So, how do the Sox stack up against the Twins?

[Cerbaho-WG]

Blockhead Dave Campbell believes that the Twins still have the best rotation in the AL Central....but do they stack up to the Sox offense?

 

Let's compare!

 

Minnesota's #1 -- Brad Radke

Sox #1 -- Colon

 

Minnesota #2 -- Joe Mays

Sox #2 -- Buehrle

 

Minnesota #3 -- Eric Milton

Sox #3 -- Garland

 

Minnesota #4 -- Rick Reed

Sox #4 -- Wright

 

Minnestota #5 -- Kyle Lohse

Sox #5 -- Rauch

 

Advantage? Sox, easily. With Don Cooper now guiding the Sox pitching staff, expect Garland and Wright's ERAs to drop about .2 or .3 runs respectively.

 

 

--

 

Bullpens:

Sox:

Koch

Marte

Gordon

Wunsch

Glover

Almonte/Ginter/Porzio

 

Twins:

Fiore

Guardado

Hawkins

Romero

Santana

Rincon

 

One could essentially say that Koch, Marte and Guardado, Hawkins cancel each other out. Gordon, Glover, and Wunsch don't look too well compared to Fiore, Santana, and Romero. But, if Gordon converts back to his old self, Sox get the advantage. But, I say:

 

Adv: Twins

 

--

 

Lineup:

Sox:

2B Jimenez

SS Valentin

DH Thomas

RF Ordonez

1B Konerko

LF Lee

3B Crede

C Olivo

CF Rowand/Borchard

 

 

Twins:

LF Jacque Jones

SS Cristian Guzman

3B Corey Koskie

CF Torii Hunter

DH Matt LeCroy/Bobby Kielty

RF Mike Cuddyer

1B Doug Mientkiewicz

C A.J. Pierzynski

2B Luis Rivas

 

Too easy, the Twins O doesn't hold a candle to the Sox O. If Frank and C Lee take small steps to improve their game, 1000 runs cannot be ruled out.

 

Adv: Sox

 

Bench:

Twins:

 

C Prince

2B Hocking

OF Mohr

OF Kielty/Restovich

 

Sox:

 

C Alomar/Paul

Util Graffanino + Harris

OF Rios

 

Bench doesn't look like a strong point for the Sox; Twins bench was iffy as well.

 

Adv: Push

 

Intangibles:

 

Adv: Twins

 

 

Going to be close, but I honestly believe the Sox can take the Central this year.

[mac9001]

Pitching is kinda even.

 

Sox's are a WAY better offensive team.

 

Twins are better with the glove.

 

Overall: The Sox's offense separates them from the Twins. If we go 12-7 against the Twins i see a 95 win season and a 5 game lead over the Twins.

[cwsox]

Overall: The Sox's offense separates them from the Twins. If we go 12-7 against the Twins i see a 95 win season and a 5 game lead over the Twins.

10-5 over the twins and a ten game or more lead

[Chisoxfn]

I think our bullpen is better simply because I can't see Guardado duplicating what he did last season. He just isn't that good of a closer.

[mac9001]

Overall: The Sox's offense separates them from the Twins. If we go 12-7 against the Twins i see a 95 win season and a 5 game lead over the Twins.

10-5 over the twins and a ten game or more lead

We play the Twins 19 times, so 10-5 would be impossible. And 10 games is a lot, for that to happen the Sox's would need to have a real big hot streak.

[YASNY]

With KC, Detroit and now the Thome-less Tribe in this division, It might take 100 wins to win it. The Sox and Twins should both inflate their win total against these teams.

[Chisoxfn]

With KC, Detroit and now the Thome-less Tribe in this division, It might take 100 wins to win it.  The Sox and Twins should both inflate their win total against these teams.

The nice thing is, both teams should beat up on the crap teams and since they are in such a week division the wild card and division winner should come from the AL Central.

