twins/mlb
Startribune.com digital sports editor Howard Sinker used to cover the Twins and now shares season tickets with friends in Section 219 of Target Field. He blogs about baseball from the perspective of a long-time fan who loves the game, doesn’t always believe the hype and likes hearing what others think.
Posts about Farm System
Section 219: Disenchantment of the Twins fan base
Posted by: Howard Sinker Updated: September 13, 2012 - 9:08 AM
This is what the outfield seats at Target Field looked like a couple of innings into Wednesday's night miserable baseball game:
Now, let's give the Twins the benefit of the doubt. It drizzled all day, clearing up and turning into a fairly nice night an hour or so before game time. And school's in session and the Royals are in town and ... blah, blah, blah.
Friends, this isn't working. If you wanted to go on StubHub and buy tickets at the last minute Wednesday, you could find a batch of tickets for $.01. Yes, that's a penny (plus a 10 percent surcharge -- $.001? -- and the $5.45 download fee..) At around 4 p.m., there were four tickets in the Legends Club listed for $5 each. Yes, that's five as in one-two-three-four-FIVE.) There were 2,500 or so unsold tickets on the 'Hub, all of which counted as part of the "attendance" of 28,139. Basically, you could have taken advantage of the one-cent sale and sat pretty much where you wanted, as long as you looked like you belonged.
In our row of 20, it was me 'n' Julie and the delightful couple who have the seats next to use and a party of four further down the row of 20. By comparison, we were packed in. By the seventh inning, the front three rows next to us in Section 220 were empty. Totally empty. We counted nine people in the no-alcohol Section 311 early in the game and figured that one fell off the wagon when we counted only eight a couple of innings later.
Here's the problem for the Twins: Attendance figures are being padded significantly by tickets already sold for 2012.
How will they sell those tickets for 2013?
My friends, who have varying degrees of baseball intensity, weighed in when they saw the above photo posted on my Facebook page:
A sampling:
"Holy Cow, that is bleak."
"Wow, that's sparse."
"Glad to see the new stadium was worth the investment."
"Seems like only yesterday I was hearing how a new stadium would allow the Twins to 'stay competitive.' What they didn't add was 'with the Indians.' "
And here's the best-face scenario from a season-ticket holder friend:
"Only difference, and it's a big one, the Metropolitan Club is a nice place to hang out when the game is too frustrating. I hate to admit it, but tonight I was one of THOSE people who watched very little of the game but had a great night at the ballpark chatting with friends. So wrong. But so fun. I'm sorry Grandpa. I'm sure he's rolling in his grave!"
One other fan-experience observation: Last year, we wanted to go out to dinner before the game at the Town Ball Tavern, the nice bar/restaurant in the left-field corner. We knew we pretty much needed to be there when the gates opened in order to get seated, even though it was a weekday night and not a particularly high-interest game. Last night, we did the same thing, getting to the restaurant about an hour before game time and having a number of tables to choose from.
I'm not talking baseball right now. If you want to watch Ryan Doumit's three-error inning, go here and skip to the 1:20 mark. I'm talking about observations and soft data. The Twins appear to be doing a pretty good job of dispiriting their fans.
Obviously, fans who just want to support a winning team are staying away. The more observant have spent another season wondering about the team's injury management, its pitching and defensive failures and much of anything that speaks to things getting better soon. The most intense have wondered about roster moves, recently focusing their nth degree analysis on why reliever Anthony Slama isn't being given another chance to see if his minor-league dominance can translate to the majors and why Chris Parmelee wasn't used in the outfield at Rochester, if that's where he has the best chance to play for the Twins. And we all marveled at the Nishioka thing a few weeks back.
When you can frustrate everyone from the advanced-statistics posse to the guy who asks which league has the designated hitter -- a question we heard last night -- it's a sign that the fan base is going, going ...
Putting my money where my blog is, I'll tell you that I'm involved with three sets of season tickets: My scorecard for 2013 has me keeping one, cutting back on another and bailing on the third. Am I alone?
