I recently noted over at Howard's blog that Punto reminded me of Juan Castro in the field. Here's what I said:

I hope the stats-only people use this as a lesson about the value of intangibles, and that everyone understands intangibles cut both ways.

Gee, I didn’t realize fundamentals were intangible. I’m sure there’s some way you can measure them. How about tallying every play Punto makes with his showboating, freewheeling style? Then you could count the plays he does not make (errors, getting picked off, etc.) and do a ratio. My point is, playing good fundamental baseball is not like “clubhouse chemistry” or “leadership” or whatever. It is something you can see with your own two eyes, which I think is the definition of tangible.

BTW, I blame Castro for some of this. Yesterday, Gladden made a comment about a ball Castro let roll under his glove that resulted in the home-town scorer giving Cuddyer a hit. He said Castro was “going for style points” rather than making the routine play, which was my biggest complaint about him when he played here. I think Punto’s game changed when he played with Castro: He realized that style counts in the eyes of coaches and fans. If Castro could keep his position on style alone, it could work for Punto. And it has worked for Punto: He is called a “gold-glove caliber” fielder at every position despite mediocre numbers. Why? He goes for style points, which leave a good impression in the minds of coaches and fans despite the numbers.

Thinking about Castro's defense triggered a memory of those two months in 2006 when the infield looked awful. Castro had 10 errors and several nonerrors in that stretch, many of them on throws. He was a surprise choice to start considering that he only played in five games in spring training, having played for Mexico in the WBC. It was especially surprising he was handed the job because he didn't play at all in the WBC because of a shoulder problem, which he apparently hid from the Twins staff. But he couldn't hide it from me. He had nothing on his throws and I swear I saw him pick up his glove on several occasions in the hole rather than embarrass himself with a weak throw. He also altered his style to run around the ball and get behind his throws more, earning him style points but also failing to record outs because the new style took him so much time to get the ball over to first on the fly.

Fast forward to this year and watching Punto, I'm seeing some of the same tendencies. And it's most apparent recently, when he has to muscle it over there just to get it on the fly. Morneau has saved him errors on balls in the dirt more times than I can keep track of. And makeable double plays seem to evaporate as his ball hangs in midair while the runner flashes by the screen safe.

So the theory is he has some kind of arm problem that he hasn't told the coaches about and it's hurting this team. Another telltale sign is his hitting. He's hitting much better from the right side of the plate than the left, an indication that his throwing shoulder is bothering him.

What I don't get is we have two healthy shortstops sitting on the bench and it's apparent to me that he's not 100 percent. So why keep playing him?