The shattered confidence that comes with a Twins postseason.

The Twins are heading to the post season with their offense finally starting to come around. I mean more than just these last couple of games against Oakland and Colorado. The last few months have seen rookies like Royce Lewis and Matt Wallner take an outsized role on the team, while the return of Max Kepler and Jorge Polanco have also added some life to the roster. 

This is a situation where the narrative fits the season better than the stats. Just look at the team leaders for the year. Right now, they are without RBI team leader Carlos Correa, and his 65 runs batted in. The 2nd highest home run total belongs to Joey Gallo, also on the shelf. Both of these things can be true, and it is also true that these players have also disappointed their fans.

The value of counting stats notwithstanding, 65RBI and 21 home runs are both terrifically low figures for an RBI team leader and a #2 in home runs for a playoff team. In this case, it shows a couple of things. One, Correa is one of the ew consistent every day presences in the lineup, and two, the Twins roster effectively pivoted to the fresh faces after the halfway point in the season.

The rate stats for players that are going to be on the roster headed into the post season are strong. With one of the best rotations the team has ever had, the vibes have been very good through September. There was n element of confidence, and a feeling that the Minnesota Twins might actually make some noise in the postseason.

I was at the game when the Twins clinched, and there was a feeling of euphoria, right up until Kyle Farmer declared that the Twins were definitely going to win a game in the playoffs this year. That's when all the stats that really matter came back to haunt us.

0-18.

No playoff wins for 19 years.

1 very real curse. 

The good news is, there isn't likely to be an outcome that is more embarrassing than our expectations. 

On to October

 

It's been a rocky road, but ultimately, the Twins did it. They are AL Central champs. Now to win a playoff game.

Digging a little deeper, finding out the whole story

Emilio Pagan has a reputation that is hard to shake here in Minnesota. He had a tough year last year, one that was so rough that it's hard to look past in order to see how good he has been this year. There is more to it than performance, I believe. Taylor Rogers, the closer that was dealt to the Padres as part of the deal was fairly popular. Pagan already had a bit of a hill to climb to get into the good graces of Twins fans, and his performances against Cleveland didn't help.

A cursory look at Pagan showed he broke out with the Rays and Padres, both organizations with smart front offices and the ability to delve tactfully into the international market, and the initial perception of Pagan is that he is another Hispanic wunderkind that the Rays dredged up. Digging even a little bit shows that Pagan started in the Seattle organization, bounced to Oakland and eventually went to Tampa. And while he is Puerto Rican, he is actually from the Charlotte area. He sounds like this:

When you hear the name, especially given the number of Latin American players in the league, you might initially think you know what to expect, and it probably isn't Carolina southerner.

Not until you dig deeper. That's what the Twins did with him too. Pagan's raw numbers were inexcusably bad last season, but the Twins liked his stuff. They also saw that some of his peripheral numbers were out of whack. Home runs per fly ball, batting average on balls in play, and his walk rate, were all very bad by any standard, even versus his career numbers.

2023 seems like a correction. Certainly, some of those same categories are now even better than his career figures. The walk rate is encouraging, and he should be even better with strikeouts than he has been this year. Digging deeper, as the Twins did, would show that this is closer to the Emilio Pagan we should know. 

The Carolina righty with an electric fastball.

The Marlins Magic

Twins fans spent the first half of the season looking closely at the Miami Marlins, wondering what might have been. Obviously, this was because the Twins and Marlins made a major trade over the offseason. Luis Arraez came out at the beginning of the year to a ton of attention, while Pablo Lopez's results weren't yet matching his metrics. It didn't help that the Twins were inconsistent, and the Marlins seemed to do no wrong.

Now that the Twins are getting more proficient on offense, people around here haven't really focused on the Marlins or the trade for a while. Arraez also hasn't been as otherworldly as he was to start the season. He's still been the best player for the Marlins by a pretty wide margin, especially on the offensive side of the ball. 

Arraez is the top player by WAR for the Marlins this year, and the next 5 players on the list are in the starting rotation. One might suspect that this is because the rotation is very good, which it is, but also, the Marlins offense is very bad. The Twins offense has been moribund this season, but still, there are SEVEN position players for the Twins that would be better than the 2nd best Marlins position player this season, including Jorge Polanco and Edouard Julien, the replacements for Arraez at 2nd this year. 

If the Twins had attained the results they expected from their two highest end position players, I think we would more clearly recognize Minnesota for the well rounded team they are. There is plenty of offensive talent on the Twins roster, and last season, the Twins learned the value of pitching depth. It's easy for me, because of the logic fand because of how often we reflected on this move earlier in the year, to see the logic and the benefit of the move for the Twins.

