bean5302

Plouffe felt he could have done it with Royce Lewis' throwing issues as well. He was openly critical of the Twins' organization, coaches and management in regard to how they handled Lewis and how they were failing to help him address his throwing accuracy issues. We don't know what work Plouffe is doing with Wallner. Is Plouffe expecting Wallner to turn into a gold glove right fielder or does Plouffe think he can identify how Wallner can be a better hitter? If Plouffe's help does show substantial, tangible improvement, it's another black mark on Falvey.

Winokur needs to have a heck of a season to factor into the Twins' future plans at this point. Schobel looked outmatched at AAA in his brief time last year, which is highly concerning given he's 25 this year. He's been a little slow to move through the system, but here's hoping it was all trying too hard in his late season promotion. I believe he could be immediate depth at SS if he performs really well out of the gate this season.

The biggest help for Wallner is having somebody else in the lineup who can hit, too. Pitchers tried their best to pitch around Wallner last year since almost nobody else in the lineup was much of a threat, and it showed. Wallner's "situational" hitting has been harped on, but it's not like he had a lot of opportunities to be in a high leverage or RISP position. In the rare instances he was, it looks more like the BABIP monster ate his production up. I expect Wallner to have a bounce-back year, but a lot of his value is going to be decided on what position he plays, I expect. Hopefully, Plouffe is working with Wallner in the field.

Yeah, Ryan and Lopez are definitely the king of the road when it comes to 1-2 punches. Ranked 10th for fWAR projection this year among 1-2 starter combinations. Truly forces to be reckoned with. BOS = 9.5 DET = 8.8 PHI = 8.3 PIT = 7.7 ATL = 6.8 TOR = 6.8 TEX = 6.6 LAD = 6.5 KCR = 6.3 MIN = 6.3 The primary concern around Festa is his health. If he's returned to form, his stuff is just as apt to play as some other internal options, and if the writer is so concerned about actual results, Festa owns the 3rd best FIP of the entire group of proposed starters, and his ERA is dramatically above Matthews. ERA 3.50 - Ryan 3.69 - Lopez 4.11 - SWR 4.49 - Ober 4.59 - Bradley 5.12 - Festa 5.92 - Matthews 6.23 - Abel FIP 3.51 - Lopez 3.61 - Ryan 4.27 - Festa 4.30 - SWR 4.30 - Ober 4.41 - Matthews 4.42 - Bradley 5.11 - Abel Personally, I think the Twins should be trading Festa or other starters before destroying their value in the bullpen. If Festa starts the year off in AAA effectively, he's worth more as a trade chip than he'd likely be worth in short relief out of the 'pen. Converting legitimate starters into bullpen arms because the front office has failed to address its needs is not a sound strategy. It's wasteful.

Seems to be a mighty high bar you've got. Only 1 in 20-ish players will accumulate 20+ career WAR. Only about 1 in 100-ish players reach the HoF (those players who have sustained elite performances). I'm not sure if you're looking for performances after 2010 or players who were drafted/signed after 2010? Dozier, Kepler, Sano, Rosario, Polanco were all signed/drafted prior to 2010, but yeah, the 2nd round of Terry Ryan 2012-2016 draft classes wasn't great.

...and he's also said there is time left in the offseason. Remains to be seen if there's enough to make major changes. We could be seeing a move of Lopez, etc. Who knows?

Beef prices are up, thanks Obama! Pohalds! Falvey has scapegoated others historically. It's not reasonable to believe the Pohlad family had anything to do with staffing changes under Falvey. Falvey makes the call on managers, hitting coaches etc. The Pohlads have made some accountability moves recently which has been out of character for the franchise for decades. They're not scapegoating. They're finally doing their job and holding people accountable (at least a little.)

I didn't read that at all. Tom has stated the Twins will be competitive in 2026. Falvey didn't change the team up. I'll go ahead and build the roster that you say is impossible in the offseason blueprint and put it here.

