AaronGleeman.com

2008-05-09T02:36:00.002-05:00

Link-O-Rama

Finally, an in-depth breakdown of Win Probability Added from the one-game playoff in Major League.

In this case, batting 6-for-100 is pretty damn impressive.

Alex Belth asked 55 "historians, biographers, columnists, beat writers, screenwriters, novelists" for a list of 10 "essential baseball books" and I'm in complete agreement with the most popular pick.

As a Julio Franco fan it saddens me that he couldn't quite make it to his goal of playing in the majors as a 50-year-old, but he did manage to put off retirement until three years after one of my columns at The Hardball Times marveled at how well the "old man" was playing. One of my favorite Franco facts is that he was the featured prospect in a five-player trade package for Von Hayes a month before my birth.

Hopefully my all-time favorite announcer is just as willing to put off retirement.

Former Official Fantasy Girl of AG.com Elisha Cuthbert celebrated checking another name off her list of NHL players to date by wearing a different bikini every day this week.

As a rare straight, male John Mayer fan, I've long wondered about his song-writing process:

Seems like a lot more work than I'd imagined. "Thanks, Kristen Bell!"

Randy Moss was photographed taking snaps under center recently in what serves as a convincing argument against the shotgun formation.

Not only did Buzz Bissinger agree to chat with one of those nasty things that he despises so much, he actually came across as legitimately contrite about his appearance on Costas Now. Of course, you might be too after making a fool of yourself on national television.

Michael Schur/Ken Tremendous/Mose Schrute appeared on a podcast recently to discuss blogs, baseball, Bissinger, The Office, neck beards, and his television cousin. It's an hour very well spent.

Patrick Reusse's most recent column carried a sky-is-falling "Who'll gather news when internet is all that there is?" headline and the Minneapolis Star Tribune's resident blog-hating curmudgeon spent most of the piece talking about how great it was working at newspapers in the good old days, before finishing with what is now a familiar refrain:

And don't kid yourself: A doesn't-cost-a-nickel, stand-alone Internet site is not going to have the quality of resources the Star Tribune has mustered for a rich sports section that lands on a doorstep.

Why would a "stand-alone internet site" that "doesn't cost a nickel" be expected to compete with a huge company employing a staff of hundreds? And exactly who suggested that it could, other than the poor strawman that Reusse has decided to pummel? A one-man, no-budget site isn't even in competition with newspapers, but why can't the growing number of well-staffed sites that cost more than a nickel produce "newspaper-style" content and reporting? Because the words don't rub off on your fingers?

The fact that the Star Tribune "lands on a doorstep" means nothing to me and a rapidly growing part of the population, yet old-school writers like Reusse continue to assume that content appearing as ink on a page automatically makes it special. Meanwhile, Reusse's latest pro-newspaper, anti-internet piece never would have found my eyes in the first place if it weren't available on the Star Tribune's website. Good content is good content as ink or pixels, and that's not a winnable fight for guys like Reusse.

Reusse probably won't read it because it's not going to land on his doorstep, but his longtime Star Tribune colleague Steve Aschburner offered an even-handed response to his column on the same day that it was published, showing off the advantage of immediacy that comes with not having to hand deliver content after printing it on a page. Aschburner called Reusse's piece an "unprovoked defense" of newspapers and added that it "read like someone protesting too much" before concluding:

Contrary to Reusse's claim, a "doesn't-cost-a-nickel, stand-alone Internet site" can offer a high percentage of the stuff that matters most to sports fans: Analysis, speculation, predictions, opinion. It might not be the first to tell you about a rumored free-agent target or a sordid Lake Minnetonka boat cruise, but it can pile on soon thereafter with the best of them.

One more thing: If the worst-case scenario for journalism happened and all newspapers succumbed tomorrow, the thing that the culture and a democratic society would miss most � whether it realized it quickly or not � would be the hard news, the investigative reporting and the watchdog journalism. The lack of proper funding and institutional muscle to cover the competition at right cornerback when the Vikings open training camp in July wouldn't be, by comparison, much of a problem at all.

When landing on a doorstep each morning ceases being a major selling point, then newspapers must compete with everything else in the vast universe of "content," because the Star Tribune's "rich sports section" simply shows up on my computer screen exactly the same way that ESPN.com or MLB.com or MinnPost does. Taking the method of content delivery out of the equation makes it a whole different ball game and people like Reusse don't seem interested in playing.

On a related note, the Star Tribune may be in financial trouble while hemorrhaging print readership.

On this week's NBCSports.com "Fantasy Fix" show, Tiffany Simons chats with me about unheralded players who make for nice fantasy pickups, including Kevin Slowey:

Slowey returned from the disabled list yesterday afternoon and cruised through four scoreless innings before serving up a pair of homers in the fifth frame.

Unfortunately, Slowey losing yesterday's game took a backseat to Pat Neshek suffering what may be a serious elbow injury. Hearing words like "snap" and "pop" associated with what he felt suggest that surgery may be in Neshek's future, but hopefully he can avoid going under the knife. Good luck, Pat.

Chris Needham has been blogging about the Nationals since before they were even the Nationals, but decided to hang up the keyboard this week over at Capitol Punishment, saying: "It's time to move on." I've never been especially interested in the Nationals, but still made sure to check out Needham's blog on a regular basis, which is one of the best compliments that a team-specific blogger can receive. Thanks for all the hard work and good writing, Chris.

In light of Needham's retirement, Craig Calcaterra dug up an old Slate article that surveyed the "Best of the Baseball Blogosphere" back in 2004 and looked at what has happened to the sites since then. Of the 21 blogs featured by Slate four years ago, 13 are still alive today. Amazingly, not only were there four Twins blogs among the 21 named in 2004, all four of them are still going strong. Per capita, no fan base has been better represented by bloggers than Twins fans.

Finally, in honor of Franco calling it quits this week's AG.com-approved music video is Neil Young doing a live version of "Old Man":

Once you're done here, check out my latest "Daily Dose" column over at Rotoworld.

2008-05-08T02:45:00.005-05:00

Go-Go Cycle (Baseball is a Funny Game)

One night after Joe Mauer's double with two outs left saved them from being no-hit by a guy with a 5.61 career ERA, the same offense that ranked as the league's second-worst erupted for 13 runs on 16 hits (and four walks!) against Mark Buehrle, who had been 20-10 with a 3.69 ERA versus the Twins. As if that weren't enough, Carlos Gomez hit for the Twins' first cycle since Kirby Puckett in 1986, Nick Punto collected five RBIs, and Livan Hernandez took a shutout into the ninth inning.

And people wonder why I love baseball so much.

Gomez was hitting .230/.247/.310 prior to being benched for one game on April 23. In eight games since then he's gone 13-for-30 (.433) with two homers, five total extra-base hits, and four steals. He's now up to .282/.306/.427 in 28 games overall, which along with excellent work on the bases and strong defense in center field is enough to make up for a hideous 29-to-3 strikeout-to-walk ratio. And to think, just a couple weeks ago some idiot wrote that Gomez "isn't an MLB-caliber hitter."

