The Twins have dealt with two consecutive rainouts in the past two nights, and there’s a real possibility tomorrow’s game against Brantford could be a wash as well. It’s going to be a problem because there simply aren’t enough days left in the regular season to make them up. The season officially ends Sunday; the Twins, though, play in Kitchener to make up the Wednesday rain-out and then need to play into next week to get in the Guelph game. Word right now is either Monday or Wednesday, and possibly in Guelph (despite it being a home game).
The problem is that they want to wrap things up ASAP so they can have the maximum amount of time possible to rest up for the playoffs – presumably, if they play Monday they could start the playoffs Wednesday or Thursday, and if they play Wednesday they’d have to start Thursday. Maybe they’d start as late as Friday, but I doubt it.
And what happens if the Twins finish the year tied for eighth with Hamilton and require a sudden death, one game playoff after all of the regular season games have been completed? That pushes everything back further, since that game would obviously be absolutely necessary.
Speaking of which, let’s revisit the Twins’ playoff arithmetic:
Hamilton lost tonight in London; it was as close as could possibly be with a 1-0 final. The Thunderbirds now sit two games back of the Twins for the final playoff spot – but the problem is, one of those games is composed of two half games from games which Hamilton has played that Mississauga has not.
Mississauga has three games remaining; Hamilton has one. In order for the two teams to finish in a tie, the Twins need to lose all three of their remaining games and Hamilton needs to win their last game, at home against London on Sunday. The problem is, though, that Hamilton has been playing well as of late. Earlier in the season, they were as far back of the Twins as five and six games; of the past month and a half or so, they’ve narrowed that to one game (in real terms, anyways) and recently have played Brantford to within one run (losing 8-7 earlier in the week) and also lost games by a single run to Mississauga and, tonight, London.
Coupled with all the games they’ve won recently that the Twins haven’t, there’s a very credible chance that they could upset London at home on Sunday, inasfar as the chances of upsets can be credible.
The good news, though, is that the Twins clinch a playoff spot by winning one of their remaining games. At that point, they’d the most ground they could lose to Hamilton is the two games (which are actually worth one in the standings) that are made up of games Mississauga has in hand.
The one that they really want to win is against Kitchener on Sunday. It would pull them even with Kitchener for the seventh spot, and to overtake them they’d need to win one more game than Kitchener loses. Other than the game against each other, both teams have two games remaining: Kitchener plays Toronto tomorrow and Brantford Sunday, before they play Mississauga, and Mississauga, as we know, plays Brantford tonight (Saturday) and Guelph at a yet to be determined date.
There’s a good chance that Kitchener loses to both Toronto and Brantford – both teams are good, and they’ll be playing to kill because they’re very much fighting for leverage in the standings. The problem is that the same thing could be said of Mississauga’s chances against Brantford and Guelph. Twins’ fans can take heart in the fact that the Twins almost beat Guelph on Tuesday, in a game everyone says they should have won, and have already beaten Brantford earlier in the year and played them very close on other occasions. It’s not outside the realm of possibility that they’ll pick off one of those games.
I was at the park tonight and all the players and everyone was there, but even after the game was called I didn’t bother doing any story-chasing. If tomorrow’s game is cancelled, and that would create a huge mess for everyone, I’ll likely be at the park until it’s officially off because they’ll do everything they can to get it in. When I am, I’ll try to tie down some pre-playoff loose ends I’ve been trying to pin down – conversations with newcomers, like Banski and Dickson, as well as getting injuries updates on Asis and Pui. The Twins will need them to be hot to have a fighting chance in any playoff series.
Blog at you after the game tomorrow!
PS -- I almost forgot! Jake Eliopolis, who was drafted by the Blue Jays this past June (and who is younger than me -- my God) is supposedly still with the Red Sox right now, and I've been planning on trying to chat with him for a long time but I haven't seen the Red Sox play since May 23rd, prior to his being drafted. I'm not sure if I'll do a feature on him if I get the chance to talk, due to the lack of a place to publish it (although I may well shop it around -- who knows?) but if I do talk to him, I'll definitely either paraphrase or quote what he had to say on the blog.
