Riverbrian

Your logic makes perfect sense... but consider these points. 1. In your post... where you are referring to Max Kepler... Substitute Travis Shaw and it kind of reads the same. 2. The possibility of Kepler playing 1B or the possibility of Rosario playing 3B or 2B for potentially decent sized stretches is necessary if the Twins want to acquire an OF like McCutchen. If these considerations are off the table because Kepler OF defense can't be replaced... the Twins have no room for McCutchen and we are back to hoping that Kepler and Buxton work out. 3. Players get hurt. Injuries will happen and they will mess up your neatly typed paragraph.

Where did McCullers spend September? In the Astros Bullpen along with ex-starters McHugh and Peacock. Where Joe Musgrove pitched out of before being traded to the Pirates and then seemlessly returned to the rotation with the Pirates with good result and his arm not falling off. Where is Maeda? In the Bullpen along with Urias and Wood. This is how teams with starting pitching depth handle starting pitching depth. They don't get confused by the "S" or "R" in front of the "P". We have bullpen space to handle our overflow.. We have multiple pitchers with options to control the amount of our overflow.

This always sounds great and it's the type of statement that can get people to their feet and say "Yeah Get Us Sale and Price". The only problem... it's not exactly true. Of the 4 starting pitchers that Boston has used in the playoffs... Sale and Price have the worst stats. They haven't been bad but they haven't been lights out. It has been Eovaldi who has been lights out. Porcello has been their 2nd best pitcher. And going into the Playoffs... All the talk in Boston was about how they needed to get starting pitching at the deadline,nobody was really trusting Price anymore and the assumption was that he could end up back in the bullpen like the year before. Speaking of last year... Sale made two appearances in the 2017 playoffs and was absolutely killed. Back to this year... All the Sox added at the deadline to feed the screaming masses was Eovaldi, a guy who throws 100 but hasn't had a healthy or productive season since... I don't know... a long time ago. Meanwhile, Brock Holt, Eduardo Nunez, Jackie Bradley Jr are coming up big while Mookie Betts has not. In Milwaukee, Orlando Arcia had a .576 OPS during the season and it was Arcia with all his might trying to do his best to drag the dead Brewer offense around come playoff time because Yelich, Moustakas and Schoop were nowhere to be found and it wasn't Kershaw that killed the Brewer offense because it was another so-so off season for the undisputed stud of the mound... Clayton Kershaw. The Brewers very nearly out-dueled Kershaw and crew with Chacin, Miley and Woodruff, a dead offense led by Arcia and bullpen options. Yes... I recognize that Bumgarner and Jack Morris happened and they were performances for the ages. But... the game is in a clear shift now. The Royals won in 2015 with their bullpen. Andrew Miller with the Indians in 2016 took things a step further. The Indians just about won it all with Kluber, Miller leading in innings while Tomlin did just enough and Bauer stunk up the joint. I'm not saying that the Twins shouldn't go get Sale, Price, Kershaw or the equivalent. I agree with you on that. I'll welcome them with open arms but, personally... I'm past the point of looking at attractive names. I just want performance now. I'm just plain tired of watching a guy with a 5 plus ERA anywhere on the pitching staff. It's a new world and the Twins just need to identify "Pitching Period" and then figure out how to proportion the innings accordingly. At some point, the analysts in the front office are going to come to the conclusion that it is questionable to give Jake Odorizzi 164 Innings and Taylor Rogers 68 Innings when Rogers was better. We are so locked into roles that Rogers can only throw 1 inning at a time and Odorizzi has to throw at least 5 to 6 innings every time without putting a monkey in the wrench. It took 1443 innings to get through 2018. There are about 13 roster spots reserved for pitchers. This is where Baldelli gets to figure out who gets the innings and I am praying to the baseball gods, the front office, Rocco Baldelli and TwinsDaily that the ones who get the innings in 2019 are the ones who actually get people out.