Right now, I think the Twins can win back most of their fans by going boldly into 2013 with a makeover that could take many shapes. If they tarry and pretend that all is good enough at 1Twins Way, they run the risk of being just another pretty ballpark with plenty of good seats available.
Section 219: Where the Twins are at (and where they should be going)
Posted by: Howard Sinker Updated: June 11, 2012 - 9:13 AMMaybe it was a good thing that the Twins didn't sweep the Cubs. For one thing, it did some good for the self-esteem of the Cubs fans who made the journey to the Twin Cities over the weekend. If you were at Target Field, you know they were there. We were surrounded by them near the top of Section 114 on Friday night, and they seemed as resigned to that night's outcome (the bullpen blowing a couple of leads) as Twins fans were earlier in the season to watching one of the local starters get knocked around.
Now please don't laugh or call me names, but on Saturday -- for the first time this season -- I did some scoreboard watching during the game. The division lead has been cut to single-digits for the Twins and, providing things continue somewhat close to as they have been lately, we'll no longer talk about the Twins in the "worst team in the majors" context.
Now, the coming dilemma. If the Twins continue playing well and chopping a few more games off the division lead in the next couple weeks of interleague play, they will be within aroma distance on first place in the American League Central. Then they'll have a week against the White Sox and Royals before the schedule turns tougher.
And then the buyer/seller question will be asked.
A few days back, Jim Souhan wrote that the team's recent success shouldn't alter plans to sell off some veterans and look to the future. He's right.
I know that some people feel you should never turn down a chance to take a run at a title, no matter what the circumstances, but the fact remains that the Twins' roster still needs to get stronger to do anything more than lurk at the fringe of one of baseball's two weakest divisions. (The NL Central, ft. the Cubs, is the other.) They could have dealt with issue this last season, but opted not to -- with the possible payoff being further down the road with the extra draft picks the Twins received through free-agent departures.
Baseball's free-agency rules have changed so that is almost certain not to happen in 2013, and for as long as the new rules remain in place.
The Twins have several bargaining chips that could help them get stronger -- and without sacrificing much in the short terms. If Denard Span is traded, Ben Revere can move into center field. If Matt Capps is traded, Glen Perkins and Jared Burton can move to the end of the bullpen in its current build. If Francisco Liriano is traded, we will finally be done with the drama.
If you want to commit to Brian Dozier at shortstop, the Twins could still stand to be stronger at second base and third base. If you are willing to give Trevor Plouffe 400 at-bats, you have the flexibility in the long term of having him play third base, right field or (if Ryan Doumit isn't around after this season) DH.
Justin Morneau is an issue deserving of more than a sentence, which it will not get here. If another team thinks he'll help bring a championship and offers a good haul in return, then it should happen. That's the starting point for a discussion that will take place for the next season-and-two thirds -- until his contract expires at the end of the 2013 season. A Morneau deal is the only move that could create a gaping short-term hole -- based on the idea of losing a 25-homer talent.
The Twins are in a position where they can make trades and not suffer much in the short term. In fact, the right pieces could even make them stronger for the short haul, as well as for the years to come, when the current group will be joined (in theory) by reinforcements from the minor-league system.
Whatever moves are made need to strengthen the starting pitching.
I'm not expecting Terry Ryan and his staff to bat 1.000 with their personnel moves. That simply doesn't happen. But the good has outweighed the bad so far and I do expect Ryan's posse to have the fortitude to make moves with the coming seasons in kind, not the coming months.
In return for that, I promise not to bring up (too often) that things should never have reached this point in the first place.
Section 219: Some sweeping thoughts about what's ahead for the Twins
Posted by: Howard Sinker Updated: May 31, 2012 - 9:12 AMWell, we got the Papa John's 50 percent discount Wednesday because the Twins won the night before, so the household pizzas really did have Josh Willingham's name on them. And we'll probably hit Leeann Chin in the next few days because those ticket stubs from a victory are good for 2-for-1 deals for a week. Combine those deals with the almost half-price seats in the Legends Club that we picked up for the Willingham walk-off, and Twins tickets are still a great value, don't you think?
