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Thursday, November 10, 2005
Woe Is MeIt sometimes seems like this blog is just what I do to kill time between computer problems.I don't know if I have bad luck or am especially hard on laptops, but I'm having major computer trouble for what I'm guessing is the fourth or fifth time since this blog started up in August of 2002. I know people typically say that their computer "crashed" in situations like this, but if you want to get technical about it that's not really the case. The actual computer is running perfectly, with all the files intact and no viruses. So what's the problem? I'm not sure how to describe it, since the people I've told never seem to understand exactly what I'm talking about. Basically, the internal part of the computer where you plug the power cord in no longer works. The battery is fine and the power cord is fine, but the plug-in is cracked or loose or just faulty. This is the exact same problem I had with the exact same laptop about a year ago. Back then I sent it in to HP and they fixed it fairly quickly. Unfortunately, this time around the warranty is expired. So instead of sending the computer in for a repair job that someone once told me would run about $350, I am simply getting a new laptop. It's always nice when a completely unexpected thousand-dollar expense pops up out of nowhere. That's the bad news. The even worse news is that the battery is completely wiped out, leaving me unable to even turn the laptop on. It's safe to say that I probably have more of my life revolving around a computer than about 99% of the world's population and it is my only computer, so this presents a major problem for me. All of my favorite places are on there, along with all of my stored passwords, documents, and music library. All the links I have set up for my daily gig collecting the news for Rotoworld? Unavailable. All of the links I was saving up for tomorrow's Link-O-Rama entry? Locked away. And so on and so on. It's a huge pain in the ass. The good news, if you can call it that, is that the laptop miraculously survived until just after The Hardball Times Baseball Annual 2006 was finished and sent to the publisher. As the keeper of all our articles, it would have been a real disaster if they would have been stuck inside a computer that wouldn't turn on. Anyway, the reason today's entry is spectacularly boring and about something absolutely no one cares about (as opposed to marginally boring and about something few people care about) is that I am not on my homefield. As I said the last time my computer betrayed me, I feel like a carpenter without my tools. But just so you can't accuse me of completely wasting everyone's time, here's a quick note on Joe Mauer from Charlie Walters' column in yesterday's St. Paul Pioneer Press: Joe Mauer held off on endorsement opportunities during his first two seasons in the major leagues in order to concentrate on catching for the Twins. This week, though, the Cretin-Derham Hall graduate, who led the club in hitting this season with a .294 average, said yes to a national offer.Good times! Today at The Hardball Times: - Tony LaRussa and the Search for Significance (by Dan Fox) - Net Win Shares Value 2005 (by Dave Studeman) Pick of the Day (135-114, +$2,145): Los Angeles -4 (-110) over Atlanta Saturday's Pick: Oregon -4 (-110) over Washington Sunday's Pick: Denver -3 (-110) over Oakland     
Wednesday, November 09, 2005
He Should Have WonThere was a time not too long ago when I would have gotten really upset about Johan Santana finishing third in the American League Cy Young voting that was announced yesterday. I would have written several thousand words about how much better Santana was than Bartolo Colon, using all sorts of numbers and tables.And now? Well, I no longer care. Benjamin Franklin once said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. The Baseball Writers' Association of America consistently screws up the awards voting and consistently does so in the same manner, and I've decided to stop getting worked up about it. The BBWAA hands out baseball's most prestigious awards, but if you really think about it, why is the opinion of 28 beat writers from local newspapers all that important? Why pay attention to a group of voters who can't look past a pitcher's win total to see that a guy who won 16 games pitched quite a bit better than a guy who won 21 games, except the 16-game winner played on a team that couldn't hit? None of the three writers who cover the Twins for the Minneapolis Star Tribune -- Joe Christensen, LaVelle E. Neal, and Dennis Bracken -- felt that Santana deserved the award. They saw first hand how well Santana pitched and how little offensive support the lineup provided, yet Christensen and Bracken still couldn't get past the fact that Colon won 21 