That same moron has repeatedly suggested that the Twins made a mistake by signing Hernandez, but after last night's complete-game win he's 5-1 with a 3.83 ERA overall and 5-0 with a 2.76 ERA if you look past his brutal start against the Rangers on April 27. Oh, and the Twins are in sole possession of first place at 17-15, although to be fair to the aforementioned doofus he did predict back in March that the team would have a winning record when many others had them pegged for last place.

Unfortunately, that's it from me today and you have my apologies for the relative lack of content here this week. Between Rotoworld player news guru Matthew Pouliot taking a quasi-vacation and the annual Rotoworld Football Draft Guide being due at the publisher, I've been swamped with stuff that sadly has kept me from blogging when the Twins are doing things that deserve to be blogged about. Everything should be back to normal here next week and surely Gomez has a few more cycles in him this season.

Once you're done here, check out my latest "Daily Dose" column over at Rotoworld.

2008-05-07T02:37:00.012-05:00

Stat of the Day: Outside Swing Percentage

Fan Graphs tracks a new stat called Outside Swing Percentage, which is defined as "the percentage of pitches a batter swings at that are outside the strike zone." So far this year Vladimir Guerrero has the league's highest Outside Swing Percentage at 43.8 and Jason Giambi has the lowest at 9.2, while the MLB average over the past three seasons has been 22.9. Here's how the Twins' hitters stack up when it comes to swinging at pitches outside the strike zone.

                     OS%
Carlos Gomez        38.3
Delmon Young        36.2
Michael Cuddyer     30.4
Craig Monroe        29.9
Mike Lamb           27.0
Brendan Harris      25.1
Justin Morneau      24.2
MLB AVERAGE         22.9
Jason Kubel         21.4
Matt Tolbert        20.0
Joe Mauer           16.9
Nick Punto          16.2

Just four of the 11 hitters who've come to the plate at least 40 times for the Twins this year have swung at a lower percentage of pitches outside the strike zone than the MLB average. Among all American League hitters with enough plate appearances to qualify for the batting title, only Guerrero (43.8) and A.J. Pierzynski (38.4) have a higher Outside Swing Percentage than Carlos Gomez (38.3) and Delmon Young (36.2).

At the opposite end of the spectrum, among batting-title qualifiers Joe Mauer (16.9) is the lone Twins hitter with an Outside Swing Percentage under 20.0. Meanwhile, the AL's other 13 teams boast a total of 33 such hitters for an average of 2.5 per team. Talk of "plate discipline" often refers to drawing walks and the Twins have fewer free passes than any team in baseball by a wide margin, but Outside Swing Percentage breaks that down even further and shows an incredibly impatient, undisciplined offense.

Oh, and the Outside Swing Percentage numbers shown above are from before the team's non-Mauer hitters went 0-for-26 with one walk against Gavin Floyd and the White Sox last night. After watching Mauer narrowly save the Twins from being no-hit by Floyd, acting manager Scott Ullger summed up an offense that ranks second-to-last in runs: "I thought the umpire might have had a tight strike zone and we just didn't allow him to walk us."

Once you're done here, check out my latest "Daily Dose" column over at Rotoworld.

2008-05-06T00:24:00.002-05:00

WPA Through April

Win Probability Added (WPA) measures how much impact specific plays had on the outcome of each game and assigns that value to the individual players responsible. For example, hitting a grand slam in the seventh inning when the score is already 10-2 has less WPA value than drawing a walk to lead off the ninth inning of a 2-2 game. The grand slam didn't have much impact on the likely outcome of the game, whereas the walk had a major impact on each team's chances of winning.

There are much better and longer explanations of WPA than that one, of course. If you're interested in learning more about it, Dave Studeman's WPA primer at The Hardball Times is a good place to start, and both Fan Graphs and Baseball-Reference.com offer tons of information on the subject. It's far from a perfect stat and is not meant to definitively prove how valuable each player has been, but WPA is an interesting tool to use in looking back at what has already taken place.

It's important to note than WPA doesn't measure any defensive contributions, which means that strong defenders don't receive full credit for their value. Beyond that, WPA doesn't place offensive contributions in the context of position, so an .850 OPS from a catcher or shortstop is treated the same as an .850 OPS from a designated hitter or left fielder. There's nothing that can be done about measuring defense via WPA, but it's relatively easy to put the numbers in better context by using positional adjustments.

With the help of Fan Graphs creator David Appelman, I've taken the Twins' raw WPA totals for April and adjusted them based on the MLB average at each position. Most adjustments are minimal, but starters are given a boost relative to relievers and hitters who play up-the-middle positions are given a boost relative to hitters who man corner spots. The end result is a sort of adjusted WPA (adjWPA), but before getting to that let's first take a look at the raw totals through April 30:

HITTERS                PA      AVG      OBP      SLG      WPA
Justin Morneau        110     .268     .345     .495     0.63
Joe Mauer              99     .295     .357     .386     0.12
Craig Monroe           50     .255     .300     .426     0.10
Brian Buscher           9     .250     .333     .375    -0.01
Matt Tolbert           54     .300     .340     .360    -0.04
Delmon Young          108     .265     .306     .314    -0.10
Denard Span            34     .258     .324     .258    -0.11
Jason Kubel           101     .237     .257     .381    -0.24
Brendan Harris         99     .287     .337     .379    -0.25
Adam Everett           29     .185     .214     .222    -0.26
Mike Lamb              84     .205     .226     .282    -0.28
Carlos Gomez          104     .265     .279     .373    -0.34
Nick Punto             44     .250     .318     .250    -0.36
Mike Redmond           14     .154     .214     .231    -0.41
Michael Cuddyer        40     .297     .350     .405    -0.47

As you can see, the offensive totals for April weren't pretty. Only Justin Morneau, Joe Mauer, and Craig Monroe provided a positive WPA--with only Morneau significantly above average--and the team as a whole batted just .260/.305/.362 while racking up -2.00 WPA. Seeing Morneau atop the list isn't news, but it's surprising to see Michael Cuddyer at the bottom given that he missed over half the month with a finger injury and hit a decent enough .297/.350/.405 when he did play.

Cuddyer's low WPA basically comes from two games (April 3 and April 25) in which he combined to go 1-for-10 while leaving 12 runners on base. He had -0.58 WPA between those two games, but 0.11 for the rest of the month. Monroe is the opposite, because on April 22 against the A's he went 3-for-4 with three RBIs, including the game-tying homer, producing enough WPA (0.32) to leave him as a positive contributor for April despite going 9-for-43 (.209) while accumulating -0.22 WPA the rest of the month.

I've heard it said that Carlos Gomez's overall struggles in April were lessened by his "single-handedly" winning games. While hyperbolic, that's actually true to some extent given that Gomez had four games with at least 0.10 WPA. To put that in some context, Morneau totaled six such games in April despite a vastly superior overall WPA. However, along with four huge games Gomez also had six games with WPA worse than -0.10. He was either very good or very bad, and the end result was -0.34 WPA.

