World Of Worley: Week #2

Rock n fire, babe...

Hello again, Twins fans!  Welcome to the second edition of World Of Worley!

For those of you who are new to the game, here's what you're looking at:  The Twins season is long.  No, like, really long.  To help pass the time we've enlisted fake Twins starting pitcher Not Vance Worley to keep us updated on the Twins as they navigate the Road To .500!

So, Not Vance, how was your week?

Well hey everybody.  Sorry for the delayed post.  After getting shelled by the Mets this week Rick Anderson took away my internet privileges as punishment.

Fortunately, I figured out his password.  It was Carlpavano.  So I'm back now with my weekly recap.

April 8th, 2013: Kansas City

Well, after a nice weekend series in Baltimore we flew into Kansas City for a showdown against our division rivals.  Honestly, I've never been to Kansas City.  Did you know it's not actually in Kansas?  What the hell is that all about?


I did find out that the city of Kansas City takes a lot of pride in their cuisine.  When we got to the clubhouse before the game we found a beautiful spread of BBQ ribs, oven roasted potatoes, corn on the cob, and all the crystal meth we wanted!  I've never seen the guys so excited before a game.

Speaking of the game, the boys were going up against Ervin "Magic" Santana.  Now, Santana's a notorious first pitch-fastball pitcher.  Plus, if I remember the statistic correctly, he gave up an average of 11.5 home runs per nine innings last year, which seems like a lot, but this AL ball is new to me.

The boys were able to get a run in the first when the Supervillain (aka MF Doumit) drove in a run.  Unfortunately, the momentum was killed when he overran second base and got caught stranded.  It was a tough inning.  Especially considering that we wouldn't score another run the rest of the game.

I asked him about the baserunning gaffe after the game:

Me: Probably shoulda just held up at second, eh Supervillain?
Doumit: Hey bro, Day Glo, set the bet, pay dough, before the cheddar get away, you best to get Maaco
Me: Maaco, huh?  Good to know.

He's a strange guy.

Anyway, Kevin Correia ended up taking the loss.  It's a shame, because he pitched really great up through the 7th but then he got lit up in the 8th.  The media has questioned why Gardenhire didn't have anybody warming up.  Let me tell you how it went down.

Correia (stepping into the dugout after the 7th): Phew.  I'm not sure I've got another inning in me, skip.
Gardy: ...
Correia: Yeah, arm's tightening up a little bit.  Got through seven pretty good though.
Gardy: ...
Correia: Uh, skip?
Rick Anderson: What the hell are you doing, Correia?
Correia: Um... I was trying to tell Gardy that I don't think I have another inning in me.
Anderson: Listen, kid, Skip's had a lot of ribs. I wouldn't wake him up if I were you.
Correia: But Andy, I really don't think I can go back out.  Maybe we should get somebody loose?
Anderson: Hey, which one of us has the homo-erotic mustache here?
Correia: You, coach...
Anderson: That's right.  And that puts me in charge of the pitching staff.  Now stay loose.  Duensing's still all messed up from his "lunch" and Swarzak wore himself out chicken fighting with Perkins.

Swarzak and his horseplay.  When's he going to learn?

Anyway, tough loss, but the offense is showing some signs of life.  Should be a good series.

April 9th, 2013: Kansas City

Made a point of getting to the park a little bit early today.  I wanted to hang out around the cage and get to know some of these Royals since we'll be seeing so much of them over the course of the year.

I ended up having a real nice conversation withe their DH Billy Butler.

Me: Hey, Billy.  How ya doing today?
Butler: I'm alright.  You are?
Me: A tired Twitter premise, but that's neither here nor there.  Looks like you got a pretty good squad this year.
Bulter: Define "good."
Me: Um... better than average?
Butler: Shit, nobody here even remembers what "average" means in regards to a baseball team.  Honestly, the fans seem to love us as long we avoid spitting directly onto them.
Me: And when you do?
Butler: Hoo boy!  They... well... nothing really.  They've been broken, my friend.

That sure seemed to be the case during today's game.  My buddy Pelfrey got roughed up something fierce and the crowd spent a good part of the first inning googling the rules of baseball to see if you were actually allowed to score that early in the game.  All in all the Royals hung 5 on the board in the first.

The boys gave it a valiant effort, though.  Joey Mauer, Willy, & EDUARDO ESCOBAR! went deep, but all three were solo shots.  Turns out that when you give up five in the first inning three solo shots ain't gonna cut it.  Oh, we had a chance at the end of the game, but Joey Ba$eball struck out because we were playing in a goddamn monsoon.  Seriously, it was like The Ice Harvest out here, with Willy playing Billy Bob & Pelfrey playing John Cusack.  Tough loss.

