Quick Notes: Dec. 12, 2010

The Winter Meetings are over, and I have to say they were more eventful than I expected them to be. I was fully prepared to write something about how I predicted that the Twins never do anything during the Winter Meetings, even when they're trying to trade Johan Santana. Boy, do I wish I could've written that.

The Twins traded JJ Hardy, Brendan Harris, and cash to the Baltimore Orioles for ... wait ... who were those guys again. I don't know, a couple minor league pitchers. Hang on a sec.... Oh yeah, James Hoey and Brett Jacobson. Word has it that Hoey could break into the bullpen in 2011, but Jacobson is strictly a prospect at this point. Both are known for throwing heat but struggle with control.

The Twins must be confident they'll sign Japanese player Tsuyoshi Nishioka or else they would've held on to Hardy at least a little longer. The organization claims they made the trade because they wanted more speed in the lineup; not very many fans buy that. Many fans believe it was a salary-dump -- Hardy was arbitration-eligible and will make as much at $5 mil in 2011.

Let me just say that I hate this trade, salary-dump or not. I'm not a fan of the current middle-infield picture -- Casilla, Tolbert, Plouffe, Hughes make for slim pickings and probably a lot of fan eye-rolling. And adding Nishioka doesn't ease my mind much; being good in Japanese ball doesn't always translate into being good in the MLB.

I'm also mad that, if they did have to trade JJ, that's really all they could get for him? He's a damn fine shortstop, I think if the Twins had held on a bit, they could've gotten a better deal. Plus, he's just one of those players I like -- he might not be a superstar, but he did his job, made some nice plays, and seemed like a good guy. I'll miss him. I wish both JJ and Brendan the best with the Orioles -- good luck facing the Yankees and Red Sox 157 times a year. The cash will do well no matter who it faces.

With all that being said however, I don't think this trade is a huge blow to the team. If the Twins can use that saved money to sign a decent starting pitcher or some reliable bullpen help, everything will be ok.

~~~

The Rule 5 Draft took place on the final day of the Winter Meetings. This is where teams can window shop the other teams and select players not on a 40-man roster. The catch is that if a team selects a player, it must put him on the big league active roster the entire next season or he must be returned to his original team (or the two teams could work out a trade).

The Twins selected LHP Scott Diamond from the Braves organization. We'll likely see him in the bullpen.

I swear, if he chooses "Sweet Caroline", or any other Neil Diamond song for that matter, as his walk-out music, I'll puke.

The Twins didn't lose anyone in the Rule 5 Draft.

~~~

I know this is a baseball blog, but I can't let the popping of the Metrodome on Sunday go unmentioned. After all, it is the old neighborhood of the Twins.

I'm sure many of you saw what happened to the roof. It's very fortunate that no one was hurt; on Saturday there were workers on the roof shoveling it off, but they called it off due to dangerous wind and cold. It would've been tragic if those workers were still up there when the Teflon tore.

In case you didn't see it, or if you want to see it again, here:



I hope they can get it fixed soon. There's another Vikings game scheduled for a week from Monday; I'd hate to have them play in a neutral site two consecutive weeks.

~~~

I know you're dying to know how I've been spending my time now that there's no baseball. Crocheting. Lots and lots of crocheting. In addition to scarf-zilla, I've made another scarf (normal-sized), three hats, and 30 smallish things that I'll pair up and give as gifts. Thirty. I'd divulge more, but my mom reads this blog and she's going to get one of those gifts whether she wants one or not (hi mom!). So will just about everyone I've ever met.

I need baseball to come back soon.

Is JJ Hardy "Injury Prone"? (With Paper Dolls!)

Editorial note: I had this post about 2/3 done when rumors of the Twins trading JJ to the Orioles started flying hot and heavy on Wednesday. But, since I've been cooking this in my head for about a week and a half, I figured I'd still go with it. So there's a very good chance that this article will be moot and worthless in 24 hours, but hey, any chance I get to break out my paper dolls, I'm going for it.

K-bro's 2010 JJ Hardy Injury Paper Doll
I find myself defending JJ Hardy a lot lately. Especially since there are rumors that he's possibly being shopped as a trade candidate. I want to keep him around. I think he's a great defensive shortstop and he's decent offensively. But several of my friends tell me that they wouldn't be sad to see him go because he "can't stay healthy" and he's "injury-prone."

Really? I knew he missed a lot of time due to that nagging wrist injury that was caused by a freak event, but I never really considered him "injury-prone." Let's examine.

First, I need to define "injury-prone." How the hell do I know? I've never spent more than 15 minutes willingly on an athletic field of play in my life. So, I did the most logical thing; I asked my Twitter friends.

The responses I got were quite varied: everything from "unlucky" to "Eric Bedard" to "unwilling to play hurt" to "managed by Dusty Baker" (that one made me laugh). But I'll go with Andrew's (@Bryz_OffTheMark): "I'd probably say one significant injury per year for 3+ years where 'significant' means spending more than 15 days on the DL." This definition is good because it excludes players who have a bad-luck injury that hurts them for only one season, such as Justin Morneau and his concussion (hopefully it's only the one year). It also excludes "achy" players who need an extra day or two here and there, but that sitting out time doesn't really hurt the team, such as Jim Thome. So under Andrew's definition, Joe Crede comes immediately to mind. Remember him?

K-bro's 2009 Joe Crede Paper Doll

JJ's 2010 injuries consisted of a migraine, sore or swollen knee, turf toe, and that poor wrist. Over the previous three years, he's reportedly missed games because of back spasms (4 in '09, 3 in '07), collarbone injury (1 in '09), a rotator cuff injury (5 in '08), a hip flexor injury (1 in '07), and a stomach virus (2 in '07) for a total of 16 games, which is not significant, and nothing DL-worthy. Additionally, the turf toe (which is a lot more painful that it's silly name implies -- it's pretty much a ligament strain under the big toe) was listed as an ongoing injury, "I played probably half my games last year with the same problem, so it's not a big deal," but he only missed one game because of it, so he is willing to play hurt.

So it's got to be that wrist, right? The wrist is what everyone is thinking of when they're complaining about JJ's heartiness (Hardy's heartiness?). But can he really be labeled "injury-prone" because of that? He jammed it by sliding innocently, feet-first, into third base after smacking a lovely triple. I'm no expert, because I've never slid into any base in any fashion ever, but looking at it didn't seem out of the ordinary -- guys put their hands down as they slide to keep the upper halves of their bodies from hitting the ground. He's probably slid like that thousands of times. It was just a freak occurrence that he wouldn't be able to do again if he tried. The unfortunate part was that it was especially stubborn to heal. A cortisone shot and a trip to the DL just didn't do it. Apparently either he or the team, or both, rushed him back too quickly, it flared up again, and he needed even more time on the DL for the second trip.

Does this one, obstinate injury make him injury-prone? I don't think so. If he still has problems with it next season, or if it happens again, maybe, but even then I'm not convinced. Yes, it was frustrating how much time he missed, but, if anything, I'd call him "slow to heal" (I totally get that -- I'm "slow to heal" too). However, after a restful off-season, there's no reason to believe it'll hold him back in 2011.

And, hey, isn't it great that I found some real clothes for the JJ paper doll rather than the body-paint uni I had for Joe's?

~~~

My tweet above inspired Nick Nelson of Nick's Twins Blog to explore the Myth of Injury Prone using JJ as an example. Be sure to check it out; it's a good read.

Quick Notes: Nov. 28, 2010

This past Tuesday was the deadline for teams to offer arbitration to their Type A and Type B free agents. The Twins offered arbitration to Carl Pavano (Type A), Jesse Crain (B), and Orlando Hudson (B). They declined to offer arbitration to Matt Guerrier (A), Jon Rauch (B), and Brian Fuentes (B). Pavano, Crain, and Hudson have until this coming Tuesday to accept or decline the offer.

Some fans believe that Orlando Hudson has a "gentlemen's agreement" with the Twins to decline the arbitration just so the team can collect the draft pick. It's a fairly common thing, so I wouldn't be surprised. We'll see.

I'm most interested in what Carl Pavano does. It sounds like a lot of teams are interested in him, so if he doesn't accept, he'll have plenty of offers to consider. But I'm hoping that he likes the Twins so much that he'll accept, which buys the team time to come up with a multi-year deal.

