Spot on. 

This is a good article but I’d say competent is not a good label for Falvey. You’re right, he’s had a few successes but overwhelmingly more bad moves and has wasted 10s of millions of dollars on below average players, much like diving in the bargain basement record bin when LPs were king.

I think he may be just above incompetent but as many tries as he’s had and the total cluster* he’s trotted out in 2025 cries incompetence.

Probably some or many will disagree but he showed a bit of competence in going out and getting Tait, Abel, possibly Rodon and the real offensive gem, Hendry Mendez. But then Outman was overmatched at the plate, though I pulled hard for him and he showed flashes on the bases, power-wise and defensively. He looks like a guy they should not plan on.

The real strength of the org is the hope that Gabriel Gonzalez, Kyler Fedko, Hendry Mendez, Walker Jenkins, Kaelen Culpepper, Austin Martin bring to the table. Now who gets the credit for all the good scouting and drafting, Falvey or Sean Johnson? I always though it was Johnson but maybe they work together.

Falvey needs to not hibernate for 2-3 months this offseason and acquire some offense to mix with all the strong hitting prospects. Without a better offense, the Twins are sunk (so please don’t count on Larnach, Wallner or Kody Clemens. I would be happy, as a minimum to start with and outfield of Martin, Buxton and Gonzalez and if anyone beats one of them out, great!

I would have fired Falvey a couple of years ago, definitely after the 2025 season and super definitely if he stumbles around for yet another season in 2026. I like Maddon, Servais and Punto of the managerial candidates - I think they all would run a game much better than Rocco (or was it pre-plan Derek) did.

Sorry for using my "response space" for an article but I usually get expansive when answering Twins posts due to all I see is wrong and what I think needs to change (ditch the exit velocity, launch angle philosophy and start putting the ball in play, moving runners, etc.)

6 hours ago, Greglw3 said:

This is a good article but I’d say competent is not a good label for Falvey. You’re right, he’s had a few successes but overwhelmingly more bad moves and has wasted 10s of millions of dollars on below average players, much like diving in the bargain basement record bin when LPs were king.

I think he may be just above incompetent but as many tries as he’s had and the total cluster* he’s trotted out in 2025 cries incompetence.

Probably some or many will disagree but he showed a bit of competence in going out and getting Tait, Abel, possibly Rodon and the real offensive gem, Hendry Mendez. But then Outman was overmatched at the plate, though I pulled hard for him and he showed flashes on the bases, power-wise and defensively. He looks like a guy they should not plan on.

The real strength of the org is the hope that Gabriel Gonzalez, Kyler Fedko, Hendry Mendez, Walker Jenkins, Kaelen Culpepper, Austin Martin bring to the table. Now who gets the credit for all the good scouting and drafting, Falvey or Sean Johnson? I always though it was Johnson but maybe they work together.

Falvey needs to not hibernate for 2-3 months this offseason and acquire some offense to mix with all the strong hitting prospects. Without a better offense, the Twins are sunk (so please don’t count on Larnach, Wallner or Kody Clemens. I would be happy, as a minimum to start with and outfield of Martin, Buxton and Gonzalez and if anyone beats one of them out, great!

I would have fired Falvey a couple of years ago, definitely after the 2025 season and super definitely if he stumbles around for yet another season in 2026. I like Maddon, Servais and Punto of the managerial candidates - I think they all would run a game much better than Rocco (or was it pre-plan Derek) did.

Sorry for using my "response space" for an article but I usually get expansive when answering Twins posts due to all I see is wrong and what I think needs to change (ditch the exit velocity, launch angle philosophy and start putting the ball in play, moving runners, etc.)

If our main disagreement is concerning the perceived daylight between "just above incompetent" and "at best competent but below-average," I'd have to be pretty incompetent to get very worked up over it. 😄

I've said elsewhere that, were I in charge, Byron Buxton holds Falvey's fate in his hands if he so chooses.  If Buxton demands a trade, I'd consider that grounds for the executive's dismissal.  You don't build a good team by alienating a man of Buxton's evident caliber.

Are Cashman and  the guy in LA great GMs or does the money mean they can buy all the right players?

Billy Beane has cycled up and down with the Athletics.  They wouldn’t write a book or a movie now.  He is still employed. Is he a genius now like then?

John Mozeliak produced winners in St Louis, until he did not and got early retirement.  Did he forget what made him successful?