 

Of course the A's, Mariners, Red Sox and Angels are all very talented.

 

I don't include the Yanks in that, they are locks to win the division, although I hope I'm wrong.

[MurcieOne]

I think santana may be in the rotation.......

[Mr. Showtime]

The Sox always seems to have trouble with KC.

[CubKilla]

I think our bullpen is better simply because I can't see Guardado duplicating what he did last season.  He just isn't that good of a closer.

I'm hoping Guardado comes down with the same "save ailment" that plagued Bobby Thigpen after he set the MLB single season saves record.

[mac9001]

The Sox always seems to have trouble with KC.

Yeah, but KC is a AAA team this year. We should be somthing like 15-4 vs. them this season.

[witesoxfan]

Killa...I don't think he has to. He is a similar pitcher to Koch...he throws a bunch of straight s***. Every once in a while, he'll drop his arm angle to fool the hitter, and sometimes it works. However, I remember watching Guardado nearly blow a ton of games last year....he is a shaky closer, at best, and was lucky as hell to save 35 games, let alone the 46 or so that he did save.

 

Koch can get by with throwing the straight s***(though he states that he has 4 pitches....LMAO). He can throw it 98 or so and on a good night get it up to 100....Guardado is lucky as hell if he can hit 95. It's a hell of a lot easier to catch up to a 95 MPH fastball than it is 100 MPH fastball.

 

I don't believe the Twins have the intangibles....this team will take on a 2000-like attitude. You got a bunch of young kids who've got talent with Jose Valentin at SS....that was a hell of a good mix in 2000, and I think it will be in 2003 as well. Our starting rotation is better, our bullpen is just as good, if not better, and our lineup is much better. The only thing they have on us is defense, and defense alone doesn't win the division, especially when one other team has the advantage in starting, relieving and hitting. With the obvious signs that we want to win and us not getting raped in a trade, I think we'll be very good.

 

If you want a sleeper team to go all the way, I'd actually pick the Sox. We have a very durable rotation, with 4 guys that threw 190 innings last year including two who threw 220 and won atleast 19 games. We can get by with Rauch sucking this year...but I don't think he will. I am already excited for September to come around...and it's only January. God I hope I can talk my parents into buying a package that I can get nearly all the Sox games. I don't want to have to watch the goddamn Twins all the time.

[witesoxfan]

The Sox always seems to have trouble with KC.

Yeah, but KC is a AAA team this year. We should be somthing like 15-4 vs. them this season.

Well then I guess they have a pretty good prospect in Mike Sweeney

[Chisoxfn]

I don't even think Guardado hits 95, more like 92. The guy doesn't have good stuff and he's pretty old, coming out of nowhere.

 

I think of it as a career year, one that he will never ever get close to reaching.

[doubleM23]

I think predicting the Twins is too tricky because I can see them winning 90-100 games next year.... I can also see them losing 80-90 games, too, and I wouldn't be overly surprised if either happened. They won 95 games last year with down years from a couple of their top starters like Mays and Radke. If those guys come back, I don't see the Sox being able to dethrone them; but if the Twins continue to struggle with their pitching I can see the Sox running away with the division.

 

That, and the Twins play fundamental baseball, the Sox just suck at the basics of the game, and that can make a difference in determing who gets to hang a banner in their park next April.

[Mr. Showtime]

They won 95 games last year with down years from a couple of their top starters like Mays and Radke.

True, but other guys had "career years" that stepped up for Radke and Mays. So if Radke and Mays comeback to form, we don't know if those players will have the same years.

 

Fact of the matter is this, Sox have to hit. Buehrle and Colon have to stay healthy all year, and the Sox must beat the Twins in the head-to-head games. Those things happen, and it's the Sox walking out with the banner.

[witesoxfan]

I don't even think Guardado hits 95, more like 92.  The guy doesn't have good stuff and he's pretty old, coming out of nowhere.

 

I think of it as a career year, one that he will never ever get close to reaching.

