Twins vs The Mighty Defenders of the Cuyahoga
Posted on April 24th, 2007 – 7:24 PMBy La Velle
Jason Tyner will lead off tonight to give Casilla a little break and let him see what the pitcher’s got before he bats.
White and Castillo are getting close.
Sidney needs a good outing tomorrow.
Here are the lineups..
Cleveland
1.Sizemore, CF. 2. Blake, 3B. 3. Pronk, DH. 4. Martinez, C. 5. Garko, 1B. 6. Nixon, RF. 7. Michaels, LF. 8. Rouse, SS. 9. Barfield, 2B. Pitching: Carmona
Twins
1. Tyner, DH. 2. Punto, 3B. 3. Mauer, C. 4. Cuddyer, RF. 5. Morneau, 1B. 6. Hunter, CF. 7. Kubel, LF. 8. Bartlett, SS. 9. Casilla, 2B. Pitching: Santana.
48 Responses to "Twins vs The Mighty Defenders of the Cuyahoga"
11 straight decisions lost by this guy and we make him look like Sandy Koufax?
This offense is officially in crisis if we’re desparately awaiting the return of Rondell White.
Problem diagnosed. And here I was going to ask if there was anything positive about this game. It’s hard to say that we have a lot of good things happening when Gardy would rather have two guys not go on the DL because he has no replacements for them in the minors. If that doesn’t say something about our depth, I don’t know what does.
Well Kubel hit the ball good tonight. that’s good.
It’d be nice if the Twins had a bat off the bench who could hit the ball out of the park. Kinda makes one miss the days of Ruben Sierra. It’s scary, isn’t it Jason, that the lineup sorely misses Rondell White.
Good to see the Tyner hitting leadoff experiment worked so well tonight.
Sometimes I think LaVelle likes to let us read between the lines a little. I wonder if his comment that ‘Sidney needs a good outing tomorrow,’ actually means he’s gone in favor of Garza or Slowey if he doesn’t go five strong against the Royals.
We can all hope that’s the case anyway.
Slowey was good agian tonight 7IP 2 er on a homer and a bunch of K’s 6-7 I think I don’t remember Manship was very good too 5 k’s no ER in 6 ip
This is silly. L-Rod is a pinch hitter.
Kubel is on base with the game on the line.
Castillo cannot play, but we can’t put him on the DL?
And we are waiting for the return of the Iron Man White.
Is Phil Nevin still a free agent? We need help.
Oh, I highly doubt it’s do or die for Sir Sid tomorrow, as nice as that would be. He’ll get until mid-May to straighten himself out, I bet.
Kubel was very impressive tonight. He needs to be told once and for all that he is our DH and will play everyday.
Great point on the lack of bench power, Charlie. That won’t change even with the return of Rondell White and Jeff Cirillo. Which brings us to the Dick Bremer line of the night: “Five days ago Borowski was beat in the 9th by Alex Rodriguez, so we’ll see if Louis Rodriguez can do the same tonight.”
In Dick’s defense, L-Rod does have more homers than Bartlett, Punto, Castillo, Cirillo, White, Tyner, Casilla, Redmond, and Mauer combined.
Yes, the lineup right now is sad almost to the point of being laughable. 3-6 is still good, and if Kubel knocks the ball around for a week like he did today, that will solidify #7. I thought at the start of the season, that Punto, Bartlett, White, Mauer, Castillo, and Kubel wouldn’t combine for 40 homers. Through one-eighth of the schedule, it now looks like they might not hit 20. It is not acceptable for two-thirds of the lineup to hit so few homers. To top it off, there have been injuries and ineffectiveness. This team looks more similar to the ‘05 disappointment than the ‘06 division champion (with much less starting pitching).
Royals are still playing right now against the hated White Sox at Kauffman. 11:33 Central time in the bottom of the 7th. They won’t get to MN til the wee hours of the morning. This could be the ONLY thing that helps Sometimes Sober Sidney tomorrow night. Twins need to bash around Odalis Perez or else…
I know….that and the game could well head to extra innings…something tells me the Royals will find a way to ensure that doesn’t happen.
Note to the person who said we made the Indians pitcher look like Koufax? How many runs did he give up to the Yankees? 2 would be the answer.
People and their homer happy tendencies. Look at the Yankees and all their homers and they are horrible. Twins have had this lineup for years still manage to win division titles, Playoffs is a different story. Too soon to tell how good or bad the team will be this early. Twins had a very bad week. If it turns into 3weeks or a month then I will get really concerned.
The problem with not going out to pick up a bat during free agency is two-fold IMHO. 1) The Twins must depend on a couple of hitters to drive in all of the runs for the team, but a lot of teams get away with this with a little pitching. 2) There is no shake-up in the lineup, which is more grave. I heard Gretzy once say that he thought that one of the the worst things for a team was to have basically the same lineup as the year before. The Twins lineup is shockingly similar to last year’s team. If 3/4 of the team has a worse year than the previous year, the Twins will be a decent 3rd place team at best.
The sad thing is we could have easily shook up the lineup by aquiring Akinori Iwamura for a song from Japan. He is fast, smart, an excellent fielder and his bat has some pop. Bummer..oh well.
There is still plenty of time to shakeup the lineup, but I am wondering with whom.
I think the lineup will get better if they can get a few of the veterens healthy and have them stay healthy. That is part of the problem. I agree with you about lineup changes. Sometime that makes all the difference and if we can get players healthy Gardy should have more flexibility with that, hopefully he tries it if need be.
