62 thoughts on “August 19, 2011: Possibilities”

  1. Span has gone from day-to-day to possibly done for the season. Why don't they just say from the beginning "We have no idea how long he'll be out. When the symptoms are gone, he can play." I'm not sure if it's a good thing that they don't think it is concussion-related.

    1. I noted an appearance by the [redacted] meme. The WGOM is insinuating itself in common parlance!

    2. I reserve the right to boo any Yankee player for any reason I deem appropriate, thank you very much.

        1. Heh, I did that exact edit with some snarky comments and decided to cancel- glad to see I wasn't the only one (two with Twayn, three with CH.

    1. Interesting, but I need to know the sample size. Swinging like Delmon certainly doesn't help, but I think there are more important reasons why he hasn't done well this season other than his batting eye.

      1. Are you telling me that Del keeps his eyes open when he swings?

        also, I'm with Sean. My guess is that the sample size for 2011 is too small to draw any significant conclusions about his batting eye, other than that he's struggled a bit this year.

      2. Actually, I can estimate the sample size. FanGraphs uses the BIS classifications, but it should be close enough. Through yesterday, Mauer has seen 1052 pitches. 11.1% have been sliders and 10.8% have been curveballs. That means he's seen 230 of them. And indeed, the run values for those pitches are negative. However, they're also negative for cutters and slightly so for changeups.

        In fact, he was slightly negative for curves last year as well. He did well in 2008, but hasn't fared well otherwise. Mauer has been positive for sliders for his entire career after 2004, so being negative now is a bit concerning. However, I think things will still be fine.

    2. My grandparents are close friends with Jim Hendry's in-laws so it was been awkward the last few years listening to them talk about how great he is at his job.

    1. Earlier in the piece... (Regarding Denard Span's PCS)

      "It's not concussion symptoms," McWane said. "The concussion stirred up a previous existing condition. These are migraines that present themselves not as a headaches but as dizziness and vertigo."

      He realizes that "dizziness and vertigo" are in the Post-Concussion Syndrome symptom list, right?

      1. The Mayo Clinic lists dizziness but not vertigo as a PCS symptom. Span had an inner ear problem a few years ago and it sounds like the same thing is reoccurring, so I guess that is why they don't think it has to do with PCS and probably why the medicine he was taking didn't help him.

        1. Ah, I had seen a couple sites which listed it. I'd trust Mayo over them, though. I obviously have no medical knowledge, just a very healthy distrust of the Twins training staff.

    2. That's fantastic. I was at a Twins game with Dan the other day and decided to randomly yell "THEILBAR!" in the middle of an inning.

  6. and then I'm talking to a guy about working as a pro wrestling referee... Main skills needed there is being able to count to two, and take a folding chair with grace.

    1. It also helps if you can completely ignore crowd noise because there might be some occasions where the action seems to take place behind you.

  7. The wee one is leaving for college in the morning, or is at least supposed to. He's really reluctant to leave his GF. I'm trying to help him best I can, but my advice isn't really what he'll want to hear.

    1. tell him that there are lots of hot babes in college.

      everything in h.s. seemed so important, so permanent, so formative. And almost nothing was.

      College is a new start -- a chance to define yourself, rather than staying within the lines drawn by others. Tell him that.

      1. I remember coming back from my first job and visiting with some of my not-yet-graduated friends back at college. They kept asking about the babes in southern California, and I had to remind them that there is no better concentration of "babes" than you will find at the typical college campus.

  8. Twenty years ago today some Communist hardliners instigated a putsch against moderate reformer Mikhail Gorbachev. (You may or may not remember imagines of Boris Yeltsin standing atop a tank). This was essentially the straw that broke USSR's back, the penultimate event of the Cold War, as well as the sort of doomsday nightmare fuel that inspired movies like Crimson Tide. Go to CNN.com today, and you'll find nary a mention of it. Search for "Soviet" on CNN's website and the first thing it brings up is a piece on US/China relations, and the fifth is an item on China's "new" aircraft carrier, an ex-Soviet Navy ship they bought from Ukraine. Further down the page is an article from last Friday on the 50th anniversary of the Berlin Wall going up.

    It fascinates me that this rates no mention twenty years on during something of a lull in the news cycle.

  9. More good news for the Twins:

    dannyvalencia19 Danny Valencia
    Wisdom tooth needs to go....

    BenRevere9 Ben Revere
    Gonna get nice massage today hopefully it will help my back a little cause my back is jacked up lol

    2. How does a wisdom tooth suddenly need to go at 26 or 27? I remember that the my dentists discussed pulling mine for at least 10 years before I actually had the surgery.

        1. Man, you guys had some strange dentists. Mine were talked about for about two weeks and then they were gone. Of course, that was the orthodontist and it was for potential jaw surgery, but still.

            1. I've been told for more than thirty years that I should have my wisdom teeth pulled, and they still haven't bothered me a bit.

            2. Three of them came in perfectly straight, the fourth came in perpendicular to the rest of my teeth. For two of the five years, the issue was that I didn't have very good dental insurance. For the last three, I just didn't want the hassle (spoiler alert: there was no hassle... or pain, for that matter).

              1. dido. I have never woken up as rested as I did when I came out of anesthesia, and there was more annoyance with the stitches for a few days than there ever was pain.

                1. Yeah, the little cotton pads they had me bite down on for the first couple of hours were easily the worst part of the entire experience. Plus, I got to eat scrambled eggs and macaroni and cheese for a couple days. I love those foods, anyway.

                2. they knocked me out but good and yanked out all four (including those still beneath the surface). good times.

                3. anesthesia? I hope I'm not the only one here that insisted on being awake for the procedure. Not only that, I asked for my teeth back and I still have them.

                  1. Mine had yet to even come close to breaking the surface, so I had no choice. It was pretty awesome waking up in a completely different spot than you were knocked out at.

                    1. heh, i remember hitting "9" on the counting back from ten, then coming to my parents house, watching star wars, with an ice pack on each cheek.

      3. If you get a cavity in a wisdom tooth that a dentist recommended being removed, the dentist won't fill the cavity. Of course, it could be that it needed a root canal, so you might as well pull it out.

    1. I can't put a finger on specific articles, but my recollection is that Ausmus was long considered one of the smartest catchers in baseball. I suspect he has a coaching or managing career ahead of him if he wants it.

      1. The Repository says he graduated from Dartmouth, where he was the bullpen catcher. The Yankmes had drafted him out of high school in 1987 but Ausmus had a childhood dream of going to Dartmouth, so the Yankees let him attend and play in their minor league system on his off-terms. That meant the NCAA wouldn't allow him to play college baseball, however, so that's why he was the bullpen catcher.

        Also gleaned from the Ausmus article:

        Though Ausmus was not drafted until the 48th round of the 1987 draft, he played in MLB longer than any of the 1,150 players drafted ahead of him did.

  13. Kubel back in the lineup tonight. Still no Cuddyer and Thome on the bench. Plouffe in right, Hughes at second.

  14. LEN3 gives the Twins something to shoot for:

    STAT OF THE DAY: With help from Mitch Hestad of the Twins' baseball communications department: The 2011 Twins have a chance to become the second team in club history to go an entire season without being over .500. The only other team since 1961 was the 1983 Twins.

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