Tuesday Talkers

I know, I know, everybody hates me.  It's been almost two weeks since my last post and I have no excuses.  Sometimes when you don't write you get in the habit of not writing and sometimes that feels good.  But there is an awful lot going on in the sports world, and I have opinions on some of it, so it's time to get back in that saddle and write not very informative, unfunny filler for you to read while you wait for your favorite message board to refresh with new messages.

-  So much NBA going on.  Lebron opts out.  Carmelo opts out.  Love trade speculation.  NBA draft.  It's actually really fun.  I'll try to write this in some kind of coherent narrative, but I make no promises.

To start, I can't believe the Warriors balked at the Love trade because they didn't want to trade Klay Thompson.  I like Thompson, and he's one of the top 2-guards in the league, but a lineup of Curry/Martin/Iguodala/Love/Bogut is a definite contender, more so than what they have now.  On the flip side, I would have been ok with the Wolves getting Thompson as the center piece of a deal.  He's the #2 guy in Golden State, but would have been #1 here and who knows if he would thrive or not, but it's possible.  Plus, assuming Flip is dead set on not bottoming out, a lineup of Rubio/Thompson/Barnes (if they got him too)/Lee/Pekovic could be a playoff team, and you're giving Barnes room to sink or swim rather than be stuck in a logjam at the wing position the Warriors had.  Personally I'd prefer bottoming out and grabbing as many picks as possible, and that's why things are getting more and more interesting.

Lebron opted out of his deal today, and with him and Carmelo both on the market teams are maneuvering like crazy to either clear cap space, build a roster that would look good to either/both of them, or both which means we could see some crazy trades and picks flying around before Thursday's draft.  One good way a team could entice either of them would be to have another Top 10 player on board (or more) and that makes Kevin Love that much more attractive.  Cleveland, or at least the media, seem to think there's a realistic chance Lebron might come home, and they have the pieces to put something together with that first overall pick, Dion Waiters (who by all accounts doesn't get along with Kyrie Irving), and Tristan Thompson.  The Bulls are in the mix as well, offering Tony Snell, Taj Gibson, and the #16 and #19 in the draft.  Plus the Celtics still have one million picks they can throw at the Wolves.  I think I'd prefer the Cavs trade to get the #1, then the Celtics, and then the Bulls.  If they trade with Chicago hopefully they package 2 or 3 of those picks to get closer to the top.

Of course, it all could be for nothing since I think it's mostly likely Lebron and the other two opt out and restructure their deals to reduce the cap number and get at least one more competent player in place.  Most likely that's the plan, but it's curious they didn't announce their opt outs at the same time.  Pay attention, because Dwyane Wade is poised to lose the most money if he opts out, so if he opts in then game on.  Until then I'd assume Lebron's back to the Heat.  Carmelo I'm guessing will be a Bull.

-  Speaking of the NBA draft, let's talk about the NBA draft.  I think your steals are going to be Noah Vonleh (criminally underutilized in college, freak athlete, great post-up game and good perimeter game for his size), Julius Randle (already an NBA ready rebounder with a good enough offensive game that should develop), Adreian Payne (already has the skills to be a stretch 4 and could eventually be an elite defender), Tyler Ennis (might not end up a big time scorer, but should be an excellent point guard for a long time), Cleanthony Early (could step in and start for most teams Day 1), and Jerami Grant (2nd round steal).  Busts look like Dante Exum (top 4 pick?  Please), Aaron Gordon (has absolutely zero skill beyond athleticism), Elfrid Payton (will get abused), Zach LaVine (another athlete light on game skills), Rodney Hood (disappeared way to many times) and Mitch McGary (no clue why anybody would take him first round).

It's hard to say who I'd want the Wolves to end up with since who knows what the roster will look like by time they pick (or after), but I'd go for either of the Michigan State guys at #13.  They could end up with Early and Grant in the 2nd round and that'd make me happy.  Should be a fun draft no matter what goes down.  I might even live blog this bad boy.  That way we have more proof of how stupid I am like when I said Kawhi Leonard would be terrible or when I said Stephen Curry would be terrible or when I said Xavier Henry would be a sleeper or when I said Earl Clark could be a star.

-  Man I enjoy the hell out of the World Cup.  Every four years I completely devour it, convince myself I'm going to become a soccer guy, watch 5 minutes of EPL, and then bail until the next World Cup.  The combination of the best in the World, the nation vs. nation thing, and the gambling make this such a fun time.  This year I also got into a WC pool to make every game more interesting, but I made the mistake of picking Spain to win the whole thing so I'm likely dead.  Sadly, I'm tied for second so far too.  Stupid la roja.  Obviously Brazil and Argentina remain the two big favorites, but I like Belgium to give it a hell of a run.  Don't sleep on Mexico, either, and Colombia's been a buzz saw.

Anyway, I won't pretend to actually know enough about soccer to really analyze that tying goal in the Portugal/USA game, but man, what a gut punch.  I mean, not really because as a Minnesota sports fan I was completely expecting it, but for fans of other sports teams that probably really hurt.  The friends of mine who really know soccer tell me I should be mad at Michael Bradley, so picture me shaking my fist and looking really mad right now.  Maybe swearing a little.

-  I owe one of the longest tenured and consistent readers of this stupid blog an apology - Dawger, I'm sorry.  I'm sorry I doubted Brian Dozier and your opinion of Brian Dozier.   I said he was garbage, you said he was good, and now I am firmly down on the side of good.  You were right, I was wrong.  You're smart, I'm dumb.  You're good looking, I am not attractive.

-  Basketball futures are out for the NCAA Champion, and you may recall that I advised you to take UCONN last year when they were 40-1 and advised taking Louisville two years ago when they were 15-1.  Yeah, I'm good.  This year my first recommendation is a team that offers significant value at 25-1 (I got them at 33-1).  Let's see:

• Significant post season run, albeit not in the NCAA Tournament?  Check.
• Strong regular season results?  Check.
• Nearly every single minute back from last season?  Check.
• Impact freshman coming in with a ranking that suggests he's a program changer?  Check.
• One of the top transfers coming in who will be immediately eligible?  Check.
• Outstanding guard play?  Check.
• Elite level head coach?  Check.

Figure it out?  That's right, the SMU Mustangs.  Take a team that won 27 games, finished third in the conference, beat UCONN twice, made the NIT final and basically has everyone back and add in the nation's top ranked incoming freshman in Emmanuel Mudiay and sharp-shooting transfer wing from Xavier Justin Martin and these team definitely has the pieces.  Plenty of questions such as how Mudiay and incumbent point guard Nic Moore mesh and if they have enough size, but at 25-1 it's a no brainer.

-  Jurassic Park 4:  Jurassic World.  It's real.  God I have such a boner.

-  I'm not going to update Gopher recruiting news or anything because it's still just way too up in the air, but know that there are a lot of balls in motion right now and I think in the last couple of weeks through the next couple weeks the Gophers are getting 5-6 visits (official and unofficial) from guys who I am pretty sure Pitino would take a verbal from immediately if he could get one.  I would really love to snag and early commitment this year.  Like tomorrow.

-  I saw Carlos Gomez was on the cover of Sports Illustrated recently.  Even though it kills me to see him be this good, let me rub a little salt in the womb:

1. Gomez's average of .312 ranks 13th in the majors.
2. Gomez's OBP of .377 ranks 22nd, whilie his SLG of .525 ranks 12th.  
3. That gives him an overall OPS of .902, which ranks 18th.
4. His batting alone gives him 18.2 runs above replacement so far this year, which ranks 14th.
5. He's also fast and a good base runner, which gives him another 1.5, and his defense is superb giving him another 1.7.  After a bunch of other league and position related factors he nets out at 31.7 runs above replacement which translates to 3.4 wins above replacement, which ranks 6th in the majors.
6. Yes, Carlos Gomez has become a tremendous all around player who, according to one metric, is the 6th most valuable in baseball.  
7. After the trade for J.J. Hardy (defensible) and then the trade away of Hardy (completely indefensible) the Twins ended up with half a season of Hardy and 24.2 innings of terrible relief (1.91 WHIP and 5.47 ERA) from Jim Hoey.  Gross.

-  Seriously though, you could make a pretty good team out of ex-Twins - better than usual even:

C - Wilson Ramos (.261/.314/.370)

1B - Justin Morneau (.298/.336/.509 with 12 HRs)

2B - Nick Punto (.230/.331/.294)

3B - Danny Valencia (.236/.291/.333 - ok so this isn't the team's strength)

SS - J.J. Hardy (.294/.321/.373)

OF - Carlos Gomez (.312/.377/.525 with 12 HRs and 11 SBs)

OF - Michael Cuddyer (.317/.366/.500 with 5 HRs)

OF - Torii Hunter (.266/.290/.441 with 9 HRs)

DH - David Ortiz (.255/.354/.478 with 17 HRs)

Ok I'm getting a little tired of looking up all these stats, but your rotation would be Francisco Liriano, Matt Garza, R.A. Dickey, and Kyle Lohse with the fifth starter being Kevin Slowey unless I think of somebody else.  The bullpen would be ok with Joe Nathan as the closer and a whole mess of guys like I know Pat Neshek is kicking ass this year.  Really, I mean, that's a pretty good team. Fill the obvious holes (C, 2b, 3b, fifth starter) with current Twins and make Joe Mauer catch again and you might really have something here.  And it really doesn't matter.