At least in a coupon-clipping sense.
We were ready to be really frustrated on Tuesday. Remember how they were hitless in 10 at-bats with runners in scoring position going into the ninth, and then -- after getting the first two guys on base -- Ben Revere popped out bunting and Joe Mauer came within an shifted infield of adding to his GIDP (grounded into double play) total.
And then Willingham made it all go away -- and came back the next day, with his kids in the stands, to drive in three of the Twins four runs in the Liriano/Burnett/Gray shutout of troubled Oakland.
Back to Tuesday's game, though. More than anything else, it was a game that made me wonder about the Twins' future. How will the twins continue to keep fans engaged and buying tickets through the struggles the organization has brought upon itself? The promise of discounted food only goes so far, after all. The most noticeable thing about the Tuesday game was how empty the stands were by the time Willingham hit his home run.
The announced crowd was 31,781; the actual crowd was smaller and I'm sure the number of people in their seats at game's end was no more than half of that number.
People took in their seven or eight innings and took off. Given the 2012 product, I totally understand -- although we did wonder why so many fans stayed through the top of the ninth and then left before the Twins had their final at-bat. I mean, if you're in for that long, you might as well stay to the end.
Unsouring the fan base will be a major challenge. What will the Twins do with the $23 million (or more) that almost certainly will come off the payroll during or after the 2012 season. (Those are the contracts of Carl Pavano, Jason Marquis, Scott Baker and Francisco Liriano.) What else could be freed up when the Twins become sellers at the trading deadlines in July and August? And can the Twins use that money as wisely as they did in picking up Willingham and, to a lesser extent, Ryan Doumit?
Knowing that others -- Justin Morneau, Nick Blackburn, Jamey Carroll and Tsuyoshi Nishioka -- are signed only through 2013, will the Twins combine their richness in next week's amateur draft with a payroll bump for next season to juice the schedule for recovery?
Here's a list of potential free agents for 2013. It's an interesting list to play with, and sometimes you (you = Pohlads) need to spend more than you might like to keep people buying those $7 beers in the short term and bringing back those who are drifting away.
I have confidence in Terry Ryan's ability to make more good decisions than bad ones: Willingham + Doumit + Carroll + Burton > Marquis + failures sniffed out during spring training. I want to have confidence in the revamped front office to do better in developing talent, a test that will be passed or failed by looking at draft results and the progress of players still a couple of years away from the majors.
It's an interesting time, even if it's not what most of us imagined for the Twins. It's also a dangerous time if things continue going so wrong.
Section 219: Something being done right by the Twins
Posted by: Howard Sinker Updated: May 22, 2012 - 8:51 AMLet's not argue about using "the worst team in baseball" label when talking about the Twins. As long as they have the worst record in the league, that's how they'll be known here -- all the more because they have the worst record while playing in one of the two worst divisions in the majors. With some success in Chicago against the White Sox over the next few days, the Twins could upgrade their status to "worst team in the American League."
Keep your fingers crossed.
But here's something I like: The Rochester-to-Minneapolis shuttle has been in full effect over the last few weeks, and the Twins seem to have a clue when moves are being made. It took five starts for the Twins to act on the folly of the Jason Marquis signing, with his awful finale on Sunday dropping his statistics into Francisco Liriano territory.
My hope is they'll use the occasion to liberate Brian Duensing from the bullpen, where he appears to have cured himself of the extreme difficulties that he faced in 2011 against right-handed batters. I wouldn't be opposed to seeing the former Gophers pitcher Cole De Vries get a shot at the rotation, but that could also happen in the Nick Blackburn slot if he remains sidelined (or ineffective) or the P.J. Walters slot if his success turns out to be a mirage. (Four home runs in 12 1/3 innings concerns me a bit.)
