Ranking the Twins Veterans Most Likely to Be Let Go

Margot has a $12 million team option for next year that the Twins won’t pick up. For now, he needs to find a way to provide some value, or there is no reason for him to be on the roster. 

Is there a reason why Buxton is on the roster? Other than his contract that will last for another 5 seasons, there is NO reason.

8 hours ago, RpR said:

Then standards are very low; he was only slightly better than CF.

So your going off of fielding %? How can you use % when he has almost 5 times as many total chances.  2nd base to cf? Thats comparing apples to oranges. And there's no hard data to confirm. But I guarantee his range and ability to turn 2 is also better than Julien.

6 hours ago, arby58 said:

Are you by chance related to Jorge?

Just using OPS, Polanco's high water mark for the year so far was .694 on April 15th. Since then, game by game, it pretty much steadily declined: .681, .643, .634, .626, .612, .612, .621, .594, .588, .582, .579, .577 on April 29. Yes, he had a HR the next game, to jump it up to .604, and after his most recent game it is .613 - but this trend line is hardly what I would call 'starting to heat up' (unless you think a two game heater is statistically significant).

I know Polanco (not personally) The person you're talking about isn't Polanco. The Polanco I know will help lead SEA to the postseason & help them advance.

21 minutes ago, Schmoeman5 said:

So your going off of fielding %? How can you use % when he has almost 5 times as many total chances.  2nd base to cf? Thats comparing apples to oranges. And there's no hard data to confirm. But I guarantee his range and ability to turn 2 is also better than Julien.

OK, this one has me puzzled, looking MLB specs.  for both majors and minors, In AAA  Martin is a far better 2nd baseman than Julien, so it makes little sense to dick around with Julien at 2nd.

When you figure in Major l.  Castro is a better CF than Martin and Farmer is a better SS than Castro and Farmer is a better 2nd baseman than any of them,  why they are putting out the line-up they do is a bit strange.

2 hours ago, RpR said:

OK, this one has me puzzled, looking MLB specs.  for both majors and minors, In AAA  Martin is a far better 2nd baseman than Julien, so it makes little sense to dick around with Julien at 2nd.

When you figure in Major l.  Castro is a better CF than Martin and Farmer is a better SS than Castro and Farmer is a better 2nd baseman than any of them,  why they are putting out the line-up they do is a bit strange.

That's the question a lot of people have been asking

12 hours ago, RpR said:

OK, this one has me puzzled, looking MLB specs.  for both majors and minors, In AAA  Martin is a far better 2nd baseman than Julien, so it makes little sense to dick around with Julien at 2nd.

When you figure in Major l.  Castro is a better CF than Martin and Farmer is a better SS than Castro and Farmer is a better 2nd baseman than any of them,  why they are putting out the line-up they do is a bit strange.

You are only looking at defensive stats.  I would hope the Twins determine who plays by determining the net runs gained or lost on both sides of the ball.  It does not matter if player X will give up 10 less runs than Julien if Julien produces 20 more runs than player X with the bat.  Of course, the same is true of Castro.  I seriously doubt the net of Casto's defense / offense and base running is less than Framer at this point.  Their WAR stat would support this conclusion.

23 hours ago, saviking said:

They never admit they were wrong. As long as they remain on the team, they can pretend, but the minute they cut them, they have to own up. It's really sad but it's the truth

Isn't cutting a player essentially the same thing as admitting they were wrong? I mean, what more should they do? 

Professional MLB clubs aren't going to bash a guy who just got cut. They're going to say all the right things like "it didn't work out for him here", or "he ran into some bad luck and couldn't get out of his slump" or whatever. 

They've never going to say "This guy is awful and we really f-ed up and wish we didn't trade our #1 prospect for a washed up outfielder". If an MLB team did that, they'd have a hard time finding free agents to sign with them. 

Castro--Not going anywhere.  Solid defensive versatility and SPEED.  I consider Castro a key piece.  

