Tag: New York Yankees

Red Sox Twitter Needs to Stay Calm

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The Yankees acquiring Giancarlo Stanton is obviously huge news and not great news for the Red Sox. The Yankees have acquired the reigning National League MVP for pennies on the dollar because they can eat salary better than any other team in professional sports. That’s tough for Red Sox fans to stomach, but it’s nothing new for fans of the other 28 teams in Major League Baseball.

The Yankees have obviously gotten [much] better while the Red Sox are still looking for their power bat, but can we stop the histrionics? I get it, it’s frustrating to see the Yankees payroll go up every year at a faster rate than college tuition, but can we stop talking about the Yankees like they’re going to hit 300 home runs next year and win 130 games? Last time I checked, Stanton doesn’t play nine positions.

I’m old enough to remember the last time the Yankees swung a trade to pick up a reigning MVP. In early 2004 Alex Rodriguez, like Stanton today, was a reigning MVP entering his age-28 season. I remember Bob Lobel holding a town hall meeting on Sports Final with Steve Buckley (or maybe it was Tony Massarotti) to calm down Red Sox fans. If my memory serves me well, Buckley (or Mazz) said that it all comes down to pitching and that the Yankees pitching staff didn’t get any better after they picked up A-Rod.

Whoever it was, they were right. On the backs of Curt Schilling, Pedro Martinez and Keith Foulke it was the Red Sox who hoisted the commissioner’s trophy in October of 2004. It took the Yankees six years to win their first (and only) World Series with A-Rod. While still a good player, A-Rod’s best playing days were behind him by 2009. That 2009 World Series title really had more to do with CC Sabathia being a stud than it did with A-Rod anchoring that lineup. Honestly, 35-year-old Johnny Damon had as much to do with that title as A-Rod did.

I’m also old enough to remember when the Red Sox had two perennial MVP candidates in the middle of their lineup. Hell, in 2003 the Red Sox had Manny, Oritz AND Nomar in their primes and all three finished in the top ten in AL MVP voting. We all remember how that season ended.

Adding Stanton definitely gets the Yankees closer to a tile, and closer to a tile than the Red Sox, but let’s not cancel the season. As was the case in 2004, the Red Sox still have the better pitching staff. Next year the Red Sox will have two former Cy Young Award winners on the staff, and that doesn’t include six-time all star Chris Sale. And like in 2004, there’s still the Wild Card. It’s not 1987. So what if the Yankees win 130 games? The Sox can still win 95 games and get into the tournament. If that happens, much like in 2004, we’ll see you in Game 7 of the ALCS.

PS – I don’t know who came up with this first, but this tweet won Twitter over the weekend.

The Minnesota Twins Don’t Get No Respect

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twins respect

CBSSPORTS.COM – Now that the postseason field has been finalized, we can look ahead and figure out which potential World Series matchups are most intriguing. There are 25 of them.

  • 25. Colorado Rockies vs. Minnesota Twins
  • 24. Arizona Diamondbacks vs. Minnesota Twins
  • 23. Minnesota Twins vs. Washington Nationals
  • 21. Los Angeles Dodgers vs. Minnesota Twins
  • 20. Chicago Cubs vs. Minnesota Twins

Yahoo! Sports – We’re down to 10. Ten teams have a chance to reach the 2017 World Series. Slowly, over the next month, that number will dwindle down until it’s just two teams. And then one. But right now, 10 teams are still alive and that gives us 25 possible World Series matchups.

  • 25. Twins vs. Diamondbacks
  • 24. Twins vs. Nationals
  • 23. Twins vs. Dodgers
  • 22. Twins vs. Cubs
  • 19. Twins vs. Rockies

The MLB Playoffs start tonight with the American League Wild Card game in New York, and it’s pretty clear that no one wants to see the Twins make a run.

The Twins squeaked into the playoffs as the second Wild Card team a year after losing 103 games and after selling at this year’s trade deadline. They have lost 12 straight playoff games, but their last postseason win did come at Yankee Stadium in 2004.

The Yankees won 91 games this year and enter the playoffs as a more traditional Wild Card team. They went 4-2 against the Twins this year, and swept the Twins in a three-game series at Yankee Stadium just two weeks ago. The Yankees have also defeated the Twins nine straight times in the playoffs.

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So why all the apathy, if not hate, toward the Twins? It is hard to say they look like a typical playoff team. Ervin Santana had a very good season and Big Sexy was a fun addition, but it’s hard to name much of their staff after that. They also traded their All-Star closer at the trade deadline. Their most recognizable player, Joe Mauer, had his best season since 2013 but is still a shadow of the first-ballot Hall of Famer he looked like at the end of the 2000s.

But the Twins franchise has been here before. The franchise won its first World Series in Minnesota in 1987 after getting outscored in the regular season. They won the AL West that year at 85-77 (the same record as the 2017 squad)  while three teams with better records from the AL East went golfing in October. They won the division on the strength of a 56-25 home record at the much-maligned Metrodome.

So while people can criticize the 2017 Twins and say a team like this shouldn’t make the playoffs, they are not the first team to squeak into the playoffs after a run-of-the-mill regular season. Mediocre teams made they playoffs long before the Wild Card was invented.

With all the Yankees Haters out there, I have to imagine at least some folks will be pulling for the Twins tonight. Who doesn’t like to root for an underdog? And don’t tell me a Dodgers-Twins World Series isn’t even in the top 20. A Dodgers-Twins World Series would feature an historical rematch, a David vs. Goliath feel, an iconic stadium, and one of the best modern stadiums in the game. I’m not saying it will happen, or that it would go past five games if it did happen, but don’t tell me the Twins aren’t worth rooting for.