Riverbrian

Predetermination

In that scenerio... The only thing that kills Altuve is pre-determination. Well... Lookie here... he has an OPS of .678. Told ya so. The dude is 5 foot 6. AAAA guy at best. He just can't catch up to major league pitching. Beckham has a .694... he gets all of the playing time and you've set yourself in stone with below average. It's really simple. Players who play everyday need to perform like players who should play everyday. If you are not Bryce Harper... you don't get the same amount of playing time that Bryce Harper gets. Otherwise you are committing everyday playing time to .678 OPS. 4 out of 6 won't hinder progress because if the player starts to show what he can do. It will no longer be 4 out of 6. His playing time will go up accordingly.

It is where we disagree and I have too much respect for your opinions to say I'm right and you are wrong. However... "I will make mistakes" needs to be thought about some more. With everything invested in that mistake "that you will make". You are unnecessarily delaying the process of this re-whatever this is. You invested everything into that eventual mistake and now you got to start over. This makes the process longer. Are we to declare Martin is our everyday LF in 2026 and make Rodon watch him through hell and high water... if there is hell and high water? Especially when we don't have to do that. Especially when the margins are razor thin. Why would you try to predetermine the next wave right now purposely limiting opportunity to a select few knowing that only thing that is close to a guaranteed lock is that someone or someone's is going to fail. Especially when you don't have to. Limiting your choices to the minimum will get you less than the minimum nearly every single time. Royce Lewis has gotten every chance in the world including being allowed a year long slump. I'm not saying Royce should be tossed, I'm not saying that he should get no more opportunity but I am saying that he needs competition. Bets need to be hedged. The addition of a decent young SS, Allows Lee to compete with Lewis and the decent young SS and with Keaschall. I love Keaschall... He is a spark plug. I'm 100% in Camp Keaschall but there is no guarantee that he won't Julien or Outman in his 2nd season after a strong 1st year. Altuve? I'd imagine he'd look very impressive with the numbers he produced in the low minors. Lots of players produce in the minors and don't get a sniff of the majors. Altuve's are seen as rarities... of course they are rarities because teams don't provide the circumstances for rarities to be more common place. Just imagine... Altuve is signed by another team out of Venezuela. Let's say the White Sox... And the White Sox are busy providing every single opportunity to Gordon Beckham. 1st round Pick...8th Overall. Beckham... Predetermined to be the next Brooks Lee. We wouldn't know who Jose Altuve is. We wouldn't know that the White Sox made a huge mistake. We just know that they made a mistake with Beckham.

Front offices have to use predetermination to determine who gets roster spots. It can't be escaped and you best hope that your front office has some skill here. The limitations of the 40 man and 26 man requires that your front office has talent. I have no choice but to trust them because they do this for living and I do something entirely different. November 18th is the mother of all predeterminations. Not only do they need to determine who gets a 40 man spot but what players do other teams covet enough to draft away. I wouldn't worry about your 40 man getting a big enough playing time sample. I would simply worry about getting your 26 man a big enough sample. In that regard... I swear to everything holy that you can provide a big enough sample for all without compromising anyone's development. It's easy math and simple logic after that. I'm simply asking this. Do not predetermine that player X is not good enough to play, compete, earn a major league career with his own two hands if you have also predetermined that he gets a 26 man roster spot. 13 players through the filter as opposed to 9 is a bigger needle moving stat than any other stat in the universe and it isn't even close. All the stats that work around the margins. WAR, OBP, SLG, wOBA to make predeterminations. None of them hold a candle to the increased odds of success by simply increasing the number of attempts to 13 from 9. If you are trying to produce 9 pairs of socks and you have very little consistency... maybe a 50% I don't know 33% failure rate. Why would you produce the bare minimum 9 pairs at a time when a significant percentage finish with holes in the toes. Why would you play Brooks Lee everyday at SS for 1500 AB's with no net... if you don't have to... and you don't have to. How would playing 4 out of 6 games hurt Brooks Lee? Ryan Jeffers has played 3 out of 6 games for the past 3 years. We are still talking more playing time than that. If the Twins could trade for a decent SS. I'll pick a name... Aiden Miller. They could break camp with Miller, Lewis, Keaschall, Lee. You have increased your odds of someone being successful. Lee is competing with Miller, Lewis and Keaschall. The Twins don't need to be 100% correct. They only need to be 75% correct. 100% to 75% is a big needle moving jump. Much Much bigger than two players comparing a .750 OPS to a .675 OPS. You bring up Jose Altuve. Jose Altuve is the poster boy of what I'm talking about. Never a top 30 prospect in the organization. He just happened to be on... the one team... perhaps the only team in baseball that had nobody else to turn to. After Keppinger was traded. They called him up from AA and told him "it was temporary until they found another 2nd baseman". He was 5 foot 6. https://www.sportskeeda.com/baseball/news-when-i-got-called-2011-told-temporary-jose-altuve-reflects-astros-journey-following-125-000-000-extension He started his career with an 11 game hitting streak and he kept his opportunity from there. If Altuve was with any other club. We probably don't know who Altuve is.