April 10th, 2013: Kansas City

Shut out.  Shut. Out.  This won't do at all.


Oh sure, that same monsoon that ruined last night's rally was still roaring come game time, but that's no excuse for being shut out.  Hell, the Royals had to play in the same stuff.  Of course they were also facing Liam Hendricks, who'd give up at least three earned in earthquake.

After the game Liam said this to the papers:

""I went out there and I was feeling a little disoriented.  I wasn't feeling right. Once I got locked in it was better. It was just the one pitch which hurt.  I felt really good out of the stretch. The number of pitches, 96 in five innings, that's not a positive. Just the one home run, I was pleased, compared to the last time out. It was tough conditions today."

Look, Liam seems like a nice enough guy, but c'mon, bud.  How can you feel "pleased" when you don't walk off the field with a W?  And don't get me started on "felt really good out of the stretch."  That sounds like more of Rick Anderson speak.  How about this, maybe get a guy out every now and then so you can get comfortable pitching from a windup.  Christ, when every inning has you in the stretch after three pitches then yeah, you'll probably get pretty comfortable.


So, swept in KC.  In a monsoon.  Ugh... Can't wait to get back to Minneapolis tomorrow.  It'll be great to get out of this terrible weather and make a start against the terrible Mets.

April 11th, 2013: Off Day

My god!  Is this what every April is like in Minnesota?  How do you people live like this?  I'm definitely buying a jacket.

April 12th, 2013: Minneapolis

Alright, let me explain.

I was feeling real good going into this start.  Sure, it was fucking snowing, but evidently that's just all it does in this godforsaken city.  Sorry, I didn't mean that.  I get a little testy any day I can't get out of the second fucking inning!

I'll tell you what happened though.  Before the game I sat down with Pelfrey.  Figured since he used to play for the Mets he'd have some tips for me.

Me: Hey Mike, what do you got for scouting on these guys?
Pelfrey: Well, I'll tell you, as long as I was in New York it seemed like all you had to do was throw the ball over 85 and they'd miss it.
Me: C'mon, they can't be that bad.
Pelfrey: Let me just say this, I faked the whole ligament injury just to get away from this team.  I went through Tommy John surgery and the rehab unnecessarily just to get away from this awful team.
Me: Wow, that seems like a pretty horrible thing to do.
Pelfrey: You try living in Queens.

So I pretty much scrapped the game plan and just threw some bullets.  Let me tell you, Pelfrey wildly underestimated this squad.  Honestly, outside of David Wright I have no idea who any of these guys are, but 9 hits, 7 earned, 1.0 innings pitched is ugly.  Men lie, women lie, numbers don't.

Still looking for that first W with the TC on my cap.  Don't worry, Twins fans, it's coming.

April 13th, 2013: Minneapolis

Guess who's back!! 

That's right, Black Diamond is back on the hill!  The ace is back!  And not a moment too soon.  Being the "ace" of this staff was wearing me out.

Things were actually going pretty good for Scotty until the fourth inning when he gave up a home run to Marlon Byrd that landed at Graves 601.  Fortunately Gardy was awake enough to get Roenicke loose before Black Diamond completely fell apart.

Sharing the hill with Scotty was a kid called Matt Harvey.  Holy hell!  This kid's good.  He was throwing a no-hitter into the seventh until Morneau hit a foul-pole shot.  Morneau was feeling good about it after the game:

Reporter: Justin, tell us a bit about the home run.

Morneau: Well, I knouw he likes to throuw first pitch fast balls. I just tried to put a gooud swing on it.

Reporter: Did you think it was going to get out?

Morneau: I couldn't be sure, but from where I was standing it looked like it would cautch the foul poule. Stayed fair by just a meter or so.

Reporter: I hate Canadians.

Morneau: Alrighty.

April 14th, 2013: Game Cancelled

First thing I did when I woke up today was run into the kitchen and turn on the radio.  The sports guy was reading off the probable starters from around the league and then he said the words I was hoping for, "Mets at Minnesota: Cancelled."

I threw my blanket off!  Snow day!

And what a day it was.  Once we all made our phone calls via the Twins Snow Day phone tree Joey Mauer invited a bunch of us over to St. Paul.  We went sledding at Buck Hill, had a snowball fight, and drank hot cocoa until Joe's mom gave us rides home.  What a day.  Just what the team needed after going 0-5 this week.  I wish we could have snow days every day.

So that's the week.  It wasn't a good one, but Road To .500 is long and winding.  The Los Angeles Angels Of Anaheim California are in town next week.  We'll be back to our winning ways soon.

Record For The Week: 0-5

Record Overall: 4-7

There you have it, Twins fans!  A lackluster week for the hometown nine, but positivity abounds!