I can come up with no better context for Marquis' awfulness than what Aaron Gleeman wrote on his latest blog post: "...opponents hit .371/.434/.629 (against Marquis). To put that in some context, consider Albert Pujols is a career .325/.417/.609 hitter, so Marquis basically turned every batter he faced into a souped-up version of this era's best hitter."
Last year, it felt like roster moves were being made to fill dead space. Yes, injuries had something to do with that, but you wonder how much the progress of some players -- Ben Revere, Chris Parmelee, Rene Tosoni and others -- was impeded by coming to Minnesota and then not playing as much, or being instructed as much, as they would have been in the minors.
By comparison, after keeping him with the team at the beginning of this season, Revere was held back at Rochester while the Twins brought in (the quickly departed) Clete Thomas, Erik Komatsu and Darin Mastroianni. None of those three players figure to have a future with the Twins that would rival Revere's, but it looks like Twins management showed some discipline in using his time in the minors as a teaching tool. I'll use four extra-base hits in 17 at-bats as early evidence, especially compared to Revere's 14 extra-base hits in 481 plate appearances in 2011.
Sometimes, minor league stats can be deceptive -- Revere had only one extra-base hit during his Rochester weeks -- when they're compiled while a player is being asked to try different things. But I'm also hoping that Drew Butera's time in the minors will make him a more functional hitter (read: not an assumed out) if he stays with the Twins. It's not often that a guy could have a .315 on-base percentage and it would be a 50 percent improvement over the previous year.
Whether time spent in Rochester with hitting coach Tom Brunansky and manager Gene Glynn, both in their first year with that team, will help Danny Valencia, Parmelee and some of the others is worth watching. At the very least -- and I am well aware that I'm operating in faint-praise territory here --the worst team in baseball is making like it has a plan for shedding that label.
Section 219: The JimCrikket spring training tour 2012
Posted by: Howard Sinker Updated: April 2, 2012 - 9:03 AM(Note: This post is by Iowa guy Jim Crikket one of our favorite Section 219 readers/commenters, whose work -- not to be confused with his day job -- can be found at the Knuckleballs blog.)
I've lost track of how many years I've been coming down to Florida to catch some of the Twins' spring training. I know I started out by just slipping away from a business trip to catch a game... maybe two. Over time, however, I decided that work just got in the way of baseball and a man has to have his priorities straight, so the last few years I've just been skipping the work part and spending several days watching baseball.
This year was no different. I did spend the first couple of days north of Fort Myers in the Sarasota/Bradenton area. The Twins celebrated my arrival in Florida on Thursday by sending a team primarily made up of soon-to-be-reassigned ballplayers to Bradenton to beat the crap out of the Pirates. Those players did their best to leave a positive last impression, however. Both Brian Dinkelman and Brian Dozier homered for the Twins. Matt Maloney got a rare start as he was stretched out to three innings of work.
I also particularly enjoyed watching prospects like Angel Morales contribute. I'm not sure where the Twins are going to find room in their outfield for Morales in the future, but his speed and his arm are worth keeping an eye on.
Friday was a "travel day" of sorts for me. I spent a little time hanging out in the Standing Room Only area of the outfield at Ed Smith Stadium in Sarasota, where the Orioles were hosting the Tigers. I only stuck around for about three innings, but it was long enough to watch JJ Hardy hit a couple of times and to see Delmon Young cut short a first inning Tigers rally by grounding in to a double play. Lets just say it wasn't the first time I've seen him do that.
Saturday was a terrific day and I largely have LaVelle E. Neal III to thank for a good part of it. On Friday night, Neal Tweeted that Scott Baker would be pitching for the Twins' AAA team in a 10 am game over at the Red Sox complex on Saturday. I'd planned to go check out the minor league fields at the Twins complex, but instead went to watch Baker pitch.
