Cody Pirkl

I quite honestly can't continue to address everything in these responses so I'll leave it at this: Gio Urshela was given away for nothing at the start of the offseason. The Twins then signed Joey Gallo, as by all accounts, they planned on trading Max Kepler. It appears they misjudged Kepler's value on the trade market and now are choosing to roll with a situation that even Dan Hayes stated "Finding at bats for everyone could be challenging" about and that they're "bordering on overkill". I don't understand why it's such an out there opinion that Urshela would be a better roster fit and use of resources than either of these bounceback candidates. You can disagree with that, that's fine. Gio Urshela was a far better player than either of these two last season though. It's not even close by any measure that exists, and based solely on the left handed outfield depth of the 40 man roster, he's a better roster fit as well in my opinion. I'd have rather they kept him and either not signed Gallo or dumped Kepler for the low minors relief arm. Either scenario makes a better team in my eyes.

It's already been reported that Gallo will be playing 1B, especially early in the year to spell Kirilloff.

Haven't seen a single report that Farmer might play 1B. If you want to make an argument along those lines, Miranda would probably move over to 1B if its a straight platoon scenario with Kirilloff and Farmer would take over 3B. Again that would raise the question as to why Urshela was basically given away. I'm not sure how it could be argued that this roster needed another left handed corner OF more than a right handed IF, especially when two of the OFs would be disasters if they repeat their 2022 performances. In regards to "why sign Gallo at all instead of keep Urshela", that's a fair question to ask. They already had a plus defending corner OF coming off a terrible offensive season, and they kept both of those players over Miranda who was the more valuable player than either. Gallo is going to play a good amount of 1B which is where I think we disagree. It's either that or Larnach, Gordon etc. aren't playing much at all.

It's been pretty widely reported that Gallo is going to be the player to spell Kirilloff at 1B early in the season if Kirilloff is going to be ready to play at all by Opening Day. Gallo has played there but why not keep Gio Urshela who isn't a gold glove winning defender at another position to play a more logical platoon role? All of the lefties also pushes down players like Larnach to a point where they're not even insurance, they're just plain buried. I'm not trying to make this Gio vs Gallo, I'd actually prefer they had gotten rid of Kepler. I just don't think they sign Gallo unless their plan at some point wasn't to trade Kepler away, but it seems they somehow misjudged the trade market for a below average hitter at a premium offensive position. They could have put this roster together a whole lot better, but in my eyes they continue to overvalue Max Kepler to the point where they're costing themselves. Gio is a better player by just about any measure, but he was dumped for whatever they could get. Don't really understand it.

Gio was far better than Kepler and Gallo against both righ and left handed pitching as well. I get that anything can happen in baseball, but in my opinion which I've based on the statistics and roster fit of all players involved, the Twins dumped the wrong player.

The roster construction is the basis of calling it a mistake. They have so many left handed corner outfielders that one of them who's won gold gloves at their position is going to have to play 1B for playing time. Gio is a much better fit for how this roster wound up than Kepler or Gallo on the basis of him being right handed and performing better than both combined last season. I also don't believe in the "the season hasn't started yet so we can't judge" idea. You can tell by looking at the roster right now that they have too many left handed hitters and that guys are going to be playing out of position. That's not a sign of good process by the FO.

Why is that exactly? I'm just curious why people don't think that they'd have a better team with Gio instead of Gallo or Kepler. Another RH hitter would help and Gio is a better bet to contribute offensively imo.

Dan Hayes had an article on the Athletic I believe 5 days ago that said the soreness hasn't gone away.

We can predict Kirilloff being healthy all we'd like, it's based on nothing more than hope on our end. At the last report he was taking 60-70 swings per day and still has legitimate soreness. Joey Gallo is going to see a lot of time at 1B.