games. Neal at least voted for Mariano Rivera, with Santana second. While that's the wrong decision, it is at least a somewhat reasonable one because Rivera dominated in a different role than Santana. To vote for another starting pitcher and say that Colon was better than Santana this year, in my opinion, is not defensible at all. The front page of the Star Tribune's sports section listed a "why he'll win" and "why he won't" for Colon, Santana, and Rivera. The problem with the BBWAA's voting can be summed up in the responses listed for Colon: Why he'll win: AL leader in victories, and team won division title. Some writers see Cy Young Award as MVP for pitchers.In other words, Santana was the best pitcher in the league, but because people have the misguided notion that the MVP should be given to someone besides the best player, they make the same illogical decision for pitchers. As if that somehow explains anything but how screwed up the process for picking the MVP is too. Santana was the best pitcher in the league, and thus deserves an award that is supposed to be given to the best pitcher. The fact that he didn't receive it is fine, but it means the award is probably not worth caring much about. After all, 17 of the 28 voters thought Colon was the AL's best pitcher while only three thought it was Santana, and five of the 28 voters came to the ridiculous conclusion that Santana didn't even deserve a vote. Imagine if you asked someone which Godfather movie they liked best and they said, "The third one." Wouldn't you immediately stop paying attention to their opinion about movies? Now imagine you asked the same person for the name of a good restaurant and they responded, "McDonald's." Rather than continue to ask for their opinion on such things, wouldn't you just stop paying attention to them altogether? Exactly. Today at The Hardball Times: - Business of Baseball Report (by Brian Borawski) Pick of the Day (135-113, +$2,255): New York PK (-110) over Portland)
Tuesday, November 08, 2005
The New Hitting CoachI've been putting off writing about the Twins' new hitting coach, Joe Vavra, mostly because I don't know anything about him. Vavra is a complete unknown to me, both as a person and as a coach, and other than reading what other people have had to say about him since the hiring there isn't much to base a potential opinion of him on.Many Twins fans wanted Paul Molitor for the job, and apparently the Twins did too. However, there was certainly nothing guaranteeing that Molitor would have been successful had he taken the gig. After all, he struggled coaching the Mariners' hitters in his one season as Seattle's hitting coach, and being a great hitter is certainly far from a prerequisite for being a great hitting coach. The Twins' pitching coach, Rick Anderson, has done a tremendous job since being hired in the winter of 2002, and he wasn't exactly a Hall of Fame pitcher. Perhaps more important than anything we could possibly know about Vavra the player or Vavra the coach is that he simply isn't Scott Ullger. Now, I happen to think that Ullger did a poor job coaching the Twins' hitters over the years. Whether you agree with that or not -- and I've certainly spoken to plenty of people who don't fault Ullger much -- I think it was fairly clear that a change needed to be made. Take a look at how the Twins' offense ranked in the 14-team American League under Ullger: YEAR RS AVG OBP SLG HR BBNo one expected Ullger to oversee an offensive juggernaut on the Twins' payroll, especially given how much emphasis the team has placed on pitching and defense. However, under Ullger the offense finished in the top half of the league just once in seven seasons, ranking sixth in 2003. Twice they scored the fewest runs in the entire league, and another time they ranked second-to-last. There are without question a number of different ways to put together a solid offense. I tend to lean towards the patience-and-power approach, but I definitely wouldn't have faulted Ullger for leaning another way. What I do fault him for is not leaning any way. Pick a season and the Twins ranged from average to mediocre (or worse) in just about every aspect of hitting. In addition to the underwhelming runs scored numbers, Ullger had almost zero ability to coax power out of the lineup and had anything but a positive influence on the hitters' collective approach at the plate. The Twins did not hit home runs or draw walks under Ullger, and in the case of this season the hitters were neither aggressive or patient at the plate. Instead, they were simply passive or complete hackers. If you're not going to hit for power, emphasize getting on base. If you're not going to be patient, emphasize making good contact. And if you're not going to do any of those things, at least focus on having solid fundamentals. As Twins fans learned