bean5302

I've decided to grade the players based on expectations and purely based on "hitting" Buxton. B - He played 25% more games than could have been reasonably expected and he did so with a .279/.335/.524 triple slash that fueled the wRC+ 142 result. Thankfully, he ended on one of his patented hot streaks to inflate his numbers, but that doesn't wipe out the 2 months of below league average production to start the season so he gets docked a point to "B" Castro. B - Castro did exactly the same thing he did last year, which is to be a bit above average hitter. Considering last year was a big step forward for Castro, just holding his own wasn't guaranteed. Solid B. Correa. C - While his production at the plate was the best of his career at .310/.388/.517, Correa missed a ton of games. Playing in only 86 games is a serious knock against the expected performance for him. He gets a C. Farmer. F - His late season batting production aside, Farmer was miserable at the plate for most of the year while also seemingly being responsible for a TOOTBLAN on a regular basis when he did get onto the field. A .214/.293/.353 wRC+ 85 campaign was not only poor by league standards, but even lower than modest expectations for him coming into the season. Jeffers. D - While a lot of Twins fans seem to think Jeffers is a great hitter, I do not and did not. Last year's production was not only lucky, but it even felt lucky to me. Jeffers continued to drive the ball hard and was on fire to open the season, but he was utterly worthless multiple months of the year. His overall production is where I expected him to be .226/.300/.432 wRC+ 107, but the Twins needed Jeffers to be more steady. Julien. F - I don't think I need to say much here. Though I do think Julien was treated poorly by the organization, he just wasn't even remotely good. He needs to make adjustments and get out of his own head or his career is over. Kepler. F - After last year's surge, expectations were raised for Kepler coming into a free agency year and the recent changes to the shift. Instead, he laid an egg. While his .253/.302/.380 wRC+ 94 performance wasn't unplayable, he was for nearly 60 games of the year due to his constant injuries. Between constantly missing time and another season with his power vanishing into the clouds and long slumps, Kepler gets an F. Kirilloff. F - This might be touch unfair since I didn't think Kirilloff was an MLB quality player to begin with, but I didn't think he'd be that bad. His .201/.270/.384 wRC+ 83 performance looked a lot like his 2022, but without the BABIP gods' help. Turning in the worst hitting performance of his career, Kirilloff sunk to new lows trying to dodge a demotion with a back injury nobody could identify or treat. Larnach. A - Anything less than an "A" for Larnach is a total disservice IMHO. Relegated to pre-arbitration with options injury replacement depth, it seemed like the writing was on the wall. Virtually unplayable strikeout rates for the mediocre power he produced, Larnach was a league average bat who needed shielding from lefties. Good enough to play for a decent team in a pinch, but certainly not starter grade. Larnach completely reinvented his game in 2024 appearing in 112 games and 400 plate appearances, he produced at a .259/.338/.434 wRC+ 121 pace. Far, FAR above expectations. Baldelli's broken spreadsheet macros still made sure Larnach didn't see PAs against lefties so no clue if he'd be better with a few more of those, but Larnach continued to hit steadily all year. Lee. F - So my expectations for Lee have been utility infielder for a while, but it seems the Twins and a lot of other fans had "All Star" written on his forehead after Spring Training... Anyway, "he was a rookie!!" isn't really a great excuse for that kind of production, especially given how consistently overpowered he was at the plate. .221/.265/.320 wRC+ 62. He was expected to make the MLB club this year, and people expected him to be good. On top of that, Lee missed huge swaths of the season with injuries. Lewis. F - My favorite Twins player and the player with the highest ceiling on the club since Joe Mauer IMHO. I expected Lewis would put up a healthy 6+ WAR season this year. I really did. An opening day quad injury sucked the wind right out of the sails. The dream of a healthy season seems... a lot further away now, but once he was back, he destroyed baseballs again, and it was a sight to see. Until it wasn't. Lewis had been struggling for a while when Baldelli shoved a 2B assignment down his throat when Lewis was already seemingly on edge. Lewis sputtered to a miserable finish with his home run power turning into warning track power, and the first real glimpses of Lewis' indominable optimism turning into infighting with Carlos Correa at the end. He still finished the year with an above average overall .233/.295/.452 wRC+ 109 season, but having missed half the year and slumped hard for the last 2 months, it was a colossal disappointment. Martin. C - Didn't expect much, didn't get much. His performance at the plate was almost exactly in line with several projection tools. .253/.318/.352 wRC+ 94. Margot. F - Come on. Do I really need to explain? .238/.289/.337 wRC+ 79. Much worse than that for a good portion of the year, Margot's going to enjoy a MiLB contract next year. Set an all time MLB record for futility at the plate as a pinch hitter going 0-30. Luckily for him, there's no grade worse than "F" and we are grading "hitters" not defense here. Miranda. A - Late season slump aside, like Larnach, Miranda didn't make the roster out of Spring Training, and apparently expectations were very low after a shoulder injury sapped Miranda's production last year. He responded by being one of the most fun Twins hitters to watch most of the year, finishing with a .284/.322/.441 wRC+ 115 performance. Like Larnach, far exceeding expectations at the plate coming into the season, and at one point, far higher than that. Santana. B - Let's be honest. Most people expected Santana to produce around league average, with a bit of optimism. Instead, he responded with a season looking a lot more like his late prime than his late twilight. After starting the season terribly, his bat finished with a .238/.328/.420 wRC+ 114 season well above expectations. Vazquez. F - .221/.248/.327 wRC+ 60. One of the worst hitters MLB has ever seen accumulating 300 plate appearances, Vazquez managed a pitiful 3.5% BB rate while also demonstrating a poor hit tool, bad base running and weak power. Any hopes of a rebound from last year are dashed. Wallner. A - As I said before the season started, Wallner is a beast. .259/.372/.523 wRC+ 155 and he continued to hit even as the rest of the team slumped. Right on pace for a 4 WAR campaign as a corner outfielder. Hopefully, he'll get the opportunity to see more plate appearances next year and Wallner can adapt his swing further to reduce some strikeouts to solidify his bat as one of the best in MLB.