-  I suppose I could live blog this Twins game, but it's already 5-3 in the top of the second which means this things going way past my bedtime.  Adios muchachos.

Is Kevin Correia like, Good?

When the Twins signed free agent starter Kevin Correia to a 2 year, $10 million contract this year there were two distinct reactions from fans - you either got "who?" or "oh please god no tell me you're kidding what why?"  I was in the second group.  Correia had been a distinctly pedestrian pitcher for the Pirates and Padres, rolling up a grand total of 0.3 wins above a replacement level player in the last three years.  After kicking around three organizations going back to 2003 and only once having what might be called a "quality" year, the $10 million seemed to be a bit of a ridiculous outlay for another Nick Blackburn.

That's basically what Correia was, an NL version of Correia.  He doesn't strike people out (less than 5 K/9 each of the last two years), doesn't walk anybody (less than 2.5 BB/9 last two years), throws his fastball right around 90mph, and relies on groundballs to get outs.  Basically your best case scenario was probably 180 innings with an ERA around the mid 4s - certainly not worth $10 million.  However Correia has pitched very well this year, going 7+ innings while giving up 3 or fewer runs in all three of his starts, giving him 3 quality starts and a very nice 2.95 ERA.  So that begs the question, is this luck (same old guy just a hot streak) or is this a brand new Correia?  By the way I honestly don't know, but I suspect it's luck.  Let's find out.

First, let's check out the quickest way to see if he's getting lucky:  BABIP (and I will include links to all the nerd stats, although you should at least be somewhat familiar with most of them by now it's the 21st century grandpa).  This year Correia is at .292 vs. his career number of .294.  This is good news for Correia.  Perhaps he is a better pitcher this year.  Next up, Fielding Independent Pitching (both versions).  This is not as good news.  Correia's ERA (2.95) is significantly better than his FIP (3.92) and xFIP (4.20), which are both more in line with his career numbers.  This suggests that so far this year Correia is pitching very similarly to how he always has, but something is affecting how many runs have actually crossed the plate.

Looking a little deeper two things immediately stand out:  his LOB% and his HR/FB.   LOB% simply means how many runners reach base against him and then fail to score.  Generally this number will be higher for strikeout pitchers which Correia most assuredly is not, yet so far this year 81.9% of his baserunners have failed to score, which rates as excellent and would have been the second best of any starter last season.  Comparing that to his career mark of 71%, which is slightly below average, and clearly something is happening here.

Similarly, his HR/FB (simply what % of fly balls he allows end up as home runs) is a very solid 8.7% this year, which is above average.  Once again, when we compare that to his career mark of 10.7% we see a pretty drastic difference.  One point you'd like to make here if you were defending Correia would be that Target Field is a tough park to hit home runs at so it wouldn't be out of line to see a low number here and you're right - From 2010-2012 Target Field saw 86 home runs hit the same number of at-bats it would take an average park to see 100.  However in that same time frame Correia pitched at two extreme pitchers parks - PNC in Pittsburgh (74 HR) and Petco in San Diego (78 HR) - so, much like the Karate Kid in My Cousin Vinny, your case doesn't hold water.

Basically Correia is getting zero swings and misses which is resulting in the fewest strikeouts in his career (a laughable 3.4 per 9 right now) and more base runners.  So far he's done a great job "scattering" his hits and avoiding the long ball and that's accounting for the low ERA and quality outings thus far.  It's up to you if you believe that is something he can sustain despite being so much better than his career numbers, particularly when there's nothing here to suggest he's pitching any better than usual and might even be pitching a little bit worse.  Personally?  I'm thinking we're going to see some hard regression to the mean, and it's going to be ugly.

Get used to this, bromigos

Adding this because I find it fascinating, but Starlin Castro has yet to walk this year in 54 at-bats (prior to tonight where he still didn't walk).  Turns out he's tied with Torii Hunter with those 54 ABs for most at-bats this year without a walk.  In fourth place with 42 ABs is your guy Carlos Gomez.  The most interesting thing looking at this list of guys without a walk is that they all suck. Seriously other than Castro and Hunter it's a bunch of crap like Daniel Descalso, Chris Getz, and Brent Lillibridge.  I don't know if you can see this without a subscription but just look at - seriously look, it's terrible.  Know the worst part?  Ron Gardenhire would KILL to have most of these guys on his team.  Don't deny it.

Brew Crew/D-Backs Live Blog?

So here's the sitch.  Wife and kids have peaced out.  Wife is on her way with her mother to Colorado to visit her sister on what sounds like the world's longest road trip, especially when you have to stop in the middle of nowhere Nebraska to get your car checked out because it's overheating.  Kids are at my parents because they're retired and it makes little sense for me to drop them off before work and pick them up after for two days, so I'm on my own.  I just got done schooling my boys Theory and Lunny in hoop by raining Js and teaching class (no shtick, I was 3-0 in 21-hustle) and then we hit the local pub for a few beers.  Now I have nothing else to do so I'm going to watch the Brewers/D-Backs game.  Because what else am I gonna do?

-  Just poured myself a captain & coke.  Except we have a stupid fridge that we can't quite get the temp figured out on just right, so in order to add the coke I had to open three coke zeros and one diet coke to get the non-frozen parts out to make a full drink.  And this is like 60% captain here.  So that happened.

-  Bets for today's game:  Nyjer Morgan YES Hit, Miguel Montero YES Hit, Prince Fielder more total bases than Justin Upton.

-  And Morgan is not in the lineup because of that ass Carlos Gomez.  That was a guaranteed winner.  You guys remember when Snacks said that Gomez would eventually be a 30-30 guy?  He still has gotten there in his career.  He's still only 25 so it's not like it's over yet and he's definitely got 3 tools, it's just that the two he's missing are hitting and hitting.  I don't know, I feel saucy.  I'm going to predict a big day for Mr. Gomez.

-  Announcer guy:  Saunders has to pitch from behind in the count.  It's just how his offspeed stuff works better.  Wow holy crap I just looked it up because it sounded like an incredibly stupid thing to say and he's actually right.  His two best counts are 1-0 and 2-0, while his worst count is 0-2.  How fucked up is this guy?

-  Fuckin' Fielder.  Walks don't count as bases.

-  FYI - I assume he's gone in any leagues you're in, but Denarius Moore is about to destroy the NFL.  Fact.  Might be next year, might even be the year after that, but if you're in a keeper don't let him go.

-  I can't believe Willie Bloomquist is leading off for a playoff team.  That's like seeing Matt Tolbert lead off for a playoff team in a couple of years.  Bloomquist career OPS+ = 75, Tolbert 65.  Once you get under 90 it's pretty much the same thing.  Unless you're talking about Butera or Rivera, they're in a special class.  Not Ramos though.  He's basically the 6th best catcher in the league (M. Montero, McCann, Avila, Santana, Posey) and that's if he doesn't get better.  But hey, at least we have a completely average reliever.

-  Upton walks.  So we're even.

-  Montero base knock.  Looking good.  Oh also I have the Brewers to win fairly heavy, which is super awesome because Ryan Roberts, who is terrible at baseball, just hit a grand slam.  Nice pitch, Wolf.  Looked super Blackburny.

-  So somebody in the comments wanted me to talk about football.  Well what should we talk about?  The Gophers?  Why?  If you want Gopher talk you have The Daily Gopher and Still Got Hope?  I literally have nothing to say about the Gopher football program.  It's a mess.  I like what Kill is spilling, but Brewster left the team barren of talent and it shows.  Vikings?  Also terrible.  You really want me to rehash the whole "out in Ponder" bit?  Yeah, I think they should put him in, but on the other hand this paragraph has been excrutiatingly difficult to write so I'm just done.

-  Announcer guy just tried to make a Guns N Roses joke.  I don't get it.

-  I must be getting old.  It's 9:26 and I'm very tired and I got nothin'.  I don't know.  Go read another blog.

-  So this New Girl show, by the way, has turned terrible.  I recommended it on here based on the first episode and Zooey Deschanel's boneriffic cuteness, but holy crap has it taken a turn for the worst in the next 2 episodes.  Really been quite awful.  If it wasn't for zooey i would quit.

-  I think it's over folks.  I think I'm done with blogging.  I'm alone and drunk and there is baseball on and I just can't care.  It's been a good run.

-  Do you think when there's a single hit to Gomez and he just has to throw the ball in to second he gets pissed?  That just happened and he did the biggest crow hop wind up ever to throw the ball 10 feet.  I feel like he's a lot like the kid in little league who is chasing butterflies and eating flowers.  He's not really paying attention, he just wants to throw the ball hard somewhere.  $20 says the middle infielders have to tell him to just throw it in lightly.

-  Maybe this party pizza will lighten my mood/wake me up.

-  It's 7-3, there's a ton on offense, and yet I'm bored out of my mind here.  Maybe it's not my fault, maybe it's this game.  Probably because Wisconsin is involved.  They ruin everything.

