The Birth of Ron Gardenhire

On Monday Ron Gardenhire woke up and said, “I am not anyone’s mother.” Monday didn’t hear Ron Gardenhire. Monday was tired of hiding. Monday said, “Someone once told me there was a place where it is always Monday.” Monday did not believe himself. He thought he was lying. His doubts manifested in the form of an egg. The egg clucked. It tried to say, “My name is Monday.” The egg had no mouth. Monday said, “Are you a chicken or an egg?”  Ron Gardenhire frowned.

Roads exist in this story. Eggs are the descendents of the existence of roads in this story. Many people are confused and still ask what came first.  Ron Gardenhire laughs, but isn't sure why.  A good number of students base their senior thesis on the idea of God being a chicken. Seminars discuss dichotomy in nature. Students screamed for duality. A few continue to cheer for the chicken.  Ron Gardenhire has a pennant that says 'Chicken'.  A professor stands up and walks to the blackboard. He picks up the chalk and writes, “The road or the egg.” He underlines ‘road’ twice. The egg clucks. Everyone laughs. When they stop laughing the egg is gone.  Ron Gardenhire is sitting in the corner naked.
The egg has gone to visit his brother. Ron Gardenhire and the egg's brother don't live in the desert anymore. Monday says, “There is a place where everyone is breakfast. Someone once ate me with pancakes in Derek, Kansas.”  Ron Gardenhire smiles when he hears the word 'Pancakes'.  The egg remembered reading of a place where 76 % of the population had the same name. Monday said, “There is a place where everyone has the same name.”

No one in Minnesota has the same name. No one in Minnesota is named ‘Ron Gardenhire’. Everyone is named ‘sand pit.’ Minnesota has three Ron Gardenhires. One is a vegetarian. There are roads in Minnesota. When I was young I tried to count all the roads in Minnesota. I sat in my closet and counted to zero then fell asleep or maybe I lost interest when my grandfather drove me to a sandpit, told me to get out, closed the passenger door, and said, “Grow up,” before driving off. Three sandpits in Minnesota are named ‘Ron Gardenhire.’ There are thousands of sand pits in Minnesota. None of them are vegetarian.

Monday said, “I would like to change my name.” Bald figurines thought this was a good idea, but they did not have eyebrows and forgot who was talking. They tried to touch their heads and ask the passing roads what happened to their hair. They had no hands. They had no mouths.

The egg tried to say, “I’ll be Monday and you can be egg,” but gave up and thought, “I am a bald figurine.”  Ron Gardenhire said, "I have hair."

I did not like to see the egg like this. I switched on the incubator. I forgot what an incubator was supposed to do. Regardless, the egg did not cooperate. It rotated its head completely around and surprised everyone by eating a road.  The road was both Ron Gardenhire and Monday. No scientific explanations were offered. Conspiracy theories found their way into the editorial pages of high school newspapers. Monday died as both a road and as a Ron Gardenhire. It was either his first death or the 10,000th time he died. Those are the only two options. Nine months later Monday returned to the world as an egg. The cycle of life was complete. There was no longer a dilemma of what came first. The first thing Monday did was change his name to Ron Gardenhire. The judged waved and said, “Goodbye Monday.”

The End

Oh yeah, Fuck you Aaron for trying to make this a serious blog.  The Twins probably won't do the right thing, live with it.

On a more serious note...

This is an important offseason for the Minnesota Twins (so important that I'm going to revive this blog with a post that is not a complete joke). The Twins have a lot of talented young players, and are a late-inning reliever and an everyday right-handed 3B with a good bat away from being one of the best teams in baseball. They also have an apparent log-jam of outfielders, one of whom they might be tempted to trade in order to acquire the pieces they need.

Last offseason, we learned that Bill Smith is not nearly as gun-shy as his predecessor when it comes to making big deals. That might be a good thing, and only time will tell whether those trades were good ones or not, but it would be a lie to say, at this point, that they have worked out in the Twins' favor. Will the GM be afraid to pull the trigger again? Will he be eager to unload some of the pieces of those trades that have looked particularly awful? We might know the answer to that question sooner than later, and this is why the current offseason is so important.

Ron Gardenhire has publicly stated that he wants an outfield of Cuddyer, Span and Gomez next year. Barring the possibility that he is purposefully making such statements in order to inflate Cuddyer's trade value or something equally sneaky, this means that he and Bill Smith are actually considering either using Young in a backup role or trading him. Both would be huge mistakes, given that the Twins are unlikely to receive good value for Young right now.

