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Riverbrian

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Everything posted by Riverbrian

  1. Riverbrian
    If you ain't making it. You are buying it. Some buy ribeye... some buy ramen noodles but both are buying it. It's the same approach. The Twins started 2025 with 8 pre-arb players. That is a shockingly low number in comparison with their peers. 8 actually changes the peer grouping. The group we belong in started 2025 with double that number. 8 puts us in a group with the Phillies, Yankees, the teams with money... those are the teams in the single digits. That's our peer group... the teams that trade prospects for 16 million a year Ryan McMahon. 8 is incredibly low. 8 doesn't happen overnight... it is accumulative over time... just like Cleveland having 20 Pre-Arb players is also accumulative over time. 8 takes neglect over time. It takes years of choosing Gallo over Larnach. Garlick over Rooker. Belisle over Anderson.
  2. Riverbrian
    My curiosity is genuine. I'm not sure how they will be competitive without (at least) the bare minimum effort at a slightly more serious attempt at building the pen. It doesn't seem like one can be done without the other. Off season isn't over yet. I'll wait and see.
  3. Riverbrian
    Got get Seranthony. 2 year contract. The guy has a rocket for an arm. Fix his mechanics... get him throwing more strikes and there's your closer for two years. Could even trade him for higher value down the road... if he establishes himself as a quality closer. If you are going for it... go for it. All 3 of you have said that you are going for it. Since you said that... You can't let all of the decent free agent closer candidates just sign elsewhere. The decent ones are almost all gone. You have told everyone that you are going for it. Going for it is going to require at least one top bullpen addition. You'll need one to prove that you are going for it. Without a high quality bullpen addition... there is really no reason to go for it. Remember you are going for it. Y'all said it.
  4. Riverbrian
    Yeah but... Lee has an OPS of .950 in Minnesota. We are going for it. How else are we going to win the World Series this year? 😉 Right now... myself. I don't see OF work because we don't need OF... and we desperately need IF. He seems to just naturally flow into the 2B position because of the huge hole there collecting the flow. If Keaschall is bad defensively as many on TD state. I'm not sure that's the case but... if he is... I'm personally not concerned about where he plays. We will be weak at 2B, 1B or LF... wherever you place him and he can move around wherever we need him. He will only matter if he can keep that OPS in the .800's. Of course... that OPS won't be as good as Lee's.
  5. Riverbrian
    I understand why everyone wants a consistent position. The continuity at least on paper should produce a more comfortable developing defender. The problem is... as you point out. It can't be done without severe compromise either way. In the scenario you use perfectly. Lee is our SS... Keaschall is our 2B. If Keaschall gets hurt and a AAA call up is necessary. In order to keep that continuity as you just lock them players into positions. Culpepper producing a .900 OPS in AAA isn't the call up because he is playing SS. The call up becomes Jake Rucker with his .650 OPS. The reason you are calling up Rucker... well... he's the 2B and we just lost ours. This continuity isn't even worth wishing for. It's a compromise either way. Either you compromise your talented young player with a position switch at the major league level. Or you compromise with a player that shouldn't be called up to play a static position. I'm firmly in the camp that you call up the best player in AAA when you need to call someone up. These baseball players are baseball players. As a matter of consideration. If Martin keeps his infield glove handy... an injury to Keaschall at 2b could make Walker Jenkins the replacement. It can't happen if we just lock Martin into LF and say... nope... can't play other positions.
  6. Riverbrian
    Dear Tom, Congrats on the new gig. I'm pulling for you. Develop or die Sincerely, Riverbrian
  7. Riverbrian
    I have no idea on what is coming in and what is going out. I don't know much it costs to fly 50 people Minnesota to Seattle. I don't know how many people travel with the team. I can only assume that they are doing just fine. They have added three separate investors and I assume that means that they were willing to invest... and therefore despite the reported debt... they are doing just fine because they found multiple investor groups willing to pay money to get involved in whatever it costs to operate. It's a business. They are going to eat. I don't have a problem with that. How much are they eating... I don't know and I don't care anymore. Weather it's a baseball franchise or a convenience store. The margins are thin. You are not going to survive if your gas prices are not competitive and you are not going to survive if you don't fix the toilet in the women's bathroom. I have nothing to prove or disprove anything. The Twins have always spent in a range and they are part of a group of clubs that spend in that same range year after year. I just don't assume that a new owner is going to arrive on a white horse and start writing out checks because the new owner will have the same conditions.