PITCHERS               PA      AVG      OBP      SLG      WPA
Joe Nathan             43     .220     .256     .317     1.21
Nick Blackburn        159     .315     .350     .416     0.87
Dennys Reyes           30     .143     .200     .179     0.65
Scott Baker           122     .256     .287     .436     0.41
Boof Bonser           151     .250     .293     .379     0.29
Pat Neshek             48     .209     .255     .395     0.04
Bobby Korecky          11     .250     .455     .250     0.00
Matt Guerrier          65     .288     .354     .441    -0.07
Brian Bass             80     .288     .350     .575    -0.16
Kevin Slowey           14     .286     .286     .643    -0.16
Juan Rincon            41     .243     .317     .432    -0.19
Livan Hernandez       154     .310     .338     .490    -0.28
Jesse Crain            34     .226     .294     .484    -0.43
Francisco Liriano      56     .366     .509     .415    -0.67

Twins hitters combined for -2.00 WPA in April, but the pitching staff nearly balanced that with 1.50 WPA. Taken together that equals -0.50 WPA or a half-win below average, which is what the Twins were by going 13-14 in April. Joe Nathan led the way by converting 9-of-9 save chances with an 0.82 ERA in primarily big-pressure, high-leverage situations. Dennys Reyes was almost flawless, throwing nine scoreless innings while allowing just one of a dozen inherited runners to score.

However, Reyes totaled "only" 0.65 WPA because he faced 30 percent fewer hitters than Nathan and worked in spots that weren't quite as crucial. Pat Neshek also worked in high-leverage situations and held batters to .209/.255/.395, but had two disastrous appearances, totaling -0.45 WPA on April 7 and -0.54 WPA on April 14. Aside from those two games his WPA for April was a Nathan-like 1.03, but the value of WPA is that what you do in crucial situations has a huge impact.

Relievers were the Twins' strength in April, as the bullpen combined for a 3.54 ERA and 1.06 WPA over 84 innings. The rotation was more of a mixed bag, although as a whole the starters posted 0.45 WPA. Nick Blackburn was fantastic at 0.87, and both Scott Baker (0.41) and Boof Bonser (0.29) checked in solidly above average, but Livan Hernandez was well below average at -0.28 and Francisco Liriano was a mess at -0.67.

After looking at the Twins' raw WPA totals through April 30, let's switch to the adjusted numbers once each player is compared to the MLB average at their respective position. In other words, Morneau is compared to first basemen, Mauer is compared to catchers, Blackburn is compared to starters, and Nathan is compared to relievers. Positional adjustments don't cause any huge shifts yet because of the limited number of games and plate appearances involved, but there are some changes:

                      adjWPA                              adjWPA
Joe Nathan            + 1.17        Matt Tolbert          - 0.03
Nick Blackburn        + 0.92        Matt Guerrier         - 0.13
Dennys Reyes          + 0.62        Kevin Slowey          - 0.16
Justin Morneau        + 0.45        Denard Span           - 0.16
Scott Baker           + 0.45        Delmon Young          - 0.21
Joe Mauer             + 0.34        Livan Hernandez       - 0.23
Boof Bonser           + 0.34        Juan Rincon           - 0.23
Craig Monroe          + 0.04        Brendan Harris        - 0.24
Pat Neshek              0.00        Brian Bass            - 0.24
Brian Buscher           0.00        Adam Everett          - 0.25
Bobby Korecky           0.00        Carlos Gomez          - 0.31
                                    Nick Punto            - 0.34
                                    Mike Lamb             - 0.35
                                    Jason Kubel           - 0.37
                                    Mike Redmond          - 0.38
                                    Jesse Crain           - 0.46
                                    Michael Cuddyer       - 0.53
                                    Francisco Liriano     - 0.65

Once positional adjustments are made only eight Twins ended April with positive WPA, which is a low total even considering the team's 13-14 record. Nathan, Blackburn, and Reyes led the top-heavy WPA distribution, while Morneau and Mauer were the lone hitters to contribute significantly above average for their position. Beginning May with a three-game winning streak has quickly changed the WPA picture, but this was the first of my planned month-by-month looks at WPA throughout the season.

Once you're done here, check out my latest "Daily Dose" column over at Rotoworld.

2008-05-02T01:10:00.002-05:00

Link-O-Rama

If you don't have HBO and haven't seen the video online yet, do yourself a big favor and watch Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter and Friday Night Lights author Buzz Bissinger make an absolute fool of himself by verbally attacking Deadspin editor Will Leitch during a roundtable "discussion" about blogging on Costas Now. The full-length version of the 20-minute train wreck is definitely worth watching, but here's perhaps the most relevant clip:

My thoughts on the subject could redefine Gleeman-length, but the video pretty much speaks for itself and some of my favorite writers have already weighed in on the topic, so check out Bissinger-related takes from Alan Sepinwall of the Newark Star Ledger, Michael David Smith of AOL Fanhouse, Joe Posnanski of the Kansas City Star, Jason McIntyre of The Big Lead, King Kaufman of Salon, and Jon Weisman of Dodger Thoughts.

Leitch recovered from the experience to pen a well-done postmortem piece hours after the taping, and Jason Whitlock of FOXSports.com and Ken Tremendous of Fire Joe Morgan also wrote interesting takes after being involved in the show. Bissinger surely got high fives backstage and congratulatory phone calls from fellow old-school media types, but to me he just looked like an angry, bitter, out of touch man who unknowingly made a great case for why blogs are thriving and newspapers aren't.

On a related note, my MinnPost colleague David Brauer reports that the Minneapolis Star Tribune's circulation declined seven percent over the past year and has dipped a total of 10 percent over the past 18 months. Given the overall state of the newspaper industry that's certainly not shocking, although the Star Tribune's decline is the sixth-largest in the country among major newspapers. Meanwhile, the St. Paul Pioneer Press essentially holding steady during that same stretch is definitely surprising.

I haven't read either newspaper's print edition regularly in years, but frequent the Star Tribune's website daily. Doing the same with the Pioneer Press' website is tough, because the layout is awful and most articles vanish within days, making linking to content nearly impossible. For a newspaper to make life difficult on people who'd like to read and link to stories online is inexplicable at this stage of the game, and I'd be curious to see a comparison of online readership in addition to print circulation.

Based on personal experience, my guess is the Star Tribune dominates online even more than in print (where Brauer notes they still hold a 2-to-1 edge). Phil Miller is a nice, smart guy who does a good job as Twins beat writer in St. Paul, but LaVelle E. Neal III and Joe Christensen will continue to dominate the links here until the Pioneer Press' website ceases being a mess. Also of note (to me at least) is that Rotoworld's daily readership is now within 10 percent of the Pioneer Press' print circulation.

As someone who spent several hundred summer afternoons mimicking entire lineups while playing home run derby growing up, this guy's eclectic mix of batting-stance impressions and attention to detail were very impressive and oddly fascinating:

My favorite was Willie McGee.

It was a good week for Keeley Hazell's longstanding and increasingly convincing Official Fantasy Girl of AG.com campaign, although as usual anyone at work may want to think twice about clicking those links. She even put out a music video that's pretty damn good if you watch it with the sound muted.

If you missed it earlier this week, check out my in-studio appearance on FOX's "Sports on Demand" show with Jim Rich and Seth Kaplan. And if for some insane reason you're hungry for more of me on video, check out my picks for April fantasy awards on NBCSports.com's "Fantasy Fix" show with Tiffany Simons and Gregg Rosenthal.