Delmon Young was one of the best hitters on the team last year, despite having a dissapointing season. Carlos Gomez was the worst. Both are extremely young, with huge upside. The most obvious, almost painfully obvious, choice is to let Carlos Gomez start the season in AAA. He will not be valuable to a major league club until he learns how to get on base at a rate that is close to average, not swing at every slider in the dirt, and successfully steal bases. Last year he showed, for an entire season, that he cannot do any of these things at the major league level. The Twins wasted an entire year of service time letting him "learn" last summer. Let's not make the same mistake again. At this rate Carlos Gomez will be arbitration-eligible before he is major league ready. That gives the Twins very little chance to get good production out of him while paying him much less than he is worth. Franchises like ours need to be smarter than this.

The next most obvious choice, if Gardy and Smith really can't stomach the idea of sending Gomez down, is to trade Michael Cuddyer. He is actually earning real money thanks to the contract he signed last offseason, and by earning I mean he was injured the whole summer and has had one good offensive season (2006) in his entire career. That injury, in fact, proves exactly why we need to start Carlos Gomez in the minors. Remember last year when we seemed to have the usual glut of weak-hitting middle infielders? Matt Tolbert was playing every day and we weren't even sure what the Twins would do when Everett came off the DL. Punto was still on the roster, of course, and Brendan Harris was having trouble turning the DP at 2B. And then there was Alexi Casilla hitting the cover off the ball in the minor leagues. Once you factor in Lamb in the majors and Buscher at AAA, we didn't have anywhere to put all these guys. And yet there were points in the season when it was difficult to put an infield together. Injuries happen every year. With probability 1.

Sometime before July Cuddyer, Kubel, Young, or Span will probably go on the DL for a little while. I'd much rather be bringing Gomez up to play everyday than fielding Span in left, Gomez in center and Pridie in right when Cuddyer gets hurt again. There is no log-jam in the outfield. There is just an obvious choice to be made. Here's hoping the front office makes it.

Gardy to Punto: You're already a great player to me

"A couple years ago, he wasn't starting, and he came along pretty good in this role," Gardenhire said. "Maybe this clears his mind a little bit, so he's not worried about going 0-for-3 every day, and he'll come back and be a great player. He already is to me because he's so valuable everywhere you play him."( from the strib)

Scene: Nick Punto and Ron Gardenhire share a candlelight dinner for two after the 2007 season.

Nick (forlorn): ...I just want to be a great player...

Ron (reassuring): You already are to me, Nick. You already are to me.

Their eyes locked, the two mens' faces inch towards each other as the lights fade to black.

Fin

Oh my darling hummingbird

La Velle E. Neal III gives us this gem of an article full of the cute quotable Gardenhire we all love. One can't help but beam with joy and feel warm all over after reading Gardenhire's nickname for rookie Matt Tolbert.
"Hummingbird"
Maybe even better is how Mr. Neal III just sticks the quote in the middle of the article. The previous quote from Tolbert's minor league manager, Riccardo Ingram, kind of explains the Gardenhire hummingbird quote.
"The Latin players call him 'Eléctrico,' " Ingram said.
Still, the fact that the next line only has Gardenhire saying "hummingbird" leaves his meaning a little ambiguous.
Of course, this post isn't meant to criticize Mr. Neal's journalistic talent. No, it's to display the pure giddiness and love Gardenhire seems to have for this young buck Tolbert. And that's exactly what we get at the end of article when Mr. Neal decided to copy down Gardenhire's excited mumbles about the rookie verbatim.
"I said, 'You're on deck. You're hitting right now,' and he was still looking for his equipment. That's not normal. So he's fun."

News flash monroe in the outfield

I love how everything Gardenhire says seems like it is a spur of the moment thought. For example, in this article talking about Crumple Magoo.
"Monroe's here to help us out, however we can use him -- and I'm going to use him. I'm going to play him in the outfield, too."
Thanks for the heads up. Wouldn't want you to surprise us with any of your managerial wisdoms like the old days when you'd bat Tyner at DH.
Of course, I'm probably not wrong, about every Gardenhire decision being spur of the moment.

More Managerial Wisdom

"Twins manager Ron Gardenhire said recently that he would not use a platoon for the club's designated hitter spot. Instead, he would rotate left-handed hitter Jason Kubel and right-handed hitter Craig Monroe based on matchups and other factors."

That quote is from Kelly Theiser ( you may remember her from such references to Johan Santana's phallus as "hardwood - or should I say, hard wood"). Now, I am no scientist, but I'm pretty sure that a platoon in baseball is generally a situation in which two hitters, one right-handed and the other left-handed, share starts depending on who is pitching. So his quote tells me one of two things. Either Kelly Theiser does not know what a platoon is, and she should lose her job as a baseball writer, or Ron Gardenhire does not know what a platoon is, and he should lose his job as Manager. I would be happy with either, or both.

