Too much baseball for a Thursday afternoon. (Ask the chaperones)
Posted on May 16th, 2008 – 8:36 AMBy Howard
Some people watched 220 minutes of baseball Thursday afternoon and the only reward was a break from the daily routine. And the game ended just at the wrong time for the 4,281 bus drivers who brought kids to the Dome. (Note to Twins: For the sake of the teachers who supervise these trips, play a quick game the next time you have so many youngsters in the stands. The cotton-candy vendors are still checking their bruises this morning.)
One quick point to be made here, a stock phrase that needs to be tossed out with the sour milk and, probably, the thoughts (delusions?) we were having earlier this week of winning 90+ games.
Anyone who prattles on about the Twins “doing the little things” right is living in the past. It is a catchphrase of the national media, which tends to live a few years behind reality when it comes to teams not playing on the Coasts or in Chicago, and of local loyalists who need vision and comprehension checks. It’s just not happening any more and the sum total of the Toronto sweep should drive home that point to anyone still doubting it.
The former manager, Tom Kelly, imbued his teams with the fundamentals and Gardy’s division-winning teams were in large part the result of Kelly’s ways of doing things. The current group has lost the right to carry that banner. Fundamentally sound baseball suffered when so much of the game became built around slugging home runs — juiced baseballs and juiced players as evidence. Unfortunately, the Twins have not bucked that tide, and never really jumped on the slugging train, either.
Doing the little things right most of the time isn’t anything special.
I didn’t see Thursday’s game — followed it on the Web like many of you and missed the end to watch a track meet — so I’m going to cut it off here. Colleague Jim Souhan is weighing in on the power issue and on Delmon Young, and it’s a good read. So is Joe C’s game story.
To those of you going to Colorado, travel safely, behave and tell us how it’s going.
(One more thing, as long as I have your attention. If you click here, you can sign up to receive a weekday Twins newsletter that includes links to all of our Twins coverage. I recommend it as a good way to start the day.)
42 Responses to "Too much baseball for a Thursday afternoon. (Ask the chaperones)"
Couldn’t agree more Howard. The Twins are clearly living off of the good work of Tom Kelly and his players. The Twins have gotten worse at doing the little things the longer Gardy has been the manager. But, I’m sure that is just a coincidence….
Good points Howard. This team has no identity right now; no trademark. Youth can explain some of it… but it goes beyond that.
Baserunning is consistently poor. C’mon, running through stop signs by a veteran. Hanging out around 1st base without an intent to go to 2nd, but not going back to 1st either by DY? That’s just dumb. The list of baserunning gaffes goes pretty long.
Defensively, my complaints are the missed cutoffs by DY and Gomez. The lackluster play in the IF, especially 2b and 3b, I believe we had to expect. But, it is not acceptable when the hitting is also below average.
I do think starting pitching has been the big and pleasant surprise. And, that is something you can build on.
I guess if I were managing this collection, my goal would be to get more consistent at bats, deliver some benching messages for the mental miscues, and hope the pitching holds up.
But, the roller coaster will continue. I won’t give up on the potential playoff run for this team until August or we are more than 15 games out… whichever occurs last.
Somebody made a good point in one of the other threads. The Twins appeared to come into this series thinking “Pfft, we beat Boston. Toronto will be just another…thing.”
And Toronto walked all over them. It was an ugly played series, and hopefully it was a reality check for the youngsters that they do in fact have to keep on playing regardless of who’s on the other side of the ball on any given day.
And honestly, I think it’s a lesson in humility for the fans. Coming off a huge 3 of 4 series against the defending champs…raise your hand if you felt like Toronto would be a walk in the park?
Oh come on now, be honest. Even I let myself start looking past them.
I might be wrong, T, but I actually think most of the fans saw this coming, or at least worried about it. I said prior to the first game that I hoped we didn’t have a let down after beating the champs, as toronto had really good pitching.