-  So I'm a huge nerd, no shocker there, and I've actually kept track on a spreadsheet the books I've read dating back to 2006.  I read 52 in 2006, 62 in 2007, 43 in 2008 (Wonderbaby ^TM was born), 47 in 2009, 37 in 2010 (Baby Ben^TM was born) and a pathetic 28 so far this year.  Having two kids and a job with no travel will really kill that number.  I need to spend more time in the bathroom.

-  Gomez with a hit and a steal.  So good.  If the Twins had Hardy instead of him I'm fine, if they have two shitty ass relievers instead of him that's the biggest shit show in history, other than Brewster's Gophers.

-  Do you realize that the best pitcher in Brewer history was Ted Higuera?  And other than striking out 6 straight dudes in an all-star game a good season or two he really wasn't that good.  I find that surprising for some reason.  Twins have what, Kaat, Blyleven, Viola, Erickson, Santana who are all as good or better?  Yeah, suck it Sconnie!  We own you guys as long as you don't count anything recent.

-  That pizza was pretty good.  I feel healthy.

-  Fielder double.  2-1 over Upton.  what up?

-  Gomez slides into first on a bunt attempt.  Some things never change.  $20 says Gardy has a boner right now.

-  God I'm tired and lame.  Go read one of my drunk blogs from 2 years ago, realize that I suck now, and go read something else. so tired.

Six Very Important Things this Morning 8.5.2010

1.  An ugly win is still a win.  And any win over a team like the Rays is a good thing, but man did they do everything they could to lose this one.  They wasted a monster outing from Scott Baker, the kind that reminds us that when he is on he is nearly unhittable.  They missed countless opportunities to get more runs across, and ended up heading into the ninth with just a 1-0 lead that was promptly squandered by new closer Matt Capps, with a healthy assist to the piss-poor outfield that seemed to make mistakes all game long, only to have Baker pitch around them - something Capps couldn't do. 

But despite their stunning ability to strike out on pitches out of the zone last night, they managed to squeak out a win over the Rays thanks to Delmon Young's big single in the 13th.  Of course, that hit came with runners on the corners and nobody out, so you would have thought a big inning was coming, but this was the Twins, and much like the rest of this series they were unable to get anything resembling a timely hit after Young, ending up on the right side of the 2-1 victory thanks to Matt Guerrier's six straight outs.

I do realize I've been a bit hard on this team in this series, and if they can win tomorrow they end up with a split, and you can't really expect anything better on the road against a team like Tampa, but they have just been so close in every game.  When two good teams matchup it's often the little things that make the difference, and do you really feel good with Gardy out there being the difference between a win and a loss (hello Guerrier vs. Upton two nights ago).  He clearly does some things right, enough to make the playoffs more often than not, but he is not a good game manager.  Sometimes that makes the difference.  I'm not calling for his head or anything, but sometimes he can really piss me right the hell off.  Seriously, go ahead and start keeping track of all the really good game decisions he makes.  I'll wait.



2.  Is it weird that nobody cares about this?  A-Rod finally hit his 600th career home run yesterday afternoon, just a mere 12 games and 46 at-bats since he hit #599.  I know everybody hates A-Rod, and for some reason the fans boo whenever he comes to bat, but I've never quite understood that.  Because he makes a ton of money?  They all make a ton of money.  Because he used steroids?  They all used steroids.  I mean, 600 HR, even in this day and age, is still a pretty special thing.  Only six other people have done it, with A-Rod being the youngest to reach that mark, and before you go spouting off about cheaters know that two other members, Bonds and Sosa, are cheaters too.  And doesn't A-Rod's cheating seem slightly less grievous somehow than Bonds or Sosa.  Bonds went from a great hitter to probably the second best of all-time, while Sosa went from a AAAA player to a home run hitting machine who still sucked.  A-Rod, to me, just doesn't seem anywhere near that level.  I actually kind of like the guy.  I'm not saying I want to go pick out curtains or anything, but if he threw some money at me and there was a little wine and maybe a back rub involved, who knows?  

3.  There is no way Bud Selig will be able to handle this.  You have probably heard the Texas Rangers are having all kinds of financial troubles, which is really too bad since they could make a run at the World Series this year.  What you may not have heard is that they are currently up for auction and it's basically Nolan Ryan vs. Mark Cuban.  So it's stoic, professional, respects the game ex-stud pitcher and maybe the most famous baseball name in history Nolan Ryan versus trashy, spazzy, do it his own way, insult every in power and get fined every five minutes Mark Cuban.  Now I think Cuban would be good for baseball - he would treat his players great, spend on a Yankee-level for payroll, and give MLB its best villain since John Rocker - but I'm guessing Bud Selig disagrees.  Of course, this is the same guy who thinks the All-Star game should mean something and almost wrecked the game twice (strike, steroids), so I like my chances.

4.  This is what Carlos Gomez should have been.  Sigh.  Back in 2007, Carlos Gomez was one of the Mets top prospects while Carlos Gonzalez was one of the top prospects in the Arizona system.  Both were centerfielders.  Both were fast as all hell.  Both were toolsy.  Both were plus defenders.  And neither understood the strike zone.  Both have been traded since then (Gonzalez twice), but while we've seen Gomez struggle to become more than a fast, inconsistent player, Gonzalez has become one of the best in the game.  After hitting two home runs today he now has a line of .319/.349/.559 with 23 home runs, 72 RBI, and 15 steals, numbers that rank him as #2 in the NL in batting average, #4 in slugging, #6 in RBI, #7 in homers, and #6 in OPS.  Take heart though, Carlos Gomez fans (all one of you), most defensive metrics have Go-Go as a much better defender than Gonzalez.  Take that!  Although Gonzalez did have one unfair advantage - he go to learn from the great Todd Helton.

5.  Edwin Jackson made me look like an idiot.  Remember how I was all like, "Jackson will suck in the AL he's not even good in the NL" and "Chicago is so stupid they totally got stuck with Jackson" and "I'm smart"?  Well I'm still an idiot.  Jackson led the White Sox to yet another stupid win, which makes them something like 50-1 in the last two months, pitching seven very good innings, allowing just one run on nine hits and a walk while striking out six.  Not a masterful shutdown performance, but pretty solid, even if it was against the suddenly punchless Tigers.  Seriously, what is going on with the Sox pitching?  It doesn't even matter who they throw out there, they are all Cy Young candidates.  I don't know what kind of magic elixir they have in Chicago, but I suspect it has something to do with Dayton wings.

6.  Brett Favre is a creepy perv?  Favre retirement talk, with him finally coming out and saying it's all about the health of his ankle and that he hasn't made a decision yet, but that's not important.  More interesting is that Jenn Sterger (pictured below), famous for having a large rack and being a Florida State fan in a cowboy hat, has told Deadspin that Favre used to send her pictures of his ding-dong when they were both employed by the Jets.  Now, I'm all in favor of people sending each other pictures of themselves in various stages of undress, but generally only when it is something both parties are interested in (or the sender is a woman).  When it's a dude sending pictures of his crank (or of him holding his crank while wearing crocs) to a chick who isn't interested, not to mention to a not interested chick who is 20 years younger than him, I get a little skeeved out.  Like, Pete Rose in his underwear skeeved out.  But doesn't this also seem like something Rose would do?  Looks like my Favre = Rose comparison just continues to get more and more accurate.

FORMER TWIN WATCH

Garrett Jones:  2-4, 2 HRs, 3 runs, 3 RBI, BB

Carlos Gomez, 4-5, HR, 2B, SB, 2 runs, RBI


Ugh.

A Christmas Wish

I'm not going to preview the South Dakota State game (Go Jackrabbits!).  I'm just not.  You can't make me.  They are the last in a string of terrible non-conference opponents, they're terrible, and they have nobody worth watching.  Instead, I'm going to do a cliched cheesy christmas wish list.  Hopefully it's not terrible, but if it is, you get what you pay for.

Dear Santa,

Please bring:

Al Nolen the ability to finish at the rim.  I could have gone with jumpshot here as well, but if he can only have one I think adding the threat of being able to score when he consistently blows by his defender is more valuable than an outside shot.  Once the big ten season starts, players aren't going to leave their men for easy dishes - they know things.

Damian Johnson a consistent outside shot.  Remember Travarus Bennett?  Similar player, but he developed into a good perimeter shooter his senior year (as did Eric Harris).  Johnson is improved, but he's not there yet.

Ralph Sampson a mean streak.  He's nearly perfect physically (*swoon*), but it would be nice to see him a little more fired up, maybe knocking around a few people's heads and toss in a technical here or there.  Get pissed Ralphie, you're being disrespected.

Colt Iverson the dream shake.  Although improved, his footwork on the low block can be cringe-worthy at times.  If he adds some moves and be smoother and more fluid, I am starting to think he could be a serious offensive weapon down the line.

Joe Mauer the one team loyalty of Kirby Puckett and Cal Ripken. Come on Joe, you know you want to.  What can money buy you any way outside of happiness, love, and everything you could ever want?

Bill Smith some aggressiveness.  The J.J. Hardy trade is a good start, but there is a lot more work to do here, especially if you want to prove to Jo-Jo that you're serious about winning.  Take a page out of Seattle's book - they have a higher payroll but they maximize it.