Anyhow, untrue to his word, last night Ron Gardenhire started the elderly, bad at baseball, right-handed Craig Monroe against the right-handed pitcher. Gardenhire justified this decision in a couple of ways.

1) "It was a gut thing."

That's a quote from Gardy. This of course means that Craig Monroe went 0-3 with a strikeout, stranding 3 runners. To be fair, he did hit a ball well and Torii Hunter made a pretty nice catch. Gardenhire's gut might consider that to be a success.

2) "Another reason for the move was that Gardenhire likes the idea of having an extra left-handed bat with power on the bench in Kubel."

That's a quote from Kelly. I find this to be really amazing. Here is a short list of things that are better than having a left-handed bat with power on the bench: having a left-handed bat with power in the starting lineup against a right-handed starting pitcher.

Thankfully, the players and assistant coaches were able to talk Gardy out of going with his gut and starting Mike Redmond at catcher in order to have an extra left-handed bat on the bench in Joe Mauer.

Managing styles

Near the end of June 2007, the Boston Red Sox called up CF Jacoby Ellsbury from their AAA affiliate. He shuffled back and forth between AAA and MLB before making the playoff roster and eventually helping the team win a world series. In 127 regular season plate appearances, he hit .353/.394/.509. In the playoffs, he managed .360/.429/.520 in 28 plate appearances. He is young talented and full of potential, and has shown that he can deliver on the biggest stage, but has struggled a little in spring training and is still only 24 years old.

Here's Red Sox Manager Terry Francona on his decision to bat Jacoby Ellsbury low in the order:

"You put a young player a little bit at risk when you put him right at the top of the lineup early on," Boston manager Terry Francona said. "I know what he hit last year. It was impressive, but you're still trying to develop guys."

In the middle of May 2007, the New York Mets called up CF Carlos Gomez to the major league roster. He more or less stuck, but suffered a serious injury to his wrist in early July that kept him out of the majors for two months. He stuck despite hitting .232/.288/.304. He is young, talented and full of potential but has yet to perform on the biggest stage, and had his first and only season in the majors interrupted by an injury that has been known to decrease a player's ability to hit for power. Baseball Prospectus says that due to the Mets' carelessness in bringing him up too early and his injury, 2007 was a complete waste in terms of his development. This spring, his hitting coach expressed concern that he was swinging so hard that he could easily hurt his back (his manager encouraged him to swing harder). He started out abysmally this in spring training before getting hot late (though he still has a lower OBP than either of the guys he beat out for the starting job in CF). He is only 22 years old.

Here's Twins Manager Ron Gardenhire on his decision to bat Carlos Gomez leadoff:

"Gomez real good... (grunting)... me like Carlos Gomez... (beating chest)... he run hard like Nick Punto. Also play bad like Nick Punto. If him not hit leadoff, Nick Punto. What on base percentage?

Gardenhire being Gardenhire

a few notes:
Gardenhire talking about Livan Hernandez:
"He's going to take his time and he's going to go in and out and he's going to spin it."
Now I know Gardenhire's describing Livan, but for some reason I feel like this description applies to all pitchers. There aren't many pitchers who don't try and put spin on it and who just throw it down the middle of the plate. Tim Wakefield. That's really it. Every other pitcher at the very least tries to 'spin it'.
"That's just the way it's going to be. We knew that going in. That's what we're getting right now. That's the way he pitches. So we're kind of adjusting to him."
Those sneaky Cubans. Always spinning the ball. Us Americans are just going to have to learn how to deal with it I guess. Or maybe Gardenhire thought Livan threw a knuckleball and is just realizing he doesn't. Gardenhire was probably on the bench for Hernandez's last start, squinting and rubbing his face a good five minutes before he saddled up to coach Rick Anderson and said, "Hot shit! When did Levine begin putting that old fashioned spin on the ball?"

Even better, later in the article Gardenhire had this to say about bullpen hopeful Brian Bass:
"Bass has been fine. Bass is throwing the ball really good. He's not afraid. He challenges guys, moves the ball in and out. I like Bass. He's doing pretty good, and that bodes well for a guy out of options. He's throwing pretty doggone good."
Aside from the elementary school grammar that is reminiscent of a white man's impression of an Indian, "Bass Good, boy has no fear, I like Bass, he my friend," there is some more talk about moving the ball in and out which I thought was something only Livan Hernandez could do. Then again maybe Gardenhire doesn't know anything about pitchers and is just reading from a set list of standard answers he has written down on an index card he keeps in his back pocket.

Gardenhire said, "We want to do the right things with this young man."
I laughed at this. He was talking about Liriano, but as we've learned Ron Gardenhire isn't really that good at doing the right thing when it comes to running a baseball team so whether or not he wants to do the right thing or not it probably won't happen.

