The Twins Should Extend Odorizzi, Not Gibson

Maybe you do that. The bottom line is that given how long it took the Twins to eat Phil Hughes’ salary, it is clear Jim Pohlad doesn’t easily do that. And it’s ultimately his call, as I’m sure the Hughes decision was.

You're making a false assumption that Jim Pohlad makes a call about things like that. It will certainly come to his attention, but he hardly requires them to ask for his permission to make a minor call like that. If the CEO at United Properties, another Pohlad Company, reports on an expenditure to make extensive repairs to a parking ramp, this might come to the attention of his board and Jim Pohlad in a similar way that jettisoning Hughes might come to the board and him through Dave St. Peter.

You're making a false assumption that Jim Pohlad makes a call about things like that. It will certainly come to his attention, but he hardly requires them to ask for his permission to make a minor call like that. If the CEO at United Properties, another Pohlad Company, reports on an expenditure to make extensive repairs to a parking ramp, this might come to the attention of his board and Jim Pohlad in a similar way that jettisoning Hughes might come to the board and him through Dave St. Peter.

Well they certainly don't appear to be using the salary savings. So, how does it benefit the FO to give up a pretty good asset (draft pick, PLUS draft pool money), with seemingly only any benefit to the Pohlad's pocketbook?

Instead of extending Gibby, why not trade him this offseason while his value is at it’s absolute peak (coming off good year and has one full year of controllability)? He may have turned the corner and is now entering his “prime,” but I doubt he’ll match his “breakout” 2018 again, so what’s the point of over paying for someone who won’t be worth his contract 2-3 years when we can just put that money towards extensions for cornerstone players like Kepler, Rosario, Buxton, Berrios, and Sano.

If Gibby really has turned the corner, should’nt he be able to bring back 2-3 quality prospects? Especially in a league that’s so deprived of starting pitching nowadays.

The reality is that Gibby’s more valuable to the Twins as a trade candidate rather than an extension candidate, while the opposite applies to Odorizzi. Still, if the opportunity arises where Odorizzi can be traded for a decent return, there shouldn’t be any hesitation.

Still, we’re gonna need replacement(s) for Gibson, Odorizzi, and Pineda in 2020 and beyond to bring stability to the rotation, whether that’s Gio Gonzalez, Jhoulys Chacin, Julio Teheran (my favorite), or Sonny Gray I don’t care, I just don’t wanna put the weight of the world on our young starter’s shoulders when we should be competing for the division.

I am not sure they should extend either one. I will leave it up to the front office to make a decision on if they think that is smart.

As far as what would be the better option, keep in mind that Gibson is probably getting a lower arbitration figure THIS year, so he may be more amenable to working a 3 year deal to up his pay this year and add on a couple years. Oddorizzi has a pretty sweet pay rate this year as a guarantee, so he will have less to gain from signing an extention at this point, and trying to sign him to an extension this year would probably have to ever push him into a pay scale that he should not be at.

So my thought is that Gibson is the only one that they will be able to sign at a reasonable rate that is acceptable to both sides.

Of course, perhaps Michael Pineda can also be signed to an extension during the season if he looks good, so leave that as a possibility as well.

You're making a false assumption that Jim Pohlad makes a call about things like that. It will certainly come to his attention, but he hardly requires them to ask for his permission to make a minor call like that. If the CEO at United Properties, another Pohlad Company, reports on an expenditure to make extensive repairs to a parking ramp, this might come to the attention of his board and Jim Pohlad in a similar way that jettisoning Hughes might come to the board and him through Dave St. Peter.

Cutting Hughes was a $30 mil decision. That’s a lot even for Pohlad’s companies. I would say him giving final approval is more likely than him not. What else explains why cutting him took so long?

It was obvious in ST that his arm was gone. Yet, the Twins wasted a roster spot on him for 7 weeks.

If it took Falvine that long to evaluate Hughes, that’s actually a MUCH bigger problem. I feel pretty confident in my point of view. Do I have proof? No. Neither do you.

Assuming the front office wants to sign Gibby to an extension and assuming Gibby is reluctant for the reasons stated above, at what point does the Gibson team say yes?

4/50 seems borderline to me.

4/60 seems like would for sure get the job done.

