Twins to Retire Mauer's No. 7: Who's Next?

I would say it will be a long time.  If/when Buxton, Sano and Berrios are at great the Twin's won't pay them to stay or they won't want to stay and will go on to a winning team.  Also they are not MN boys!

Next? I like the question though I want to find an objective way to comment.

Radke has nearly as much baseball reference WAR as Blyleven in a Twins uniform. Knoblauch is even closer to Hrbek as a position player. Nathan is the reliever with the most WAR.

Any new addition may be lowering the bar though I am not sure where the bar should be for Nathan other than he is clearly the best reliever to wear a Twins uniform.

I wonder if anyone would stand out differently with Jay Jaffe’s JAWS. Do we consider the season in Senator uniforms for Kaat, Pascual and Allison? I don’t think they catch Radke or Knoblauch but it would be closer.

This strikes me as a sad attempt to create a marketing draw in a down attendance season. It's a bit fast, isn't it?

Including Jackie Robinson is a real stretch of retired Twin numbers.

Robinson? Allison?

This strikes me as a sad attempt to create a marketing draw in a down attendance season. It's a bit fast, isn't it?

This strikes me as a sad attempt to create a marketing draw in a down attendance season. It's a bit fast, isn't it?

Edit: According to his wiki page, Hrbek’s number actually was retired in 1995.

Likewise, there was still hope that Puckett would play again deep into the first season that he did not.

With the exception of Hrbek and Oliva, all the retired numbers are hall of famers, most likely including Mauer. Mauer just broke Hrbek’s tenure record. That is, longest career with the Twins and only the Twins. The hometown aspect is a big reason why Hrbek is retired as well.

By nearly every national account, Oliva is one of the best players not in the Hall and probably should be.

As for other candidates from the past, next in line IMO would be Brad Radke or Joe Nathan. But it wouldn’t be terrible if neither were.

As for future candidates, it is an absurd conversation. That kind of over-hyping is how this organization found itself in the situation it is in with Buxton and Sano.

Does Mauer get a spot in the Twins HOF? I don't recall if the articles included that or not. Wouldn't that be a lower honor that would come first, as there are more members of the team HOF than retired numbers?

I think the only numbers to be retired should be an impact player who spends his entire career with the team and/or the next player to go into the HOF as a Twin. I have no idea what future or current player will accomplish that.

Given that, Radke’s number should already be retired.

Give the team another bad attendance season and it sounds like a great reason to do a promotion.

Also 2020 will be the ten year anniversary of the ballpark, certainly worth celebrating with a promotion!!

This strikes me as a sad attempt to create a marketing draw in a down attendance season. It's a bit fast, isn't it?

Eh for Mauer and all he meant to this franchise probably not. Just about anyone else being brought up in this thread though I would've agreed with you.

They should retire 36 (and that can go both ways, and it will be fun to see two names,)

Those two names are Robbie Grossman and Blaine Boyer, right? 

That will probably be Jim Kaat

Isn’t Kaat already past consideration, even by the veteran committee?

An interesting case though. 16 consecutive gold gloves should count for something.

A very good career as a starter, albeit in an era with quite a few guys who were a lot better.

Perhaps the first successful middle reliever, setting up Bruce Sutter in St. Louis.

Of his top 10 in BR similarity scores, only Tommy John, Jamie Moyer and Frank Tanana aren’t in. John should be as well. He was the first guy to come back from an injury that ended the career of every pitcher before him. There are probably 3-4 guys in now that wouldn’t be were it not for Tommy John.

Sadly I don't see any of the current team guys as a longterm Twin, even Berrios will become trade fodder once it looks like he may be too expensive. If the Twins sign Lewis or Kiril to a long-long term deal down the road, yes.

It is going to be a strange decade, the next ten years of Twins ball.

I personally hate the tradition of retiring numbers. Worst case scenario: Montreal Canadiens. They have retired 1,2,3,4,5,7,9,10,12,16,18,19,23,29,33. Dickie Moore and Elmer Each anyone?

Having your name on a wall of honor is enough.

How many numbers have Real Madrid or Manchester United retired? Zero. It isn't the number, it's the player.

I would say Harold Baines even though he was never a Twin. If he is worthy of being in the Hall of Fame we may as well make him a member of ours as well. Sad part he probably will never had his number retired by any team. So why not be "Minnesota nice" and bring him in. 

Retiring a number is for an MLB HOF type player, or close to it, in my opinion. I would not have retired Hrbek's. And so far no one else but Mauer deserves it.

Hopefully Lewis or Kirilloff are next.