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LOREN OMOTO: Well, the Minnesota Twins are back in town, and they're getting ready for tonight's season opener against the Oakland Athletics over at the Metrodome. Also back with us for another season is our baseball commentator, sportswriter Howard Sinker of the Minneapolis Star Tribune. Good morning, Howard.

HOWARD SINKER: Good morning, Loren. Good to be here.

LOREN OMOTO: Well, it's good to have you back, I got to tell you. You've been watching the Twins from-- you watched them down in Florida. You've been watching them prepare for this season opener. What can we look for this year as far as bright spots in the Twins? It's always good to start off on the optimistic side.

HOWARD SINKER: Well, I think the first thing that's really nice about being here is that the weather is so much nicer than it's been in Orlando the last couple of weeks.

LOREN OMOTO: A great day for baseball, yeah.

HOWARD SINKER: Yeah, Orlando was doing a pretty good imitation of Duluth in November. Cold, gray, blustery skies. It wasn't in anybody's best interest.

And I think by the weekend, people were pretty sick of spring training. I really think, and as you know, we're not real big on optimism in this corner. The Twins are not going to be a bad team this year.

LOREN OMOTO: That's a kind of qualified answer.

HOWARD SINKER: Well, I know. I mean, I'm not going to sit here right now and say, hold open those October dates for playoff and World Series tickets. But this isn't a bad little group. They've made some moves in the offseason to improve the roster. Obviously, Jeff Reardon helps.

Obviously, Dan Gladden should help. More discreetly, guys like Al Newman and Tom Nieto give them dimensions that were lacking, I think, in the very dog days, the German shepherd days of last summer. This is a team that will not finish 20 games under 500, I promise you that, and has a pretty good chance to make things somewhat interesting for most of the season.

LOREN OMOTO: Well, yet again, we've got some new leadership. We got Tom Kelly as manager and some changes in the front office there. What kind of effects is that likely to have?

HOWARD SINKER: I think that the revolving door in the front office has kind of put the notice to some players that you produce, or maybe you'll produce next year in Nova Scotia or something. I think that we've got a front office in the Twin Cities now that will not tolerate the mediocrity as readily as its predecessors did.

LOREN OMOTO: Is it the front office that's responsible for that though, or is that more the fans doing and the whole town?

HOWARD SINKER: Oh, the fans, over the years, the Twin Cities has a reputation for not really caring one way or the other, whether the Twins are good or bad, as long as they provide a piece of entertainment here and there. The fans always have the option of not showing up at the games, and the front office realizes that that's the best statement they can make.

LOREN OMOTO: How about Tom Kelly? What do you think of him so far?

HOWARD SINKER: I think that Tom Kelly has the respect of the players, which is something that Ray Miller didn't always succeed at. Kelly, I think, is a sleeper as a manager. People don't realize that he's as astute a baseball guy as he is.

He was a terrible player. I mean, here's a guy who had one career home run off Vern Ruhle, spent 10 years in the minor leagues, learned how to play first base just so he could get to the majors. I mean, the guy had to learn something while he was sitting on the bench all those years.

LOREN OMOTO: Yet a lot has been made about the fact that he's a former Twin and knows whereof he speaks and that kind of thing.

HOWARD SINKER: Well, former Twin, 1975, 50 games, most of them again on the bench. It's not like hiring Kent Hrbek to manage the team in 1987 or 1997.

LOREN OMOTO: Didn't exactly come back to his alma mater, in other words.

HOWARD SINKER: No.

LOREN OMOTO: Now, the big weak spot for the Twins last year, obviously, the pitching. Have they shored that up this year?

HOWARD SINKER: Jeff Reardon should make each of the starters look a little bit better. It's funny, the problem now, or the perceived problem, really is in the starting rotation. The Twins have to hope that Blyleven and Viola can at least push 20 game seasons, get up to 18 and 19 mark and that Mike Smithson improves on his dreadful 1986.

Then your other two starters, Mike Smithson or Mark Portugal and Les Straker, just are totally unknown quantities. Straker allowed one hit to the Gophers last night, but those were the Gophers.

LOREN OMOTO: Well, do they have the potential there for being a crack starting lineup for the Twins?

HOWARD SINKER: They do, yeah. I mean, the potential is always there. You don't want to go into the--

LOREN OMOTO: I suppose it its.

HOWARD SINKER: You don't want to go into the season saying, oh, these guys can't do it, or else they probably wouldn't be here. This is a front office, I think, with MacPhail and Bob Gebhard that if they had felt these guys were terrible, they would have looked elsewhere for pitching the last couple of weeks before the season started.

LOREN OMOTO: What, he just said, hang the cost, we don't care what we have to pay. We need some great pitching?

HOWARD SINKER: They could have done that. Well, let's keep it in perspective. No. Anything short of going out and acquiring those high-priced free agents. We all know Rich Gedman couldn't help the Twins or Ron Guidry. I mean, we just know that, don't we?

LOREN OMOTO: OK, OK. Well, let's see now. Let's take a look at the defense on the Twins. A weak spot that's been talked about a lot so far has been at catcher. Any possible solution there?

HOWARD SINKER: I think it's a signal from Kelly to his team that Nieto is going to start tonight. Nieto is a career 230 hitter, but also has a reputation for being a reasonably good defensive catcher who calls a very good game. And I think what Kelly is saying to Laudner and Salas is if you want to play, watch to see how this guy works behind the plate.

LOREN OMOTO: How about in the outfield? As late as last night, apparently, Kelly is still flipping coins or moving people around and trying to decide who's going to start in the outfield, who's going to DH.

HOWARD SINKER: Well, he has five outfielders, and none of them are terrible defensive players. I mean, there's no Billy Beane out there who can't throw or a Mickey Hatcher who makes the easy plays look difficult. And I think his dilemma there is more who to play and how to work them all in, and how to keep them somewhat fresh, and how to keep them somewhat efficient, both at the plate and in the field.

LOREN OMOTO: So even with the Hatcher business, we're going to be OK?

HOWARD SINKER: The Twins should be-- the Twins, I think, are a better team. I mean, as much as Mickey Hatcher was a wonderful human being and could hit singles in his sleep, I think the Twins are better off without him.

It pains me to say that because Mickey was really one of my favorite guys to have around, but it reached a time where he wasn't going to play every day and he wasn't going to get-- he wasn't going to be satisfied sitting on the bench.

LOREN OMOTO: If you had to characterize this team in a couple of well-chosen adjectives, what would they be?

HOWARD SINKER: How about let's see now. Why don't you ask me again in six months?

LOREN OMOTO: OK, OK.

HOWARD SINKER: That's a chicken way out, isn't it?

LOREN OMOTO: Fair enough, fair enough. And your pick for the Twins? We have to get that from you at the beginning of the season for their finish this year.

HOWARD SINKER: I'll say third right now, just because I think that the Texas Rangers, who everybody loves as a pre-season pick, I think they're a fraud.

LOREN OMOTO: OK. And they will finish above 500, you think? Even in this--

HOWARD SINKER: A little bit to. Let's say 82 and 80 right now.

LOREN OMOTO: All right. Thanks for being with us, and we'll talk to you again.

HOWARD SINKER: OK.

LOREN OMOTO: All right. Howard Sinker, our morning edition baseball commentator. He's a sports writer for the Minneapolis Star Tribune.