Carlos Gomez the drive to excel when he's been disrespected (think Steve Smith).  I'd rather have him do it with the Twins, but he's gone now.  I'd love to see him channel their giving up on him into becoming a great player.

Brad Childress all the mental faculties a head coach needs.  Any of them would do, I'm not sure he has a single one.

Adrian Peterson twenty carries a game.  How is this something we even have to ask for?

Brett Favre the fountain of youth.  Don't you go falling apart on me old man.

Michael Cuddyer the hope that someone takes away Greg Gagne's inability to resist the down and away Slider in the dirt - this would be the White Elephant/Yankee Swap portion of the evening.

Devoe Joseph a brother to play with.

Lawrence Westbrook some focus.  You may be the "#1 option", but this whole team is essentially 1B to  your 1A, and drifting in-and-out of attentiveness on both ends of the court is not an endearing trait.

Delmon Young some plate patience.  I'm not sure what his ceiling is, but I'm confidant we aren't going to see it unless he stops swinging at every pitch he sees.

Devron Bostick a time machine.  If he had chosen St. Louis or Northern Illinois (two others who offered) he would be averaging 15-20 per game.

Blake Hoffarber nothing.  He's perfect.

Baseball some kind of reform.  Watching the Yankees and Red Sox continue to stock pile anything they want is actually starting to leave a bad taste in my mouth, and I know I'm late to the party and have defending the sport over and over again.  The Yankees just picked up Javier Vazquez, who is owed $11.5 million next year, to be their fourth starter.  $11.5 million for a fourth starter!  If he doesn't work out, they just shrug their shoulders and move on, meanwhile that money would be a huge investment for 90% of the other teams.  Frustrating.

Francisco Liriano some kind of miracle cure.  I can't be the only whose heart breaks every time he's on the hill, and not just for me as a fan, but for him as well.  It has to be incredibly frustrating.

Joe Crede the guy who worked on Larry Bird's back towards the end of his career.  Bird couldn't move on non-game days, but when he had to play the dude worked his Miyagi/Kilmer magic and Bird would go mess around and get a triple-double, yet Crede has missed like, 75% of his teams games.



I'm sure there's more I'm forgetting, but unfortunately that's all the time I have.  For now, let me say Merry Christmas (and all other Holidays) from Down with Goldy and Wonderbaby^TM, who really is not a big fan of Santa Claus:

BREAKING: Bye-Bye Gomez

Just heard on KFAN that the Twins traded Carlos Gomez to the Brewers for SS J.J. Hardy, who the Sidler actually advocated for last year.

I haven't found a link yet.  I will post it when I find one.

Here it is.  Still kind of sorting out my thoughts on this, will post more later.

Twins

1.  Obviously losing the first game isn't ideal, but I don't think anybody outside of the delusional and the wildly optimistic expected them to win this first game - not only due to the circumstances but also because of the pitching matchup.  The important thing in my opinion was that they made sure they didn't get blown out and let the Yankees know this is going to be a series, not a walk-over, and I think they accomplished that.  The score isn't as close as I would have liked at 7-2, but the team was able to get hits - actually outhitting the Yankees, and had plenty of opportunities to score, just couldn't get the big hits.  Even getting two runners on against Rivera is a bit of a mental win for the team.  I don't believe in moral victories, so this isn't one, but I do believe in moral losses - as in if the Twins got blown away here I could see them just rolling over and getting swept.  They now after to win three of the next four, which is going to be quite a chore, but game 1 gave me some hope, despite the loss.

2.  I am perplexed by Gardenhire's use of the DH.  Harris, really?  I understand why he was going Morales since he was swinging such a hot bat earlier this year, but now that he's looking overwhelmed (six pitches against Porcello, six swings-and-misses) why go with Harris?  Even the radio announcers were laughing at the Twins DH, saying they look like a national league team who doesn't have a DH and has to scramble to find one.  The move here is to play Gomez in center, shift Span to right, and move Kubel where he belongs which is no where near the field.  Gomez is a better CF than Span, and Span is immeasurably better than Kubel in right.  You gain far more in the field than you lose with Gomez's bat compared to Harris, if you actually lose anything at all there.  It's a no-brainer.  Which, of course, means Gardy will never, ever do it.

And speaking of my boy Kubes, I'm pretty sure he could face Sabathia 50 times without getting a hit.

Also, Rockies Guy - what happened?

New Jersey Part II

You ever have one of those dinners with work people that just makes you want to claw your own ears out?  I mean, it was a really good dinner (bacon-wrapped shrimp, bruschetta, and mini-burger appetizers, micro green salad with apples, walnuts, and feta, with a top sirloin with grilled asparagus along with a few vodka tonics and a couple of glasses of wine) but the conversation was really sub-par.  Most of the time was spent with my co-workers extoling the comedic stylings of Home Improvement, The Nanny, and the George Lopez show and waxing nostaligic for movies like Dirty Dancing, Mannequin, and the Dirty Dozen.  In the meantime I try to slip in a reference to How I Met Your Mother, Seinfeld, or Roadhouse and I'm met with blank stares.  And when the chatter turned to work, I had to hear endlessly about "The Golden Nugget", "Low-hanging fruit", "looking at things from 30,000 feet", and "a long run for a short slide."  Seriously people, just say what you mean and stop sounding like corporate zombies.  Also, when referring to a previous job, please stop saying, "In my past life."  Just stop.  Let's just move on.

- Oh, and they all love Family Guy, too.  Ugh.

- Of course, the first thing I do when I get back to my room is check the Twins, and knowing Manship is throwing tonight I'm not expecting much.  But we're actually sitting at 0-0 through three.  How often does a Twins' starter go three innings without giving up a run?  10% of the time?  5%?  I need to get a slingbox, I'd love to be watching this game.  Although it looks like Denard just hit into a double play.  I'm assuming it was a rocket.  Keep smilin' Denard!

 

- How about the White Sox throwing in the towel?  I can't say I blame them.  They're too busy molesting little kids and visiting Turkish Bath Houses to be a real team.  After trading Thome and Contreras, I really wanted to know if they got anything decent back (hopefully not), but ESPN has their most recent transaction as calling up Freddy Garcia on August 19th.  Thanks ESPN!  You are truly the sports leader.  While I look elsewhere for the info, go ahead and chew on the logic of picking up Alex Rios and his contract right before you attempt to rebuild.

- Found a little info thanks to some website called Google.  The Sox got minor league infielder Justin Fuller from the Dodgers for Thome.  Fuller is nowhere to be found on any Dodger top prospect lists.  He's never been a big hitter, but has shown a little more promise this year, and has some value as a guy who can play every position, infield and out.  So like a Denny Hocking.  I'm not terrified.  From the Rockies (for Contreras), they picked up minor league pitcher Brandon Hynick.  This is, frankly, truly bizarre.  Contreras is, as you may recall, a broken down old man who says he's 37 but is probably more like 43 and on his best day is no more than a #5 starter.  Hynick, on the other hand, was a top 20 or top 10 prospect in the Rockies system at the beginning of the year depending on where you looked.  He didn't have a great year (4.98 ERA), but did register a 3-1 K to BB ratio.  The knock on him is that he doesn't have great stuff, but he does have great command of his pitches, and the Twins have shown those kind of pitchers can have at least a modicum of success in the AL Central.  A case of the Sox trying to get more and more like the Twins?  Maybe.  But I know one thing for sure, Rockies' fans should be pissed about this one.

- Home run Cuddyer to even the score.  Suck it, I Hate Cuddyer Guy.

- Hold on, I think I just remembered that this hotel bar has the baseball package.

-  Yep, sure did.  Just got back from watching the Twins beat the White Sox in the bottom of the ninth, which is essentially a ritual at this point.  At least so much so that after I asked the bartender for the Twins game, and he couldn't find it, I said, "try channel 668" which had the game.  He asked how I knew that and I said, "Same channel as back home."  Random guy says, "Is home Minnesota or Chicago?"  I says to him, "Minnesota" and he says, "I hate that fucking stadium.  I can't wait for next year."  It's these moments, and only these few moments, when I'm going to miss the dome.  It is so much in Chicago's head it's like a suburban white boy playing ball against Gary Payton in his prime.

- In case you missed it, Jose Morales knocked in the winning run in the bottom of the ninth in his first at-bat back from AAA.  Awesome.  That guy can seriously rake.  I say we trade Mauer now before it's too late and give the catcher job to him.  Other observations from tonight's game:

• Cuddy with a second home run.  He drives me crazy, but there's no doubt he can hit.  And still has the best arm on the team.
• Casilla bouncing into a key double play for the Sox.  I have to be honest, I'm not overly impressed since he's back up.  
• Guerrier comes in and does what he does, namely give up a game-tying home run to David Beckham.
• Jermaine Dye has got to be the scariest mo fo in the league.  I've always been so scared of Thome when they play the Sox, I've mostly been able to ignore how terrifying Dye is.  Not any more.
• At one point I switched seating areas in the bar (more on that later) and I was now watching the White Sox feed.  After Dye's fly out to the track, they started in on the "dome air conditioning blows in when the visiting team is at bat" theory.  They showed every single air vent in the dome, and actually a couple were blowing in, including the one in left.  Of course, like all shitty conspiracy theorists, they neglected to show the vents while the Twins were hitting.  One sided evidence is not evidence.
• Jon Rauch is a huge individual, neck tattoo and all.
  
