Friday Download: Links and Things from the Interwebs

It’s Friday once again my friends, FRIDAY! The weekend has arrived, good times are rolling in and the work week is headed to the rearview. Praise the Lord, we have all made it through another week and can get onto spending a couple days doing things we actually want to do. To get you started, check out some of the links below.

Baseball Prospectus is filled with a lot of awesome articles, and not all of them are hidden behind the paywall. If you have an account check out Dustin Parks’ list of the top 10 Twins prospects or the 2012 AL Central Review if you don’t you can take a look at a ranking of 10 possible MLB relocation/expansion markets and the pros and cons of each.

The Twins Geek takes a look at the numbers to try and find out the difference in value between an 85 win team and a 95 win team in the playoffs. Also from the Star Tribune, Michael Rand takes a look at Scott Baker’s legacy as a Twins pitcher.

For those of you inclined to the sort of posts that grace the electronic pages of NotGraphs, you may want to take a look at this collection of things you should never bring into your home or this proposed rule change. My favorite post from NotGraphs this past week, however, supplied a guide for navigating the hot stove season. And if you’re looking for something equally absurd but unrelated to baseball, I encourage you to visit The New Enthusiast to read one jamook’s idea to fix the economy and other nonsense.

Our friends over at the Knuckleballs Blog seem to always be putting out interesting content about the Twins, this week you can take a look at all of the Twins 2012 Rookies and read why Jim Crikket things the Twins should follow the Blue Jays lead.

The Blue Jays / Marlins trade has dominated baseball headlines since news first broke; rather than try to capture all of the responses from around the league, check out MLB Trade Rumors, who have already done the leg work. Not everyone is happy with the trade, and some baseball writers/fans even think Bud Selig should push Loria out of baseball.

Over at ESPN’s SweetSpot Blog they take a look at some of the surprise teams from 2012 and wonder why more teams don’t go all-in and take a chance.

Joe Posnansky thinks the Manager of the Year award is volatile, do you agree?

Over at It Takes All Kinds, Mark takes a look through a box of old stuff that his parents brought over and finds a few baseball gems inside.

In Minnesota and across the nation snow is falling and ski slopes are opening to the joy of children and adults alike. The Art of Manliness this week supplies us all with a guide to one of my favorite winter activities, snowshoeing.

Over at Hardball Times the Azure Texan takes a look at the anatomy of a moment in baseball.

Have you ever wondered what kind of good performance enhancing drugs actually do for athletes? What about for ordinary Joe’s like you and me? One blogger turned himself into a guinea pig to see what would happen if an ordinary fellow started using PED’s.

The Arizona Fall League is almost over. Kyle Gibson came out of the gate pitching fantastic but cooled off as the fall league progressed, but the Twins think that Gibson’s arm has passed an important test.

Over at Twinkie Town Jesse takes a look at a fictional conversation between Ron Gardenhire and Torri Hunter.

Vikings fans across the state breathed a sign of relief as Adrian Peterson was cleared of all charges related a a Texas nightclub scuffle.

The baseball on the field in Seattle has not been very good the past couple seasons, but their ballpark is beautiful. Like Target Field, Safeco is set for some upgrades this off-season, including the addition of the largest big screen in all of baseball.

Last week Beyond the Box Score gave us a look at a comprehensive list of baseball players under going Tommy John Surgery. This week they followed that up with a look at the surgery and pitch velocity.

__________________

Follow me,  @BaseballPirate, on Twitter