No, we don't. Tom set the expections he wasn't a half-measures guy. Falvey employed half-measures. We're almost to pitchers/catchers reporting so Falvey got fired for not meeting expectations. Not sure if there's enough time left in the offseason to change directions or make bold moves or whatever. I do think it's unreasonable to expect the current roster to be competitive. Tom Pohlad has substantial experience as a CEO and being the head of businesses. I'm not sure where you're going with this? You think the owners are lottery winners who just bought the franchise out of the blue? Jeremy Zoll has 15 years of front office experience starting in 2011 with the Reds, then moving on to being a scouting coordinator with the Angels before becoming the assistant director of player development with the Dodgers (similar to Falvey's role before the Twins hired him). The Twins brought Zoll in as director of MiLB operations, promoting him to assistant GM in 2020, operating as an assistant GM for 5 years, replacing Thad Levine as general manager for 2025. What has Tom Pohlad done with the bullpen? He's the owner, not not the GM or president of baseball. If you're mad about the bullpen, that's on Falvey. Owner role = provide sufficient resources to field a team which can meet ownership's expectations for on the field performance. Determine overall business vision and objectives. Hold the front office accountable for following through with strategies that align with business vision and objectives. If it's not inside that scope, it's not Tom Pohlad's wheel house.

I'm not "team Tom" I'm team get Falvey the *(&^out of here. It's the team I've been on for several years. Falvey is now gone so the biggest problem with the Twins has been removed from the situation. I'm happy about that. This Twins team doesn't resemble the "no half-measures" type of owner Tom says he wants to be.

5 Worst #1 - Rogers & Rooker for Paddack and Pagan. Brent Rooker is a multiple time All Star and a highly productive right handed power bat the Twins have desperately been in need of for years. Not only did Falvey choose Kyle Garlick over Rooker, he went so far as to toss Rooker in to get him off the roster. It was a shocking misread of Rooker's talent for an organization. #2 - Carlos Correa 6yrs $200MM. Ignoring the findings of the Giants and Mets, Falvey pushed ahead to lock up Carlos Correa on a long term contract. It's turned into a disaster in no small part due to foot issues, but team chemistry was also impacted. #3 - Josh Donaldson. 4yrs $96MM brought former MVP Donaldson to the Twins and signaled to the rest of the league the Twins weren't bottom feeders going forward; however, it was a bad contract. This would clearly have been #1 had Falvey not been able to get out from under the terrible signing in the nick of time, flipping Donaldson, and IKF for Sanchez and Urshela. #4 - Brian Dozier for peanuts. Dozier was coming off three 5 WAR seasons in the past 4 years, and Falvey needed to move him. As has been the pattern, Falvey overplayed his hand and kept Dozier for his age 31 season, finally trading him for peanuts at the 2018 trade deadline. This has been a pattern for Falvey we've seen over and over again, this was just the most drastic negative impact on the return. I don't know. There are just so many relatively minor items which kind of fit into that mold of poor decisions. From Andrelton Simmons to a half dozen other deadline moves.

Based on 4 of 5 years in a row of not making the playoffs Tom Pohlad had a pretty good reason to believe Falvey wasn't the guy. Beyond that, Falvey's teams only 1 full season when any of his teams deserved a playoff appearance in 9 years (2019). It's not like Falvey should have still been here, anyway. It's mind boggling Falvey still had a job, actually. Making his life difficult? Why? For what possible reason would it have been in Tom's best interest to pick a fight with the head of the front office who has a good relationship with Tom's bosses and other board members? Falvey had the largest budget of any team in the AL Central and missed the playoffs 4 of 5 seasons while his teams one a single Wild Card playoff series in 9 years. He'd drafted and developed 0 players to represent the Twins in 9 years. The 1 multiple time All Star he drafted, he traded as an after thought to keep Kyle Garlick on the roster. Falvey was a bad GM. It's open to debate whether or not he was terrible at his job, but it's not open on whether or not he was bad. Falvey got fired for incompetence, plain and simple. He did not "resign," he got fired. He did not read the writing on the wall and choose to step away. He got canned. You think Falvey walked from a guaranteed, multi-million dollar payday without an exit plan or new role lined up because his boss was being mean? Pohlad set the bar. Here's our strategy. Falvey failed to adapt and ran things business as usual. You know what you have to do when the owner says "here's our strategy"? You follow it. Falvey couldn't do it. Whether it was ego or lack of ability, Falvey didn't operate within the lines of the new strategy and he got fired for it. Falvey could have adapted and stuck around, instead he challenged the boss and lost.

