bean5302

I think it results in players who never get comfortable in the field. Instead of plays being reflexive, every play requires thought. Word is the Twins are going to have Acuna practice soccer and tennis more so he'll be better able to kick baseballs or at least bat them down with his glove... that is when he's not practicing his throws to always miss a 10 foot wide target setup over 1B. Also, they've ordered him to gain weight to increase his HR power and sloooooww down that run speed so he doesn't embarrass the rest of the team.

Keirsey's defensive metrics do not paint him as a potential plus center fielder. At best, he might be able to hold his own. I really wish Keirsey would have gotten some more playing time and plate appearances at the end of the season so we could get better data on his true sprint speed. Eyeball scouting returns some serious bias.

No, it represented me not wanting to put relievers into the mix, and when I went to 40IP on my Fangraphs.com sort, I had dozens of relievers showing up. If Dobnak wasn't pitching well enough, the Twins wouldn't have added him to the 40 man and called him up.

I wasn't concerned with the Guardians' rotation before the season began or for the last couple years, actually. I just wasn't impressed with what I'd seen in terms of their results. They were always projected to suddenly get better, but it felt like the kind of expectations Twins fans and analysts had for Fernando Romero a few years ago. Often those mystical "they're going to be good because they just have to be, right!?" projections don't turn out. Cleveland has a dominant bullpen, a very solid core in their young, cost controlled position players, and more positional help close by with an outfielder in Chase DeLauter finishing the year at AAA. Oh, and they have a young shortstop who... now get this... doesn't boot balls around the infield and chuck throws into the stands?! What is this blasphemy? Baldelli and Falvey are surely throwing staplers at walls for the Guardians having the audacity to teach fielding techniques! How dare they? That's cheating! The Guardians probably have somewhere in the ballpark of $30-50MM of payroll room for next year. They'll be able to shore up some holes with that if they choose, but they're such a cheaply run franchise it's hard to say what they'll do. In any case, the Guardians probably project to be competitive with the Twins. I expect them to be behind Detroit and Kansas City.

In my offseason plan last year, I wanted the Twins to trade for Jarren Duran (Wilyer Abreu was a secondary thought). I didn't think Duran would turn into what he did, but I think there was a lot better fit the Twins' assets (Kepler, Polanco) to get Abreu or Jarren Duran last offseason. I still think the Twins might be able to get some movement on a deal by including Larnach to offset the loss of Abreu. The Twins are going to have to clear payroll to pick up O'Neill. Spotrac projects 3yrs $48MM for him. Feels super steep to me. I think he'll go for more like 1-2yrs and $15-25MM? JJ Bleday, Daulton Varsho, Brenton Doyle would be potentially better targets. Perhaps Trevor Larnach could be traded as part of those deals to offset the depth loss.

Dobnak pitched pretty well in AAA relative to his peers. Of the 130 pitchers with at least 60 innings, Dobnak ranked as follows: ERA Top 25 - 3.78 Dobnak - 4.25 (#42/130) Median - 4.59 FIP Top 25 - 4.14 Dobnak - 4.54 (#54/130) Median - 4.74 There's a reason Dobnak got an opportunity; it was because he earned it with results. There's also a reason it took so long to get that opportunity; it was because the front office thought it was probably smoke and mirrors, and it was.

I think Winder and Jackson are both better than anything you can expect from Dobnak without a major change to Dobnak's arsenal.

Abreu would be a great target, but I don't think Woods Richardson gets anywhere close to closing that deal. Abreu looks like a legit potential perennial All Star 4+ WAR player with an ability to cover CF if needed (perfect for the Twins, but great insurance for the Red Sox if Duran were to get injured.) The Red Sox are watching Tyler O'Neill hit free agency so they're not going to be excited about parting ways with a potential All Star caliber outfielder, either so lining up a trade that makes sense might be pretty difficult.

