JR Graham Traded To Yankees

[Seth Stohs]

Per Dustin Morse on Twitter just moments ago:

 

 

 

[Danchat]

We traded for JR Murphy from the Yankees and now we send them JR Graham. Interesting.

 

Well, there goes a full season of Graham on the roster just to ship him out one month into 2016. I don't get why they needed to DFA him, but I guess he wasn't in the team's long term plans.

[DocBauer]

And the rebuild commences! 

 

*sarcasm alert*

[Mr. Brooks]

Wow. He must have done or said something that really irked them.

They liked him enough to basically play all of last yeasty with a 24 man roster to accommodate him.

[jorgenswest]

Really poor management of the 40.

 

I think they have 39 on the 40 now. If I understand correctly, they perceived a one game need to add Mastroianni. He came up on Friday the day before two spots opened by Milone and Fien. Maestro sat on the bench that game and then started the next two going 0-7 with 4 strike outs.

 

Why not keep Graham and bring up Mastro Saturday? They knew it would be a day. They could also have waited one more day before flipping Centeno and Murphy. They even could have put Perkin's on the 60 day DL. Has their valuation of Graham changed so much that he isn't worth waiting 1 day? They waited the entire season last year. Was their staff horribly wrong about him last year or are they wrong about him this year?

 

The 40 man roster management of Graham and even Hicks earlier this season leaves serious question about the ability of those responsible for this roster.

[Kwak]

 

We traded for JR Murphy from the Yankees and now we send them JR Graham. Interesting.

 

Well, there goes a full season of Graham on the roster just to ship him out one month into 2016. I don't get why they needed to DFA him, but I guess he wasn't in the team's long term plans.

The tweet said  "...or cash."  Magic words to the Twins for a player for whom they have no use.

[Shaitan]

While I think the level of talent they're clearing out now is questionable for May vs March, it does seem like May has been Ryan's historical hosuecleaning month when I look back at my fuzzy memory of players like Hernandez, Ponson, Harris, Bautista, etc.

 

That's really all I have to say on this. The timing feels odd, but I won't miss Graham if he's never going to  be more than mop up.

[Platoon]

Well at least now we have something to discuss besides the record. Btw, while this post was not sarcastic, we really need to get a sarcasm button on here. Some of the humor is just to subtle and refined to comprehend for some (of us)

[Mr. Brooks]

The tweet said "...or cash." Magic words to the Twins for a player for whom they have no use.

If the Twins have no use for him, why did they carry him on the 25 man roster all last year?

[Seth Stohs]

 

If the Twins have no use for him, why did they carry him on the 25 man roster all last year?

 

Because there was hope that he could become Ryan Pressly... 

[Mr. Brooks]

Because there was hope that he could become Ryan Pressly...

And 1 mop up appearance this year convinced them he can't be?

[TheLeviathan]

So either the team badly mis-identified him as a future contributor or they bungled keeping him on the roster (but rarely using him) for an entire year.  

 

Either way it's hard to be anything other than frustrated about the Twins/Graham situation. 

[stringer bell]

C'mon people! The Twins saw enough of Graham to believe there was a chance. His struggles in the minors this year indicated he hadn't taken the step forward he needed to be a major league pitcher and without the Rule V status, he isn't enough of a prospect to keep on the 40-man roster. This all makes sense to me. You take people in the Rule V draft that look like they can eventually help. Having that status grants them a 25-man spot, but once that factor is out of the way, the player gets evaluated purely on his ability and potential. There isn't enough of either to hold on to Graham. Selling him for a few bucks or a similar lottery ticket makes good sense.

[stringer bell]

 

 

Because there was hope that he could become Ryan Pressly... 

Exactly Seth. A month plus into 2016, they are convinced he won't be that good and he's behind a number of other guys.

[deanlambrecht]

 

And 1 mop up appearance this year convinced them he can't be?

 

No.  Last season's performance plus this season's performance, including spring training, etc., convinced them that he cannot perform like Ryan Pressly.

 

It's like stringer bell said above: let's not look at every player who doesn't work out as sufficient evidence that Terry Ryan is the root of all evil.  That crap is getting really old around here.  Take a step back, people: most baseball prospects fail.  By a huge margin, in fact.  And that's true for every single MLB team.

 

I've got substantial problems with how this team is run, but we simply cannot have a freak out every time one player doesn't pan out.

[deanlambrecht]

Sorry to double post, but thought I'd pop the mlbtraderumors link confirming the transaction in here given its greater level of detail about the move:

http://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2016/05/yankees-acquire-j-r-graham-from-twins.html

[spinowner]

I've said something like this before--we can certainly say what we think about a trade just after it happens but we usually don't know whether a trade was a good one until several years later. As deanlambrecht said above, that's because it takes so long for the vast majority of baseball prospects to fully develop.

[zchrz]

For cash considerations, they really are becoming the Wolves.

[USAFChief]

This would make more sense, for a normal bad team, as a rule five gamble, had the Twins been a normal bad team last year.

 

But they weren't...they were in, or on the fringe of contention till the last weekend of the season. So they spent an entire season in contention wasting a bullpen spot on a rule five guy, essentially punting a 25 man roster spot.

