Three Offseason Decisions Already Hurting the Twins

[bean5302]

1 hour ago, Dman said:

...Farmer was such jack of all trades and a solid right handed bat versus lefties it kind of made sense to keep him around for emergencies...

I really thought sign and trade would be a good option for Farmer. I'd also love to know Farmer's thoughts on catching since that's what the Dodgers drafted and coached him to be. Wonder if the Twins considered using him at catcher at all last year? It would be a good strategic choice to bolster Farmer's value in plans to sign/trade later.

[Doctor Gast]

I was against all our off-season acquisitions, a waste of money & players.  Paddack, Varland & SWR are pretty good #4, 5 & 6 SP (we'd be better if SWR is brought up & put Varland in long relief/ spot starter). If you want greater depth, it could be easily resolved by signing a capable #5 veteran arm, Our greatest rotation need is the postseason. At 1B we have Julien, Kiriloff & Miranda which are a much better bat than Santana. Signing Farmer was a smart move, Where would we be with the injuries of Correa, Lewis & Lee, Farmer is great insurance. We need a platoon at 2B but everybody are busy elsewhere.

Our biggest problem has been & is lack of clutch hitting & a lot of SOs, especially with the loss of Polanco, Lewis & Correa. Return of these players & warmer weather will solve most of our immediate problems.

[DJL44]

15 minutes ago, Kenny Powers said:

Good stuff.  For whatever reason, I just happened to look at the stats from an "old school" perspective this morning.  I was shocked to see the following batting averages:

.208 Buxton

.189 Julien

.189 Margot

.135 Santana

.133 Vazquez

.111 Castro

.080 Wallner

.071 Farmer

.050 Kepler

I realize the new standard is OPS over AVE.  But man...that's ugly.  I think the boys need to spend some extra time in the batting cages 😆

Overall MLB average is .240

[Fire Dan Gladden]

25 minutes ago, Karbo said:

I'm thinking or maybe even hoping the seat Falvey sits in is getting warm. Questionable use of a reduced payroll, lack of the "pitching factory" he was supposed to bring in. And I also wonder if he's calling most of the shots with lineups or if Rocco has the freedom to do what he thinks is best. The payroll was lowered, but other teams are doing better with lower payrolls. One more thing I wonder about is the way they handle ST. I get early on they want to see some of the kids play, but the last week or so the regulars should be getting 3-4 AB's to get into a better rhythm? Just a thought but the way the team has come out to start the last couple of seasons I would think it's time to try something?

I am not seeing this as a Falvey issue... yet.
Other teams with lower payrolls have had years to work their way through that process.  Falvey has basically had 6 months to deal with a 20% payroll cut for a team that had high expectations.
The ST question is real.  Over the years, it seems many players have had offensive  issues at the beginning of the season.  This probably needs a deeper inspections. 

[bean5302]

9 minutes ago, Woof Bronzer said:

Plenty of blame to go around - I'm getting strong "Total System Failure" vibes about this season.  

Yeah, I'm not happy with the Pohlad's decision to cut payroll capacity so much. I think the real cut they needed to make was Dave St. Peter's responsibilities and find somebody who can put fans in the seats. They really botched it this year. I think the Twins bought into the strategy "spend money to make money" the past couple years, but without success. I think that has mostly to do with St. Peter as I still feel the strategy is 100% valid.

[Jocko87]

31 minutes ago, Cody Pirkl said:

Based solely on the fact that Farmer isn't the backup SS, that $6.3m was an overpay without even considering his performance so far. Farmer was surprised he was brought back, and if you're a Gleeman & the Geek listener, Twins sources themselves admitted that they misjudged that decision. Is that the main issue with the team right now? No, but it's hurting them. 

I'm not sure that his main value was as the shortstop. If Correa goes down longterm it's Lee or Lewis at short. The value was that he can backfill anywhere to support short, as well as play it. He set the floor better than anyone available.

I'm sure they tried a sign and trade but he shouldn't be surprised they were OK with keeping him at price knowing what they value. I don't care about a biased interpretation of what sources supposedly said. I listen, and didn't hear anything that would make me believe the Twins regret the move. Their price was obviously high.

Farmer is also a notorious slow starter. His splits are pretty ugly first and second half.

[chpettit19]

Lots of season left, but the incredibly questionable moves that many of us spent the offseason complaining about are all coming up as losses early.

DeSclafani being the only starter they brought in was doomed from the jump. I think Paddack will be solid in his limited innings most of the year, but banking on him and Varland playing core roles in replacing Gray and Maeda's innings was always a massive bet. Not a good bet to this point, and the depth behind them is nothing to be excited about yet. The lineup is very likely to regress to the mean and improve throughout the year, but the rotation is teetering on the edge and is likely to see some pretty brutal dips with any of the injuries that are coming.

A 38-year old Santana who can't hit righties never made sense as an add. Never. Not for a single second. It looked even more questionable when they said they planned to use him as their everyday 1B. Again, he can't hit righties. Hasn't been able to for years. He's playing a bat first position in a lineup that had plenty of questions already (for some of us at least) and can't hit against 75% of the pitchers in the league, but they brought him in as their everyday guy. Never made sense.

I expect Farmer's numbers to improve as the season moves forward and he faces more lefties, but he was never worth that contract, and that was even when we thought he'd be the primary backup SS. If he's a short side of a platoon 2B/3B bat he's really not worth that deal. When the player themselves publicly state they were surprised to get the deal they did it's hard to argue that the team didn't misplay the situation.

The Twins believe in platoon splits and veterans. They cut payroll (that's 100% on Pohlad, not Falvine) and answered by making bad bets on short side platoon veteran bats and a starter who lost his job last year because he wasn't good enough to beat out Dallas Keuchel late in the year. Farmer isn't this bad, but Santana may actually be. And Varland likely isn't much better at all as a starter than he's shown to this point.

Things will get better, but this team is worse than last year's and while the FO had fewer dollars to play with they still deserve blame for the roster choices they made. The injuries can't be blamed more than a little either. Injuries happen every year. When you choose to build your depth around short side platoon bats you can't complain when the injuries everybody knows will happen happen and you're stuck with short side platoon bats playing everyday. Really can't complain when you bring in a short side platoon bat to be your everyday 1B. 

[In My La Z boy]

10 minutes ago, Fire Dan Gladden said:

I am not seeing this as a Falvey issue... yet.
Other teams with lower payrolls have had years to work their way through that process.  Falvey has basically had 6 months to deal with a 20% payroll cut for a team that had high expectations.
The ST question is real.  Over the years, it seems many players have had offensive  issues at the beginning of the season.  This probably needs a deeper inspections. 

"This" may not be a Falvey issue... yet, BUT - where is the "pitching pipeline" we ALL thought was coming when we hired him away from Cleveland? Hasn't Falvey had enough time now to have developed this "pipeline" we were ALL told about, and was the PRIMARY reason he got the job?

I was expecting a "pipeline" / I see no "pipeline" / I wanted a "pipeline"

Perhaps we should have hired a front office who promised a "hitting pipeline" and could have accidentally swerved into THIS pitching pipeline without even trying? The buck seems to stop in this baseball company with Falvey. Ultimately he will need to go if this year plays out like this for the duration. He was the "pitching pipeline" guy.

[Mike Sixel]

Agree on all fronts. Martin over Margot was an easy choice. Santana? Never liked this at all, and they'll hang into him forever. They love veterans. The youth carried this team last year and they went out and bet on old, mediocre, players? 

I wanted them fired if they didn't make the playoffs last year, and if they don't this year? I'm ready to move on. 

If Farmer isn't the backup SS, they should have kept Gordon. 

I don't know if there is a cheap SP I liked.... So I don't know what to do there given they cut payroll. 

In any event, they decided not to trust the farm, again, and the guys they brought in are even worse than I feared....

[D.C Twins]

Just to be clear.... while many problems have been discussed, there is ONE principle off season failure that will likely sink the season:

Lack of SP depth 

The FO should expect to need to use at least 10 per year (8 last year and 14 in 2022).

BUT, they went into the year with 2 solid question marks (maybe 3 depending on your view of Ober) in the starting rotation alone and limited proven depth in AAA. 

When injuries inevitably manifest, we will be in trouble.

Key hitters and bullpen arms should reasonably be expected to get back and stabilize those areas.

But, I just don't see a solution for SP (unless we get VERY lucky on the injury front)

[Fire Dan Gladden]

11 minutes ago, In My La Z boy said:

"This" may not be a Falvey issue... yet, BUT - where is the "pitching pipeline" we ALL thought was coming when we hired him away from Cleveland? Hasn't Falvey had enough time now to have developed this "pipeline" we were ALL told about, and was the PRIMARY reason he got the job?

I was expecting a "pipeline" / I see no "pipeline" / I wanted a "pipeline"

Perhaps we should have hired a front office who promised a "hitting pipeline" and could have accidentally swerved into THIS pitching pipeline without even trying? The buck seems to stop in this baseball company with Falvey. Ultimately he will need to go if this year plays out like this for the duration. He was the "pitching pipeline" guy.

You were expecting 5 Justin Verlanders in the rotation?

Define pipeline.  Shrewd trades for quality SP or prospects has to be in there...

Up until this year, the pitching has improved steadily basically every year.  After last year, there was some expectation that there would be a step back.

[gunnarthor]

7 minutes ago, Fire Dan Gladden said:

...

Up until this year, the pitching has improved steadily basically every year.  After last year, there was some expectation that there would be a step back.

That's not really true. Under this FO, their team pitching WAR ranking has been - 

2017 -24th
2018 -22nd
2019 - 4th
2020 -3rd (in a short season)
2021 - 21st
2022 - 26th
2023 - 4th

That's a bit all over the map and hasn't really shown any development of a "pipeline." 

 

[Mike Sixel]

Just now, gunnarthor said:

That's not really true. Under this FO, their team pitching WAR ranking has been - 

2017 -24th
2018 -22nd
2019 - 4th
2020 -3rd (in a short season)
2021 - 21st
2022 - 26th
2023 - 4th

That's a bit all over the map and hasn't really shown any development of a "pipeline." 

 

I defended the pipeline the last few years, as it takes time to actually develop pitchers.... But it's time for someone to be at least reliable other than Ober. SWR might be that guy, but we'll not know any time soon. The promise of a few prospects means nothing of no one new cintributes seriously this year, given how many mediocre guys starting in Minnesota. 

[hitterscount]

1 hour ago, gunnarthor said:

It's not a good team but they'll probably still win the central. Maybe. But it's a boring and surprisingly old team. It's not fun to watch (admittedly, I haven't seen much b/c they aren't on youtube tv). Watching journeymen players struggle sucks. I'd rather watch young guys try. 

That said, there are problems - they have two legit ML starters in Lopez and Ryan. But the rest of the rotation is a question mark. I assume our strategy of throw things against the wall, see what sticks will let us find another reasonable starter but the depth is poor and the ceilings aren't that high. 

Offensively, they aren't going to post a 81 OPS+ for the season, they aren't this bad. So we should see some basic positive regression as a team and they have some potential players with pretty good upside, if they can get healthy. 

But there is a lot of season left and both Baltimore and LA are far superior teams so a bad start was a little bit likely. After this, we get Detroit and the White Sox. We might look a lot better in a week or so. 

I would take that bet any day...  against them winning the division. Just not seeing them as a contender in the mediocre AL central ,. , it goes deeper than the last 14 games. It's the philosophy in AB's, the questionable to lousy defense, the lack of speed, the manager that continues to push all the wrong buttons.. it's brutal and a terrible approach on offense and the use of the BP at times is beyond frustrating.  

I would argue that you can count Ober as an MLB starter. Really all that needed to be done was acquiring one more SP and a viable 1st base and an outfield option. Instead payroll was slashed when just maintaining it would have allowed for those three positions to be addressed. whether through trades or free agency. We tend to hang on to all of our prospects when they rarely live up to the projected potential when they can be used to acquire viable major league talent. 

I will throw this out to the cheap ass Pohlands, fire the GM's and I will take a 1 million$ salary and use the savings to help field a contender... seriously, could the roster be construction be any worse? 

[Woof Bronzer]

43 minutes ago, In My La Z boy said:

"This" may not be a Falvey issue... yet, BUT - where is the "pitching pipeline" we ALL thought was coming when we hired him away from Cleveland? Hasn't Falvey had enough time now to have developed this "pipeline" we were ALL told about, and was the PRIMARY reason he got the job?
 

I think fans probably define pipeline differently.  Falvey's philosophy to pitching is extremely simple:  "grip it n rip it".  It isn't about "pitching" as much as "throwing" and he definitely has a lot of throwers in the organization.  For extreme sabermetrics guys like Falvey results don't matter - only "velo" - so it wouldn't surprise me if Falvey believes he actually HAS delivered a pipeline.  

[GKuehl]

1 hour ago, Cory Engelhardt said:

He just signed a minor league deal with San Diego yesterday.

CUT SANTANA AND TRADE CASH FOR SOLANO

[Riverbrian]

26 minutes ago, Mike Sixel said:

 

If Farmer isn't the backup SS, they should have kept Gordon. 

 

I agree with you if these were the only two options. I would have taken Gordon for less money but this was never going to happen. We like oranges and the front office likes apples to the point that there is no other consideration.   

Gordon can't protect Julien from left handers... Farmer in theory can. The front office is absolutely locked into this. Margot was traded for because the front office is absolutely locked into this. Margot also isn't our primary CF backup that most here thought was necessary due to the Buxton fragileness. They are here to hit lefties. They have bad numbers against righties.   

#1. The advantage of the platoon split is absolutely statistically real.

#2. 75% of pitchers being right handed is also absolutely statistically real. 

#3. The amount of hitters on the disabled list at any time during the season is absolutely real.  

Based on 75% to 25%... I think they are playing the percentages wrong by playing them right. 

The front office has sacrificed #2 and #3 to prioritize #1 because Farmer and Margot are now being asked to bat against right handers because injuries have changed everything and injuries were always going to change everything. 

Injuries have upset the apple cart.   

[MABB1959]

1 hour ago, chpettit19 said:

Things will get better, but this team is worse than last year's and while the FO had fewer dollars to play with they still deserve blame for the roster choices they made.

I would think the money made from the play-offs would offset the Bally's nonsense.  They are now getting TV money.

[Mike Sixel]

3 minutes ago, Riverbrian said:

I agree with you if these were the only two options. I would have taken Gordon for less money but this was never going to happen. We like oranges and the front office likes apples to the point that there is no other consideration.   

Gordon can't protect Julien from left handers... Farmer in theory can. The front office is absolutely locked into this. Margot was traded for because the front office is absolutely locked into this. Margot also isn't our primary CF backup that most here thought was necessary due to the Buxton fragileness. They are here to hit lefties. They have bad numbers against righties.   

#1. The advantage of the platoon split is absolutely statistically real.

#2. 75% of pitchers being right handed is also absolutely statistically real. 

#3. The amount of hitters on the disabled list at any time during the season is absolutely real.  

Based on 75% to 25%... I think they are playing the percentages wrong by playing them right. 

The front office has sacrificed #2 and #3 to prioritize #1 because Farmer and Margot are now being asked to bat against right handers because injuries have changed everything and injuries were always going to change everything. 

Injuries have upset the apple cart.   

I don't really care about Gordon one way or the other, really....my point (as you know) is that Farmer really has one role on this team, backup SS. 

Martin could be the short side platoon at 2B (though I'd just play, you know, their best hitter that is healthy most of the time). He could also be the short side platoon in the OF. 

They could have spent the Margot, Santana, Farmer money on a legit 1B or thrown the dice at a SP (not sure who, frankly). Or just pocketed it, that would have been better for the team at this point. 

Why they refuse to trust the farm is beyond confusing. If they don't trust their farm, they really should fire themselves.....The seem to trust Lee, despite the tiny sample size....and of course he somehow managed to get hurt when both Lewis and CC are hurt (and we still have zero updates on his status, or Jenkins').

[MABB1959]

Potential injuries should have been calculated.  Correa, Buxton and Kepler are injury prone.  

[nicksaviking]

3 hours ago, VivaBomboRivera! said:

Until this team has played 15 more games, articles like this do all three of those players a disservice.

There are certainly players who are having stronger starts to the season, but fans who wanted a higher-powered roster out of the gate need to direct their voices several floors up.