Santana Visits Teammates, Homoeroticism Ensues

Santana did more than just exchange hugs and handshakes with everyone, from the players to the training staff to the coaches and also his longtime buddy, clubhouse attendant Wayne "Big Fella" Hattaway. He even walked away carrying a new piece of hardwood, or perhaps better said -- hard wood.

The emphasis is mine, but that's still amazing. It wasn't enough that Santana hugged all his teammates and "Big Fella" and then walked away with a new piece of hardwood. Kelly Theiser of MLB.com, motivated by the fear that an average reader would not be able to grasp the innuendo and desperately wanting to make a reference to Santana's erect penis, chose to add the words "or perhaps better said -- hard wood".

In related news, I was fired today from my job as a beat writer for the WNBA when I referred specifically to Allison Bales' comparatively large breasts.

Where's Rondell White?

While trying to figure out what happened to Rondell White I came across this August 6th, (2007) article. I should warn you there is a lot to take in.
Let's get it started with some Lew Ford:
"It's disappointing," [Lew Ford] said. "I really want to be part of the team up here."
I guess he learned a valuable lesson, no matter how much you want to be a part of the team it's tough to justify your worth when you're only hitting .232 (unless you're Nick Punto). This quote also doesn't seem to hold much truth anymore following his decision to flee America. Unfortunately, for Lew they seem to also agree that he isn't very good. Here are my five favorite quotes from this forum talking about Lew's arrival in Japan"
"I don't like this move. Ford has an abysmal OBP (on-base percentage) and hasn't displayed any power."
"Hope he's better than our last ルー (Lou)."
"I live in Minnesota, and am a MN Twins Fan. Lew Ford is a worthless pile, at least as a MLB player. Maybe he'll do better overseas, but I highly doubt it. Now if your in need of a good Dungeons and Dragons player, then he's your guy."
"Ford seems to be endearing himself to the Tigers faithful already. He didn't get any hits (almost no Tigers did), but drew a walk and had a couple of nice running catches. The fans were very supportive of him."
"[Japanese Fans] are very used to big mean sluggers who will swing at your head if you just throw high and inside on them. I think Lew Ford is a nice change of pace."

Okay, back to the original article, talk turns to Rondell White, my original quest, and we get this little quote from Gardenhire:
"We're still trying to give him plenty of time here. He's feeling really good, moving around a lot better. He seems to think by the time we get to Kansas City [on Tuesday], he might be well enough to go out and play in the outfield, and that would be wonderful."
Not too much substance here, but I can't help but picture Rondell White as an old man in a retirement home when I hear this quote. It's as if one of the medical staff is commenting on whether or not he can make a bowel movement. Read the quote again, but this time let me just fix it up just a bit:
"We're still trying to give him plenty of time here. He's feeling really good, moving around a lot better. He seems to think by the time we get to Kansas City [on Tuesday], he might be well enough to go...and that would be wonderful."
You really don't have to stretch your imagination very far to make it work.

Now we get into the heavy hitting part of the article. As always it involves Punto:
"Nick Punto is in another 0-for-16 rut that has dropped his average to .209."
The amazing part is that isn't as far as it would drop. He'd get down to the .199 mark before too long. What's even more amazing is Gardenhire's love fest with Nicky:
"I don't have that luxury because we need him."
I'm sure institutions of higher learning in America sometimes feel the same way about managers in the AL central (Jim Leland gets a pass here, mostly looking at: Wedge, Ozzie, and Gardenhire). "They aren't smart and they don't bring anything to the table, but we just can't afford to not have them be a part of our faculty or at least give them some honorary degrees." In short, I don't think any MLB team needs a sub-.200 hitter.
"We'd like to see him get a little more confidence in his own ability to hit."
That's like saying you'd like your dog take more pride in his typing skills and grammatical accuracy. Dogs can't type, Nick Punto can't hit. That should be one of the basic corollaries for any GM running a MLB team, or at least an AL team.
"Just swing. Get up there and let it fly. Instead of trying to be so patient, swing the bat. And hopefully we'll get there. It's hard. It's not easy when you're struggling. But he's a big part of this team."
Basically, Gardenhire's admitting that Nick Punto has free reign to do whatever he wants on the baseball field. "Put your helmet backwards, try running around the base paths backwards, and for God's sake wear your pants inside out."

If this article weren't great enough already they leave us with this nugget:
"FSN North baseball analyst Ron Coomer was arrested and booked in Hennepin County Jail early Saturday morning on suspicion of drunken driving."
Coomer later confessed that he had only fumbled his hot dog and it slipped under brake peddle making it impossible to stop. Investigators checked Coomer's glove box and found sixteen steamed hot dogs confirming the confession

?

