Twins Face Tough, But Necessary Choices

Since this is a topic I've already covered once within the last month, I'll try to keep it a little short this time around.

With the Twins being shut out for a 13th time this season, there is a question that needs to, not only be asked, but quite frankly, one that needs to be answered sooner rather than later.  That question is: Who will be held accountable for the Twins' offensive struggles this season?

I've contended for most of the season, even before the offense went from mediocre to sub-par, that the Twins' front office needs to take a serious look at changing some of the major "players" in order to make a significant change going into 2012.  When I say "players," I'm not referring to those that take the field on a day-to-day basis (or a day-to-every-third-day basis, as is the case with one Mr. Mauer).  I'm referring to the coaching staff.  As the saying goes, the definition of "insanity" is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.  With the Twins scoring one run or fewer for the 40th time this season, I would say that constitutes doing the same thing over and over again and waiting for a different result, wouldn't you?

Quite honestly, the three coaches who have the most impact on the team itself are pitching coach Rick Anderson, hitting coach Joe Vavra, and the manager himself, Ron Gardenhire.  In any organization, sports or otherwise, when the employees are unable to get the job done, the "bosses" are looked upon to determine if the proper training and coaching was given to allow them to succeed.  If the answer is yes, then the employees are let go and replaced.  If the answer is no, the boss is deemed to be inadequate, and often times replaced.

Take a department store, for example.  When a particular department is not succeeding, the Store Manager would look at the supervisor of that department to determine if he/she has been giving their employees everything they need to be successful.  If they have, the Manager would ask the the employee be fired.  If the Manager deemed that the supervisor was not providing the best leadership to those employees, then it would be the supervisor who would find him or herself replaced.

What Gardenhire needs to do is take a long, hard look at his staff.  That look needs to take into account the overall season's performances, and not allow personal friendships to interfere.  After all, this team is actually a "business".  What he needs to realize is that, although they may have been great at getting results in the past, their message may now be stale.  The results both Vavra and Anderson attained in years past may have ultimately been the pinnacle of what they were capable of attaining.  It may just be time for someone else to take over the reigns to take this team a little further going forward.

As with any sport, the goal is to win.  Plain and simple.  As with many sports, that goal is attained by outscoring your opponents.  In football, if a team gives up 40 points, but scores 45, they win the game.  In hockey, if a team gives up five goals, but scores seven, guess what?  It's still a win.  The same theory can, and should, be applied to baseball.  Unless you are a team fortunate to have the likes of a Roy Halladay, Justin Verlander, C.C. Sabathia, or a Felix Hernandez at the top of your rotation, the likelihood of you needing only a run or two to outscore your opponent is slim to none.

That being said, it would be imperative for a team like the Twins, with the inconsistent track record of their pitching staff, to put an emphasis on the offensive side of the ball.  This season, the Twins have more games of four or fewer hits (20) than any other team in baseball.  How have the Twins decided to address this issue thus far?  They've decided to fire both Tom Nieto and Floyd Rayford, their Triple-A manager and hitting coach.  But those 20 games of four or fewer hits took place at the Major League level, not Rochester.  Of those 20 games, the big four of Mauer, Morneau, Cuddyer, and Kubel each played in at least nine, so, to say that the lack of hits came as a result of the injury bug would be a stretch, considering even the "big guns" were unable to hit their ways on base.

The Twins' front office needs to consult Gardenhire and allow him to make the correct decision for the ball club, which is to remove Joe Vavra from his position as the hitting coach of this team.  Vavra has served the team well over his almost six years as hitting coach, but as with many things, it's time to move on.  If Gardnhire is unwilling to make that difficult decision, or doesn't see it as an option, then perhaps the front office needs to look long and hard and making a different change; that being at the managerial position.

Unwritten Rules Need To Be Erased

Every sport seems to have its "unwritten rules".  You know which ones I'm talking about.  The rules that say you can't run up the score, or that you can't steal a base when you're winning by a lot, or even that you have to "defend" a teammate by going after one on the other team.  Unwritten rules need to virtually erased!

Sunday afternoon, after Carlos Guillen of the Tigers stared him down following a no-doubter home run, Angels pitcher Jered Weaver, clearly upset by being shown up by Guillen, decided to pay him back by throwing the very next pitch almost into the ear hole of Alex Avila, the next Tiger hitter.  I've heard many people over the last 48 hours saying Guillen was completely wrong by admiring his handy work, rather than heading toward first base immediately, thus saying Weaver was entitled to either throw at the next batter, or to throw at Guillen when he got up next.  I have a better idea for Weaver:  Keep the ball off the center of the plate next time.

