Matthew Lenz

The Twins have a projected $70 million to spend with the goal becoming a perennial World Series contender instead of just a playoff participant. The importance of this offseason will be discussed a lot over the next few months. Here is a rundown of important offseason dates.Below you will see the list of important offseason dates and a short summary of how the date impacts the Twins. Nov. 4 - Award Finalists Announced Rocco Baldelli was announced as a finalist for the American League Manager of the Year. Nov. 5 - Qualifying Offer Deadline This year the league-wide qualifying offer was determined to be $17.8 million over one year, which is determined by taking the “mean salary of MLB’s 125 highest-paid players,” per MLB.com. On Monday the Twins extended a qualifying offer to RHP Jake Odorizzi. He’ll have 10 days to make a decision to accept or enter free agency. If he declines, the Twins could be compensated with a draft pick if he signs prior to the 2020 MLB Draft. Nov. 11 thru Nov. 14 - General Manager (GM) Meetings Among other topics, this is where trade talks can start and you could start hearing rumors about possible deals. Nov. 12 - Managers of the Year Announced Rocco will look to become the fourth Manger of the Year in franchise history. The Twins would become the first franchise to win three MoY awards in a 10 season period. Not to mention with three different managers. Nov. 14 - Qualifying Offers Accepted or Rejected Here is a list of all the qualifying offers around the league, some of which have been mentioned as free agent targets for the Twins: Jose Abreu, Madison Bumgarner, Gerrit Cole, Josh Donaldson, Jake Odorizzi, Marcell Ozuna, Anthony Rendon, Will Smith, Stephen Strasburg, and Zack Wheeler. Nov. 19 thru Nov. 21 - Owners Meetings Owners meet to talk about the “business” side of MLB (TV deals, rule changes, etc.). Dec. 2 - Non-tender Deadline MLB Trade Rumors is a great resource for various projections and, well, rumors. Here is their take on our arbitration eligible players: Dec. 9 thru Dec. 12 - Winter Meetings This is where trade talks can really heat up and even happen, as well as many other things. Dec. 12 - Rule 5 Draft Seth Stohs wrote a good article on the Rule 5 draft for the Twins. Jan. 10 - Arbitration Figures Exchanged Jan. 24 thru Jan. 25 - Twins Fest Tickets go on sale on Dec. 11. Notice that they it’s only a two day event this year. Jan. 25 - Twins Daily Winter Meltdown Mark your calendar!! Feb. 12 - Pitchers and Catcher Report It may be a long time until baseball season, but we'll definitely have a lot to pay attention to over the next 99 days. Please share your thoughts in the comments below. Not registered? Click here to create an account. To stay up to date, follow Twins Daily on Twitter and Facebook. Click here to view the article

You've made it clear that you don't judge based off awards, thus my comment about re-evaluating obviously don't apply to you. I am still curious as to what defensive metrics you're looking at as I have scoured Fan Graphs and Baseball Savant but cannot find somewhere that would show he's the best LF In the AL. I understand your scouting and insider knowledge are probably off limits but I'm still not seeing a metric that would suggest that. Am I looking in the wrong places?

I think Eddie gets so much hate because of where he batted in the order, which obviously isn't his fault. But putting him 4th, with his approach, was frustrating to watch for much of the second half.

Metrics and statistics definitely do not paint the whole picture. None of the ones that I have looked at take his "arm" into consideration, so he isn't be docked for how often he tried to throw home or the accuracy of his throws.

I'm curious what you're seeing that suggests that Grossman is the best LF in the AL? If you're using a gold glove as your only evidence, then I would recommend re-evaluating how you judge defenders in baseball. I'm not saying metrics and statistics are the end all be all, but I trust those wayyyy more than I trust the gold glove voting process. I know it's MLB coaches, but they're making their votes based on watching a player for at most 19 games and in majority of cases 3-7 times...assuming that the best defenders are in every game.

None of the defensive stats I've referenced rank/rate his "arm".

Odorizzi and Berrios posted the highest fWARs of their career. Once Pineda regained his velocity he was better than both Odorizzi and Berrios. Gibson was on pace for his highest fWAR season before ulcerative colitis derailed his season. This all seems really good, in my opinion.

Tom and I discussed Eddie's defense on Periscope...check it out!

That's called a minor league contract. If they would agree to that, great, but I doubt they are at the point in their careers where they can only get a minor league deal.

