MLB: Twins Trade Aaron Hicks

[roundball]

well... the Royals.

True, but even just 10 years ago the Royals K% would be considered average. Until then, it was virtually unheard of for a team's batters to strike out 20% of the time...over the past couple seasons, there were only 6 teams in MLB whose batters didn't strikeout more than 20% of the time.

 

[coolerifyoudid]

True, but even just 10 years ago the Royals K% would be considered average. Until then, it was virtually unheard of for a team's batters to strike out 20% of the time...over the past couple seasons, there were only 6 teams in MLB whose batters didn't strikeout more than 20% of the time.

Tony Gwynn's corpse just face-palmed.

Some of my favorite TG stats:

In 2,440 career games, Gwynn had only 34 multi-strikeout games. So, the odds were better that Gwynn would get four hits than striking out twice.

• In 1995, Gwynn struck out only 15 times in 535 at-bats.

• Eleven times in his career Gwynn managed to not strikeout for 20 consecutive games. The longest streak, 39 games, came in 1995.

 

[JohnnyFive]

Joe graduated one year ahead of me. At the time the twins were doing well in the central, opening a new ball park, just had the most productive hitting-catcher of all time win the MVP, and he was from st paul. Joe is not a money-hungry guy but he is also not dumb. every single thing about his contract lined up in his favor without him needing to say a word. the twins paid what the market would have brought. joe would have accepted a hometown discount but they didn't ask. or if they did it was not relaid to him.

Man he was good that MVP year.

Im not a Twins fan but I have wondered since they made the switch to move Mauer to first, is he playing okay there? I mean I see the hitting stats and they seem to have fallen off a bit the past two seasons, but as a defender is he good there?

 

[Kurttr]

Man he was good that MVP year.

Im not a Twins fan but I have wondered since they made the switch to move Mauer to first, is he playing okay there? I mean I see the hitting stats and they seem to have fallen off a bit the past two seasons, but as a defender is he good there?

Mauer is a good athlete so plays 1B just fine. It's "just" that he provides no power or run production. He'd rather get a walk than drive in the winning run in a clutch situation... If you covered his name and looked at the stats, you'd never pay him even half what he gets paid. I don't blame him for taking the $, and his timing was impeccable, hitting almost 30 HRs in a season when he missed the first month and a half - then signing the big contract. The Twins had always argued that he was worth so much because he played catcher and called such a good game... It's sunk $ that provides little value, made even worse when he's not playing catcher. He's a nice on-base guy - singles and walks. If he were a $5M middle infielder, that would be just fine. He doesn't seem like a bad guy but appears to have no leadership in him whatsoever; that's why bringing back Hunter this last year made such a big difference.

Someone asked about Sano - he's actually very athletic for his size. I'm sure he could be a decent OF, but with his size and all he brings at the plate, it seems like a much better idea to play him at 1B or 3B. He made quite a few errors in the minors but seems capable of being a decent infielder and played well there last year when getting the chance (Not DHing) - strong arm, good hands, agile (even for his size). He and Plouffe bring so much more at the plate than Mauer.