Thielbar--For Caleb, it's all about health.  He will land on the I.L. at least two more times this season.  We have Funderburk, in every way a competent major league relief pitcher down in St. Paul.  This is Caleb's last season.  If his health holds up, he'll finish the year with the Twins.

Farmer--A solid glove at 2nd, 3rd and SS he has to hit to his career numbers to avoid being traded or DFA 'd.  Brooks Lee is getting healthier and closer to playing.  Farmer is safe for now.  But if Lee hits the ground running in St. Paul and Farmer continues to struggle at the plate, Farmer probably shouldn't finish the year with the Twins, despite his $6.3 million dollar salary.

Santana--Nice to see the 3 HR's in back-to back-to back games.  But with Kirilloff and Miranda hitting, the ice was getting pretty thin for Carlos.  I will predict Santana cools off in the not too distant future and when Royce Lewis comes back Santana's time (and AB's) will dwindle.

Jay Jackson--Jackson has a pretty decent track record but he's got to perform.  Alcala is deserving of another opportunity and if some of these veteran guys don't do the job the Twins may just turn to the younger arms.  Alcala and Funderburk and Varland for that matter if they consider the bullpen an option for him, are wasting bullets in St. Paul.

Margot--The seat is the hottest for Margot.  Frankly, the only thing I could see saving him is to go on a hot streak (similar to Santana's 3 game stretch).  As guys get healthy or if they continue to perform at the major league level (Martin, who was not tearing it up but was clearly better than Margot to date) or in the minors (Kiersey) there could be no choice but to cut bait with Margot even if other teams are paying all but $4 million of his salary.  

4 hours ago, Major League Ready said:

You are only looking at defensive stats.  I would hope the Twins determine who plays by determining the net runs gained or lost on both sides of the ball.  It does not matter if player X will give up 10 less runs than Julien if Julien produces 20 more runs than player X with the bat.  Of course, the same is true of Castro.  I seriously doubt the net of Casto's defense / offense and base running is less than Framer at this point.  Their WAR stat would support this conclusion.

With Julien is give up 10 more runs with 20 more Ks; at this point he is another Gallo, minus top line defense.

His defense is better than it was but that is not hard to do.

2 hours ago, TopGunn#22 said:

Santana--Nice to see the 3 HR's in back-to back-to back games.  But with Kirilloff and Miranda hitting, the ice was getting pretty thin for Carlos.  I will predict Santana cools off in the not too distant future and when Royce Lewis comes back Santana's time (and AB's) will dwindle.

Santana was brought in to be a full time 1st baseman whichis exactly what he will do; one reason he waas brought in was his much better defense than Kirilloff and that has not changed.

3 hours ago, bighat said:

Isn't cutting a player essentially the same thing as admitting they were wrong? I mean, what more should they do? 

Professional MLB clubs aren't going to bash a guy who just got cut. They're going to say all the right things like "it didn't work out for him here", or "he ran into some bad luck and couldn't get out of his slump" or whatever. 

They've never going to say "This guy is awful and we really f-ed up and wish we didn't trade our #1 prospect for a washed up outfielder". If an MLB team did that, they'd have a hard time finding free agents to sign with them. 

If the Twins said such things as players were awful, then in the past few years they would have been saying our rookies are awful.

Sano and Wallner would be two big examples.

15 minutes ago, ashbury said:

By the time we had him, Gallo was minus the top line defense too. 😀

I will say though that in the small sample of the season so far, Julien's split stats show the same sad susceptibility Gallo had for shining when the team was already ahead, and disappearing when behind.  Ditto for bases empty versus with men on.  Hopefully that's just a fluke, because it wasn't quite such a trend for Eddie last season.

Still far, far better than Kirilloff and surprisingly , very good in Center Field but not in Right or Left.

Margot should have never been.

We wasted $15M on 3 players we did not need. Could have signed a real outfielder like Gurriel or a decent pitcher.

now we are scrambling without Buxton & Lewis. Ah Buxton, Dela Cruz has become everything we had hoped you would be.