Quote of the Week: "She is fully aware of the potential of her body."

Between the multiple mentions in this space and this news, Lori Loughlin is on a role lately.

I've intentionally avoided any hint of politics here over the years, but it's probably worth making an exception when the Dilated Peoples provide the soundtrack to Barack Obama basketball highlights:

His court vision and passing are actually pretty impressive. Seriously.

As a rare straight, male John Mayer fan whose blog traffic has benefited greatly over the years from Jennifer Aniston, they have my blessing.

Can you imagine living in a world where Avery Johnson loses his job after going 194-70 (.735) and Mike D'Antoni possibly moves on after going 267-172 (.608), all while Randy Wittman keeps his gig after going 96-192 (.333)?

One of my rules is that whenever the original Official Fantasy Girl of AG.com poses with a current OFGoAG.com candidate, it gets a link.

The following "Point of View: Guy Stuck in Class" video is sadly a fairly accurate representation of my illustrious college career:

Four years of that definitely prepared me for a life of blogging.

Even local television weathermen can't contain their air-quote making excitement about Jared Allen.

Rotoworld rookie Drew Silva is showing an awful lot of range with his new blog, One Droo Hill. A look at the front page reveals entries about Peyton Manning, Kim Kardashian, and Kosuke Fukudome, plus Silva live blogging an episode of The Hills.

Two more new(ish) blogs to check out: Down With Goldy and SoCalTwinsFan Musings.

Like me, Will Young's wife Laurie is fed up with the Twins' longtime lack of plate discipline. Unlike me, she's actually doing something about it that will help a worthwhile cause, raising money for the Susan G. Koman Three-Day Walk to benefit breast cancer awareness. I'll let her explain:

I'll walk 60 miles over the course of three days with other people in an effort to raise awareness and to find a cure for breast cancer. I've created a mini-program named "Walks for a Walker" to raise money for the walk. In this program, people are donating a certain amount of money for each Twins walk from the beginning of the season until August 1 (since the walk is in September).

So far the people are donating anywhere from 25 cents per walk to $1 per walk. I'm making this pretty painless for the people who want to donate in that I'm sending out monthly e-mails to each person who decides to be part of this program, letting them know how much they owe. Each donor has the option of donating money per month, at any point they want, or at the end of the "program."

For more information, please check out her blog, where you can pledge a donation and then have even more reason to hope that Carlos Gomez can learn some semblance of the strike zone.

In honor of Mrs. Young's "Walks for a Walker" fund-raising effort this week's AG.com-approved music video is James Taylor doing a live version of "Walking Man":

Once you're done here, check out my latest "Daily Dose" column over at Rotoworld.

2008-05-01T01:55:00.005-05:00

Twins Notes: Bunting For Hits and Letting It Fly

Carlos Gomez went 3-for-4 in yesterday's win over the White Sox, making him 7-for-15 with a homer, a double, and two steals since a one-game benching last week. He's already bunted for a hit eight times this year, which accounts for nearly one-third of his total hits and puts him on pace for 50. During Tuesday's broadcast Dick Bremer and Ron Coomer brushed aside a question about Gomez topping the all-time record for bunt hits in a season, which they said was 42 from Brett Butler in 1992.

Given their reaction to the topic my guess is they simply saw the huge total from Butler and assumed Gomez wasn't close to being on that sort of bunt-hitting pace. In reality, he's actually on track to top Butler's mark. According to Baseball Prospectus, since 1959 only Butler, Willy Taveras (38 in 2007), Kenny Lofton (31 in 1992), and Alex Sanchez (31 in 2003) have bunted for more than 30 hits in a year, so Gomez has a chance to make some history even if his pace slows considerably.

Twins fans might be surprised by Rod Carew's absence from the bunt-hitting leaders, but Baseball Prospectus' historical data shows that he never bunted for more than 30 hits in a season. However, despite Carew never producing a historic number of bunt hits in a single year, his 190 career bunt hits ranked fourth among all players from 1959-2007 and Dan Fox of Baseball Prospectus--who has since joined the Pirates' front office--awarded him the crown of "Best Bunter of the Past 40 Years."

Fox showed that among players who attempted to bunt for a hit at least 100 times from 1959-2007, Carew was the only one to be successful more than two-thirds of the time. Carew's success rate? An astounding 80 percent. To put that in some context, Butler, Lofton, and Otis Nixon were the only three players to have more bunt hits than Carew from 1959-2007 and their success rates were 51, 59, and 46 percent, respectively. So far, Gomez has successfully bunted for a hit on 53 percent of his attempts.

Francisco Liriano made his first post-demotion start yesterday afternoon at Triple-A and struggled, allowing four runs without getting out of the fifth inning. Liriano was chased from the game with the bases loaded and one out in the fifth frame, but reliever Ricky Barrett kept his final line from being even uglier by wriggling out of the jam without any further damage. Liriano needed 94 pitches to record 13 outs and just 54 percent of his offerings went for strikes.

He walked five and allowed five hits, including a homer to Jeff Bailey, a 29-year-old veteran of 4,000 plate appearances in the minors who has appeared in three career MLB games. Liriano has made a total of 11 post-surgery starts if you include spring training along with his time in the minors and majors, posting a 7.03 ERA, 36-to-32 strikeout-to-walk ratio, and 1.94 WHIP in 40 innings. If you ignore his spring starts, he has a 9.00 ERA, 21-to-23 strikeout-to-walk ratio, and 2.25 WHIP in 24 innings.

Joe Christensen of the Minneapolis Star Tribune wrote an article earlier this week focusing on what should be incredibly obvious by now, which is that on-base percentage, slugging percentage, and runs scored are a whole lot more important to an offense than batting average. Of course, that point is far from obvious for most fans and far too many media members (including just about everyone covering the Twins on television or radio) equate batting average to offense on the team level.

To show the difference between team batting average and team offense, Christensen noted that the White Sox came into this week's series against the Twins leading the league in runs per game despite ranking dead last in batting average. He could have just as easily and perhaps even more convincingly used the Twins as the example, because they've shown for years that "batting average" and "offense" are often very different things.

From the time they re-emerged as a competitive team in 2001 through last season, the Twins ranked among the AL's top five in batting average five times in seven years. During that same span, they never ranked among the AL's top five in scoring and were in the bottom half of the league all but one year. On average from 2001-2007, the Twins ranked sixth in batting average and 11th in scoring, including a 2006 season that saw them lead the league in batting average while ranking just eighth in runs.

None of that is a coincidence, because few organizations place more emphasis on batting average while focusing less on power and plate discipline. All of which is why the Twins haven't finished with a higher ranking in runs scored than batting average since way back in 1987. For 20 years the team has been better at hitting for average than actually scoring runs--and often significantly better--yet no one in the organization seems to view that as a problem.

