caulfield12

All these things being said, Jenks at 93-94 without secondary stuff is a lot more likely to blow up than at 95-98. He simply has to get either the change or curve across the plate. Still, with Putz, Thornton and Santos, we have much better options than the rest of the teams in the AL. The Twins would certainly use Putz or Thornton before Rauch, and arguably Santos or even Pena/Linebrink. Unless we completely wear it down, our bullpen (overall) should be a strength at all season long.

It's too early in the season to draw conclusions about anything with Peavy. I'm sure if he has 2-3 more starts like tonight, we'll have a lot more information to go on as far as him having a "dead/tired" arm that all pitchers go through, especially coming out of ST. If he's still pitching like this in May, then obviously Daniel Hudson will be back in the rotation and Peavy will be on the DL or consulting with Dr. James Andrews. But I'm thinking it's more mechanical and early season rust, rather than something more insidious or nefarious.

Now the next trick is believing we can win a tied ballgame on the road in TOR. Thanks for showing up finally, Teahen. Better late than never.

I would agree with everything you said about Nix except for the part about playing better defense at SS. With Teahen and Nix on the left-side, you might be creating another problem because we'll be in so many close games this year, every error or defensive miscue will be magnified. That said, if Ramirez continues to struggle the next 3-5 games, Ozzie's hand might be forced, especially if we only win a game or two and continue to get buried behind the Twins.

QUOTE (Friend of Nordhagen @ Apr 12, 2010 -> 07:43 PM) He can take his annual slow start and sit down for 2 goddamn months. And you're going to play Nix there? Vizquel? Move Beckham around for the 3rd time in two seasons? Rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic, that's all we are doing. For what it's worth, Ramirez actually adjusted fairly well to breaking pitches in the 2nd half of 2009. For most of 2008, he was our best hitter in terms of making adjustments from pitch to pitch, and AB to AB. Arguably, he has the best bat speed on the team when he's on.

Well, we've only lost 11/12 against the Blue Jays in Rogers and our last five in a row against TOR. Of course, the one time our offense shows us, our starting pitching lets us down. Just feels like another one of those "blah" years where we're 79-83 games over .500 and basically treading water.

1.409=Andruw Jones' new OPS

what got into Andruw Jones? note to Ozzie: it's okay to play Jones against RHP, thanks for listening

Ummm....no thanks, we had Corky Miller last season, that didn't last very long, predictably. Castro is a fine offensive catcher if healthy, and he's certainly far better than Lucy. That said, it's a nice opportunity for Donny. Here's hoping he takes advantage of it.

You also have to consider how mightily the Twins have struggled when Punto had to be the regular SS...offensively, he's just not a regular, at 2B, 3B, wherever you stick him, it creates a pretty big hole. Then finally covered it up with Orlando Cabrera for a half season. Hudson will really solidify 2B if he can stay healthy, although you have to be concerned about the back end of the pen more than anything at this moment. The left side of the infield and Rauch are the only weaknesses that are obvious with the current Twins' squad. Now with the Twins' offense these days, they can afford to have Punto/Harris in the line-up and not suffer too greatly. Surely the Twins would have won the division in 2008 and 2009 with Garza and Bartlett. They almost did without them. And Twins would have had a really nice infield had Bartlett stuck around and Alexi Casilla become the player it at one time looked he was capable of becoming.

Even today, we won, but it's that winning with a "gasp" or sigh of relief at the end because of a mistake made by our opponent. Usually, that's the way the Twins would beat us, unforced errors. There still continues to be something of a cloud over Jenks. He did get some of his pitches in the 95-96 MPH range, but he's just not as intimidating a presence as he once was...then again, he's better than any Indians reliever (except when they're pitching against us). It feels a heckuva lot better than being 1-5, that's all I know. Huge psychological lift before the team flight to HELL (aka Toronto). I'd be very happy with just winning 1/4 there and then taking 2/3 from the Indians at Progressive to even things up with them.

Rios has actually been hitting a lot of line drives and "at 'em" balls....last year, there was nothing positive to say about his average. Plus he had a homer and another big RBI double in a key situation, the bar's been set VERY low with what can make us encouraged.

That just earned the Kotsay/Jones Experiment another two weeks, until May 15th.

We do have at least 2 GIDP's that have scored runs, lol.

At least the 2007 season, we didn't tune out until about the halfway point. This year might set some records for lowest attendance in the decade. The only thing that will be intereresting is to see what our 25 man roster will be on Opening Day, 2011.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Apr 11, 2010 -> 12:48 PM) No reason to complain. It's still early in the season. I'm sure we'll come around. Mayne in June. I don't think starting 7 1/2 or 8 1/2 games back after 2 weeks will do much to build confidence in the fanbase. Minnesota hasn't even opened up their park yet. KW and Ozzie will have some explaining to do, as to why anything but the most sado-masochist White Sox fan would pay hard-earned money for this crap.

Konerko with the brain cramp, not cutting off the throw. Lots of confidence that our offense will counter in the bottom of the 3rd. NOT.

Here we go again. The Mark Buehrle that had a 6+ ERA against the Twins last year. Is it possible that the Twins might really beat us 14 out of our last 16 games? OUCH.

It wouldn't be April without Alexei hitting a buck fifty something... I think someone needs to do a little research and have updated comparisons of all the AL DH numbers...on the other hand, that might be too depressing. One can only take so much. The only way we get good numbers out of DH is sticking Quentin there...although I have a feeling Tyler Flowers might get the first shot at it before KW makes a trade.

Yes, Blackburn is RHP.

JJ Hardy with two early homers, has batted third in their line-up and he's bunting in the 2nd inning? Gardenhire makes even stranger decisions that Guillen sometimes.

QUOTE (fathom @ Apr 11, 2010 -> 12:25 PM) Kotsay really grinds the ball into the ground. The Kotsay experiment needs to end...it's sad he actually received a Major League contract. It's sad that we thought he was anything but the last player on the roster...I can't think of very many teams in the majors that would give him this prominent a role.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Apr 11, 2010 -> 12:23 PM) Why pitch to PK with an open base. Kotsay is up next. I'm sure Gardenhire will give very serious consideration to walking Konerko the next time in that same situation. It would have seemed crazy just then, but why wouldn't you do it?

Wow...Konerko with three homers and 7 RBI's already this season. What got into his Wheaties? At least one veteran hitter on our team showed up this season.

Now, can we actually get a hit with RISP and two outs? Seems like Rios is the only one to do it all season long...at least since the first game.