Who do you think the hardest throwers are that have been on the Twins the past handful of seasons or so? One thing is safe to say; if Joel Zumaya throws even a single pitch in the regular season in 2012, he'll probably vault to the top of the list. That got me thinking: Who are the 20 hardest throwers in Twins history, at least as far as we can get good, reliable data on?

Continue reading this post »

I wanted to post my first article in a series examining the 500 HR club tonight, but life has gotten in the way. In lieu of that, which will be gotten to later this week, I present you with a little bit of Sunday night entertainment: a caption contest.

Tonight's contest has no prize. Unless you consider being funny and making your fellow community members chuckle, and perhaps hit the much-desired "Rec" button, a prize. Hast thou the stones?

As many of you remember, we're running a contest through New Years Eve.  Our goal is to get as many Facebook "likes" as we can, and to encourage and reward all you fine people we're giving away Twins stuff at certain benchmarks.  As of right now we're sitting at 651 likes, which is pretty impressive considering how recently we added our official page!

That means, of course, that we've crossed the first threshhold for our giveaway!  As a reminder, those threshholds are...

500 - 1999 likes:  Twins jersey t-shirt of the player of the winner's choice ($25 value)
2000 - 9999 likes:  Twins hooded sweatshirt ($75 value)
10,000 - 39,999 likes:  Twins replica jersey of a player of the winner's choice ($129 value)
40,000 + likes:  Twins authentic jersey of the winner's choice  ($250 value)

Our first winner is:

Dustin J (aka The Dman)!

Congrats, Dustin!

Our next level is 2000 "likes".  I know that's going to be a hard run, but I'd love to make it so we can give away that Twins hooded sweatshirt.  So check us out on Facebook, like us if you haven't already, and be sure to tell your friends.  All of you are the reason Twinkie Town is such a great place to talk Twins, and we couldn't be as successful as we are without you.

Finally, if you're on Twitter, be sure to follow us there, too.  We automatically post notifications of our new stories (and most FanShots), we engage in a lot of Twins talk, and just have a lot of fun in general.

That's it folks, enjoy your Wednesday night!

This could either be an exercise in accepting reality, or an excuse for the dreamers to compile a mysteriously affordable team of All-Stars, but ultimately this is your chance to flex your creative powers to solve the Twins' off-season questions.  Which is what I want it to be.

If you've read the 2010-11 TwinsCentric Offseason Handbook, you'll have seen that John, Nick, Parker and Seth all outlined their blueprints for the 2011 campaign.  Names like Jorge De La Rosa, Derek Lowe, Coco Crisp and others manage to make their ways onto the Twins roster in one way or another, and suffice it to say I'm not the only one who likes the idea of Derrek Lee.

Between their blueprints, or even the plan I drew up last week if you haven't picked up the Handbook yet, you have the basis for your plan:  make decisions on your free agents and arbitration-eligible players, and put together a complete and competetive club with a payroll that doesn't exceed $115 million.

Over the next few days, come up with your own plans in a FanPost.  I'd love to see what you all come up with.  The best ones will be promoted to the front page, where the efforts of the author will be put on full display for the world (or, at the very least, the Twins blogosphere) to admire.

As a baseline for salaries that are Twins-related, check out TwinsGeek's post from last month called The Party Is Over.  As a baseline for free agents, try to be realistic.  You can use the numbers from the TwinsCentric Handbook, or you can take your own best guess.

Sources you might like to use:
Twins' contract statuses
2010-2011 free agents
FanGraphs

Good luck!  Let's see what you've got!

We know there's not a lot going on in the world of Twins baseball right now.  Over the next couple of weeks that won't change too much, although we will endeavor to keep you entertained nevertheless.  But as we wait for the Rangers and Giants to face off in the World Series, and as we wait for the off-season to officially begin...we thought it might be a good idea to give you a chance to win more free stuff.  How does that sound to pass the time?

While Jon, Adam, Stu, Beau, Roger, James, Trevour and I try to bring you balanced, diverse and (generally) informed commentary, we all recognize that it's all of you who make this community what it is.  And in an attempt to continue to bring people into the conversation, we've spread ourselves to Facebook.