Paying Gibson 4/60 right now seems absurd to me. That's more than we paid Ervin Santana, who had a much better track record. Gibson has never put together two halfway decent seasons in a row.

Right now, the three are hungry. They should produce (especially Gibson) like they have never ever produced before. Of course, having a decent lineup and guys in the field would help any of them. The Twins need to take stock of what they have on the verge and on the horizon. I think they have enough. Pitch the three, trade them. If you feel the need to extend one...try to do so as the season progresses.

Right now I a even wary that extending any would still make it possible to trade them in the future.

Thus, a rebuilding team fer sure.

Well they certainly don't appear to be using the salary savings. So, how does it benefit the FO to give up a pretty good asset (draft pick, PLUS draft pool money), with seemingly only any benefit to the Pohlad's pocketbook?

That roster spot was filled, was it not?

Overall I like the trade the Twins made but I see why the Rays were willing to take such a low prospect and dump his modest salary. 

If we were to extend Odorizzi I would hope that the contract is short and reflects a 5th starter salary.

Cutting Hughes was a $30 mil decision. 

I did not realize this. I thought that was money already spent whether Hughes got moved or not.

I did not realize this. I thought that was money already spent whether Hughes got moved or not.

Of course it was. But the decision to cut him results in getting no return on that money. Just because you and I and fans look at the situation a certain way, doesn’t mean Jim Pohlad does. Again, what other plausible explanation is there for the delay of the decision? The only other explanation is that Falvine held out hope that Hughes could help the team. Something every objective observer dismissed in March. If that is the case, it’s a much bigger problem IMO.

I think the floors and ceilings of these two pitchers is about the same, with either of them performing in the top halves of their potential equally likely (to which I mean ... I wouldn't bet on it).

I don't think it matters if the Twins pick one, pick both, or pick neither. All options are rolling the dice.

I couldn't disagree more. Odorizzi averages just over 5 innings a start for his career which puts a tremendous strain on the bullpen. I would rather have Gibson ,who had a revelation on how to trust his stuff and rely upon his defense instead trying to be perfect. I know Gibson is older but he is a lot more capable of shutting a lineup down especially in a playoff game.

Completely agree, Gibson may be older but he seems to have figured it out. It looks like his ceiling is way higher and he may now have a new floor as well. Very bullish on Gibby, may be a mirage but I think he has a chance to be really good for the next 4-6 years.

That roster spot was filled, was it not?

As it could have by simply cutting him.

Again, what benefit does the FO get by sending SD very good assets to take on some of his contract? Neither one of us have evidence, nor will we ever, but it simply defies logic that the FO would give up good assets in order to save money that they don't get to use, unless they had to too appease ownership.

I did not realize this. I thought that was money already spent whether Hughes got moved or not.

Would I need my employer's permission to push a quarter million dollar dump truck off a cliff? I mean the money is already spent, whether I destroy the dump truck or not.

Would I need my employer's permission to push a quarter million dollar dump truck off a cliff? I mean the money is already spent, whether I destroy the dump truck or not.

Was the dump truck worthless? If so, as a CEO or board member of that business, don't waste my time telling me how you disposed of it. Oh, and hop out before it goes over the cliff. If it was worth a quarter mil, you're fired. But you're fired anyway for littering, so...

I agree that Falvey and his people factored in salary relief. They moved Hughes off the roster, and in retrospect, they should have done so earlier. We don't know how much hope they had in getting some performance out of him, but they didn't keep him around strictly because Jim Pohlad told them to.

It was a sunk cost. As a businessperson, if you have an asset that impedes the efficacy of your business, you discard it in favor of a producing asset. Get what you can for it. Took 'em too long, but they finally concluded that Hughes was as worthless as an old dump truck.

The Twins sent the 74th selection and a future cash obligation in Hughes. They got back a Venezuelan catcher named Janigson Villalobos. This may be a lopsided transaction done primarily to slough off the contract. But my only point was to push back on what I'm confident is a misinformed impression that Jim Pohlad was responsible for the decision to keep him around and the decision to ship him off. He's not running a Christmas tree lot here. He's got people to handle this stuff.

Back to Odorrizzi: it's not extending him that's necessarily a bad move, it's rendering him illiquid by overpaying him. But again, you could extend him on a "reasonable" contract and have him become illiquid because injury erodes his value. Like what happened with Hughes.