MLBTradeRumors.com released their arbitration estimates for the 30 teams. The Twins have the 2nd highest number of Arb eligible players in MLB behind the Cubs' 14. Most teams have 10 or fewer. MLBTR also expects Royce Lewis to hit Super 2 status. I am surprised only with the seemingly very low figure for Griffin Jax. Fangraphs' model has Jax at more like $4.5MM if I remember right, but who knows? https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2024/10/projected-arbitration-salaries-for-2025.html Twins (13) Willi Castro (5.017): $6.2MM Jorge Alcala (4.165): $1.7MM (Twins hold $1.5MM club option/$55K buyout) Ryan Jeffers (4.089): $4.7MM Michael Tonkin (4.074): $1.5MM Justin Topa (4.044): $1.3MM Alex Kirilloff (3.141): $1.8MM Bailey Ober (3.093): $4.3MM Brock Stewart (3.093): $800K Griffin Jax (3.091): $2.6MM Joe Ryan (3.033): $3.8MM Trevor Larnach (3.009): $2.1MM Jhoan Duran (3.000): $3.7MM Royce Lewis (2.142): $2.3MM

LOL, it's all the hitting coach's fault. The job will go to whatever coach wants to move their career on and up into MLB and is willing to work as scapegoat for owners, mangers and executives making bad decisions.

It's the most tone deaf part of the 'we're running a business here' type quotes from the Pohlads. I wonder how any of their businesses are successful at this point.

Nice deflection, there. Obviously wasn't the point of my post. Sorry the facts didn't help your case.