the hard way this season, there is little worse than watching an offense that is inept at both the big things and the little things. Finally, no discussion of Ullger's time as hitting coach can be complete without mentioning the lack of development the Twins' young hitters have had. First and foremost is David Ortiz, who essentially blossomed into a middle-of-the-order monster the moment he got away from Ullger. To what extent Ullger is to blame for that is unclear, but there is no doubt that Ortiz's power potential was not nurtured here. Of course, guys like Doug Mientkiewicz, Bobby Kielty, Corey Koskie, and Cristian Guzman haven't exactly thrived since leaving Minnesota. Still, even within that group is Guzman, who showed almost zero significant improvement as a hitter in six seasons with Ullger coaching him, all despite the fact that he debuted at the age of 21. Guzman was a hacker with a horrendous approach at the plate when he came up in 1999 and he was a hacker with a horrendous approach at the plate when he left last offseason. And the same general lack of improvement, development, and maturation can be seen in a number of the guys who stuck around, from Torii Hunter and Jacque Jones to Luis Rivas and Michael Cuddyer. Hitters are more responsible for their progress than a hitting coach, but when a team is constantly bringing up talented young players they can't afford to have a coach who has such a lengthy track record of letting the growth of hitters stall. Did anyone really have any sort of confidence in Ullger's ability to help Justin Morneau and Jason Kubel reach their full potential, turn Jason Bartlett into a capable hitter, or pave the way for Joe Mauer's power to develop? In my mind the answer was a resounding "no." With Vavra at least the answer is "maybe." Today at The Hardball Times: - Third Base: The Crossroads, Part One (by Steve Treder) Pick of the Day (134-113, +$2,155): Los Angeles -5 (-110) over Atlanta
Monday, November 07, 2005
Almost Back in the SwingMy writing has been a little light of late both here and at The Hardball Times. I'm hoping that'll change starting tomorrow, because we finally put The Hardball Times Baseball Annual 2006 to bed last night. It's off to the publisher and will be in stores (and available online) November 30.While my blogging has simply been a little on the light side, I haven't written a column for THT since October 24 and have posted just one since October 11. Geez, that's bad. That can't continue, mostly because I am going through withdrawal from not being able to babble about stuff in great detail. For today, a few quick Twins notes ... With Jason Kubel and Lew Ford already around to potentially take over for Jones in right field, I don't see how the Twins can justify paying what I'm sure will be at least $6-7 million a year for a guy who hit .249/.319/.438 this year and .254/.315/.427 in 2004. Regardless of what you think of Kubel or Ford, that sort of production from a corner outfielder shouldn't be particularly difficult to replace. Today at The Hardball Times: - The Rise and Fall of Nomar Garciaparra (by David Gassko) Pick of the Day (133-113, +$2,055): Indianapolis -3.5 (-110) over New England
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E-Mail: AaronGleeman@Gmail.com  Read Me Elsewhere Rotoworld NBC Sports MinnPost Hear Me Elsewhere I'll be appearing on KFAN radio every Friday at around 8:00 a.m. to talk Twins on "The Power Trip Morning Show." To listen online, click here. Minnesota Twins Stuff Minneapolis Star Tribune St. Paul Pioneer Press MinnesotaTwins.com LaVelle E. Neal III Joe Christensen Stick and Ball Guy Seth Stohs Nick Nelson Will Young Over The Baggy Howard Sinker Twinkie Town John Bonnes Phil Miller Jim Mandelaro Twins Territory Mike Decaire Pat Neshek Sports Stuff Dead Spin The Big Lead AOL Fanhouse UFC Junkie The Hardball Times Baseball Prospectus Baseball Think Factory Baseball America U.S.S. Mariner Baseball Toaster Baseball Musings Minor League Ball Al's Ramblings 6-4-2 Bill Simmons Five Ounces Of Pain Fire Joe Morgan Shyster Ball Rob Neyer Joe Posnanski Gregg Rosenthal MLB Trade Rumors Sports By Brooks 10,000 Takes Non-Sports Stuff Gorilla Mask WWTDD? Buzz Machine Alan Sepinwall Egotastic A Socialite's Life Popoholic Hollywood Rag Splash News Online Hollywood Tuna IDLYITW The Superficial TMZ.com Perez Hilton Steve Silver Tony Pierce Wicked Chops Poker Shelley Rants Away Guinness and Poker Tao of Poker Site Sponsors Chicago Cubs Merchandise Let theseats.com help you find greats seats for MLB tickets, Red Sox tickets, Cubs tickets, Bears tickets, Baltimore Orioles tickets, Patriots tickets, Packers tickets, Lakers tickets, Yankees tickets, Cowboys tickets.   ![[Powered by Blogger]](http://buttons.blogger.com/bloggerbutton1.gif){kind=small}
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