If the Twins are able to give big names at the top of the rotation, then these guys could be good fillers for very low cost. I completely agree...if the Twins headline the 2020 offseason with one of the three mentioned here, then we are in trouble. We do have young arms, but are they for sure any more or less solid than these 3? A very small sample of starts and relief work doesn't sell it for me.

I know there are many metrics to look at in terms and defensive performance, but most metrics suggest that Eddie has been below average since 2017 and has been getting worse each season.

If Michael Pineda is truly your 5th best starting pitcher then you might have the best 1-4 in baseball history! I would love this!

Despite Eddie Rosario being ranked as one of the worst outfielders in baseball, per Baseball Savant, the other two-thirds of the Twins outfield is one of the best in baseball. Let's take a deeper dive into three fly-ball pitchers on the free agent market who could complement the strengths of the Twins defense.Last week, I attempted to quantify the value of Byron Buxton's defense and joined Tom Froemming via Periscope to discuss several topics related to the outfield. Let's take a look at how that unit may impact how the Twins invest in their pitching staff. Four names that will not require a deep dive as you are probably already pretty familiar with are Gerrit Cole, Madison Bumgarner, Michael Pineda, and Jake Odorizzi. These four pitchers ranked in the top 50 in fly ball percentage in 2019, per FanGraphs, and I think any Twins fan would be happy to see them in uniform in 2020. After the four mentioned above, the remaining fly ball free agent pitchers would be guys who the Twins might grab as a fourth of fifth starter in their 2020 rotation. Jordan Lyles, RHP, 29 years old In his last two seasons, where he has played for four different teams, Lyles had a fly ball rate of 39.4 percent and a dreadful 16.1 percent homerun per fly-ball rate. Prior to his last two seasons he was more of a ground ball pitcher, but he’s been relying more on his fastball and curveball while using his sinker significantly less. Part of me wonders if this is partly because of pitching at Coors for three plus years of his career. Lyles' peripherals aren’t attractive, but the former 38th overall pick is young and will be cheap if the Twins decide to spend big on other names. If Wes Johnson can work his magic and improve Lyles' control, then we could tap into what the Astros saw back when they drafted him in 2008. Rick Porcello, RHP, 30 years old How is Rick Porcello only 30-years-old? It’s crazy to think he was the game 163 starter for the Tigers back in 2009. Ten seasons and one Cy Young Award later, Porcello enters the 2020 free agent class after one of his worst seasons as a pro. That said, Porcello might fit right in with Baldelli’s philosophy with his starting pitchers as well as the Twins defense. In 2019, Porcello was significantly worse the third time through the batting order than he was the first two times. One indication is his home run per fly-ball rate went from average to awful, per FanGraphs, and his K/BB went from above average to awful. As Baldelli did with Odorizzi in 2019, the key to Porcello may be not to let him face the opponent a third time through the order. Drew Smyly, LHP, 30 years old Another former Tiger, Drew Smyly, is a cheap name the Twins could add to the bottom of their rotation. Smyly has struggled with injuries for much of his career, so much so that he did not make a major league appearance in 2017 or 2018 before being signed by the Phillies in late July of 2019. He’s always been an intriguing pitcher when healthy as he has the ability to strike out more than one batter per inning. In his return, he boasted an above average K/BB of 3.24 but had a dreadful 19.1 percent home run per fly-ball rate in 62 2/3 innings, per FanGraphs. Taking the small sample into consideration, the good news is that the K/BB is right around his career averages while the home run per fly-ball rate is significantly higher. Of course none of the names above are the sexy names we are hoping the Twins will get, but at the end of the day the Twins need to find four guys who can take the ball every fifth day. Even the Houston Astros don’t have the sexiest of names as their fourth and fifth starters, but somebody has to do the job. Please share your thoughts in the comments below. Not registered? Click here to create an account. To stay up to date, follow Twins Daily on Twitter and Facebook. MORE FROM TWINS DAILY 4 Off-the Radar Pitching Trade Targets for the Twins Should Twins Consider Moving Mitch Garver to 1B? Excellent Plate Discipline Emphasizes Why Luis Arraez Deserves Starting Spot on 2020 Twins Click here to view the article