• Right before Morales hit the big game winner, Gomez had a chance to be a hero and instead did his best Cuddyer impression, whiffing on a slider outside and in the dirt.  We already have one of those Gomez, we don't need another.
• Saw Span hit a triple to give the Twins a lead (the one Guerrier later blew).  Afterwards he looked like this:

- There is one good story from the bar.  About fifteen minutes or so after I came down and had them switch the tv to the Twins game, some guy comes and sits on the same side of the bar as me and asks if they can put it on the Phillies game and the bartender told him he had just switched it for someone else.  Now, the bartender already mentioned the Twins game was on a TV on the other side of the bar, so naturally - being the nice guy I am - I say I can just head over to the other side and watch it, no problem.  So then the guy ends up buying me a drink for being a nice guy.  Funny thing is, the Phillies game was already over at this point.  The guy was so drunk and busy macking on some chick that he never knew.  But hey, free drink, so that works for me.

- And well, it turns out that I accidentally had a lot to drink whilst watching the game, and I'm going to call it a night.  I know, the old me would have kept chugging through and blogged while I could barely see, but apparently I'm a more responsible W.  Dammit.

Carlos the Gomez

As much as it pains me, I think the time has come to admit that Carlos Gomez might be developing into a good hitter. He certainly isn't there yet, but he has made some major improvements this season compared to last, and at the very least is moving in the right direction. Add in his speed and already world class defense, and the Twins just might have gotten a good player back from what was starting to look like a disaster of a Johan Santana trade.

You might not think so to look at the numbers. His batting average (.240) is lower than last year, his OBP (.296) is identical, and his slugging (.378) is marginally up. So why all the praise?

First of all, and most obvious, he's been hot lately, putting up a line of .250/.323/.411 in July - All three numbers are the highest of any month this season. Since June 23rd and through last night, his numbers are .280/.330/.500. If those are numbers he keeps up for a full season - look out.

Digging deeper, he's made some pretty substantial improvements in his hitting. Last year his stats were buoyed by 30 bunt hits - this year he has four. Not because he's forgotten how to bunt for a hit, but because he's been doing it less and working on being a hitter who can hit for extra bases - key given his speed. He has bunted just 15 times this year compared to 66 all last season.

If you take his 30 bunt hits out of his numbers last year, his average drops to .233. This less-reliance on the bunt as a way to get on base is a huge step in his development. This shows in his power. His doubles, triples, and home runs (per AB) are all up from last year, and his isolated power (SLG-AVG) is up by about 40 percent.

Everything points to improvement. His walk rate has nearly doubled, and his strikeout rate has dropped a bit. His Line Drive % is up, and those line drives are taking the place of fly outs, not ground balls. He's showing a much more disciplined approach at the plate. Last year he swung at 37% of pitches out of the strike zone, one of the worst marks in the majors. This year he has drastically cut that down to just 28% (Morneau is at 31%), which has cut his overall pitches swung at percent to under 50%, when last year it was at 60%.

Simply put, he is progressing in a nice way at the plate, which, along with a sometimes circuitous route to some flyballs, was his weakness. If he continues to work on his plate discipline, and he has improved all three years he's played, things could even get better. I'm not quite ready to say he has 30-30 potential or will be a #3 hitter someday like his biggest pimp Snacks believes, but if he played a full season at the level he has since June 23rd, we're looking at a line of .280/.330/.500 with 32 doubles, 16 triples, and 11 home runs (and 16 steals, but I expect this number to get better with more experience).

Can you imagine that as your #2 hitter? Span-Gomez (this version)-Mauer-Morneau-Kubel is pretty damn good start to a lineup. Now if only they could find some pitching.

Oopsies

Looks like that Johan deal keeps getting worse and worse for the Twins and moving-up-the-worst-GMs-list-with-a-bullet Bill Smith after Kevin Mulvey got rocked by the retarded at hitting A's in his first real outing (a one-batter one-out appearance on Monday doesn't count, mostly because I didn't see it.)

Yep, this afternoon against a team that ranks third from the bottom of the AL in runs and last in batting average, slugging percentage, and OPS raked Mulvey in his only inning of work for six hits and four runs before being promptly sent back to AAA in an exchange for The Necklace. To be fair, the A's have a pretty intimidating lineup. I mean, with names like Scott Hairston, Landon Powell, and Rajai Davis, giving up six hits should probably be considered a success.

This makes the second of the three pitchers acquired in the Santana deal to hit the bigs and flame out. Philly Humber was up to start the season, but after putting up a 12.46 ERA in four unimpressive games, he was placed on waivers. Luckily for the Twins, he was so crappy that nobody wanted him, so back to AAA it was.

At least Mulvey still has a shot to develop into a serviceable major leaguer, with an ERA under four in seventeen triple A starts this season and a respectable 2-1 K/BB ratio. Humber, on the other hand, may be a lost cause, as his unclaimed waiver trip suggests. An ERA over six in sixteen starts with a WHIP over 1.6 suggests his new upside might be a middle reliever.

The third pitcher, Deolis Guerra, continues to get less and less impressive despite a recent promotion to double A. After a promising 2006 in A ball, where he put up an ERA of 2.20 and a 1.17 WHIP, he's failed to put up anything resembling a comparable season, with an ERA of almost five in about three seasons at high-A, and is up over five in his three appearances at AA.

Of course, Guerra is just 20 years old, very young for double A, and has still been very impressive at times, but the reviews sound less and less awesome as times goes on.

Gomez at least seems to be improving, albeit quite slowly, but when all is said and done he might end up being the only major league player in the deal. Hopefully I'm wrong, and hopefully this is the second coming of the haul the Indians got when they traded Bartolo Colon to the Expos (Cliff Lee, Grady Sizemore, Brandon Phillips, and Lee Stevens), but don't count on it.

At least Halladay is on the market. Maybe we can get him for Mulvey, Humber, Guerra, and Gomez.

- I'll also mention here because when the hell else am I going to bother with it that Ricky Rubio has decided he is leaving his current team whether he can reach an agreement with the Wolves or not. I'm not exactly sure what this all means, but I almost made it through that entire article and I think it means if the Wolves can't work something out with him he could jump to another team and creating a whole new headache world of problems. I'm starting to think this Rubio kid is Samantha Ronson, and the Wolves are Lindsay Lohan, chasing and chasing and chasing and ending up getting locked out of the house without a bra.

- Speaking of bras, we are watching some show now that has Susan Ward in it and she looks like a mom now. I prefer to think of her like this:
Good god. Actually, just go ahead and google image her. There's not a single picture on that first page that isn't a 10.

- FYI, Dusty Rychart is officially a facebook friend of DWG. Rickert has yet to respond.

- Just in case you weren't ready to kill yourself yet over the Twins, Jason Bartlett is hitting .346/.394/.526 with 18 doubles, 8 homers, and 20 steals.

For perspective, that's a better average than Albert Pujols, a better OBP than your boyfriend Derek Jeter, a better slugging pct. than Jason Bay, more doubles than Carl Crawford, more homers than Magglio Ordonez, and more steals than Willy Taveras. Kill me.

[EDIT: I'm going to add the video of Lebron getting dunked on here, just because I don't want to start another post for something that is so stupid. This is the dumbest thing ever. If he/Nike/Zeus/Jesus/Buddha whoever never grabs the tape in the first place, this is a non-story. Hell, this is still a non-story. It's like that time I told everyone I know that I humped Estella Warren, but I really just got some elbow-boob. [EDIT within an EDIT: I can't figure out how to embed this. Just click this link, jackass]]

Liriano's Last Stand

I was considering watching Hammerhead: Shark Frenzy tonight, but I found out it's not actually about Hammerheads. It's actually about some kind of crazy Hammerhead/Human hybrid science experiment gone rogue. Think Armaggon from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (see above). Lame. How can I bitch about faulty science and shoddy research if the movie isn't about something real? That's the blessing and the curse of Sci-Fi; you can make up anything you want. The Hammerhead/Human thing could speak fluent Esperanto, shoot lasers out of it's eyes, and have a chainsaw for a left hand and it could just be explained away as "that was the result of the experiment that created the creature." I can't handle that. Plus I don't speak Esperanto and I hate sub-titles. So instead I'm going to watch Francisco Liriano try not to lose his job.

This is a huge game for Francisco. He's been a giant pile of dung lately, failing to get to the fifth in his last three starts. With Glen Perkins coming off the disabled list soon, and Anthony Swarzak pitching well enough to stay in the bigs (mirage that it may be), this might be Liriano's last chance to stay in the rotation. If he falls flat again, expect to see him either sent down to AAA once again or thrown to the bullpen.

Liriano will once again be taking on Felix the King, the third time these two enigmas have dueled this season. Felix beat the Twins 6-1 on opening day, and the Twins got him back with a 9-6 win on May 9th, chasing him after just four innings thanks in large part to back-to-back jacks by Mauer and Morneau.