Facebook is The Social Network (see how that works on multiple levels?), with more than 500 million users worldwide.  Most people I know are on it in some capacity, whether that's to keep in contact with their friends and family, to brag about their kids or simply to waste time by playing games.  Certainly nobody uses it to use up time at work.

On our Facebook page we'll be sharing the stories that appear on our front page here at Twinkie Town, sharing links to other baseball and/or amusing stories, and generally just finding another way to engage with you.  That's one of the great things about Facebook--it makes interaction easy.  It's one more way for you to stay in touch with Twinkie Town, and we want to make it worth your while.

By "liking" us on Facebook (either scroll down the page and like us directly from here, or you can follow the link above and like us right on our Facebook page), you enter yourself into a drawing for a prize.  Once we reach each level, we'll hold a drawing and select a winner.  Here are the levels and prizes:

500 - 1999 likes:  Twins jersey t-shirt of the player of the winner's choice ($25 value)
2000 - 9999 likes:  Twins hooded sweatshirt ($75 value)
10,000 - 39,999 likes:  Twins replica jersey of a player of the winner's choice ($129 value)
40,000 + likes:  Twins authentic jersey of the winner's choice  ($250 value)

The only other rule:  this contest only runs until December 31, 2010.  This means we're running on a limited time schedule, people!  So if you don't like us yet, get on it.  If you already like us, recommend us to your friends.  Right now we're sitting at 325 likes, so I have no doubt we'll reach level one.  But I'd like nothing better than for us to reach 40,000+ likes, no matter how incredibly out of reach that might seem.

Stick with us this winter, and hopefully we'll be bringing you more contests to help keep your Twins-lovin' hearts warm no matter how cold it gets outside.

Official contest rules below the jump.

Continue reading this post »

First off, thanks for the turnout yesterday!  We had quite a few FanPosts to choose from, which is great, so thanks to those of you who took time out of your day to contribute.

Here are our three finalists:

1. Target Field at 30,000 Feet by ColossusOfRhode
2. NASA Unveils Plan to Head Off "Scott Baker Effect" by FoulJack
3. A-Rod:  A Tale of Forbidden Love by what_would_gil_thorpe_do

Once agian, this is for commemorative artwork which celebrates 50 years of Twins baseball, by local artist Karl Jaeger.  Visit ArtByASI.com for more, or head over to Twins Baseball.

Be sure to check out all of our FanPosts, but read all three of our finalists' submissions before voting.  Polls close at 11pm, so tell family and friends!

For the three of you up for the prize--I'll contact the winner by email this weekend.  Feel free to promote yourself via Twitter, Facebook, your mom, whatever.  Good luck!

Today's your chance to shine, by showing Twinkie Town and Twins fans how creative and funny you are.  We're running the Best FanPost competition, of which you can find more details here.  A few other bits of info after the jump!

Continue reading this post »

On Thursday morning, when we hope the Twins will be up one game to none over the Yankees, we'll run our third and final contest for a print by local artist Karl Jaeger.  For everything you need to know, read this.  As always, thanks to Karl and Aaron from Five Technology for choosing to work with Twinkie Town.

What you see on your right is what you have the opportunity to win.  Over the next few weeks, we'll be running three contests with the end result being that the winner of each contest will win a print.  Each print retails for $30.00 and measures 18" x 22", and is printed on fine art paper.  It features the greatest players in Twins history along with an image of Target Field from Opening Day with the Amerian flag across the outfield and F-16s flying overhead.

Our contest, just like the first one, will be for the best FanPost.

Between 5am and 11pm central time on Thursday, submit the best FanPost you can come up with.  It can be on anything you like--analysis, numbers, something funny, opinion, it's completely up to you.

By Friday morning at 9am the Twinkie Town administrators will have selected three finalists, who will be put to a public vote.  Voting finishes at 11pm Friday night.  I will notify the winner by email on Saturday.  It's simple, quick, and you get something that's pretty damn cool for free.

By the way, if you want to check out the prints and framing options for yourself, you can check out ArtByASI.com or Twins baseball.

So get planning!

Official contest rules are below the jump.

Continue reading this post »