I've also wanted to talk to Rick Johnston, a Red Sox coach/executive who has been around Baseball Canada, the Blue Jays & really everything else baseball in Canada for quite some time. The big thing I wanted to chat about was the future of the national team -- and Ernie Whitt's future as manager -- after that debacle in March, but I was also curios to get his thoughts on what's going on with the Blue Jays right now, since I'm pretty sure he guest-coached at spring training during the Gaston Era I. Anyways, nothing against Rick, but I kind of doubt that there's a market for an article about that conversation, but it'll definitely go up here because I'm sure it'll be very interesting stuff!
Showing posts with label Ryan Assis. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ryan Assis. Show all posts
Saturday, July 25, 2009
Sunday, June 7, 2009
On a Chilly Saturday...
The Twins were edged on Saturday night by the Kitchener Panthers – the final score was 6-5, and, mercifully, it was a bit more exciting than the Friday game. I’ve put off writing my game stories until tomorrow or so, and I don’t have my notes in front of me, nor do I care to go get them, so I’ll see what I remember.
The big story – I think – was that the Twins were a hell of a lot more aggressive on the basepaths than I have ever seen them be. By any standard, they were very aggressive. A couple of double steals; a straight steal of third; a steal of second to put the tying run in scoring position with two out in the bottom of the eighth. Matt Calcagni – who just joined the team after being released by a Northern League squad – had a really great at-bat in I think the fifth or so. He wound up striking out, but he fouled off about four or five pitches with a full count. Funny thing is, there were guys on first and second and they ran on each full count pitch, so they got their work in. And despite the strike out, the double steal was successful!
Coach Calcagni told us afterwards that as a team they want to be a bit more aggressive on the basepaths, and that the steals were called by him. I don’t think they lost any baserunners to over-aggression last night, so he certainly picked his spots. There will be some more precise comments from him about that part of the game in my story, whenever it is eventually written.
In terms of pitching, this time Brian Speck came out of the’ pen to do some long-relief work – he picked up Benson Merritt, who was pretty mediocre. As I remember it, both guys walked far too many batters. Anyways, this was a case of Speck being sent to the ‘pen to work out whatever issues kept him from being dominant as a starter. On the balance, he was fine – he certainly kept the Twins in the game, but the Panthers put up a crooked number on him late in the game to give themselves some breathing room, and obviously that wound up being the difference.
Another pitcher who really impressed me was Adam Zorzit – he worked a single inning of relief, and he has great stuff. It doesn’t break ten to twelve inches the way Mike McGilvray’s stuff does, but it buzzes and is pretty electric. He picked up the save in their first ever game in Hamilton, and even though I haven’t seen a lot of the Twins’ pen, I have to think I would be pretty comfortable putting him in for most save opportunities. When it’s up, I’ll take a look at tonight’s boxscore and see if he was put in to protect the one run lead, and now that I think of it I may as well check some of their previous wins and see what his role has been. If he isn’t the closer, the closer is pretty good – I’ll say that much!
To look at some long-term prognosis stuff: the Twins, having won a make-up game tonight in Oshawa by a count of 3-2, sit at 5-6. Not ideal, but far above anything that could have reasonably been expected of an expansion club. A few people have told me that they think the record is what it is because it’s a really young team that just needs to grow into hanging with some of the teams that have been together for years and years, and I think that theory may have some truth to it, as far as accounting for the actual wins and losses goes. Coach C said – and this will be in either the game piece or something else (more on that later) – he’s thrilled with where the team is, and if I were in his position I would probably feel the same. Baseball being baseball, as long as you know you can hang with anyone in the league – and the Twins now know that – it’s all about executing once you get into a short playoff series.
Anyways, we’ve been talking about some vague journalistic plans for my coverage of the team for a while now, and they’ve sort of materialized: we’re hoping, subject to executive approval, to run an insert in the programs given out at games with a feature piece (written by me, of course!) about the success of opening day/the arrival of the Twins in Mississauga/the results thus far/some kind of encouraging spin on the future and a feature player profile on Ryan Assis. I’ve always liked his story – because he left the BayCats specifically to play for his hometown team – and I finally got to talk to him after the Saturday game. The hope (at least on my end) is to turn that insert into a regularly changing feature – probably more general pieces about the overall direction of the team, organizational news and so on, and then one or two player profiles per issue.