Two decades passed in between the Twins producing a 30-homer hitter and the David Ortiz saga provided a glimpse into why that was the case, as the team tried to take a young hitter with tremendous power potential and essentially mold him into just another slap hitter. Back in 2004, when Ortiz was putting together the second of what is now five straight (and counting) 30-homer, 100-RBI seasons for the Red Sox, he said the following about his time in Minnesota:

When I first came to Minnesota, that's when I was told, "Stay inside the ball, hit the ball the other way." I always was a power hitter in the minor leagues. Everything changed when I went to Minnesota. I would take a hard swing and my first manager would be in the dugout, saying, "Hey, HEY, what are you doing?"

Beyond the apparent lack of interest in encouraging slugging and inability to develop power hitters, the organization also repeatedly makes it clear that they care little about plate discipline, acquiring players who struggle to control the strike zone and seemingly refusing to coach them differently. When told last week that Delmon Young had chased more pitches out of the strike zone this season than any other hitter in baseball, Ron Gardenhire said:

I watched Torii Hunter for like 10 years. You think Torii hasn't swung? You know what? There's nothing wrong with swinging. That's why they give you a bat. This kid's 22 years old. He's got everything ahead of him. So let it fly. Learn as you go. He'll learn the strike zone.

To start telling a guy to just "take, take, take," sometimes that's just not human nature. You don't get to the big leagues, and you don't become a big league player, by "take, take, take" and get walks.

Some people are paid to drive in runs. You think David Ortiz goes up there to walk? He's paid to drive in runs. He walks because we walk him. On purpose. And that's what's going to happen to Delmon as he goes along, too. Right now, they know he's going to chase a little bit, but that's OK. I'll take my chances with him letting it fly.

Gardenhire acting like he knows what makes Ortiz a great hitter while dismissing his outstanding plate discipline is amusing given what Ortiz has repeatedly said about the Twins stifling his development. Torii Hunter is a fantastic all-around player and succeeds offensively despite lacking plate discipline, but possessing that ability is fairly unique and pointing to him as the model for Young hardly inspires confidence given Hunter's lowly .325 career on-base percentage and unspectacular .795 OPS.

Beyond that, why are the only choices to "go up there looking to walk" or "swing at everything"? What happened to being disciplined, showing patience, working the count in your favor, and putting together a good at-bat? How many seasons in a row does the Twins' offense need to rank in the bottom half of the league while everyone in charge downplays the importance of plate discipline before people do the math? And why do they love pitchers who avoid issuing walks, but not hitters who coax them?

The Twins have failed to draw an above-average number of walks every year since 1988. On average during the 20 seasons since then they've ranked 10th in walks, never placing higher than seventh. So far this season they rank dead last in walks and on-base percentage, plus second-to-last in homers and runs. Oh, and as usual they also rank fifth in batting average, for all the good that does them. As for Young, he's "let it fly" to the tune of .265/.306/.314 this year and .290/.317/.407 for his career

The names and faces change plenty on both sides, but beating the White Sox never gets old. After sweeping this week's two-game series, the Twins are now 74-61 (.548) against the White Sox dating back to 2001 and have had a losing record against them in just one of those eight years. Meanwhile, the White Sox have gone 61-74 (.452) versus the Twins during that eight-season stretch, compared to 547-478 (.534) against everyone else.

Once you're done here, check out my latest "Daily Dose" column over at Rotoworld.

2008-04-29T01:20:00.005-05:00

Me on FOX's "Sports on Demand"

Here's the video of my appearance on FOX's "Sports on Demand" show yesterday:

"Sports on Demand" - April 28, 2008

Thanks to sports director Jim Rich and producer Seth Kaplan for inviting me down to the FOX studios and having me on for the full 30-minute live show. Aside from me looking not totally unlike a whale on camera, it went well and was a lot of fun. We covered a wide range of Twins topics in some pretty solid depth and also discussed the Vikings, so please check it out.

Once you're done here, check out my latest "Daily Dose" column over at Rotoworld.

2008-04-28T01:39:00.004-05:00

Twins Notes: Liriano, More Liriano, Korecky, and Waldrop

Francisco Liriano struggled for much of spring training before posting a 6.75 ERA and 1.71 WHIP in a pair of minor-league starts, at which point Triple-A manager Stan Cliburn suggested that he needed more time to regain his pre-surgery form before returning to Minnesota:

I would say maybe one more start here to get a little bit more command, maybe build a little bit more strength. That would be my call. Of course, I know it's going to be a group decision. His health is good. His strength is good. His mound presence is good. He just pitched backwards, and maybe he just wanted to find out if he could use all his pitches.

Instead, the Twins called up Liriano shortly after Cliburn uttered those words and stuck him right back into the rotation. He looked shaky in his first two starts and then completely fell apart in his third outing Thursday against the A's, allowing six runs on five hits and three walks without making it out of the first inning. Liriano's first two post-surgery outings were recapped in plenty of detail here, and the third start featured the same decreased velocity and lack of command.

After going 0-3 with an 11.32 ERA, 13 walks, and a .366 batting average against in three starts, his comeback was aborted Friday and Liriano was sent back to Triple-A. He rarely looked comfortable on the mound or capable of consistently getting big-league hitters out with the stuff he was working with, and Official Twins Beat Writer of AG.com LaVelle E. Neal III reports that Liriano will stay in Rochester "for a while." Here's what pitching coach Rick Anderson had to say about the three-start comeback:

Confidence comes with success. He's got to get down there and clear his mind, and he admitted to me that he's thinking too much about what he's doing. I asked him, "How did you feel before you were hurt?" He said, "I didn't think, I just threw." He's not to that point yet. When he does get to that point, he will have success, and success breeds confidence.

What Anderson said is true, but no amount of confidence is going to make up for Liriano's missing velocity. General manager Bill Smith said Friday that "there's no harm done" in calling up Liriano when the Twins did, but Anderson's quote about his current lack of confidence may contradict that somewhat. Smith also admitted that the Twins rushed Liriano's return timetable "just a bit" due to Kevin Slowey's biceps injury, which seems incredibly short-sighted.

"I think we did the right thing," Smith said. "Maybe the best thing that will come out of this is everyone realizes he's not ready." Fair enough, but given how he pitched this spring and during his abbreviated stay in the minors, it's unclear exactly what made the Twins think that Liriano would have success in the majors to begin with. Of course, my MinnPost colleague Pat Borzi recently wrote that the Twins may have wanted Liriano in the majors just to keep an eye on him regardless of his performance.

Given how Liriano pitched during his three-start comeback, it's interesting to look back on offseason reports about his status. Early offseason updates included quotes like "everything is perfect" and "there are no problems at all." In February, as spring training neared, Ron Gardenhire said that Liriano was "letting it fly" while throwing at the Twins' academy in the Dominican Republic: "He threw two innings at the academy and they said he was averaging 93 and throwing it up to 96. Free and easy."

It seems pretty obvious now that those reports were completely false, because Liriano averaged 88-91 miles per hour with his fastball this month, reached 93 MPH on maybe a handful of pitches in three starts, and never came anywhere close to "throwing it up to 96" at any point. Nearly every report about Liriano prior to his arrival at spring training noted that he was looking good and throwing as hard as ever, which is astounding given what we know now.