#1 - Joe Ryan trade. There's no real room to debate this as far as I'm concerned. 11.3 fWAR so far, and probably + more fWAR lifetime for about 0.5 fWAR Tampa received. It's crazy lopsided. #2 - Nelson Cruz signing. Cruz delivered huge value for his reserved paycheck leading the only full season Twins team that deserved a playoff appearance during Derek Falvey's tenure in 2019, and his cheap option allowed him to return for the shortened 2020 campaign where the Twins again looked like a contender. Later, he was flipped for the best trade in recent Twins history. Needed to edit this list. (edited, new #3) Josh Donaldson & IKF to Yankees for Urshela and Sanchez. As a result of going through the worst moves, the Donaldson trade is clearly moving way, way up. Donaldson wasn't a disaster for the Twins, but it certainly turned into an utter cluster shortly thereafter with the Yankees. Explosvie racial context controversy, terrible play and injury wiping out his career reputation all while eating up $23MM per year. Meanwhile, Urshela proved a valuable piece at 3B for the Twins, and Sanchez averted disaster by filling in for Jeffers at catcher. #4 (prev #3) - Jake Odorizzi trade. Acquiring Jake Odorizzi for PTBNL category prospect, Palacios turned into a huge boost for the Twins. Odorizzi was soid enough in 2018, but he put up legitimate front of the rotation arm results in 2019 with 4.5 fWAR (behind only Sonny Gray since Johan Santana) while doing it for dirt cheap. #5 (prev 4) - Sonny Gray trade. While the Twins gave up Chase Petty, the 2023 team doesn't make the playoffs and certainly wasn't a threat to advance without Gray. The only legitimate Ace pitcher the Twins have seen trot out to the mound since Johan Santana. #6 (prev 5) - Polanco/Kepler extensions. Just before the 2019 seasons, the Twins got ahead of Kepler and Polanco's future with some aggressively team friendly contracts which included options into free agency years. Both players earned peanuts relative to what they would have made and it provided a stable, cost controlled core for Falvey to try and build around.

I feel like we might be on really different conversations? From my perspective, Tom took over the Twins from not only a spokeman point of view, but as a controller. I'm sure he was well aware of how the Twins had been previously run, and it seems more than reasonable to conclude Tom had been vocal about how he felt the franchise should be run. Tom wasn't listed as a front office employee or stakeholder in the Twins. He took over the role, and I've never seen a CEO-type executive come into an organization (other than wack job Elon Musk) and immediately make sweeping changes without first coming to up to speed on operations and strategy in a much more detailed level. It's not reasonable to think Tom was deeply familiar with the operations and baseball side when he was a CEO of a different company. The Twins are very much a flagship company for the Pohlad family. Now, in regard to what needed to happen, I think it's only fair to get a feel for the leadership and strategy of a team in a more detailed fashion, then set the goals and direction of the company, and then ask leadership for their strategy to accomplish those goals. The Twins were clearly committed to Falvey until Tom stepped in, and order to obtain buy in from the real owners, you need a little time before you fire their best buddies in the organization. Less than two months is a very fast decision making time frame. In fact, based on reports, Tom had already moved on from Falvey within a single month because they discussed exit strategies for 2 weeks. I think it's more than clear Tom didn't believe Falvey was the guy for the job, but was tasked with proving it to Jim, Bill and Bob. Falvey failed to meet the goals laid out with the change in direction Tom asked for, apparently. It took Tom 1 month to get buy in and get the fiscal owners to eat the remainder of Falvey's contract to get him out of his position. That's fast.

A totally new ownership group probably would have fired Falvey immediately, but they would have already been in negotiations with new prospective GMs. Tom took over in December and less than 2mo later he had seen enough. It was a fair probationary period where Falvey needed to show he could follow the change in direction. Instead, Falvey ran things the same as he always had.

Falvey got fired for incompetence. I do wonder how people are thinking this was Falvey's decision to leave, LOL. I don't know what you're seeing, but it seems to me Falvey is making the same kinds of moves he's been making throughout his entire career as the head of the Twins front office.

Same thing in 2024. While cutting payroll was a massively stupid move from ownership, the Twins didn't roll out a bare bones payroll. Falvey had $130MM to use responsibly. Instead, he burned $35MM on Vazquez, DeSclafani, Margot, Farmer, and Paddack. Falvey had an obvious need to make tough decisions on where the payroll was going to come from, but he refused to make those choices. It's not Falvey fault if he makes some bold moves designed to make payroll and field a winning team without the depth needed to absorb injuries. That's on ownership and he can make that clear when he's handed the payroll. Instead, time and time again, Falvey has demonstrated an inability to make moves when it's clear he needs to make them.

