Minnesota Twins

The Minnesota Twins announced today that they have reached a three-year contract extension with manager Paul Molitor.

In his three seasons since becoming the Twins manager, Molitor is 227-259. That includes two seasons in which they were above .500. They were 83-79 in 2015, and this year's squad went 85-77. Of course, we also have to mention the 103-loss 2016 season in his resume.

Improvement was the story of the 2017 Minnesota Twins. From 103 losses to 85 wins; from worst team in baseball to a postseason berth. It was a year-to-year jump like none we've ever seen in this franchise's history.

Many different players contributed to this seismic upswing with their own individual progressions, making this first Twins Daily Award a tough one. As you'll see, there was plenty of diversity on the ballots, but in the end, one player stood out as a fairly clear choice.

The last few years, I have done preseason predictions in March. The last couple of years, I thought it would be fun to take a look back at those predictions and compare them to what actually happened. While I tend to be optimistic, my 2016 predictions were generally way too optimistic. I have no problem admitting my mistakes!

Keep on reading to see if I was over-optimistic again in 2017 or if my predictions proved fairly accurate. Be sure to click into each player’s projection page and see if you left any comments with your predictions to see how you did at the time.

UPDATE (5:30 p.m. on Thursday) - According to Charley Walters (former Twins pitcher and Pioneer Press writer), Paul Molitor WILL return to the Twins under a new contract. A tweet from Mike Berardino said 'I'm told Paul Molitor has indeed been invited back for 2018, but source w/direct knowledge says 'nothing has been decided or agreed to' yet.
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When Paul Molitor was hired as the Twins manager, he was given a three-year contract. His contract ran through this season, so he is technically approaching free agency. The legend from St. Paul has been in the Twins organization for most of the nearly 20 years since he retired from his Hall of Fame career.

Derek Falvey and Thad Levine took the helm of their new positions with the understanding that Paul Molitor would be the manager for at least the 2017 season, finishing his contract. That season is now over and the front office must decide whether they want to keep Molitor as manager or bring in their own choice for skipper.

And so it ends. We saw the 2017 Minnesota Twins put together the greatest bounce-back season in team history, but just because this team would never say die didn’t mean it could live forever. As a way to look back on what was an unforgettable season, here is every game recap published at Twins Daily this season all in one place. I’ve also highlighted my personal top-10 moments and added some brief notes.

The 2017 Minnesota Twins season came to an end last night in The Bronx with yet another loss to the New York Yankees in the playoffs. Following the game, Aaron Gleeman went into the KFAN studio and took phone calls from Twins fans for well over an hour with Eric Nordquist.

The Twins Geek called in from Yankees Stadium after the game to discuss the game and the atmosphere, as well.

You can listen by downloading us from iTunes, Stitcher or find it at GleemanAndTheGeek.com. Or just click this link.

The Twins lost the Wild Card game. The circumstances in which it happened were pretty tough to swallow. This isn’t the kind of thing that’s easy to react to right away. Time is going to heal wounds and the good memories are going to outlast the bad ones, but right now … well, in the wise words of Joe Mauer “This sucks right now.”

On Monday in New York City, the focus was on the 0-4 New York Giants, with a small portion left for the surprising “success” of the 2-2 Jets.

But as Tuesday drew closer, the focus turned to the Baby Bombers and their Wild Card matchup with the Twins. How do Gotham’s writers and fans see this game? You can start below...

Believe it or not, Tuesday’s match-up between the Twins and the Yankees will be the sixth AL Wild Card game. Major League Baseball expanded their playoff format in 2012 to add more drama with a one-game playoff to decide who would move on to face the best regular season team. There has been some drama and plenty of story-lines.

Are there any trends that can be found in the previous games? Let’s take a look back.

The Minnesota Twins 2017 season is done. 162 games down and somewhere between one and 14 postseason games left to play.

As the BBWAA does, our Twins Daily writers were asked to vote by the end of the regular season (Sunday) for our annual postseason awards. As we have in recent years, we vote for four Twins awards; Most Valuable Player, Pitcher of the Year, Rookie of the Year and Most Improved.

Our winners will be announced in the days following the Twins postseason run, right here at TwinsDaily.com.

Twins Daily founders and regular writers vote for the award.

No player can have a bigger impact on a single game than the starting pitcher. Go out and throw a gem, you've put your team in excellent position to win. Turn in a clunker and your team may have already been sunk in the early innings.

With that in mind, here's a deep look into how Yankee starter Luis Severino likes to attack hitters, Ervin Santana's history against the Yankees and some other notes regarding tomorrow's big game.

'Let me start with issuing you a challenge: Be better than you are. Set a goal that seems unattainable, and when you reach that goal, set another one even higher.' - Herb Brooks

The Twins have already achieved the seemingly unattainable in becoming the first MLB team ever to go from losing 100 games to making the playoffs – er, playoff.

To pluralize that, an even bigger challenge now stands in the way: Going into New York and overcoming those damn Yankees.