Simply avoiding two of those players gets you Justin Turner instead, avoid all three and Rhys Hoskins could be here. Yeah, ownership screwed everyone over this year, but the front office is the area that seems obsessed with quantity vets over A quality vet.

[nicksaviking]

1 hour ago, Bigfork Twins Guy said:

I know he has no offense to contribute, but with Lee injured wouldn't Miller look great defensively at SS with Correa out?  Especially with how Castro and Farmer have handled that position defensively.  It would have been a great look at who possibly would have been our Correa replacement in a few years.

No. Defense isn't the issue, offense is. 

If this team goes back to the Pedro Florimon era of just putting the best defensive player at SS, offense be damned, then they aren't playing for anything anyway. Might as well cut payroll to 70M and start over as you're not a serious contender.

[VivaBomboRivera!]

5 minutes ago, nicksaviking said:

Simply avoiding two of those players gets you Justin Turner instead, avoid all three and Rhys Hoskins could be here. Yeah, ownership screwed everyone over this year, but the front office is the area that seems obsessed with quantity vets over A quality vet.

Turner's certainly off to a hot start in his sunset years. Was ownership ever going to sign off on paying 13 million for him, no matter who you swap him in for?

[DJL44]

43 minutes ago, GKuehl said:

CUT SANTANA AND TRADE CASH FOR SOLANO

Or just sign Brandon Belt. They're last in hitting but somehow don't have room for a guy who put up an OPS+ of 136 in 2023 (better than any Twin except Royce Lewis) and has a career OPS+ of 124.

[Mike Sixel]

13 minutes ago, nicksaviking said:

Simply avoiding two of those players gets you Justin Turner instead, avoid all three and Rhys Hoskins could be here. Yeah, ownership screwed everyone over this year, but the front office is the area that seems obsessed with quantity vets over A quality vet.

I would have gone for Hoskins, but not Turner.....

[In My La Z boy]

1 hour ago, Fire Dan Gladden said:

You were expecting 5 Justin Verlanders in the rotation?

Define pipeline.  Shrewd trades for quality SP or prospects has to be in there...

Up until this year, the pitching has improved steadily basically every year.  After last year, there was some expectation that there would be a step back.

No Mr. Extreme example. I was expecting whatever the term pitching pipeline means? I didn't invent this term and I didn't apply it to the Falvey deal, but someone did, and we've been discussing it for the better part of 7 years. I take it to mean the cupboard is never bare. I'm feeling a rather bare cupboard this spring, and we've given Falvey plenty of drafts and plenty of off-seasons to work with here in Minnesota. Not complicated. Pitching in Cleveland is WHY he got the job.

[nicksaviking]

20 minutes ago, VivaBomboRivera! said:

Turner's certainly off to a hot start in his sunset years. Was ownership ever going to sign off on paying 13 million for him, no matter who you swap him in for?

I doubt ownership cares how they spend their money, they only care how much they spend.

[nicksaviking]

10 minutes ago, Mike Sixel said:

I would have gone for Hoskins, but not Turner.....

Turner is someone I would have used to avoid, but I was turned off by how streaky all the hitters were the last several years. While old, Turner hasn't had a bad season in over a decade. I would have trusted him to be reliable more than just about any of the other free agents, Cody Bellinger included.

[Mike Sixel]

Just now, nicksaviking said:

Turner is someone I would have used to avoid, but I was turned off by how streaky all the hitters were the last several years. While old, Turner hasn't had a bad season in over a decade. I would have trusted him to be reliable more than just about any of the other free agents, Cody Bellinger included.

I had no interest in Bellinger at any price he'd accept. None.

[nicksaviking]

8 minutes ago, In My La Z boy said:

No Mr. Extreme example. I was expecting whatever the term pitching pipeline means? I didn't invent this term and I didn't apply it to the Falvey deal, but someone did, and we've been discussing it for the better part of 7 years. I take it to mean the cupboard is never bare. I'm feeling a rather bare cupboard this spring, and we've given Falvey plenty of drafts and plenty of off-seasons to work with here in Minnesota. Not complicated. Pitching in Cleveland is WHY he got the job.

You mean all the pitchers they traded for? Like the Twins also have done the last half decade? Because while Falvey was there, Cleveland only developed Danny Salazar, they traded for the others.