Twins FO Rumors

[gunnarthor]

Take this for what it's worth but Cafardo has a few notes on the search.

http://www.bostonglobe.com/sports/redsox/2016/09/03/nick-cafardo-how-toronto-boston-baltimore-compare-entering-final-four-weeks/EYRmqKwZJ9Wcf1Eb5m0fRK/story.html

 

Jason McLeod, assistant GM, Cubs — Given the Cubs’ success and McLeod’s outstanding draft record, it’s apparent the search firm hired to find qualified candidates for the Twins’ GM job will spit out McLeod’s name. McLeod did not respond to questioning on whether he would accept such a job at this time. In our last interview with McLeod, he expressed a desire to stay in Chicago to be close to his children and finish off the business of winning a championship. The Twins may also hire a president of baseball operations. Suffice to say, the running of the Twins, one of the more traditional teams in the league, will never be the same.

 

Ben Cherington, former GM, Red Sox — Cherington will also likely be a candidate for the Twins’ job. A year later, Cherington’s moves in Boston look much different. Among them, acquiring Rick Porcello for Yoenis Cespedes; not trading his top prospects for Cole Hamels (who has been excellent in Texas); signing Hanley Ramirez, who has worked out at first base and at the plate (though the left field experiment was a failure); the signing of Yoan Moncada; and the drafting of Andrew Benintendi.

[PseudoSABR]

I wonder if Cherington and McLeod could work together.  They both worked under Theo, and a move to President and GM, respectively, would represent a promotion for both.

[Kwak]

 

I wonder if Cherington and McLeod could work together.  They both worked under Theo, and a move to President and GM, respectively, would represent a promotion for both.

"...could work together." If the money was right I think they would be fine together.

[Rosterman]

The process is simple. People either want to work for the Twins or not. They come in with their ideas and plans and hired or not. I'm sure there are a lot of folks out there looking at any job for an organization on a rebuilding brink like this. How many Presidents of Baseball Operation jobs are there that pay x-amount? How many teams have assistant general managers that want to be general managers, plus the ones looking to move to more of a challenge (possibly up) and those that have worked the job.

 

I'm still scarred about who will be making the decisions on who is hired. Real scared.

 

But I hope it is sooner rather than later.

 

 

[darin617]

 

"...could work together." If the money was right I think they would be fine together.

If they are the right people for the positions this organization better not play the cheap route.

[old nurse]

McLeod was in Boston. Probably knows Carfado. Nice to see Carfado boost his friends. Very Sid like

 

[jokin]

 

 

 

I'm still scarred about who will be making the decisions on who is hired. Real scared.

 

 

 

I'm sure I speak for many Twins fans in saying that we are BOTH scarred and scared by the potentialities, perils and pitfalls that can take place during the upcoming personnel decision-making process from the Potentates. A bad hire could set this team back well into the 2020s before they might return to relevancy.

[USAFChief]

I'm a big fan of McLeod.

[amjgt]

Alex Anthopulos - confirmed candidate.

 

 

http://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2016/09/twins-considering-alex-anthopoulos-for-president-of-baseball-operations.html?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=facebook

[gunnarthor]

 

Alex Anthopulos - confirmed candidate.

 

 

http://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2016/09/twins-considering-alex-anthopoulos-for-president-of-baseball-operations.html?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=facebook

Interesting.  I thought he was overrated in Toronto and made some pretty bad trades - Dickey - but he's certainly a different type of GM than we've had and presumably he's learned a lot as a GM.  His time in LA probably helps too and he'd have a pretty good grasp of their prospects if/when the teams discuss a Dozier trade, as well.  

 

I'm not sure he'll be ok with the payroll issues he'd be given here that he didn't get in Toronto and LA but we could certainly do worse.  

[DaveW]

 

Interesting.  I thought he was overrated in Toronto and made some pretty bad trades - Dickey - but he's certainly a different type of GM than we've had and presumably he's learned a lot as a GM.  His time in LA probably helps too and he'd have a pretty good grasp of their prospects if/when the teams discuss a Dozier trade, as well.  