"Kubel proved he can hit the second half [of 2007]," Gardenhire said. "I've decided that with him what you see is what you're going to get. He's going to be that speed. And when he turns it up a notch, we don't notice.

"It's not that much of a notch."

That is from this gem by Patrick Reusse, inexplicably titled "Young has look of a force for Twins". I have been racking my brains for answers as to what Gardy could possibly mean, and I have come up with the following possible interpretations (translations?) of this quote:

1) Kubel is a good hitter. He is not very fast. When he runs a little faster, I can't tell the difference. He can't really run that much faster.

2) Kubel hit really well in the 2nd half of the year, which is when I saw him hitting well. His bat is going to travel at that speed (the speed it traveled in the second half of 2007). When his bat goes faster, it looks the same to me, perhaps because it is not actually going that much faster.

3) Kubel hit well in the second half last season, and since I saw that I expect him to do the same this season. However, I have also seen him struggle in Spring Training. What you see is what you get. Also, he is going to drive his car about as fast as he did last year. When he turns the radio or heat or AC up a notch I don't notice, perhaps because I am getting a bit senile and this also has the side effect of making me not notice when my starters aren't actually playing that well.

4) With Jason, I have decided that what I see him do is actually what he does, unlike many other players who do completely different things than what I see them do. Take Nick Punto, for instance. I see him hitting .310 with power and driving in a lot of runs, when in fact he actually sucks at at hitting. Maybe I should look at the box scores and if I did I could see that Punto is 0 for 4 for the third straight night and is in a 3 for 47 slump, but since what I see is an 8 game hitting streak, I keep putting his name in the lineup, sometimes near the top of the order.

5) When Jason Kubel stands in front of a mirror, he can see his reflection. His image travels at the speed of light. I cannot tell the difference between light speed and light speed plus epsilon.

6) Kubel hits well, and when he hits even better, we (the coaching staff) don't notice.

7) I'm old. My knees ache and Jason Kubel is a Russian submarine. Sometimes he speeds up and sometimes he slows down. Do you think he will take me to the dentist? I have a banana in my arm.

Whatever he is thinking, I am glad Patrick Reusse decided to close his article with such words of wisdom (The article, once again, is titled "Young has look of a force for Twins" and it refers to Delmon Young, not Jason Young Kubel or anything like that).

Gardenhire's been watching too many cartoons again

There haven't been a lot of great Gardenhire quotes of late unless you want to look at clear cases of Gardenhire confusing a reporter's question of whether or not so-and-so can help the team as whether or not he's friends with the said player, in this case Nick Blackburn. I can imagine a reporter asking Gardenhire, "So what do you think of Nick?"
"We really like him a lot and we liked him a lot last year."
I guess their friendship has been building for a few years.

Anyway, if you can't immediately find something quotable from the jolly old skipper you don't have to dig very far. Apparently, a few weeks ago some reporter was curious who Gardenhire thought had the best rubber arm he had ever seen. A decent question, maybe they had been talking about Livan Hernandez's durability or maybe he was hoping to get the skip to talk about an old friend (Everyday Eddie) who is trying to battle his way back (shouldn't be too tough in the NL central). I can certainly bet that the reporter was looking for the answer to be someone who had played major league baseball or at least had played professional baseball sometime in their lives. What the reported did not plan was for Gardenhire to tap into his fond memories of growing up watching Saturday morning cartoons. Or maybe Gardenhire owns the 7-disc box set of that green rubbered amalgam and his friendly horse Pokey and he still watches them each morning when he wakes up and eats a bowl of Fruity Pebbles. What ever the case, according to Ron Gardenhire, "Gumby" is pitcher with the greatest rubber arm he's ever seen. And if it was up to him I bet his five man rotation would look something like this:
1. Gumby
2. Stretch Armstrong
3. Reed Richards
4. Li'l Stretch dog toy
5. A slinky
[note: the slinky would probably need a pitch count just so it doesn't get extended too far which would then result in it not returning to normal form]

Ron Gardenhire <3 Free Swingers

According to the Star Tribune and the Pioneer Press Ron Gardenhire really likes it when Delmon Young and Carlos Gomez swing baseball bats at baseballs. From the Strib story:

In his next two plate appearances, Gomez came up with runners on base and took some tenacious swings that left Gardenhire chuckling. "I really think he swung so hard that the bat broke before the ball got there," Gardenhire said. "... He's a little bit of a free spirit."

Gardenhire met with Gomez on Saturday and encouraged him to keep being aggressive. "He took it to heart," Gardenhire said. "He looks at me and says, 'Boy, I like this guy.'