On a good day he hits 95....he normally does hit 92-93 or so.....he changes speeds every once in a while, but that hasn't fooled Frank over their careers...what is Frank, like a .700 hitter against Guaradado?

 

That reminds me....there were 4 games off the top of my head that the Twins won very luckily last year....the game where the Sox lost 5-4 or something and the infamous "f*** off" yelling from AJ Pierzynski after Maggs popped up to end the game....Frank hit a screamer right to Jones in left, and if that is 2 feet to the left or to the right, it scores two runs and the Sox tie it up, and it would have most likely gone to extras. There was another game where the Royals had it all but wrapped up, Jones hit a weak grounder to Neifi Perez, he botched it, Jones reached, he eventually scored and the Twins won in extras.

 

And then there were those two Bobby Kielty homers in the last series of the year...for all I care, Kielty can go f*** himself. That son of a b**** is a pest. He hit a homer off Ritchie on a 3-0 count...that kind of s*** pisses me off. I hope Kielty blows ass this year for the Twins....hits like .240 with 5 homers and 30 RBI in like 100 games...that would be sweet as hell.

 

If the Twins lose 3 of those 4 games, then they are a 91 win team(as they won 94 games last year....they won the division by 13.5 going 94-67...come on guys, brush up on your facts! ) and we are an 84 win team....there's a big difference between 94 and 81 wins and 91 and 84 wins....a very, very large difference.

 

And for my wish going into the season....I hope someone, preferably Jose or Thomas or Maggs, hits a two run homer in the bottom of the 8th that puts us up by 1, and then Koch closes it down...and then the next night, the exact same thing happens. We'll see what the Twins like when we shove that up their ass.

 

And then I wish we win the division!

[Chisoxfn]

Kielty is the guy on the Twins I'd love to acquire as an outfielder. I mentioned him last year. THe guy came up with umpteen big hits and plays good defense.

 

I love the Twins outfield. I hope that was ranked as one of the best in the majors, it should of been.

[witesoxfan]

Kielty is the guy on the Twins I'd love to acquire as an outfielder.  I mentioned him last year.  THe guy came up with umpteen big hits and plays good defense. 

 

I love the Twins outfield.  I hope that was ranked as one of the best in the majors, it should of been.

It was like 6th best....they have a ton of f***ing depth in the outfield...they have Hunter, Jones, Kielty, Mohr, Cuddyer, Restovich, and someone else(I'm sure Cerb could help you out)....they have atleast 7 pretty good outfielders in their entire system. Their depth is the only thing that scares me....I'm almost sure that we will win the division....the old adage is good pitching beats good hitting....and we have good pitching. What I'm wondering is what good pitching AND good hitting beat.

[Guest hotsoxchick1]

face facts here for a minute guys... if we cant figure out how to beat the twinkies in the baggiedome then we are f***ed.........and if we cant figure out how to beat them in our own house we are f***ed..........our big down fall last season was the twinkies and the other teams in our division.. dont think by just adding colon and koch that it changes anything.....or makes us that much better.... we still have the same fielders, lineup and such........so please be realistic........the tribe sucked last year and lost a few of their bats.. now without thome this year they may or may not suck... they always find a way to give us a hard enough time reguardless who they put on the field.......and dont sell kc short either... sure they suck but guess what.... we didnt do so hot against them the past two seasons.......the only team im really not worried that much about in our division is detroit.. and of course the rocked us a few times last season but not enough to leave a lasting impression on me..............we have got to get alot of s*** together before i would say we have the division locked and ours for the taking..........just making you guys try to think outside the box for a minute.........

[doubleM23]

Uh, the lineup that we virtually return intact scored the 3rd most runs in the American League. No, we don't have a complete team, but we did just shore up a big weakness.

 

I can't understand why you seem to hate this deal so much, but yet you vehemently defend picking up Sandy Alomar, Jr. Maybe Kenny's just not as stupid as you believe?