 

Then decide a month into the following season that was no longer worth a 40 man spot, when contention is no longer a factor, and you would have time to further evaluate.

 

So somebody, somewhere, either made a real bad decision last year, or is making a bad one this year.

 

"No big deal, nothing to see here" is getting to be a bit of a tired rationale IMO.

[OldTimeTwinkie]

Glad to see TR making moves to help the big league team out.

 

Not that we need it of course

[mikelink45]

The frustration is that last year a couple games would have made a difference and keeping Graham on the 25 could have cost us those games.

[Otto von Ballpark]

But why dump Graham with an open spot on the 40 man roster, no one needing an immediate add, and at least Mastro, Vargas and probably Dean available for painless removal at any time? Not to mention Perkins being in 60 day DL territory (I notice the Yankees put someone on the 60 day DL to make room for Graham). And our bullpen still largely lousy overall.

 

Seems a weird time to make a definitive judgement on Graham, for no appreciable gain.

[diehardtwinsfan]

yeah, Graham wasn't blocking anyone last year, and considering they weren't planning on contending quite like they did, the decision to take him was somewhat defensible.  The mistake last year wasn't doing enough to fix the pen once they were in contention and then doing nothing again this year.  I'd imagine at the very least that by the end of this season we will at least be seeing some of that help, but in the mean time, it's not going to get better.

[DaveW]

yeah, Graham wasn't blocking anyone last year, and considering they weren't planning on contending quite like they did, the decision to take him was somewhat defensible. The mistake last year wasn't doing enough to fix the pen once they were in contention and then doing nothing again this year. I'd imagine at the very least that by the end of this season we will at least be seeing some of that help, but in the mean time, it's not going to get better.

Graham was blocking plenty of players last year, guys like Meyer, Berrios and more could have taken his bullpen spot and contributed.

 

Keeping Graham on the 25 man roster all season long, then trading him one month into the season is just another(minor) example of TR's inability to run a ball club these days.

[jokin]

 

Why not keep Graham and bring up Mastro Saturday? They knew it would be a day. They could also have waited one more day before flipping Centeno and Murphy. They even could have put Perkin's on the 60 day DL. Has their valuation of Graham changed so much that he isn't worth waiting 1 day? They waited the entire season last year. Was their staff horribly wrong about him last year or are they wrong about him this year?

The 40 man roster management of Graham and even Hicks earlier this season leaves serious question about the ability of those responsible for this roster.

 

Gardy's footprints in this are are beginning to loom ever larger...

[raindog]

Also, an actually good GM wanting Graham makes me nervous. We'll see how it turns out.

[deanlambrecht]

 

The frustration is that last year a couple games would have made a difference and keeping Graham on the 25 could have cost us those games.

 

Sure, but you can say that about almost any player from any year that you're close to a playoff slot, right?  Seriously, what did we need, 2 or 3 more wins to make it to the post season last year?  So pick any 2 or 3 losses, find a player who caused us to lose that game, and say "if only player X wasn't on the roster/wasn't in the lineup/wasn't playing X position we'd have made the playoffs."

 

There are 162 games, and more than 40 players who are eligible to play in any given year.  There are a lot of things that don't go right every season, even when we win.  The criticism you've lodged carries very little weight under the circumstances in which professional baseball is played.  It's simply not a proximate cause all by itself.

[Mr. Brooks]

No. Last season's performance plus this season's performance, including spring training, etc., convinced them that he cannot perform like Ryan Pressly.

 

It's like stringer bell said above: let's not look at every player who doesn't work out as sufficient evidence that Terry Ryan is the root of all evil. That crap is getting really old around here. Take a step back, people: most baseball prospects fail. By a huge margin, in fact. And that's true for every single MLB team.

 

I've got substantial problems with how this team is run, but we simply cannot have a freak out every time one player doesn't pan out.

1)They must have been encouraged by last year's performance, because they chose to keep him on the 40 man over the winter, over Zach Jones.

 

2) As was well pointed out a few posts above, they could have waited one more day and wouldn't have needed his 40 man spot.

[Mr. Brooks]

Sure, but you can say that about almost any player from any year that you're close to a playoff slot, right? Seriously, what did we need, 2 or 3 more wins to make it to the post season last year? So pick any 2 or 3 losses, find a player who caused us to lose that game, and say "if only player X wasn't on the roster/wasn't in the lineup/wasn't playing X position we'd have made the playoffs."

 

There are 162 games, and more than 40 players who are eligible to play in any given year. There are a lot of things that don't go right every season, even when we win. The criticism you've lodged carries very little weight under the circumstances in which professional baseball is played. It's simply not a proximate cause all by itself.

No, that is not even close to the same.

Most players on your roster help you win some, and also lose some. It's not fair to point out a game here or there that a player cost you, since they probably helped you win a few too.

 

This is different. They chose to compete with a 24 man roster against teams who had 25 players.

(Graham was only used in games in which the outcome was largely already decided)

[jokin]

 

The tweet said  "...or cash."  Magic words to the Twins for a player for whom they have no use.

 

So how much cash? Did they simply recover their $50,000 selection fee?