Real Talk: Rebuilding Is Not an Option for the Minnesota Twins

In a piece published in the Minnesota Star Tribune over the weekend, veteran columnist Patrick Reusse takes a rather odd angle in sizing up the Twins and their offseason outlook. "Pressure will be on Twins to spend money," the headline states, "but they should rebuild instead."

This immediately raises a question: What does a "rebuild" look like for the Twins? Traditionally the term refers to a strategy that involves tearing down a roster to the studs, clearing out expensive veteran contracts and starting fresh--typically with low payroll and low expectations (but high draft picks!) in the short term. 

We saw the Astros do it successfully. We saw the White Sox do it less successfully. Jury is still out on the Orioles, who are currently in the process of trying to parlay their many years of losing and amassing young talent into a championship run. So far, not so good.

To many of us fans, the act of "rebuilding" as portrayed above is a BS approach meant to provide cover for ownership to not spend and front offices to not try. I don't doubt, sadly, that if they had the capability the Twins might try to go that route. But let's be very clear: They don't have that capability.

Carlos Correa is locked into for another four years and $140 million, guaranteed. He'll make $37 million next year and there's no getting around that. Byron Buxton, likewise, has a four more guaranteed years on his contract, at $15 million annually. Both players have full no-trade clauses, and even if one or both were willing to waive theirs, the front office wouldn't be able to find a trade partner willing to take on their contracts at this point given their health situations. 

Those are the two players a traditionally rebuilding team would aim to unload in efforts to start fresh. It's not an option for Minnesota. And Reusse knows that; he's not suggesting trading Correa or Buxton. Instead he references the decision Terry Ryan made more than a decade ago to sign Ricky Nolasco as an unhelpful, reactionary, overpriced free agent on a losing team. In fact, Reusse's summarizing conclusion literally amounts to: "No Nolascos."

Which ... what?! I mean, yes, obviously. Don't sign Ricky Nolasco, literally or figuratively: He proved to be an ineffective malcontent, but also, throwing big money at unspectacular starting pitchers aging into their 30s is a losing proposition. Those aren't the kinds of moves Derek Falvey has ever made. It's part of the reason he replaced TR. There's no need to warn him against it.

If we pull back from that specific example, we can perceive Reusse's mandate to be: Don't spend any more money on this roster. That's an argument that falls flat with me. I don't think anyone is realistically expecting payroll to jump back to the $160 million range where it was in 2023, but I also don't think local columnists need to be using their platform to urge ownership to not add at all, or even to cut further. 

It's nonsensical. As we just discussed, Correa and Buxton are going to be here next year, making a combined $50 million. They're still in their physical primes, and both just showed us that they can still play at an elite, game-changing level when healthy. The Twins invested all of this money into them with the idea of building a winning team around them. 

And that's the thing: They have plenty of components in place already to do so. Reusse spent much of his column talking about all the young talent the Twins have ushered in, or will soon, as a rationale for following his suggested approach. Hand it over to the young guys.

This isn't a misguided notion, and the Nolasco example makes some sense through that lens: The Twins would've been better off just giving innings to their own young starters or experimenting with cheap reclamation signings versus running out a sub-mediocre Nolasco to eat innings on 90-loss teams. But that was a failure of decision-making, not investment. Thirteen million dollars can get you Ricky Nolasco or it can get you Nelson Cruz. 

If we want to take Reusse's "rebuilding" suggestion to a practical conclusion, the biggest move they could actually make would be trading Pablo López, whose salary will escalate to $21 million over the next three years. Unlike Correa or Buxton, he actually has surplus value and could bring in a haul. But is that actually a move Reusse, or anyone, would endorse? 

If we're talking about rebuilds, that's what we're talking about, so let's keep that term in the proper context. The foundation that's in place for the Twins is fairly immovable, so the question is whether they're going to build around it and maximize their chances of success, or further sabotage the champion vision that they've already invested so heavily in.