Byron Buxton’s short four and a half year career has seen him play over just 100 games just once back in 2017. In the two years since, Buxton has only had five at-bats after July 31, most recently missing the Twins final two months of one of their best seasons in franchise history. With just three years of team control remaining and the 2020 offseason being crucial to the Twins competitive window, it’s time to consider how much the Twins should be planning their window around Buxton.Byron Buxton, when healthy, is one of the best center fielders in the game. Baseball Savant has many metrics that can make this argument. Keeping Buxton healthy has been endlessly debated on Twitter and, without spending too much time on that, I think the answer may be found by improving his reaction time, per the graphic from Baseball Savant below. I found their “jump” metric to be the most surprising. For being such a great outfielder (he was sixth in Outs Above Average among outfielders despite missing two months) he was rated as average in his “jump”, which takes into account a players reaction, burst, and route. Improving on reaction time is something much more realistic than asking him to change his instincts. Defense can be a hard thing to quantify in baseball, but using data Baseball Savant I will try to paint a picture of just how impactful Byron’s glove is in center field. For the majority of this exercise I will compare Buxton’s centerfield metrics to Max Kepler’s as he has the most meaningful data from the 2019 season. In 2019, the average batted ball had an average flight time of about five seconds, was hit about 65 feet away from the outfielder, and had a 97% catch probability. When looking at five second hang time data, the catch probability significantly drops from 85 feet (72.5%) to 90 feet (50.0%) and then again at 95 feet (27.8%), so this is the range I want to focus the comparison. In the graphic above, I have put a black rectangle around that 85 foot to 95 foot range mentioned above. Your first reaction might be to notice that the specified range, specifically around the five second mark, doesn’t look much different. On that note, I’d remind you that Kepler had 419.0 more innings in the outfield than Buxton and thus had many more opportunities to get outs. If anything, you should compare the number of grey dots (hits) in each rectangle as well as the number of red dots (outs) to the right of the rectangle. More simply put, Buxton had three more Defensive Runs Saved (DRS) in fewer innings than Kepler. Let’s look at the impact it had on Twins pitchers. Due to sample size, I did not include relief pitchers, and due to suspension or health issues, the only starters I decided to include were Jose Berrios and Jake Odorizzi. Prior to the Buxton injury on Aug. 1, Berrios and Odorizzi had a .968 and .830 OPS on line drives and fly balls hit to center field, respectively. After the Buxton injury, their OPS increased to 1.339 and 1.154, respectively. In short, it’s clear Buxton absence had a significant impact on their defense. With all that in mind, where do you sit on Buxton? Trade him? Buy out his arbitration years and sign him to a long-term deal? Continue playing the waiting game to see if he can stay healthy? Let’s discuss in the comments. Next week, I’ll be looking at what free agent starters we should target to compliment Buxton’s strengths. Please share your thoughts in the comments below. Not registered? Click here to create an account. To stay up to date, follow Twins Daily on Twitter and Facebook. MORE FROM TWINS DAILY The 2020 Offseason Handbook Is Now Available for Preorder!Excellent Plate Discipline Emphasizes Why Luis Arraez Deserves Starting Spot on 2020 TwinsThe Defensive Future of Royce Lewis Click here to view the article

On Monday, I wrote a quick hitter on my 2019 Twins Daily Twins Awards. Now, I want to do a quick rundown of my postseason roster. Catcher: Mitch Garver, Jason Castro It'll be interesting to see how much they split time in the postseason. Both have been good this year but Garver has been better. Infielders: CJ Cron, Luis Arraez, Jonathan Schoop, Jorge Polanco, Miguel Sano With Rocco saying that Arraez is progressing better than expected, I think he'll make the roster. He may not play on Friday but I think we'll see him sometime during this series. Outfielders: Eddie Rosario, Jake Cave, Max Kepler It won't happen, but I'd love to see a guy like Ian Miller on the roster for his speed. On this roster, the Twins don't have anyone in their lineup to pinch run if they need speed on the bases. Utility/DH: Marwin Gonzalez, Nelson Cruz, Ehire Adrianza or Willians Astudillo Adrianza, Gonzalez, and Astudillo are guys who can mostly play anywhere. The health of Adrianza makes it seem like he won't be on the roster, so I think Willians gets the 25th spot. Pitchers: Jose Berrios, Jake Odorizzi, Randy Dobnak, Trevor May, Tyler Duffey, Taylor Rogers, Zack Littell, Sergio Romo, Cody Stashak, Brusader Graterol, Lewis Thorpe, Devin Smeltzer, Kyle Gibson The first 11 are locks for me. Kyle Gibson, I'm not so confident in. It feels weird to not have Gibson on the postseason roster, as the most tenured Twin, but if he's not healthy and can't pitch well then he shouldn't be on the roster. It's that simple. I also wouldn't be totally against leaving Adrianza/Astudillo off the roster and adding another pitcher like Martin Perez, but with his struggles I don't think he brings as much value as an extra utility player. What does your postseason roster look like?