IMO, give me Gio over Kepler or Gallo. We don't need 6 left handed corner OFs on the 40 man roster, that's absolutely ridiculous. Sure, Gallo can move to 1B, but that eliminates his defensive value which is the safest way he contributes to a team. I'd argue that if they were willing to hold out on a legitimate return for Kepler, who has been injured and terrible offensively for years now, that they either shouldn't have signed another left handed corner OF or shouldn't have traded Gio. Just value going to waste.

The Twins had a roster jam and an offseason of moves on the horizon when they dumped Gio Urshela for what was essentially salary relief. Given how the rest of the offseason has played out, this move appears to have been a mistake. Image courtesy of Kamil Krzaczynski-USA TODAY Sports We’ve received more straightforward news on the Max Kepler front these last few days. After speculation grew regarding the Twins possibly keeping the left-handed outfielder, Dan Hayes reports that Kepler sticking around is likely at this point. It’s been discussed how Max Kepler still has value in the right role to help the Twins if he stays. This news does make us second guess parting with Gio Urshela earlier this winter, however. The Twins decision to trade Gio Urshela was straightforward at the time. Jose Miranda is getting a fair crack at being the everyday third baseman, and Urshela’s projected arbitration salary was a bit high for a player whose role wasn’t certain. They followed it up by signing Joey Gallo to a one-year, $11 million prove-it deal. This all but cemented the fact that Max Kepler was on the way out, as six left-handed corner outfielders on the 40-man roster is beyond excessive. With the addition of Gallo and Kepler apparently staying around, however, the Twins may have misplayed their hand. It appears the plan with Kepler still being in the mix is for Joey Gallo to play a lot of first base in 2023. With Alex Kirilloff’s health being in question and Gallo having some experience there, it makes sense given the state of the current 40-man roster. Consider however that given Joey Gallo's recent offensive struggles, a fair bit of his floor value comes from his defense in the outfield. Perhaps his offense rebounds to passable levels for a first baseman, but his ability to cover ground and throw out runners on the base paths would be all but nullified by a move to first base. Make no mistake, the debate didn’t have to be Urshela vs Gallo for the first base platoon role. It seemed that the plan was to trade Max Kepler for much of the offseason. The Twins asking price appeared to have been high all along, but given the level of player Kepler is at this point and the context of the roster, it’s confusing why they’d play hardball on his price on the trade market. Urshela was a far more valuable player than Kepler in 2022 by any Wins Above Replacement measure and was essentially given away for free because of his redundancy with Miranda moving over to the hot corner. The irony in this is that the Twins now have Gallo, Larnach, Gordon, Wallner, Kirilloff, and Kepler as left-handed corner outfield options and it appears they haven’t lowered their asking price at all. Kepler has a $10 million option for 2024, but do the Twins really plan on paying that if Kepler’s performance from the last two years continues? The Twins current roster includes a massive left-handed logjam with players like Joey Gallo out of position where his skillset isn’t being maximized. Several young players such as Trevor Larnach and Matt Wallner who should be nearing their chance to show what they can do are now pushed further down the line by the excessive outfield depth chart. They could have a better platoon partner for Kirilloff and one more right-handed bat in Gio Urshela for less money, but instead, they traded this scenario away for a 19-year-old pitching prospect in the low minors. It’s hard to say there weren’t miscalculations on the Twins part this offseason. Looking at the roster now, it becomes clear that Urshela’s value to the team exceeded the value he carried on the trade market. This is further exacerbated by the Twins appearing to overvalue Kepler on the trade market despite the obvious lack of need for him on the roster. If they valued Kepler this highly, why sign Joey Gallo at all as opposed to keeping Gio Urshela or designating that $11 million to a right-handed hitter with more experience at first base? It’s possible Max Kepler is still traded before the season and that the roster makes a lot more sense on Opening Day. As things stand now, however, it sure looks like dumping Gio Urshela for anything they could get was a mistake. Do you agree? View full article

I agree, to start the year I don't see them moving Ober to the bullpen. I do think if they like what they see from younger guys such as Varland, SWR, etc, they're likely going to move ahead of Ober in terms of next man up in the majors if he's hurt. If they reach a point where they feel like they have other depth starter options and Ober continues to miss time, they may see more value in Ober being on the field to relieve than on the shelf as a starter. I'd love it if Ober stayed healthy however. He has the ability to be a starting pitcher.