 

I'm not sure he'll be ok with the payroll issues he'd be given here that he didn't get in Toronto and LA but we could certainly do worse.  

He would be great as a president of baseball operations. If you are going to fault him for the Dickey trade, then you need to crown him for the Donaldson trade and maybe even for Bautista?

 

With aggressive GM's you are going to "win some" and you are going to "lose some", give me someone who isn't afraid to pull the trigger over the Twins strategy any day of the week.

 

Bad trades happen, I mean Brain Sabean seemed to overcome the AJ trade, and that might have been the most lopsided trade in the past 30 years.

[markos]

 

Interesting.  I thought he was overrated in Toronto and made some pretty bad trades - Dickey - but he's certainly a different type of GM than we've had and presumably he's learned a lot as a GM.  His time in LA probably helps too and he'd have a pretty good grasp of their prospects if/when the teams discuss a Dozier trade, as well.  

 

I'm not sure he'll be ok with the payroll issues he'd be given here that he didn't get in Toronto and LA but we could certainly do worse.  

I would be cautiously optimistic. If his tenure at Toronto is any indication, he will invest a lot in acquiring young, high-upside arms both in the draft and internationally, and he won't be afraid of using those arms to improve the big-league team. 

 

Drafts from 2010-2015...

76 players taken in top-10 rounds.

50 pitchers (66%)

29 high school pitchers (38%)

Look at the 2011 draft... http://www.baseball-reference.com/draft/index.cgi?team_ID=TOR&year_ID=2011&draft_type=junreg&query_type=franch_year

Not necessarily a lot of success, but pitcher after pitcher drafted, most of them high schoolers. 2013 was pretty much the same. By comparison, during the same stretch the Twins drafted 6 HS pitchers.

[gunnarthor]

 

He would be great as a president of baseball operations. If you are going to fault him for the Dickey trade, then you need to crown him for the Donaldson trade and maybe even for Bautista?

 

With aggressive GM's you are going to "win some" and you are going to "lose some", give me someone who isn't afraid to pull the trigger over the Twins strategy any day of the week.

 

Bad trades happen, I mean Brain Sabean seemed to overcome the AJ trade, and that might have been the most lopsided trade in the past 30 years.

Fair point on the Donaldson trade - that was one of the great heists and I forgot that it was him that pulled that off. 

 

 

[Hosken Bombo Disco]

Cubs did that in 2014, too. Pitchers and catchers first 12 rounds and nothing else.

 

http://www.baseball-reference.com/draft/index.cgi?team_ID=CHC&year_ID=2014&draft_type=junreg&query_type=franch_year

[Winston Smith]

This team is a mess and needs some major changes and he isn't afraid to make moves, which is what we need.

 

[laloesch]

 

He would be great as a president of baseball operations. If you are going to fault him for the Dickey trade, then you need to crown him for the Donaldson trade and maybe even for Bautista?

 

With aggressive GM's you are going to "win some" and you are going to "lose some", give me someone who isn't afraid to pull the trigger over the Twins strategy any day of the week.

 

Bad trades happen, I mean Brain Sabean seemed to overcome the AJ trade, and that might have been the most lopsided trade in the past 30 years.

 

I'd like to see a much more aggressive GM (in comparison to Ryan) and or president of baseball operations.  The problem with the Twins is that they always seem to move at a snail's pace when making roster decisions.  Examples would be Josh Willingham, Kurt Suzukii, Ricky Nolasco, Tommy Milone, Trevor Plouffe, etc., etc.  Instead of moving on from non-productive players under contract they were stubborn and tried to milk every penny when it was obvious these guys were busts, taking up space or in the midst of a career season that they would never repeat.  

 

The reverse is also true.  Instead of trading veterans for maximum value in the midst of a rebuild they clung to them like trophies and ended up with nothing a year or two later.  Too me this is illogical unless you are only worried about selling tickets and putting butts in the stands or are close to the end of a rebuild and need some veteran parts to complement the young talent.  

 

If Ryan had decided to move on from Hughes, Suzuki, Plouffe, Dozier and Willingham before that it's quite possible we'd be A LOT closer to contention then we are now.  To me indecisiveness is as detrimental as a bad trade and it's a huge waste of precious time.  

 

Last and not least, give the prospects a real chance to prove themselves.  I don't agree with the yoyo back and forth between AAA and the Big leagues that this front office has treated Buxton and Berrios too.  If a guy needs more time in AAA you leave him there for an extended period.  If you call him up, you use him and give him 5+ starts before tinkering.   

 

The other thing that would be nice is not having such a dumpster diving, penny pinching GM like Ryan.  Even after TF opened they didn't spend that money wisely or step up their offers to reel in premium talent.  Instead we had to settle for reclamation projects like Hughes, Nolasco and Santana (to a lesser extent).  The Twins don't have to operate like this anymore and hopefully the new GM and President will understand that and be given that latitude.  

 

If a guy stinks and you can't trade him DFA him! If a top of the rotation pitcher is available and your interested make him a REAL offer!  The days of the Twins being cheap (pre TF) and foolish with their money (post opening of TF) should be over. 

[gunnarthor]

 

 

If a guy stinks and you can't trade him DFA him! If a top of the rotation pitcher is available and your interested make him a REAL offer!  The days of the Twins being cheap (pre TF) and foolish with their money (post opening of TF) should be over. 

Ignoring everything else, I suspect the Pohlads will still require the next GM to keep payroll low.  This team will never be big spenders in FA and we probably won't lock up Sano/Buxton et al much beyond their 6 years of team control. 

[Thrylos]

The other thing about both Anthopoulos and Cherington is that they have proven abilities to turn teams around, which is exactly what the Twins need.  Also, both have been drafting and developing prospects extremely well.

[gocgo]

I think one of my concerns is that the incoming people have already been told who the manager is.  Nothing against Molitor, but no incoming boss likes to be told who he/she will hire or, in this case, not fire.

[gunnarthor]

 

I think one of my concerns is that the incoming people have already been told who the manager is.  Nothing against Molitor, but no incoming boss likes to be told who he/she will hire or, in this case, not fire.

I'm really hoping this late season collapse changes ownership's mind b/c Molitor should have been fired in May.

[laloesch]

 

Ignoring everything else, I suspect the Pohlads will still require the next GM to keep payroll low.  This team will never be big spenders in FA and we probably won't lock up Sano/Buxton et al much beyond their 6 years of team control. 

 

I don't consider 100+ million a low payroll.  That's mid market and makes the Twins players for free agents.

[Rosterman]

 

Ignoring everything else, I suspect the Pohlads will still require the next GM to keep payroll low.  This team will never be big spenders in FA and we probably won't lock up Sano/Buxton et al much beyond their 6 years of team control. 

Unless they do jettison Plouffe and Santiago, who alone with Suzuki and Milone, will lower the payroll some. A few guys will get raises. But Mauer is still eating 1/4 or 1/5th. Hughes/Santana another 1/5. Perk/Dozier and a resigned Plouffe would take another 1/5. 

 

Plus there is the drop in attendance and overall concessions and such, which is no one's fault but.....

 

Plus they have to payoff Ryan and Molly and any front office staff that will depart.

 

Plus they included airfare home in the Park contract. They could save a few bucks by not making it roundtrip.

 

 

[Mike Sixel]

 

I don't consider 100+ million a low payroll.  That's mid market and makes the Twins players for free agents.

 

100 million would be the 27th lowest payroll this year....so, ya, that's low.

 

The median this year is 143MM......so, ya, 100MM is low, very low.

[Doomtints]

 

I'd like to see a much more aggressive GM (in comparison to Ryan) and or president of baseball operations.  The problem with the Twins is that they always seem to move at a snail's pace when making roster decisions.  Examples would be Josh Willingham, Kurt Suzukii, Ricky Nolasco, Tommy Milone, Trevor Plouffe, etc., etc.  Instead of moving on from non-productive players under contract they were stubborn and tried to milk every penny when it was obvious these guys were busts, taking up space or in the midst of a career season that they would never repeat.  

 

The reverse is also true.  Instead of trading veterans for maximum value in the midst of a rebuild they clung to them like trophies and ended up with nothing a year or two later.  Too me this is illogical unless you are only worried about selling tickets and putting butts in the stands or are close to the end of a rebuild and need some veteran parts to complement the young talent.  

 

If Ryan had decided to move on from Hughes, Suzuki, Plouffe, Dozier and Willingham before that it's quite possible we'd be A LOT closer to contention then we are now.  To me indecisiveness is as detrimental as a bad trade and it's a huge waste of precious time.  

 

Last and not least, give the prospects a real chance to prove themselves.  I don't agree with the yoyo back and forth between AAA and the Big leagues that this front office has treated Buxton and Berrios too.  If a guy needs more time in AAA you leave him there for an extended period.  If you call him up, you use him and give him 5+ starts before tinkering.   

 

The other thing that would be nice is not having such a dumpster diving, penny pinching GM like Ryan.  Even after TF opened they didn't spend that money wisely or step up their offers to reel in premium talent.  Instead we had to settle for reclamation projects like Hughes, Nolasco and Santana (to a lesser extent).  The Twins don't have to operate like this anymore and hopefully the new GM and President will understand that and be given that latitude.  

 

If a guy stinks and you can't trade him DFA him! If a top of the rotation pitcher is available and your interested make him a REAL offer!  The days of the Twins being cheap (pre TF) and foolish with their money (post opening of TF) should be over. 

 

Lots of cherry picking of facts here.  Ryan let go of nearly every veteran the team had within the first couple of years of him getting his job back.  In retrospect it really looks like this was done to be snotty towards the previous GM than it was anything else, because Ryan had no plan to replace anybody.  He claims he had to reign in spending but the owner says that was never the case, and now the Twins find themselves spending just as much anyway but with a worse roster than when he started "cutting"!

 

As you can gather I'm not a huge Ryan fan either, and I understand there was a lot of venting on your post.  Even still, I don't think your characterization of Ryan as a villian is correct.  I think Ryan was allowed to do whatever he wanted to do, which (again, in retrospect) seems like that consisted largely of long vacations and not really paying much attention.

[Otto von Ballpark]

 

He would be great as a president of baseball operations. If you are going to fault him for the Dickey trade, then you need to crown him for the Donaldson trade and maybe even for Bautista?

Also, while they weren't heists, Anthropolous has a pretty decent aggressive history.  He was able to get value out of Vernon Wells and Jose Reyes when they were both pretty much past their expiration dates.  He also got Reyes and Buehrle with a little left in the tank by targeting the Marlins during one of their fire sales (not unlike how he got Donaldson from cash-strapped Oakland).  If he has the support of ownership, you can be pretty sure that Anthropolous will leave no stone unturned.

 

The Halladay trade, which objectively didn't work out as hoped, didn't hurt them too much. They only controlled Halladay for one more season, and beyond that Philadelphia only got one good year out of 3 from him anyway.  And in return Anthropolous did get some assets to help support the Dickey trade (d'Arnaud) and even got Devon Travis in a series of moves (via Michael Taylor, via Brett Wallace, via Anthony Gose).

 

The "pricey" David Price trade paid some definite dividends, with their division comeback and competitive playoff showing.

 

Even the maligned RA Dickey trade, while they'd much rather have Syndergaard back now, Dickey was quietly worth 2-2.5 WAR each year from 2013-2015.

 

And there's other nice deals in there too, like Lind for Estrada and Happ for Saunders (although the current Toronto front office gets credit for bringing both Estrada and Happ back).

[Champuckett]

This is the thread that I would hope Twins fans would be paying very close attention to.  The next 5+ years are going to depend on how well this decision is made.  We can talk all day long about which players from the Twins need to be traded, which need to be better developed, who needs to be promoted, which is 95.78% of all threads on these forums, but the person that is actually going to be making all of these big decisions is of the utmost importance and seems to be in the works right now with Twins ownership.

 

I'm kind of meh on Alex Anthopolous.  Still, he would be 10x better than the TR of the previous 4 years.  Both Ben Cherington and Jason McLeod have my vote.  All of these guys who seem to be getting the most acclaim and discussion and would be vast improvements over what we had.  They all seem to have one thing in common, they are young, they are tapped into the times, and are enthusiasts of using modern day scouting and mathematics to evaluate players.  They also are all willing to wheel and deal.  Here's to hoping the decision made is the correct one.

[laloesch]

 

Lots of cherry picking of facts here.  Ryan let go of nearly every veteran the team had within the first couple of years of him getting his job back.  In retrospect it really looks like this was done to be snotty towards the previous GM than it was anything else, because Ryan had no plan to replace anybody.  He claims he had to reign in spending but the owner says that was never the case, and now the Twins find themselves spending just as much anyway but with a worse roster than when he started "cutting"!

 

As you can gather I'm not a huge Ryan fan either, and I understand there was a lot of venting on your post.  Even still, I don't think your characterization of Ryan as a villian is correct.  I think Ryan was allowed to do whatever he wanted to do, which (again, in retrospect) seems like that consisted largely of long vacations and not really paying much attention.

 

What on earth are you babbling about in reply to my first post?  Cherry picking facts?  Please....it is exactly what he has done and any attempt to down play that is laughable and homeristic.  And by the way i don't think Ryan is a villain nor was i trying to characterize him as such.  

 

My point is that his time has come and gone as GM.  When the Twins were still in the garbage dome giving up a good chunk of their revenue to the ViQueens, under threat of contraction and a severely limited budget he did a great job, but things changed.

[laloesch]

 

100 million would be the 27th lowest payroll this year....so, ya, that's low.

 

The median this year is 143MM......so, ya, 100MM is low, very low.

 

Not sure why you place so much credence on median payroll when the number iss scewed by the Dodgers, Yankees and Red Sox, all with 180 million plus payrolls.  Fact is the Twins are 18th  in the league in team spending at 108 million ahead of the Astros, Diamondbacks, Rays, Athletics, Marlins, Pirates, Indians, Braves, Rockies, Brewers, White Sox and Mets.  The Blue Jays, Royals, Orioles, Cubs, Reds and Cardinals are ALL within 4-12 million of the Twins payroll.

 

So no, 100 million+ is hardly "LOW, VERY LOW."

[Doomtints]

 

What on earth are you babbling about in reply to my first post?  Cherry picking facts?  Please....it is exactly what he has done and any attempt to down play that is laughable and homeristic.  And by the way i don't think Ryan is a villain nor was i trying to characterize him as such.  

 

My point is that his time has come and gone as GM.  When the Twins were still in the garbage dome giving up a good chunk of their revenue to the ViQueens, under threat of contraction and a severely limited budget he did a great job, but things changed.

 

He didn't do a great job his first time around.  In the 90s it was the same story, he let a lot of veterans go and had no viable plan to replace them.

 

The Twins got good in the 00s because the PLAYERS decided they weren't going to take it anymore, largely because of the contraction talks you mentioned.  He also scored well with the Pierzynski trade and nailed down a great closer.  

 

What you mentioned about "holding onto veterans for dear life" is false.  Take a look at what Johan Santana said as he was going out the door.  

[Mike Sixel]

Median isn't scewed, mean is. 

 

The comment was about how much 100MM would be...and it not being on the low side. 

 

The twins current payroll is $111MM, and is 23rd on the list.

 

http://www.spotrac.com/mlb/payroll/