Offseason Worries

2020 was the weirdest season of baseball we’ve ever seen and it’s led into what may be one of the weirder offseasons. So many questions remain including whether the NL will again adopt the DH and how many games will be played in the regular season. Unfortunately as players search for jobs and teams look to fill their openings, the uncertainties are clearly slowing the market. One change teams are expecting to see however is the expanded playoff format, and this expectation may be having early effects on the market that the Twins should keep an eye on.

The Royals paid decently for Carlos Santana and Mike Minor, both of whom were discussed as fallback options for the Twins. The Giants signed Anthony Desclefani, a Statcast star in 2019 fallen on hard times in 2020. He looked to be a perfect example of a possible Twins pickup. The Mariners picked up recently DFAed Keynan Middleton, a hard throwing high spin reliever coming off of Tommy John. While not top tier free agents, all of these players were intriguing in their own way and would have slotted in nicely as complementary pieces on contenders.

All of these players however went to teams who missed the playoffs in 2020, something that we may see more and more. More playoff spots means the bar to clear for October has gotten a bit lower. Teams that aren’t surefire contenders may be spending more money to give themselves that extra push to bring their fanbase more excitement as well as the income added of making it to the playoffs.

While good for baseball, this new development may be bad for the Twins. This year they have a ton of needs including a few starting pitchers, a utilityman and multiple high leverage bullpen pieces. They also seem to be in the same staredown as the rest of the obvious contenders are with free agents, as they’ve done little to make impact acquisitions. Meanwhile some nice options have surprisingly gone to teams who never would have considered such signings in years past.

The Twins likely have their targets they want to bring in this winter, but this front office has a price point in mind where they’re more than willing to pivot to other options. The market for those other options however could be more shallow than it has been in recent years, and the free agent market could explode so quickly that the Twins could miss out on effectively filling their many needs.

It’s still earlyish in the offseason and there’s certainly plenty of talent left to bring in. That being said, it’s not just one or two spots the Twins need to fill. This front office has always “zigged” while others have “zagged”. Doing so now by breaking the apparent stalemate between teams and free agents gives them their pick of the free agent market and eliminates the risk of running out of backup options later this winter. The small premium they may pay in doing so should be worthwhile for a team in the middle of a competitive window.

The early moves we’ve seen by apparent non contenders may not hold up throughout all of free agency. That being said, with expanded playoffs this assumption becomes a bit of a gamble for a competing team with roster spots to fill. Obviously everybody wants to see the Twins make some notable moves, but should we be more concerned with the lack of free agent signings so far?

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