Pic of the Week

Kauffman Stadium in Kansas City gets spiffed up
for tonight's season opener between 2015's World Series foes.

I think that says it all, folks. Play Ball!

From the (almost) print column: Twins remake has the look of more losing

This was supposed to be the Monday print column. For unknown (to me) reasons, it didn't run. Since it's pegged to this afternoon's opener, I'm posting it now.

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Opening Day is supposed to be about fresh beginnings and the promise of the new season.

With the Minnesota Twins about to start the 2014 season, I'm here to quash that kind of optimism among their followers. (I strive to be a realist, not a romantic.)

The Twins spent the offseason reinforcing a weak starting rotation. Terry Ryan and Co. did a pretty good job of it. Ricky Nolasco, Phil Hughes and the returning Mike Pelfrey aren't likely to win any Cy Young awards, but the rotation won't be the burden it has been the past two years.

But the offense is ... offensive.

The 2013 Twins scored 614 runs. That was Minnesota's lowest full-season total since 1972, a year when hitting was so low the American League adopted the designated hitter rule.

The Twins' lineup repairs: Replacing Ryan Doumit and Justin Morneau with Kurt Suzuki and Jason Kubel.

That's not enough. The 2014 Twins will struggle to score runs again. It really doesn't matter what batting order Ron Gardenhire deploys; he can only hit Joe Mauer in one place in a game, and most of the remaining slots will inevitably be filled by guys who should be hitting eighth or ninth if they belong in a major league lineup at all.

In fairness to the Twins' brain trust, I don't think they intended their position-player moves to be largely recycling guys who were good five years ago. In the words of assistant general manager Rob Antony, "We were trying to give money away." The good veteran free agents went where they might win immediately; other free agents, to be blunt, would only be in the way.

What I'll look for in 2014 from this team isn't contention. It's progress.

These things will make the season a success:

■ Kyle Gibson establishing himself as a mid-rotation (or higher) starter. (He opens as the No. 5 starter, but he certainly has a higher ceiling than Kevin Correia or Pelfrey.)

■ Aaron Hicks hitting well enough to be a corner outfielder when Byron Buxton arrives to take over center field. (Possible but doubtful.)

■ Oswaldo Arcia getting a clean shot at establishing himself as a middle of the order bat. (If he plays, he'll hit. But he may be streaky,and the manager needs to live with those ups and downs.)

■ Josmil Pinto's bat justifying his glove behind the plate. (I think it will.)

■ Trevor Plouffe and Brian Dozier establishing themselves as something more than second-division regulars. (I don't know that either will hit enough.)

■ Michael Tonkin getting a late-inning role in the bullpen. (Please.)

Suzuki, Kubel, Josh Willingham, Pedro Florimon, Correia, Jarod Burton, Jason Bartlett ... they are all essentially irrelevancies. None of them will be part of the next good Twins team.

Probably the best thing the front office did this winter was not get themselves into a position in which the irrelevant players are in the way of the relevant ones.



Edward Thoma (344-6377; ethoma@mankatofreepress.com) maintains his Baseball Outsider blog at fpbaseballoutsider.blogspot.com. Follow him on Twitter @bboutsider.

Notes from the weekend

It's Opening Day — at least for most of the majors. It'll be a frigid one for those of us at Target Field, and I don't expect to see a full house there.

Trying to guess at the weather in making the April schedule is impossible, of course. Last year we had 70 degree temps on April 1, but the home opener came a few days later and was quite cold. This year we might have something considerably warmer a few days after the opener — when the Twins have hit the road.

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Ron Gardenhire spent much of spring training using Brian Dozier (and others) in the second spot in the batting order. But this weekend the manager said he will move Joe Mauer up to the two-hole and elevate the other middle-of-the-order guys one spot each, while hitting Dozier eighth.

This makes perfect sense to me; I called for it in January as part of my Benchmarks for 2013 series.

Dozier may become a good top-of-the-order guy. He certainly didn't perform like that in 2012, and it seems wise to put him at the bottom of the order until he demonstrates that he merits a more prominent role.

Elevating Mauer, Josh Willingham, Justin Morneau, etc. one slot each will, over the course of the season, get them about 25 more plate appearances apiece. Dropping Dozier from second to eighth should take about 150 plate appearances away from him. Right now, there's no reason to believe the team is helped by giving him those at-bats.

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The Twins on Friday lost relief pitcher Alex Burnett, who had already been optioned out, on waivers to the Toronto Blue Jays.

Waiving Burnett opened a spot on the 40-man roster for outfielder Wilkin Ramirez. As I said last week, I doubt that Ramirez is going to last long on the active roster.

But I also doubt that the Twins will have as much reason to regret exposing Burnett to waivers as they did in 2009 when they lost Craig Breslow that way. I used to envision Burnett emerging as a Juan Rincon-type of set-up man, but after three seasons of declining strikeout rates, it had become clear that that wasn't going to happen.

The Twins have plenty of other right-handed relief candidates they can turn to.

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Play Ball!

Pic of the Week

The Detroit Tigers are introduced to their home crowd
before starting their 2012 season on Thursday.

Opening Day: The possibilities, the hope, the pure spring of it all.

Happy baseball season, everyone.