Felix is having a lot more success this season, sporting an ERA of 3.41 and a WHIP of 1.28. The Twins are hot but honestly I don't really like their chances here. More important than the win though is Franky pitching well. Let's watch.

Oh, and I'm going with Sweet Tea Vodka and Lemonade tonight. Nostrovia!

9:09 - Hmm. Buscher DHing tonight. I was really hoping for some Delmon action. If I'm live blogging, there's nothing better than a little Delmon.

9:12 - Mauer is 10-16 lifetime against Felix. 10-16! That's unreal. He has a career OAVG of .260, and Mauer just owns him (small sample size, yes). Of course, a lazy fly out to center is the only logical outcome.

9:14 - A 1-2-3 first inning on something like 7 pitches. Yeaaaaaaaaaah!

9:16 - This is not a scary Mariner lineup. Just looked it up, and they are last in the AL in runs scored and on-base percentage, and 2nd to last in slugging. If he can't handle these guys, it's time to move him while he still has value.

9:17 - We get Gomez instead of Cuddyer, too. At least there's some entertainment.

9:19 - Fly out, Strikeout of Branyan (of course), and another fly out. Looked good too.

9:21 - Kubel whiffs, chasing a curve in the dirt for strike three. Tonight the roll of Delmon Young will be played by Jason Kubel.

9:23 - By the way, did you know Delmon Young has all of two extra-base hits this year? Two! His Isolated Power (slugging - batting average), basically a different way to look at slugging without singles and a high average mucking it up, is the fourth worst in all of baseball. You know is the worst? Nick Punto. You know who is the fifth worst? Alexi Casilla. Jesus, the Twins have less power than Obama, who we all know is just the nominal head of a shadow government working behind the scenes for a One World Order.

9:25 - Base knock for the pervy alcoholic (Brendan Harris) as Bert let's us know just how racist against asians Felix is. He is 1-3 with a 7.22 ERA when Kenji Johjima catches, and 4-0, 0.83 when someone else does. Bert tells us if you can't communicate with your catcher, you can't win. Maybe Bert is the racist one? Buscher stikes out to end the inning.

9:31 - Mike Sweeney ding dong to start the second. I think he was the clown who broke up Baker's no hitter last year too. In my experience watching Liriano, once there's a run, several more will soon follow. Like kids in a trailer park family.

9:35 - Liriano settles down, getting a weak ground out and two strikeouts to finish out the second. Got to see him use the elusive changeup, too, and got a swing and a miss. Oh, and it's some white dude catching for the Mariners, so it's safe to say the Twins are effed.

9:39 - Gomez leads off the third with an infield hit. They need to institute the Willie Mays Hayes program for him - every time he hits the ball in the air, it's twenty push ups. There's no reason for Vince Coleman 2.0 to ever hit the ball in the air. By the way, this is the guy Snacks said would hit 30 home runs some year. He's the next Scott Stahoviak.

9:42 - Infield hit for Casilla now. The Isolated Power here is off the charts.

9:44 - And of course, Gardy is having Span bunt. He's your second best hitter (canucks and roid-heads ineligible), don't take the bat out of his hands - especially in just the third inning. What, you really think you're only gonna need one or two runs? Freaking Liriano is on the mound, you better look to get at least five or six, which means no sac bunts in a potential big inning. God I hate Gardy so much. If this town wasn't so retarded about the "blue collar mentality" he would have been run out of here already for being a dipshit.

9:45 - Mauer walks, setting up the double-play. Speaking of Morneau, did you know that there are two Canadians in the top 3 in the AL in RBI? It's an invasion. We were busy watching the south, but they got us from the north. A classic diversionary invasion. Sun Tzu would be proud.

9:48 - They end up getting one to tie it on a Morneau sac fly. Good use of the sacrifice that inning. I'm so proud.

9:51 - Some clown for the Mariners lays down a bunt and then tries to slide into first Punto-style. Shocker, he was out. Where is Punto? Is he hurt? No way Gardy has just stopped playing "his guy Nicky", right?

9:53 - I looked it up. He's on the DL with a groin strain, same injury I got last time I humped your sister.

9:55 - Liriano actually just walked Ichiro. Do you know how hard that is to do? In his career he walks in 6% of his plate appearances, and that walk right there gives him a whopping eleven this year. He's so awesome, he can even walk guys who hate to walk worse than fat softball players. And now we get to watch him try to pitch with a runner on, which is where he usually falls apart - and there's a single for Branyan, which actually I didn't know he ever did. Now here's Beltre. That god there are two outs.

10:01 - God dammit. Had him 1-2 and ended up walking him after he fouled off a bunch of pitches. I'm going to go ahead and say this is the at-bat of his season. If Sweeney takes him to a gap and clears the bases it's time to trade him before the implosion plays all the way out. If he can get out of it, maybe he can turn it back around and stop sucking.

10:06 - Lazy fly ball, out of the inning. Honestly, I think what Snacks and Sidler said about it being mental might be right. Watching him once a runner is on base is like watching a whole other pitcher. He's afraid to throw it over the plate, gets behind, and then has to groove it. He needs to stop that and get over it. Kind of like how Theory was afraid of being our softball pitcher because he was convinced he was going to take a line drive in the melon. Like that, but not as girly.

10:08 - Effin' Dick just stole my bit. Said that might have been a "crossroads" type inning for Liriano.

10:13 - Sean O'Hair can go to hell by the way. That little bitch dropped out of the Memorial at some point between round one and two. I can't find any news on why, but I'm going to guess his dad yelled at him and made him cry. Also, Adam Scott is absolutely wrecked somehow. He finished 77-81 and missed the cut at +12. Seriously, the guy has died faster than David Ortiz.

10:17 - What kind of name is Wladimir? I swear, black people can misspell anything.

10:24 - What the hell? Suddenly Span strikes out on a ball out of the zone. That means both of my favorites, Kubel and Span, who I love for their plate discipline, have struck out on pitches well out of the strike zone tonight. The only possible explanation is that Felix is the Jesus of pitching. He's the Joe Mauer of pitching.

10:31 - Two one, two out for Kubel and he just misses a pitch and ends up flying out. Twins are knocking Felix around and drawing walks, but can't get the big hit - which almost always comes back to haunt them. Middle of the fifth, still 1-1.

10:34 - Four pitch walk to start the fifth. Great.

10:40 - I've never seen anyone so afraid to throw the ball over the plate. The only called strikes he gets are when he nips the black on the outside corner with his slider. I have no idea if he doesn't have it since the surgery or if he just thinks he doesn't, but somebody needs to get in that guys head and fix it back up. He struck out Beltre with a low change up (a really good pitch) to end the inning after two walks, but he just looks like it's a struggle the whole time he's out there. Still, it's 1-1, and if he can get his confidence back up I'm convinced he can still be a 1/2 type pitcher. I BELIEVE.

10:45 - Joe Crede sucks

10:51 - Couple more hits, still no more runs. They are squandering every opportunity. It's not every day Buscher gets a hit, you need to take advantage of that, man.

10:57 - Two quick outs for Liriano, and then Wladimir somehow hits a soft ground ball that somehow gets passed Crede and down the line, and then Denardo drops it into the bleachers going from glove to hand. Ends up as a 2-out double for Vlad.

11:00 - Bert wants us to know that he hasn't seen Liriano shake off Mauer at all tonight. He then continues to praise Mauer and essentially give him the credit for Liriano's solid outing (which is likely now over after a weak fly out since he's through six and over 100 pitches now). What can the baby jesus not do? Oh, right, stay clean.

11:03 - Span down on strikes again. I hope he isn't broken. Mauer and Morneau follow it up with a couple of easy outs. It's now bullpen vs. bullpen. I have no idea who Seattle has, but I like their chances.

11:12 - Crain manages to get two outs, which is weird. Now we are going to get Mijares to go after Ichiro - who is still hitless and stuck on his 27 game hit streak. This might be his last time up.

11:15 - Easy ground out, still 1-1 going to the 8th. Good game. Not a lot to bitch about so far though, which sucks.

11:19 - Seattle goes with Sean white, who appears to be about 6-10 and Mrs. W says, "He could be cute. Wait. Nope, nevermind." He gets Kubel to ground out, but then somehow manages to walk Crede, which is nearly on par with walking Ichiro. Harris and Buscher coming up next doesn't exactly fill me with hope. It's more like, the opposite of hope. But not quite despair. We'll call it, Less Hope.

11:23 - When I mentioned to Mrs. W she made the blog, she asked how and I told her and she was underwhelmed. She would like me to mention to all of you that she ran 10 miles today in her prep for Grandma's half-marathon in two weeks. If I can have a moment of seriousity here, let me say that she is pretty awesome.

11:25 - Tolbert steals second, and I have no idea where Tolbert came from. Apparently he's so much faster than Crede that taking away Crede's bat and putting Tolbert's (the equivalent of a little girl) in is a worthwhile thing to do. Meanwhile Harris strikes out on a ball in the dirt, and Mrs. W (who is suddenly paying attention) sees Buscher at the plate and asks "Who is this Pud (pronounced with a long u)?" He then lines it off the second basemen's chest and somehow this all results in Tolbert being thrown out at home. Good call on taking out Crede, ass.

