Trading Trevor Larnach Just Makes Too Much Sense

[karcherd]

1 minute ago, MMBoys93 said:

What’s potentially changed is that Bell is on an absolute tear right now and if that continues then there’s absolutely value there. I can’t predict the future though, but if he continues hitting well, a switch hitting guy with an .800 OPS is absolutely valuable.

He’s not gonna bring back much but allowing Sabato to take some of his innings is valuable to me. 

 

And in May he was horrible.  Do you really think the rest of the league doesn't know that he is a streaky hitter.  We need a dose of realism on our players.  I love the streak he is on, but it's not going to change his value.

[thelanges5]

34 minutes ago, Mike Sixel said:

Taj?

Yes, trade Larnach. It's 100 percent what Milwaukee and Tampa would do. 

💯 you can buy and sell at the same time! Use the rest of this year to figure out who is/are the future. I want to see Gabby, Roden, Jenkins, Erod, Culpepper in the MLB in 2026. 

[Patzky]

1 hour ago, mickster said:

Joe, Taj, Ober (Parades), Zebby, Prielipp.       

I'm throwing all the firesales together so no Abel or Taj

[Sampson5]

Honestly I'd be crazy not to trade him to create a spot for one of the outfielders at some point here you want wallner and one of the others up here easy way to do it is trading larnach I've always assumed fedko was a placeholder until roden or a prospect was ready and with how well larnach is playing you could actually get a solid return hope he continues to thrive until the deadline to maximize his value 

[mickster]

12 minutes ago, Patzky said:

I'm throwing all the firesales together so no Abel or Taj

I am keeping the Jax trade, as the issue between him and Rocco on the field led to him going

[DataNerd]

27 minutes ago, Sampson5 said:

I've always assumed fedko was a placeholder until roden or a prospect was ready

Fedko is up because Larnach/Clemens are both poor hitters against LHP and Fedko is a righty, while Roden and our other OF prospects are LHH.  Martin can platoon with one of them, but they both should be on a platoon

[Heiny]

I would start by getting what you can for Wallner.  Let him jack around the AAA pitching until someone makes an offer for a decent RP and send him on his way.  He strikes out way too much and is a horrible defender.  As far as Larnach goes,  I really like him.  But he should also bring back an above average RP.  And an above average RP would be a closer in our BP.  But honestly, this team will probably never go anywhere until the ownership cooperates.  How bout a budget of about 200M?  That might make it a little easier on the front office to do their job!!!

[rdehring]

2 hours ago, thelanges5 said:

💯 you can buy and sell at the same time! Use the rest of this year to figure out who is/are the future. I want to see Gabby, Roden, Jenkins, Erod, Culpepper in the MLB in 2026. 

Add me to the list of those that believe you can be a seller who improves their current team while doing it.  With all the young outfielders on the horizon one has to believe that at least one is going to be a very good or great player.  Moving Larnach opens a spot for that prospect.  Should he keep hitting like he has for another three or four weeks, he should bring back something of value.  And the Twins biggest need is help in the pen.  If they need to add a minor league prospect to get a very good reliever, do it.

 

[mikelink45]

Only trade for pitchers!  We have plenty of OF/DH - we don't have a complete roster of pitchers. 

[MMBoys93]

4 hours ago, karcherd said:

Clemens has no value at the deadline.  His hot streak is over and he reverting to what he is, a good role player. The rest of the league knows what he is.  There is no reason Lee can't fill at SS.  If you are adding an infielder to the 40, give Ross a shot.  

Clemens has a .753 ops over his last 30 games.
He's been worth a 2.25 bWAR average per season since coming over (better than Castro during his time in MN)
He also plays at least league average defense at 4 MLB positions and he's beginning arbitration next year.

They don't have to trade him, but once Culepper comes up Kreidler has shown he can be that super utility guy. Kreidler doesn't start arbitration for a couple years, Clemens starts next year. 

Brooks has been worth -6 OAA at SS this year, he's not going back to SS.

 

[MMBoys93]

3 hours ago, karcherd said:

And in May he was horrible.  Do you really think the rest of the league doesn't know that he is a streaky hitter.  We need a dose of realism on our players.  I love the streak he is on, but it's not going to change his value.

Bell is a known slow starter. .689 OPS in April and a .760 OPS or better in all other months.

[Dman]

5 hours ago, DJL44 said:

Larnach has zero trade value this offseason. He is a borderline non-tender.

I'd say it depends on where his OPS ends up at the end of the year.  While he's never had an .800 OPS before he was around .770 in 2024.  We just paid Josh Bell 7M to be a less flexible defensive player with around a .740 OPS the last three years.  I think Larnach can do that especially if protected from lefties. 

Unless Larnach drops that OPS back down to the .725 range I don't think he will be a borderline none tender.  We'll have to wait and see where he lands.  Right now for the trade deadline the athletic has him at number 37 out of 50 players so they feel he has value.  FWIW Bell did not make their list. 

I think Larnach is more valuable than many assume regardless of his limitations.

