bean5302

Exactly. There is no possible amount of spectacular defense which can make up for a wRC+ 11 bat. It's impossible. Every .025ish OPS = 1 WAR. Playing spectacular defense at SS is still a -5 WAR player... and it's not like the limited metrics agree Kreidler is a good SS anyway. I hope the Twins are just claiming and DFA'ing, but I'm skeptical. Falvey is always captain "Hey, take a loo.... SQUIRREL!!!!!, GET IT!!!" with waiver wire garbage.

OAA is unstable. If Josh Bell had stood in the middle of Center Field for every play (assuming the rules allowed it), he'd have an OAA of 0.0 because he was not in a position to make any plays for a 1B. DRS is also unstable because it overcompensates for fringe plays. Get to a ball at the edge of a section of the field a 1B doesn't normally get to? DRS x1000 points! Play the rest of the year booting balls around the field, you wind up with a neutral score. The Twins manipulate a bad metric (OAA) by positioning their 1B in a spot where they couldn't be expected to get to balls. If they positioned their 1B in a more traditional position, the 1B would have more opportunities to make plays, but since a poor defender wouldn't make them, their OAA score would drop. That's my read on it.

Alex Jackson got lucky in a SSS last year. It's not like he earned the boost in production. 5.0% BB and 37.0% K rate tells you almost everything you need to know about a hitter.

I could argue Mickey Gasper is the best catcher of all time by this logic. Butera has a -3.8 CAREER WAR. Take a look at 2011 please.... Your memories of Butera are in massive conflict with the reality. wRC+ 19 as a primary catcher for Minnesota because of Joe Mauer's "bi-lateral leg weakness" huge reason the Twins collapsed.

Gasper last year owned a wRC+ 42 Jackson's career is wRC+ 48, but at least he's supposedly solid defensively. Drew Butera is wRC+ 45 We're basically getting Drew Butera. I think there is a long shot Jackson could take a big step forward. He can hit fastballs at least. The scariest part is the ice blue center zone on meatballs. If he got every pitch middle/middle last year, his xwOBA would have been a miserable .214. Like seriously... how can a guy have an xwOBA of .214 on meatballs? Hopefully, that's just a SSSS issue and he really has figured a little something out. I guess? Whatever. It's fine. Everything is fine.

Not really. ISO is .165 for his last 4 seasons. Larnach is .170 for the same period. They're the same as "power hitters" Bell isn't a power hitter at all, he's barely median for ISO. He gets to about 20 HR, but it takes him 600+ plate appearances to do it. He hasn't been serious "power" threat since pre-COVID.

It's kind of the point I've been trying to make in other threads. $110MM doesn't make the Twins any better than they are at $90MM. It just doesn't matter. Falvey has no concept of how to manage a budget. None. It's like needing a new car because your 2000 Ford Focus took a dump. You're saying you can't afford a $100k new BMW so you spend everything you've got on an absurdly overpriced $10k rusty, broken down, non-running 2010 Ford Focus with 300k on the clock. Great deal! It's way less expensive than a new BMW... but it's no better than your old car. It just makes your wallet lighter. For every Carlos Santana, there's a Manny Margot, Joey Gallo and an Andrelton Simmons.

I think what this shows is a significant faction of fans are tired of dumpster diving for replacement level players to simply eat up a budget rather than spending money on fewer guys who are seemingly obvious upgrades. Josh Bell has been the definition of a replacement level (aka next in-line AAA call up) for 3 years. No reason not to go sign Ty France again at $1.7MM based on Spotrac's estimate. Save the expenditure for something of value.

Are you saying April didn't happen and the games in April didn't count? He was bad in June and average in August as well. Josh Bell was also terrible in April in 2024 as he has taken a couple months to catch up to fastballs the last couple years. The trend strongly suggests Bell is cooked. Then again, Carlos Santana in 2024 was also bad in April and looked pretty cooked so maybe Bell could have a big late career year rebound out of the blue? My opinion is Bell is much more likely to be France than Santana, and probably more likely to be Farmer or Margot than Santana as well.

Josh Bell = 0.1 WAR last year and -0.1 WAR the year before. Definition of replacement level.

Lewis essentially missed 3 of 4 years with lower body injuries and the erosion of strength which came out of that is real. People are seriously overlooking the toll that takes on a hitter's power. Power comes from the legs and core, not from beefcake biceps. He'll rebound just fine this year if he committed to building back up. Lewis made sacrifices to stay on the field and play hurt. Correa and his $36MM salary made comments about how the young guys weren't working hard enough while he missed months with a sore foot and young guys were literally playing hurt. On top of that, Correa demonstrated a lack of effort on the field failing to run out an infield grounder which was misplayed. You bet it pissed Lewis off. I'm sure it pissed a LOT of players off. I don't think Lewis is a diva, he's just exuberant, and the kind of guy who could lift the entire sport up. He could learn to reign some comments in a bit (like the comments downplaying Schwarber's value), but he's honestly a breath of fresh air as far as I'm concerned. Lewis avoided arbitration with a salary well below projected multiple years in a row. He's been horribly mishandled by a laughably egotistical front office from not hiring competent coaches for defense, playing musical chairs with positions, breaking commitments, beating down players in arbitration (winning another coveted beat-down your players trophy belt, I'm sure) and having a manager who is trying to re-live his career vicariously through his players.

Typical Falvey move. Spend money to spend money. Make sure to add nothing while spending it, hope for career years out of the blue.