This has been a common thing for the Twins to play to the level of their opponents. Now, that could be a bad thing going to Colorado. Maybe we’ll lift the rockies’ hopes like we did the blue jays.
The frustrating part is the Twins should have won this series and had a chance to win all three games. I’m not going to help start a fire Gardy campaign but at the same time when it’s more then one player making the same dumb mistakes then the man on top should be held accountable.
That’s a fantastic point, Howard. I’m tired of hearing about how the Twins do the little things–and this isn’t a recent thing, this has been ongoing:
The BIGGEST issue I have is our bunting. We don’t know how to execute a sacrifice bunt…this has been a trend for quite some time and it’s truly embarrassing.
Errors. The Twins were middle of the pack in the AL for errors last year…so you say “so what”…well, we were also third from the bottom in runs per game so if you’re going to be that feeble offensively you should be near the top in fielding.
It’s hard to quantify in statistical terms whether or not a team is doing “the little things”, but, conversely, it’s easy to just assume they are or just throw it out there in the face of shameful numbers up and down the lineup (like the pathetically low HR and RBI total of the three and five hitters; the pathetically low team HR total, OBP, etc.)…it’s easy to justify it all by saying ‘we do the little things right’.
Well guess what, we don’t always do the little things right.
Some morning random thoughts…
I saw the Squeeze Play highlights last night…what’s up with Michael Cuddyer’s glove? I think he missed another one out there yesterday…frustrations at the plate are heading out to the field, it looks like (remember the goofy bill of the cap play on Mon? Amusing, but another screw up)
If there is a guy who does the little things right, it’s Matt Tolbert. The box score didn’t show it, but he hit some rockets yesterday. He also stole second and advanced to third on a sac fly (and eventually scored on a wild pitch)…I really like this kid, seems like a Gardy-type and hopefully replaces Nick Punto.
D. Young…well, Reusse and Souhan have said it all, pretty much. Not looking good for Bill Smith at the moment.
Of course, in his written assault on D. Young, Souhan dismissed the lack of extra base power by our Golden Boy, Joe Mauer…saying that at least Mauer has gap power. Jim, I know you wear the company line on your forehead, but how can you dismiss a 6′5 No. 3 hitter with 0 HR and 15 RBI? For the record, Mauer only has 6 more extra base hits than Young and one fewer than Craig Monroe, who’s behind him by 50 ABs. (I hope Gardy sees fit to keep Monroe in the lineup everyday)
Finally, props to Justin Morneau. Through it all, this guy is our one real threat at the plate. He flat out gets it done night in, night out, and is quickly becoming THE reason to watch the Twins.
And I want to point something out to all you Mauer defenders who say that RBI is more a product of if you have guys on base than anything else….
Mauer has 15 RBI
Carlos Gomez has 14 RBI
You can’t tell me that this is the result of the great table-setters for Gomez (great hitters like Mike Lamb, Adam Everett, and Nick Punto).
That’s an absolutely embarrassing stat for Mauer….I know the guy’s hitting .331 and we all love that…but when you’re producing the same amount of runs as Carlos Gomez, well, the excuses don’t work for me.
We saw the same thing last year, too. 60 RBI in the 3-hole. It’s not everyone else’s fault.
Jason while Mauer is partially to blame for the lack of production it’s not his fault Gardy bats him third every day. It’s easy to speculate on what lineup would work best but ultimately the best three hitter we have is Morneau who also happens to be our best clean up hitter as well. So what’s the answer?
Moving Mauer and Morneau both up one spot in the batting order would be a good thing even if it weakened the cleanup spot. 20 extra at-bats in a season for Morneau could be huge.
“D. Young…well, Reusse and Souhan have said it all, pretty much. Not looking good for Bill Smith at the moment.”
In defense of Bill Smith, did anybody think Delmon Young would have this kind of season?
If you look at the opposite end, Smith recieved a fair amount of criticism for signing Monroe at the beginning of the year.