Unless Jeffers is extended. He's gone after this year. Letting him go and getting nothing in return would be something that a team planning on a playoff run would do. Catchers are scarce. Caratini is probably the 2nd best free agent catching option available. The top free agent option Realmuto is 35 years old. Nearly every team needs catching because the back up catcher gets playing time because the primary requires significant rest. Vazquez is probably the 4th best catching free agent option. Instead of getting into a Caratini bidding war. They should take advantage of a potential Jeffers bidding war. Our catching depth is crap. The position has not been a priority for the Twins. We just paid 30 million for Vazquez and there should be no desire to do anything similar again. Apparently Vazquez was impossible to replace despite a consistent unwavering .500 OPS for the length of the contract. Players with defensive ability who OPS in the .500 range will be released in the coming days. Just scoop those guys up for free. They should sleep in the bed they made so they can spend limited resources on other positions. Instead of overpaying for Caratini to correct this long term mistake. Just punt the position. Rortvedt, Dom Nunez and Pereda. I'm good.

I've read that Nunez is a solid receiver. He certainly hasn't shown he can hit. I would be Ok if they staffed the catching position with DFA's like Nunez so they can concentrate on... commit limited resources to... other positions.

Pre-determination. It's one of my least favorite things. Pre-Determination. Sand in my car cupholder, Teletubbies, Mosquitos and porch pirates are some of my least favorite things.

It GCPC. General curiosity process confusion. That's all.

If I was a conspiracy theorist. I'd say they are still on the roster due to possible OF moves to come. Some consolidation possible that dwindles the numbers because the numbers will need to dwindle. I'm not a conspiracy theorist. Although I do believe the state of Arizona is up to no good with their refusal to consider Daylight Savings Time. I'll say it rather confidently. 12 OF on the 40 man roster is way too many. You won't have space to sufficiently staff the other positions. With Keirsay and McCusker still on the 40 man that's 9 total already in place. With Rule 5 decisions to be made on GG, Mendez and Fedko. I would have guessed that Keirsay and McCusker would have been the first names dropped.

He shouldn't remain on the 40 man if they won't play him beyond late inning defensive replacement or pinch runner. This team should not roster any specialists. They should be rostering only full potential players in need of opportunity. Maybe the front office or Shelton feels differently about Keirsay than Baldelli did.

Laweryson is the only surprise and not much of a surprise. I wonder why these releases will be staggered. As Chembry asked in the post above. Why wasn't McCusker and Keirsay Included? I can see Gasper and Julien keeping a 40 man spot for a bit but I don't see any reason for McCusker or Keirsay to remain. At least not yet I don't.

To me... It's kind of like those family discussions around the Thanksgiving table. Nobody sits around talking about the thousands of times that I parked the car successfully in the garage without incident. They like to bring up that one time I drove the car through the garage door. I kind of lost my fundamentals on that one. The garage story is told every year. It has been told so often that my Turkey taste buds have been conditioned to think that the turkey tastes different if nobody is around to tell the story while I'm eating it. My wife likes to focus on the couple of times that I accidentally tipped my glass of grape juice over onto our white carpet in the living room. When it happens, it's quite tramatic for her and she blurts out that I spill all the time. She isn't even considering the millions of times that I successfully lifted the glass to my face and drank from it without incident. It doesn't matter... she is convinced that I have a fundamental problem reaching for that glass. She stares at me if I bring a beer into the living room and suggests I sit in the kitchen and drink my beer. Once you hit a garage door and spill purple juice. People start to question your fundamentals because each fundamental mistake is loud. The Twins certainly spilled some grape juice the last couple of years. Do they know the fundamentals? I'll bet they do. Did they execute every time?: No they do not. How do they compare to other teams? No idea... However... I also see the other teams do some dumb things.

