Now that wasn't so hard, was it?
One night after a gut-busting loss on another Capps blown save, Gardy finally makes the right decision and puts Joe Nathan back in his familiar closer role and suddenly everything seems right with the world. The Twins win at home against an AL Central team and Nathan gets the save with the usual obligatory base runner. Even without a strikeout, Nathan looked good with three popups for outs and the only hit a roller through the infield, which may have been helped with Cuddyer guarding the line in the ninth.
It will be interesting tomorrow if the Twins have another narrow, late lead. I think Gardy may have been hesitant to make Nathan the closer because he has said he won't use Nathan three days in a row. I'm fine with that, since most relievers (outside of LOOGYs) shouldn't be used that often anyways. This undoubtedly means Perkins will close tomorrow, if necessary, and I'm fine with that as well, especially after he dominated Saturday night and absolutely abused Alex Gordon, who's been the Royals' best hitter, on three pitches. The interesting part will be to see who gets the eighth inning, or at least who starts it. If righties are coming up, I wouldn't be surprised to see Capps in there with Mijares warming up. The other choice would be Alex Burnett and neither one inspires a lot of confidence right now, although Capps' splits make me think he can thrive as a protected setup man. Of course, this means the Twins need Mijares to figure out his control problems as well.
It's amazing how much difference one bases-empty single can make. The Royals' Jeff Francis was in cruise control in the eighth inning Saturday before Alexi Casilla flared a single into right field. Joe Mauer followed with a ground ball through the hole created by the presence of Casilla and suddenly Francis was out of the game and ended up with the loss after Cuddyer singled off reliever Aaron Crow to put the Twins ahead.
That eighth inning and Nathan' s save prevented me from a meltdown after two bad calls by the umpires in the sixth inning allowed the Royals to tie the game on an infield out. Both were close plays, but when you have two close calls go against you in one inning of a tight game and both were shown to be bad calls, well that can be pretty tough to take. Fortunately, it didn't mean much more than prevent Pavano from getting the win and give me one more reason to have no respect for Cowboy Joe West.
I was there. Pretty fun game for my two kids to have as their first at Target Field.
I was afraid that Hosmer would hit a homer against Nathan there in the 9th. I wanted him walked. That single was as good as a walk.
It was hard explaining to the kids why there would be any umpires that are known for bad calls. Isn't their job to get the calls right?
Mauer did good enough there in the eighth to allow both of the other runners to advance as far as they could.
HPR decided that he doesn't like Alex Gordon.
Saw Freealonzo there. Nice catching up with you, man.
Perk is awesome.
I'm also digging the Twitter feed and stribblog posts of Joe C's substitute, Amelia Rayno. Good amount of snark in there for a pro scribe.
Bert was goofy even in his ceremony. Ran in from LF, started jogging, then stopped to catch his breath. Was awarded some wooden shoes from the Dutch-American League (something like that), immediately put them on, and didn't take them off until his ceremonial first pitch, so we got to see his zebra-striped socks.
Someone tell me why one of the audience sing-alongs is Journey's "Don't Stop Believin'". I thought the Pale Hose adopted that for their WS run. At least the kiss cam uses the Mr. Nelson's "Kiss".
I'm really happy for Perkins. When he was having trouble as a starter, it was never about his ability to get outs in the first couple innings, it was always the second and third time through the lineup that his pitch count would balloon. Looks like he found a way to successfully transition to the bullpen, eh?
hate to break it to you, but according to b-ref, Perkins worst inning during his career has been the 1st with a 6.44 ERA. His second worst inning is the second inning with a 5.79 ERA. Batters have an OPS over .900 in both innings.
I imagine, however, that this is similar to many pitchers, as you're always facing the other team's best batters in the first inning or two.
Huh, just shows how my perception differs from reality yet again, I guess. I remembered him as getting tattooed in the fourth and fifth innings, and rarely making more than six innings a start. Of course, this is all influenced by the fact that Gordo and Dazzle were my main sources of information at that time.
I thought I remembered Perkins being fairly Radke-like, and it appears Beau's findings agree. Baker, though, is the opposite. I think the dropoff for him on the third time through the order is pretty significant.
If only there was a way to look these things up....
for his career:
243/295/387 1st PA facing Baker in game
257/298/419 2nd PA
300/343/486 3rd PA
for 2011
203/265/329 1sr
250/322/390 2nd
252/281/431 3rd
the sample sizes are pretty small for 4th+ PAs, but are much uglier for both career and 2011. But my guess is that Baker's progression of declining success is pretty typical for quality starters.
for what it's worth, here are Radke's career splits by PA
276/309/463 1st
255/290/415 2nd
296/333/463 3rd
285/311/431 4th+
I really hope Baker can remain healthy and remain a Twin. I would hate to see the FO get rid of him because of some bizzare preconception despite reality. Based on those slash lines, he could be a Radke with strikeouts.
Also, is it weird that Baker might be my favorite Twin based on a combination of his skills and Bert's scorn despite all evidence to the contrary?
That's what pretty much cemented his "favorite Twin" status for me about midway through 2008.
I think it came for me about 2007 when he dominated the Brewers at a game I was at. Looks like maybe May 19th, 2007 when he went 8.1 innings.
If his 2011 slash lines are indicative of future performance, he will be better than Radke, because those slash lines are pretty good.
That's pretty much what I was getting at. Less a pitcher like Radke, more a really good Twins pitcher who can be relied on to give a good outing every turn in the rotation and someone we can be proud of as Twins fans.
C'mon now, if we all looked things up before firing our opinions through the internet, we'd lose our half-baked license!
Well, I knew it was true, so I didn't bother.
It was hard explaining to the kids why there would be any umpires that are known for bad calls. Isn't their job to get the calls right?
Loved this part.