And now everybody’s clamoring for him to get more play time.
Smith did exactly what was asked of him. He traded one of our many quality pitchers to bring in a young right-handed bat that had shown the ability to hit for power.
Young may actually be a prime example of how the “Twins way” of hitting (not just Vavra) is not the best approach.
I started out looking to answer Jason’s question about Mauer’s RBIs and was astounded by the answer. Wow, here are some numbers that will shock you. I still can hardly believe these stats:
RISP:
Morneau .452!!!!
Lamb .417 !!!
Gomez .400!!!
Punto .400 !!!
Mauer .333
Monroe .318
Cuddyer .294
Kubel .294
Young .243
Tolbert .200
Harris .121
Everett .077
Clearly, most of the team performs BETTER with RISP. So, the answer to our hitting woes is to convince the batter that someone is on 2b, even when their isn’t. Anybody good at that hologram stuff? (we also need to let tolbert, harris and everett think the sacks are empty)
Stats from Yahoo sports in case you want to check them yourself.
Howard,
I read your comments about ‘doing the little things’ and couldn’t help but be reminded of an essay I read about the Blue Jays, complaining that they were drawing too many walks and thus not hitting well in situations. (http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/article/walking-into-disaster/)
Note that article was posted after the Jays had already beaten the Twins in the first game of the just-concluded series. You think the writer is feeling a bit better about his club today?
Jason,
Simple comparisons don’t always work.
Yes, Gomez has 14 RBI and has batted with 67 runners on base (31 in scoring position). Mauer has 15 RBI and has batted with 89 runners on base (but just 46 in scoring position). Gomez is also batting .400/1104 with runners in scoring position (versus .270/704 overall), while Mauer is batting .333/803 with RISP (versus .331/828 overall). (All numbers courtesy of baseball-reference.com.)
In other words, Gomez’s 14 RBI are not a reasonable comparison to Mauer’s 15 RBI, because Carlos Gomez is not going to continue hitting like Ted Williams with runners in scoring position.
Meanwhile, Mauer in 2007 did hit 60 RBI — in 106 starts, only 88 of which were batting third. He basically had 50 RBI in the 3-spot in about a half-season of starts, which doesn’t seem too shabby to me for a guy who spent about half of those starts hitting in front of Nick Punto and Alexi Casilla.
Here is the obvious solution to our favorite baseball team: Billy Smith needs to clean house of all managers and coaches (with the exception of Rick Anderson) with the big league club. Starting with Vavra, who has proven nothing. There needs to be a new mentality in the clubhouse and on the field. I would be willing to put Charles Barkley’s money on the fact that the coaches secretly do not want the team to hit a lot of HR’s or score many runs. Why? Because then they wouldn’t be the ‘little small market team that could.” I am not even going to mention all the errors and boneheaded plays in the field/on the bases this year. Oops..I guess I did. So not only are they the ‘little small market team that CAN’T”, they are also “the little small market team that doesn’t do the little things correctly”.
The Mauer excuse machine is absolutely hilarious to me…
If the dude hit for power the way a No. 3 hitter is supposed to, there wouldn’t be a discussion about his lack of RBI…a singles hitter comes to the plate with a handicap each at-bat in the RBI arena.
Gomez has gone yard 3 times. That tends to spike the RBI total, but apparently Mauer is too good for homers.
Runs are what wins games…not getting on base. Seems pretty simple to me…Joe can handle the latter fairly well but he has yet to prove he is able to consistently provide the former.
a singles hitter comes to the plate with a handicap each at-bat in the RBI arena.
The philosophy that a hitter “has an RBI chance in every at-bat” is flawed at best…as no hitter in the game can hit a homerun in every AB.
Maybe not, but a few here and there are certainly better than none.
By your definition, since no hitter in the game can hit a homerun in every AB, that means we should NEVER have the expectation that a player hit a homerun.
See my point yet?
And the fact that a hitter has an RBI chance in every at-bat is not a philosophy; it’s a fact.
