Baseball season is finally here!!!

Well tonight is the beginning of a new baseball season for almost every team. My predictions for the AL central are as follows.

1st place: Twins- Power hitting with Morneau, Cuddyer, and Crede. Speed on the bases and defense with Casilla, Punto, Gomez, and Span. Pitching staff with 5 of the best young guns in the bigs. The best hitter in the game with Mauer, and of course the fearless leader Gardy.
2nd place- Detroit Tigers
3rd Place- Chicago White Sox
4th Place- Cleveland Indians
5th- Kansas City Royals, sorry KC but you never seem to dissapoint with having a bad season.

Lets hear what everyone else thinks.

My Twins goal for this year is the same as all years……….

“Beat the hated Whities”

Twins will be fun this year. Kubel will have a year people just aren’t going to believe. If the starting pitching continues to improve all will be well in Twinkie land.

I hope you are right about Kubel. I’ve not yet warmed up to him and I think Young is a dink. Hopefully Gomez learns to hit, we could be pretty fun to watch.

I’ll throw out my prediction here as well.

1) Twins – The addition of Crede, if healthy will be a huge offensive upgrade. I predict breakthrough years from Kubel who can hit 25 homers and .300. Delmon Young will also step up this year. Slowey will emerge as an ace as well. If we have a downfall its the bullpen. Nathan is the only real star we have in the bull pen. Marajes came to camp out of shape and found himself back in the minors. If he gets back into shape he can be a dominating set up man and we need one of those.

2)Cleveland – They are the biggest threat to the Twins in my opinion. They have good pitching and the addition of Kerry Wood at closer will help them. Fausto Carmona also will have a lot better year which will help their pitching.

3) Chicago – They haven’t made enough improvements in the off season to get a lot better and they are getting older. Could really fall off like Detroit did last year if they aren’t careful.

4) Kansas City – could have a really good year if some of the young guys like Alex Gordon step it up and Greinke emerges as a Cy Young type pitcher which he is capable of doing.

5) Detroit – they really don’t seem to have the mix they need right now. They were predicated to be great last year and really struggled. I don’t see that changing.

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I hope you are right about Kubel. I’ve not yet warmed up to him and I think Young is a dink. Hopefully Gomez learns to hit, we could be pretty fun to watch.

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The only thing you need to understand about Delmon is he will walk in free agency. From now until that day he will be all about the money. He took a bad rap last year. Nobody really can step in and play outfield in the dome. He is a good player who is only 22 years old. People forget he was in the Majors a year after graduating high school.

July 4th Go Go will be the rotating outfielder with Young, Span and Cuddyer as the starters. If any of those falter I think it will be Span.

Kubel will see a ton of fastballs this year. He has proven at all levels he can hit.

After watching Cuddyer strike out twice to start the season, let’s not throw out Delmon yet.

Cuddy’s only had one good year in his career and it was years ago.

ET

If you wanna throw out everybody who strikes out twice you will run out of players by mid April.

Cuddyer if you factor in defense, hitting, power, leadership and attitude is probably our best outfielder.

Lets remember Hernandez wasn’t some stiff off the street. He is Seattle’s number one starter.

I get your point, it’s just a little early in my opinion.

Cuddyer’s a good guy, I’m just not a big fan. Throw out 2006 when every Twin had a good year and he’s been very average.

Of course if Mauer had been playing last night he would have hit into a couple 6-4-3’s so striking out was actually an improvement.

Cuddy wasn’t the only one who failed to come thru in the clutch last night.

I dont like strike outs, but it is part of the game. I do get ticked watching Cuddy take 3 pitches looking and striking out late (8th I think) in the game.

If you are a 3 hitter, at least swing the bat. W/ Morneau hitting behind, you arent going to get pitched around. You will need to make some contact.

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I dont like strike outs, but it is part of the game. I do get ticked watching Cuddy take 3 pitches looking and striking out late (8th I think) in the game.

If you are a 3 hitter, at least swing the bat. W/ Morneau hitting behind, you arent going to get pitched around. You will need to make some contact.

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I’m not a huge Cuddyer fan but the Twins act like he is an all star caliber player. He has had one good year and is very good defensively. Somehow the Twins seem to think he should have his spot in the lineup cemented in forever. He gets a lot of free passes when other players are criticized for their approach at the plate. Kubel has been getting jerked around for years, including last year and Cuddyer continues to play everyday when healthy like he has proved something. It’s frustrating to me as a fan to see this. Kubel should play everyday at DH regardless of if a lefty or righty is pitching. If he gets 500 at bats he hits close to 30 homers.

In addition to Kubel, if you traded Garza and Bartlett for a guy you think has unlimited hitting potential in Young, then you play him. So he had only 10 hr’s last year and failed to wow anyone. He’s what 23-24 years old? So you bench him for a guy that averages 14-16 HR’s over his career in Cuddyer? Give me a break.

ET

Haven’t really begun to follow yet…. Is Neshek back for the pen ???

big G

I fully agree with all comments about Cuddyer…he is over rated by the Twins Brass, with the exception of his good arm in right.
Although I do believe Mr. Young has an excellent arm as well, and far more potential at the plate (In my opinion)

I belive Neshek is not back until next year, or very late this year…