Andy McPhail was the Boy Wonder after winning 2 championships, Never at a loss for a job but never ended a season with a big win.

Terry Ryan had a string of success, came out of retirement to have a total system failure.  That bunch that was a total system failure was called Ryan’s core when the team won a division under Falvey.  

Is Falvey competent? Maybe, maybe not. He probably came up sounding competent in the interview talking about pitching.  He might be as competent as the developer of an internet site that has a system that regularly crashes in the middle of a note,  The competency will be evaluates on the next wave of pitching. He certainly had a half dozen relievers get better while he was leader. Was it competence to trade them all will not be determinable right now. Is it competency when a lot of the arms start blowing out?  

With the random thought out of the way, here is the random opinion. 

Baseball is a game of adjustments, One of the hardest adjustments  is to change what a team drafts or signs as amateurs. Baseball when Falvey took over was on the position player side was becoming 3 outcome baseball.  Note that for all three outcomes defense isn’t part of the equation. The focus is offense.  The money for position players always has been offense. They draft for offense,  Problem was the shift by MLB in the ball they used. That shifted the metrics on the three outcomes, HR were not as easy to come by,  Third row power became warning track power. Contact became important. When contact, ie ball in play, became important, thus the defense matters.  The metrics on what works change in baseball. How quickly a FO adjusts is the competency. The other part of competency  is trades. What is winning a trade?  Losing a trade is hard to define. The Dodgers paid the cash but the Margot trade was  a loss. Luis Arraez won batting titles, Lopez got Cy votes. Did either team really lose that trade?  The DeScalfini trade, the Giants pretty much paid his salary. Topa was injured again, the prospects were still developing. Polanco played so well his option was not picked up. Has anybody won at that point?  Assessing trades can take longer than many people’s attention spans will allow. That makes it hard to assess trades. That makes it hard to assess competency. 

So what is the fan to do to assess competency of the FO? When the team loses over 90 games,  finishes out of the playoff, loses in the playoffs, or otherwise does something the fan does not like there is only one thing for the fan to do. That is thump their chest, holler they know baseball and utter an expletive filled tirade about the competency of  the front office. 

How does the owner decide competency? 3 ways. Pocketbook is one. Make the owner money. Whim is number 2. It is called dysfunctional franchise. Way number 3 is unproven but maybe having the pictures or some documentation for leverage helps. Circling back to where I started. Cashman has every advantage and how many years has it been since a World Series win? Almost a whole generation? He must have leverage. 

My Siskel & Ebert review would be two thumbs down.

If you’ve heard one Falvey interview, you’ve heard them all. I have met guys in my professional life in the same mold; I wouldn’t call them all competent. Maybe a few were. I do give credit for Falvey breaking in to the game as a self scout, however. These types of guys in my experience always say mostly the same things, in the same breezy voice, regardless of setting or topic. With a small edge of “I told you so” in their voice when things are going well (eg, postseason). I always preferred Levine just for his directness. 

There is a radio program called Inside Twins that airs on Sundays during the regular season. Falvey normally appears on this program about once every 3 weeks or so, rotating with Rocco and another person, but after this last trade deadline he did not appear as a guest on this program until mid-September, something like six or seven weeks.

6-7, as the kids would say it.

20 hours ago, Hosken Bombo Disco said:

My Siskel & Ebert review would be two thumbs down.

If you’ve heard one Falvey interview, you’ve heard them all. I have met guys in my professional life in the same mold; I wouldn’t call them all competent. Maybe a few were. I do give credit for Falvey breaking in to the game as a self scout, however. These types of guys in my experience always say mostly the same things, in the same breezy voice, regardless of setting or topic. With a small edge of “I told you so” in their voice when things are going well (eg, postseason). I always preferred Levine just for his directness. 

There is a radio program called Inside Twins that airs on Sundays during the regular season. Falvey normally appears on this program about once every 3 weeks or so, rotating with Rocco and another person, but after this last trade deadline he did not appear as a guest on this program until mid-September, something like six or seven weeks.

6-7, as the kids would say it.

annddd????

From about mid August through the close of the season there was an abrupt change in how the Twins played the games. That was a surprise to me, if not to anyone else. Previous to the change the Twins were one of the least interesting or exciting teams in MLB. While the roster certainly may need and hopefully receives several changes before the 2026 season, I will be curious to see what type of baseball they play. 

It would be nice to think that Derek Shelton provided the best critique of what he saw from the outside, and was awarded the job on that basis.