Gee, and here I thought I ended this debate with stats. Unless you want Gomez, Punto, or Lamb hitting 3rd, we already have the best RBI machine in the 3 hole now with Mauer based on his average with RISP (unless you want to move Monreau to 3 and Mauer 2
Carlos G says:
May 16th, 2008 at 11:16 am
I started out looking to answer Jason’s question about Mauer’s RBIs and was astounded by the answer. Wow, here are some numbers that will shock you. I still can hardly believe these stats:
RISP:
Morneau .452!!!!
Lamb .417 !!!
Gomez .400!!!
Punto .400 !!!
Mauer .333
Monroe .318
Cuddyer .294
Kubel .294
Young .243
Tolbert .200
Harris .121
Everett .077
Clearly, most of the team performs BETTER with RISP. So, the answer to our hitting woes is to convince the batter that someone is on 2b, even when their isn’t. Anybody good at that hologram stuff? (we also need to let tolbert, harris and everett think the sacks are empty)
Stats from Yahoo sports in case you want to check them yourself.
Good points…
I think that the problem is multi-faceted and a bit too hard to fix:
a. For some reason, this season it seems that the Twins are performing well on at bats and on bases when the pitching is bad and not when the pitching is good. Rarely (in only 3 games out of 40 - Royals 5-0, Tigers 11-1, Boston 7-3) the hitting and pitching clicked at the same time.
b. I’ve never seen so many mental mistakes from that team, from not adjusting on the plate, to not adjusting on the mount, to mental lapses on the bases and with the glove. This is team-wide… The only players exempt from the above criticism are probably only Morneau, Reyes, Hernandez (maybe) and Nathan.
c. When a and b happens, the coaching staff and the manager are at fault. These hitters proved that they can score several runs and these pitches have proven that they can pitch shutouts. The fact that the whole team is out of synch, is a problem that it is indicative of bad coaching and game management. We are not talking about single games we are talking about 37 of the 40 games so far.
d.And (for the umpteenth time) again there is not a single critical drop in real or virtual ink from the Twin Cities media to that effect. The only complaints about coaching/game management are made by fans. I do understand that the Twins’ staff might not like criticism and that reporter would prefer to avoid it, in order to have more access to them… but it is about time that someone actually reports the real truth and not Gardy’s truth (which usually has several others, and always players, than himself to blame.) His latest “analysis” of the 3 game sweep was “We had plenty of opportunities, but we ended up shooting ourselves in the foot. It’s a matter of getting hits, big hits.” A manager with that shallow view of what is happening this season, should probably not manage…
e. I would like to see a major message from the FO. It does not necessarily have to mean fire Gardy at this point. Just shake him up and get rid of a couple of his coaches (Liddle, Ullger, Vavra, take your pick, but Ullger should be a prime candidate after those 2 non-stop signs.) I know it is not “Minnesota nice”, but “Minnesota nice” has proven that it cannot win championships.
btw, Jason is correct: it is a fact that a hitter has an RBI chance in every at-bat is not a philosophy; just some hitters have higher probability of delivering.
“By your definition, since no hitter in the game can hit a homerun in every AB, that means we should NEVER have the expectation that a player hit a homerun.”
Most definately not the case, but good try. It simply means we shouldn’t count it against a player that some nonexistant player is able to hit a home-run in every AB.
Using your logic, we can say that a hitter has a chance to make an out in every AB. So naturally players such as Nick Punto, Adam Everett, etc are good players simply because they don’t make an out all the time.
We aren’t playing to our ability level yet. The best days of this team are still ahead. We need baker healthy and the addition of Perkins to the rotation will leave slowey the odd man out or maybe boof if can’t be consistant locating his curve.
Maybe Perkins can give us the lefty in the rotation that we expected 47 to be.
thrylos, are you serious with these comments?