I would like to think this is just an innocent quote about how much Gardy likes the way the young guy swings, but the exact same story appeared in both papers. And the next line of the story is...

"He was hacking; nothing wrong with that. I like the way he plays. He's pretty fast, and he can be pretty exciting."

NOTHING WRONG WITH HACKING! THAT'S WHY IT IS CALLED BY SUCH A DEROGATORY TERM! My god! Is anyone else hearing this? I am less amazed by the fact that Gardenhire thinks the way he does than by the fact that he says these things out loud, to people whose job is (supposedly) to think critically about sports. This was a historic offseason for the Minnesota Twins. They acquired a raw talent who has the potential to be one of the best in the game (Delmon Young) who also swung at more pitches than any other player in major league baseball in 2007. They acquired a center fielder with a ceiling perhaps as high as any, with big shoes to fill (Tori's) and big expectations give who he was dealt for (Johan Santana), who is currently causing injury worries among the coaching staff because of the ferocity with which he attacks every pitch. What does Gardy have to say?

"All the on-base percentage [stats] and all those things -- he's dangerous when he lets that thing fly and gets fastballs."

That's not even a sentence. But it is an incredibly stupid thing to say. Good night.

Boof working hard at dinner time

Boof Bonser made some headlines last week when he showed up to training camp 30 pounds lighter. Many couldn't take their eyes off him, either out of a newfound attraction in the young boy (he's only 26) or in envy. Manager Ron Gardenhire falls into the latter. There was almost hatred in his voice as he spoke to the media. It was if he came to the realization that with Boof in trim shape there is no one left on the team that he could beat in a foot race besides gout infested Matt LeCroy and it really isn't fair to challenge him to a race when doctors are still weighing the options of whether or not amputation is the best option. Yes, there was sorrow in his voice as he spoke about Bonser and his off season Jenny Craig miracle.
"Bonser worked hard, but he worked hard on the field and off the field," Gardenhire said.
I'm not really sure what he means by working hard off the field. Is he saying that on top of Bonser losing weight that he also picked up a part-time job to pay the electric bill?
"He worked hard at dinner time."
Oh, I get it. I was confused for a second. Why didn't you tell me he was doing the seated Arnold presses and Hindu pushups in between each bite?
As an athlete, you have to know how to take care of yourself. I'm not being mean. I'm just saying that some guys really know how to take care of themselves off the field, and it's a learning process...
And then there are some that didn't learn very well and aren't very good about taking care of themselves off the field:
Oh, that was a low blow, even for me. What about this one?
Come on, the dude's a hall of famer and besides he's lost some weight recently...
Okay, Okay, I think I got one we can all live with:
So anyway, back to Gardenhire talking about Boof:
He's taken it by the horns, and I think you see the product out there."
Hmmm...I guess that speaks for itself?
Here's a thought, if Gardenhire can't find anyone else for his foot races I think this guy is still kicking around the ball park these days selling hot dogs and chasing foul balls.

It'll be a battle for the right to be called 'RonRon' but someone may already have that nickname and you probably don't want to mess with him.

Ron Gardenhire <3 Pitchers and Catchers

It's no secret that Ron Gardenhire prefers to carry 12 pitchers on his 25-man roster, as well as 3 able catchers in just case Mike Redmond is injured during one of his starts after Joe Mauer has been already used as a pinch-hitter, an event so improbable that it is likely to cost the Minnesota Twins about one game every 20 or so years by my own back-of-the-envelope calculations. Obviously, this leaves a pretty thin bench given that backup catchers usually do not make the best pinch hitters or defensive replacements for positions other than catcher.

According to this article in the Pioneer Press, Mike Lamb will be able to serve as the third string catcher as well as the first string 3B, allowing the Twins an extra bench spot for a qualified major leaguer such as whoever comes in 2nd in the CF sweepstakes, fourth outfielder and possible fourth string catcher Craig Monroe (also a senior citizen if I am not mistaken), scrappy piranha Nick Punto, a poor man's David Eckstein (David Eckstein is in turn a rich man's replacement level AAA shortstop) or Brian Buscher , who maybe could fill in for catching duties if Mauer pinch hits, Redmond gets hurt, Lamb is sick with the Bubonic Plague, Craig Monroe is in CF filling in for an injured Carlos Gomez and Nick Punto is at 3rd filling in for Lamb and Jason Pridie is in right because Michael Cuddyer is not traveling with the team so that he can be with his wife when she gives birth to their first child. Other potential candidates for those bench spots:

Matt Lecroy, a fat fifth (at best) string catcher whose major league career was ruined by the fact that he has gout and 2/3 of the pitchers in MLB are not left-handed. Of course, a fat guy with gout really seems like Billy Beane's type so maybe he sticks with the A's.

