Brock Beauchamp

omfg I'm dying

First, if you say anything 16 times a day, perhaps consider stopping doing that. Second, "catastrophic collapse of broadcast revenue" is accurate and I have no problem with it. Both things can be and are true.

I'm actually pretty moderate on the entire payroll situation. I disagree with the Twins here because I think the TV revenue will re-stabilize at a lower number than 2023 pretty quickly, which means they will need to move payroll downward at some point in the near future. I happen to think 2024 and 2025 are the wrong seasons to do it. You have prime Lopez, Buxton, Correa, et al. Spend a little more today knowing that those players aren't going to be in their primes forever. But anyway, we've both explained our opinions, let's not derail the topic any more than we already have.

But that absolutely is what's happening. You can understand and agree with their decision, that's fine. I happen to disagree. A business wholly owned by the Pohlads (and therefore not under pressure from minority stakeholders) can decide whether to be profitable and to what extent, particularly over the short-term of a season or two. Businesses do it all the time. I don't recall the team giving money back to the fans when they were wildly profitable running barebones payrolls from 2013-2014. Why is it okay for them to reap the rewards during boon times but play the role of the pauper when things temporarily go sideways?

It shouldn't surprise anyone but both Nightengale Jr and Dan Hayes have mentioned that the Twins expect to add a starting pitcher to their rotation this offseason. Given the self-imposed payroll constraints the Twins face this offseason and their relative pitching depth in the upper minors, a one-year deal remains the most likely result should they opt for the free agent market. Wade Miley, 37 years old, remains a well above-average lefty when he's healthy. It's hard to expect more than 120 innings out of him in any given season but that might actually make him appealing to the Twins, who have Louie Varland waiting to step into the rotation at any time. Other options include reclamation projects like Frankie Montas or, if he's available on a one-year deal, Lucas Giolito. The Twins are equally likely to opt for a longer-term trade candidate and at that point, there are a dozen viable names who may be on the market. View full rumor

They also have Jeferson Quero in the upper minors, who could legitimately turn into an All-Star himself. The Brewers are all full up on catchers.

The problem with this analysis is that the Brewers snuck into the Contreras deal, turned him into a good defensive catcher, and he became a 5.4 fWAR catcher in 2023, over a win more than Sean Murphy.

That'd be great, thanks!

Love this, have you considered writing more of these as blog entries? https://twinsdaily.com/blogs/

There's a rumors forum now, please direct all rumor-based conversation to that forum.

Jon Heyman is reporting that the Twins and Tigers are interested in signing Kenta Maeda. He calls Detroit’s interest “serious” while also saying there might be other clubs interested in adding the veteran starting pitcher. Will Maeda end up on another AL Central team? View full rumor

Yeah, I wasn't entirely clear what I meant. And your feedback is absolutely useful and constructive. In the case of Pascual, his sabr bio is in-depth and great. But what other Pascual content is out there of quality? In the case of Pascual, we don't need to replicate the sabr work. In his case, maybe his page is most useful as a link aggregator: link to his Wikipedia, Sabr, and other articles of note. But in the case of Gagne or Mack, I see the biography being of more importance because of the gaps left by other sites. And in this situation, the purpose of this wiki gets a little squishy. Some players are best served by collecting a repository of others' works. Some players are best served by creating new work. And in the case of "squishy" stuff, that means human decision-making and coordination becomes more of a necessity.

I don't know if his money is dead money, though. He could easily rebound and be considerably more valuable next offseason than he is right now. His numbers could be better and his contract length shorter. I'm in no rush to dump him just for the sake of dumping him. If the Twins need to clear payroll, a better way to do so is moving Polanco and/or Kepler. They're more valuable and would return legitimate talent, not just payroll relief.