Yep, fair point. I don't think the catchers defensive contribution (more than just blocking, framing, and throwing out runners) can be overstated. Catchers, outside of Realmuto, aren't expected to play everyday. Only 7 played more than 120 games next year. Garver will get a lot closer to that number next year with Castro, assumedly, gone. My opinion of Berrios fell drastically this year and could admittedly by biased with his second half, but I just don't think he'll ever be "the guy". Solid #2 but not the ace we heard so much about. 200 innings is great, but I need something more than quantity to get him on my list. Ultimately he had one bad year (2018) after having two and a half good years (2015-2017) and now a career year (2019). Sure there's a case but I don't know that anyone should have been super surprised by this year.

Yea, 1-4 was tough for me. And absolutely admitting my catcher bias

Soon enough the 2019 Twins Daily Twins Awards will be published. I was excited to be part of the balloting process and wanted to release by ballot with quick explanations behind my decisions. Rookie of Year: 1. Arraez 2. Littell 3. Harper I'll be shocked if Arraez isn't the unanimous first place vote. Littell definitely made his case, especially late, but Arraez was the spark plug in one of the best offenses in The League. The fact that Ryne Harper, who actually did okay, got my 3rd place vote shows how little the Twins relied on rookies this year. Most Improved: 1. Garver 2. Polanco 3. Max Kepler In my opinion, this is a toss up for the three above. You could easily add Duffey to the mix here too. You'll see this reflected in my MVP voting but I was a catcher growing up and believe it's the most important position on the field, so Garver gets my vote. Kepler showed signs last year of big improvements, so I had Polanco over him. Pitcher of the Year: 1. Rogers 2. Duffey 3. May 4. Pineda Man, this was tough but throughout the year Rogers was the most consistent pitcher, and no I'm not just talking out of the bullpen. Duffey and May were two of the best relievers in baseball when it mattered most but if it wasn't for his suspension, Pineda probably would have been at number two for me. Most Valuable Player: 1. Garver 2. Kepler 3. Polanco 4. Cruz 5. Sano 6. Rogers Did I tell you have I a bias towards catchers? Honestly, my 1-4 could have been in any order but ultimately landed with Garver on top for reasons previously mentioned. Kepler over Polanco and Cruz because of the the defense he added and Polanco over Cruz for his defensive contributions although he had some really tough stretches this year. Sano would have been higher for me, probably #2 or #3, but just missed too many games at the beginning of the season. Rogers makes the list but that could have been recency bias as Eddie was in the midst of an ugly month of September. In general, I find it hard to give an MVP vote to a player who plays in so few games compared to offensive players. Would love to hear what your ballot would look like and what you think of mine!

