98 thoughts on “March 29, 2013: Good”

  1. Rochester defeated Pawtucket 3-2 yesterday. Kyle Gibson started, giving up one run on three hits in 3.2 innings. He struck out six and walked three. Oswaldo Arcia homered and doubled while Chris Colabello delivered a pair of singles.

  2. Ugh...this is where I meant to set up the CoC to be a call for predictions.

    If you want to get in on the predictions, send me the list of finishes for each team, MVPs and ROYs. If you want to throw in anything else, go ahead. I'll gather the spreadsheet and make it public when the season starts.

    foreverunchanged@gmail.com

    3. How about a post for it? Replace the game log/recap sticky post with it. Everyone then submits with spoilered predictions, allowing others to comment on them.

        1. Obviously keep the spreadsheet. I was just thinking that a post could/would generate more discussion.

        2. Do you have a spreadsheet noting all the known spreadsheets created by Citizens?

          2. Oh man, now you made me go into my "Old Tables" folder.

            Anyone want to know what country has fared the best in their only appearance in the Olympic Hockey tournament?

            Spoiler SelectShow

  4. MLB.tv alert. All games today are free. Unfortunately, the Twins are not on, but there are a bunch of games this evening.

  5. The Tigers just signed Justin Verlander to a 7 year, $180 million contract. $20 million for 2013 & 2014, $28 million annually for 2015-2019, and a $22 million vesting option for 2020. Wow.

    1. So, $5 million more than Felix Hernandez. Sounds about right since I think Verlander's current contract is a bit higher than Hernandez's.

    2. I hope the Tiger bought insurance on that contract. The Mets did not on Johan Santana's.

      1. I hope they didn't buy insurance, if he has injuries. If he doesn't have injuries, then I hope they did.

      1. I haven't seen that in years. I saw it too early in life (about ninth grade) and didn't appreciate what I was seeing at the time. It's in my queue still as a result.

        Otherwise, I think I'm pretty caught up with the Coens.

    2. Oooh, Gabriel Byrne and the Jesus FTW! Oh, and Crosetti from Homicide. I am offended in you not having seen it.

      1. Burnett would be an improvement over Robertson, but Burnett cant strike anyone out

  11. Swing and a Mystery: Why Strikeout Rates Are Soaring

    Total strikeouts in the major leagues have risen in each of the last seven seasons, peaking — so far — at 36,426 last year to establish a record, according to the Elias Sports Bureau. Eighteen teams struck out at least 1,200 times last season; in the history of baseball, through 2005, there had never been a season in which more than two teams topped that total.

    1. Interesting article. One of my friends and I often debate the reasons for increased strikeouts, I'll probably send this along to him.
      Thanks.

      1. In the late '90s, when everyone was hitting home runs, the Twins had a bunch of banjo hitters. Now, when we're in a pitchers' era, the Twins have a bunch of mediocre pitchers.

    5. Strikeouts used to be so taboo. Guys like Cust were referred to as "free swingers" by Twins announcers because they didn't understand that sometimes, strikeout kings are guys who don't swing much and are waiting for the right pitch.

      Cust had the lowest swing rate in the entire league at the time I heard Bremer call him a "free swinger."

        1. I wonder what they were saying in the 50s and 60s. That is quite the jump in strikeout rate: from a bit above 3 K/9 to nearly 6 K/9.

          1. for comparison's sake (I need to get a copy of my stats package at home again; working with spreadsheets to create graphs sux rox)

            data from b-r

            If I weren't lazy, I might give you both trends on the same graph. Anyway, you can clearly see that both K's and HRs peaked in the early 1960s and declined until about 1980 before recovering. PEDs!!!111one111!!!

            1. Interesting graphs! I don't claim to have as much baseball knowledge as everyone else here, but with regard to home runs, I assume we should ignore the first couple decades of the 1900s given the inferior quality of the balls as well as the fact that players weren't generally trying to hit homers the way they are now.

              I'll also be very curious to see if the downward trend for home runs continues throughout this decade or whether it's going to level off. You want to make a note to yourself to do an updated graph in 2018 or so? 😉

              1. for kicks, I just did the scatterplot for HR, BBs and Ks per game all on the same graph. Walks and Strike Outs move together (and are almost identical) until about 1950, then walks level out while Ks keep rising.

