The debut of Cole De Vries was a game with several ups and downs. De Vries struck out Alejandro de Aza, the first batter he faced. He threw a scoreless first inning. Then in the second frame, AJ Pierzynski got him. He was charged with three unearned runs in the third inning after an error, a pop up and a blooper. He then got seven batters out. Given a 5-4 lead, he went out for the 6th inning and served up back-to-back home runs to Paul Konerko and Alexi Rios and his debut was over. His line at the ...
Game one: Michigan State def. Nebraska 10-9 Game two: Ohio State def. Penn State 12-5 Game three: Nebraska eliminated Penn State 12-3 Game four: Indiana def. Michigan State 6-4 Game five: Purdue def. Ohio State 5-4 Game-by-game player notables: In game one, Tony Bucciferro was very good, giving up only one earned run in 8 innings. In game two, Jaron Long struggled for Ohio State, only going three innings. In game three, Michael Pritchard ...
I realized just now that last night's edition did NOT have the May 23rd game for the Twins. This cold is getting to me. Thankfully it's on its last days. Hitter of the Day: Justin Morneau: 3-5 2 HR (8), 2B (7), 3 RBI, 3 R Pitcher of the Day: Madison Boer - RHP - FTM - A+: 5 IP, 3 H, 1 ER (2 R), 0 BB, 3 SO I chose Boer not because he had the best line (though no one really took charge of that tonight), but after his struggles after his promotion from ...
Early in the season, Justin Morneau looked a lot like he did last year at the plate. That is to say: he was tentative, consistently fooled by good breaking balls, and generally ineffective. At the end of April, he informed the team that his wrist had been ailing him for the better part of two weeks. He sat out a few days, then ended up on the disabled list, returning on May 16th. It would seem that the rest did him some good. Since coming back ...
As you probably know, the MLB Draft will be taking place in just a little over a week. There is a lot of draft-related material scattered all over this very website. Among them are a handful of Draft Previews that I've written. Recently, there was a lengthy thread started by "cmb0252" which is all about the draft. What follows is a tag team effort between myself and "cmb0252" (I'm not sure if he's ready to introduce himself to the world yet), which took place over the last couple of ...
This article was originally posted at Knuckleballsblog.com. With the dismissal of Jason Marquis and subsequent promotion of Cole DeVries, the Twins’ rotation is down to one member of the original group projected to come out of Spring Training. Only Carl Pavano remains (and his balky shoulder makes you wonder how much longer he’ll last). And we haven’t reached Memorial Day yet. So, with the rotation situation as it is, I’m going to put myself in Ron Gardenhire’s and Rick ...
Originally published at The Tenth Inning Stretch --- With the Twins having a severe need for pitching in the organization as well as six picks among the top 100, it is certain that more than one of those picks (and probably the second overall pick) will be used to draft a pitcher. To this respect, I am presenting profiles of the top 22 pitching prospects for the 2012 MLB draft. I will be presenting these alphabetically, and at the end I will rank them. I will be ...
Today, we continue our trek through my Top 50 Twins Prospects list by looking at my choices for prospects 21 through 30. Yesterday we looked at prospects 31-40, and the day before I presented prospects 41 through 50. I think that this 21-30 group is interesting. You still have some young players who have great potential but haven’t quite reached it... yet. You have a couple of players who have been ranked quite a bit higher who, for whatever reason, have fallen and are looking to move back up. ...
These next two months are huge for the Twins and their future. With the trade deadline approaching I feel the two players with legit value, if healthy, are Morneau and Span. I think Span should be no problem in getting us a good return in prospects with his play and team friendly contract. The tricky one is Morneau. If he can stay healthy and put up some strong numbers in these next 2 months I can see a couple of teams competing for him. To me I think St. Louis is the team to watch. Losing ...
Original post from North Dakota Twins Fan ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ In the last couple of weeks, the Twins have seen a concerning development with two players in the upper levels of the minor leagues. Joe Benson and Rene Tosoni were demoted to New Britain after starting the year with the Rochester Red Wings. The most concerning thing for both of these players might be the fact that ...
It's been a little over a quarter into the season and the Twins seemed destined to be sellers come July 31st. Unsurprisingly, many contenders are more than certain to inquire about the availability of Denard Span. Bidding for the center fielder could very well be competive as it is a position of need for quite a few division leaders. One of the biggest decisions the organization will have to make is whether or not they want to accept a deal for him. The biggest factor in the choice could possibly ...
Here is an update on my top 50 prospects list from February. I will actually construct a new list soon. 1. Miguel Sano (2): Confirming the unanimous #1 ranking. Will go through some ups and downs this year and strikes out a lot, but his ceiling keeps getting higher. Ranking status: stays at the top. 2. Aaron Hicks (1): Some scoffed at keeping Hicks so high. This season is a mixed bag of good and not-so-good for Hicks (as is true of many New Britain players, see throughout). ...
It was a risk without an acceptable backup plan. The Twins knew that. And it failed. And they’re paying the price. And that price is a .192 batting average. That’s the combined batting average of whoever the Twins have played in right field so far. It’s last in the majors. Their combined OPS is .594. That’s the career OPS of Juan Castro. And there isn’t anything close to a solution in sight unless the Twins want to mess with their best hitter. Two weeks before the end ...