I'm also interested in what will happen with Matt Guerrier. The Twins probably did him a favor by not offering arbitration. If they had, teams may have been unwilling to sign him since he's a Type A free agent. Having to give up a high-round draft pick may have been too costly to sign a middle reliever. So this scenario makes it pretty unlikely that the Twins will try to re-sign him. Too bad; I like him -- probably more than most fans do.

~~~

Late Thanksgiving night and early Black Friday morning, we heard that the Twins earned the exclusive negotiating rights with Japanese middle-infielder Tsuyoshi Nishioka. The Twins have to pay his team, the Chiba Lotte Marines, reportedly $5.3 million just to talk to him. The Twins have 30 days to come to an agreement, but since they're the only MLB team allowed to talk to him, there's no reason to believe that they won't sign him. If they can't sign him, they do get their damage deposit bid money back. Joe Christensen of the StarTribune has lots of great information about Nishioka and the whole process.

There are a few questions surrounding his potential signing. Will he play 2B or SS? Will this make a difference in whether the Twins offer JJ Hardy a new contract? What about Alexi Casilla and Matt Tolbert? (Ok, I was kidding about Tolbert.) And what if Hudson accepts arbitration?

Another pressing question is, how many different ways will Bert Blyleven pronounce his name? And how bad will Dan Gladden butcher it? Most importantly, what in the world will Gardy's nickname for him be?

Tigers at Twins -- Sweeping Up Around Here

Recap:

Monday: Tigers 4 - Twins 10
Tuesday: Tigers 3 - Twins 4
Wednesday: Tigers 4 - Twins 5

Twins sweep the 3-game series

Record: 19 - 9

~~~

Like my bedazzled, blinged-out, glitzy broom with the golden bristles and silver handle? Isn't it nice? Yes, you may have seen it before, but it's been a while. But, finally, I get to show it off. Those silly Tigers can leave such a dusty mess -- we don't want them to crud up the brand new stadium. It was nice that the Twins took care of the housecleaning and swept the Tigers right on out of there.

~~~

I gotta say that even though I like Wilson Ramos and all, I really can't wait to see Joey back in the lineup. His foot isn't too badly hurt, so it shouldn't be too much longer. And Wilson was great -- for his first three games. Then I think everyone figured out how to pitch to him. So now he's the one who has to adjust. But, fine, he probably will and be all great and everything because he really is a good player.

But, there will be a lot hand-wringing and Twitter-debating (Twibating?) about what to do with him once Pat-Pat is ready to come off the DL. Do they keep him up and let him ride the pine most of the time while getting to learn major league pitching? Do they send him down and give him lots of plate appearances so he can work on his hitting? Do they trade him for lots of wonderful talent? Does it even really matter?

Not in my opinion. For what that's worth.

~~~

I gotta say that even though JJ Hardy pretty much single-handedly won the game on Tuesday and all, but...wait a sec, there's not a "but" here. JJ is amazing. I love his defense. His bat's pretty good. He seems like a nice guy in the interviews. Oh, and he's pretty nice to look at. I'm glad he's here.

I never really bought the whole "change of scenery" theory before -- it always seemed like something the front office would say to the fans when it acquired a crappy player ... "he'll be a great player; he just needs a change of scenery." But, in JJ's case, it might be true. I think he's a better Twin than he was a Brewer. It probably also makes a difference that he was hurt a lot last year. But this year...wait...last week he had turf toe, and Tuesday he suffered a sore wrist from sliding (feet first by the way -- who knows how that happens)...hmm.

