March 16, 2011 – I headed out to the Hammond Stadium today hoping to meet up with JC of Knuckleballs who just got into town the other day. Since we had not met before I had no idea who I was looking for and I had no cell number to reach JC but I did give JC my cell number and I was hoping he would call me. Well, to make a long story short, I ended up in a nice conversation with former GM Terry Ryan and during that conversation someone else joined us but we never introduced ourselves. After the conversation we each ended up going our separate ways and when I got back to the house I sent JC an e-mail saying it was too bad we did not hook up. This evening I checked my e-mail and I have a note from JC with a picture attached, the picture was of Ryan and I talking and JC was the guy that had joined us. What a small world indeed.
The conversation with Terry Ryan was very interesting, the man has been on the road all spring and today was the first day that he had really spent any time at Hammond Stadium at all. He said he is doing way more traveling than he did when he was the GM. I asked him a number of questions about numerous players but since I did not tell him up front that I was a blogger I do not think it is fair to write what he had to say in detail. But I think it is fair for me to say that he feels that Revere needs to keep playing and not sit on a Twins bench. Ryan mentioned that the Twins are not looking to trade a starting pitcher unless a need develops that needs to be corrected at some position because the chance of injury to starters is always there. Ryan reemphasized that the Twins like Diamond and that you need to be patient with Rule 5 pick-ups, using Johan Santana as an example. Terry also went into detail explaining that Alexi Casilla has all the tools to do the job at short, he just needs to grab the bull by the horns and get it done (my words). I really enjoy talking to Terry Ryan whenever I get the chance, he will always tell you what he thinks and he will challenge you if he thinks you are off base.
Other than that, there was nothing out of the ordinary going on since the Twins were playing the Mets at home today. I spent some time watching TK and Rick Anderson hold some pitcher fielding drills but other than that most of my time was spent watching the minor leaguers. We are getting to a point in spring training now where the open position battles are going full tilt and the Twins walking wounded are starting to see some game action, the only non participant so far continues to be Michael Cuddyer but hopefully he will be in action soon too.