Paddack does not have trade value. The Twins might be able to move him as part of a trade if they kick in 1/2 his salary like the Mariners did with Desclafani. Adding up Paddack's typical SSS's over his 3 years with the Twins, you've got a pitcher with a 4.82 ERA with only 1 good season as a starter in his career (rookie 2019). No MLB team looking to compete for a playoff position would trust Paddack with a rotation spot, and no team would pay $7.5MM for MiLB emergency depth when you can get those guys on MiLB contracts. Paddack would be awfully lucky to secure more than a MiLB contract with an opt out right now. Vazquez is bad, but the Twins could move him if they ate half his salary. The problem is the team has nobody to replace him in the system, and a free agent catcher who is going to be better than Vazquez for significantly less than $5MM in savings we'd have is going to be picked from a pretty small potential pool. Correa has the NTC, and sure, maybe he'd waive it. Great. What team would want him? How many teams would be willing to take on 4yrs $135MM guaranteed remaining, plus the 4 potential vesting options after that? How many teams could afford that and need a SS? Here are the teams who got less than 2.5 WAR from their shortstops this year. Pirates, Diamondbacks, Nationals, Rays, White Sox, Braves, Athletics, Marlins, Guardians, Tigers. Easy to eliminate the Pirates, Rays, Athletics, Guardians as the low budget teams. Easy to eliminate the White Sox and Marlins since they're terrible and probably not going to compete soon. 4 left. 1. Diamondbacks are trying to tie up guys like Gallen and looking for pitching. Perdomo (2.0 WAR) was adequate and just 24 years old. No need for Correa, probably not a lot of payroll flexibility for him, either. 2. Nationals - This could be a fit if the Nationals are ready to go all-in, but that feels like a stretch. 3. Braves - They don't have the payroll capacity. They've already been struggling with their commitments. 4. Tigers - Not with Baez still on the books, and they're not bailing the Twins out in the division. Basically, there is 1 potential trade partner, IMHO. That's the Washington Nationals, and that's only if the Nationals are going all-in, and if they are willing to blow the doors off the budget with Correa vs. a much less payroll risky signing like Willy Adams or Ha-Seong Kim. Considering Correa's massive negative trade value, I don't see this happening. Buxton - NTC is not getting waived, the Twins have nobody behind him who can cover CF, and I'm not sure how many teams would be interested in 80 games from Buxton. Lopez wouldn't do much more than just clear payroll since he's a 3-4 win pitcher with a salary in line with his production and a 3 year contract. I think the Twins could move him, but they won't get much back, and then they'll be short their "ace."

Career 3.65 FIP. Career 3.91 ERA. It's a career thing. Like Ricky Nolasco. Also, 4.08 vs. 3.65 is a gap far too wide for the defense, so even if you built in Twins defensive woes, it wouldn't add up. Which defensive metric would you like? OAA? Twins = 0. Dead average. UZR? Most people around here hate that one, but it shows the Twins as the worst defense in MLB with -30 runs. DRS at -19 runs. The Twins pitched 1440.1 innings last year. Using OAA, FIP and ERA should be equal. Using UZR, ERA should be 0.18 higher than FIP. Using DRS, ERA should be 0.11 higher than FIP. Lopez is 0.43 higher. Doesn't add up. After that, how about explaining how Lopez's FIP gap is larger than all the rest of the starters with 100+ innings like Ober (-0.18), Ryan (-0.18), and Woods Richardson (-0.05)? How is it guys like Ryan, and Ober have career FIPs so much closer to their ERAs as well? Not sorry to trample on the Pablo Lopez, Ace who can single handedly win playoff series', Perennial Cy Young Favorite, Best pitcher in the history of baseball, guaranteed! movement around here.

When you take a face of the franchise and push them off their position, and their dream position which they've been told they were next in line for (SS in Lewis' case) to play a rookie who can't field or hit, there's a lot of potential to see a major shift in interest. If you were promised a promotion or position at work, and instead your boss brought in a new employee and shifted you to a position you didn't like, a position viewed as less valuable, to accommodate the new person, how would your commitment be impacted? Honestly, I'm not terribly concerned with Lewis right now as a person, but I am a bit concerned with him as a Twins player given how things went down and the fact the incompetent owners brought back the incompetent front office and management.

https://blogs.fangraphs.com/an-arbitration-compensation-update/ Fangraphs' study/model would put Jax at $4.5MM for year 1 arbitration. Duran is probably about right, but everything seems to be shifting around a bit. Closers have typically done better.

I don't understand the grades at all. In either article. Lopez gets a C+ for being the "Ace" and the "Cy Young Favorite" with a 4.08 ERA and barely better than 50% quality starts. Lopez's ERA is almost always higher than his FIP. Lopez was a #1 who pitched like a #3 or #4. That's a D from me. Joe Ryan looked fantastic out of the gate (again), and flopped later before going down with an injury. Still, he put up the same bWAR as Lopez, and he did it for $760k. Matthews gets an A. He started the year in High A ball, exploded up the national rankings. He wasn't ready, and the signs were there in AAA, but the Twins didn't have anything to fall back on so they put Matthews in... and then let him struggle. Paddack gets an F. There's no world in which a 4.99 ERA from a veteran who was hitting a wall as the calendar turned to June, who couldn't even keep the Twins in a good spot for half his starts gets anything other than an F.

I don't understand how a guy who wasn't even allowed to start the year on the 26 man who puts up a wRC+ 115 on the season gets a D+. I guess he needed to win the MVP to get a C?

