2011 Twins Game Logs

2011 Game 127: Mauers w/Pauers at P*ssy Single Hitters

237 Comments

Tonight, the Twins get to take on somebody their own size for a change. The O's are a sad 47-77, on pace for 101 losses per coolstandings.com.

Pitching matchup:
Zach Jeremy Britton for the O's (scheduled; he's coming off the 15-day DL, although it was for a strain in his non-pitching shoulder)
Carl Pavanostache for the Twins.

Bal'more is tied with Minnesota and Seattle for having used the most position players this season (35 different players have had PA), but they've gotten much better offensive production out of all that deck-chair shuffling (team OPS+ of 99, compared to 85 for the Twinkies).

On the bright side, the O's pitching staff leads the AL in HR allowed by a wide margin (157; Twins are tied for second at 130) and is last in the AL in "defensive efficiency" according to b-r (Twins are two rungs higher). So I'm rooting for a slugfest. How long has it been since Jimbo had a three-HR game??

(oh, and that Wieters guy? He's hitting 261/319/404 with 12 HRs and 69:32 K:BB in 426 PA, compared to Joe's 288/350/352, 1 HR and 33:23 in 277; so I suppose you could say that the moniker kind of fits this season)

237 thoughts on “2011 Game 127: Mauers w/Pauers at P*ssy Single Hitters”

  2. Just a little early, but here's the lineup. Could be real interesting to watch.

    JoeCStrib JoeChristensen
    #Twins vs. #Orioles LH Britton: Revere 8, Plouffe 6, Mauer 3, Cuddyer 9, Kubel 7, Thome DH, Valencia 5, Hughes 4, Butera 2. (Pavano P)

      1. It's as if Gardy's trying to show Pavano that he could always find a worse infield defense to put behind him.

  3. JJ Hardy is back in town and boy do I miss him. Pretty damning stuff from Hardy:

    @PMac21 Phil Mackey
    I remember chatting w/ J.J. Hardy in Sarasota during spring training in March, and he said he got a little nervous when his wrist flared up

    Regarding the flare-up, Hardy said this today: "The trainers worked on it, got rid of it in about a week, and I haven’t dealt with it since"

    Did O's training staff do something different than #Twins' staff? "Yeah. I don’t want to get into that too much and make people look bad."

    Excuse me while I go throw up. Does anyone else think the training staff's incompetence has a lot to do with Mauer's lingering leg issues? I do.

    1. I agree with you, as usual.

      Seriously, I don't know what's wrong with this training staff, but I think they've shown us all they need to show us. At this point I can only assume they're using a voodoo healer or something.

      1. I'm still waiting on a response from Dave St. Peter re: my "Are there actually MDs on the team's medical staff, or do you have a sweetheart deal with Holiday Inn Express?" tweet.

      2. Two years ago, Rany Jazayerli had a similar rant about the Royals' trainer (which got contentious as he was an MD giving a non-medical opinion on a medical issue). In the next offseason, the trainer was replaced. I wish there was a Twins-blogger doctor who could give an unprofessional opinion about the Twins' trainers. Hey, brianS, what academic designation do you have?

          1. Then start drawing conclusions about the Twins' Medical staff and at the end say "I'm a doctor!"

    2. Yeah, I'm not a fan of the training staff. Everybody who gets hurt always takes longer than the original prognosis. That's pretty damning.

  4. Wait, there's more. Mackey tweets he was told the Twins were going to non tender Hardy last year until the Orioles showed interest in a trade. Similar to Young this year.Obviously, Hardy has been way better this year than he was for the Twins. But in what world is it even conceivable that Hardy would be a non tender candidate? Doesn't this represent a fundamental failure in the ability to evaluate talent and the scarcity of talent at certain positions?

    3. Hardy averaged 1 rWAR the last two seasons and was going to get a raise to about $6M. His defense had declined for three years in a row (and continues to decline this year). His best offensive attribute is his power, which is muted by the Twins' home ballpark. I am not at all surprised he's much better offensively going to Camden Yards. They should have gotten more for him, but I don't think they missed on his evaluation. It was Nishioka they totally missed on. Hopefully, he's just having a bad transition year, but the biggest mistake the Twins made this year was Nishi.

      1. I don't know how you can separate the two mistakes. I get that Hardy would not have so many home runs in target field this year but the offense is just gravy in my opinion. The fact that they thought Hardy wouldnt be worth 6 million dollars even at last years level of production is disturbing.

        1. With the Twins medical staff, there's a 50-50 shot Hardy would have been DL'ed for at least half the season.

      2. I think the biggest issue with Nishioka was that the Twins basically installed him with no backup plan in the infield. If they'd kept Hardy and signed Nishioka to bolster the infield, I think the move isn't quite so bad because you have Hardy at short and Casilla is an adequate backup in case Nishioka is a disaster (which he has been) or a perfect bench player.

        Signing Nishioka and trading Hardy was completely foolish. And that's been proven night after night this season.

        2. Plouffe was probably the backup plan and he had a monster season at AAA, although no one could have predicted that. Unfortunately, his throwing became a problem and Gardy couldn't trust him, so he got moved off short. Maybe tonight can start to change that. I don't see how Plouffe is a downgrade defensively from Nishi.

