Brock Beauchamp

I like the idea of the question a lot but I can already see the response... "There are a lot of kids we like in the draft and time will tell blah blah blah". Ryan isn't going to tip his hand in next year's draft. On the other hand, if you make the question more about last year's draft and the implied philosophy change that went behind it, I think it would provide a more substantive answer.

I still think Romney should attack that. I don't think most Americans know the truth about that and about how terrible it was handled start to finish. Romney royally screwed up a major opportunity, but he should keep at it. Honestly, I think it's a mistake. After killing bin Laden, I think any conversation that questions Obama's policy on terrorists puts the ball squarely in his court to bring up his victory in finally killing that bastard. Romney can try to talk about Libya and the mistakes made there but I don't see it gaining any traction with the downside of opening the door for Obama to talk about his "big win".

Obama cleaned up on Libya. He had the perfect response that left Romney on very thin ice to continue the attack. Obama put on his serious face and delivered a hell of a response that was only helped by Romney's blundering over the "act of terror" comment, which made him look pretty dense.

Excellent question. This gets my vote.

I don't understand the benefit of having Gibson pitching through September. It's unlikely that the Twins will be competitive in 2013, so if they want to cap Gibson's innings at 130 then it doesn't really matter when he reaches that limit. If the Twins somehow find themselves in a situation similar to what the Nationals went through with Strasburg this summer, then maybe they have Gibson skip a start here and there so he can pitch through September. If that's the case, it's a good problem to have (and hopefully one that they would handle better than the Nats with Strasburg). I'm of the opinion that you never enter a season without the expectation of being competitive unless you've just finished wiping the roster through a fire sale.

I believe he was an infielder in the minors.

Mark Buerhle is going to be paid $19m as a 36 year old in 2015. Santana has turned mediocre for the Mets while making ~$23m a season. The Twins put out the offers but thankfully, they were smart enough to keep those offers within reason. Pitching contracts that go over $50m in total rarely (almost never) work out for the team that "wins" the bidding.

"a slider that was christened by Baseball America in January as the “best” slider in the Twins’ system" Isn't that a bit like winning silver in the Special Olympics?

I don't see the need to have him sit out but a short stretch in the bullpen might be in order to keep him pitching through September.

Deduno and Walters, yes. De Vries, I'm not so sure about. Given Pavano's velocity over the past two years, I don't think he could outpitch De Vries (mind you, this is a comparison of which player will be less terrible, not which one will be good).

It worked for Mike Trout. Oh, wait...

Well, if not getting out (OBP) is the best measure of offensive performance, then Joe Mauer must be the best offensive player in the league. No, because there are other players that make outs at nearly the same percentage while also slugging at a much higher rate. The poster I replied to used RBI and compared Joe Mauer to Austin Jackson. Anything more than a cursory glance at each player shows just how ridiculous that comparison is and that Mauer is obviously the superior player.

It's really, really hard to be "not that productive otherwise" when Joe Mauer is the best player in baseball at avoiding getting out (highest OBP). Remember, kids... The most important thing in baseball is not getting out. Everything else is secondary. And for the love of God, never quote RBI as an indication of performance. It's worse than useless.

Liriano and Baker have considerable upside to them. It makes sense to pursue both for the right price. Pavano has almost zero upside at this point.

I was speaking about "megastar" player salaries, not overall payroll. I should have made that more clear. Anyway, I think this just depends on which side of the fence you fall... For me, I believe it's a more sound practice to pay a player relative to expected performance than it is to pay a flat rate. Either way, deferred money is the worst option possible. I can live with a flat salary but deferred money is a terrible idea no matter how you look at it. You're mortgaging the future for today and that's not a sound business practice.

I would have liked to see Arcia and Hicks as well but I won't complain too much that they didn't get ~25 ABs apiece in September. There is plenty of time for them to show their talents in ST and the minors early next year. Not a lot was to be gained by bringing them into a crowded outfield situation while the downside is that a crowded outfield situation would have cramped Parmelee's playing time even more. Considering that Parmelee is at the point where more time in the minors will do him little good, I preferred seeing him over Hicks or Arcia. The Twins have plenty of time to gauge what they have in Hicks/Arcia while Parmelee needs playing time right now to see if he's a Major League player.