“Rarely (in only 3 games out of 40 - Royals 5-0, Tigers 11-1, Boston 7-3) the hitting and pitching clicked at the same time.”
“We are not talking about single games we are talking about 37 of the 40 games so far.”
Show me a team that can have all aspects (hitting, fielding, and pitching) click every time and I’ll show you a team that has just gone 162-0.
The problem you and Jason have is your comparing the Twins to some mythical team that hits homers in every AB and “clicks” 100% of the time.
Of course a team will win games if that happens. But it’ll never happen.
The true measure of a ball club isn’t how well they can play when everybody’s perfect…because as the Twins demonstrated in 06, and the Rockies repeated in 07, you can be the hottest team in baseball for a month…then suddenly breakdown and fail when it matters most.
The most important aspect is that you have the staff that can support one another. That is, an offense that can click when the pitching isn’t at its best, and a pitching staff that can come through in a tight spot when the hitting is struggling.
Oh, and before either thrylos or Jason responds with: “Oh, so you don’t WANT a team that hits home runs in every AB or pitches a shut out every night.”
The problem I have with the logic demonstrated by those previous statements is that its comparing performance to perfection.
And what happens when you considering perfection the only measure of success?
You become a Yankee fan.
Yes, the Twins are only at .500. And yeah, they only “clicked” in 3 games. But if that’s the case, then obviously there’s something they’re doing right that they managed to win another 17 games with such an imperfect and crappy squad.
To call for the coaching staff’s head because the Twins have only had three “clicks” (I’d still like to know what you define as click) out of 17 wins is riddiculous.
T Twins have proven throughout Gardy’s tenure good pitching but lousy hitting always makes a team a playoff loser!! during Gardy’s reign(of terror??) Twins have won 6 of 21 playoff games and 1 playoff series a team needs to have more balance, and obviously Twins haven’t had it since 1992
And who wouldn’t love the perfect player and perfect team?
The only problem is you’ll never find one. Because even A-Rod strikes out, and even Johan occasionally loses a game.
T must be the screen name for Sid Sr….
So VMG: You’re saying that it’s all Gardy’s fault, even if the team hasn’t had balance since 1992.
So from 1992 to 2001, the Twins didn’t have balance. (But they had Ryan and Kelly)
Then in 2002, Gardy arrived. And they still didn’t have balance. But they made the playoffs 4 times in the next 6 years. (Ryan and Gardy)
The common factor I see there is Ryan, with Gardy apparently doing something right to start the corrective process.
Now Ryan’s out and Smith’s in.
Maybe Gardy helped take the team as far as he could go with what he had with Ryan. Weren’t we always saying that the team was just that little extra push FROM OUTSIDE away from winning it? A bat, a glove, a pitcher?
So now we’ve got the new GM. One who’s already tried to bring in a new bat with Young (though it’s unfortunate that isn’t playing out as anybody thought). And the pitcher he found to replace Silva (Hernandez) has turned into a pretty good discovery.
So why don’t see if Gardy, now paired with Smith can put something together in the next two years. If you expected the playoffs at all going into 2008 you were fooling yourself.
“T must be the screen name for Sid Sr….”
Twins Blog Rule #1: When unable to form a valid counter-arguement, simply accuse the opposition that they’re some random player/coach/figure. As that’s the only possible reason they’d ever have to disagree with you.
I apologize T Sid Sr would never write his own material and has no idea what a computer is let alone how to find an on switch to turn one on .. back to current discussion…
let’s step off the “jumping to conclusions mat” for 1 second - The Twins organization has has the same foundational elements since Pohlad has owned the team - somehow TK overcame them Gardy and his staff hasn’t
Re: runs produced. We used to calculate a stat called “runs produced” by adding Runs Scored to RBI and subtracting HR. Easy stat and based on that, Mauer has “produced” 40 runs this year while Gomez has “produced” 33.