Be it injury or ineffectiveness, sometimes it just doesn’t pan out for starting pitching prospects. The Twins were carried at times in 2023 by starters who switched to the bullpen. It’s hard to ask for another Jhoan Duran, but who could be the next Griffin Jax? Image courtesy of Rick Osentoski-USA TODAY Sports Griffin Jax got a look as a starting pitcher down the inconsequential stretch of 2021. It didn’t go great as evidenced by his 6.37 ERA in 82 innings, but when his bright spots popped up, they were typically driven by a slider-heavy approach. While it can be rash to judge a starting pitching prospect when they struggle in their rookie season, the Twins opted to allow Jax to play to his strengths. In shorter stints, he could feature his wicked slider and complement it with a middling fastball that played up with a three mph increase in velocity. He went on to be a staple of the Twins bullpen, posting a 3.36 ERA in 72 1/3 innings. Could we see another Griffin Jax-type reliever in 2023? Cole Sands Sands became an afterthought to many in 2022 after being used to fill innings in several spots where the Twins were struggling to field a team. Never a prospect with a particularly high pedigree, it’s easy to see his ERA over 5.00 at both the Triple-A and MLB levels in 2022 and consider him as nothing more than a fringy fill-in type. The Twins however haven’t exhausted all of their options with Sands yet. Sands’ carrying tool as a prospect has always been his huge breaking ball which received an excellent 70 grade by Fangraphs. He doesn’t excel in any other department, but there’s a world where the offspeed is good enough to make him a legitimate weapon if he can go out and throw it as much as he wants for an inning. The pitch was in the 88th percentile in spin rate in 2022 and stymied opposing hitters even as he was often used for multiple innings. With several other starting pitching prospects graduating into the depth chart, it may be time for Sands to make the switch. Ronny Henriquez Henriquez is listed at what has been described as a generous 5’10. Regardless of his size, he’s shown the ability to run his fastball into the mid-to-high-90s with impressive spin. In addition, he features a well-regarded slider and changeup as well. Despite these tools, Henriquez just didn’t show what he needed to in Triple-A, posting a 5.66 ERA in 2022 due to issues with the long ball. He made his MLB debut working as a multi-inning bullpen arm for 11 innings. Henriquez could follow a similar path to Jax if converted to a traditional one to two inning reliever. He already featured his slider in his debut, throwing it about 46% of the time and drawing a 32% whiff rate. Like Jax, his fastball got absolutely pummeled. In a condensed role, it’s possible the fastball which debuted at 93.3 mph could gain a few ticks to help him get away with a few more mistakes. Unlike Jax, Henriquez appears to already have a solid left-hander equalizer in the changeup. If the Twins commit to the move for Henriquez at 23 years old, he has the tools to excel in short stints. Bailey Ober It may seem like a longshot for Ober to wind up in the bullpen, but he may be closer than many fans would like to believe. When it comes to the body of work for the 6’9 right-hander, it’s hard to complain about his performance. Ober has a sub 4.00 ERA across his first two MLB seasons and a legitimate four-pitch mix, making him a painful consideration to ever be moved to the bullpen. It’s more about quantity than quality in Ober’s case, however. He’s had an injury-riddled career and has surpassed 100 innings just once in his five professional seasons. His lack of reliability likely played a big part in the Twins acquiring Pablo López, which appears to have pushed Ober out of the Opening Day rotation. Many would be surprised to know that he’s already 27 years old, and at this point, another multi-week IL stint will likely push prospects like Louie Varland and Simeon Woods Richardson ahead of him on the rotational depth chart. With his age, Ober not only becomes more of an injury risk every year, but his projectability becomes an issue. The idea of building up to even 140-150 innings is almost unfathomable following a 2022 season where he threw just over 70. At some point, the Twins may just decide that if Ober’s cap is 100 innings, he may be better off throwing 50-60 innings out of the bullpen and giving those bulk innings to younger starters who are still capable of reaching a starter’s workload. Ober’s already-sufficient pitch would most certainly play up in the bullpen, and it may even help keep him on the field. Do you think the Twins have any more starting pitching prospects who could be headed for a successful bullpen job? Let us know below! View full article