Skippy, I don’t agree about continuity, but you do make a good point. Six of the nine projected regulars had their best year ever last year. To expect more from Kubel and White would be reasonable, but to expect better or equal from everybody else is pretty unrealistic. It is still really early, and perhaps the return of Ford, Cirillo, White and Castillo would turn things around. I certainly think a bench of Cirillo, Ford, Tyner, Redmond, and Casilla would look more formidible than Rabe, Heintz, L-Rod, along with Tyner and Redmond.
Meanwhile, one player I hoped the Twins would acquire looks like he is going to get regular work for the next month or more. Ty Wigginton was named the D-Rays regular 3b until Iwamura returns.
I hadn’t heard that Iwamura went down.
With all due respect, Nora, the Yankees have not been horrible due to a lack of hitting. They have scored 4 or more runs in every game this year. They have big-time pitching problems at the moment. The Twins, on the other hand, have scored 3 or fewer runs 10 times already!
LEN3, thanks for the regular blog updates. what will it take for Gardy to switch Punto and Bartlett in the lineup? i know it seems like convenient timing to mention it with Punto’s OBP at .275 (however Bartlett’s is only .288) but i feel Bartlett is a better hitter and should be seeing more ABs that come with hitting higher in the order, and i’ve been saying that since they finally recalled him last June.
We will not see a change in the line up until we fall far enough out of the race to trade Torii and Castillo.The reason is painfully clear.we have no positional depth in our minor league system.The Twins seem to be pretty good at judging other teams minor league position players and it will soon be time,given the fact that neither Hunter or Castillo will be around next year,To start reloading.My hope is that Silva pitches well enough to garner some interest as trade bait also.Freeing up nearly 20m will go a long way in the re signing of Santana.Hunter and Castillo would bring back some young talent to the organization.If all three are traded to the right teams we may be able to get 5 or 6 talented youngsters in return.Trading someone to soon is better than tring to trade them too late(the same may also have to be said for Nathan)Remember,anything this years team accomplihes is gravey as far as the Organization is concerned.As Twins fans we need to realize that we will only be able stay successfull over the long haul if we are willing to re load every 4-5 years.
Agree that this may be the year to consider some changes. Castillo and a pitcher for a third baseman would be a thought, if neither Moses or Winfrey is ready.
Punto needs to return to utility role. Good fielder, he’s now decided he’s going to hit for power, apparently. Unfortunately, in his case that seems to mean medium-deep fly balls.
Casilla looks like the solution at 2B for years. Bartlett looks still to be favoring the injured groin, but should be solid.
Kubel appears only to have needed playing time. He won’t be a gold glove, but he won’t embarass us, either. Cuddy is solid, and hitting OK. Enjoy Hunter this year; even with no plate discipline and all the whining, he’ll look awfully good next year with Span in center struggling to hit .200 off major league pitching.
There’s no short term, silver bullet solution here. We have to hit better, period. Moving Mauer through Kubel up one notch in the order would help. Getting Cirillo back, if he could play daily and contribute wouldn’t hurt, and a healthy Rondell would remove the question of whether or not we should just forgo the DH, let the pitcher hit and lengthen the bench. But that’s just tweaking: until we start hitting with more power, and better with RISP, it isn’t going to improve.
Pitching will be OK, but rotation will look like Santana, Ortiz, Perkins, Slowey & Bonser by July. Silva’s doing it with mirrors thus far - he’s throwing a ton of pitches, struggling with control. Hopefully he’ll throw well enough that he’s worth something as trade bait.
Bullpen has been solid, other than Gardy’s slavish adherence to right-left matchups, and allowing himself to be maneuvered into situations where he has no pitchers left in a game. Doesn’t happen often, but how much does he have to do, really????
It’s tough with the injuries, but how can we expect this team to win when
our leadoff D-H (Tyner) doesn’t even hit a ball out of the infield. This current lineup just stinks and how does Kubel play in left field over Tyner when they’re in the lineup together?
Nora talks about not needing power, but you have to bunch hits together and that isn’t happening. After Torri’s base-running gaffe, he may be the dumbest veteran player I’ve seen in a Twins uniform in a long time. Remember his decision on the Kotsay inside the parker last fall!!
I think the guy we really miss is Castillo, not White. Castillo sets the example of being patient at the plate, fouling off pitches instead of hitting them for outs, etc.
Fantastic point, Dave T.
With all due respect Skippy, I am not saying Twins offense is great. That was not the point I was making at all. Not sure how NY pitching caused them to get 2 runs of Carmona. It is just an observation. Just pointing out Yankees with all their offensive talent only managed 2 of Carmona. I think it is quite a legitimate thing to bring up.
Our hitters need to work the pitchers more that is for sure. I think batting
Bartlett 2nd is a good idea, but we need alot of hitting help and bench help. I feel our best hope will be to trade Hunter (not a popular choice),
he would bring us a quality 3B man and a
bench player or at least a average 3b man and an average outfielder. When I say average that’s a .270-.290 hitter who will give you 15-20 HR’s. We would have to Trade him to a team that should make the playoffs and in the NL. Also we have such a stock pile of young pitchers but not much in the way of position players that we will need to be
willing to part with some pitchers to
bring in some position players. Our team is capable of making it’s self better through trades but we may need to trade some quality players to do it.
I think Barlett hitting second is more of an idea than a solution. I personally thought the Castillo, Tyner, Mauer approach worked out fairly well….but if Rondell White returns, I might even consider the Castillo, Mauer, Cuddyer approach….
Either way, the Pirahnas, you know that cute little marketing ploy….are turning into a joke.
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