Cup of Coffee

September 11, 2013: Tragedy

68 Comments

It's starting to really feel like it was a lifetime ago, for me. I had not yet met the Milkmaid and children seemed like a foreign concept. Still, twelve years later, I can recall the terror and regret what we lost that day.

68 thoughts on “September 11, 2013: Tragedy”

  1. Sept. 11 was a tragic day for my parents long before 2001.

    Speaking of my father, he just turned 83 on Sunday, but he's in the hospital for tests after complaining of a cold. He doesn't have any fluid on his lungs, which is great, but they plan to do some heart tests. Any thoughts and prayers are appreciated.

  2. Michael Cuddyer is tied for the NL in batting average at .330. I didn't realize he was having such a good year. OPS+ of 140, though Coors Field and his defense kill his WAR.

        1. -12 in DRS and UZR. He only has 494 PAs so far this year, that dampens his value. Which, huh, he still leads the Rockies in PAs. They've played 146 games and Cuddyer leads with 494 PAs and is second in games played (119) to Arenado's 121. Fragile team.

  4. Saw this stat and threw up in my mouth a little bit:

    After Florimon's double play [in the 6th], Minnesota is batting .228 this season with the bases loaded.

    2. Sometime during the game last night, it was mentioned that the Twins are hitting .229 with runners in scoring position, and how bad that is. It is bad, of course, but it was also mentioned that the Twins team batting average is .242. With a .242 average, .229 with RISP does not seem out of line. I mean, if you have a career .242 hitter, you wouldn't be surprised if next year he hit .229. It wouldn't be a good year, but it wouldn't make you ask "what's wrong with him" either.

      What I'm saying is that the reason the Twins have trouble scoring runs is not that they can't hit with runners in scoring position. The reason the Twins have trouble scoring runs is that they can't hit.

        1. unlike some other Yahoo who blames Gardy and the Twins' "philosophy" of use-the-whole-field small-ball. I think it is probably time to move on from Gardy too, but I have a hard time blaming him for lousing hitting by lousy hitters.

          1. The AL as a whole hits

            260/336/401 with RISP
            265/323/415 with runner on first only
            253/314/406 with the bases empty

            The Twins:
            228/309/339 with RISP
            245/319/402 with runner on first only
            249/315/405 with bases empty

            Basically, the Twins are league-average with the bases empty, and are not all that far below league-average with a runner at first only. They fall far short on average (partially made up for with walks) and power with RISP. How much of that difference is philosophy and how much is bad luck?

      1. I wonder if that's their biggest miss. They have a few poor choices in retrospect early in their history, but none with as low of an rWAR. Delmon still has time to improve that number, but this year and last don't bode well for it getting larger.

        1. The comparisons and the expectations are only going to grow. "It makes me cringe," says Mientkiewicz, who broke into the majors with a wave of top Twins prospects led by outfielder Torii Hunter, the star of Minnesota teams that won four division titles between 2002 and '06. "We forget how hard this game is, and I blame Trout, Harper and Machado for that. What people don't realize is that they aren't the norm—they're the exception. Before them, who was the last guy to make a splash at 19, 20? Ken Griffey Jr.? A-Rod?
          "But then you see these two young men in person, you realize everything you've heard about them is true, and you can't help but believe, and dream."

        2. And how...

          "The power is extreme," Baseball Prospectus writer Jason Parks reported after a trip to New Britain, "and made me question my religious beliefs."

          and

          They grew up in different parts of the world, speak different languages and have never been teammates. They are not yet household names, but already are sensations on the minor league circuit. "The last player to have an impact like this on our team was Joe Mauer," New Britain owner Bill Dowling says of Sano. "You see people stop in the stands when he comes up to the plate, because you don't want to miss what he's going to do next."

          In Cedar Rapids this season the club sold out T-shirts with Buxton's name and number 7 in less than a week, and before heading to the park fans would call the front office to make sure he was in the lineup. When he was promoted to Fort Myers, the first batch of Buxton T-shirts lasted three days. The outfielder returned from a recent road trip to find piles of fan mail spilling out of his locker in the home clubhouse. A player shook his head as he walked by and said, "Joe Mauer doesn't get that kind of mail."

          Two more Joe Mauers.

          Spoiler SelectShow

  6. Bill James looks at if playing shallow works. Linking to it because of the two shallowest playing center fielders:

    Here are the ten players who have played the shallowest center field in baseball by this method:
    Player Going Back Rate
    Denard Span 42%
    Ben Revere 42%

    Who plays the deepest?