I'm inclined to think Spotrac is way high and Baseballtradevalues is way low on Cal Raleigh's. Raleigh's best comp is probably J.T. Realmuto who got 5yrs and $115MM, which seems pretty reasonable as to what Raleigh might expect on the open market right now. Will Smith's contract was at $140MM, but he was still under team control and the AAV is far lower than what free agency would get. Raleigh isn't in the realm of Buster Posey or Joe Mauer comps, and he'd never approach that $194MM figure Spotrac is projecting for a few reasons. The biggest is injury risk/durability for catchers as they just don't age well. Second is Raleigh's bat being above average rather than elite. Third is the looming possibility of robo umps. If robo umps come to fruition, Raleigh's value would be halved. When it comes to Jeffers, he's basically Gary Sanchez. All power - no on base, but league average-ish bat with mediocre defense. Also not going well for Jeffers is how few games he plays, even if that's just Baldelli being Baldelli. Durability concerns are real for Jeffers. I think anything over 3yrs $40MM would be unrealistic for him if he were hitting the open market.

Dobnak's a nice story, but his stuff doesn't play at the MLB level, and we saw that in some small sample sizes last year. He's not on the 40 man roster, but there are a lot of arms at or knocking at the AAA door level. I think the Twins have probably seen everything Dobnak can do at this point. Whatever spot he can go in the minors to develop a better fastball is where they should put him. I don't think he has a way to see game time, but he's a sunk cost.

Spotrac predicts a MV of Iglesias - 1yr at $1.7MM Pillar - 1yr at $1.1MM Hampson - N/A (probably MiLB contract) For Iglesias, his wRC+ 90ish bat was serviceable at SS. Pillar's similar bat profile made him technically playable as a part time 4th outfielder / center fielder. Hampson, though? A career wRC+ 69 hitter has basically kept him as AAA replacement value, accumulating only 1.2 fWAR across 8 years, peaking at 0.6 in his one outlier (still only wRC+ 99) season with Miami in 2023. He's basically a pinch runner. I think the Twins have options as good or better in house than Pillar or Hampson, and with Correa entrenched at SS, Iglesias as well.

Baseballtradevalues doesn't appear to use "catcher framing" in the same way Fangraphs or Baseball Reference (DRS) have chosen to dive full on into it. Catcher framing is where a huge portion of Cal Raleigh's fWAR and bWAR comes from. I do not believe in catcher framing as a statistic catchers have good control over anymore. It's not stable or predictable. It seems to me the "framing" metric appears to be more reliant on the pitching staff and umpire adjustments so you see massive swings in catcher defensive value from year to year. I hate that. Just like OAA or DRS in general have wild adjustments from one year to the next in even medium sample sizes. For example. Cal Raleigh's DRS value over 1200 innings projected. 2021 = -4 or below average 2022 = +18 or elite 2023 = +2 or average 2024 = +17 hey, he's elite again! Cal Raleigh's breakdown for Baseballtradevalues is as follows: AFV = 56.7 (2.4 WAR per year, approx), Salary = $28MM remaining over 3 years. AFV - Salary = 28.7. Jeffers is at AFV 24.9 (average 1.5 WAR per year) I agree, it's certainly not perfect, which is why I stated that in the initial post, but it's a pretty good ballparking tool to correct fan biases about the value of players on the Twins. In Cal Raleigh's situation, I think his value likely depends on how much any given front office believes in his framing value, but I also have a feeling BaseballTradeValues is low on his performance. Ryan Jeffers Arb2 (+13.1) 2024 = 122 G, 64 RBI, .226/.300/.432 .732 OPS, wRC+ 107, OPS+ 103, 1.7 fWAR, 2.1 bWAR Cal Raleigh Arb1 (+28.7) 2024 = 153 G, 100 RBI, .220/.312/.436 .748 OPS, wRC+ 117, OPS+ 119, 4.3 fWAR, 4.6 bWAR Last2 = 298 G 175 RBI, .226/.309/.446 .755 OPS, wRC+ 115, OPS+ 117, 9.7 fWAR, 7.8 bWAR If you compare Jeffers and Raleigh in BaseballTradeValues, I think it's within reason in terms of true projection (lots of catcher injuries?), but probably not in real life since I don't think front office's "expect" injuries from previously healthy players, they just understand the elevated risk.