For more Not Vance Worley be sure to give him a follow on Twitter (@TinyVancer).

For more Newest Industry be sure to give us a follow on Twitter (@NewestIndustry1) to stay up on the work being done by all of our contributors.  More importantly, we have a Facebook page here.  Trivial as it seems, stopping by and giving us a "Like" is a free & legitimate way to support the blog.

World Of Worley: Hello Twin Cities!

And ya say Twins City!

Well hello, baseball fans!  Welcome to brand new column here on Newest Industry!

A lot of us here at Newest Industry are Twins fans.  As such, we were hoping to incorporate a weekly Twins column into our usual mix of posts.  We reached out to several people before finally finding somebody who was willing to embrace the challenge.

Ladies and gentlemen, please give a warm welcome to Newest Industry's newest contributor: Not Vance Worley!

We're planning on having Not Vance here all season, providing updates on the Twins season each Monday throughout the summer.

The season kicks off tomorrow, so we thought today would be a good time for our newest blogger to write his first column, introducing himself to our readers and Twins fans everywhere.

Not Vance, take it away!

Hello Twins fans!  You'll have to bear with me just a bit here, I've never been asked to write a blog before.  I guess I'd like to take a second to thank Newest Industry for inviting me to join their crew of bloggers for this season.  Despite their generally unkempt appearance they seem like nice enough folks.

So this is my first season with the Minnesota Twins.  I'm pretty excited.  I've heard that Minnesota has some of the best fans in the world.  Any fanbase that was willing to put up with Alexei Casilla for six years must have hearts of gold.

As most of you probably know, I spent the last couple of  seasons with the Philadelphia Phillies.  I had some great times in Philly before getting injured last season.  I won't get into all the specifics, but let me be the first to tell you, you haven't lived until you've experienced one of Jimmy Rollins' "Cheesteak Parties."  I'd tell you about them, but everybody who attends one has to sign a legal waiver banning them from discussing what goes on at the party.  Let me just say this, nobody knows a Philly cheesesteak like Jimmy Rollins knows his cheesesteak.

But, that's in the past.  I'm here in Minneapolis now and I'm looking forward to helping the Twins get back to their winning ways.  I know that a lot of people were skeptical of Terry Ryan for trading Ben Revere for me.  I can understand that.  Let me just throw a couple of numbers at you:

Ben Revere HR total for 2012: 0
My HR total for 2012: 0

Think about that for a second.  I think you made the right move, Minnesota.  I know there's a lot of skepticism about our team this year, but let me tell you, we are .500 bound!  We play in a division with the Royals and Indians, right?  How could we not get to .500?

Spring training down in Fort Meyers has been a blast.  I thought a fun thing for us to do to kick off the blog would be for me to tell you a little bit about my new teammates.  Some of you probably know them better than I do, but that's part of the fun!

Let's have a look at the managers and the lineup first!

Manager Ron Gardenhire:  I was impressed with Gardy from the first time I met him.  His ability to scratch off lottery tickets using the cap from his Budweiser was particularly impressive.  I've never seen anybody scratch off so many lotto tickets in one sitting!  Truly a player's coach.

Pitching Coach Rick Anderson: I spent a lot of time with Coach Rick during the spring trying to get my arm back up to speed. He seems nice enough, but he has this pitching strategy that involves trying to get the batter to make contact with the pitch.  Seems kind of counter-intuitive to me.  I typically plan on striking out everybody that I face.  I learned that from Roy Halladay.  I think I'm gonna stick with that for a while.

Catcher Joe Mauer: Everybody knows Joe Mauer around the league, but let me tell you, few people really know Joe Mauer.  When I arrived in Fort Myers he gave me a gift basket filled with Head & Shoulders shampoo, Kemps whole milk, and a note that read, "Shake me off and I'll have you in Rochester before the 7th inning.  Sincerely, Rubber Band Man."  It was surprising, and a little unpleasant, considering the milk had evidently just been sitting out for days.

First Baseman Justin Morneau: I was super excited to meet Justin Morneau when I got to Florida.  I remember watching him win the MVP award during my senior year of high school.  He was such a monster that year.  It was cool meeting him, though for the first two weeks of spring training I think he thought I was Devin Setoguchi.  He kept telling me the Vancouver Canucks were going to run away with the division.  Being the new guy I didn't want to argue with him. The only way to get him to stop was to get him to face the sun and hope a headache took hold.

Second Baseman Brian Dozier: The Bull-Dozier seems like a good kid.  Lot of energy and lots of fire.  His passion reminds me of Chase Utley back when he was still alive.

