Riverbrian

He's only 14 years old.

Tom, If I knew you were out there 10 Years ago. I would have learned to read sooner.

The Schwarber comp is a decent one. Kyle would benefit from being in the American League where he could serve as a DH. The Cubs don't have that luxury but they do have a very creative manager who has the ability to adjust his lineup to fit the chips he has to work with. Fortunately for us and Sano... We have the DH to use. We also have Escobar and some depth. I'd move Sano around... 3B, 1B and DH and don't force it by saying he's a whatever exclusively. His play and how the others play will help Molitor decide where Sano spends the majority of his time and where he shouldn't play at all but... Paul has to let the players show him and not try to force some faulty plan. I didn't mind Sano being tried in RF... I fully supported the idea... What I minded was... Sano remaining in RF when he was clearly struggling.

IT WAS ZACH DUKE... IT WAS ZACH DUKE... IT WAS ZACH DUKE.

If Darvish doesn't sign with the Twins. Trading for Greinke could be a consideration. The D-Backs would like to have money to sign JD Martinez. If the D-Backs will take Phil Hughes back in return and pay off the 12 Million left on Greinke's Signing Bonus. After you factor in the 13 Million from Hughes in 2018 and 2019 --- The Twins will be left adding: 2018: 18 Million 2019: 18.5 Million 2020: 32 Million 2021: 32 Million 4 Years/100.5 Million for Greinke. Darvish might be 6 Years/150 Million or 5 years/125 million so the AAV would be close. Greinke would possibly be a 2 year shorter commitment. I have no idea... but... I assume taking on that contract would probably lower the price of the player assets needed to complete the deal significantly. The D-Backs could then take the 100 million savings and use that money to bring back JD Martinez. The Twins have that front line starter minus Phil Hughes. Darvish would be 25 million AAV plus Phil Hughes. Yeah... 37 year old pitchers making 34 million will make anybody nervous but Yu Darvish will be 36 at the end of a 6 year deal and this is how much money it takes to sign a top end starter.

If we don't get Yu? I hope it happens soon enough so there is time to execute Plan B. I hope there is a Plan B. If we open 2018 with only minimal improvements... I will consider it a fairly significant failure. There better be a decent Plan B and Plan C. Support the young offense!

1. We need him. 2. Payroll is low enough to take on the salary. 3. The World Series may have lowered his price tag a little. 4. The Yankees and Dodgers are probably out because they are trying to reset that cap penalty. 5. The 18-19 off season is going to be a huge free agent year and teams may be holding back this year in consideration. 6. Timing is perfect because, the Royals, Tigers and White Sox are clearly or at least most likely not planning on being ultra competitive in 2018. 7. The Twins offense announced it's presence with authority in 2017. Perfect Storm indeed!

Great Discussion... I find myself agreeing with Parker, Spycake and Steve Lein. I think Duke is a smart dice roll. He looks great but he would be even greater with some bigger bang additions along side.

I don't care if a reliever is paid 3 years at 27 Million or 1 year at 2 Million. I only care if the player produces and I think it's quite possible that Sir Duke produces. I'm happy with the signing. I just want arms that can hang zeros regardless of the contract. In my personal quest for an elite bullpen... Duke could fit nicely... my primary concern right now is using one of the 7 or 8 bullpen spots on: A Rule 5 guy A Couple of spots on guys (Pressly, Duffey) that we hope turn it around. A couple of spots on guys who are heading into a sophomore season with sustained success yet to be proved. I'm not suggesting that we shouldn't be giving Hildenberger or Pressly a job. Just suggesting that when you add the totals up... you are hoping that a lot goes right.

Step 1: Get a QB. You'll need someone dedicated to make sure efforts are rewarded with a prominence. If content falls through the cracks you may not get a 2nd. Make sure the QB understands the overall goal of TwinsDaily. Step 2: Don't over Filter. Your designated QB will need to perform some quality control but always remember that perfection is the enemy of the good. Step 3: Open the content doors wide. There is only so much Twins content out there. A majority of the information is locked away in the front office closets and not reachable for us mere mortals. If the content makers feel limited in what they have to write... inspiration will come much slower. Foster and encourage creativity in whatever direction it goes. Step 4: Strength in Numbers - Understand that finding a prolific work horse like Seth Stohs or Nick Nelson is a very hard thing to find. It will be difficult to find people who can match that kind of output so you have to be OK with some one and done's to fill the content hole. Step 5: Use the LIKE button. At bare minimum... you need to let the content creators know that you read what they put down. Nobody is going to get rich doing this... validation for their efforts with a simple acknowledgement is what they are looking for. Don't rely on the community to take care of this for you. It will to a certain degree but this is something that the ownership can do to help reach your stated goals.

I'm all for gaining assets. However... I can't help but wonder what happens to Kennys if Napoli is brought on board. It sure looks like a one or the other type situation. Vargas is 9 years younger Vargas is probably 6 million dollars cheaper. Vargas had better stats last year. ' I have no idea how anybody is in the clubhouse but Napoli better be good in that clubhouse.