Denard Span, who is currently facing the prospect of not even being the starting CF at AAA. If he knows what's best for him he'll learn to catch or become a weak-hitting middle infielder (he's halfway there, as he is already a particularly weak hitter).

Jose Morales, because his actual position is catcher.

Alexi Casilla, a middle infielder who, given his inexperience, will probably hit weakly enough to be given a shot at the leadoff spot provided he plays adequate defense.

So Long Luis

Gardenhire seems excited at the prospect that he'll have someone who isn't Luis Rodriguez as his main pinch hitter.
"[Luis] was a good hitter and put the ball in play," Gardenhire said. "But you want to walk up there and think that you'll have a chance..."
Sure, I misquoted Gardenhire by not providing the full quote, but I think when read this way we understand his true feelings. Also, let's not forget about the beginning of this quote where Gardenhire admits that all it takes to be a good hitter on the Twins is to put the ball into play. And people were probably wondering how Mr. Luis Rodriguez was still on the team, let alone their top option off the bench late in the game, when he only turned in a .219 AVG and .281 OBP.
Oddly enough, one of the players Gardenhire is excited about also only hit .219 last year, but provides a bit more power than Luis. Hello, Craig Monroe. For some reason I want to call you Retarded Craig, but I will refrain and just call you Crug Moron. What I don't get though is if all it takes to be a good hitter on the Twins is an ability to put the ball into play (Luis struck out 14 times in 155 ABs, Monroe struck out 107 times in 392) then why would you basically trade two useless parts for each other when you originally had the better of the two (albeit by your own standards)?
Lastly, who exactly was Luis pinch-hitting for?
Smart money is on Punto, the man who volunteered to be the team's lead off hitter this year.

Ron Gardenhire <3 Nick Punto

If you are a Twins fan, you are already aware of Ron Gardenhire's nonsexual man-crush on all weak-hitting middle infielders, particularly Nick Punto. Why Gardy feels so strongly about Punto et al. I am not completely sure, but it may have something to do with his own career line of .232/.277/.296 as a utility infielder over 5 years with the New York Mets. And if you are a Twins fan with a vested interest in seeing the team score more than 600 runs this year, you are probably wondering what Gardenhire's well publicized infatuation with Nick Punto means for the 2008 starting lineup. Unfortunately, all signs point to Punto getting a lot of plate appearances (or asI like to call them, "automatic outs"), and that is good for no one except perhaps for Gardy's 50-year-old hard-on. Let's review the offseason developments that pertain directly to Nick Punto's role:

1) Twins deal Jason Bartlett to Devil Rays as part of the deal for Delmon Young

Great news for Punto (and his manager's erection) as now Nick can provide gold-glove caliber fielding every day at a defensively crucial position while batting 9th and hopefully raising his average to somewhere around .250. The Twins have a hole at 3B (later filled by the Mike Lamb signing) but they had one before as well. And they also have a probably every day 2B who can actually hit in Brendan Harris. Nice job Bill Smith!

2) Twins sign Adam Everett to one-year contract

This is a bad sign. Adam Everett is a fantastic defensive SS, better than Nick Punto. He is also an atrocious hitter, worse than Nick Punto. Last year he posted an OPS of .599 in the NL Central! That's disgusting! I am chocking down my own vomit just thinking about it! But he plays the most crucial defensive position except Catcher and he does it very well. Without Punto on the roster, I have no problem with this move, but as it stands we have to find somewhere else in the batting order for Ron Gardenhire's scrappy piranha boyfriend. Moreover, this move only makes sense if they want to play Punto at 2B! We all know how much Gardenhire loves defense, and given how bad Brendan Harris is at it (and how bad Mike Lamb is at third) w could be seeing a lot of Nick this summer at 2B or (god forbid) the hot corner.

Twins have trouble with Concordia, Gardenhire makes joke

The Twins struggled to pull out a win against Division II Concordia a few days back. They had to rally for a 7-5 victory.
Most of those five runs were allowed by new comer Phillip Humber who gave up four in one inning.
Gardenhire had this to say about the seven pitchers and Humber who took the mound.
"They were all pretty much around the plate. Juanie [Juan Rincon] was kind of all over. Humber was kind of all over ..."
wait for it...
wait...
patience...
"...the fence."
zing!
Mr. Gardenhire your jokes are too much for me. If I were a former weak hitting middle infielder, with a propensity to comfort young boys named Nick in their failures by continuing to write their name down on the lineup card at third base job then I may have crapped my pants at your humor, but I am not you. Only you are you and only you laughed at this joke. And later it was only you who walked out of your office with new pants on and told the clubhouse boy that there was a mess that needed to be cleaned up.
In related news: early findings have shown that Phil Humber is not Johan Santana. Small sample size need not apply.