    Spoiler SelectShow

    1. The article suggests playing shallow costs teams significantly more than playing deep. That would go along with my hunch. Playing deep can cost you singles, while playing shallow can cost you doubles and triples (and possibly prevent you from robbing homers).

      I'm glad Hicks plays deep.

      1. I also wonder if it's easier to run forward, where you can watch the ball and where you're going, than backward. That might be reflected in the differences in runs saved.

        2. Playing softball, I tend to play pretty far back in the outfield because it's much easier to run forward and track the ball than it is to run sideways or, even worse, have to turn your back to the infield and track the ball over your shoulder.

          I can only remember a few diving attempts where I dropped a ball after running up on it (except the line drive that dislocated my finger), but I've dropped at least a half-dozen when I'm trying to go back from my starting point.

    2. That's very surprising. I wonder if Span and Revere have changed how they play since being traded? I always remember the Twins as having players that play deeper than most. I know Kirby did, and I think ii did, too. Of course, in the Metrodome, they always wanted to make the home run robbing catches. I always thought that playing shallower would be better because you would cut off more hits overall. I would prefer reducing the total number of hits even if it meant allowing a few more extra-base hits. Context should also determine how you play. For leadoff batters, play shallow to prevent the leadoff batter reaching. With two outs or a man on first, play deep to prevent an extra-base hit. With runners in scoring position, play shallow to prevent hits from scoring runs. If you have a lead late, play shallow until the tying run comes to the plate, then play deep until the tying run gets into scoring position.

      1. certainly context enters into it, but unless certain players aren't playing up with RISP while others are, or some players are facing significantly more/fewer RISP, it's still comparing apples to apples

      2. You'd also need to play deeper in the dome to cut off ground ball gappers that'd cruise across the turf. Hits that'd never get the gap on a grass field.

        1. That's an interesting point. I remember that Span's defensive metrics improved markedly when the Twins moved to Target Field. I wonder if that allowed him to play not so deep since he was on grass almost every game.

  7. I found this article entertaining. Jon Bois* on trying to break a computer football game by creating horrible players to pair up with Peighton Manning.

    *So you know it's good, or at least an uncomfortable approximation of good.

    1. It reminds me of how we played NBA Live 98. I turned off most of the rules and created the largest player possible with perfect stats. My brother opted for the same thing, but with the shortest player possible. I don't think we ever played anything resembling a normal game, but we did have a lot of fun.

      1. My favorite all-time baseball game was Baseball Simulator 1.000. You can still play it at VirtualNES. You could customize every player on your team, but you only had so many points for each category to spread around. Sometimes I would make every player exactly the same to have a deep lineup and deep rotation and bullpen. I also experimented with maxing out players. My favorite was giving my leadoff batter 99 speed. If the ball hit the ground to the left side of the infield, it was a hit. They had no chance to throw him out on stolen bases and if they threw to third base, he would steal second and third on the same pitch. My favorite pitcher was a sidearming lefty with a maxed out splitfinger that would drop in the dirt every time unless he was tired. I loved the concept of the game because you had to decide where to put the talent, whether to spread it out or give to just a few. The best teams I had, had a handful of players with a lot of points and the rest spread out pretty evenly.

  9. I'll always remember the weather on 9/11/02. A strange wind was blowing in NYC, and it felt as if the unsettled souls of the dead were among us. The following day, the wind was gone.

    1. My memory is a bit hazy, but I believe I attended a 1-year commemorative/memorial Ceremony at Naval Station Great Lakes on 9/11/02. As I recall, the weather in northern Illinois was comfortable & sunny, downright gorgeous for the F-18 flyover; really incongruous with the solemn mood of the event.

    1. So, if my cousin wants to catch a Twins game with me at Target Field, what team do we want to see,
      -the Tigers (who likely will have wrapped up the Central) or,
      -the Indians (who may have fallen out of WC contention)?

      1. The Cleveland remaining schedule:
        4 at ChiSox
        3 at Royals
        4 vs Astros
        2 vs ChiSox
        4 at Twins

        They're two games back of the WC right now, and well, that's as easy a schedule as the Twins might have had when there were no other good teams in the AL Central.

    1. They're waiting to see if the Yankees make it.

      If they do, then they can soldier on to victory, and Jeter can oversee the group of scrappy underdogs.

      If they don't, then yeah... it's cancelled.

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