I got much more than I expected! Jon Lester was starting for the Red Sox' AAA squad against the Twins' counterparts, which was bonus enough. But that's not all! Lester brought along a few friends for offensive support. David Ortiz, Kevin Youkilis, Jarrod Saltalamacchia and former Twin Nick Punto all were in the Sox' batting order.
Something I should mention about these "minor league" games... you see a lot of stuff in those games that you'll never see anywhere else. For example, the teams have a very loose relationship with a "set" batting order. So, for example, despite giving up only one run in four innings of work, Baker managed to face Big Papi three times. Essentially, when the Big Leaguers want to hit, they grab a bat and go hit. Another thing I saw that I don't think I'll ever see again was Ortiz squaring to attempt to bunt... twice in one at-bat... with nobody on base.
In any event, it was well worth the side trip. There's been chatter on social media about differences between mainstream media members and bloggers lately. Some of it has been healthy debate and some of it has been a bit disturbing, but much of the discussion came down to the level of "access" that beat reporters like Neal have and the value of that access. This was certainly a prime example of how a reporter with that kind of access and a willingness to share the information he gets (in this case, the news about Baker pitching in the minor league game) can benefit a blogger (like me, for instance). See? We CAN all get along.
In the scheduled game that afternoon, I watched the Twins bludgeon the Pirates again. Anthony Swarzak pitched well and benefited from another offensive outburst, this time with a pretty full slate of regular players contributing. Brian Dozier homered again, as did Ryan Doumit. In addition, Denard Span, Joe Mauer, Justin Morneau, Danny Valencia and Trevor Plouffe all contributed extra-base hits. The result was a 15-3 Twins win.
Sunday was another full day. I finally did make my way to the Twins' minor league complex and was treated to intra-squad games in the morning. I spent pretty much all of my time alternating between the Ft Myers (high A) vs. Beloit (low A) game and the Rochester (AAA) vs. New Britain (AA) games. It's not like it's tough to watch both games when the only effort it takes is to walk about 20 feet.
I was happy to see fellow Iowan BJ Hermsen pitching for Ft. Myers and he got off to a good start by striking out uber-prospects Eddie Rosario and Miguel Sano in the first inning. Sano did eventually claim some level of revenge by doubling off of Hermsen and scoring a run. The other game was interesting in itself, because so many of the players had been over at the Big League camp until quite recently. Casey Fien did some pitching, with Drew Butera catching him. Mike Holliman had hit well in his time with the Twins, but needs work in the field, apparently. I have no idea how these games turned out. I wasn't keeping track of score nor inning, just enjoying the fact that I could watch some terrific young talent from very close range.
In the afternoon, I made the trip eastward a few short miles to get my first look inside JetBlue Park, the Red Sox new spring training home. The dimensions are roughly the same as Fenway Park and they even have their own version of Fenway's famed "green monster." It's a very nice ballpark, but it isn't perfect. First of all, how can any new ballpark NOT have a display for the speed of the pitches? Second, I was surprised that they built the stadium with concourses and concessions in behind the seating area. I thought pretty much every ballpark being built today had inside concourses that allow fans to watch the game while waiting in line for food. In any event, the crab nachos from the Pinchers Crab Shack tent were outstanding!
The game was not particularly outstanding, from a Twins perspective, however. Carl Pavano cruised through five innings before the wheels came off a bit in the sixth. His defense didn't so him any favors, though. Pavano did throw close to 100 pitches and I suppose that's the important thing for your staff "innings eater." Chris Parmelee contributed what little offense the Twins could generate as he hit a long home run to left right field for the Twins' only run. That's about all I have to report, unless you would like a review of the pizza or pulled pork nachos from Shoeless Joe's Sports Grill (both very good), the bacon wrapped shrimp at Pierside Grill (even better) or the shrimp marinara at Nino's (also excellent).
It's hard to believe my trip is over half complete.
If you would like to know more about what all I'm seeing and doing in Fort Myers, as well as a healthy number of photos, please check out www.knuckleballsblog.com.
-- Jim Crikket
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