Then Saint Bill (James) taught us we were being too simplistic. He gave us three more “accurate” formulas for calculating “runs created”. A basic formula, a formula that considered stolen bases, and a more technical formula that also included walks, intentional walks, HBP, and SACs.
Based on those, the calculations change a bit:
Basic RC: Gomez 17.64, Mauer 21.93
RC (SB): Gomez 18.88, Mauer 21.57
RC (Tech): Gomez 18.60, Mauer 21.08
But St. Bill never rests. Now we have been with a new and improved formula and based on that formula the numbers become: Gomez 19.04, Mauer 20.69.
AHAH! So no matter what formula, Mauer has created more runs than Gomez… right??? NOT SO FAST, MY FRIENDS…
We’re also told that we should add situational hitting statistics to add that “clutchiness” factor to the formula. When we do this, the numbers become (drumrole please): Gomez 21.30, Mauer 20.77.
What does this mean? (whew… flashback there to my Lutheran Catechism class)
I think it all means these two guys have contributed about 20 runs a piece to the Twins total this year and that the difference between the two isn’t worth all the time we’ve put in to debating the issue… much less the time I put in to these calculations.
This philosophical convo has to end. See the ball, catch the ball, hit the ball, throw the ball. Baseball is not a hard game. The Twins got swept. It won’t be the last time. They got swept in 06′ more than once. In 06′ we never would have made the playoffs with out playing the NL. I think we were like 15-2 against them. Lets see how we look in July and they you can start to pull out the physics and philosophy books.
talent does not determine playing smart fundamental baseball - smart base running, defensively making all the plays your supposed to, adjusting to pitchers method of getting hitters out - all of these elements are needed to be at peak form for Twins team to have a “chance” to compete - for years it was the one EDGE twins had over all teams - now it is no longer an edge and Gardy and his staff have to be held acountable
“now it is no longer an edge and Gardy and his staff have to be held acountable”
And you don’t think any of that “rough around the edges” troubles stem from the fact that this is a fairly younger team than most teams Gardy’s had to work with?
Rookies make dumb mistakes. Let’s see how the Twins bounce back from that sweep. Because they didn’t look like a bunch of buffoons against Boston.
It’s the same situation game after game after game. A series goes well and it’s PLAYOFFS AHOY! A series goes poorly and it’s THE END OF THE WORLD!
Thank god I’ve been expecting to finish in the middle of the pack since Decemeber. Otherwise this up and down would’ve likely killed me.
is Kubel a rookie? I believe Delmon was in the majors last year also.. regardless bottom line some of us Twins fans have higher expectations then to watch this team finish as a non-playoff team or playoff team with no chance of winning a playoff series let alone game year after year and see no real improvement or hope for the record I expect this team to be in “rebuilding” mode until 2010.. but the coaching staff has to start preparing this team (veterans also) to play the right way and use their talents to the full
Santana was correct when he said (paraphrasing here) “this team always builds for the future but when is it going to be the future?” How many Twins fans actually believe that 2010 is the ‘future’?
Maybe the thin Colorado air will help a few Twins’ fly balls clear the fence this weekend.
Of course, you also need the pitchers to induce as many ground balls as possible.
I’m not getting too pumped up over series wins or too suicidal over a sweep (that, ugly though it was, still included two one-run losses). I tend to always look back a couple of weeks and see where things stand comparatively. It’s mid May and the Twins are tied for 2nd, 1.5 games back. Two weeks ago they were half a game back. Let’s see where they are a couple of weeks from now.
They’re interesting (if a bit frustrating) to watch and there’s certainly plenty of room for improvement.
jimcrickett, that is a good way to look at things. Helps with the stress level too. I’ve always said that I believe we will be much better in August than April. If not, then I think you look at the causes. Injuries? Player performance limitations? coaching limitations?
This does need to be a teaching year. I am starting to get concerned about the teaching of DY. Not that we would necessarily know what goes on behind closed doors, but we sure aren’t seeing any growth in discipline on the field.