What I don't think enough people understand, though, is how utterly lost the Marlins would be without Arraez. The Twins added another weapon to a rotation that needed health to really thrive. The addition of Arraez gave Miami a decent player. The third highest WAR among Marlins position players is utility guy John Berti. The Marlins, thanks to their rotation and Arraez, are still somehow in the playoff hunt.

The Marlins are clearly able to develop pitchers -- they had one to spare in Lopez, and still are riding their arms this season. Their offensive ineptitude makes me think it was lucky they grabbed Arraez in this trade rather than any sort of real prescience. 

A simple look under the hood for the Marlins should show the team that they need to work on their offense this offseason. With a weak free agent class this off season, maybe they can try to work a little magic on the trade market. It worked once.

Cable Crunch

 The best part about Cable TV, or over the air TV, anyways, is the ability to flip channels. As we sit here now, I am flipping from the Twins game to Monday Night Football, all with the press of a button. That is right now the last best thing about over the air TV, the ability to toggle through live events easily.

Sure, if you have more than one screen, or multiple apps completely eviscerating your CPU, you could watch a bunch of events with a simple flip of a button or what have you. On college football Saturday's it would be a challenge to have several ESPN versions running, in addition to Fox Sports, Youtube or whatever college games are going to be on. And during the postseason, I would want MLB.TV up and running as well...

With Bally Sports about to collapse, the Minnesota sports teams are going to be free agents. The only local area networks that I can think of that might be able to secure the rights to keep local sports on air locally are things like 45, WFTC or the CW. Don't count out the CW, which has purchased the rights to LIV and Inside the NFL. They are making a sports play, and local sports rights might be next.

But then the Loons and the rest of MLS have gone to Apple TV. I can't imagine other sports will be different. We already have Amazon, Peacock and ESPN taking pro sports online. There is a decent chance local sports are taken out of locals' hands, as with the MLS. With TV deal money already becoming limited, the inability to tap into local interest seems like it could be ruinous for the non-NFL leagues.

The next few years are going to be tough for sports fans, especially those like me, who like to watch a quantity of sports, as we adapt, and will be forced to pick and choose what it is we want to enjoy.  The rest of the TV world was subsidizing sports ans forever, so I guess turnabout is fair play.

The next best thing about Cable TV was the array of channels that I can turn on and leave to take in idly.  Law and Order marathons, cooking shows, weather, things like that. Now, there is plenty of 'free' live television, or subscription television, like FreeVee, Peacock and Paramount +. You can leave it on for hours without having to be invested in anything, and it's great.

If only there was a platform that could aggregate all the live sports for us now. I don't think that's going to be happening, though. And that's a bummer.

Well, well, well, the Twins are heating up

 The Twins have been in front of the AL Central, and after taking 2/3 from the Cleveland Guardians, in Cleveland and after they made a bold move to claim three players on waivers, have essentially ended the race, in their favor. They lost this afternoon, but with a resurgent offense and a weak slate of upcoming opponents, the door is wide open for the home town 9. 

The consternation over the bullpen is important over the final stretch of the season. With the pacing of playoff series, starters can go longer, and back of the rotation starters, like Kenta Maeda, a very good starter in his own right, will also move to the bullpen. Bailey Ober may come back and pitch out of the 'pen. With starters like Pablo Lopez, Sonny Gray and Joe Ryan, the concern over the relief corps should be diminished in the post season.

Through the first half of the season, the bats were completely dormant. As the season progressed, three things have happened. First, players that were slumping are coming around. I'm looking at you, Max Kepler. 2nd half Carlos Correia, Ryan Jeffers and even Christian Vasquez have been appreciably better since the break.

Then, there has been the contribution of young players, all added in season. It started with Edouard Julien, followed by Matt Wallner and most recently, emphatically, Royce Lewis. Somehow, Lewis is getting better and better as he goes. Also, importantly, he's coming through in important spots, an important trait with the playoffs looming.

Of course, the steady performance of veterans like Donovan Solano and Michael A. Taylor have been valuable, the improvement at designated hitter has been remarkable. Byron Buxton just hasn't had it this season, and while some of his other teammates were given the chance to sort things out, the DH role was improved by replacement, as it has rotated through Julien, Jeffers and Jorge Polanco. 

The Twins, despite only emerging lately, are built like a playoff team. Many fans worry that their team isn't built to reach the playoffs, but not whether or not they are built to succeed in the playoffs. This version of the Twins is built for the playoffs. They have a strong set of starting pitchers, fixable bullpen issues with anchors at the back end, and an offense littered with veteran, clutch performers. 

If Minnesota wasn't in the clutches of an unbreakable curse, I'd feel really good about their postseason chances.