Lots of 20/20 hindsight rebuilt into "I knew it all along" in here while also knowing the current prospects are made of gold and guaranteed! 2016 - Buxton #2, Berrios #19, Kepler #44, Tyler Jay #60, Nick Gordon #91, Jorge Polanco #97 Plus recent graduates or top 100s from 2015 Miguel Sano #11, Alex Meyer #29, Kohl Stewart #36, Plus other pre-Falvey regime prospects who hit top 100 status Alex Kirilloff #9 in 2019 Stephen Gonzalves was #78 in 2018 Fernando Romero was #68 in 2018 Then there were the exited fanbase around here at TD with can't miss starting pitching prospects from the Falvey draft/acquisition process. Blayne Enlow, Brusdar Graterol, Jhoan Duran, Jordan Balazovic, Lewis Thorpe, Matt Canterino, Josh Winder, Simeon Woods Richardson, Connor Prielipp, Louie Varland. There was tons of hype around each one of those guys. They were all practically money in the bank. The only one of those guys to potentially pan out as a legitimate starter is Sim. Prielipp is a maybe that could work out. If you're thining, what about Ober? He never even appeared on the Twins top 30 organizational prospects lists. Joe Ryan? Wasn't in Tampa's top 10 when he was traded.

My feeling is, yes. 1993-2001 - Feels a lot like the same kind of ownership as we've seen since the end of last year. "Can't compete on the big budgets, etc." Fan apathy just set in. Hatred of greedy sports owners in Minnesota (Carl Pohlad, Norm Green, etc.). 2002-2009 After miser Carl Pohlad blinked when Radke held his feet to the fire extending the ace in mid 2000, and the failure of the contraction effort in 2001, it was a new age for the Twins. Fans were energized by false cries of financial woe eventually giving way to the rusty hinges of Pohlad's wallet opening and the success of the Twins in 2001. 2010 Fans were excited with the opening of Target Field, Jim Pohlad's promise of expanding payrolls, and the unprecedented (for the Twins) recent extensions of their top players like Joe Mauer, Justin Morneau, Michael Cuddyer, and Joe Nathan. 2011 - It seemed like a convergence of unexpected performances, and bad luck caused the collapse. Liriano completely cratered, Baker had a great season but missed a huge chunk, Pavano declined. "Bilateral leg weakness" and the training staff handling it poorly crippled Joe Mauer. Injuries devastated the team with only 2 players qualifying (Valencia, who was a huge disappointment and Cuddyer who had a great season). 2012 - The realization the Twins just weren't that good, but the terrible 2011 softened the blow a lot. The Twins went out and picked up Willingham so there was at least some effort, I suppose. Plus, Bill Smith was shown the door after the brutal 2011 campaign which meant somebody was held accountable. 2013-2014 - The rebuild was underway. The team wasn't expected to be good. 2015-2016 - The signs of life showed up with a surprise playoff appearance in 2015, followed by a let down in the 2016 campaign, but the Twins young core showed enormous promise. 2017-2023 - The Falvey era hope. Regardless of which side you were on, the doors opened up and the dingy basement of Twins analytics was rapidly aired out, expanded and enhanced. Falvey brought the team into the modern age of scouting and analytics driven development. After 20 years of ineptitude, the Twins were finally a team to be reckoned with. A playoff series win. A young core with truly impressive potential. Analytics in place. An ownership group with a younger and interested voice who were willing to spend money and compete. 2024 was the year. You could just feel it. Yeah, from the end of 2023 to now, ownership took the fan base out back and put it down in a way which is almost incomprehensible. It was almost like a strategic plan to kill the fan base. I'm not sure they could have done any more damage to skip by hope and anger and go straight to apathy.

Buxton (wRC+ 98 through all May) and Castro (wRC+ 85 August-Sept) get their two months of sucking ignored. Lewis, Farmer, Miranda get dinged for their 2 rough months. Side note, Larnach gets an A from me. For a career wRC+ 96 guy coming into the season, putting up wRC+ 121 is outstanding. The guy resurrected his career.

"not hobbled by something" Buxton has been the recipient of the most shameless excuse making in the history of baseball with a close second being Alex MVP When Healthy Kirilloff. Every game those two go 0-4, they're hurt. Every game they do well, they're suddenly healthy again. Even if it's literally back to back games. Buxton is a 5-6 WAR player, if healthy enough to play CF, if he played a 150 game season. Lemon was just as valuable as Buxton will ever be at his peak. Buxton is not better than Lemon, and Lemon was just very good (but never truly exceptional) for a very long time. Chet is closer to Kirby Puckett since Puckett and Lemon actually played about the same number of games. Puckett got the HoF nod due to popularity and the fact he was forced to retire maybe a couple years early. Just because Buxton put up some really great numbers in a SSS in 2021 with a 40pt over career average BABIP doesn't mean a person can project that reasonably. Castro looked like a 6 WAR player this year for a while. How did that turn out once the plate appearances stacked up?

