chasfh

I believe the key reason Hinch platooned and pinch-hit frequently this year was because of the nature of his roster. He didn't have guys he could comfortably throw out there game after game for all nine innings, and also, he had bench players who did happen to match up really well in platooning, which may have been more of a Harris result than a Hinch result. When Hinch did have everyday guys in Houston, he was among the least likely to use pinch hitters, and when he didn't have decent bench pieces his first couple years here, he hardly used pinch hitters here as well.

She has to bring a bigger Trump hammer to this interview than she's been wielding lately. I think she's losing ground because when she talks only about herself and her agenda, she's boring. She needs to mix that message with the message of how Trump is bad for America—not because of the real threat to democracy, which he is, but to ordinary Americans. For example, she needs to point out that he tried to kill the ACA something like 50 times, that his party wants to keep families from using IVF to help them have children, that his irresponsible actions during COVID cost hundreds of thousands of lives, that he will drive up the cost of everything with his Trump Tax, that he has said will send the military to fight our own citizens, that he has said he will indict business rivals to put them out of business—stuff like that. She cannot waste this opportunity to hoist him with his own petard.

Given how Arizona, Nevada, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania all went for Biden in 2020, I would conclude that these look alarmingly good for Trump.

In the age of famous people who have all the resources in the world living way into their 90s, I could see them both alive in 2028.

Man we're gonna hang on 50-spot on the Cowboys at home ain't we!

Hopefully this won’t be a career-ender for Hutchinson, but if it is, and it’s a real possibility, the front office has to go into full business mode and prioritize finding a permanent replacement. The team may struggle emotionally for a bit, but the front office can’t go into a funk over it—they have to rise above it. If Hutchinson does manage to come back, then having two elite pass rushers would be a good problem to have.

And neither Avila nor any development people he managed could do a thing with them. If Avila were here today—which he might still be had Reinsdorf hired Hinch instead of LaRussa—I'm sure we'd've lost close to 100 again this season. It's just amusing you can't talk about the Tigers' success without giving him the credit for it.

Yup. Apparently they don't want it starting even a little.

Not just facts, either—he quiets people who make fun of Trump or Vance. I started a Twitter account called Bowman Hamel, with a picture of Vance. Within ten minutes, it was locked.

Switch out Max for Wenceel and you got a deal.

Right. Keep the eeny-meeny-miney-moe picks that Harris figured out could be saved. (Outside of Riley, of course. Everyone would have picked him at #5.)

So ... now can we fire Hinch and the hitting coaches?

If the Twins hadn't collapsed, we wouldn't have been in there.

Stinky McStinkface was also very good, as was JHM, but they did not get many at bats. Jake was also pretty solid, more than he is normally. And, of course, Parker. Almost makes up for the horrific trade for his brother. The one guy with the playoff experience, Vierling? Huge disappointment. Couldn't stop striking out. Also, all the other rookies hit like rookies. Just about everyone else was within margin of error for average. All in all, a mixed bag offensively.

Epic.

The Twins are in disarray, with talks of a sale, so I wouldn’t expect a full court press by them to win the Central or else next year. I think we will see more of the same in the offseason: continue to improve with tactical free agent signings, minor league free agents and waiver wire pickups, and trades. One big thing I think has a good chance of happening is Tork getting traded.

Close: just as I got off the train at Clark and Lake, Skubal plunked Ramirez. Before I got out of the building, Skubal had grooved one to Lane Thomas. It was already 5-1 by the time I got to the Goodman, and it actually relaxed me a little since I figured it was a long shot to get back out of the hole. But I was able to sneak a peak at the phone between set changes.

No … please … not the offseason thread … for the love of god, please, not the offseason thread …

Because baseball is ironic, we got a bunch of guys in scoring position and couldn’t score them, and the guy we scored was not standing in scoring position.

They want him to hit again.

Oh baby what a shot by Carp

Riley owes Skubal dinner every night for the rest of the year for pulling his ass out of the jackpot.

Too early for Carpenter, probably because we can get maybe one high-leverage AB out of him today.

Malloy runs like an old-timey Tiger from the 2010s.

Not only do they not anymore, they actually never did.