I would rather rebuild than go out there with a $110MM payroll. Why not just keep the payroll at $90MM? It's not like the $20MM makes any material difference to this team. Why you rebuild? Because virtually every single World Series team in the past decade has a rebuild which preceeded the World Series run. Small market, mid market, large market. Doesn't matter. With the exceptions of the ultra-market teams, rebuilds are almost required if you feel like ever sniffing a World Series. While free agent cost per WAR is about $8MM, the overall cost per WAR in baseball is more like $2MM (including free agency). That's why rebuilding is required. You have to start with a very good, cheap, cost controlled core, then add a few free agents on top because they're way too expensive to use exclusively. A replacement level team is projected to be about 45-117. 90 wins through free agency = 90 - 45 = 45 added WAR * 8 = $370MM in payroll. 90 wins through average cost = 90 - 45 = 45 * 2 = $90MM in payroll. The Twins have 2 years of competitive window left. 2026 and 2027. If they don't make the World Series in the next two years with the existing core, they will have burned every bit of trade value they've got on their biggest assets with nothing in return. This team lost 92 games last year with what was arguably the best bullpen in baseball prior to the trade deadline, plus Correa, Bader and Castro. Can we get real about how good this team was, and about the expectations of what the team might be in 2026? This is likely a very bad team. Fangraphs is bizzarely bullish on the Twins by predicting several career years next year. FGDC vs. Steamer Jeffers 2.6 2.3 * Clemens 0.8 0.6 Keaschall 3.2 2.6 * Lee 2.1 1.6 * Lewis 2.6 2.2 Martin 1 0.8 Buxton 3.3 2.9 Wallner 1.8 1.5 Larnach 1 0.8 18.4 15.3 Ryan 3.4 3.4 * Lopez 3.2 3.2 Ober 1.7 1.7 SWR 1.2 1.2 Matthews 1.7 1.7 * Bradley 1.4 1.4 * Abel 0.6 0.6 * 13.2 13.2 *Career year projected Total WAR (bullpen WAR is only like 2 for each) 33 WAR for the main guys for FGDC (78 wins) and 30 WAR (75 wins) for Steamer plus a BUNCH from the bench, I guess. This feels like a 75ish win team as-is. $20MM of payroll gets us, what, 2-3 more wins. So the Twins might be a .500 ballclub at $110MM or a 70 win ball club if they rebuild. It does not matter. At the end of the year, it does not matter. This team is a long shot to make the playoffs. If the team goes to $110MM and wins 75 games this year, then the team wins 75 games for the next 3 years. But, if they go down to 70 wins this year, they might go to the World Series in 2027.

I can't understand people not being excited about this. There's been a recent trend of the comeback of the dual role baseball player. It's exciting, fun and new. A throwback to a far bygone era at the earliest roots of the sport. To me, it's not about Joey Gallo, it's about the prospect of seeing more of these types of athletes and how much fun it is to bring something old, but exciting, back into the sport. Matt Wallner has a cannon arm. What if he's the next Shoehei Ohtani? (he's not), but how cool is this? The answer is it's super cool. Every player who makes this transition or player who is successful in dual role begins to change the sport. I love it.

Nobody other than the Twins would have put Brooks Lee at shortstop as a planned starter, but Lee also doesn't play SS if Correa isn't hurt. That really leaves 2 legitimate options for shortstop duty. Brooks Lee or Royce Lewis. Personally, I would have chosen Lewis 7 days a week and twice on Sunday from a skill standpoint, and to honor their commitment to the player to keep a potential future superstar happy; however, Lewis had his throwing issues AND he had a lot of lower body injury woes. Of course, Lee had his back issues... I mean, it's kind of 6 of 1, half-dozen of the other. Lee has the less error prone glove, but the Twins were enamored with his switch hitting and SSSS performance in AAA as they annoited him as a superstar in the making, but he's actually severely deficient in range, has an unacceptably weak arm, and the chronic back issues. Lewis had poor mechanics on his throws and was a little more error prone than Lee, but had a ton of lower body injuries. Lee can't hit. He needs a drastic approach change to be an MLB starter. Might be an acceptable utility guy at this point.

.748 vs .687 OPS is not remotely close. It's the slugging percentage that blows things out of the water. That's 2 WAR right there.

I'd hire a coach who understands how to coach defense... but that's just me.

If the Nationals trade CJ Adams, they'll be looking for prospects. Not arbitration eligble MLB players. Royce Lewis isn't going to be an interest for Washington if the team is rebuilding. If you want CJ Adams, it's Walker Jenkins you have to give up. Maybe a combo of Connor Prielipp, Luke Keaschall, and David Festa if you were trying to avoid parting with Jenkins.

CJ Abrams trade value +54 Royce Lewis trade value +20 This trade proposal is nonsense.

I'm glad Correa isn't on the roster. The fact it cost $10MM a year to get him off the roster isn't a great look, but we're saving $21.5MM, that's what this article should be about. The fact we don't have a guy stirring things up in the clubhouse by demanding effort from the rest of the players that he isn't putting in while simultaneously not playing well and being paid more than 20 guys on the roster combined wasn't helping the team.

Did Falvey also express disappointment Lewis wasn't asked to play at least 4 positions per game last year? Where's that coveted versatility? I honestly don't want to hear another word out of that talking head (Falvey).

McCusker didn't exactly tear up AAA towards the end of the year, and he was clearly outmatched against MLB pitching in his brief stint in the big show. I expect he'll clear waivers. I could see the Twins bringing him back on a MiLB contract.

I guess having 5 relievers with more than 20 IP each all with an ERA at 2.45 or better doesn't move your needle for "stacked"