Interestingly, a rare winter report suggesting that Liriano wasn't looking anything like the pitcher from 2006 came via Tracy Ringolsby of the Rocky Mountain News. In the middle of a long column covering a variety of subjects, Ringolsby wrote the following one-sentence note about Liriano under the heading "overheard": "Left-hander Francisco Liriano, 24, is rehabbing from the reconstructive left elbow surgery he underwent a year ago, and it appears he will not be ready until midseason."

That got my dander up at the time, because it differed dramatically from every other Liriano report, yet Ringolsby didn't see fit to expand upon his note. My response here opined that the Liriano information "would be worthy of more than a one-line note buried midway through Ringolsby's column if it was based on serious reporting" and suggested that "if Ringolsby has solid information about Liriano being behind schedule, it'd be nice to engage in a little journalism by sharing with the rest of the class."

For the most part my feelings on Ringolsby's report haven't changed. It seemed to me that "he will not be ready until midseason" implied that Liriano wouldn't pitch until then, let alone pitch multiple times in April. Beyond that, Ringolsby dropping that little tidbit into the middle of a column without going into any further detail still seems odd to me, but while engaging in an extremely long, testy e-mail discussion with me over the past few weeks Ringolsby explained that his non-Rockies coverage is limited.

Of course, the column that the Liriano note appeared in contained 1,300 words of non-Rockies content, so Ringolsby certainly could have offered up another sentence or two if he felt that the news he was passing along had major importance. Whatever the case, my dismissal of Ringolsby's note was due partly to it differing from what later proved to be totally inaccurate reports, making the whole situation an interesting reminder not to believe everything you read regardless of the source (among other things).

Because a fifth starter won't be required for a while thanks to multiple off days, the Twins replaced Liriano on the roster with reliever Bobby Korecky. He didn't come close to cracking my annual ranking of the Twins' top 40 prospects, but Korecky has a chance to carve out a decent MLB career as a middle reliever. Originally taken by the Phillies in the 19th round of the 2002 draft, the Twins acquired Korecky along with Carlos Silva and Nick Punto in exchange for Eric Milton back in December of 2003.

He's spent parts of three seasons at Triple-A, posting a 3.31 ERA and 111-to-54 strikeout-to-walk ratio over 149.1 total innings. Korecky has been a closer in the minors, saving 110 career games, but he's already 28 years old and his low strikeout rate combined with mediocre control make it unlikely that he'll succeed as a late-inning option in the majors. With that said, Korecky has a 3.04 ERA in 365 pro innings and induces a high percentage of ground balls, so a middle-relief gig seems doable.

After blowing a 5-0 lead and losing in extra innings Friday, Gardenhire said: "We deserved to lose that game." We're in agreement, except Gardenhire wasn't talking about his misguided, oft-repeated decision to leave the team's best pitcher unused in the bullpen for 10 innings while lesser relievers combine to face 16 batters and allow the game-winning run. Saving Joe Nathan for a save situation that never arrives and then needing to "get him work" in a blowout days later is a Gardenhire tradition.

Johan Santana is off to a nice start with the Mets, posting a 3.12 ERA, 32-to-5 strikeout-to-walk ratio, and .209 opponent's batting average in 34.2 innings spread over five starts. He's also smacked three doubles, which gives him one fewer extra-base hit than Delmon Young, in 87 fewer plate appearances. For his career, Santana has now hit .250/.283/.386 in 46 trips to the plate. As a team, the Twins have hit a combined .263/.303/.364 this year, for a slightly lower OPS than Santana's career mark.

After being benched Wednesday and called "not an MLB-caliber hitter at this stage of his career, let alone an MLB-caliber leadoff man" in this space Thursday, Carlos Gomez led off that night's game with a homer and collected four hits over his next seven at-bats. Unfortunately, that simply raised his overall hitting line to a still-horrible .255/.271/.362 and he exited Friday's game with a calf injury that kept him out of action for both weekend games.

Thanks to the Minneapolis Star Tribune's decision to bring back LEN3's weekly minor-league report after a long hiatus, there's news of Kyle Waldrop being out for the season following shoulder surgery. Waldrop was a first-round pick back in 2004 and many people considered him one of the team's top pitching prospects initially, but he ranked just 32nd on my list of the Twins' top 40 prospects heading into the season. Here's part of my write-up on Waldrop, from back in February:

The closer he's gotten to the majors the more difficult it's been for Waldrop to succeed on that mediocre stuff, which is evident by his sub par strikeout rates and the deterioration of his once-great control. With that said, it's important to note that he's only 22 years old despite logging over 500 pro innings already and has induced two ground balls for every fly ball over the past two seasons, which shows that he's still capable of having a solid big-league career as a fourth or fifth starter.

It's possible that a year of lost development time won't hurt Waldrop's long-term outlook as much as it would an elite pitching prospect, because he's relatively polished and seemingly doesn't have a ton of projection remaining. Of course, he'll have to come back from the surgery first and that's certainly no sure thing. Along with Waldrop's season-ending shoulder injury, LEN3 reports that No. 13 prospect Deibinson Romero will miss 3-4 weeks following surgery to repair torn meniscus in his right knee.

Analyzing pitching mechanics is a growing trend among bloggers and there are a pair of new entries about Twins pitchers that are worth checking out. Kyle Boddy of Driveline Mechanics examines Nick Blackburn's delivery, while Kiley McDaniel of Saber-Scouting looks at Deolis Guerra's form.

Speaking Guerra, he was part of an eclectic mix of pitchers who worked a game at high Single-A Fort Myers last weekend:

                     IP     H     R     ER     BB     SO     HR
Kevin Slowey        3.0     1     1      1      1      5      1
Deolis Guerra       4.0     4     3      2      2      3      1
Danny Graves        1.0     0     0      0      0      1      0
Tim Lahey           1.0     0     0      0      0      1      0

Making his way back from a strained biceps, Slowey began his rehab assignment by starting the game and tossed three solid innings. Guerra came on in relief and worked four innings to pick up the win. Danny Graves, who was an All-Star closer with the Reds and is now little more than minor-league filler at the age of 33, pitched a scoreless eighth inning. And Tim Lahey, who was briefly lost via the Rule 5 draft before returning to the organization earlier this month, closed things out.

Livan Hernandez: 5.05 ERA. It was fun while it lasted, at least.

Once you're done here, check out my latest "Daily Dose" column over at Rotoworld.

2008-04-25T01:29:00.005-05:00

Link-O-Rama

FHM recently revealed their annual list of the "Top 100 Sexiest Women in the World" and I'm proud that two former Official Fantasy Girl of AG.com title-holders and one current OFGoAG.com candidate rank second, third, and fourth, respectively. My baseball analysis may be stats-driven, but my taste in women apparently shows some pretty decent scouting skills.

OFGoAG.com candidate Marisa Miller somehow managed to place just 58th on FHM's list, but the rankings were obviously compiled before she threw out the first pitch at a Cubs game last weekend:

Setting aside the fact that Miller wearing a baseball uniform might be the greatest thing I've ever seen, it's very impressive that she made the throw all the way from the mound while showing off an arm that would make Shannon Stewart and Rondell White jealous.

As a fat person and Twins fan, this idea intrigues me.

