50 thoughts on “June 11, 2014: Soul Sucker”

  1. Speaking of soul sucking - how many more starts does that performance buy Correia?

    1. When he put on two runners in the first I sent a text to my friend that he needed to be removed from the rotation immediately. I think I still feel that way.

      1. FIP of 4.13 and his K-BB is an iota better than last year. Just regressing to the mean.

  2. According to b-r, Brian Dozier is 8th in the AL at 2.5 WAR (position players). He has also shot ahead of Josh Donaldson in the Runs Scored category (54 to 52).

  4. If I want to share an image, can I do so from a saved file, or must it be from a URL somewhere online?

  5. Looks like my next trip to Omerha will be during the CWS finals. Not planning on going to any of the games, but maybe I'll try snap a photo of the stadium from one of the upper floors in UP HQ.

      2. The planners of these two events really need to do a better job of spacing things out.

  6. The new name of my eventual band is now "Jorah and the Andals".

    It'd be interesting to go thru the archives and see just how many names my non-existent band has had.

    1. So far I've found:
      The European Contingent
      Pierce Hawthorne and the Greendale 6
      Dragon Leash

      I feel like there should be more than that, but I'm on my phone so searching the backend is time consuming.

      1. Really, these sound like the names of my various side projects:

        The European Contingent - some sort of weird German house/techno
        Pierce Hawthorne and the Greendale 6 - something like The Lumineers with a bunch of harmonizing and foot stomping
        Dragon Leash - Finnish death metal, obviously
        Jorah and the Andals - 60s retro (a la Derek and the Dominoes)

    2. Yesterday the song "She Drives Me Crazy" came on the radio, and it occurred to me that "Fine Young Cannibals" was a darn good band name.

  7. As I suspected, my Father's Day gift was indeed a MLB.tv subscription for the remainder of the season. G sprang for the premium edition, so I downloaded the app and fired it up to see how it worked. It was late in the evening, so the Twins game had finished, but Reds/Dodgers was still going, so I clicked that one on.

    The first at-bat I saw on my new subscription with my fancy new phone app was ... Drew Butera. Sigh.

  11. It's nearly 4 o'clock and no mention of the Spurs historic first half of basketball last night? That was as impressive a display of team basketball that you will every see. SA scored 41 points in the first quarter on 15 shots. FORTY ONE POINTS ON FIFTEEN SHOTS! Miami shot 56% from the floor in the first half, and still trailed by 21.

    (You're slipping, doc.)

    1. Yea, yea. I think I've been in a stupor BECAUSE TEAM BASKETBALL PLAYED THE RIGHT WAY!!!!!1111ONE11111!!!!

      1. Most efficient half of shooting in the Finals ever*.

        * Ever being the game that have that data, so back to the 80s or so I think. We're so spoiled in baseball with play-by-play data going back to the 30s. Postseason play-by-play appears to be almost 100% for the modern era.

        1. made me think of Ed Pinckney and Villanova's incredible shooting night against G'town in the 1985 NCAA title game. Except that San Antonio scored more points in the first half of their game than Villanova did in the whole game against G'town.

  12. From Twinkie Town-

    You think it's odd that the Twins have used infielders in their outfield? Tony Sipp is a pitcher for the Astros, but that didn't stop manager Bo Porter from having Sipp pitch to Gerardo Parra, then go out to right field while Jerome Williams faced Paul Goldschmidt, and then Sipp returned to the mound to pitch to Miguel Montero.

    I can't decide if I think this is neat, or if I hate it because it's three (??!?!) pitching changes in an inning and using up two pitchers to face three batters.

    The more I think about it, the more I hate it.

    1. Stashing the pitcher in the outfield is a classic, and smart, move. It works best when used for more than an inning though.

      1. Fangraphs has a more informative article on it, and I have to say the move did make sense after looking at the batter splits and knowing more about the bullpen situation.

        Oh, and the article mentions they could only find 27 instances since 1950 that a pitcher has been moved to a defensive position and back to pitch later on.

        Side note- what if a team did that early in a game with the starter, like in the fourth inning in a real tight spot? Would the starter still be eligible for a win if he finished out 5 innings but didn't pitch to one batter?

        1. I think the rule is five innings, not consecutive. But I don't know if it's ever happened before.

      2. Herzog did it a few times with Todd Worrell I remember. He'd stick Worrell in right while Ken Dayley got out a lefty or two.

    3. I think one instance where it wouldn't bother me is if you had a pitcher who was really good with the bat, which I admit is almost never these days. Say you got Red Ruffing on the mound and it's a tight spot late in the game. He's due up the next inning and he's actually a better hitter than most of your bench. However, he's kind of gassed and some left-handed batters are due up. Stick him in right field, have the lefty come in. Then you can put back on the mound for the righties and save his bat.

    1. Twins' front office must read Aaron Gleeman. No word yet on his replacement, but it would almost have to be Eric Fryer since Herrmann is hurrt. Dan Rohlfing isn't on the 40-man roster.

  14. Love referred to the Wolves as "they" in an interview. Ouch. I just hope Flip learned from the Garnett trade that it's quality over quantity if you want to get any real value out of the trade.

    1. BAJ was just named All-NBA third team this year. There was some quality in that trade. In his three seasons with the Wolves, he averaged 20-10.

    1. "When Mauer is introduced to the Target Field fans at the Major League All-Star Game on July 15"???

      Is Mauer going to be an honorary captain? I can't really imagine him being selected as a 1b this year.

      Also, love this piece's dig on Mauer-with-Pauer:

      Catcher: 1. Matt Wieters Baltimore Orioles, 1,235,369. 2. Brian McCann New York Yankees, 827,200

      Let's try to imagine the mindset of the All-Star voter here.

      "Gee I want my All-Star catcher to be a guy who is hurt, and who can't throw a baseball."

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