Interview with a Wart

I was lucky enough to have the opportunity to chat with a new addition to the world of Twitter, @cuddyerswart -- someone who has some insider knowledge of Michael Cuddyer and the travails he's gone through to get in shape this Spring Training. I thought it would be interesting to hear his side of things and get a new (albeit awfully low to the ground) perspective.

CURVE: Mr. Wart, thanks for taking the time to chat with me, I'm sure you've got a particularly busy schedule what with Spring Training winding down.

WART: Not so much my schedule, I just hang around for the most part. It's Michael doing all the work, he's the real star. I'm just along for the ride.

CURVE: Well put. Tell us a little bit about your relationship with Michael, how things got started...

WART: Wow, that's a loaded question. I honestly don't remember how things went down -- it was just after getting knocked out of the playoffs, things weren't going too well. I think Michael was in a little bit of a funk. It was just one of those things -- two people in the right place at the right time, we kind of grew attached to each other. Perhaps some sort of a post-partem depression from baseball.

CURVE: I don't think I heard about your presence in his life until sometime during the Winter Meetings? I think we were all a little caught off guard in Twins Territory?

WART: I can see how that would happen. I think Michael actually wanted to let go at that point. Looking back perhaps I was becoming too clingy, it's one of those things seen a little easier in hindsight. But things went on a little longer than they should have, no one wants to be alone for the Holidays and all. In fact, I think the longer our relationship went on, the harder it was for us both to walk ... walk away I mean.

CURVE: What was the deciding factor for parting ways?

WART: He's kind of career driven. I think that was part of it for me at least. When the Twins front office stepped in and decided it was time to sever our relationship it was a little tough to say no. They basically just told him to cut me off. Freeze me out of his life. I was a little shocked, and I think he was too. It seems like it left a hole in both of our lives and we each sought out things to fill it. For him it was bandages and gauze, for me -- drugs, alcohol, and cheap pimples.

CURVE: Have you stayed in contact with Michael at all?

WART: These things linger on, they don't die quickly. We've had infrequent contact, only recently over Twitter. That was a defining moment in our friendship, I think, the fact that we can still stay in contact and let bygones be bygones.

CURVE: Do you have any complaints about your time together?

WART: Not complaints, per se. I think there's always things you'd want to change looking back on things. I think I held him back a little bit. Personally I hated how he would always wear tennis shoes after practice. We were in Florida, it was humid, I just wanted to breathe, I felt smothered. But really, if that's all you can find to complain about -- the guy's a gem, Claudia's a lucky lady and I really hate to think I ever might have got between them.

CURVE: Why a baseball player? Do you ever ask yourself that?

WART: I've always been a baseball fan. Sometimes I look back on the greatest moments in baseball -- Curt Schilling's bloody sock comes to mind -- and I think: that ... that's my future ... that's what I want to be remembered for. Blood on a sock in a baseball game. I guess it just wasn't meant to be.

Again, I'd like to thank @cuddyerswart for taking the time to answer these questions and being such a good sport!

The Cuddyer Trap

If there's one thing that sticks in my mind from the past month of this '09 campaign, it was the amazing performance of Michael Cuddyer. After Justin Morneau went down for the season and Twins fans everywhere began to throw in the towel, Michael Cuddyer went on a torrid streak of baseball hitting .279/.338/.582, while jolting 10 home runs to accompany his 29 RBIs. Those are some impressive numbers over the course of a month, and he did it all while playing out of position on the infield (where, come to mention, he provided stellar defense as well).

Recently, there's been some speculation in the blogging world -- and I'm sorry, I can't find the link -- that the Twins could be looking to lock up Michael Cuddyer for a lifetime contract this offseason.

Interesting.

My immediate reaction is that this would be a great chance for the Twins to showcase a commitment to keeping some of their core players and building a championship team. But the more I think about it, the more I wonder if this should really be a priority?

Yes, I think I'd love you as a career Twins player, but is that for the best right now?

Michael Cuddyer is a great player, especially on a Twins team that's almost devoid of veteran leadership and power-hitting outfielders. But neither of those traits are particularly hard to find in free agency, and unless Cuddyer comes at a lower price, why should we commit such a large chunk of payroll to it? This, especially, in the season in which we are trying to resign ultimately the best player in baseball to one of the most lucrative and perhaps cash-strapping contracts in Twins history?

Is it because of Baseball Unplugged?

I'm still hoping to go sometime, so I'd kind of like you to stick around. (Thanks for the photo, Betsy.)

The Twins shouldn't be in any rush to sign him long term this offseason, especially considering that they'd be signing him after he just had the hottest month ever in his career. He's still under contract for this season, and the Twins will undoubtedly be able to afford his option for 2011 (10.5 million).

Cuddyer has been in the majors since '01, but he only started getting regular playing time since '04, where he primarily started in the infield to rather unsuccessful results. His first full year in RF he rocketed out of his mediocre numbers to post a solid .284/.362/.504 while belting 24 HRs and 109 RBIs in '06. After his monster year, he was rewarded with a big 3-year contract and an option for 2011.

He went on to post a decent, if unspectacular season in '07, and an awful season in '08 hampered by numerous injuries, before turning it on again this year (though to be realistic, those numbers were significantly helped by that September onslaught he produced).

Grrr, onslaught, grrr.

Let's be clear, I'm not advocating letting Cuddyer go. I just don't think resigning him right now is the priority when he's already inked. We can afford to wait and see how 2010 goes for him, how much money it takes to resign Mauer (which had better be Bill Smith's priority), and get ourselves a look at players like Rene Tosoni and Chris Parmelee, who don't seem to be too far away and both could profile as corner outfielders.