Then they'll move the team because another location will give them a new stadium. Doesn't matter to me.

I've received the ban hammer before for less insulting stances. The number of people soaking up this open attack on anybody who understands there's some nuance in business is disgusting. No opinions allowed on TD? This article was not satire and not filed as such.

It's both. For a buyer not necessarily interested in moving the team, they'll get a new stadium soon. For a buyer who is interested in moving the team, they'll be able to justify the move. Chicago will not let the White Sox leave town without serious efforts to retain them, regardless of whether or not a new stadium is a popular idea currently.

I think you're overselling how much risk the Pohlad's felt there was. Like the foreclosure crisis where issuing banks had taken on high risk mortgages and packaged them as low risk to purchasing banks and investors. This wasn't a "Twins" or "Pohlad's" issue since a dozen MLB teams were dragged into the situation. I think every single team who didn't cut ties mid-2023 after non-payment wound up re-upping with Bally Sports given the opportunity, and zero of them would have been okay with most of their fans being unable to watch the games, period. As a collective, MLB ownership clearly didn't see the risk.

Wallner will be fine in RF. He'll get better if the Twins actually give him regular time in the position rather than moving him all over the place. Wallner 2024 RF = +0 DRS, -2.3 UZR/150, -1 OAA Kepler 2024 RF = +0 DRS, -0.7 UZR/150, +4 OAA Kepler's been declining a lot over the past few years as his speed has evaporated. I don't think there will be a big difference between the two in fielding next year, wherever Kepler ends up.

The White Sox are the dramatically more attractive team to purchase. It's not even close. Bigger market currently, expiring stadium deal, enormous room for revenue growth. Prospective baseball franchise owners are looking for a few things. 1) Prestige in general. Any MLB team grants this. 2) Financial growth potential for the investment. 3) Flexibility to explore options for returns on investment. Things prospective baseball franchise owners do not care about. 1) Farm system rankings 2) Front office construction 3) How good the team is or is expected to be next year. 4) Roster, apart from long term contracts which are major liabilities The White Sox are going to get a new stadium soon, and the stadium does not have to be in Chicago. Wherever that stadium goes, billions and billions of dollars will be made in the surrounding real estate. A prospective owner looking to bring MLB to their city wouldn't even be interested in the Twins, who aren't going anywhere for 15 years. There's also much more potential revenue in Chicago than Minneapolis. It's a dramatically larger and more prestigious market in every conceivable way. White Sox = a franchise with bottomed out value, with dramatically more revenue growth potential, with dramatically more profit potential, with a more prestigious market, with a new stadium almost certainly coming, which can also be potentially moved to a new market in the near future. This article is written as if a TwinsDaily reader/contributor or general baseball fan is shopping to buy an MLB franchise with the hopes of winning a World Series in 2025 or 2026.

