By Jon Laging

Terry Ryan and the Minnesota Twins tested the Laws of Probability last fall and early winter.

First, they picked up Carlos Silva&8217;s option for another year. Then signed free agent Ramon Ortiz and rescued Sidney Ponson with a minor league contract.

Ryan was gambling with his pitching staff or to put it another way, he was testing the Laws of Probability. Probability by one definition is, &8220;using a number of disciplines to draw conclusions as to something occurring.&8221; Most of us are not able to use mathematical theory or other sciences to help determine choices. Just as well for if we were, we would probably spend most of our time at the blackboard and never get anything done.

What you&8217;re attempting to do is evaluate something that is very difficult to pin down. For example, assigning a value to each portion that make up the whole. Some baseball scouts do this to a degree, trying to put a total value on a prospect by saying he has a 10 arm, eight speed, five power eight character. They add the figures up and if the prospect meets the bottom line expectation, they try to sign him.

Now life or people are not that simple and the person in question may have many things occur in his life that are very difficult to measure. He may have a growth spurt, he may get depressed, he may have an accident and his value as a baseball player takes a nosedive.

Ryan had many considerations when he looked at shoring up his pitching staff. My simplistic look at the laws of probability is that if Ryan signed three suspect pitchers and two succeed he should be congratulated.

I believe Terry Ryan thinks long and hard before he makes his moves. And while I doubt he used mathematics I think he did informally invoke the laws of probability. What has been their career record? What has been their recent record? What has been their ERA? Then Ryan finds himself on less firm ground. What kind of defense did their teams have? Although a team&8217;s defense can be measured to a degree by using something called sabremetrics, which not only tells you the number of errors, but also the number of balls hit that the defense is able to turn into outs. If a defense is able to turn 72 percent of balls hit into outs over a season, that is certainly better than 65 percent.

Ryan then tried to find the will to succeed each pitcher has and what kind of teammate he would make. Then scouting reports: Did he still have his fastball etc.? Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, is he affordable? Now Ryan had his toughest task and one that divides the good general manager from the bad one. He had to blend all these attributes, some good and some bad and made a decision. To hire or not hire.

Obviously the good outweighed the bad on Silva, Ortiz and Ponson. Trying to get in Terry Ryan&8217;s head is hard, but I think in Ponson&8217;s case the cost was so little that the downside was minimal. With Silva, one of the positives was that he was already a Minnesota Twin. He is a good guy and Johan Santana&8217;s close friend. Also he had good years previously with the Twins and his arm was still strong. Ryan took a look at Ramon Ortiz, noted there was nothing wrong with him physically and he was an innings eater. He appeared to be a stable big league pitcher. Not only that, he had many favorable reports on his personality and enthusiasm. It looked like he would be a good Minnesota Twin.

Terry Ryan had an ace in the hole in the three gambles with pitching coach Rick Anderson, who is known for salvaging major league pitchers. At this juncture it looks like at least two of Ryan&8217;s choices will work out. I&8217;m not sure, but I think that exceeds the laws of probability.

Jon Laging writes a regional commentary from his home in Preston.