JJ, stay healthy please.

~~~

Hmm...

A few notes on a couple of things that kind of made me scratch my head.

The Twins signed all eight of their arbitration eligible players
This is good. I've heard that neither the teams nor the players want to go into the arbitration room. The team tells the player how awful he is so that they don't have to pay him as much money as he wants, and then when it's all done, they have to convince him how much the love him. Can't be good for anyone.

So it's great that everyone (JJ Hardy, Carl Pavano, Delmon Young, Pat Neshek, Jesse Crain, Matt Guerrier, Francisco Liriano all for one-year contracts and Brendan Harris for a two-year contract) signed so quickly -- all done on the very day when figures were exchanged. But it's curious that it was indeed that fast. The Twins and one other team (I forget which, Dodgers maybe?) were the only ones that had that many arbitration eligibles. So it would have been understandable if a few of them had taken a day or two.

Now, I haven't really followed Twins contract activities in the past, so I'm not sure about what to think of this. But I seem to remember when Cuddyer was arbitration-eligible, he and the Twins came to a "hand on the doorknob to the mediator's room" agreement.

So it seems odd to me that they'd knock off all eight in one swell foop. What does it mean? Are they opening the wallet freely? Are they just trying to get it over with and just saying "whatever" to whatever the players wanted? Were all the players extraordinarily reasonable with their demands? Huh?

The Twins are seriously interested in signing Jim Thome
Um, ok. The White Sox announced earlier this evening that they're not interested in him, so speculation is that he's deciding between the Twins and the Rays.

Now Thome's great. He's the kind of player you hate, only because he always beats you. I always like him a lot better when he's in the National League.

He's been described as the nicest guy in baseball. And that came from Mike Redmond -- after Thome cracked his skull when he forgot to hold on to his bat.

But, despite all that, the curious part is: why? We already have a left-handed, and much younger, DH in Jason Kubel. And it's not like we could put Thome out in the field to rest some guys.
I know the bench is a bit thin, but I seriously think they have other needs to address first. I don't know; bringing him in is like bringing beer to a wine tasting -- really good beer, but it still doesn't quite fit.


Ok, this is a no-brainer
The estimable Seth Stohs is planning a super-duper, action-packed, star-studded, pre-TwinsFest extravaganza podcast tomorrow (Tuesday) evening. Ok, I exaggerate, but it's still going to be great.

Follow this link to listen live: www.BlogTalkRadio.com/SethSpeaks

Here's his tentative schedule (Central Time):

8:00-8:05 – Introduction

8:05-8:20 – John Sickels

8:20-8:35 – Pat Neshek

8:35-8:50 – Joe Benson

8:50-9:05 – Carlos Gutierrez

9:05-9:10 – Catch Up

9:10-9:25 – Kyle Gibson

9:25-9:35 – Open

9:35-9:45 – Denard Span

9:45-9:55 – Jeff Manship

9:55-10:00 – Wrap-Up

Be sure to tune in; it sounds like an awesome show.

Sunday Sundries

A few thoughts about the goings on over the last week.

Twins traded Go-Go to the Brewers for Hardy? Wow! Did. Not. See. That. Coming.
So the biggest news of the past week was also the biggest surprise. First of all, I'm not used to trades happening before the first week of Post-Baseball is up. And, I figured if any of the Twins' extra outfielders were to be traded, it would've been Delmon.

On paper, I think it's a fair trade -- not really a blockbuster, but ok. Talent for talent; they needed an outfielder, we needed an infielder. I do think Hardy will be a decent player for the Twins, despite the fact he had a crappy season in 2009. And I'm glad that Span is now guaranteed to be the everyday center fielder. I'm also hopeful that Young will improve, knowing that he's the everyday left fielder.

It's a bummer that this ensures that Orlando Cabrera won't be with the Twins any longer. He was great while he was here. And I'll always be grateful to him for his Game 163 heroics. MNTwinsZealot has a nice tribute to him.

But I'm the most sad about losing Go-Go's spark, personality, fun, and fire. He would drive me nuts with his crazy swinging at balls on the ground, but I'd always forgive him because he was so luvable. Erin and Tricia have nice tributes. Godspeed, Speedy Go-Go.

And welcome J.J. Hardy.

k-bro and her mom go shopping - the salesperson win edition
On Friday, Mom and I stopped in the Minnetonka Twins Pro Shop to spend a little of my birthday money (thanks Auntie!) and we had a really nice time. The gal working there was so happy to see us -- probably because it was dead and she likely hadn't had any customers for a while. I do feel bad that I was the one who broke the Gomez news to her, because she seemed really bummed about it. But, otherwise, we had such a nice time talking baseball with her. She was super helpful in locating the items we were interested in. So Mom and I bought matching shirts. I know that sounds lame, but they're really sweet shirts, so we're cute.

But, as we were talking about buying tickets for next season, our new friend gave the info I needed: single-game tickets will go on sale at 5 pm on the Friday of Twins Fest (I can't remember if it's the 22nd or 29th of January -- sorry a quick glance at my Target Field calendar tells me it's January 29th). They'll be available by phone, on line, at the Metrodome (Twins Fest will still be at the Dome), and at the Pro Shops. She did make sure to tell me that it's subject to change and that I should keep checking the Twins website for info. So, I'm thinking about hanging out at the Pro Shop on that day.

k-bro and her mom go shopping - the sale fail edition
Mom and I decided to head to the Twins moving sale Saturday morning. We figured if we showed up at about 10:30, all the people who camped out would be in and we wouldn't have to wait.

Yeah. Riiiiight.

The line was long when we first got there; we were happy that the weather was nice. After waiting for about 20 minutes, I decided to see just how long the line was. So I walked. And I walked. And I walked all the way around the Dome. Yeah, the end of the line was about 20 feet away from the start of the line. I walked so long, Mom got worried. I asked the folks at the start of the line how long they'd been there. An hour and a half.

Forget that. We figured by the time we got in, all the good stuff would be gone anyway. And the irony that the piped in announcement said "a short wait may be required" was not lost on us.

So we went to the mall.

Two more years of Cuddy
So, in the time-suck that was the moving sale line, I learned via Twitter that the Twins exercized their 2011 option on Michael Cuddyer. Everyone standing immediately around me learned it too, since I kind of shouted it.

Yay!

And that's all I have to say about that.

The Newest Twins Commercial
Clever as ever.

Click here.