[CSF]

Everybody remember one thing: The Twins played the entire season on 2 key factors: Adrenaline & Momentum. With the prospect of the team being contracted, the players literally played for their jobs, & their fans responded in tow. Yes, the Twins are more of a fundamental team than the Sox, but, they are also prone to error as well. This year should be different, we have a new baserunning coach (Santana, also 1B coach), new 3B coach (Kimm), & hopefully that itself will make a difference. Don Cooper seems to have the pitching staff's collective heads on straight, while trying to undo the s*** that Nardi f***ed up. I also believe alot of the Twins had career years, & last year some of them (Mintkiewicz, Koskie, Guzman) struggled at many points of the year. Who we really need to focus on against the Twins are the players like Rivas, who for some reason had our number constantly, & while we may have solved Joe Mays, we really, really, really need to solve Kyle Loshe, who looked like Greg Maddux every time he pitched against us. Radke and Milton are beatable, & that pen can't do that s*** back to back years, & I agree, Guardado had a career year, if he gets 30 saves this year, I'll be suprised. This division is ours for the taking, the Sox just have to remain focused, if they do so, they can run away with it.

[witesoxfan]

face facts here for a minute guys... if we cant figure out how to beat the twinkies in the baggiedome then we are f***ed.........and if we cant figure out how to beat them in our own house we are f***ed..........our big down fall last season was the twinkies and the other teams in our division.. dont think by just adding colon and koch that it changes anything.....or makes us that much better.... we still have the same fielders, lineup and such........so please be realistic........the tribe sucked last year and lost  a few of their  bats.. now without thome this year they may  or may not suck... they always find a way to give us a hard enough time reguardless who they put on the field.......and dont sell kc short either... sure they suck but guess what.... we didnt do so hot against them the past two seasons.......the only team im really not worried that much about in our division is detroit.. and of course the rocked us a few times last season but not enough to leave a lasting impression on me..............we have got to get alot of s*** together before i would say we have the division locked and ours for the taking..........just making you guys try to think outside the box for a minute.........

HSC....we really don't have the same fielders and lineup we had last season. For atleast half the year, we had Lofton, Durham and Clayton(along with Alomar, but he's coming back)...we then had Rowand in CF for Lofton, Jimenez and Harris in at 2B for Durham and Valentin back at SS for Clayton....MJ and Paul were a formidable catching platoon for 2 months and Crede then replaced the vacant 3B job left by Jose once he moved back to SS. We started clicking as a team then and we played very, very good baseball over the last two months of the year.

 

Also....we had a rotation of Buehrle, Garland, Wright, Ritchie and Glover for much of the year last year. Thisis with Garland and Wright still developing as pitchers and two very s***ty pitchers in Ritchie and Glover as starters....this year, we add Colon and Rauch to the mix, along with a matured Wright and Garland, and their ERA was going to drop just because of Don Cooper, and will drop more with experience. This year, we have a rotation of Colon, Buehrle, Garland, Wright and Rauch....if you tell me that that rotation isn't a huge improvement over last year's, then I'll have to call you crazy.

 

The bullpen won't improve that much. We'll have Koch, who is as good as Foulke is, regardless of what the stats say. Marte will pitch just as well, and Glover will as well. We'll have Wunsch, who will be coming back at 100% from his surgery. We will then have Almonte(my preference) or Ginter or Munoz or someone else....whoever it is is a good arm in the bullpen. I'm hoping that Almonte wins the job out of ST....he's a very good pitcher and has shown it in the minor leagues. We've been waiting a couple years for this kid to come up...let's see what he's got.