Absolutely Every game I've watched perhaps at least once per game there is a fundamental issue from either squad. We all notice them when they happen. We also tend to take for granted the many many times that the fundamentals are executed correctly. Players should know the fundamentals by the time they reach the majors. Doesn't mean they will execute them perfectly at all times. The Gophers are pretty fundamentally sound at the college level. It's isn't unreasonable to expect your high school team to play with decent enough fundamentals. After having fundamentals drilled into you at High School, College, The Minor Leagues. They should have a pretty clear understanding when they reach the majors.

Yep... And it's not like the other clubs are waiting in anticipation for our players to reach free agency so they can offer them millions upon millions. Nor does it seem like the other clubs are willing to offer significant talent to acquire our players. The bullpen is where we had developed value that interested clubs and they are gone now. That's why we are sitting with bullpen desert in need of water. They will poach our coaches but not most of our players. Ryan is probably the only guy left with decent enough trade value to move a needle. Jeffers? The other players like Lopez have diminished value due to salary. I'd say we have an identification problem.

I won't make suggestions because I am not qualified to determine who the Twins will need to protect from Rule 5 on November 18. Just saying... it's a big day. The decision made on this day will determine exactly how many 40 man spaces are available for additions. Therefore determining how many players they NEED to trade. I could be way off but in my opinion... there are quite a few names who should be taken off the 40 man roster to create space. Before you get into the debatable names to remove. There are the no doubters. McCusker - They didn't utilize him last year... Don't know why they would utilize him last year. Miranda - Out of options... I can't see them giving him a 26 man spot to keep him after last seasons performance in St. Paul. Misiewicz - If building an entire bullpen requires his presence. We got problems. Age 30 and 16 professional innings in the past 3 years. Hatch - I think he has potential even at his age. He actually threw fairly decently for Shelton in Pittsburgh... But... a low strikeout guy in the bullpen isn't where my hopes and dreams lie in this new bullpen so I think he is guy you let go. Fitzgerald - I like him. He certainly didn't hurt the team in limited opportunity last year but, the club didn't really consider him for lineup duty so why would they consider him going forward. His presence on the roster isn't required. Keirsay - This team does not need a specialist. This team needs special players. Holding a 40 man spot for someone utilized as a defensive replacement or pinch runner would be disgustingly misguided. Quit trying to Frankenstein a team together. Commit to youth and talent. Utilization has already shown the world that they don't belive in Keirsay's abilility. Kriedler - Yeah they signed him. Doesn't mean he should keep his 40 man spot. He is not the future for the MInnesota Twins. Then you get into the debateable names like: Gasper - I know most of us would say goodbye. I know most of us don't like his catching skill. However... I assume that they are working on his recieving skils. Catching is a problem and that catching problem might keep him on the 40 man at least temporarily. Outman - I think he's a lock for a 26 man spot for the simple reason that they traded for him. I know that most of us have our finger on the eject button but I think we have to get used to the idea that he will be reporting to major league duty out of spring training. Larnach - I know others are willing to debate this but it's not a debate for me at all. I don't even think twice... He keeps his 40 man and 26 man spot until players start to show that they can out hit him. They can reassess the OF/DH situation after this year. For now... He is one of 5 hitters on this current roster that have actually out hit the average MLB player and I think one of those 5 (Jeffers) should be a strong trade consideration so he could be one of 4 players left. Tonkin and Cabrera - I don't know... I just don't know. We have nearly an entire bullpen to rebuild. How many can you toss a side. My instinct is to toss them because they should be easily replaceable. Laweryson and Ohl and Adams - Young players with potential. I'd ride these guys over Tonkin and Cabrera. Would anybody scoop them up if they were sent into the wind? I don't know. Pareda - Who is he? Does he matter? Right now... I'd say... Yeah he matters since he is currently #2 on the depth chart. Until you find a sensible replacement catcher for a 40 and 26 man spot. Can they just send him packing? Julien - Out of options? I believe so. He will need a 26 man spot or you just let him go. If you give him a 26 man spot. That will either bounce Clemens off the roster or mean a full commitment to Julien as the 1B and trying to acquire someone with a more potential. I still believe the guy can hit but rolling with him at the 1B spot is a dangerous without a net move. Anyway... November 18th is a big day and it will provide clues on how the rest of the off-season goes.

The team has done a 180 change of direction that started at the trade deadline. If you are going to do this... then do this. Jump into the water with both feet. If the club is going to commit to developing young players as stated by Shelton in the press conference. They are not just going to adjust the player personnel. They will also need to adjust the support positions. Tingler moving on... regardless if he left on his own or was told his future was short is an opportunity to hire somebody who is exactly qualified to help the team on it's new mission. I'm not saying if Tingler was or was not qualified for the new direction... just saying it's an opportunity to hire someone who is perfect for the direction. I'm going to assume that when Tingler was hired. The Twins were in a totally different place.