11:28 - I'm really in the mood for some chili. During some of the commercials we put it on a show that is doing a feature on a chili tavern in Seattle. Looks good. I'm making some tomorrow. If you know where I live you can come over and have some.

11:29 - Now that I see the replay, Tolbert is a jackass. He tried to run over the catcher, when he would have had a better chance trying to go around him and hook in like Dawg's guy Randy Bush, especially since his running into the catcher looked like a Deion Sanders tackle. I think I hate Matt Tolbert. Of course, Dick's reaction is "Wow, did the ball in the glove ever touch Tolbert, I'm not sure." God you're an ass, Dick.

11:30 - ASSDICK!!

11:31 - Guerrier in for the bottom of the 8th. I am predicting a three run Seattle lead after this inning.

11:33 - Beltre hits a weak fly ball which Gomez decides to break back on and can't get back for it. So it's now a single instead of a can-of-corn. Guerrier doesn't get that many people to hit the ball poorly. When he does, you really need to get an out.

11:35 - Double play. I've always been a big Guerrier fan.

11:37 - I've never been a fan of white pizza. I need the red sauce. And fancy toppings aren't really necessary either. Just give me sausage and pepperoni. I mean, I also like olives (green not black, sicko), peppers, and onions, but they aren't necessary. And thin crust, for the love of god thin crust. And I'm not adverse to weird pizza necessarily. I went to some super fancy pants restaurant and we had pizza as an appetizer, but it was goat cheese, bacon, and green apple pizza, and it was good. But for my money, there is nothing better than a thin crust, sausage and pepperoni cut into squares and not from a chain. Let me recommend Donatelli's if you are in the North St Paul type area? Second best pizza ever. I think I'm going to go there tomorrow. Pizza and Chili. I'm so healthy.

11:41 - Yes, we are still watching food shows during the commercials.

11:47 - Span gets tossed trying to steal with Mauer up. Man, the steal is such an awesome weapon. It's so important to get Span to second there with two outs. I mean, what are the odds Mauer would hit the ball in the gap? No way there's a chance at all Span could score from first on anything Mauer could do. Thank god we have Gardy to make all these super smart decisions for us.

11:50 - Hooray for more Guerrier. Also I want to mention once again that Gardy might be the worst game manager of all-time. That attempted steal by Span is simply inexcusable.

11:53 - I don't know how this happens, but Guerrier puts them away 1-2-3. I also don't understand how Mrs. W can be complaining right now because she's out of Michelob Ultra and "has to" drink my Red Stripe. That's like saying you have run out of Mike Redmond at bats and have to play Mauer intsead. And he's up right now, which is probably why I used that as my analogy. I'm not very clever.

11:57 - Roid boy hits it to the wall, but not over. I can't decide if that would have just been a fly out or if he is between cycles and a little weaker right now. Actually he was mostly helped out by Seattle's center fielder who played that fly ball like the helpless kid in little league who loves to play the piano and listens to Mozart but his parents want him to be well-rounded to get into Harvard so they make him play baseball.

11:59 - So that was a double, and then they walk Morneau to get to Kubel. The intentional walk is Mrs. W least favorite thing eve, and she is currently in mid-rant about how dumb and gay and stupid it is and how it should be illegal and I'd write more but Kubel just hit the hell out of the ball and it should have been a 3-run dinger but stupid Gutierrez, who is probably an illegal, made a great catch to rob him. So now we have first and third, one out, and Joe Crede isn't up because instead we have Tolbert. Sounds like a double-play waiting to happen.

12:03 - A suicide squeeze????? A suicide squeeze?????!! Gardy needs to go. This is the worst managing I've ever seen. Oh, they pitched out, so they knew it was coming and Mauer, who was on third, just 90 feet away from scoring with one out, is now out. Stunned. I'm stunned. I've heard people say they were stunned but I didn't really get it until now. What the fuck, gardy? I'm shocked he didn't pinch run for Mauer earlier.

12:05 - Tolbert doubles off the glove the same guy who misplayed Mauer's double earlier, scoring Morneau and giving the Twins the lead. So now they will win and everyone will forget how Gardenhire is the dumbest person in history. (ha ha they ruled it an error go to hell Tolbert)

12:11 - One out. Griffey pinch hitting. He's about to go yard and tie this garbage up.

12:14 - Or not. Two outs. Ichiro up. I kind of want him to get a knock here to extend his hit streak. But not a home run. Plus, if this goes any more innings Mrs. W is going to straight up kick my ass.

12:17 - Struck him out. Good win. Suck it Japan.

Some Stuff Quick

- Cry. Travis Busch is leaving the Gophers. The team declined to renew his scholarship, so Buschy is taking his ball and leaving which, with the graduation of Shamala, leaves the team dangerously low in the unathletic white guy department. The Daily Gopher reports that the Pioneer Press reports that Busch is getting interest from Winona State and Nebraska-Omaha, and I'm kind of surprised. I actually figured that his little hustle routine and pigmentless skin would have a higher profile team (like a Northern Iowa or Valpo) come calling, but it would seem not. Faith in the world slightly restored. Slightly.

- One of the things I'm most impressed with this early in the season is the improvement of Carlos Gomez's batting approach. His stats aren't staggering, but looking deeper (or even just watching him) you can see he's matured and made changes, and the Spring Training reports to that weren't just Spring fluff. Last season, according to fangraphs, Gomez swung at 36.8% of pitches thrown that were out of the strike zone, and so far this season he's only gone after 21.7%. He's even letting more balls in the zone go as well, swing at 58% of strikes this year compared 68% last season. Overall, he's swinging at just 34% of pitches this year, whereas last year he went after 53%. This is awesome, and should not only contribute to more walks and less strikeouts, but also to a higher batting average and slugging percentage as he stops going after pitches he can't hit. Excellent.

- Also excellent is Alexi Casilla turning the double play. I agree with The Fourth Strike that he and Punto might be the best double play combination in the league - fielding wise at least. Certainly not offensively, since Punto sucks and that honor pretty clearly goes to Hanley Ramirez and Dan Uggla in Florida.

- ESPN released their final list of the top 100 prospects, The ESPNU 100, for 2009. As you'd guess, two Gophers ended up in the top 100, with Royce coming in at #35 and Rodney at #42. According to this list, they end up being the #2 and #3 ranked freshman coming into the Big Ten for next season, since there isn't a whole lot of talent coming into the conference, behind just Indiana's Christian Watford at #34.

- Oh, and if you're wondering, last year Delmon Young swung at 39.9% of pitches out of the zone (fourth in the league) and this year he's so far gone after a whopping 60%, and overall has gone after a staggering 64% of pitches he's seen.

- Joe Crede just hit a home run in his first at-bat against the Sox. So awesome. Eat it, queers.

- The Masters is shaping up nicely, with a couple of surprises at the top of the leaderboard in Chad Campbell and Kenny Perry, with nearly all the big names in striking distance, including Furyk, Garcia, Kim, Singh, Ogilvy, Mickelson, Villegas, Westwood, Harrington, and el Tigre all within seven shots. Shaping up to be a fun weekend, although my new least favorite golfer in the world Zach Johnson won't be there after shooting a freaking 80 today. 80! Raymond Floyd is 66 years old and hasn't won on the Champions tour since 2000. There were only five rounds the entire first two days of the tournament worse. What a giant piece of crap. Thanks for sucking and making me look like an idiot.

- I have two movies queued up to live blog when I get a chance. The first is Shark Attack 3: Megalodon, which I have mentioned before and finally found again and Tivo'd, and The Sandlot 3, starring Dylan McKay which I can't wait to watch - it has to be better than Sandlot 2, which had girls playing ball for god's sake.

- Since baseball is harder to keep up with who is being Awesome and who is sucking in a given week, I'm considering going to a "Daily Review" every morning rather than just the weekly roundup. So that would mean daily content updates. Stay tuned.

- By the way, if you search this blog for "Shark" it returns 11 posts, only one of which references Greg Norman and zero of which reference the San Jose Sharks if they still exist. I may have a problem of some sort.

EDIT: Un-freaking-believable. I get my ESPN Streak for the Cash up to 10, and Phoenix gets beat by Memphis - and not only beat, they get rolled by 20. F that. Turns out Phoneix played their backups more than their starters. God that sucks.

