Monday Mumblings

Of course the big news today is Joe Mauer winning the MVP, and it nearly being unanimous.  I'm just curious about the guy who voted for Miguel Cabrera instead.  It seemed the consensus #2 candidate was Mark Texeira, not Miguel Cabrera.  But let's look:

Cabrera:  .324/.396/.547, 34 HRs, 104 RBI
Texeira:  ..292/.383/.565, 39 HRs, 122 RBI

Pretty close, right?  But by voting for Cabrera, this dude is saying he values things like average and on-base percentage over home runs and rbis, which is actually pretty refreshing.  But at the same time it's completely bizarre, because Mauer beat everybody in those stats.

If some ass clown had voted for Tex based on home runs and RBI, it wouldn't have surprised me one bit, as wrong as it would have been.  I was actually expecting Jeter to end up with a 1st place vote as well, since people are morons who want to make out with him all the time, but Cabrera?  You can't even use the "playoffs" argument since the Twins did that miracle comeback thing to steal the playoff spot.  I can't come up with any conceivable argument, and I've looked at this in every stupid way possible, to vote for Cabrera.  Boggled.

Lastly on MVP, I haven't been able to find the the actual full breakdown of the votes/points, but according to ESPN's "Others receiving votes" section, both Mike Cuddyer and Jason Kubel received votes.  There's not way that a hot 1-month stretch out of Cuddy would vault him ahead of the season-long excellence Kubel showed, right?  RIGHT?  Someone tell me when you find the voting breakdown.

-  Sticking with the Twins for a minute, Shooter had this little ditty in his "column" today:

It wouldn't be surprising if the Twins tried to make a deal with the San Diego Padres for third baseman Kevin Kouzmanoff, 28, who in 141 games last season batted .255 but hit 18 homers with 88 runs batted in. Starter Glen Perkins would seem to be the bait.

 Now, it's Charley Walters here, so I'm guessing this is more him taking a name that was bandied about last year and tossing a rumor at it, but it's worth a short look at because Kouzmanoff's name seems to keep coming up.

Walters, of course, hits on average, home runs, and rbi, the relevant stats if this was 1988, but since we are no longer in the dark ages, let's look further. 

The Kouz hit .255/.302/.420 this year, and was about an average fielder range wise, although is .990 fielding percentage was obviously outstanding, and a major league record.  Those aren't great numbers, but I don't much care for Glen Perkins anymore, so I'd be willing to do that deal depending on Kouzmanoff's contract.

Which brings me to the real problem - I can't for the life of me find any details of his contract, and one site actually says he's a free agent.  Now, would it shock me if he was actually a free agent and Walters had no idea?  No, it would surprise me one bit. But I won't assume that, as much as I want to, and for now I will just say that pending his contract, I would be interested in a Perkins for Kouz swap.  If he's going to cost $5 million or less, I want him.  And if he's on the open market, and I don't think the Pads would resign him since they have prospect Chase Headley coming up to play 3b, I be willing to pay more like $6-$7, as long as it's just for two years or so - enough time for Valencia to properly marinate.

Thanks to intrepid reader Kate J. for the tip.

-  Hey, you guys remember how I told you Cincinnati would be all awesome this year, and how you should have watched them today in the Maui Classic?  Well, they rolled a pretty good Vandy team (ranked #24 with a win already over St. Mary's) 67-58, and believe me the game wasn't nearly that close.  I really hope you got in on the Bearcats when they were 200-1 to win the National Title, because that number is going to go way, way, way down.  Might as well jump on it now before it gets to like, 10-1 before the tournament starts.

-  Since we're talking about things I watched tonight, I also want to mention that although I hate Pitt, and I loathe them, and specifically Pitt point guards - from Brandin Knight to Carl Krauser to LeVance Fields, hate them all - but I think I might really like this kid Travon Woodall, and I'm kind of wishing I had picked him in my fantasy league (last four picks:  Ralph Sampson, Courtney Fortson, Mikhail Torrance, Jon Leuer - I feel dirty).  He's a sophomore, and although he wasn't a highly ranked recruit when he came out, and didn't make much of an impact last year, he's killing it this year.  Coming into tonight, he was averaging just 7.7 points per game, but added in 7.7 assists and 3.7 rebounds, and then tonight against Wichita put up 19 points, 6 boards, 5 assists, and 4 steals and just seems to be moving at a whole different speed than everybody else out there - almost Rico Tucker like.  Well, I like him.  And I'm actually giving him his own tag.  Yeah, that's right.  With luck I can grab him next round (only 3 left!)