The Twins drop the rubber match to the Washington Nationals as they were outhit 14-12 and outscored 12-6. Kyle Gibson was hit hard but showed some positive signs while most of the offense scuffled against left-hander Patrick Corbin.Box Score Gibson: 4.2 IP, 8 H, 5 ER (6 R), 4 BB, 5 K, 6.13% strikes (57 of 93 pitches) Bullpen: 4.1 IP, 6 H, 6 ER, 2 BB, 4 K Home Runs: Cruz (36), Schoop (22) Multi-Hit Games: Cruz (2-for-5), Schoop (3-for-5) Top 3 WPA: Schoop (.092), Castro (.071), Cruz (.061) Bottom 3 WPA: Gibson (-.302), Stewart (-.120), Stashak (-.47) Gibson Hit Hard in Return to Mound but It Wasn’t All Bad After missing two starts Gibby returned to the mound with the tough task of facing the Washington Nationals who were going for the series win. The Nationals are a top 10 team in all of baseball when it comes to facing right-handed pitching as well as being one of the best teams in baseball since June 1. Throughout the evening Washington was hovering around .380 in xBA, per Statcast, which means Gibson was getting hit hard which was mostly due to not hitting his spots. For example, Adam Eaton’s home run to lead off the fifth inning was left middle/middle, and this was a recurring issue through the night for Gibson. It also didn’t help that he walked four hitters. That said, there were some positive things to note. Gibson’s fastball velocity was actually a tick or two above his average in the first inning before settling in at about 94 mph, which is where he normally sits. A good sign considering the symptoms of ulcerative colitis include weight loss and fatigue. What might have been the most impressive thing from his start tonight was the movement of his off-speed pitches which induced a 21 percent swinging strike rate against a team who Fangraphs has ranked as third in all of baseball in contact percentage. In all, it wasn’t a terrible start and may be somewhat expected considering his recent illness coupled with the line-up he was facing but there were still some positive takeaways. Cruz, Schoop, Garver Hit Well, Rest of Line up Squanders Opportunities As the Nationals were smoking the ball from the top of the order to the bottom, the Twins struggled to make hard contact against the soft-throwing lefty Patrick Corbin. Through the evening the Twins xBA was in right around .275 give or take 10 points or so before plummeting in the later innings to the low .200’s. Rosario responded to a Rendon homer in the top of the first with a RBI single to right scoring Luis Arraez who had doubled on a ball that had an xBA of .020 (yes, the “2” is in the right spot). Cruz blasted his 36th home run in the bottom of the third while Mitch Garver was about two feet away from hitting his 31st home run of the season in the bottom of the fifth. Other than Schoop, who hit his 22nd home run in the eighth as well as a 109 mph line drive at an umpire, the rest of the offense was pretty stagnant. This was a little surprising as this was the best lineup the Twins had in the three game series with the Nationals. Postgame With Baldelli Bullpen Usage Spreadsheet Click here for a review of the number of pitches thrown by each member of the bullpen over the past five days. Click here to view the article

On a night when the offense couldn’t catch a break the Twins were, somewhat surprisingly, carried by Martin Perez and the Polanco-less defense. Perez outshines Eovaldi, the defense saves the day, and the Twins win the rubber match 2-1 over the Red Sox.Box Score Perez: 6.0 IP, 2 H, 1 ER, 2 BB, 1 K, 70.0% strikes (49 of 70 pitches) Bullpen: 3.0 IP, 2 H, 0 ER, 0 BB, 3 K Home Runs: None Multi-Hit Games: None Top 3 WPA: Perez (.242), Rogers (.226), Duffey (.151) Bottom 3 WPA: Cruz (-.172), Cron (-.161), Kepler (-.152) Martin Perez starts strong in September, Bullpen holds the lead Hopefully tonight was a sign of things to come for Perez. Through four innings Perez had a strike percentage of 82 percent and had induced just three hard hits as defined by Baseball Savant. If it wasn’t for a fluke home run by Mookie Betts, which had an xBA of .250, he would have pitched four perfect innings using fewer than than 40 pitches. Things started to unravel a bit in sixth inning when Perez lost control of the strike zone, allowed a rocket double to Betts off the Green Monster, followed by a Bogaerts walk and an errant pick-off attempt before escaping the inning without giving up a run. After just 70 pitches and six innings from Perez, the bullpen took over. As has been the case since the All-Star break, the bullpen was dominant, sending May and Duffey to shut down the seventh and eighth, respectively, followed by Romo and Rogers teaming up to close out the ninth. Despite good contact, offense does just enough to reward Perez Throughout the evening the Twins expected batting average was hovering right around the .300 mark, per Baseball Savant, but ultimately ended the night batting .077. That should tell you how well they actually hit the ball tonight but were just the victims of some bad luck. Loading the bases twice resulted in just two runs and they hit into four double plays, their seventh in the last two games, despite Cron’s batted balls having an xBA of .550 and .480. Per BaseballReference, this was the fourth time in Twins history and 11th time in franchise history they won a game with only two hits and zero homeruns. Defense picks up offense, for a change It’s no secret that the defense has been struggling for a while after looking great at the beginning of the year. Outside of the errant throw from Perez, which did not lead to a run, the Twins defense shined in a game the offense needed the “pick me up”. In the second and third innings, Sano made two plays at third base that could have easily been hits. Cron made a nice diving play on a ball that was awkwardly hit just short of first base and barely in foul territory. Jake Cave robbed an extra-base hit from Chirstian Vazquez in the seventh which had a catch probability of 25 percent, per the FSN broadcast. Everything was capped off on the final play of the game when Eddie Rosario threw out Rafael Devers, the tying run, after Martinez hit a ball high off the Green Monster. Postgame With Baldelli Bullpen Usage Spreadsheet Click here for a review of the number of pitches thrown by each member of the bullpen over the past five days. Click here to view the article