After the trading Span the other day we now have 70 million or so in commitments for next year. That should leave around 25 million to sign 3 pitchers. Since the Twins have announed they are unlikely to trade for a pitcher at this point. They can really only look through FA at this point for next season. The Twins have talked to 20 plus pitchers this offseason to guage what it would take to sign them and their interest level in comming to Minnesota. Several more pitchers are now on the market as Lannan, Pelfry, Jurgens, and Karstens were non tendered today.

There are several ways to divy up the money and get starting pitching. the Question is whats the best formula for achieving that? there are several pitchers on the market that is going to get anywhere from 10-16 million or possibly more. Some one like Sanchez, Jackson, Dempster, or Haren is only a possiblity if we sign one of the bargain pitchers like the ones listed above or others including Pavano, Liriano, Villanueva, Bedard, Milwood, Lowe, and more or do we focus more on the midlevel SP Marcum, Myers, Blanton, McCarthy, Saunders, and so on, or we could sign one from each group or go the Twins way and see if we can get this done for 15 milion or less. I really hope we get one from each group as a 50 million (or large) contract would cause a lot of excitement in Minnesota. And if we were to get (1 from top tier and 1 form the middle tier) Dempster and Myers or even(2 from middle tier) Blanton and Myers for example, I would be fine with Karsten or Jurgens as our 3rd starting pitcher. What configurations of high dollar and low dollar pitchers do you feel comfortable with? Try not to spend more than 25 million per season. The closer to being between 15 and 20 million you can get the more realistic your guesses will be.

There are lots of options as I count at least 40 FA starting Pitchers on www.MLBtraderumors.com we only need 3 of them. Also with that last statement I wanted to point out there there are tons of options out there. So we have time to be competetive for next year.