Jesse Crain is Probably Human

The Star Tribune mentioned a small thing about Jesse Crain coming back from surgery. He threw off the mound against hitters for the first time, but it seemed Gardenhire could hardly care less and barely was able to form an opinion.

"He looked normal, like he was letting it go, and the ball was coming out really well," manager Ron Gardenhire said. "We have a long ways to go. There could be setbacks, but the first day was good."

To me it just sounds like he's saying:
Crain looked human. It looked like he was throwing a ball when he was throwing a ball, but then again he might not have been. Things might be different tomorrow.

Of course, Gardenhire had other things on his mind like the batting order, but that's been a painful process and he still seems to struggle with the basic understanding of how it works:

"You better have somebody behind [Morneau]..."

It is unclear if he was talking to reporters or himself.

First Post

Eisler Livan Hernandez has lived a remarkable life. Born into the state-sponsored poverty of a socialist dictatorship, he grew up as one of the lucky ones who were talented enough to play El Presidente’s favorite game in the Cuban baseball academies. He earned $6 a month playing in Cuba before defecting as a 19 year old while abroad with the Cuban national team in the fall of 1995. He made his MLB debut the very next year for the Florida Marlins as the youngest player in the NL. In his 12 seasons in the major leagues he has averaged over 200 innings pitched. He was the Rookie of the Year in 1997, as well as the World Series MVP, and he has been an All Star twice.

His brother, Orlando “El Duque” Hernandez defected as well, coming to the US on a raft with 5 other Cubans seeking asylum. He had to defect, as a meeting with an associate of his brother’s agent had led to a lifetime ban from Cuban baseball. Both brothers are pitchers, while their father Arnaldo Hernandez once played all nine positions for the Villa Clara Azucareros in the Cuban National Series. In the US, Livan developed a reputation as a great teammate who would often help younger players, going so far as to buy them dinner and jackets. His kindness paid off when in 1997 his teammates wrote a formal plea to Cuban officials that, coupled with negotiations between the two governments, led to a dramatic Game 7 World Series win in front of his own mother, the first and only time she would be allowed to travel to the United States.

His is the kind of story that makes you smile, especially when you are a Twins fan and you realize that, due to his recent signing, the Twins now have a starting pitcher on their 40 man roster who has pitched at least two full seasons in the majors (for the record, Boof Bonser is the only member of the rotation who has pitched even one without also pitching in AAA). So how does Ron Gardenhire show his appreciation for the newest addition to the team? How does he welcome the grizzled veteran, the workhorse of the staff who will be called upon to provide leadership to the talented but largely untested core of young pitching?

“We don't wear bling-blings on the field," Gardenhire said. "... I told him he can't wear those anymore. So he's game-on."

That’s from last Monday’s (February 18) Pioneer Press. In Gardenhire’s defense, he probably did not phrase the request in exactly that way, nor is there anything inherently wrong with having team rules such as no “bling-bling” (it is worth noting that Torii Hunter and Johan Santana are among Twins who have played under Gardenhire who have worn necklaces on the field that could legitimately be called “bling-bling”). Moreover, Gardenhire is probably blissfully unaware of how ridiculous is the straight-faced appropriation of the term “bling-bling” by the redneck 50-year old native Oklahoman who currently manages a team that over the years has been perhaps the whitest in the history of integrated professional baseball in the United States. To say Gardenhire “doesn’t get it” would be an understatement, one which could be applied to many other aspects of his job.

Maybe, with all the new faces in training camp, Gardenhire feels the need to lay down the law and show the new guys who’s boss. After all, this off-season the Twins traded for a 22-year old who is most famous for throwing his bat at an umpire, let two faces of the franchise walk away to bigger contracts, and are now having trouble even getting some of their players into the country so they can report to Spring Training. He needs to let these kids know they can’t get away with whatever they want. Especially that Livan Hernandez guy. Even better if he can get a tough-sounding quote in the newspapers, just to prove that he has complete control over his men, even the rowdy Cubans.

Luckily for Gardenhire and the Twins, Livan Hernandez is “game-on”. Given his positive attitude and less-than-perfect command of the English language, he probably did not read Gardenhire’s words as an attempt by the manager to put him in his place, which is exactly how the quote comes across (he probably did not read them at all). Eager to please his new team he will take off the earrings, not throw bullpen sessions in a windbreaker, and abide by any other team rules of which Gardenhire kindly makes him aware. He will work hard to rebound from a bad year. He will try to play well for himself and for his teammates.

He will take until at least mid-April to realize that Gardenhire absolutely “doesn’t get it”, in the truest sense of the word.

Welcome to Minnesota Livan, meet your new Manager: