Semien, Rangers set SS market...

[mnfireman]

Semien just set the SS market bar quite high, 7/$175MM ($25MM AAV) for a guy who will be 2B in a couple seasons. Here's to hoping Lewis or Martin pans out after whoever the team signs as a stop-gap.

[Squirrel]

Well, neither are going to 'pan out' this year ... we still need a SS. Polance won't be moved off 2nd, so ... we will need someone

[mnfireman]

1 minute ago, Squirrel said:

Well, neither are going to 'pan out' this year ... we still need a SS. Polance won't be moved off 2nd, so ... we will need someone

Exactly, and I think this signing for sure pushes the Twins out of pursuing a top-name SS this year. Welcome back Andrelton Simmons (JK, I hope not).

[Brock Beauchamp]

That's an absurd amount for Semien. Hard pass on that, for sure.

[tarheeltwinsfan]

I'm ready to hand the SS job to Lewis and let him do the best he can and take his lumps as he progresses. He has the type of mindset and the type of athleticism which will succeed at SS for a winning MLB team. . To quote Newman: "Mark my words and mark them well.". Lewis will succeed at SS for the Twins in 2022.  He will light a fire that this team needs and he will be a leader in the infield and Buck will be a leader in the OF on this Twins team for years to come.

[Twins_Fan_For_Life]

Did Texas pay a premium to be the first to sign the shortstop? And why the hell is Texas spending that kind of money for a veteran shortstop?

[TheLeviathan]

Oof...that will make acquiring a SS a lot harder.

[nicksaviking]

This contract is nuts and I wouldn’t want or expect the Twins to do it.

But inflation is hitting all businesses and consumers, the Twins better be ready and willing for team a record payroll in 2022 and by a substantial margin. Employees are getting paid more, they need to deal with it just like every other company.

[Danchat]

It sounds like the Twins are looking for a one year stopgap SS, so I don't expect them to go after the Story/Semien types.

[Wax Kepler]

Move Polanco to SS and re-sign Simmons as backup. We have one hundred guys who can play 2nd base, including Lewis and Martin sooner or later. 

I'd still like a FA SS, but this would be a very payroll friendly situation. Maybe Polanco's resurgence at the plate has nothing to do with the move to 2B.

If Lewis has a future as starting SS, this would leave him a path.

Maybe the Twins could target Chris Taylor and then have a SS platoon of Taylor, Polanco, and Simmons with a potential audition for Lewis.

All that said, my preference is to sign Baez or Story, but hey... c'mon.

[DJL44]

Seager and Correa will both top this number

[bean5302]

It's so funny to see people call it nuts to sign Semien to $25MM/yr when he's put up back to back 6+ fWAR seasons while simultaneously cheering like it's the best decision ever the Twins signed Buxton (a guy who's typically a 3 WAR player at this stage) to $15MM per year. Semien finished 3rd in MVP voting in 2019 and 3rd again this year. If Buxton did what Semien did in 2019 or 2021, he'd earn $24MM / year, but Buxton has never finished above 16th in voting.

Side note, Semien has been a very good shortstop for the last 4 years (2018-2021) straight, and he was a very good primary 2B in 2021. He's not going to instantly become bad. Semien's defensive value over the past 4 years is double that of Buxton's. The truth is, this contract is reasonable, and Twins fans on this site are jealous other teams are willing to spend big money when the Twins are not. It looks ridiculous. Manny Machado got 10yrs and $300MM for less production. Arenado got 8yrs and $260MM before free agency with the Rockies. Correa is likely going to get $300MM. Seager is probably going to get $240MM.

3 hours ago, Twins_Fan_For_Life said:

Did Texas pay a premium to be the first to sign the shortstop? And why the hell is Texas spending that kind of money for a veteran shortstop?

They did not pay a premium for Semien. They paid market value and a lot of other teams were interested. Texas is spending that kind of money because they care about being competitive and winning a World Series after rebuilding for the past couple years.

[RpR]

2 hours ago, bean5302 said:

It's so funny to see people call it nuts to sign Semien to $25MM/yr when he's put up back to back 6+ fWAR seasons while simultaneously cheering like it's the best decision ever the Twins signed Buxton (a guy who's typically a 3 WAR player at this stage) to $15MM per year. Semien finished 3rd in MVP voting in 2019 and 3rd again this year. If Buxton did what Semien did in 2019 or 2021, he'd earn $24MM / year, but Buxton has never finished above 16th in voting.

Side note, Semien has been a very good shortstop for the last 4 years (2018-2021) straight, and he was a very good primary 2B in 2021. He's not going to instantly become bad. Semien's defensive value over the past 4 years is double that of Buxton's. The truth is, this contract is reasonable, and Twins fans on this site are jealous other teams are willing to spend big money when the Twins are not. It looks ridiculous. Manny Machado got 10yrs and $300MM for less production. Arenado got 8yrs and $260MM before free agency with the Rockies. Correa is likely going to get $300MM. Seager is probably going to get $240MM.

They did not pay a premium for Semien. They paid market value and a lot of other teams were interested. Texas is spending that kind of money because they care about being competitive and winning a World Series after rebuilding for the past couple years.

He was very good at 2nd base, 2021, at best average at short stop any year; 2018 was his only good year at short stop, even with 20 errors.

They signed him for his bat, not his fielding ability.

[terrydactyls]

There are several stop-gap SS available.  The Twins need to use the money on pitchers like Stroman, Ray, Kikuchi, Pineda, Danny Duffy etc. instead of more offense.  And the make one trade with the Marlins for additional pitching.

[nicksaviking]

13 hours ago, bean5302 said:

It's so funny to see people call it nuts to sign Semien to $25MM/yr when he's put up back to back 6+ fWAR seasons while simultaneously cheering like it's the best decision ever the Twins signed Buxton (a guy who's typically a 3 WAR player at this stage) to $15MM per year. Semien finished 3rd in MVP voting in 2019 and 3rd again this year. If Buxton did what Semien did in 2019 or 2021, he'd earn $24MM / year, but Buxton has never finished above 16th in voting.

Side note, Semien has been a very good shortstop for the last 4 years (2018-2021) straight, and he was a very good primary 2B in 2021. He's not going to instantly become bad. Semien's defensive value over the past 4 years is double that of Buxton's. The truth is, this contract is reasonable, and Twins fans on this site are jealous other teams are willing to spend big money when the Twins are not. It looks ridiculous. Manny Machado got 10yrs and $300MM for less production. Arenado got 8yrs and $260MM before free agency with the Rockies. Correa is likely going to get $300MM. Seager is probably going to get $240MM.

They did not pay a premium for Semien. They paid market value and a lot of other teams were interested. Texas is spending that kind of money because they care about being competitive and winning a World Series after rebuilding for the past couple years.

I would have liked Simien, but I don't think anyone believes the 25M/yr is crazy, just the years.  He's three years older than Buxton and he's already about the age when players need to be moved from SS.

[ashbury]

53 minutes ago, nicksaviking said:

I would have liked Simien, but I don't think anyone believes the 25M/yr is crazy, just the years.  He's three years older than Buxton and he's already about the age when players need to be moved from SS.

His most recent team moved him from SS.

[dex8425]

I'm curious what Story gets now, given that he is younger, capable of playing a good defensive SS, and has had more consistency. Has to be 200+. Correa will top 300 and Seager will top 250 unless they want shorter deals with higher AAV.

[tony&rodney]

Would I like to see the Twins sign a top shortstop? Yes. The market value is $25+ million and 5-10 years. The top players have proven their worth and the teams who need a shortstop badly, are fairly set elsewhere on their rosters, and have the resources will gladly pay the price. The Twins need pitching and they should address their need via a signing and a few trades. I would leave Jorge Polanco at 2B, sign Ehire Adrianza as a backup, and hope to add someone like Taylor Walls via trade or just go with the flow via a player that doesn't excite us necessarily but works, like Galvis. 