If we are going to discuss this years one year deal free agent first baseman. Can we just save some time and discuss the 2027 one year deal free agent first baseman and the 2028 one year deal free agent first baseman that will come after. They are attached to the deal so let's not just talk about bringing Ty France back... because we will still have a gaping first base hole in 2027 after we scrape a .670 OPS out of Ty playing every day. Let the Pirates Pham, Frazier, Tellez, Taylor and IFK there way through a development stage and lets see how long it takes to find an offensive supporting cast for Skenes, Keller, Jones, Chandler etc. Limit your youth options to Hayes, Suwinski, Cruz and whoever is watching Pham, Frazier, Tellez, Taylor and IFK from the bench and watch what happened when the limited amount of young players they thought could hit don't hit. Take notice of how long the rebuild or whatever term is used takes. Spoiler Alert: It will take long enough to get the manager fired.

There are a lot of decent Red Sox options to consider for a Joe Ryan. It's amazing that they have a lot of decent options. How do the Red Sox have so many options to consider? Look at the Red Sox and figure out how they did it because it's exactly what the Twins need to do. The Twins need a Chaim Bloom like development shift. We talk a lot about Milwaukee and Cleveland development these days and rightfully so... However... The Red Sox!!! Dave Dombrowski won a world series and was fired shortly afterwards because he basically burned down the farm system to nothing left while running out of money at the same time. When Chaim Bloom was hired in October, 2019 to clean things up. He had to rebuild that farm system, cut pay immediately to get under the luxury tax threshold. He had to walk in and trade Betts as his first act... right in front of those crazy Red Sox fans. Betts was the guy big enough that he could attach Price to the deal for a quick 43 million dollar cut. Easy Peasy... Cut Payroll, Build a depleted farm system and and... Boston wasn't going to tolerate any losses. Chaim wasn't able to do the winning thing but look how quickly he rebuilt that farm system in the 4 years he was in the chair. Not just the number of prospects but highly ranked prospects. Teel and Meidroth over in South Chicago are a couple of Bloom ERA guys. Anthony, Abreu, Mayer, Early, Campbell, Hamilton are Bloom Era additions on the current roster. They still have 4 top 100 prospects that we can talk about for Joe Ryan. The Red Sox have enough young talent that they can trade Devers and get better after they trade him. They have enough players making the minimum that they can comfortably shop for any free agent talent. The Twins need this type of Bloom thing. The Cards are in good hands. Red Sox fans hate Bloom. They should be sending Bloom Thank You cards.

No idea if Eldridge is the real deal or the Next Andrew Vaughn. But, he would be perhaps the only consideration. If they are going to move Ryan... the players we get in return need to be legitimate candidates for the opening day roster.

I checked every new baseball manager press conference ever held since 1898. Yep... Same thing.

I'm thinking for running for a Senate seat. I want to try being honest and transparent. Here's my speech below. Will it work? I stand in front of the fine people of this fine state asking for your vote. I will be proud to represent your interests in Washington although I'm sure you understand that the special interests that finance the overwhelming majority of my campaign will be expecting me to act in their interests before I can even consider any issues that may make the lives better for the every day Americans like all of you, the fine people, who will be sending me to Washington on thier behalf. You all know that financial support isn't free and I will need that financial support to be elected in the future so I must act in their special interest. The majority of voters, will not call, will not ask questions, will never know how the legislation that I create benefits the people with the money to finance my future. The majority of voters collectively don't contribute enough money to sufficiently finance the campaign that I need to run just to to manipulate all of you into voting for me. Manipulation on this scale requires a consistent message repeated over and over again and that take ad buys, expensive public relation professionals... it take money... lots and lots of money. I will not work across the aisle because what's the point. Party lines are drawn and I must vote what my party needs me to vote so the party can hold the majority for better service with less roadblocks for the major contributors to the party. There is nothing that I can do to end the gridlock in Washington so I will promise that I will contribute to this endless gridlock. I know the thought of more of the same may frustrate all of you but it's OK... it's alright. We will tell you how to feel. We have a big budget to get our message across... we have entire entertainment news channels that will tell you how to feel. You will choose who you believe and who you hate based upon on who you choose to listen to. When something doesn't work out, we will blame the other side even if it is a direct result of policies that I support. You will agree with who to blame because the entertainment opinion news, not actual news, will tell you how to feel about it. We will use social media, to repeat the message over and over again, if you click on the message, social media will repeat it over and over again until you repeat it to everybody you meet in the street, until Thanksgiving with family is nothing but a political discussion repeating that message over and over again and it will spill over to word of mouth... until the message becomes intertwined with your soul. I'm saying please elect me... send me to Washington and don't worry about it because there is nothing you can do about it. Nothing is going to change if you elect me but I stand here asking for your vote anyway. It's OK... It's alright... I promise... you will not the know the difference because this is what you require just to get your vote in the first place. You require that we lie to you to get elected. You require that we say the words that you want to hear even if I will not lift a single finger to accomplish what I say. We know the words that resonate with you. We have researched them. I just thought you would appreciate the honesty as I tell you exactly what I will do as your represtative. I stand here and ask for your vote. Please send me Washington so I can get to... you know... doing what has been done for many many years now.

