No Relief: Griffin Jax Goes South, as Twins Trade Him to Tampa Bay Rays

[Major League Ready]

22 hours ago, Dman said:

They traded a reliever for a starter.  A starter with team control to 2030.  He is essentially a cheaper version of Chris Paddack in his current form. Pretty much the same K rate, same ERA.  Bradley walks more guys but keeps the ball on ground better than Paddack.  I still don't know why they couldn't have gotten a couple of throw in's but maybe that just isn't how things work at the deadline.  

Still it's hard to argue getting a solid starter that might get better for a reliever even one as good as Jax.  Not that it matters but Bradley was Tampa's number one prospect in 2023.  He has a plus fastball. Hopefully he can find a little more and turn himself into a mid rotation starter. I think it makes sense especially if they plan to move any starters in the offseason.

You hit the nail on the head with the last sentence.  Bradley / Abel and Rojas made their starting pitch very deep.  They are going to trade 1 or 2 of the big 3.  That's how high impact prospects are acquired.  How did the Royals build their WS team?  It started with trading away Zach Greinke.  There is a phase 2 this winter.

[Jack207]

The only logical way to handle this is NOT show up at Target Field. F**K the OWNERS!

[Killer Rod Tony]

On 7/31/2025 at 6:50 PM, mikelink45 said:

This is beyond rebuild.  This is just a free-for-all and we take on a pitcher that Tampa Bay can't fix?  There is no team that maximizes pitchers more than the Rays and no team that seems incapable of maximizing talent like the Twins. 

Except for the Joe Ryan Deal don't try to trade with Tampa because you lose pretty much every time. Listening to Mr Falvey talk in the third inning tonight he's real good at making trades sound like it's a magnificent choice but it's not when you have a bona fide player like Varland who is finding his place you have received the benefit of what you have the player for as soon as he gets it going you decide to start over with a different player who already has the experience at the major league level of failure. How much more tweaking can this guy do to put him at a 2.02 era? You can't you already got your man you don't replace that with a mediocre pitcher. Not everything about Thursday was bad but most of it we did not receive value for value and just utterly destroying the back end of the bullpen. I can say we're not going to win very many games with a bullpen like we have now. Lrjohnson195230@yahoo.com

[Killer Rod Tony]

On 7/31/2025 at 6:10 PM, AceBee said:

This is sad...I thought they would only trade one out of Jax and Duran..Losing them both sucks

Seeing what the Oakland team received for their closer by comparison to what the twins received for Duran and Duran is twice as good as Miller. If we got all that for Duran then maybe okay but trying to build up these two guys is being superstars of the future for Duran just isn't going to happen. To look in the Dugout during the game and see so many different people it's just deflating for the players I mean they are making millions of dollars but they're still is a little bit of camaraderie and it's hard to have to see that many new people in The Dugout especially when they don't have the talent with what was sent away. I don't see the positive in any of it. Lrjohnson195230@ yahoo.com