  8. Riverbrian
    You basically answered this question yourself in your entire reply. You left off the "without the money to do it". part when you quoted me and then used the money to illustrate why they are not the same... and that is basically my point. The difference between signing Ty France and signing Pete Alonso is money... and obviously talent but it's the same approach. One is done without money and one is done with money. Without the money to do it is the key difference. Signing Ty France and signing Pete Alonso is the same approach. One is what the big boys do. The other is telling everybody in the world that you have no money but it's the same super market. We have become reliant on players developed by other teams. We just don't get the good ones.
  9. Riverbrian
    You are exactly right. It sorts it out. It becomes what it is based on what you have to work with. Right now Lee is the best option. We can talk about how his defense is lacking but he is our best option for SS and the Twins will have to work with it and around it. Yes... We all want better everywhere in every facet of the game. However. I'll point out that the Twins won the most games in history with a SS by the name of Jorge Polanco. Below Average defense at SS doesn't mean the end of your season. Although... the combination of players around that SS certainly could end your season.
  10. Riverbrian
    I have high hopes for Culpepper. I hope he is everything we dreamed he will be. But...his performance at AAA is still TBD. This leaves all of the immediate SS Eggs in the Lee basket. I agree with you. Lee needs to be pushed... Lewis also needs to be pushed and we don't know what 2026 Keaschall will be. I'm not going to get my wish and see a young SS come to town to push them. It will probably be IKF. This team is going for it... With Bell and probably IKF and whatever they find for a bullpen.
  11. Riverbrian
    In 2026 They are going for it. I believe it will lengthen whatever this is. I believe that we will lose significant trade value with Joe Ryan at the very least in order to go for it. Ryan Jeffers trade value could be lost in it's entirety. They can survive it with some momentum into 2027 but the only place momentum will take place is with the young starting pitchers developing and the young outfield group developing and I fear that going for it... is counter to the development of young talent. So... it's quite possible that any momentum toward the future will be facing self imposed strong headwinds. If this attempt at going for it in 2026 doesn't work. They will probably have to do next off-season what they should have done this off-season and do so without the trade value that is available right now. If this doesn't work... it will certainly set us back a year perhaps two or three years.
  12. Riverbrian
    I haven't seen the books but I don't assume that every single owner in baseball is just stuffing money in their pockets. 17th is good for the grouping that they should probably be operating in. Not that I trust Forbes or any of the valuation services but those folks rank the Twins 22nd in franchise value. I assume these valuation models at least attempt to assess revenue since revenue plays an important in valuations. So I assume that the revenue they pull in belongs in a fairly large group of teams in the bottom of half. Amongst that group... 17th is a significant push upward. We can make assumptions about 17th ranked payroll. Out of those 16 teams ranked higher. Mets, Dodgers, Yankees, Red Sox, Cubs, Giants, Phillies and Blue Jays make up 7 of them and they are simply at a level above everyone. We can't spend with them so they don't apply to us or the rankings. There is another group behind them that we don't belong with either. Braves, Astros, Rangers, Angels and the Nationals don't apply to us. If the Nats want to turn it on... they probably could. These grouping are obviously subjective... but in my subjective opinion and I really have no information on any of the teams to offer anything worthwhile. 12 teams out of the 16 teams who spent more are teams that we can't financially keep up with no matter how much we spend and shouldn't even try.
  13. Riverbrian
    I honestly don't know. The books are not open and I have no way to speculate on the intermingling of the Twins and everything else they own and operate. I'd imagine that the Pohlads have accountants with talent working for them but who knows.
  14. Riverbrian
    I have to assume they did their due diligence. Anything that is failing today... doesn't have to be failing tomorrow. I've never worried to much about this. They can bring on investors... they can sell the team to new owners but in the end... I'm pretty sure that the team is going to spend what the revenue allows them to spend and the revenue is never going to allow them to operate how the Dodgers, Mets, Yankees, Phillies and Blue Jays operate and in my opinion... the Twins have been trying to operate like the big boys without the money to do it. How ownership is structured won't significantly change the revenue. Whoever is sitting in the chair that Tom now sits in is what I'm interest in. Many will argue with me on TD but I absolutely believe Tom Pohlad when he says that they invested when they allowed payroll to near 160 million. They did. That figure was well above what the lower revenue teams spent. They spent it wrong... but they spent. The only assumption that I can make after reading Gleeman's artlicle. Joe Pohlad was removed from his chair and it doesn't sound like he wanted to be removed. I think that speaks louder than any words he said. Best of luck to Tom Develop or Die
  15. Riverbrian
    They are without a doubt going to utilize the same playbook this off-season.