I think that’s all I have to say. I’m not sure when I’ll be back on the beat – two weeks, maybe? I’ll see about contacting coach C to get enough material to do game pieces for the away ones I miss. I’ll probably blog mid-week or something with some Blue Jays material and misc. Twins news/comments!
The big story – I think – was that the Twins were a hell of a lot more aggressive on the basepaths than I have ever seen them be. By any standard, they were very aggressive. A couple of double steals; a straight steal of third; a steal of second to put the tying run in scoring position with two out in the bottom of the eighth. Matt Calcagni – who just joined the team after being released by a Northern League squad – had a really great at-bat in I think the fifth or so. He wound up striking out, but he fouled off about four or five pitches with a full count. Funny thing is, there were guys on first and second and they ran on each full count pitch, so they got their work in. And despite the strike out, the double steal was successful!
Coach Calcagni told us afterwards that as a team they want to be a bit more aggressive on the basepaths, and that the steals were called by him. I don’t think they lost any baserunners to over-aggression last night, so he certainly picked his spots. There will be some more precise comments from him about that part of the game in my story, whenever it is eventually written.
In terms of pitching, this time Brian Speck came out of the’ pen to do some long-relief work – he picked up Benson Merritt, who was pretty mediocre. As I remember it, both guys walked far too many batters. Anyways, this was a case of Speck being sent to the ‘pen to work out whatever issues kept him from being dominant as a starter. On the balance, he was fine – he certainly kept the Twins in the game, but the Panthers put up a crooked number on him late in the game to give themselves some breathing room, and obviously that wound up being the difference.
Another pitcher who really impressed me was Adam Zorzit – he worked a single inning of relief, and he has great stuff. It doesn’t break ten to twelve inches the way Mike McGilvray’s stuff does, but it buzzes and is pretty electric. He picked up the save in their first ever game in Hamilton, and even though I haven’t seen a lot of the Twins’ pen, I have to think I would be pretty comfortable putting him in for most save opportunities. When it’s up, I’ll take a look at tonight’s boxscore and see if he was put in to protect the one run lead, and now that I think of it I may as well check some of their previous wins and see what his role has been. If he isn’t the closer, the closer is pretty good – I’ll say that much!
To look at some long-term prognosis stuff: the Twins, having won a make-up game tonight in Oshawa by a count of 3-2, sit at 5-6. Not ideal, but far above anything that could have reasonably been expected of an expansion club. A few people have told me that they think the record is what it is because it’s a really young team that just needs to grow into hanging with some of the teams that have been together for years and years, and I think that theory may have some truth to it, as far as accounting for the actual wins and losses goes. Coach C said – and this will be in either the game piece or something else (more on that later) – he’s thrilled with where the team is, and if I were in his position I would probably feel the same. Baseball being baseball, as long as you know you can hang with anyone in the league – and the Twins now know that – it’s all about executing once you get into a short playoff series.
Anyways, we’ve been talking about some vague journalistic plans for my coverage of the team for a while now, and they’ve sort of materialized: we’re hoping, subject to executive approval, to run an insert in the programs given out at games with a feature piece (written by me, of course!) about the success of opening day/the arrival of the Twins in Mississauga/the results thus far/some kind of encouraging spin on the future and a feature player profile on Ryan Assis. I’ve always liked his story – because he left the BayCats specifically to play for his hometown team – and I finally got to talk to him after the Saturday game. The hope (at least on my end) is to turn that insert into a regularly changing feature – probably more general pieces about the overall direction of the team, organizational news and so on, and then one or two player profiles per issue.
I think that’s all I have to say. I’m not sure when I’ll be back on the beat – two weeks, maybe? I’ll see about contacting coach C to get enough material to do game pieces for the away ones I miss. I’ll probably blog mid-week or something with some Blue Jays material and misc. Twins news/comments!
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