What drives me up a wall when it comes to professional sports are the "codes" or the unwritten rules that teams and players are supposed to abide by.  As far as I'm concerned, if you're being paid to play a game, anything goes.  Jered Weaver makes $7.37 million this year.  That ought to be enough money to keep someone from Carlos Guillen from driving the ball out of the ball park.  The fact that you couldn't accomplish that shouldn't give you the right to get ticked off and throw at the next guy, just to show both Guillen, and the Angels, that you mean business.  After the game, Weaver was quoted saying:

"He caught me in the All-Star Game (referring to Avila), and we gained a little respect for each other there. So I'm not here to hurt nobody. I just felt like I needed to prove a point.  I think if I wanted to hit him, I could have hit him. I just threw a fastball up and in and it got up and away. It probably looked a little worse than it was, but it was clearly about a foot or two over his head."

You were trying to prove a point?  What point was that?  You threw at a guy who you supposedly had gained a little respect for, not the guy who supposedly disrespected you.  And the pitch was only two feet over his head because he ducked down as it was nearing his helmet.  Seriously Jered, you might want to bring a box of Kleenex out to the mound with you in case someone decides to disrespect you with a five-hit game.

The troubling thing to me wasn't just the fact that Weaver decided to throw at Avila to avenge the home run Guillen hit.  The fact that a second unwritten baseball rule was supposedly broken later that game.  With Justin Verlander in the midst of his second no-hitter of the season, and the Tigers leading 3-0 in the top of the eighth inning, Erick Aybar of the Angels attempted to lead off the eighth with a bunt single.  How could he possibly consider bunting in a 3-0 game, especially off a guy who has no-hit kinda stuff?  How inconsiderate of Aybar, to try and break up a no-hitter with such a cowardly act, rather than try to reach base like a man and just get a hit.  Forget the fact that the Angels just needed base runners in order to try and come back.  He was probably more interested in showing up Verlander and preventing the no-hitter than he was trying to win the game.

Verlander was clearly upset after the inning, despite the bunt attempt resulting in an error on his own throw to first base, thus not breaking up the no-no.  Motioning to Aybar as he took the field in the bottom of the inning, Verlander indicated that the next pitch Aybar saw from him would be square in the middle of his back.  Kinda childish, actually.  Perhaps if the game were more than a grand slam away from being an Angels win, say maybe an 8-0 score, then I could understand the "cheapness" of what the Tigers and their fans considered Aybar's act of bunting to be.  But, that wasn't the score, and as far as I'm concerned, Aybar was doing everything in his power to keep his team in the game, not to bust up history in the making.

Professional athletes shouldn't be allowed to have "hurt feelings" in situations like this.  When an NFL team is leading 35-0 at half-time, that shouldn't mean that they take to strictly running the ball in the second half to preventing running up the score.  NFL teams pay their players quite well, actually, so, if a team is paying its defense $50+ million collectively to stop the other team's offense, then by God, they better be able to stop the other team's offense.  If they can't, then that's too damn bad.  Now, if we're talking high school, or even college, then we're talking about something different entirely.  But, we're not talking high school or college.  We're talking about professional athletes getting paid very lucrative professional contracts to perform.

The same could be said for baseball as a whole.  If a team is up by nine runs in the fifth inning, should that mean that the team leading shouldn't be allowed to steal bases?  Last I checked, Joe Mauer was making $23 million this year.  If a team is leading 9-0 and chooses to steal on him, and he can't throw the guy out, then that's tough luck for Mr. Mauer and the Twins.  Does that mean a hitter who drives a ball into the gap for a sure-fire double in a 12-2 game should hold up at first so he doesn't appear to be "rubbing it in"?  That's an absolutely ridiculous notion!

The sooner sports decide that the unwritten rules or the unwritten code aren't what keeps the game going, the better.  Is it embarrassing when your team gets shellacked by 10 runs?  Absolutely.  Is it any more embarrassing when they get beat by 15?  It shouldn't be, but for some reason, that's what we make it.  So...let's get these unwritten rules unwrittenly erased.