Gomez has a lot to learn as well, but the image we get is that he is at least willing to listen and learn.
Yeah, Carlos, I’m all about keeping stress levels at reasonable levels.
As for Young, I’m just not going to get too shook yet.
You know how Twins fans have reacted to some early Mets’ fans hand-wringing concerning Johan’s propensity to give up HRs and generally appear human early in the season? “Yeah, we coulda told you that.”
Well, guess what… Young hit .257 in April last year and .247 in May… followed by .304 the rest of the year. Sure, he had a few HR in those months last year, but I just think it’s way too early to fret yet.
By the way, an interesting statistic… he hit .343 for the Rays in July last year, without a single HR that month, yet still maintaining an .806 OPS for the month (his highest in any month last year).
Remember, the guy only hit 13 HR all last year so we’re clearly looking at a guy who’s still developing at the age of 22, not someone I expected to come in and rip 25 a year his first season as a Twin. This was an investment in the future. Let’s keep expectations in perspective.
The bit about getting caught off 1B from behind by a throw from RF to the Catcher covering? Yeah… bonehead move deserving of criticism, which I’m sure he’s heard plenty about.
jimmycrickett, I actually am one of the guys giving DY a lot of slack offensively as well. It’s the mental mistakes that are starting to annoy me. He has a great arm, but he needs to hit the cutoff man once in a while. I am just saying I would like to see more evidence that he is a) being told to improve these things (throws/baserunning/plate discipline) and b) putting these things into practice.
We saw it with Gomez’ benching and his obviously improved patience at the plate. So far, not seeing any evidence on the DY front.
Having said all this, I still see a lot of upside for DY. But, 22 is a good age to teach him some things. I hope they have a plan to do that.
Speaking of Young:
Metrodome Dimensions: Left field: 343 ; left-center: 385; center field: 408 ; right-center: 367; right field: 327;
Tropicana Field Dimensions: Left field: 315 ft.; left-center: 370 ft.; center field: 404 ft.; right-center: 370 ft.; right field: 322 ft.
New Twins’ Stadium Dimensions: Left field: 328 feet; left-center: 371 feet; center field: 402 feet; right-center: 371 feet; right field: 331 feet.
T,
The problem you and Jason have is your comparing the Twins to some mythical team that hits homers in every AB and “clicks” 100% of the time.
Not really…
But let’s have a methodology instead of using terms like “clicking”. You made me do some work 
Let’s substitute “clicking” by games that the team scored 5 or more runs and allowed 3 runs or less (which means that the pitching staff had ERA less than the league average, while the hitting staff created opponents ERA higher than the league average - league average arbitrarily = 4), here are the MLB rankings:
St. Louis: 13/43
Dodgers: 12/40
Mets: 11/39
Tampa Bay: 11/41
Houston: 11/42
Boston: 11/43
Atlanta: 10/40
White Sox: 10/41
Yankees: 10/42
Cubs: 9/41
Toronto: 9/43
Marlins: 8/40
Cincinnati: 8/41
Cleveland: 8/41
Milwaukee: 8/41
Oakland: 8/42
Seattle: 8/42
Detroit: 6/41
Pitsburgh: 6/41
Washington: 6/42
Philadelphia: 5/42
Twins: 4/40
Texas: 4/42
Angels: 4/43
Kansas City: 3/40
Baltimore: 3/41
Arizona: 3/42
San Fransisco: 3/42
San Diego: 3/42
Colorado: 2/41
No one is asking for a team to “click” at all times, but “clicking” at rates closer to Everett’s batting average would have been more acceptable… And this stat is not really a measure of performance per se(look where the Angels and Diamondbacks are, for example) but a measure of preparedness and overall coaching and managing of a team…
Greetings from Denver. It’s a beautiful day/night for a ball game. Should be a good series. Tons of Twins fans out here.
[…] Sinker said it extremely well: The former manager, Tom Kelly, imbued his teams with the fundamentals and Gardy’s […]