A lot of the comment section seems to be trying to come up with proof the RSN impact caused all this... The Pohlad family was well informed of the RSN situation. It's inconceivable they weren't because MLB was aware, and other owners were aware which led to changes in the last CBA. There are two parts to the RSN situation. The first is direct RSN revenue to the Twins and the second part is revenue sharing. With the increase in revenue sharing in the CBA, the league mitigated some of the RSN collapse impact on teams. The Twins' RSN deal prior to last year was $54MM, which was higher than analysts thought, and Bally Sports renegotiated deals with existing contracts at about 85%. It's inconceivable the Twins hadn't been negotiating with Bally prior to the end of the season so they must have been aware of a "ball park" RSN revenue stream for 2024. It may have been lower than the 85% which Bally renegotiated with existing contracts, but 85% would be $46MM. $8MM of revenue shift for a team analysts at Forbes thought made $19MM in net operating income last year is a drop in the bucket. I just don't see this as a reason to cut payroll in 2024. Even if the RSN deal dropped to, say, $36MM (a drop of 1/3rd), the Twins would still likely at least break even returning the exact same payroll as 2023. The Twins could have dropped payroll in 2025+ had the future RSN issue turned into a mess, and the Pohlad's have long said they look at financials on a year to year basis to determine payroll. I also don't think anybody thought Diamond Sports was so poorly managed or they'd do something so destructive to their brand as play a hard core game of chicken with Comca$t; a game which was a predictable epic loss for Diamond. Quotes from the commissioners office were brutal on assessing Diamond's management. There is absolutely no way the Twins agree to a deal with Bally's knowing a full half season of baseball would be unavailable to people watching at home. This doesn't seem like it probably impacted 2024's opening year budget. I don't think a person can pinpoint a singular component to the change in strategy. Knee jerk reactions from ownership, RSN revenue streams, failures to increase attendance in recent years, concerns about the performance of Falvey's teams despite record setting payrolls, the performance of other teams in the playoffs with dramatically lower payrolls, potential family liquidity, and a whole host of other factors probably contributed to the decision to cut payroll.

Brooks Lee has always been scouted as a poor athlete. Even when the Twins drafted him. He looks polished in his instincts, movement, and balance which could serve him well enough to hold down 2B or 3B full time. Lee is a lot like the now 34 year old Kyle Farmer from a physical skills standpoint. Farmer managed to even handle SS because he was incredibly reliable at the position in 2021. If Lee was almost perfect in the field, he could handle SS.

The quad strain would have taken 6 months to completely heal and for all Lewis' strength to come back. The hip adductor was related to the quad strain, and Lewis was advised of his elevated risk, but the Twins and Lewis didn't want him to miss the whole season from the quad injury. It was healed up to the point that Lewis could play, but the Twins did put restrictions on him to reduce the risk of injury. The quad strain is linked to the 2nd torn ACL... which was possibly linked to coming back too soon from the previous torn ACL. Basically, everything kind of tracks back to the first torn ACL and Lewis pushing hard to get himself back on the field. Hopefully (not holding my breath) Lewis is truly 100% for next year.

The article hits the nail on the head. The Pohlad's essentially turned the roster into a long term only investment, then immediately performed a 180* turn and tried to cash out. It's an absolutely catastrophic decision from an investment/business perspective. The irony with "have a business to run" statements from the Pohlad family is awfully thick. Changing illiquid investment strategy, and not holding failed sales/marketing channels and leadership accountable (Dave St. Peter). Those are not how successful businesses are run.

Brooks Lee's arm is significantly weaker than Lewis'. I actually don't see much defensive upside with Lee, who proved the scouting reports correct with as a very slow runner so I'd put Lewis ahead of Lee at every single position on the field from a potential standpoint, though Lee looked smooth out there... until he didn't.

Jose Miranda is the clear 1B for next year if the Twins don't do some roster shuffling. Miranda will either be at 1B or DH. As far as 1B being studs at the plate, there were really about 4 of those in MLB. Jose Miranda (wRC+ 115) and Carlos Santana (wRC+ 116) were both within 10% of the #5 ranked hitter with 300+ PA at 1B, Nathaniel Lowe (wRC+ 123). I don't see why having a good hitting 1B instead of an MVP caliber hitter at 1B is a "problem." We have a "problem" at 2B since neither Lee nor Julien were MLB caliber hitters last year, and Castro likely isn't returning.

Lewis had 1 error over his last 27 games, and the leg issues were with him all year from the severe quad strain. The slump was probably mental, IMHO. Good time to repost positional adjustment values. C = +12.5 SS = +7.5 CF = +2.5 2B = +2.5 3B = +2.5 RF = -7.5 LF = -7.5 1B = -12.5 DH = -17.5 Moving Royce Lewis from 3B to 1B erases 15 runs of value. Lewis will still be 25 years old for opening day next year. Across his career, Royce has just about 1 full season at 3B and he's graded out average there.