The Pohlad family is "toxic?" Seems like a pretty wild perpective to me. It feels to me there's been a bit of a power struggle inside the family in terms of what to do with the Twins. I think they've been poor owners in regard to what seems like extreme nepotism and the unwillingness to hold high ranking positions accountable. It's clear the Pohlad family wanted to bury the bad debt they'd accumulated through other business transactions in a sale, but other buyers wouldn't bit. Now the Pohlads are also trying to pretend they invested in the team to accumulate that debt, but I think that's a bad strategy because it's dishonest. I've gotten the impression that Joe Pohlad became very buddy-buddy with Falvey. It wouldn't even surprise me if there was some brownnosing going on Pohlad to Falvey since Falvey is clearly the guy who started speaking to the public because Joe and Dave St. Peter were incompetent in that regard. FWIW, Joe was never in charge of ownership decisions. He was a spokesman. From the comments Tom has made, he seems like a much more demanding, and he has the authority to make ownership style decisions. This is awesome. His move to fire Falvey after Derek once again rolled out the status quo stay pat and add some quad-A types to block talent and keep the floor better than 100 losses, on the surface, it's reasonable to expect Tom had enough. Given the opportunity to support ownership's philosophy of non-half measures, Falvey failed, and likely the future strategy he presented was a failure. The Pohlad family (or new ownership) will not turn the Minnesota Twins into a large market franchise with annual $200MM+ payrolls. There's reason to believe an ownership group willing to tank/rebuild would be able to stretch payroll to $160-180MM in the best of seasons, but I really can't see a responsible owner in the Twin cities pushing higher in the near future. The Twins ran a $155MM payroll in 2023. They opened 2025 with $143MM. About one big name signing away from the absolute max (if people actually went to the games).

Levine's role is largely unknown, but I think it's clear at this point he was about to be supplanted by Jeremy Zoll and decided to leave. Levine hadn't impressed other franchises in regard to either his role or philosophy as he was interviewed and immediately dismissed as a candidate by Boston and while Levine's name came up several times in other GM type searches, he ultimated landed as a an assistant in the Brewers organization. From early on, Levine seemed to have a clashing strategy with Falvey. It felt like Levine wanted to be more aggressive in the competitive window "boot to the throat" comment, etc. Falvey seemed to fit best with the Pohlad family's historical perspective of goals. 3/5 = Play competitive ball (.500ish) 4/5 = make playoffs 5/5 = win the division. I'm quite concerned that Zoll is "Falvey's Guy" and he'll be a Falvey-type GM.

The Pohlads have always been hands off owners when it comes to roster construction. I don't know why people continue to dream they're leading scouting meetings and doing contract negotitions. The Pohlads were a totally different leadership group last year. Now with new minority owners and Tom not buddy-buddy like Joe was with Falvey, it feels obvious what's happening. Tom and minority owners aren't impressed with what Falvey's accomplished, and they shouldn't be. Falvey did make sweeping changes at the trade deadline to gut the bullpen. The MLB talent Falvey brought back to replace outgoing MLB talent is of questionable value moving forward, largely redundant, and they players were not productive. Despite assurances the team was not going to use half measures, Falvey has once again entered into 2026 with the philosophy of signing ten quad-A type of players while re-arranging deck chairs because he can't help himself. Watching serious talent come back from recent rotation arm trades in the past couple weeks had to push Tom to the boiling point since Falvey refused to move similar talent. The message is crystal clear. Falvey doesn't believe in his pitching pipeline and Falvey isn't going to operate like the teams the Pohlads have repeatedly mentioned as successful models for mid and small market franchises. I don't know as Zoll is the answer, but Falvey was the big problem.

Somebody has to run things. Zoll's being given the keys because there isn't anybody else, I'd wager. It'll be interesting to see what he does.

Falvey isn't a scapegoat. He used other people as scapegoats. Falvey was the NUMBER ONE reason the Twins have failed. He was given substantial enough budgets to win the division every single year and yet the Twins managed only 1 playoff appearance in the past 5 years. Falvey didn't decide to part ways. He was fired, but given the opportunity to step down to save face.

I do feel like Ohl has more potential than Adams right now. Ohl was a hard-core strikes thrower in the minors, perhaps challenging hitters too much. Ohl backed the strike throwing off at the MLB level and delivered pinpoint control with a 115+ location, very good O-swing rates, but his stuff got barreled a lot. Maybe the Twins felt there wasn't any room for stuff improvement and MLB hitters would start getting too good at pitch recognition and just crush Ohl as a result.

The Twins DFA'd Ohl, but didn't DFA Adams.

I think it's pretty much exactly what you said. The team has more talent than what people are giving credit for, and there's ceiling. My projection is not unrealistic for any given player. Every single number I posted is reasonable given past performances and ceiling. Unless you were implying like 2-3 players improving would be enough on their own to add 20+ wins to last year's results? Sorry, but that's pretty well impossible as we don't have 3 Shohei Ohtani's on the roster.