Gilberto Celestino had a chance to cement himself as an MLB player in 2022 and couldn’t get the job done. After several outfield additions, it seems his future is unclear. Where does Celestino stand in the organization? Image courtesy of Jordan Johnson-USA TODAY Sports Through the end of May, Gilberto Celestino appeared to have turned a corner in 2022. The Twins backup center fielder was slashing .324/.398/.378, 50% above league average by wRC+.With little power to speak of, Celestino was a legitimate offensive contributor for a month or two. And then it all fell apart. From June 1 forward, Celestino slashed .211/.286/.278. The Twins clearly lost faith in him as they acquired Michael A. Taylor in a trade this last week, and he’s likely to fill the backup center field role. Celestino simply has too many questions left unanswered. Nothing demonstrates the Twins lack of trust in Celestino like them trading for a nearly identical player to fill the role he was in last season. Taylor is nearly a carbon copy in terms of raw skills. Both are elite defensive center fielders with little offensive value. It begs the question as to why the Twins traded for Taylor in the first place. There are two main considerations to take into account. First and foremost, the Twins likely have a lack of trust not only in Celestino’s performance, but in his ability to focus. Celestino regularly made awful decisions in the field and on the bases down the stretch in 2022, and in September it reached a breaking point. The offensive struggles were one thing, but it likely said a lot to the Twins brass that in a golden opportunity to prove himself with so many injuries, Celestino was losing focus in several aspects of the game that he had no reason not to be excelling at. It likely told the Twins that for 2023 on days when Byron Buxton is not in center field, Celestino was not a trustworthy replacement even to provide defensive value. A bigger reason for the Taylor trade is that Celestino may be the same zero offense, plus defense type player as Taylor now, but he doesn’t have to be forever. In 2021 Celestino was promoted straight from Double-A as a 22-year-old out of necessity. He was an average hitter there and didn’t have time to adjust before making a massive leap to the MLB. He predictably showed little offensive value, but went down to Triple-A to end the season and slashed a fantastic .290/.384/.443 in 49 games. It seems Celestino is headed back to Triple-A St. Paul to begin 2023, and he may spend significant time there. His unrefined plate approach became too obvious in 2022, and his plan of what to work on is pretty straightforward. He hit the ball to the opposite field more often than any other direction, and as the season went on, he was successfully challenged by pitches inside. He rarely made loud contact, as he appeared to just be trying to hang in there at the plate against MLB pitching. In Triple-A the Twins can work on him pulling the pitches he should be. Even developing some gap power would make him a much more serviceable fill-in. He has one minor league option remaining and won’t even be arbitration eligible until 2025, meaning the Twins have a solid timeline to develop Celestino just a bit more offensively. There is likely still a slight chance that the Twins could trade Celestino if a team calls them up and sees him as a legitimate piece in a trade for an impact player. The Twins would likely prefer however to turn the keys over to Celestino next season after Michael A Taylor departs in free agency. Even if Celestino doesn’t show the offensive upside he flashed in his brief AAA stint, he can play a valuable part in the Twins outfield mix the next few years. It’s obvious that Gilberto Celestino is the big loser in the Michael A Taylor trade, but the Twins have to ensure they don’t find themselves in the same spot as last year. Celestino was dealt a tough hand the day he was promoted directly from AA, and it likely set him back a bit. With Taylor, the Twins bought time for Celestino to develop into the player he’s capable of however, and now it’s up to him to make use of the development time he missed out on in AAA. View full article

I'd guess 2, 3, 4 is some mix of Buxton, Polanco, Correa. I really don't think we want Max Kepler anywhere near the top of the lineup. He's hitting .217/.311/.379 over the last two seasons. I don't have much faith in the shift saving him, but why don't we put him at the bottom of the lineup where his performance suggests he belongs and if the shift helps him that much we can adjust later?

