bean5302

Give him plate appearances. Keep him in a routine instead of telling him to come ready to play catcher. Or hot dog vendor. or 2B. or RF. or pitching coach or ball boy.

Sounds like Correa is going to need to get some custom shoes/orthotics and work on his preparation going forward to avoid this type of injury now that he knows he's susceptible to it. Correa has delivered 3.6 fWAR so far this year. Maybe has an outside shot at 4.0 WAR on the year, which isn't far off from what the Twins expected when they signed him. There were significant injury limitations for Correa in years prior to him signing with Minnesota in 2022. I'm not sure what the Twins' strategy is on Correa, but I'd be willing to bet they're driving the slow treatment process, not Correa. If they asked him to speed it up and say, I think this is as good as we're going to be able to get it this year and we can't risk missing the playoffs, I'd bet money Correa would be in St. Paul the next day. Buxton is an 80 game a year player. I don't understand why people are acting surprised. Like, at all. This is what happens with Buxton. He's a 10 year veteran who has played more than 92 games at the MLB level only once in his 10 year career (7 years ago in his age 23 season). Everything over 80 games is gravy. Everything over 100 games should be looked at as a career year going forward. Anything over 120 games would be an outright miracle. This is why it was critical the Twins acquire (and always have) a starting caliber center fielder option on the roster to back Buxton up. They didn't do that, and the team is suffering as a result.

First of all, both the Mets and the Giants still wanted him, they just wanted to use the medical evaluation as a way to reduce his price. The Twins got Correa at the reduced price.

Either that or Farmer has photos of wild parties attended by Falvey and Bauer together...

It's unbelievably easy to be unimpressed. Since the Twins were arguably the worst team in all of baseball from 2011-2016 results wise so being "better" by that metric is a virtually non-existent bar. In other ways, I'm not sure how you'd quantify an advancement. Both Smith and Ryan were better in drafting and developing valuable players for the Twins. Buxton, Sano, Polanco, Dozier, Berrios, Rogers all of them All Stars as Twins. Falvey inherited all that talent, plus other valuable roster pieces that had been drafted and developed like Kepler, Garver, and Gibson. On Falvey's side.... nothing. Zero. Zilch. Nada. Not a single All Star Player ever drafted or signed out of the international market by Falvey. Ever. Unless you're talking about guys he traded away like Rooker. Falvey lived off the cushion he was given. Then there's payroll which expanded greatly under Falvey's regime. If Terry Ryan had been given an extra $50MM to spend, do you think he might have been able to field a better team in 2016? How about the farm system rank? To start 2016, the Twins had an absolutely elite farm system. For 2015-2016, ranked in the top 5 or 10. Where do we sit today? Middle of the pack after trudging along in the bottom 10 recently. Dramatically expanded payroll. Lower ranked farm. Not one single All Star drafted and developed in 8 years. One playoff series win. One season with more than 87 wins. Again, color me unimpressed.

Personally, I think the Twins typically don't spend on bullpen arms because they feel it's the worst return on investment. I've also long held the belief Falvey can't focus on priorities and gets distracted by "shiny things." There's just no money left after he's done signing 37 platoon bats and utility guys. It'll be interesting to see what happens starting in 2026 as Jax and Duran are likely going to start getting very expensive. Next year, they'll probably be in that $3-5MM range each as Arb 1, and the Twins were willing to pay that kinda scratch to Thielbar.

Julien's actually MLB average-ish on the year due to his hot start. In any case, I think it's been mentioned Farmer is viewed as emergency catching depth. Looking at what the Twins have in the minors, I could see why they'd be awfully scared to risk it.

Brooks Lee - .253/.309/.333 OPS .642 wRC+ 81 <--- not good Eduoard Julien - .217/.320/.354 OPS .673 wRC+ 96 Canterino's career is over. I'll help you out with that.

The Twins haven't dealt with anything other teams haven't dealt with. They failed to plan and backup players and when they had foreseeable injuries, they weren't ready to cover appropriately.

Last year, Joe Pohlad communicated clearly the new goal for the franchise was advancing in the playoffs. Since that time, ownership has pivoted greatly on their investment in the team which makes it hard to speculate whether or not the performance goal remains the same. Lame duck GMs don't happen unless somebody is being seriously evaluated in terms of whether or not to part ways. Since nobody seems to understand the roles of Falvey and Levine it's also hard to tell who would be held accountable for any failures. Levine probably isn't well regarded as a potential GM since Boston didn't even grant him a second interview. Whatever he does, it doesn't seem to be running the show. It'd be awfully surprising to me if Falvey were already extended unless the ownership has recognized they're no longer going to target that "advance in the playoffs" goal so the Twins wouldn't be nearly as attractive to other potential GMs. Not sure what value running the franchise all "secret squirrel" provides. It's not like knowing who is in charge of what is a "secret" worth keeping, but the Twins do seem to like pretending their strategies are particularly special and valuable. Under Falvey's regime, the Twins have won more than 87 games just once, in 2019. They've won a single playoff series. I'm not impressed.

It sure feels like the front office has zero urgency. Laying back comfy because they have a lead on the Wildcard?

Watch the video recap. Max Kepler clearly had a not happy conversation with Tommy Watkins at 3rd. Also, The Twins sent Kepler over and over last year only to watch him be thrown out. He's not even an average runner at this point. Max is at fault for not looking for a potential signal change once he started slowing down. This article is quite the personal hack job.

