Brock Beauchamp

I see almost a zero percent chance of the Twins risking Polanco's health and offensive production by moving him back to short, a position he was bad at in 2019 before injuries and age set in. Gleeman & the Geek don't dislike Gordon, not at all. They simply don't have faith in him as a starting shortstop (or probably even a starter anywhere) and for good reason. He hasn't shown either the long-term hitting proficiency to be a starter or the ability to play a competent shortstop in Major League Baseball. Scouting reports have been skeptical of his ability to stick at short since draft day and they haven't improved since then. For right or wrong, it's quite apparent this front office does not view Nick Gordon as a starting shortstop.

I know he has options, I'm saying I don't reserve a 40-man spot for him. If he can sneak through waivers, sure, keep him... but I'm not dedicating a spot for him at this point.

Given how this season has gone and the way the roster is built, I wouldn't hesitate to clean house in the outfield. I'd drop Garlick, Refsnyder, Cave, Astudillo, and Rooker. I'd keep Gordon because I think he has real potential as a 10/11 man and he's actually kind of key to my outfield plans... If Gordon is a legit CF backup, maybe I keep a right-handed bat like Refsnyder or Rooker (I lean toward Refsnyder due to the glove but Rooker's bat is far more potent). If Gordon is not a legit backup CF, I ditch all the corner guys and go sign a competent defensive backup CF for a million bucks. Basically, it's time to move on from no-position corner guys taking up well over half the team's positional roster space. This team needs more balance than it has had in the past and that means sacrificing a little offense for defensive competency on the bench.

Agreed on Rooker. I quite confident we'll see Jax in Minnesota again, almost surely from the bullpen. His slider is good enough he'll receive more chances and he has options remaining. I believe the chance of Cave returning is near-zero. He's now arb eligible and there's absolutely no reason to start paying him a seven figure salary.

So you're asking us to go out of our way to create workarounds for you to watch free videos while using an ad blocker?

Going into the offseason, I'd plan on a bullpen of: Rogers Duffey Thielbar Alcala Moran Gant (iffy on this, could easily be Garza or Farrell in his place) Free Agent Free Agent I wouldn't hesitate to drop guys left and right in favor of younger pitchers with more upside and free agent signings. I don't expect the Twins to run out and give someone Hendriks money but at least one guy should be paid May money ($7-8m per) to stabilize the pen.

While I agree that I want them to either sign or target a very good pitcher in trade, we shouldn't just write off a "reclamation" project. This front office traded for Odorizzi and Maeda, both of which provided outstanding results. They weren't only good, they were some of the best pitchers in baseball (Odorizzi 2019, Maeda 2020). If this front office targets an under-appreciated pitcher in trade again, I'm all on board for it. Bonus points that they traded with what I view as the two smartest organizations in all of baseball to acquire those two pitchers. While the jury is still out on the Dodgers trade, the Twins absolutely torched Tampa in the Odorizzi trade.

I appreciate how many times the announcers worked the word "nice" into commentary about Sands' 69th pitch.

In 1990. rapper MC Hammer may not have been on the top of the world - yet - but he was close. While in the Twin Cities finishing up his soon-to-be 3x platinum 2 Legit 2 Quit album at Paisley Park, he dropped by the Metrodome to take batting practice with the 1990 Twins squad. While there are many familiar faces in the crowd, what stands out is the short conversation between Hammer and Twins great Tony Oliva. Keep an eye out for the other Twins players lurking in the background, such as Randy Bush and Kent Hrbek. View full video

By "that pathetic rut", I assume you really mean "pretty much all of the 2021 season". Split G GS PA AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI SB CS BB SO BA OBP SLG OPS TB GDP HBP SH SF IBB ROE BAbip tOPS+ sOPS+ April/March 14 13 53 45 7 12 4 0 0 4 0 0 7 8 .267 .377 .356 .733 16 3 1 0 0 0 0 .324 163 113 May 27 27 101 92 9 21 1 0 2 9 0 0 9 21 .228 .297 .304 .601 28 2 0 0 0 0 1 .275 116 71 June 20 20 72 67 9 17 3 0 1 3 0 0 3 9 .254 .296 .343 .639 23 0 1 1 0 0 0 .281 130 75 July 25 24 88 80 7 13 1 0 0 4 1 0 6 7 .163 .221 .175 .396 14 4 0 2 0 0 0 .178 42 10 August 25 24 82 77 3 17 2 0 0 8 0 0 4 10 .221 .268 .247 .515 19 2 1 0 0 0 0 .254 85 44 Sept/Oct 6 6 18 16 1 3 0 0 0 1 0 0 2 0 .188 .278 .188 .465 3 1 0 0 0 0 0 .188 66 32

Okay, fair enough.

It's rare but Edgar Martinez accumulated over 1,000 plate appearances in AAA with a ~.940 OPS before receiving a legitimate chance at playing in Seattle. That's a pretty long time by my standards.

While I have lots of not-nice things to say about Simmons and his anti-vax stance, I can't agree with your take on his on-field demeanor. Simmons is constantly talking to his teammates, directing action on the field, and I think his smoothness looks like laziness just because he's that damned good (or was, as his athleticism is now on the decline). Look at the way the guy throws the ball. No effort, looking flat-footed quite often... and it drops right into the first baseman's mitt almost every time. He makes it all look so easy.

Except the expectation was that Simmons would be a pitching assist player. His signing was primarily to supplement the entire pitching staff after several seasons of terrible infield defense.

Given that I control the god account on the site, I’m considering logging in under 100 different accounts just to like your post, ash.

You’re right, I had the payers reversed. What I meant was that giving back Baddoo out of ST was Detroit essentially throwing away a little bit of money.

Oh, velocity isn't everything but it sure doesn't hurt. And I believe Ryan can be a good pitcher, I'm only saying we need to temper our expectations a bit, particularly after a night where he posted an amazing stat line but actually watching the game, he was slightly less dominant and with 1-2 more mph on a few of those balls (or even a slight pull instead of to dead center), could have merely posted a middling start. Again, I'm very encouraged by Ryan and excited to see more, I'm just suggesting people not get too drunk on his stat line from last night.

While the game was fun and really exciting in the moment, I feel we should pump the brakes on Ryan a little bit. At the end of the day, he's still a two-pitch pitcher whose second pitch isn't great and he has little velocity, to boot. I think he can have a really nice career because he really seems to have the right mojo on the mound, which goes a long way with a starting pitcher, IMO. But Ryan had quite a bit of hard contact last night, it just fell into Twins' leather until the seventh inning. Good start, loved to see it, want to see more. But it wasn't as dominant as it looked on the stat line.

How is it "cherry-picking" to use WAR, which is generally regarded as the best catch-all single stat to measure a player's value? Sure, most players decline in time but it's not a guarantee to happen with high-end pitching, just look at the likes of Verlander or Greinke. They may have declined from "elite" but they're still quite good.

Detroit kept Baddoo on the roster because they had to keep him or literally pay the Twins to take him back. The good spring was just a bonus.