-  This Lewis Jackson injury is going to be a big deal, mark my words.  It makes me a bit nervous that Boiled Sports seems to disagree with me, since they cover Purdue hoops and my opinions are basically of the "JaJuan gives me a boner" type, but they seem to be pretty split on this one over there.  Of course, as seen by the post above and my continued Rico Tucker love, I seem to have a real affinity towards lightning quick, slightly out-of-control point guards.  I know I'll miss him at least.

-  The television program "The Big Bang Theory" is simultaneously the most underrated and overrated show on TV. 


-  Finally, since I'm keeping this short tonight, I'll close with an email from studly reader Stan N.:

Minnesota Golden Gophers--what a ridiculous mascot. Maybe Minnesota Golden Mosquitos would be more appropriate. There's plenty of them in Minnesota too, and a mosquito is more intimidating than a gopher--at least they get more attention. When you're facing Wolverines, Badgers, Wildcats, Hawk(eye)s, etc. what can a Gopher do? I guess their record speaks for itself. Although I'm a Minnesota alumni and support its sports teams, I can't support Goldy the Gopher. I wish we could impeach Goldy and substitute a Timberwolf(I guess that's already taken), a Lumberjack or anything else that would command respect.

I'm not entirely certain about a Lumberjack, since that seems pretty gay, but I'm pretty on board with this.  Any chance we can get rid of Goldy altogether?  Snacks and Bogart, you are both lawyers, can we file a class-action or something?

Sigh

Oh Charley Walters, you always keep me on my toes. An excerpt from his column today:

"Uh-oh: The Gophers, who allowed 412 yards passing by Bowling Green last week, said they plan no major pass protection scheme changes against Miami (Ohio)."

I just can't let this pass. He either doesn't understand the meaning of pass protection, or this is a major typo. It wouldn't surprise me either way, and either way it's inexcusable for a newspaper the size of the Pioneer Press.

This also seems like a good place to mention the moronic radio announcers for last night's Colts/Saints game. I was driving home listening to the third quarter, and they started talking about Colts safety Bob Sanders and how he's awesome (true) and how he's always hurt (also true). Then they said he needed to be more like Rodney Harrison and get bigger so he wouldn't get hurt.

Harrison just got suspended for steriod use. Frickin' brilliant.

I'll be back later with a look at the Gopher/Miami game.

Charley Walters is Dumber than I Thought

I haven't read any of the local columns in a while, due to being stuck in New Jersey for work which was not awesome, so I just saw Charley Walters reaction to the KG trade, which was this:

In exchange for Garnett, the Wolves will receive Al Jefferson, Sebastian Telfair, Gerald Green, Theo Ratliff, Ryan Gomes and two first-round draft picks from the Celtics. If the Wolves got just Jefferson in return, they would have gotten the best of the deal.

That last part has to be a joke, right? Jefferson is a nice, young player who will probably be very good. KG is a top five player over his career, and is probably still top 10 right now. Maybe this is the beginning of the unfortunately inevitable bashing of Garnett that will take place to make idiots feel better about the fact that he's gone.

Or maybe Charley Walters is a stupidhead.

Bryce Considering Leaving?

This might be the first time Charley Walters has broken a story, but according to him in today's Pioneer Press, Bryce Webster is considering leaving the team to concentrate on academics.

Actually a pretty good move. He clearly doesn't have a future in the NBA or anything, so if he needs to concentrate on his grades he certainly should. With Coleman, Tollackson, and Williams taking up the front court minutes, Webster wouldn't get a whole lot of playing time. He didn't get a whole lot last year either, even though he looked ok at times.

The more scholarships available for Tubby to get his guys instead of being stuck with Monson's, the better.

Since Walters wrote this, it's most likely either completely made up, or at best is third or fourth-hand knowledge, so who knows, but it's out there.