  5. On the Grill: Pork tenderloin wrapped with 8 pieces of No-Name Peppered Bacon. And fresh green beans.

    1. I have an excellent pheasant pot pie tonight, with scratch sage biscuits on top. Also a big PBR.

        1. I'm looking forward to ruffling a grouse. Apple-ginger grouse is pretty unbeatable.

          1. Not many grouse here in eastern SD- don't think I've ever eaten any, but I'm sure I'd like it.

            1. Grouse is my favorite. Drag in milk, then flour/salt/pepper. Brown on both sides with oil and butter. Add a cup of water. Cover and simmer until done. Remove meat, add water from boiling potatoes to make a couple of cups liquid. Dissolve 1-2 tbsp corn starch in 1/2 c. water. Slowly stir in to get the desired thickness - you'll know when is enough. Serve over mashed potatoes w/ milk, butter, salt, and pepper.

      1. I'm planning to make pasta with a green bean pesto (to use up a mess of green beans before they go off the reservation).

        1. Lamb chops w/ garden rosemary, seared with red chard, carrots, and garden zucchini - paired with Columbia Valley CMS Cab. Not bad.

    4. Pork chops and sliced potatoes on the grill. Salad with home grown tomatoes. Corn on the cob. Steamed broccoli and carrots.

  7. hey, rhu_ru:

    PatNeshek Bought 3 unopened 1970 Topps baseball cello packs that are in case and graded, do you guys think I should crack them open #praying4gemmints

    PatNeshek I'm opening them, prob though is I had them shipped to FL so when I find out where I'm playing next or if my season is done I'll youtube it

    1. Now I want to hear Thome and Manuel talking to each other as they stand alongside a road.

        1. I get that a lot from my wife. It's not nearly as funny when I try and explain the whole thing to her as it is to me when I'm reading it.

    1. Went to half price books yesterday. Picked up the complete short stories by Hemmingway. Plus, downloaded a Mitchell book.

      1. The Short, Happy Life of Francis Macomber a favorite. Love it when Margot dispatches her husband.

        1. First one in the book. I woke up in the middle of the night and read half of it to get me back to sleep. 69 short stories! I'm pretty excited about that.

              1. Ghostwriter. It sounds like they are all good, so I'll start at the beginning. You got me with that article from the Times on him.

      2. He's not even in the bottom 200 for batting, where #200 is around -100 runs for their career. If I switch to rWAR, #200 is at -2.7, which is two wins below Butera. He has a long, long way to go.

    2. Yeah, that's probably a worse offense by the FO than having Nishi over Hardy. It's a close call, anyhow.

        1. I wasn't sure if Hawking was Stephen or Harrelson- I figured it was the latter, but thought you might be going for something very obscure.

        1. good station.

          i listen to NPR and my JoePod pretty much exclusively. i was telling this to a co-worker i was driving with as she was flipping through the standard, banal top-40 and "classics" stations. i told her the one exception was 93XRT, which plays decent stuff from time to time. she flipped it over, and i heard about 3 seconds of wilco playing before she flipped it back, remarking "mmm, never heard it before." i was effectively gobsmacked.

          1. I'm just happy to have a station that will play something different, at least. Plus, The Wood is sponsoring They Might Be Giant's concert here next month

          2. Points for using gobsmacked in a sentence. Double points for using it to end the story.

      1. Oh, no doubt. It makes me more than a little sad to know that Bartman's life was forever transformed for the negative over a foul ball.

      2. The CUBS were the villains. The game was theirs to win whether that ball was caught or not. Still, moral is, Bartman was a more convenient excuse than the goat.

        1. That's just the way the game goes. Alou, however, stood there and complained about Bartman. That's the unforgivable part.

    1. I wouldn't hate Wieters as much if people hadn't compared him to Mauer, but I think I'd still hate him.

      1. I was going to reply to Zack, but then a homerun ball landed near me and I got excited.

    1. That would definitely be his nickname if he was a Twin- well, probably not the stupid part.

    1. That catch is a reminder of why watching baseball, even with this crappy team on the field, can be worth the time investment.

          1. mmmm, good times. I spent a lot of evenings in the family basement, pool cue in hand and long necks of Blatz near by.

          2. Man, I remember pounding long-necks of that stuff snatched from ice-filled styrofoam coolers tucked in the trunks of early 70's Detroit automobiles. Ah, high school...

            The following day was usually a marathon of plotz shat Bremmer.

  53. I got here just in time to miss the greatest catch of all time. Great.

  55. I was reading today that Kubel might end up on another AL Central team next year because "they've seen what he can do". Please God, don't let him end up with the ChiSux.

  57. Today, since I didn't have Omar to tend to, I went straight to the bar for happy hour. Since I haven't really drank much this month, I'm feeling it pretty good right now.

    1. I don't drink much, so at two-fers for happy hour, I'm done long before the hour is up.

  62. Bad blood oranges.

    Sad that the only thing left to watch the locals for are ejections. (And catches that make the media talent incontinent.)

    1. if i was a manager and got tossed, even if there was a well established chain o' command, on my walk to the clubhouse i'd still say something like, "liddle, you have the comm."

  65. Just saw the Revere catch. I don't think elm'n would have caught it.

      3. I remember about five years realizing the FOTF was overrated when I saw Granderson go back on balls that ii could never get to.

        1. yea, that was pretty awesome. but Kirby coulda had it (because he always played deep).

          I also want to note that both Wieters and JJ were standing like 9 feet away from the plate on their respective HRs. Why would you EVER try to go inside on a guy who has to extend his arms to reach the middle of the plate????

        1. I'm with you, Mags. memes die hard at the WGOM.

          Despite his faults, the dude played some damn good ball in a Minny kit.

          1. He is sleeping, too. Now would have been the perfect time to take the picture!

    1. it seems like we scored more runs when our Rochester Red Wing lineup played everyday

          2. I'm not disagreeing with you. I'm just pointing out that "great run" has been pretty much cancelled out by a "great collapse". There's nothing optomistic about that.

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