  16. Riverbrian
    I just read the Gleeman Article. The last paragraph: “Our revenues don’t support the expenses we have, particularly when you talk about the level of investment we’ve been making over the last couple years in player payroll,” Pohlad said. “We have chosen, for some time now, to continue to invest beyond what the revenues support. People like to say we’re not committed to investing in this team, but $500 million of debt would tell you exactly the opposite. That’s how the debt got to where it is.” There are many who say the Pohlad's are cheap but... in comparison of their peers... The Twins spent money... not insignificant money in comparison. However... this last paragraph... it just brings me back to the question that I can't get out of my mind. When Falvey and Lavine were hired and told to get to work. Who told them that the money was going to be there? Every decision they made matched up with a front office thinking the money was going to be there. The path they chose could not be controlled. It can only be fed more of the same. Payroll gets eaten with each arb raise, the players get more expensive and you have to keep spending to try and sustain it because development at the major league level was not a priority. The path chosen was always going to hit a wall that would require more money to get over. We are still signing Josh Bell from that same playbook and still dealing with a wall. Just a wall at a lower payroll level. Who told them that the money was going to be there?
  17. Riverbrian
    I'm not betting. I hope he gets the opportunity to become something and I hope he does. Lee becoming something would be huge. Betting everything on him? I'm hoping Culpepper gets here quickly.
  18. Riverbrian
    You are a great poster on TD. I love reading your stuff. In my opinion. McMahon and Lewis had similar numbers last year. That's really the only comparison. I guess the other comparison is a cautionary tale. They both hit the major leagues around age 23. McMahon played in Colorado therefore despite 6 years in a row (not counting 2020) of 20 plus home runs.... OPS+ has never been kind to McMahon. He's been pretty consistent average to below average and as pointed out he makes a lot of money due to Colorado giving him a 6 year deal with two years and 32 million left on the deal. I believe that Royce has the talent to be special but if I'm the GM of another team. I'm not giving up anything special for him. Not until he shows he can bust out of this thing. Therefore his value is with the Twins. His value needs to be repaired and the Twins are all in on him. He will be given the playing time and nobody will be allowed to take his job no matter how he performs. We will live and die with Royce Lewis.
  19. Riverbrian
    We have to start producing actual major league talent before any of this applies to anything. As long as we are bringing in Kyle Farmer types on one year deals. We are paper thin in regards to the infield.
  20. Riverbrian
    Range Ratings are like Plastic. They are in everything. I'd really like to dispose of it but it's just piling up everywhere. The majority of plays are routine and this is causes a overweighting of small sample volatility. It causes the year to year swings that you perfectly illustrate for all to see... yet unquestioned by so many. This plastic is in WAR. To quote Radiohead. It wears me out... it wears me out.
  21. Riverbrian
    Here's the deal. Whoever the Twins bring up to Minnesota. Kreidler, Fitzgerald or IKF. One thing is for sure. The club is betting everything on Brooks Lee.
  22. Riverbrian
    If you are going to accumulate talent. You need flexibility. If you don't have flexibility... talent accumulation can't happen. If you can't accumulate talent... you will live and die by the health and performance of a thin layer.
  23. Riverbrian
    The front office said they were looking for a power bat. We can debate weather Josh Bell has a power bat or not. Josh Bell isn't a true power bat in comparison to actual power bats but compared to Arraez from a power perspective... Josh Bell is King Kong. It doesn't matter if any of us think Josh Bell is a power bat. They said they wanted a power bat and Josh Bell is the guy they chose to fulfill that want. Now they can move on to finding the infielder they said they were looking for.
  24. Riverbrian
    As it stands right now. Yep... He might be on the roster to handle emergency SS and CF duties. If the club goes with Fitzgerald instead or calls up Culpepper or acquires another SS capable player. Kreidler's 26 man spot would most likely be gone and then it's a matter of stashing him... keeping him after he takes a trip through the waiver process and goes unclaimed. If no other moves are made. I'd place my bet on Kriedler breaking camp and heading north because Fitzgerald can be stashed in AAA and Culpepper doesn't have to be added to the 40 man roster yet. I just think a SS capable addition is coming via trade or free agency.
  25. Riverbrian
    He wasn't really OK 5 years ago based on his numbers in 2020. But, I'd be surprised if they didn't ask his thoughts since they worked directly with each other. Personality... Club House Presence. Was he fighting through an injury that year. Hey Derek... This is Derek. We are looking at Josh Bell. What do you think? How was your experience with him? Like I said... I wonder about Shelton's advocacy.
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