Fresh off receiving surprisingly non-horrible reviews last month for my first ever on-camera work for NBCSports.com, I'm going to be a guest on the local FOX affiliate's "Sports on Demand" show Monday. The show is hosted by KMSP sports director Jim Rich, who also serves as the sideline reporter when Twins games are on WFTC each weekend. You can watch the show live on the station's site Monday afternoon and hopefully I'll be able to post a clip here afterward.

For years now my favorite meal in the world has been "hunan chicken with carrots, baby corn, and extra rice" from Yangtze in St. Louis Park. I can say without even an ounce of hyperbole that I've ordered it 500 times. The other day they raised the price a couple dollars, informing me that the cost of rice had risen too high for them to stick with the old amount. That didn't bother me at all, especially after seeing a "Skyrocketing rice prices has Sam's Club limiting sales" headline on CNN.com.

However, the good people at Yangtze then informed me that even before the price increase the cost of each order had already included $5 to account for the seemingly minor "extra rice" part. So now, after ordering the exact same thing from the exact same restaurant multiple times per week for the past 7-8 years, I've come to the startling, highly disturbing realization that I've likely spent somewhere around $2,500 on white rice. If only Guinness had a category for carbohydrate-based stupidity.

How is a lowly Twins blogger who spends a fortune on white rice supposed to have a chance when professional basketball players start invading his turf?

Finally, some compelling video evidence to support the New York Times' hard-hitting investigation into blogging sweatshops.

Joe Posnanski of the Kansas City Star has long been my favorite newspaper sports columnist and like me the people who read his blog are big fans of Lori Loughlin (although sadly not enough to make her a first-ballot Pozcar winner).

Speaking of Posnanski, friend of AG.com Chris Jaffe interviewed him over at The Hardball Times.

Over 1,800 votes were cast in this week's poll to determine the best submission from the AG.com logo/header contest and there's an overwhelmingly clear winner:

With 45 percent of the vote and nearly four times as many votes as the second-place finisher, "Double Stitches" from Dan Olson is the winner:

With over 50 submissions the response to the contest was far beyond my expectations, so thank you to everyone who sent in a design. You'll notice that the new logo hasn't been added to the site yet, mostly because my extremely limited web-design skills guarantee that it'll take me a while to figure out how to actually make that happen.

Curmudgeonly, blog-hating Minneapolis Star Tribune columnist Patrick Reusse wrote the following tidbit about himself earlier this week:

Answer never changes when someone asks if he read a Bill Simmons column: "No. What newspaper is he with?"

Bill Simmons isn't with a newspaper, of course. Instead, he writes for a media outlet that people under the age of 50 actually read. One of the most rewarding aspects of blogging or creating a website like The Hardball Times is that your writing has to speak for itself and your audience has to seek you out. Unlike Reusse's column this blog isn't thrown onto someone's doorstep each morning along with a bunch of local news, advertisements, and coupons, so people read it solely because of the content.

There's something satisfying about that, even if it means old-school newspaper writers like Reusse are automatically dismissive of your work because it doesn't appear as ink on a page. Meanwhile, his column appears alongside the brilliant prose of Sid Hartman and Jim Souhan in a medium that sees its audience decline further each day. The shift has already begun to some degree and in a few years people may be dismissive of writers like Reusse because they work for a newspaper.

Gordon Edes of the Boston Globe established himself as one of the best, most respected baseball writers in the country during his 35 years in the newspaper business, but he'll apparently now have to cross Reusse off his list of readers. It if makes Edes feel any better about losing Reusse's respect, the "no, what newspaper is he with?" club has expanded pretty rapidly over the past year.

Speaking of Minnesota's elite group of local newspaper sports columnists, Charley Walters of the St. Paul Pioneer Press wrote this nugget the other day:

One longtime Twins fan is willing to bet that, at season's end, Twins rookie pitcher Nick Blackburn wil have a lower earned-run average than ex-Twins starter Johan Santana of the New York Mets.

That sentence is fascinating on a number of levels, beginning with the notion that the opinion of "one longtime Twins fan" is somehow noteworthy enough to deserve space in a newspaper. Walters gives no hint about who the "one longtime Twins fan" might be and that one sentence is the entire extent of the note, which is found in the middle of a lengthy column made up of similarly random tidbits such as "the Gophers are trying to close a deal to schedule a home football game with Texas in 2015."

As if Walters devoting column space to an anonymous, random thought from "one longtime Twins fan" isn't absurd enough--seriously, think about that for a moment--the Pioneer Press' editors failed to catch an obvious misspelling and "wil" made it to print, as if the newspaper is some lowly, unedited blog. Of course, as 10,000 Takes pointed out, the most amazing aspect might be that "there are actually people who pay money to have this kind of incredible sports insight 'dropped' on their doorstep each day."

He previously struck me as annoying because my first exposure came via the forgettable XFL, but after staying up into the wee hours listening to him call last Thursday's amazing 22-inning game and making a point to hear him work several times since then, Padres play-by-play man Matt Vasgersian is quickly becoming one of my favorite baseball announcers. He's extremely laid back, witty, smart, and has a great on-air rapport with partner Mark Grant.

If all my money wasn't currently tied up in rice, I'd pay a decent price to have him replace Dick Bremer.

Friend of AG.com and Rotoworld football guru Gregg Rosenthal passed along the following note while working on the annual Rotoworld Football Draft Guide: On passes that traveled at least 20 yards, Tarvaris Jackson went 4-of-36 with two touchdowns and four interceptions last season. Me opining repeatedly that Jackson "throws a nice deep ball" now seems sort of silly, but as Rosenthal pointed out: "Well, it looks nice and goes far. It just lands on the ground."

Perhaps realizing that it's tough to justify cutting content when you're printing articles devoted entirely to my mom attending basketball games, the Star Tribune is bringing back Official Twins Beat Writer of AG.com LaVelle E. Neal III's weekly minor-league reports.

I've never read the Mankato Free Press before, but if my names keeps showing up in articles it might become my favorite local newspaper.

A new(ish) Twins blog to check out: Tuesdays With(out) Torii.

Finally, this week's AG.com-approved music video is Mike Doughty doing a live version of "Looking at the World From the Bottom of a Well":

Once you're done here, check out my latest "Daily Dose" column over at Rotoworld.

2008-04-24T02:24:00.001-05:00

Twins Notes: Bonser, Gomez, Cuddyer, Thomas, and Krivsky

Boof Bonser turned in his fourth Quality Start in five outings this season by tossing six innings of two-run ball against the A's last night, but his record fell to 1-4 when the Twins once again failed to provide him with decent run support. After being shut out last night the lineup has produced a grand total of seven runs in Bonser's five starts and he also ranked second-to-last among AL starters in run support last year. In Bonser's last 35 starts, the Twins have scored more than four runs just 11 times.