[bean5302]

14 hours ago, RpR said:

He was very good at 2nd base, 2021, at best average at short stop any year; 2018 was his only good year at short stop, even with 20 errors.

They signed him for his bat, not his fielding ability.

Semien has an above average fielding rate at SS in 4 of the past 5 years, and he was average in 2018, which is the the season you cherry picked, not that errors are all that matters anyway. I think it's absolutely wild to claim defense doesn't play into a 7 year $175MM contract for a shortstop. Semien's positional value and defense is a big part of the reason he's getting paid.

[bean5302]

2 hours ago, nicksaviking said:

I would have liked Simien, but I don't think anyone believes the 25M/yr is crazy, just the years.  He's three years older than Buxton and he's already about the age when players need to be moved from SS.

...and yet a near 35 year old shortstop just re-signed with the Giants for 2 more years. There is no rule a player can't play SS anymore after age 31 or 32. I don't believe Texas signed Semien (who will still be 31 next season) with the expectation he'll play shortstop in his age 37 season, but he'll just move to 2B or 3B as needed. Maybe he'll pack on that big contract 30lbs and lose all his speed like we've seen from many other players, but teams don't get to plan around that. Semien will be playing his age 37 season in the final year of the contract and if Semien were 3 years younger, he'd likely be looking at $35MM/yr or a longer contract. 

Teams pay for production and the expectation Semien will still be good at 35-36 is reasonable. The Twins just signed Donaldson to 4 years and $23MM/yr at age 34, 3 years older than Semien and Donaldson was not as good over his past couple full seasons as Semien had been.

 

 

[nicksaviking]

1 hour ago, dex8425 said:

I'm curious what Story gets now, given that he is younger, capable of playing a good defensive SS, and has had more consistency. Has to be 200+. Correa will top 300 and Seager will top 250 unless they want shorter deals with higher AAV.

It just seems hard to see four shortstops getting 175M+ in one offseason. Might, but seems like Story and probably even more so Baez, will have more of an uphill battle.

[bean5302]

13 minutes ago, nicksaviking said:

It just seems hard to see four shortstops getting 175M+ in one offseason. Might, but seems like Story and probably even more so Baez, will have more of an uphill battle.

I don't think Baez gets anywhere near Semien money with all the red flags. Story is interesting. He had a down year last year which is probably the only reason he's not in the club north of $250MM in my opinion. It wouldn't surprise me if Story ended up in the $150-175MM range. If Story was 28, I could see him taking a short contract and betting on himself, but reaching free agency at 30 instead of 29 would be a big risk.

[RpR]

8 hours ago, bean5302 said:

Semien has an above average fielding rate at SS in 4 of the past 5 years, and he was average in 2018, which is the the season you cherry picked, not that errors are all that matters anyway. I think it's absolutely wild to claim defense doesn't play into a 7 year $175MM contract for a shortstop. Semien's positional value and defense is a big part of the reason he's getting paid.

Yep, those negative numbers are just what the Twins need; and that 35 error makes Polanco look like a first rate Short Stop but the Second Base numbers could put fear into Polanco.

[bean5302]

31 minutes ago, RpR said:

Yep, those negative numbers are just what the Twins need; and that 35 error makes Polanco look like a first rate Short Stop but the Second Base numbers could put fear into Polanco.

...and yet UZR and RF/9 both have him as consistently above average. Also, feel free to take a look at his career numbers. Even on those wildly up and down metrics you want to use, he's neutral. Or you can cherry pick another meaningless number from 7 seasons ago.

[dxpavelka]

On 11/28/2021 at 4:49 PM, mnfireman said:

Semien just set the SS market bar quite high, 7/$175MM ($25MM AAV) for a guy who will be 2B in a couple seasons. Here's to hoping Lewis or Martin pans out after whoever the team signs as a stop-gap.

Turns out Semien will become a 2B in a couple hours not seasons.