[DJL44]

8 minutes ago, Dman said:

I'd say it depends on where his OPS ends up at the end of the year.  While he's never had an .800 OPS before he was around .770 in 2024.  We just paid Josh Bell 7M to be a less flexible defensive player with around a .740 OPS the last three years.  I think Larnach can do that especially if protected from lefties. 

Unless Larnach drops that OPS back down to the .725 range I don't think he will be a borderline none tender.  We'll have to wait and see where he lands.  Right now for the trade deadline the athletic has him at number 37 out of 50 players so they feel he has value.  FWIW Bell did not make their list. 

I think Larnach is more valuable than many assume regardless of his limitations.

The Twins are paying Bell $7M for that kind of production and he has negative trade value. Larnach is going to have very little trade value at $7-8M arbitration salary.

[jkcarew]

Agreed. Sell high. Unfortunately, the obvious case for trading him makes it less likely that this org will do it. Because…after all, we’re “competing”.

3rd lowest team bWAR in all of baseball, maybe THE worse defensive team, bullpen a complete dumpster fire, starting pitching a work in progress, and can’t get your head above water in a horrible division in a horrible league. And the one thing that Larnach is relatively good at…offense…is the one and only thing the team can be expected to be decent at without him. But, you could get hot and steal the last wild card spot…so, better to do nothing. Especially, when your fan base swallows the pile of false hope that you regurgitate year after year.

[tony&rodney]

3 minutes ago, jkcarew said:

fan base

What fan base?

[Dman]

6 minutes ago, DJL44 said:

The Twins are paying Bell $7M for that kind of production and he has negative trade value. Larnach is going to have very little trade value at $7-8M arbitration salary.

Well the sad thing is right now almost half way through the season he has the second highest OPS on the team next to Buxton at .800 so he is pretty valuable to the Twins at the moment.

[karcherd]

1 hour ago, MMBoys93 said:

Clemens has a .753 ops over his last 30 games.
He's been worth a 2.25 bWAR average per season since coming over (better than Castro during his time in MN)
He also plays at least league average defense at 4 MLB positions and he's beginning arbitration next year.

They don't have to trade him, but once Culepper comes up Kreidler has shown he can be that super utility guy. Kreidler doesn't start arbitration for a couple years, Clemens starts next year. 

Brooks has been worth -6 OAA at SS this year, he's not going back to SS.

 

If Clemens is a starter, then we are no more than .500 team.  He is a role player who should be playing 3 to 4 days a week.

[jkcarew]

8 minutes ago, tony&rodney said:

What fan base?

The fan base mesmerized by the current 15.6% odds at the post season and 0.3% of winning the World Series…and would be legitimately perfectly satisfied if those odds went to 35 and 1 at some point before the trade deadline. The forever “we’re still in it” crowd in the era of a terrible ALC and 3 wild cards.

They’re easy to find, including in these threads.

[karcherd]

1 hour ago, MMBoys93 said:

Bell is a known slow starter. .689 OPS in April and a .760 OPS or better in all other months.

He actually had a decent April, a bad May and now a couple of good weeks.  You do understand, Washington tried to trade him at the deadline last year and had no takers.  And there was minimal interest this off-season except for Falvey.  Just because we like a player, doesn't mean they are tradeable.

[TheLeviathan]

53 minutes ago, DJL44 said:

The Twins are paying Bell $7M for that kind of production and he has negative trade value. Larnach is going to have very little trade value at $7-8M arbitration salary.

The one thing I'll give both Bell and Larnach a slight bump for value is that one is a switch hitter and the other is a lefty.  Those can be valuable mix-and-match pieces for contenders.

They won't blow your doors off with the value you get back, but I bet we can move them both.

[shimrod]

59 minutes ago, tony&rodney said:

What fan base?

That would be me. God help me. 

[DJL44]

58 minutes ago, Dman said:

Well the sad thing is right now almost half way through the season he has the second highest OPS on the team next to Buxton at .800 so he is pretty valuable to the Twins at the moment.

A good bullpen arm would be more valuable.

[MMBoys93]

1 hour ago, karcherd said:

If Clemens is a starter, then we are no more than .500 team.  He is a role player who should be playing 3 to 4 days a week.

He’s a super utility guy who plays good defense and has hit righties at an .800 ops the last 2 years. Any team outside of the Dodgers would play him almost every day against righties. 
 

If you hit you play, that what Castro and Bader did last year. Clemens is hitting. 
 

This isn’t that difficult 

[MMBoys93]

1 hour ago, karcherd said:

He actually had a decent April, a bad May and now a couple of good weeks.  You do understand, Washington tried to trade him at the deadline last year and had no takers.  And there was minimal interest this off-season except for Falvey.  Just because we like a player, doesn't mean they are tradeable.

Ahhh ok so Zoll should just sit on his hands and do nothing and not even try and trade him cause if he wasn’t traded last year that means 100% that he won’t get traded this year.

I simply said the Twins should look to trade him so that Sabato could get a look, as part of a much longer message. Idk why you’ve decided to focus so much on Josh Bell.