Joel Piniero, Jeff Francis, Jon Garland. Please tell me this is a joke, Twins!

Wed, 21 Dec 2011 12:08:30 +0000

The Twins are at it again. They’re targeting a trio of past-their-prime starting pitchers who get knocked around and cannot buy a strikeout. It seems the Twins have learned nothing from their experiments with Sidney Ponson, Livan Hernandez, and Ramon Ortiz. Instead of targeting a respectable #2 or #3 starter, the Twins are chasing after a parade of #5s. I know this isn’t exactly breaking news – the rumors came out last week, and the Twins have been looking at Francis since before the Winter Meetings – but I feel the need to address it before the Twins do something stupid (not that I can stop them, but at least I can shake my head and say “I told you so”).

The 33 year old Piniero had a 5.13 ERA last year in 27 starts with the Angels. His strikeout rate was 3.8 per nine innings. That number was very low even for Piniero, but not totally out of character; he hasn’t struck out more than 5.5 per nine since 2004. In 2011, Piniero gave up 181 hits in just 145 innings, helping pad a Blackburnesque WHIP of 1.51.

Francis, 30, beat Piniero in pretty much every statistical category last year, but that is not saying much, of course. He had a still-ugly 4.82 ERA in 2011 to go with 4.5 K/9 and 1.44 WHIP and 224 hits allowed in 183 IP. (more…)

Puckett's Pond » Ramon Ortiz

Joel Piniero, Jeff Francis, Jon Garland. Please tell me this is a joke, Twins!