First Fantasy Baseball Draft of the Year

I was so antsy for fantasy baseball that I signed up for a free yahoo league and drafted a team tonight. Things kind of fell apart because it moved too quickly (autodrafters) and it got to the point I couldn't cross people off my list so I kind of had to wing it (and also I was drinking). Here's where I ended up

C - Matt Wieters (buying into the hype)
1b/3b - Chris Davis (ditto, but with some production to back it up)
2b - Howie Kendrick (sort of ended up here by default, could be worse)
3b - Aramis Ramirez (got him when I didn't realize it was my turn and I timed out, but I was considering him here anyway so it's ok)
SS/2B/OF - Alexei Ramirez (good in the outfield, awesome as a SS)
OF - Grady Sizemore (40-40 this year?)
OF - Matt Holliday (leaving Coors will hurt, but I still think .300/.370/.500 with 25 homers and 20 steals is possible and even likely)
OF - Justin Upton (LOVE this guy this year. LOVE him.)
UTIL - OF Lastings Milledge (either going to breakout this year or whither away, betting on the breakout)

BENCH- SS Orlando Cabrera (don't particularly like him, but need a backup SS)
BENCH - 1B/3B/C Pablo Sandoval (could be a rookie of the year candidate in the NL, and qualifies at catcher)
BENCH - OF Carlos Gomez (so call me a homer. He gives me steals if nothing else - or at least did the first half of last year. Plus, Snacks says he will be thirty/thirty someday)

SP - Tim Lincecum (what's there to say - dude rocks)
SP - Rich Harden (don't particularly care for this pick - should have taken Cliff Lee or Felix Hernandez - both were available - instead. If Harden stays healthy it could still work)
SP - Ricky Nolasco (quietly had a great year last year, and PECOTO loves him)
SP - Zack Grienke (I dissed him last year, but now studying the numbers I can admit he looks like the real deal - not JD Durbin)
RP - Mariano Rivera - seems old and all, but a 0.67 WHIP last year? I bet this dude is throwing PECOTA into a tizzy, who could compare?
RP - Jose Valverde - 44 saves last year, and also is a free agent this year and will likely be traded to a contender = more saves
RP - Chad Qualls - PECOTA doesn't like him, but like F computers man. Bobby Fischer rules!

BENCH - SP Justin Duchscherer - was an all-star last year before getting hurt, and was helped by an insane .238 BABIP. Still, seems like a good gamble with one of my last picks.
BENCH- SP Jason Schmidt - I have no idea what to expect since he hasn't pitched since like 2005. Other choice here was Ian Snell of the Pirates, and although he is supposed to have potential the fact that he got the crap kicked out of him last year and he pitches for an awful team scared me away. Who knows, Schmidt might work out.

Guys I love who I missed - Evan Longoria, BJ Upton, Cole Hamels (:sadface:), Carl Crawford, Dan Haren, Nick Markakis, Matt Kemp, Joey Votto, Jay Bruce, Jon Lester, Francisco Liriano, James Loney, Conor Jackson, Scott Baker, Carlos Guillen, Alex Gordon, Chris Iannetta (shut up Sidler), Adam Jones. I also left Jason Kubel out there. It makes me sad inside. Maybe I should drop Gomez, but I might need the steals.

I'm sad? No, you're sad!

Drinking at home. Go me.

- In case you missed it or didn't want to hunt around the internet, Devron Bostick won the dunk contest and Lawrence "LDUB $ SIKC 6" Westbrook won the three point contest at the Gophers' Before Midnight Madness hoo-ha. If you want more details, you can get plenty from the nerds over at The Gopher Hole. Lot's of good info, and I'm very excited about the reaction to Paul Carter, who I was expecting the least out of among the newcomers this year. Granted the Gopher Holies are generally pretty optimistic, but it sounds good to me.

- Speaking of nerds, From the Barn has a very nice rundown of Tubby's Tip-Off with more details than you could ever need. I don't particularly feel comfortable with his Kevin Love comparison, but pretty good stuff in general. Also be sure to check out his player-by-player preview of the 2008-2009 season. Not featured: praise for Kevin Payton. Except that he's tall.

- This is freaking unbelievable. TBS is showing the Steve Harvey show right now because they're "having technical difficulties" and aren't able to show the Sox/Rays game. Bull. F'ing. Crap. This is some kind of pro-Red Sox conspiracy, I know it.

- Remember Kenny George? The 7-7 behemoth from UNC-Asheville? The guy who's pro scouting sheet read:
PROS: Really tall. Has both feet.
CONS: Everything else
Remember him? Well, update your cheatsheets, because he just had part of his foot lopped off. Apparently he had some sort of bad ass infection or some such. He should probably wash his feet better, but I bet it's tough when you're so far away from them. Should probably use a stick.

- Bossman Junior Upton just hit a homerun that I can't watch. But on the bright side, Steve Harvey is funny.

- I'm kidding. No he's not. And if you just agreed with that what I said up there then you should probably stop watching TV.

- Hey whoever this announcer is, they do not call James Shields, "Big Game James." That's James Worthy. And now announcer #2 even brings up Worthy, and acknowledges and condones the stolen nickname, which is only ok if you're LaDainian Tomlinson. Homerun Youkilis. Nice pitch, Worthy.

- I'm a wee bit concerned about my boy Rico. Checking out the report on Pepperdine's Midnight Madness, there's nary a single mention of King Rico. He didn't participate in the dunk contest, despite winning it last year, and was also absent from the three point contest, despite being able to make it rain. There is a play-by-play of the intrasquad scrimmage available, and he doesn't show up there either. There is no mention of an injury anywhere on Pepperdine's site.

I was concerned, so I checked out his facebook page, and he seems to be in good spirits as he recently changed his status to read, "Rico Tucker is the New King of Everything." I can't say I disagree. I may have found a clue, however, in a mysterious message left on his page by Moe Hargrow. It reads,

"my niggga...wus hood? yea back on the book to keep in tune wit the rest of the world. As for me back across the water for another season"

Perhaps if I can decipher this cryptic message I will find the answers I seek.

- Did I ever tell you that Mrs. W is a Red Sox fan? So embarrassing.

- What's best: Cheez-Its, Cheese Nips, or Goldfish?

- I was going to write about how the Twins were lucky at this point to not have gotten Jacoby Ellsbury in a Santana trade, since he OPS+'d just 89 and was basically nothing more than a fast, excellent defensive center fielder with no real pop and lacking an understanding of the strike zone. Then I realized how familiar that sounded, except Gomez was even worse at the plate.

- Tonight's post is brought to you by Monica Keena:As seen in such films as Freddy vs. Jason and some other movies that don't matter.

- F v J was actually a pretty good movie by the way. Of course, I'm a huge Friday the 13th fan, but in my totally biased opinion it was one of the better ones in either series. Quite clever how they wrote it up to get those two together, and a very good ending. Unlike the new Indiana Jones movie. More on that Monday.

- Are you telling me we're all paused and what not here because of an Umpire's injury? What happened? Did he actually call a strike and it caused massive chest pains? We had flipped away so now I'm all confused. Much like the new Indiana Jones movie.

- Basically they're just freezing Shields at this point. Thank god he's Big Game James and this ain't no thing for him. I still don't know what the hell happened, but we're back.

- Is there a worse hitter right now than Jason Varitek? He's completely lost up there. It's like watching Snacks try to hit a lefty in town ball. He hit all of .220 this year, with an OPS+ of 74 and has gone 3-14 and 0-14 in the two playoff series so far. Note: That OPS+ of 74 is in the same basic region as Carlos Gomez this season. But according to Snacks he has 30 homerun potential, so look out world.

- Crawford steals second, which means Varitek can't hit nor can he throw runners out. Having trouble figuring out why he's even on the team at this point.

- You know, I've heard a whole assfaceload of times about how Cliff Floyd is just a winner, and he wins everywhere he goes. Well, what happened in 1995 (66-78)? 1998 (54-108)? 1999 (64-98)? 2003 (66-95)? And there's a bunch of other sub .500 seasons in there too. Plus, he just grounded out here in the fourth with the tying run on second, so it's clear he doesn't "win everywhere he goes" but he doesn't even know how to win and probably doesn't even want to win. What a dick.

- Nevermind about Varitek, he just threw out Navarro. Dioner Navarro. The opposing catcher. He has five career steals and his middle name is Favian, I sure as hell hope you can throw him out. Why the holy mother hell is he stealing in the first place? I hope that was a busted hit and run. I'd know, but Mrs. W got all antsy so we're watching the Office now. That Creed is a funny Mofo.

- As I typed that Jason "Sweet Cheeks" Bartlett goes deep to tie the game, and once again assures me that our Bartlett vs. Varitek Total Bases bet will be a win.

- WTF? Seriously?

- That was awesome how Bartlett couldn't make a throw to first there, leading to another Boston run. It's like watching the Tigers against the Cardinals two years ago, they're just giving it away.

- God, fine. Here's another Wonderbaby (TM) picture:
I don't know. Eating a fake pig. She's not a genius.

- Terrelle Pryor is the next Mike Vick.

- Holy god the Rays are pissing down their legs like Ohio State against an SEC team. Except they are actually more talented, not less. I bet I could have made a good comparison for this like an hour ago, but beer makes my brain not work so good. In any case, they're choking hard. Like your mom. There, that's a pretty good comparison.

- I'm calling it a game here. Pena just got an inside fastball from Masterson with a runner on that he should have absolutely crushed, but completely missed it and hit a horridly weak pop up. Rays suck. Go Phillies.

- I would be willing to bet $5,000 (approx. 1 week's pay) that Papelbon gets passed around the Red Sox clubhouse like Andy Dufresne in Shawshank.

- God dammit. I just, I just hate the Red Sox so much. And if they win tomorrow night all we're going here is a bunch of destiny bullshit. and just now as the game ended and the gay sox won Mrs. W started clapping and I've never wanted to toss her down a flight of stairs more than I do right now. Except right after she told me she was pregnant.