This post isn't intended to start a Terry Ryan debate. It isn't even to point out past mistakes or successes. It's simply to illustrate that it's about assets. It's about shopping at Dollar General for the past 5 years. Past 5 year outside bullpen acquisitions: Rodney (Free Agent 1 year 4.5 million) Watson (Trade) Belisle (Free Agent 1 Year 2 Million) Breslow (minor league deal) Abad (minor league deal) Kintzler (Minor league deal) Boshers (minor league deal) Graham (Rule 5) Boyer (minor league deal) Jepsen (Trade) Cotts (Trade) Pino (Minor League Deal) Stephen Pryor (Trade) Jason Adam (Trade) Twins cost to acquire outside bullpen assets: 6.5 Million (all spent by Falvey and Lavine), Half Years of Brandon Kintzler, Kendrys Morales and Josh Willingham... Plus a Mid Range prospect with potential in Chih-Wei Hu and a bunch of minor league deals at the MLB minimum. Bullpen Assets trade acquisitions: Willingham to Royals for Jason Adam Morales to Mariners for Stephen Pryor Graham to Yankees for PTBNL or Cash Abad to Red Sox for Pat Light Kintzler to Nats for Austin Watson Most would agree that the Twins were in selling position at trade deadlines for 4 of the past 5 years. Yet didn't have bullpen assets to sell when all contenders are looking for them. When the Twins did find themselves in buying position... they paid a pretty heavy price. Bullpens need to be prioritized a little higher than Dollar General to prepare for good seasons and bad seasons. The Yankees got serious about their bullpen and built a super one. Watched the team fail with a super bullpen in 2016 and cashed it in... they acquired Gleyber Torres, Billy McKinney, Clint Frazier and Justus Sheffield. The Yankees then rebuilt another super bullpen and will use at least one of those acquired prospects to outbid the Twins for the services of Gerrit Cole. If the Yankees shock the world and fail in 2018 because Judge and Stanton strike out too much... They can trade Chapman, Betences, Robertson, Kahnle, Greene and Warren for more top 100 prospects.

This "too risky" thing is getting a little out of control. There is risk when you sign any player to multi year contracts and the highways are littered with bad contracts. The percentages may or may not be higher in the bullpen but bad contracts are not unique to bullpen free agents... it is however... less painful from a cost standpoint. The Astros got burned for 18 million spread over 3 years signing Tony Sipp. They still won a world series and getting burned like that didn't stop them from spending even more this year with the signings of Joe Smith and Hector Rondon to two year deals. Would have been worse for the Astros if they signed Jason Heyward to an 8 year 184 Million Dollar deal. The Mets got burned for 12 million over two years signing Antonio Bastardo. It didn't stop them from spending even more money on Anthony Swarzak this year. Would have been worse for the Mets... if they signed Chris Davis to a 7 year 161 million dollar deal. The Tigers got burned for 11 million over two years signing Mark Lowe... I guess it is possible that that may have stopped them. They ain't spending money right now. However... it could have been worse for the Tigers... if they would have signed Jordan Zimmerman to a 5 year 110 million dollar deal.... wait... they did. There is simply risk and it can't be avoided... anytime you sign a player to a contract. The risk increases with each year you attach. If any GM's or Owners are risk adverse and afraid of signing a bad contract. They should get out of baseball and focus on death and taxes.

Yep The Twins and Rays actually seem to match up well as trading partners. We got some young hitters and they got some experienced pitching.

If they do. I want new guys running the front office immediately!

Perfectly summed up.

I've figured it out. He is meeting with teams in order... based on the size of contract. Working from least amount offered to largest amount offered. The Twins will be the last team he meets with. I hope nobody takes this post... or any post of mine... seriously.

Personally, I'm not going to worry about a meeting... that much... at least not yet. Maybe one is scheduled for later. Maybe the Cubs and Astros need the meeting to throw a hail mary because they are behind. Maybe the Cubs and Astros need the meeting because they are offering less and they have some B.S. to peddle. Maybe the Cubs and Astros need the meeting to get a quick assessment on probability before determining if they need to move on to Arrieta or Cobb. I'll worry later. Although... it sure would be a lot easier if we didn't have 29 other teams to contend with on EVERYTHING!!!

Pay the Man He's earned it

So if we need 24 of them... Asking for 7 seems reasonable.

We don't seem to be too far away. As long as neither of us assume that either of us is not advocating doing it only with bullpen or ignoring the bullpen entirely. I'm a 25 man guy I want 25 men on the roster who can all contribute to victory. I'd like the Twins to top the Astros in all phases. I'm praying that we sign Darvish. I just don't believe that Money that was previous allocated to filling out a bullpen is sustainable at that budget rate anymore for any team... and absolutely not... for any team that considers themselves contenders.

