After the Twins blew a four-run lead in the ninth inning Saturday night against the lowly Brewers, Star Tribune columnist Patrick Reusse astutely criticised Twins skipper Ron Gardenhire for managing for statistics. By that Reusse meant that if the lead had been three runs, Gardy would have brought in his closer, Jon Rauch, to pitch the 9th; but […]
The air went out of the Twins tonight – and I hope it was just for one game, not the whole season – when that least-admirable of Yankees, Alex Rodriguez, turned a painfully wrought 4-3 Twins edge into a 7-4 Yankee pounding with one swing of his bat. One must question why Ron Gardenhire brought […]
A favorite moment from my first visit to the new Target Field came on Orlando Hudson’s first at-bat. I had heard he was loquacious, ebullient, effervescent and all the rest, but I had never witnessed him in person. He gave a love-pat to umpire Tim Tschida, then rubbed his hand over the head of Red […]
Before the first pitch of the 2010 season, I should make my predictions. First, however, is a resolution: to be patient. Last year was not the first time that I gave up on the Twins in midseason, only to have them ultimately win their division. I die a little with each loss, not accepting that […]
My season of Timberwolves-viewing got off on the same bad foot previous ones have ended on, with the T-Wolves unable to get off a decent shot with a chance to win the game. Last night it was against Kevin Garnett and the undefeated Celtics, who played a very losable game with the particular help of […]
When one team is 0-10 for the year against another, it is pretty safe to say that that second team, in this case the Yankees, is better than the first, in this case the Twins; so it is not really worth harping on a) the Twins’ fatigue in Game One; b) the ump’s bad call […]
By coincidence or not, the Twins began their improbable 17-4 stretch run the same day Justin Morneau went out for the season and I posted my negative assessment of their play to-date (see Twins at the Far Turn). Since no one read my posting, it’s likely that Morneau’s absence had the greater impact, in an […]
Like water seeking its own level, the Twins gurgle inexorably toward a .500 finish with three weeks remaining in the 2009 season. It is not, however, the frequency with which they have followed a big win with a deflating loss that has been most frustrating. Rather, it has been the listlessness of their play, their […]
In assessing a league’s MVP, no statistic is looked at more closely than the RBI: what wins games is runs, and he produces – i.e., drives in – the most runs must be the most valuable. But looked at more closely, the rbi, like many of baseball’s treasured stats, is somewhat suspect. One, not all […]
Among official baseball statistics there are a few pure ones, like batting average. Unlike rbi, batting average doesn’t depend on what the hitters ahead of you have done, nor, unlike runs scored, on what the hitters who follow do. It is also valid as a measure of worth: someone who hits .300 will be an […]
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