Carlos Gomez had a memorable Twins debut--doubling, bunting for a single, walking, and stealing two bases on Opening Day--and hit .326 with five steals through his first 10 games. Unfortunately, he's been completely lost at the plate since, batting 6-for-44 (.136) with zero walks in 10 games. Gomez went 0-for-5 with four strikeouts Tuesday before mercifully receiving last night off, but his problems offensively shouldn't come as a surprise given his various projections heading into the season:

                               AVG      OBP      SLG      OPS
Baseball Prospectus           .249     .301     .361     .662
Baseball Think Factory        .241     .299     .346     .645
The Hardball Times            .247     .293     .337     .630

Gomez was handed an everyday job in the majors as a 22-year-old despite having a month's worth of experience at Triple-A and his minor-league track record suggested that he was anything but ready to thrive against big-league pitching. Sure enough, he's hitting .230/.247/.310 with a horrendous 24-to-2 strikeout-to-walk ratio through 20 games, underperforming even those modest projections and making him a .231/.272/.307 hitter in 78 career games once his time with the Mets last season is included.

He's drawn a total of eight non-intentional walks in 228 career plate appearances while striking out 51 times, which isn't the type of ratio that lends itself to being a quality leadoff man, especially when it accompanies a .272 on-base percentage. Nearly one-fourth of Gomez's career hits have come via bunts and he's unsuccessfully laid one down plenty, which leaves him as a .202 hitter with a measly .278 slugging percentage and 50 strikeouts in 203 plate appearances when he swings away.

That works out to a strikeout in 25 percent of his non-bunt plate appearances, which would've ranked as the eighth-highest strikeout rate among AL hitters last year. Even with the bunt attempts included, Gomez has whiffed in 22 percent of his career trips to the plate, which would've ranked 14th-worst among AL hitters last season. Gomez's speed makes him plenty exciting, but he's been rushed to the majors despite having huge holes in his game and has predictably been overmatched at the plate.

Gomez can wreak havoc once he reaches base, but that rarely happens because he has horrible plate discipline, struggles to make consistent contact, and possesses little power. He has loads of potential and has shown flashes of brilliance, but isn't an MLB-caliber hitter at this stage of his career, let alone an MLB-caliber leadoff man. Perhaps the Twins feel that he'll learn more in Minnesota than Rochester, but in the meantime he's burning through pre-free agency service time while dragging the lineup down.

Michael Cuddyer is scheduled to return from the disabled list Friday and figures to resume batting third in the lineup, which hopefully means that Ron Gardenhire will move Joe Mauer back into the No. 2 spot. Sliding Gomez to the bottom of the order while making Brendan Harris the leadoff man would also make sense given that Harris is hitting .297/.352/.406 this year and batted .286/.343/.434 last season. Of course, as Official Twins Beat Writer of AG.com LaVelle E. Neal III reports, it'll never happen:

Gardenhire said he's against moving Gomez from the leadoff spot, reasoning that he needs at-bats and he'll be better off down the road if he stays at the top of the order.

Gomez would still get plenty of plate appearances at the bottom of the lineup and staying at the top of the order won't help anyone involved if he doesn't actually perform well enough to warrant being there. Gardenhire views speed as having tremendous importance atop the lineup and regardless of what you think of that stance Gomez's wheels do have plenty of value, but Harris figures to get on base about 20 percent more often and that's far more important.

Had Cuddyer's finger injury been more serious it would have made sense for the Twins to pursue Frank Thomas after the future Hall of Famer was released by the Blue Jays earlier this week. Thomas would have provided an upgrade to the Twins' lineup, but with the team committed to playing Cuddyer, Delmon Young, and Jason Kubel nearly every game and Craig Monroe already around to take starts against left-handers away from Kubel there would've been limited work available.

Interestingly, Thomas is rumored to be negotiating a return to Oakland, where he'd presumably replace Mike Sweeney as the A's designated hitter. Sweeney revealed yesterday that he "had some talks with the Twins early in the offseason" and "was pretty excited about the possibility" of coming to Minnesota before "talks calmed down" and he signed with the A's for just $500,000. He then went 2-for-3 with a homer and two RBIs in the A's 3-0 victory last night, improving to .309/.391/.418 on the year.

Monroe was in the starting lineup Tuesday because of his previous success against A's starter Joe Blanton and went 3-for-4 with a homer, a double, and three RBIs to raise his OPS from .656 to .897. He was back in the lineup last night, but without Blanton to smack around went 0-for-3 with two strikeouts. Monroe costs nearly eight times as much as Sweeney, but when not facing Blanton this season he's 6-for-29 (.207) with 12 strikeouts and a .310 slugging percentage.

Mauer's durability is questioned by fans, media members, and self-proclaimed tough guys who sit with sore toes, but he's started 18 of the first 21 games, catching 158 of a possible 185 innings. He's on pace to catch 1,220 innings, which is noteworthy given that Jorge Posada led the AL by catching 1,111 innings last year. Even his limited rest hasn't been optimal, as Mauer has started four of the five games against lefties while two of Mike Redmond's three starts have come against righties.

While Gomez struggles, Jacoby Ellsbury has been great for the Red Sox, hitting .308/.456/.538 in 20 games. Ellsbury was my preferred position player from the various Johan Santana trade rumors this winter, and including last season's playoffs has now hit .342 with a fantastic 23-to-24 strikeout-to-walk ratio while going 19-for-19 stealing bases in 64 career MLB games. On the other hand, my preferred pitcher from the Santana talks was Phil Hughes, and he's 0-3 with an 8.82 ERA for the Yankees.

Wayne Krivsky's underwhelming stint as Reds general manager ended yesterday, as Terry Ryan's former right-hand man was fired after two-plus years on the job. Cincinnati went 161-184 (.467) under Krivsky, who hired Dusty Baker as manager despite his being horribly miscast to lead a young team and too often filled the roster with players like Juan Castro after honing his love for veteran mediocrity in Minnesota. Krivsky is respected enough to land on his feet, but hopefully not back with the Twins.

Once you're done here, check out my latest "Daily Dose" column over at Rotoworld.

2008-04-22T00:13:00.002-05:00

AG.com Logo Vote

A few weeks ago I asked people to submit designs for a new AG.com logo/header, because this site has long been overdue for a new look and Sony had sent me a bunch of video games to give away via some sort of contest. My only requirements were that the design couldn't involve a copyrighted image (such as the Twins' logo) and had to include "AaronGleeman.com." Amazingly, over 50 designs were submitted and I'd like to thank each person who took the time to send me something.

My seven favorites are shown below, but before you take a look please note that the images have been scaled down to fit the space and may appear somewhat blurry. They're all intended to be used atop the page as headers and would be bigger than what you see below, so to view full-sized versions of each design simply click on the image. Once you're finished looking at all seven designs, please take a moment to vote for your favorite in the poll at the bottom of the entry.

UPDATE: Polling is closed. Thanks for voting.

No. 1 - "Double Stitches" (Submitted by Dan Olson):

No. 2 - "New Ballpark" (Submitted by Joe Stahlmann):

No. 3 - "Lots of Baseballs" (Submitted by Jory Dyvig):

No. 4 - "AG.com Ball" (Submitted by Dan Olson):

No. 5 - "Women of AG.com" (Submitted by Tom Berrisford):

No. 6 - "Eyebrows" (Submitted by Robin Decaire):

No. 7 - "Old School" (Submitted by Dan Olson):

Once you're done here, check out my latest "Daily Dose" column over at Rotoworld.