Kab repeatedly asked for some sort of tangible proof of a correlation and that's why I asked him to do the same thing to support his side and that was the context for the quote you highlighted. My contention is that you will not find that proof either way because this is such a new thing. Kab has my respect... I think he's very knowledgeable but he was a little heavy handed asking for proof without proving his opinion. (Which I respect without proof because I'm sure he came by it honestly). I'm not contending that a bullpen is the single most important thing. It may come across that way because I'm strongly advocating the need for it. I liked what you put together (Gave you a like) and I appreciated your effort but limiting the discussion to the past 4 world series winners makes what is already a too small sample size even smaller by ignoring the Yankees Bullpen last year and the Indians Bullpen Last Year and the Year before that. The set of data is just too new since it seemed to start with the Royals. I come by my opinion honestly... I watched the Royals in 2014 do amazing things with a bunch of young energetic position players that were able to put up crooked numbers with a very average starting rotation still keeping it close. Then that scary bullpen would hit the stage and they overcame the average rotation and almost got the job done if it wasn't for Bumgarner and then get the job done in 2015 against the big scary Mets rotation. I watched the Indians acquire Andrew Miller in 2016 and then I watched Francona put him in the game in the 4th inning and then leave him in for the 5th and 6th before turning it over to Shaw or whoever. I watched Francona put Miller in the 7th inning the very next day when everyone would assume he was toast and I realized that Francona just created a new valuable thing and everybody needed one. It's my opinion... that if the Twins would have acquired Miller under similar circumstances. He would have been the traditional 8th inning set up guy or closer and locked into that role. Francona showed everyone a new way to do it. Put him in... regardless if the team was ahead or behind. Use him when it matters no matter what the inning was. I watched the Yankees take the bullpen to perhaps a higher level still last year. Adding Robertson and Kahnle to Chapman, Betences, Green and Warren. I believe the prices will continue to go up and I believe that results will be inconsistent or volatile because players are inconsistent and volatile when you are using 50 to 70 IP's or 100 to 200 AB's data sets. However... I am not advocating ignoring the rotation or any other position from Shortstop to the I.T. department because it can be done with a bullpen alone. BTW... I'm Ok with the Rodney Signing.... I'm just really really pro bullpen.

You keep asking us bullpen supporters to show a correlation between bullpens and winning. That's going to stop us all dead in our tracks unless someone pours through the necessary research or finds someone who knows what they are doing and pours through the necessary research and publishes it for us to regurgitate. I think it's fair to return the request back at you. Please show some correlation that a bullpen doesn't produce winners. The best bullpen argument I can make is this: Jake McGee RP 31 Rockies 3 years $27,000,000 Bryan Shaw RP 30 Rockies 3 years $27,000,000 Brandon Morrow RP 33 Dodgers 2 years $21,000,000 Tommy Hunter RP 31 Phillies 2 years $18,000,000 Pat Neshek RP 37 Signed Phillies 2 years $16,250,000 Joe Smith RP 33 Signed Astros 2 years $15,000,000 Anthony Swarzak RP 32 Mets 2 years $14,000,000 Steve Cishek RP 31 Signed Cubs 2 years $13,000,000 Luke Gregerson RP 33 Signed Cardinals 2 years $11,000,000 Brandon Kintzler RP 33 Agreed Nationals 2 years $10,000,000 Yusmeiro Petit RP 33 Signed Athletics 2 years $10,000,000 Hector Rondon RP 29 Signed Astros 2 years $8,500,000 The Rockies, Dodgers, Phillies, Astro's, Mets, Cubs, Cards, Nats and A's are disagreeing with you by the contracts they are offering. Those front offices might be going through that research that you want H2O to provide you. Then again... they might not. I totally respect your position when you state that you would spend money/resources making starting pitching a priority. I don't disagree with that. However... The KC Rotation in 2014 or 2015 wasn't lights out. The Indians rotation was decimated in 2016. The Bullpens got them there. I just don't think you can elect to spend less in the bullpen on purpose anymore. I also agree that the 9th inning is way overrated... I don't care if Rodney is in the 9th... I want additional guys who can get a big strike out in the 7th... Protect a lead in the 6th. Stop a bad 1st inning with a great 2nd and 3rd inning. I want a bullpen full of these guys. I admit I can't predict who those guys will be but I do expect the front office to try in this day and age. At least... I expect the front office to try... until someone can prove that Kansas City and Cleveland bullpens didn't overcome a weak rotation and help them immensely.

David Price Jason Heyward Chris Davis Justin Upton Jordan Zimmerman Jeff Samardzia Wei-Yin Chen Mike Leake Alex Gordon Ian Kennedy Ben Zobrist Scott Kazmir John Lackey Denard Span Yiesel Sierra Just listing another 15 from 2015 to provide food for thought. Maybe Multi Year Contracts are just plain risky all around. However... Multi Year Contracts are the cost of doing business.

You can't win unless you try.