There is more than one path to get where you are going. I like the looks of the path I'm standing in front of at the moment but your path may work out better. Whatever path is chosen by the front office... they will have to marshal their resources and make it work. Who knows... I might shift directions when more clues come in... Like after the 40 man roster is released and I see who was added, who was offered arbitration.

When it comes to ratings. I look at them... I find them interesting... I even accept them as more knowledgeable than my knowledge on prospects which isn't a high bar to clear... However... I tend to be a little more guarded because it's one opinion. Other sources may have a different rating and that's OK. Diego Cartaya was a 55. Mick Abel was once a 55... now he's a 45. Kelenic was a 60. Pache was a 60. Kiriloff was a 60. William Contreras was a 45. PCA was a 45. Did we get enough for Duran. I don't know. Did he have to be traded at the deadline. I don't know. I'm sure the Twins made their phone calls and decided that Tait and Abel was the best deal. Trey Yesavage has a future value of 50. He sure looks like one of the best young arms to come around in a while. If Yesavage is a true 50... Chandler with the Pirates at 60 is going to be amazing. Skenes was a 60... He looks like an 80. Franco was once an 80 so I know the ratings can reach FV80. I've heard rumor... Don't know if it's true but a rumor from wherever that the Twins turned down Duran to the Yankees for the Martian. He was a FV50. Is one 50 better than two 45's. I don't know. Speaking of Rumors... Don't know if they are true but rumors suggest that Kwan is on the block and rumors are that he was on the block at the trade deadline so I don't think Cleveland is operating with a formula... I think it's case by case... current team context driven. Do they think they are in contention context and if so... do they have an acceptable replacement for Kwan if they trade him. I don't know but the only think that I can rationalize in that regard is this. Cleveland and Milwaukee are much further along in their process. Cleveland has the Manzardo's, DeLauters, Williams, Cecconi's in place. Milwaukee has the Chourios, Turangs, Frelicks, in place. The Twins are just getting started in the process and have some catching up to do. Cleveland and Milwaukee can probably comfortably believe they will be in contention in 2026 and act accordingly just sticking with the process that has carried them thus far. The Twins... The just did a 180 at the end of July and are still trying to accumulate Manzardos, Turangs and Frelicks to catch up. The front office may think this team could contend... Even I will say that they are probably closer than most on Twinsdaily feel they are but can the Twins really act like 2026 contenders when constructing their 2026 roster. Keeping Ryan for 2026... it's risky. If he blows a ligament. His value is gone.

I totally understand that many here will not be comfortable with my punt the catcher position idea. I see our catching depth chart and cry at night. However... Ryan Jeffers. His trade value probably went up with Perez remaining with the Royals. I don't know how much catching Perez has left in his body but he did catch 92 games last year. With Perez off the market. Realmuto is probably the only big name catcher in free agency. If Realmuto is it... Jeffers trade value due to scarcity... in theory... is bound to go up. Go get Rortvedt cheaply when the Dodgers DFA him. Give Parada a roster spot and cash in Jeffers before we lose him for nothing. I know it's scary... but I think we should do it.

I'm with you. I think it's more likely that the Twins front office chose a different path that fell apart on them after the RSN money went away. It produced a 4 playoff berths but it fell apart and now they are going to take a different path. Perhaps this new path is the path they should have been on all along. However, I refuse to assume that Falvey and his staff are idiots. You can't be an idiot and get one of these 30 jobs. You just can't. Can you be worse than your 29 other peers... Yes but you can't be an idiot.