Yay for all the people coming back! It's not a bad thing. Who doesn't like rooting for perennial .500 or 1 and done teams??? Whoo hooooooooo!!!! Yay!!!!

I'm sure they said the same thing after 2011. I have 0% confidence in the Twins delivering a better product next year. Even worse than anger is apathy, and the Twins are probably in that category at this point. At the moment, I'd peg this franchise for 90+ losses next year. Detroit will get stronger. KC will get stronger. Chicago will get stronger. Cleveland looks set. The Twins are getting weaker.

Screw the Pohlads. Some day, we may see some semblance of them running the business with accountability for the executives, but it's not this year. Hope they like bottom 5 attendance.

Don't you dare write me in! I'm not going to become a Nationals fan!

This article is so annoying. Can we get a Pablo Lopez proved doubters wrong, too? Maybe @Cody Christie is addressing @Cody Pirkl from 3 months ago when Byron Buxton was basically replacement level, 2 months into the season? LOL. I can't wait for the Pablo Lopez proved doubters wrong article! Just ignore the half of the season where he did his best Louie Varland impression... and leave out a couple of the later starts, too. Maybe the Carlos Correa proved doubters wrong is coming? Or the Royce Lewis, MVP favorite article? Truth is, I do think Correa will be worth his contract and it's clear what a huge impact he makes when he's on the team. I think Lewis will get his fire back and crush it next year. There are a lot of Twins players I'm really bullish on, but about the only Twins worthy of this kind of article are: Trevor Larnach Matt Wallner Carlos Santana Cole Sands Simeon Woods Richardson David Festa

Tapani was basically the Twins' ace in 1991. Had a rough start and a good one in the WS. He certainly wasn't overlooked by fans at the time.

If you're not willing to spend 10 minutes researching it, but you form a really, really strong opinion on the subject... A family of 4 can go to a game, get a hot dog each, mom and dad can get a drink and the kids can get a soft drink for under $150 altogether. $18 ea for 300 level, $9 for SRO. Want to go cheaper? Park on 4th street down by the Salvation Army. $9 and a 10min kid friendly speed walk into the game. Literally two turns where you just follow the crowd anyway. You can carry food and water into Target Field, but the $1 hot dogs days kinda moots that point. Get SRO tickets and stake out a place at Truly On Deck. Get in and out of Target Field with good seats for a family of 4 for under $100 including parking. Also, don't take this the wrong way... but "Frostbite Falls" was never going to be a significant draw for fans in the seats. The vast majority of seats are filled by people within 30 minutes.

This article is getting the "1 star" from me. Barely concealed more than an open taunt, Buxton proved nothing this year. Absolutely nothing. People said he couldn't hit for power! - Yeah, they said that back in 2018... hanging onto that internet debate grudge, much? He gets injured too much. - What? He played in only 100 games. That's awful. Terrible for a guy on a 7 year contract with a NTC. He's an 80 game a year player because of constant injuries, and he did a little better this year. Yeah. The Twins are in a financial crunch and Buxton is a big part of it. They should not have given him the contract. Buxton requires 2 roster spots, and he requires another starting caliber MLB outfielder to take that second roster spot. Case in point, when Buxton went down this year, the lack of a CF likely cost the Twins a playoff spot. Buxton's actual cost is way higher than his contract. I was glad to see Buxton play 100 games, but this article is ridiculous.

Embarrassing game. I've never seen worse fielding than Brooks Lee's display tonight or a team which looked more unprofessional. Side note, 30min early, no hat. There wasn't 1:10 fans with hats despite a real attendance like 20k. 10,000 hats? BS. Absolute BS. I was in Hrbek's 20 minutes before game time. At least 30 people there. ZERO hats. Side note, I probably could have gotten a hat by going to one of the two "extra allocation gates" but I didn't care enough. I just found it to be utter BS the giveaways did not add up.

Lets get Al Newman in there! He was part of the 87 and 91 teams too! Gladden was not a good player. He was a scrub, just like Gene Larkin, who is the one who actually knocked in the RBI-less in 33 1991 WS plate appearances Dan Gladden to win game 7.