That's great but it's hard to look at that as more than just randomness. I wouldn't put him in the top of the lineup based on those numbers.

Let's be clear: It hasn't been several years of so-so hitting though, he's got a sub .700 OPS since 2020. In regards to the variance in his defensive value, at least by Fangraphs measures, 2022 was his best defensive season since 2016. If he drops down to even 2021 levels of defense he's probably closer to a 1 win player than the 2 win player he was in 2022. And yes, if there's injuries he isn't redundant. I just question if the possibility of someone being hurt or ineffective offensively is enough of a reason to keep him around when he's fallen into both categories for several consecutive years now.

Linked in the article but Mike Petriello on Baseball Savant broke down Kepler's case for the shift change and basically determined that Kepler would only get a handful of singles per season. Among concerns noted, Kepler actually has a higher BABIP against the shift than without. Also noted is Kepler has hit the 5th most pop ups among all left handed hitters over the last 5 years. It's less about where the fielders are for Kepler and more about how poorly he impacts the ball and the launch angles he does it at. Yes he's a dead pull hitter which can be exploited by the shift, but when he's hitting the ball softly either straight up in the air or straight into the ground, the fielders don't matter.

The injury context is real for Kepler's spots in the order last season, I meant that more as an "I hope they learned those days are behind him" rather than trying to chastise them for putting him there. When they really needed him to step up because they had no other choice, he was absolutely terrible and eventually wasn't even available himself which I think needs to be learned from which is the bigger point I wanted to make. I personally don't know that I look at him as much of a floor player anymore either. People look at defensive value as fairly safe but even random variance could lead to a down defensive season for him, look at Correa's metrics last year. If he isn't truly elite defensively and is below average at the plate against lefties and righties again, he's the definition of replaceable. You could possibly even call him a net negative on the roster if that's the case. My whole thing behind trading Kepler is basically that I find him incredibly redundant on this roster and I think it's become far more likely that his once cheap $10m option is declined for 2024. Might as well get some kind of value on him now.

FWIW, Gallo's wRC+ against lefties in his career is about 20% higher than Kepler's and their matchups against righties are about the same. Taylor's splits against lefties is also much better than Kepler's. Between those two and Larnach who graded incredibly well in LF last season, I find Kepler pretty redundant. I think he's the second worst outfield option on the team with a lefty pitching and is probably 5th best against righties behind Buxton, Gallo, Larnach, and Gordon. I think when a guy is that far down on the depth chart because of offense we have to start wondering just how valuable their defense really is.

FWIW I have two Kepler jerseys. He's one of my favorite Twins from that 2019-2020 back to back division leaders teams. Just an unfortunate reality of baseball however that he's been a part of the injury problems the last few years and hasn't been an offensive contributor in really any fashion. Twins were saying he had legitimate value in trade which was when I really came around to trading him. If that's changed and they see more value in keeping him now I'm cool with it. I'm just really going to question what we're doing if he's in the top half of the lineup on opening day.

I never thought they had to but I think it makes a lot of sense. Given how little of a benefit Kepler is projected to get from the shift, his value may never be higher. If he goes out there and hits .210 and slugs .400 again the Twins are just going to decline his $10m option for 2024 and he's probably fighting for an MLB deal next winter. Even trading him for a serviceable reliever makes sense in that scenario but if they hold him for depth and not as a starting caliber player that's fine as well.