You know this team is in awful shape when people are dreaming about Carl Pavano.

I believe the exact opposite. Mauer should be getting ~$30m right now with his contract tapering to ~$15m at the end of the deal. That way the Twins have the most flexibility to field a competitive team during his entire career, not just parts of it. When the Twins are getting the most production from him, they need less players to complement him and can afford to pay him a larger portion of the salary. The end of that contract is going to be an albatross to the team's financials. Deferred money only compounds the problem. Except that, currently Mauer's contract would eat up 23-25% of payroll (assuming a $90-100 million payroll), while by the last couple of years of the contract one would expect payrolls in general to have risen at a rate comparable to what they have over the past half decade, so Mauer's pay would, over time, account for a smaller percentage of the total nut. Of course, this assumes that at some point the Pohlads start giving Ryan more money every year to spend on players instead of less every year. I guess I see pros and cons to both front-loading and back-loading long term contracts. In Mauer's case, I'm fine with a level contract that overpays him a bit in the first year or two when Target Field was brand new and attendance was expected to be high, regardless of how good the team was. By the end of his contract, he probably will no longer be worthy of megastar salary, but then by 2018, I'm not sure $23 million will be still reflect the going rate for a megastar. There are negatives to each way of doing it but payrolls aren't going to jump that much in the 6-7 years it takes for Mauer to finish out his contract. We'll probably see a swing of $4-5m but that's still considerably less than the $7-8m in differential I'm talking about by front-loading the contract. With the inevitable decreasing attendance as the new stadium smell wears off, the Twins are going to have a hell of a time competing with a 35 year old Joe Mauer consuming $24m while producing a .750 OPS. When he's an .850-.900 OPS player at catcher, he plays close to the level of his $24m contract. When he's a .750 OPS player manning first base and DH, that $24m is going to hurt the team.

I believe the exact opposite. Mauer should be getting ~$30m right now with his contract tapering to ~$15m at the end of the deal. That way the Twins have the most flexibility to field a competitive team during his entire career, not just parts of it. When the Twins are getting the most production from him, they need less players to complement him and can afford to pay him a larger portion of the salary. The end of that contract is going to be an albatross to the team's financials. Deferred money only compounds the problem.

Willingham played his last game on September 24th. Arcia hadn't played baseball for three weeks at that point and may have been at home when it happened. There was no reason to call him back for ~10 days of baseball.

Yeah, obviously "Andy n Gardy" were to blame for Marquis' performance. After all, he shut down the NL to the tune of a 90 ERA+ while pitching in what might be the most pitcher-friendly ballpark in MLB and racked up an ERA+ of around 85 in the second half. Dominating stuff.

I consider Baker to be a legitimate starter if he's in any condition to pitch before June.

I'd rather take a flyer on De Vries/Deduno than Pavano. Carl has almost zero upside at this point. There is no reason to throw bad money at him.

Let's not blur the issues. The Pohlads are responsible for the budget. If you have issues with the budget, that's another argument entirely. JR has nothing to do with it (or, perhaps more accurately, he has VERY LITTLE to do with it). Going into the season, the Twins looked to have a serviceable rotation. Marquis looked like he'd be pretty pedestrian but would post somewhere around a 90 ERA+. Baker looked great in 2011. Pavano looked to be meh but not terrible. That's 60% of the rotation that completely and utterly collapsed. It was my belief that the rotation should have been a bigger priority last offseason but given the amount of holes in the 2011 squad, it's damned hard to fault JR for prioritizing the offense over the pitching staff.

He only took the "old" approach after he had spent most of his money on Willingham and Doumit. I wasn't a fan of the Marquis signing but it's not as if he had a ton of money left over to go get a decent pitcher after spending $10m on those two players. This season should be different, as almost all of the front office's efforts will be focused on shoring up the rotation.