Preparing for a start vs. preparing for a relief appearance is a different animal. That said, Dobnak's stuff doesn't seem to play at the MLB level. Our infinitely wise front office sent Winder down so they couldn't use him for 15 days reminiscent of how they badly mishandled Alcala out of the gate this year.

Winder's velocity and stuff have looked good out of the bullpen this year. The team's usage of him is a bit of a head scratcher. Feels like they're wasting his value.

Indeed. I was pointing out how sometimes things are unpredictable in terms of this team's strategy. I didn't expect them to focus on reducing strikeouts like they did, and in a big way, especially after so many comments about how K's didn't really matter to the team last year.

Wide variety of guys there with dubious comparability to a young, cost controlled face of the franchise player, but in general, players viewed as utility guys get paid less than players who are viewed a starting position players. That's an "in general" situation.

Correa was having trouble running, it was though to be a bone bruise and later diagnosed as plantar faciitis. Correa last year (with plantar faciitis vs. this year without) .230/.312/.399 OPS .711 wRC+ 96 vs. .308/.377/.520 OPS .896 wRC+ 151 I think it's pretty clear why the Twins want him to fully heal up, and I suspect it's taking longer than they had hoped.

Yep. They pushed Alex Rodriguez to 3B so the lesser fielder, Jeter, could stay on SS. I'm not sure how that would work today with metrics, but you reward your best players and team favorites with a position they earned most of the time. Giving your star players who've earned their positions and roles directives they're going to move around is unusual. Mookie Betts has been moved around a bunch recently, but he volunteered and wanted the opportunity. The Dodgers didn't tell him. Come ready to play!

You have your best players, and then you have your "not the best" players. I'm not sure why you'd think moving your best players around will benefit the team, but it sure seems players improve their defense by having static positions. Moving Royce Lewis to 2B changes what in terms of players on the field? What depth does it add? We have lesser depth at 3B than 2B. In any case, the article speculates no definite positional change is incoming. Moving your franchise cornerstones around willy nilly is a pretty good way to depress player salary (and trade value), though, so who knows?

I don't expect the Twins to get better at stealing basis, but then again, I didn't expect them to focus on reducing strikeouts, either. A lot of the fundamentals which were calling cards of the old scrappy Twins teams are not viewed as valuable under the current front office.

A lot of excitement about a player who has produced negative WAR this year. It's tough to gauge a true ceiling since he's got adequate raw power he could tap into in the future, and his defense is very poor in the outfield as he gets a poor read off the bat. The realistic high expectation for him is probably a 1.0-1.5 WAR type utility player. If he's never able to tap into his raw power, his ceiling is much lower. He needs to improve greatly in CF to become a legitimate backup there.

I've never been a fan of the musical chairs defense strategy. In my opinion, all you wind up with is a whole bunch of players who are poor at all the positions.

While I hope you're right that Keirsey can provide some IL backup relief for Buxton, I actually think it's probably a tall call to hope he'll be serviceable at the MLB level. I view Keirsey as more likely a slower version of Andrew Stevenson. Cave is being undersold here. He made the big show at age 25 after having never had a single season at any level of below average plate production, including AAA at age 23 for NY. Cave had back to back seasons where he projected as a serviceable every day player for the Twins putting up 1.0 (1.6 WAR at 150G) and 1.1 (2.3 WAR at 150G) WAR in 2018-2019. That's consistent with the value Trevor Larnach has produced in his 2 best seasons.

Keirsey didn't hit in AA in 2022. He didn't hit in AAA in 2023. Prior to the IL trip, Keirsey was raking, but there were signs of unsustainability with the highest BABIP of any sample size over 3 games (.370 BABIP), the highest ISO, the highest BB rate, etc. Everything was going his way, and then it all evaporated. Just looks like a flash in the pan to me, and probably to the Twins. He'd been struggling at the plate for 200 plate appearances after he returned from the IL on 6/22. His defensive metrics suggest he'll be adequate at CF, but certainly not a plus fielder at the MLB level. Basically, Keirsey probably isn't as good as Austin Martin, and on top of that, he bats left handed. Even with his couple big games recently, since Keirsey returned from the IL on 6/22 .272/.339/.431 OPS .770 wRC+ 99 in the International League. as of 3 days ago... .257/.327/.388 OPS .715 wRC+ 86 BABIP .326 as of his first 199 PA after return through 8/17 one week ago? .249/.317/.367 OPS .684 wRC+ 78 BABIP .310 If a player doesn't force their way onto an MLB roster by age 25, the chances they'll be a significant contributor in their career is low. Keirsey is already 27...

I know the article says Lopez struggled from time to time, but I never got the impression he wasn't in control of the game. It honestly felt like Lopez was dialed in and it seemed like the Cardinals hitters couldn't do anything consistent against him at all. The game was fast and Pablo was incredibly efficient. On the other side, Gray looked just as good to start the game. Everything changed in the 3rd. Larnach got a hold of a cutter inside, but inside and high is not a good pitch (hits cutter well) or location (rakes the high/inside corner area) to give Larnach, and Gray had already shown Larnach the cutter twice in the first. Feels like Larnach was sitting cutter the rest of the night, and it sure paid off. The Twins eeked out another run when it had a feeling double play when the ball came off Kepler's bat, but Donovan was slow to make a decision. If he goes 3-4 there, inning over, but Lewis probably scores before the ball gets the 3rd out so moot, I guess. Side note, was at the game over 2hrs before the start and the season ticket holder line ran out of jerseys before I got there. First line to run out at the stadium it seems. There were other places, but my friend had recently had surgery, and I couldn't drag her all over the stadium. I was more than a little mad.