SB Nation User Blog: rayken

See ya Luis!

rayken — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 04:05:57 -0000

Rotoworld:

Padres claimed infielder Luis Rodriguez off waivers from the Twins.
Color us stunned that another team wanted Rodriguez, especially that the team is one that relies more on statistics than most. The 27-year-old Rodriguez is a .243/.311/.339 hitter in 445 at-bats as a major leaguer, and he was especially bad this year. If he were a particularly rangy shortstop, maybe he'd be an acceptable utility-man. However, he's clearly not. In fact, the Twins didn't have him make one appearance there all year. It just doesn't make much sense that the Padres want him anywhere near their 40-man roster.
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Hurray! No more wasting a roster spot on this guy and his 2 AB sample sizes.

Poll

Who is Dickbert's next "emergency catcher" guy?

Punto

0 votes

Nick Punto

1 votes

Nicholas Punto

0 votes

Nicholas Paul Punto

0 votes

You down with NPP? Yeah you know me!

17 votes

18 votes | Poll has closed

Hypocrisy R Us

rayken — Sun, 19 Aug 2007 08:15:18 -0000

Via twincities.com and BYTO:

Punto fits at No. 2: Ron Gardenhire believes Nick Punto is well-suited for the No. 2 spot in the Twins' batting order, .204 batting average or not.

Punto proved that Friday night, when he manufactured the winning run in the 10th inning.

"He's a good bunter, good speed - get him on base, that's a good scenario," the Minnesota manager said. "You've got doubles hitters coming up after him, and if a guy hits a double, you should score. If Punto or (Jason) Tyner is on, they will."

Gardenhire said has heard all the complaints about Punto, but "I have a lot of respect for a guy who goes through troubles like he's had offensively and still never carries it over (to defense)," he said. "It never affects him on the other side of the ball. He goes out there and plays defense, really plays it, and saves us all kinds of runs."

Gardenhire used Tyner as his leadoff hitter on Saturday because left-handers hit .328 against Texas starter Kameron Loe. And he preferred Punto over Alexi Casilla, who batted ninth, because of his experience. Besides, Punto is a .261 career hitter in the second slot, better than any other spot in the order.

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Okay, couple things here. First, apparently Gardenhire needs to start watching some Twins games like the rest of us. Everyone knows Punto hasn't been able to bunt at all this year, and Gardenhire himself said as much after that bunt third strike debacle a few days ago. But a single, error, and wild pitch later, and here we are, back to the completely irrational support of the worst regular MLB batter hitting second in the lineup. Does Gardenhire have amnesia or something?

Second, Gardy cites the fact that Punto doesn't let his terrible offense affect his defense. Well that's just super. Unfortunately, this has nothing to do with his abilities to hit at the top of a major league lineup. Psst, Ron, you can actually bat the position players in any order you want. Little Nicky's defense won't be diminished by batting him ninth. Just an FYI.

Finally, being a terrible hitter with experience does not make him a better option than a decent hitter without experience. They don't hand out extra runs at the end of the game based on how many cumulative games your lineup has played.

And, of course, I had to do a photoshop for this tremendous outburst of baseball savvy by Gardy:

Cirillo traded?

rayken — Fri, 03 Aug 2007 22:30:57 -0000

LEN3 says so, but is being cryptic.

"At about 4:15 p.m., Twins manager Ron Gardenhire pulled Jeff Cirillo off the field to inform him that he had been traded to Arizona. We'll have the details as soon as they become available."

I...didn't see this coming. I really hope this isn't the move to make room for Cuddyer rather than ridding ourselves of the redundant L-Rod.

Thoughts?

Deadline fallout in the clubhouse

rayken — Wed, 01 Aug 2007 05:15:03 -0000

Johan Santana is pissed off.

Bodes well for us after next year, eh?

Terry Ryan says in that article that he purposely avoids reading/hearing comments from players regarding his deals, especially the recent salary dump known as the Luis Castillo trade. Somehow I think he's going to hear about these comments one way or another, and if he wants to keep the torches and pitchforks away from the Metrodome, he should probably think about how to remedy the situation immediately.

As people have pointed out already, Santana is not a loudmouth. He generally praises the organization or remains indifferent when the media pokes around for a sound byte. This leads me to believe that he has some very harsh words about upper management when there aren't reporters around to write it down, since he volunteered his opinion today. I'm sure letting Hunter walk in the off-season will signal to Johan that the team is really committed to winning with him here!

I'm glad he said it though. Maybe it will finally get through to Ryan if the best pitcher in baseball says it publicly...but I doubt it.

McDonald down, Buscher up

rayken — Thu, 26 Jul 2007 05:43:50 -0000

McDonald was optioned to Rochester after the game today, but no official word on his replacement had been given, though Gardy apparently hinted at Buscher. It is now a done deal.

Some background on Buscher

Let's hope he gets a fair shot and not just random at-bats to show what he can do up here.

Crain out, DePaula in

rayken — Wed, 16 May 2007 05:51:45 -0000

Crain headed to 15 day DL

Julio DePaula got the call.

Lots of people were offering up Crain as trade bait, along with Baker. Looks like that is definitely not happening anytime soon. I haven't seen/heard much about DePaula, but his numbers don't look all that bad. Obviously those might not translate to major league hitting, but here's hoping.