Blame Game: Who Gets the Most Blame for the Twins’ Poor Start?

[Major League Ready]

On 4/25/2024 at 12:26 PM, TopGunn#22 said:

Oh, there is blame aplenty to go around.  It all starts with ownership.  The idea $30 million needed to be cut from the salary budget when there was no great mystery the Pohlad's were NOT going to be $55 million in the hole for the 2024 season is laughable.  They KNEW there were going to get a pretty hefty sum from Balley for 2024.  These things don't just suddenly happen.  They got $48 million.  Cutting $30 million wasn't necessary.

I'm not against dealing aging players to give younger, up and coming players a chance.  With Julien, Brooks Lee and even Austin Martin in the pipeline there was no need to keep Polanco.  So this brings me to the FO.  This FO has always been either a home run or a strikeout.  Much like their hitters.  They either push all the right buttons with veteran pickups, like last year with the exception of Gallo (which made zero sense from the beginning--adding a LH bat when the team craved a RH bat).  Or they push all the wrong buttons like Margot and Santana, or every veteran they brought in for the bullpen, also keeping an aging Theilbar when Funderburk is the obvious successor, to hanging on to an expensive utility guy like Farmer.

The hitters need to hit.  But I watch their approach and I wonder "are they being coached to this" or do they just have no plan or sense of situational hitting.  The Twins are incredibly frustrating to watch while batting.  I go back to the ownership and FO.  They needed to fill the void left by Sonny Gray's exit and essentially chose not to.  They deemed DeSclafani the replacement and then went with Varland as the #5 SP.  Cleveland, Detroit and KC all WORKED to get better and it shows so far.  If ownership imposed a "salary cap" for lack of a better term and the need for a veteran SP was acute, the answer was right there all along and actually still is.

Would like to see the link confirming what the twins are getting from Bally's.  I have not been able to find any report, just conjecture based on what Cleveland and Texas received which is a totally different scenario.  They had contracts and needed the approval of a bankruptcy judge.  The Twins did not have that leverage in negotiations.  You also ignored the $30M decrease in revenue from the BAM money.  Are you still not aware of the BAM money after all the discussion or are you simply choosing to ignore anything that contradicts your position?

.... You are also comparing this year's starting payroll to last year's ending payroll which of course includes the additional cost to replace injured players.   The current payroll is 129.6M.  The difference is roughly #23M not $30M.

[Hawkeye Bean Counter]

I am patiently waiting for the OP's article on how the front office management has led to this 9 game winning streak and brought us within 3 games of the lead.   SSS are SSS.   Making significant claims based off of 20 games is silly.  Let alone when having several with injuries that were short term.  Now we will see how we do against better teams,  which is Chpettit argument.  

[ashbury]

6 hours ago, Hawkeye Bean Counter said:

I am patiently waiting for the OP's article on how the front office management has led to this 9 game winning streak and brought us within 3 games of the lead.   SSS are SSS.   Making significant claims based off of 20 games is silly.  Let alone when having several with injuries that were short term.  Now we will see how we do against better teams,  which is Chpettit argument.  

I love a good 10-game winning streak - are there bad ones?

But this seems like the thread* to say that a better team beats the Twins today.  I mean, obviously a different team plays everything differently and nothing is comparable.  But if you're willing to play a what-if game on specific plays as today actually unfolded, a couple of defensive miscues and an ineffective performance by the White Sox bullpen were the difference.  A better opponent might have kept the lead.  I'm not willing to extrapolate to the rest of the season based on just this good stretch against lesser opposition.

 

* Certainly not the game thread or the game wrap up.  Let's enjoy the win for what it actually was, a good comeback.

[Hawkeye Bean Counter]

19 hours ago, ashbury said:

I love a good 10-game winning streak - are there bad ones?

But this seems like the thread* to say that a better team beats the Twins today.  I mean, obviously a different team plays everything differently and nothing is comparable.  But if you're willing to play a what-if game on specific plays as today actually unfolded, a couple of defensive miscues and an ineffective performance by the White Sox bullpen were the difference.  A better opponent might have kept the lead.  I'm not willing to extrapolate to the rest of the season based on just this good stretch against lesser opposition.

 

* Certainly not the game thread or the game wrap up.  Let's enjoy the win for what it actually was, a good comeback.

We have beat up on 2 poor teams,  lost to a few decent teams early while still trying to find a footing with all the injuries.  I understand the consternation or elation of the fanbase over a few wins or losses is meaningless.  That is essentially my point, it is the absurdity of getting in a tizzy over an extremely small sample size of what is a very long season.  the 25% mark of games is where I think you can begin to make some decent observations of the team.  

As to what if games, are we 10 games over .500 if we don't have the injuries early.   Also the white sox are a decent team,  the issue is their bullpen.  If they can find 2-3 decent arms to add to the bullpen they will actually put up a fight in most games.  I am glad we faced them when we did.  

[Schmoeman5]

On 4/24/2024 at 3:33 PM, Jocko87 said:

Now that we've gotten all the same old repeated front office wailing out of the way, I have a serious question.

What could they realistically have done in the offseason that would offset the poor performances of the players who were already here to the point that this article would not be written?  I agree completely that they own this roster entirely, but we are talking performances several notches below even the most conservative projections all across the roster.  

No matter how deeply (and incorrectly) you believe Falvine are pushing the buttons on pitch count and hitting plans, day to day on the field ain't on them. 

This will be a good article to bookmark for 6 months from now.

How bout 2 weeks

[Hawkeye Bean Counter]

Right now this looks like a pretty loaded team with decent depth at all spots except SP.  We have a couple minor leaguers moving up levels, and Festa may be seasoned enough later in the season,  but Varland can't cut it as a SP.  Revert him to RP and lets move on there.  The hitting approach has improved immensely.  When you are crushing Seattle you are doing something right.   

The other argument that we play in a poor division is also falling by the wayside.  The central has 4 solid teams.   Currently record wise the Central has the 6, 8, 9, and 12 best records in baseball.  This isn't an easy division by any stretch of the imagination.  You also have the White Sox who have gone 3 and 3 since finishing playing us.   I think we will be glad that we got a lot of our games against them out of the way.    

Kepler is continuing to be a stud this year.   SP is firing on all cylinders and the relief pitching could be dominant by mid season once we get everyone health and Staumont built back up.  

Lastly most of the consternation in this thread is now looking pretty silly a few weeks later.