                The correlation between Ks and HRs is ~.81. That is pretty tight.

                Here is the plot of average HRs (times 6.7 so that they scale better -- multiplying by 6.7 equalizes the medians of the two series) and Ks per game on the same graph. Ks are in red, HRs in blue. (sorry, I didn't fix the legend)
                data from b-r

                So, you can see more clearly that Ks continue to rise through the 1960s, whereas HRs fell off. When the mound is lowered, Ks fall back for a decade.

  12. Cole De Vries diagnosed by Twins with mild forearm tightness. TJ surgery to be scheduled sometime in June after rehab attempts fail.

  13. Phil Mackey has been saying all winter how the Twins pitching will be so much better than last year. I'm not seeing it.

    1. Yale was the top seed in the tourney a couple years ago, but not this year. Terrible.

      1. Disgusting. Way to go out with a whimper...just...man...I didn't think I'd be this angry if they lost today.

        1. Good thing that the Gophers' back-to-back national champions could not get on TV....

          1. That still blows my mind. Heard that the B1G Network was in discussions to put it out, but the NCAA didn't want to set a precedent by charging too little so getting the rights was too costly. Talk about cutting off your nose to spite your face. An undefeated season culminating in a championship for a state where women's hockey is huge (and growing) and the NCAA doesn't want to sell "low". Just short-sighted.

    3. Who would have thought the basketball team would last longer than the hockey team. Is The Don on the hotseat?

      1. My first inclination was to scoff at the notion. But I guess with the local support, facilities and level of talent he has access to, a 10-year championship draught should provoke, at the least, some scrutiny.

    4. Words cannot express how frustrating it is to a sports fan in this town. I've long given up caring about the Vikings, but my God is the only thing I can cling to a women's college hockey team? T-wolves: disaster; Twins: bad; Gopher football: Jer is way over his head; Gopher bball: clueless; Gopher Puck: criminally underperforming; Wild: maybe on the upswing after years in the desert? Who knows.

      I'm going to go on the bike and watch the season finale to The Wire Season 4, which I've seen once and know is completely depressing (that's not a spoiler btw), then drown my disgust with a bunch of Summit Saga IPA and watch shitty college basketball while figuratively cutting myself by listening to my playlist of bad Robert Pollard and GBV songs. After that I think I will do my Spookymilk Play with the Prose submission and just get all this bullshit out my system.

      1. you can always cheer for Minnesota United FC (formerly the Thunder) or the Swarm indoor lacrosse team

                1. Minnesota placed first in both the jazz and pom divisions

                  Don't do like me and read that as the "jazz and porn divisions."

    1. It was a clean hit.

      back in the day, Spamtown had a Junior team coached by Lou Vairo. The Mavdicks, as they were known affectionately, were fun to watch.

      The players lived with families in town. Some attended Spamtown High. Among the players who passed through was Rick Zombo. I also got to know one of the players (Darius Backus, my physics partner).

      Vairo's first paying job as a coach was for City College of New York, making $600 for the season. In 1975, he was recommended as a possible coach to the Austin Mavericks, a Mid JHL team in the US Hockey League.

      "I thought it was Austin, Texas. I didn't even know where it was. Anyway, I called [the GM] and he talked big to me, 'We can give you a car and an office, and pay you $25,000 a year.' I said, 'I'll take it.' Then the president called me the next day and said he got his numbers mixed up; can't give you a car, we have no office, and we'll give you $2,000 a year. 'I'll take it' was my response." The team was located in Austin, Minnesota, not Austin, Texas.

    1. Schilling picked Howard to win the NL MVP. He deserves two scare quotes around expert. Oh, so did Alex Cora.

      I see four people picked Hicks to win ROY: Aaron Boone, Jim Bowden, Alex Cora, and Jerry Crasnick.

    1. Me too. I was a bit surprised they put it so late, considering both teams are from Florida.

  20. So, the Wolves and the .... you know what I don't want to jinx this

  22. between the CBB, the Wolves, and the surging Wild, my remote might need new batteries in about 20 minutes.

  25. it was a fun ride Dunk City
    hopeful your uptempo play spurs other teams to play like that

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