Shortstop Pedro Florimon: Even though I don't speak much Spanish and Pedro doesn't speak much English it's important for a pitcher and his shortstop to develop chemistry.  I figured the best way to share who I was with him would be to give him a good old "Sacramento Hello."  For those who don't know, this is a tradition among those of us from Sacramento. Basically, you sneak up on a guy in the middle of the night, duct tape his mouth, tie up his hands, cover his eyes, put a Vlade Divac jersey on him just start whaling away on some cowbells.  Pedro seems genuinely terrified of me now, but deep down I think he appreciates the gesture.

Third Baseman Trevor Plouffe: I never actually got to meet Trevor.  I saw him sitting across the locker room from me, but every time he got up to come over and introduce himself he'd strain his quad and have to sit back down.  Maybe we'll get to know each other in Minnesota.

Left Fielder Josh Willingham: Looking at last year's Twins team I saw that Josh had a big year for the club.  Since he's the team's offensive leader I thought it would be important to get to know him, but when I went over to meet him all he said was, "Great, another fucking new guy.  Listen, whoever you are, I don't know why I'm still on this team and you can bet your ass I won't be here come August."  When I explained that I was the new pitcher he said, "Oh, the guy they traded my center fielder for?  You know how much more running I'm going to have to do because of you?  For every ball hit to the left-center gap while you're pitching you owe me $4,500.  I suggest striking out everybody."  Seems like we're on the same page.

Center Fielder Aaron Hicks:  Man, this kid went nuts this spring!  Home runs, gappers, stolen bases, scoring runs... Plus, he's a fellow California boy, which is nice.  People have been telling me that Minnesota weather is tough on people from California, so I'm glad I'll have another homeboy there to lean on.  I've heard it sometimes gets down to 50 degrees!  In the spring!  Crazy!

Right Fielder Chris Parmelee: Meeting Chris Parmelee was great!  This guy is so talented!  Not only a big league ballplayer, but he's great as Dr. Spaceman on my all time favorite show 30 Rock!

Designated Hitter Ryan Doumit: Doumit's a strange guy.  First time I met him he demanded that I refer to him as The Supervillain and told me that, "just because someone wears a mask doesn't mean he done something automatically..."  That seemed reasonable, but then he put on his metal mask and disappeared for the rest of spring training.  Like I said, strange guy.





So that's the lineup.  I'm excited to watch those guys.  Top to bottom they're easily one of the top five lineups in the AL Central.

Now, on to my kind of guys, the pitchers!

Starting Pitcher Mike Pelfrey:  Mike and I actually got to know each other pretty well last year as we each spent the season living in NL East DL purgatory!  We would have nice long chats about how bad our arms hurt and who's lineup was worse defensively so it was probably a moot point that we weren't pitching.  There's no bond stronger than the shared bond of lowered expectations.  He's really bounced back this spring though.  I think getting out of Queens was probably good for him.  He told me that getting out of Queens is good for everybody.

Starting Pitcher Kevin Correia: Another new guy here in Minnesota.  Seems like a nice guy, but let's just say that guys batting averages jump up a couple of points just by making eye contact with him.  Just try not to get hurt out there, bud!

Starting Pitcher Scott Diamond: Scott made a point of coming up to me on the first day of spring training to, "make a couple of things clear.  First off, I'm the ace of this staff.  If you think you're coming in here and taking my spot you got another thing coming.  Second, you call me 'Black Diamond.'"  I was surprised by the nickname.  "'Black Diamond,' like the KISS song?" I asked.  "Well, kinda.  The KISS song, but not the KISS version.  The Replacements version on Let It Be is kind of the one I took the name from."  I told him that's a lot to ask of a nickname, but he assured me that most of the people in Minneapolis get it right away.  In fact, most don't even know it's KISS song.

Starting Pitchers Liam Hendricks & Cole De Vries:  If you can tell which of these guys is which you're a better man than me.

The Bullpen: A bunch of guys who aren't good enough to take a job from Kevin Correia.  No sense discussing them.

So that's my first impression of the team.  The Road To .500 starts tomorrow afternoon at Target Field with yours truly throwing bullets!  Looks like the game time temperature is going to be in the high 30's, but there'll be so much heat coming off me that you can probably wear t-shirts.

Talk to you next Monday!

There you have it, folks!  The very first edition of World Of Worley from our newest contributor Not Vance Worley!  Be sure to check back each Monday as Not Vance recaps the week and scouts out the week ahead!

For more Not Vance Worley, be sure to give him a follow on Twitter (@TinyVancer).  The next person to follow him will be the first!

For more Newest Industry, be sure to give us a follow on Twitter (@NewestIndustry1) to stay up on the work being done by all of our contributors.  More importantly, we have a Facebook page here. Trivial as it seems, stopping by and giving us a "Like" is a free & legitimate way to support the blog.