Puckett's Pond » Nick Swisher

Friday Links (NOW A DAY EARLY!)

Thu, 17 Nov 2011 06:01:22 +0000

Once again I’d like to welcome Christian Engels to the Puckett’s Pond staff. I know he is going to continue to uphold the high standards we have here at the Pond. (Christian is on Twitter, but he hasn’t tweeted anything yet. I can only imagine he’s waiting for an awesome suggestion for a first tweet. Feel free to send some his way.)

Just like Black Friday, the Friday Links are moving closer to the middle of the week, and going forward you can expect your Friday Links on Thursday, so we’ll start calling them Thursday Links starting next week, to avoid any confusion.

The Jamey Carroll signing is finally official, $6.5 million for 2 years, with an option year in 2014 for $2 million more if he reachest 401 plate appearances in 2013. Joe Christensen thinks the Twins overpaid, and I tend to agree. Not exactly a bargain, but this helps bridge the gap to Brian Dozier as he fine tunes his game in AAA.

Now on with the links!

Fangraphs is working their way through Top 15 Prospect lists for all of the MLB franchises, this week they rolled out the Top 15 Minnesota Twins Prospects. Checking in at number 1? – Miguel Sano. Last year’s number 2, Aaron Hicks, dropped all the way down to number 6, the biggest loser of the bunch, after a fairly disappointing 2011 season. Last year’s number 1, Kyle Gibson dropped only 3 places, despite season ending Tommy John surgery.

Beyond the Boxscore finds an interesting little picture that alludes to wOBA being invented nearly 100 years ago. Fangraphs, the great sabermetric site it is, has all the details. Pretty amazing to consider that 100 years ago baseball minds were noodling on the inadequacies of Batting Average, and yet in 2011 Batting Average is still king on the back of baseball cards. (more…)

Friday Links

Fri, 16 Sep 2011 08:00:01 +0000

Friday Linkers! I apologize for keeping the links from you for so long. The Twins have been bad. And not just bad, but downright awful. They’re now the worst team, not only in the American League Central, but in the entire American League. Only Houston, who is on pace to lose 4,924 games this year, is worse than the Twins in all of Major League Baseball. But the night is darkest before dawn, Twins fans, so let this edition of the Friday Links be your guiding light.

(I’ve been away from the links for a while, so this edition is a little light, bear with me.) (more…)

The Weekend that Never Was.

Mon, 11 Apr 2011 15:10:52 +0000

Talk about a missed opportunity! The Minnesota Twins came into a 3-game series with a chance to really shine in front of their home crowd. After going just 2-4 in a rain shortened season opening series against the Blue Jays and the Yankees, the Twins were ready to be back home. They were home without their imported second basemen, Tsuyoshi Nishioka, thanks to Nick Swisher and the cut throat nature of Major League Baseball. They were home without the immediate services of Kevin Slowey, bullpen phenom, due to lingering soreness in his throwing arm. But they were home. Baseball was back in Minnesota and Mother Nature was happy to lend a hand, bringing beautiful weather back to a population decimated by winter blues.

But all was not lost for the Twins. With Nishioka out of the lineup, manager Ron Gardenhire had a great opportunity to put some extra pop in his starting 9. Using a combination of recently called up Luke Hughes and Michael Cuddyer at 2B, the Twins should have seen a boost in offensive performance. Moving Cuddy over to 2B gave room for DH Jason Kubel to come in and play RF and long time home run masher Jim Thome to fill in at DH. A lot of bats, a lot of home run potential, and Joe Mauer and his consistently high OBP (Career .406) in the 2-hole should have meant lots of opportunities for the Twins to score.

(more…)