5 Reasons Why the Twins’ Front Office Avoids Spending on Relief Pitchers

[old nurse]

On 8/29/2024 at 8:58 AM, LambchoP said:

While I agree we shouldn't spend huge or long term money on relievers, that doesn't mean we don't need to spend SOME. I mean, if we're not spending on starters, what kind of pitching are you going to get. While a 10-15 million dollar per year relief arm is never going to happen, why not 3 different couple million dollar arms. Spread the money out a bit and build depth. But building almost an entire pen with cast offs, injury recovery guys, bargain bin release waiver wire types is not going to cut it. Sure, we got lucky once in awhile with someone like Brock Stewart, but most of the time you'll get as advertised. And we've seen what a waiver wire bullpen gets you this year. We've been too top heavy all year. 2-4 guys you can count on at the top, otherwise, everyone else is probably going to cost you games. This makes you overuse your top guys, they wear down. Get hurt or underperform. Now, I do think we could have a solid pen next year with just a small handful of additions 

Obviously you missed how large Pagan’s paycheck is with his free agency and how people here complained how bad of reliever he was here. . Perhaps you would want to check out the hit and miss of relievers making 2 million when the are signed as free agents 

[old nurse]

20 hours ago, Linus said:

Nobody is saying you have to hand out $10 million contracts. There is a large middle ground to be explored. Teams hand out good contracts to starters who bust all the time. Then it’s called a cost of doing business. If it’s a reliever than it’s some sort of brain dead decision that means the gm should be fired (in the Pagan example he probably should be as that signing is from outer space. 

What good contract for a free agent starting pitcher have the Twins handed out?

the preponderance of these undefined middle ground contracts for relievers, how many of them actually work out or go bust?

[old nurse]

A good reliever is not a fungible asset, a mediocre one is. That is why there have been about a dozen of them cycle through the bullpen this year. It is also why Okert got as much use as he did and the team had stuck with Thielbar 

[Linus]

2 hours ago, old nurse said:

What good contract for a free agent starting pitcher have the Twins handed out?

the preponderance of these undefined middle ground contracts for relievers, how many of them actually work out or go bust?

I said teams not the Twins. Here is what I know for sure: if you collect a bunch of bad pitchers because you don’t want to invest in the pen then don’t be surprised when you get crappy performance. 

[old nurse]

12 hours ago, Linus said:

I said teams not the Twins. Here is what I know for sure: if you collect a bunch of bad pitchers because you don’t want to invest in the pen then don’t be surprised when you get crappy performance. 

What is a medium level contract for a reliever and what are the odds that the contract works out any better than the bargain basement variety