of the anto-optimism, even if the twins are playing just 2 games over ,500, it seems like the Tigers and Cleveland refuse to put us away. I heard the tigers have lost every series since they swept us.
Bless you Anto; I was waiting for someone to come and try to remove the burial dirt I was tossing on the Twins. I'll give you this much: Minnesota plays Cleveland six times in its next nine games after the weekend series in Baltimore. They also get the Tigers six more times in September, and close out with four games in Fenway. If they can take at least four of six from both Cleveland and Detroit and encounter a Red Sox squad that has already clinched and is getting rest for the playoffs, they might make things interesting.
Now for the reality check: Have you seen the Twins bench? Their most capable pinch hitter is catcher Mike Redmond. Meanwhile, what you say about the Twins big bats could also be claimed for Cleveland. Victor Martinez and Casey Blake both haven't homered in over three weeks, and Grady Sizemore is batting .227 over the same span. Travis Hafner is severely dinged, so his slump could continue, but, as I mentioned in my last post, a triumverate of Sabathia, Carmona and now Jake Westbrook is better than anything Detroit or Minnesota can offer at the front of its rotation. (It will be interesting to see whether either Cleveland or Detroit snatch up former closer Bob Wickman--a longtime Indian recently cut by Atlanta.)
Yes, it is possible the Twins could catch Detroit, who have been really damaged by Gary Sheffield's injury on top of all the DL time from their pitching staff. Can vets like Magglio Ordonez and Carlos Guillen turn it up a notch or are they getting spent in the heat of a losing playoff chase? (Not to mention Pudge, whose physique in the pre and post steroids era is markedly smaller than it was in the steroids era, yet he keeps hitting and fielding his position marvelously well into his 30s.) But even if they do manage to put Detroit behind them, there are the Mariners (or Angels if Seattle catches Anaheim) and the Yankees to contend with for the wild card. I don't care how hot the M+M boys get (and you better include Cuddyer and Kubel in that equation), there are simply too many quality teams to surmount with barely a month left in the season. And, the ultimate reality check: The Twins are currently two games over .500 after 128 games. On balance, they have pretty much demonstrated that is about the record they should own over the first 4/5 of the season.
And if my abject pessimism (or realism) should be proven inaccurate, it would be just fine with me.
I'll also fess up to being a recovering Silva-hater, though we were so hurting for arms at the beginning of the season that we HAD to sign him. He's done more than admirably this season and gets major props from me.
I'll also confess to being less hardcore about the Twins this year than in years past (there's no way I could rank our pitching prospects), but can someone remind me why we've all written this team off when we're out of the playoff race by 5.5 games with 34 left to play? Yes, our offense is sputtering, but this team isn't all that different from the team that took the division last year.
Do we really think Joe Mauer will hit under .300 for the rest of the season? That Justin will go through another insane homerless slump? Torii, the guy who many had written off as trade bait, has been trying to carry this team on his back (I think he's got a hitting streak going at the moment), and it's only a matter of time before the rest of our bats get hot again. Baseball is, to an extent, a game of chance and streaks, and I can't bet against the possibility of this club catching fire.
And while Rondell hasn't come back in the way I'd previously predicted, he's got a post-cortizone shot, pinch-hit homerun in him somewhere, I can feel it.
I was certainly a Silva detractor, and have to admit that he has been outstanding for much of the season. However, I still wonder what sort of bat 4.5 million could have landed us. Matt Garza certainly could have been pitching in the bigs all year. As for the prospect ranking, I find it curious how little credit Scott Baker is given by the Twins base. His minor league numbers all project him to be a middle of the rotation starter, and he's been fantastic since the All-Star break. He had a confidence problem and left too many pitches over the plate when he first made the Twins, but he's been superb of late. That said, I'd go:
1. Garza
2. Liriano
3. Baker
4. Perkins
5. Slowey
6. Bonser
Given Boof's stamina problems, I wouldn't be at all surpised to find him in a relief role. I haven't really seen enough of Perkins or Slowey to make an accurate case for or against them, but from what I've seen, they look to have some potential.
I'll be online all day trying to get Brewers playoff tickets when they go on sale. I really hope they make the playoffs, the first playoff game at Miller Park will be amazing.
Go Crew!!!
And as an eternal optimist, go Twins! Never say die!
A better role for Liriano, maybe as a short guy at the back of the bullpen. A max of 50-60 pitches per week rather than 100 every 5 days. No one with that motion who throws the number of sliders Liriano does, will have a long career as a starter.
I was not a Silva hater and applauded (OK, understood) when TR picked up his option for this year. That said, the guy does deserve big props, though I won't hold my breath for his detractors to admit it.
And I'm probably in the minority among this readership group, but I want Torii Hunter back, too. Even if it means $12M+ per season. If TR can be creative with extensions for Hunter and Santana (backload to after the new ballpark opens in 2010, deferred $ like Ichiro took?) and resist wasting a few million here or there on retreads like White, Ortiz or Cirillo, then I think it's doable within the Twins payroll structure.
As for my ranking the young pitchers:
1. Matt Garza
2. Francisco Liriano
3. Glen Perkins
4. Boof Bonser
5. Scott Baker
6. Kevin Slowey
I'm confident that the Twins coaching staff can help Liriano strengthen his arm and adjust his delivery to reduce the strain on his elbow. It sounded like pre-injury, he'd never really had much of a formal conditioning program. I'm rating Baker ahead of Slowey for now just because I think they have about the same stuff from what I've seen but Baker has at least shown some hints of understanding how he needs to pitch at this level. Jury's still out on whether Slowey will adjust. I'm keeping Bonser ahead of both because like Britt said, he seems to have a good makeup. I just hope he can figure out a way to work deeper into games, whether it's getting in better shape or doing a better job of hitting his spots to keep his pitch count in check.