I would argue that the outfield is still one of the richest areas for the Twins right now. Denard Span is probably the third, maybe the fourth best hitter on our team (debating how he ranks compared to Kubel). Young and Gomez both represent substantial investments and are both still young and relatively cheap -- hence, their presence on this team does not impede money we need to resign Mauer and shore up our entire infield left of Morneau. Even Kubel is, when not a DH, a corner outfielder. This just isn't an area of pressing concern in my mind right now.

But again, his leadership and clubhouse presence is substantial, especially if Redmond is gone next year. Cuddyer WILL be around in 2010, and he will almost certainly be around in 2011 as well. Let's focus on some players of more urgency this offseason.

Feel free to discuss, I'd love to hear your thoughts on how hard we should go after resigning Cuddyer this offseason.

Also, be sure to tune into the podcast Wednesday night as I join Jack Steal again -- this time it will be at 9PM Central, 10PM EST.

3 Things to be Thankful For

To be completely honest, it was a major let-down to not sweep the Tigers this weekend. That would have effectively put the nail in the coffin despite the fact that we still would have been 1 game behind. Regardless, a series win is a series win, and the Twins could have done a lot worse. 

What did this show Bill Smith, however? No clue. At times the Twins were firing on all cylinders, and at other times they looked utterly futile. I think it's safe to say that no reinforcements will be coming of any kind, and the current roster will have to continue to exceed expectations these next two weeks for us to have any chance. If you haven't yet read this article at Twins Fix though, do so and it will give you an interesting take on why we can take heart in the product we're currently putting on the field.

Still, this weekend showed us at least three things that we can take away and be thankful for going down the stretch:

1. Brian Duensing is amazing.

I don't know if anyone remembers this, but Duensing was essentially given up on earlier this year by everyone following this team. He did OK in Spring Training and made the team out of the bullpen due to the fact that Scott Baker needed some time to rehab from an injury. During his cup-of-coffee in the bigs at the beginning of the year he made a lone appearance against the White Sox in Chicago, where he pitched three innings and gave up two runs (via homer). He didn't see any more action with the big league club until July.

After a handful of appearances out of the pen to start July, he was forced to make a spot start against the White Sox (thanks to Glen Perkins and the omnipresent "shoulder injury"), where he pitched 5 solid innings to earn a no decision, although the Twins got a much needed win later in the game.

Due to all the upheaval in our starting pitching, Duensing finally joined the rotation full-time on August 22 in Kansas City, and since then he's rattled off 4 wins over 6 starts, lasting 7 innings in half of those starts, and blanking the A's over 7 innings and the Tigers over 6.1 innings in his past two.

Most likely, all the attention going into Friday night's game was focused on Porcello and the solid rookie season he's put together, but Duensing deserves special recognition for being so dependable after nearly being written off by an entire fan base. 

Some might forget that Duensing was actually selected to the Olympic team in Beijing to represent the United States, and although he only played in one game (out of the pen), he pitched 3.1 scoreless frames for the win against Canada.

It's hard to tell if his rockstar performance will continue for the duration (or into next year), but who would have predicted Denard Span to defy his minor league career numbers and become one of our most dependable players? Duensing's peripherals don't indicate that he's winning by smoke and mirrors -- his good numbers have been legitimate (and consequently I've added him to my fantasy roster for the final week just to try to capture some of this magic...)

2. Michael Cuddyer is a beast.

Michael Cuddyer's defensive and offensive proficiency while in the infield has always been a huge concern; thus his move to right field where he flourished. I'll admit, when I heard that Morneau was out for the season and Brock Peterson was not joining the team, I figured Cuddyer at 1B spelled doom for our chances. In truth, he's been more than adequate and I'll gently remove my foot from my mouth and take this opportunity to apologize for anything negative I've said about him.

Cuddyer is the glue holding this team together, and it's not just the magic tricks:

In fact, in the past 7 days he's hit .350/.350/1.050 with 4 HR and 11 RBI. Those are Mauer-like numbers. Those are Pujols-like numbers. Those are better than anything that even Morneau has shown us for a stretch in September.

Not to hype up my fantasy team, but I got a text in the middle of a game this weekend from the person I'm facing in the semi-finals, and he was clearly in awe of the numbers that Cuddyer's been posting (for my fantasy team...) this past week. He's turning heads, and at the right time of the season too. Perhaps it's because he was rewarded with his favorite candy.

For all the concentration Mauer, Morneau and Kubel get for this offense, Cuddyer is easily overlooked, including by me, and I'm glad he's finally enjoying the spotlight.

3. At least we're not the Tigers.

Yeah, OK, so they're in first place. I've seen this before. The Twins are clearly playing the best baseball of their season and they've saved it for the right time. The Tigers are struggling and scraping for every win right now, and I can't point to anyone on their team who I think will carry them to the post-season.

Sure, Ordonez has been doing well recently. Miguel Cabrera has been putting up typical numbers for himself as well. Verlander is as dominant as ever. But Ordonez and Cabrera were kept relatively silent this weekend, and the Twins eventually got to Verlander before he left on Saturday as well. The Twins are still 9-5 against the Tigers this year, and if you watch either of these teams play you can tell that the Twins are clicking and the Tigers look like they're struggling to stay relevant.

In some sense, for inconsistent and underperforming teams like the AL Central, it might almost be better to have something to chase after than to have something to hold on to, and as long as the Twins are still gaining ground, I think they have the upper hand.