 

The best of the worst is KC....Cleveland is going all young and will suck...and we really did hand it to them last year. We must have won atleast 10-12 games against them last year, and we played them for about 6 games in a stretch where we were really sucking badly. We were the team that swept them after they started out 11-1...we were the team that put them in their grave, threw the dirt on them and and put up their tombstone. They were done after that. We then took 3 of 4 from them in the next series. We dominated them early on and ended up with a decent record against them. KC is the only team that scares me in the AL Central, aside from the Twins of course. They don't have a good offense, but they have a bunch of quick playes and Tony Pena likes to steal bases. Their pitching is mediocre, but it looks like it could be get hot and win a big stretch of ballgames....was it them that won 9 games in a row last year? I think so....it just shows that any team can and will get hot at any given point and play the unbeatable team in the league. I think KC will play a major role in who wins the Central.

[doubleM23]

Everybody remember one thing: The Twins played the entire season on 2 key factors: Adrenaline & Momentum.  With the prospect of the team being contracted, the players literally played for their jobs, & their fans responded in tow.  Yes, the Twins are more of a fundamental team than the Sox, but, they are also prone to error as well.  This year should be different, we have a new baserunning coach (Santana, also 1B coach), new 3B coach (Kimm), & hopefully that itself will make a difference.  Don Cooper seems to have the pitching staff's collective heads on straight, while trying to undo the s*** that Nardi f***ed up.  I also believe alot of the Twins had career years, & last year some of them (Mintkiewicz, Koskie, Guzman) struggled at many points of the year.  Who we really need to focus on against the Twins are the players like Rivas, who for some reason had our number constantly, & while we may have solved Joe Mays, we really, really, really need to solve Kyle Loshe, who looked like Greg Maddux every time he pitched against us. Radke and Milton are beatable, & that pen can't do that s*** back to back years, & I agree, Guardado had a career year, if he gets 30 saves this year, I'll be suprised.  This division is ours for the taking, the Sox just have to remain focused, if they do so, they can run away with it.

Played for their jobs? Trust me, I'd want pretty much any one of their guys on the Sox. Don't cry over the Twins, they'd find work (probably for a less asshole of an owner).

 

Anyone who automatically thinks we can run away with this division is doing something VERY stupid by overlooking a very solid team. We can beat them, but it is far from a guarantee.

[CSF]

Everybody remember one thing: The Twins played the entire season on 2 key factors: Adrenaline & Momentum.  With the prospect of the team being contracted, the players literally played for their jobs, & their fans responded in tow.  Yes, the Twins are more of a fundamental team than the Sox, but, they are also prone to error as well.  This year should be different, we have a new baserunning coach (Santana, also 1B coach), new 3B coach (Kimm), & hopefully that itself will make a difference.  Don Cooper seems to have the pitching staff's collective heads on straight, while trying to undo the s*** that Nardi f***ed up.  I also believe alot of the Twins had career years, & last year some of them (Mintkiewicz, Koskie, Guzman) struggled at many points of the year.  Who we really need to focus on against the Twins are the players like Rivas, who for some reason had our number constantly, & while we may have solved Joe Mays, we really, really, really need to solve Kyle Loshe, who looked like Greg Maddux every time he pitched against us. Radke and Milton are beatable, & that pen can't do that s*** back to back years, & I agree, Guardado had a career year, if he gets 30 saves this year, I'll be suprised.  This division is ours for the taking, the Sox just have to remain focused, if they do so, they can run away with it.

Played for their jobs? Trust me, I'd want pretty much any one of their guys on the Sox. Don't cry over the Twins, they'd find work (probably for a less asshole of an owner).

 

Anyone who automatically thinks we can run away with this division is doing something VERY stupid by overlooking a very solid team. We can beat them, but it is far from a guarantee.

True, but they can't play with that same emotion back to back years. We walked into last season with alot of question marks, while they were pretty solid top to bottom. Believe me, I would definitely not underestimate the Twins, but those question marks we had last year, I feel pretty confident we answered them the 2nd half of last year, during the early parts of the winter meetings, & just this past Wednsday. The ball is in the Sox' court. So, while not underestimating the Twins, I really like our chances of running away with this division.