Keith Law just lost me. If he qualifies Cora because he had a couple of years managing in the PR Winter League. He obviously in charge of his own version of qualification.

My perfect manager would be someone who can simultaneously 1. Believe in every single member of the 25 man roster. and 2. Hold every single member of the 25 man roster accountable for their performance. I also want the next manager to have the ability to unburdened himself from any thoughts that a new idea will never work because it wasn't done that way for the past million years. I want manager who can blur the old baseball conventions line. If the manager thinks a 5 man starting rotation is the only possibility because it is how it's been done for a million years... I don't want that guy to be the manager. I don't want a manager who has to lock down players in assigned roles such as Matt McGill isn't going to pitch much this month because he is now the assigned long man or Astudillo won't catch because he is a utility player and then later Astudillo won't be a utility player because he is now the catcher. I want a manager who is creative enough to deal with the problem of having 4 outfielders kicking ass and have the ability to find playing time for all 4 and I want a manager who is creative enough to solve the problem of having only 2 outfielders performing decently. I don't want a manager who thinks that Brandon McKay can only be a pitcher or 1st baseman but he can't be both at the same time. And perhaps most importantly... I want the manager on the exact same page that the front office is working on. If a manager doesn't believe in the players that are being provided to him... that's a huge dysfunctional issue. The Cubs and Rays are one of 3 (maybe 5) organizations that operate the way I'd like to see teams operate. I have no idea what any of the candidates think or feel so I don't have a strong opinion about any of them but I'm certainly OK with where all 3 of them have been training.

Hopefully the Front office is doing some recon during the process of conducting interviews. No matter who they hire... the interview is a great way to gain some inside information from each candidate's current team.

News is floating around today that the Red Sox are considering playing Mookie Betts at 2B on the road during the World Series. Betts at 2B will allow Martinez to play OF when the DH is not an option. This is only a rumor floating around so I have no idea if the Red Sox will actually do it, they might not but if they do, it just might work out and we can all see the reasoning for such a consideration. However... Regardless of the results soon to come... if they do? if they don't? The Red Sox could have been better prepared for this possibility by playing Betts at 2B on occasion during the year instead of coming in cold on the big stage. They had the opportunity to do it. The Indians could have been better prepared for the addition of Josh Donaldon, if Ramirez played some 2B during the year and Kipnis played some CF instead of coming in cold in September. Of course Kepler can and should play 1B on occasion in 2019. I believe Rosario could play some IF if needed. Doing so will provide our new manager more options to work in the 2019 World Series. Prepare for Success and Prepare for Failure. Depth and Flexibility is how it's done.

There are multiple scenarios where Kepler playing some 1B would help the Twins win baseball games. LIke you said... If Kepler could be considered as a candidate to play 1B... It opens the door to sign Cutch . If Kepler could be considered as a candidate to play 1B. We won't have to die if Sano gets hurt while Austin is hitting .112 Kepler playing 1B shouldn't be forced but it shouldn't be anything we are afraid of. Tom you are spot on with this article. Increasing flexibility and depth should be the number one priority of the Twins and I hope it is a major... (make that mega major) consideration when choosing the next manager.

Right now... I'd settle for simple diversification to protect the overall investment. We just saw what happened when they invested in a single stock and saw the stock bottom out. Personally... I'm not even counting on Rosario. What he did this year doesn't mean he will do it again next year. He could get hurt or start swinging at back foot sliders and not get himself out of it. Go get an outfielder... Don't care who at the moment... that's the job of the front office... Just get someone who has a reasonable chance to surpass the projected production of Kepler, Rosario and Buxton that the three of them can compete against for playing time. If all 4 of them work... Wonderful. And then a new manager who knows how to handle too many players and that's where my daily flexibility diatribes come in. Prepare for success and Prepare for Failure. Sano, Buxton, Kepler will have to sink or swim but they won't be allowed to sink us if they don't swim. I am also of the opinion that we don't need to compare ourselves to Houston, Boston or anyone. We just need a team that can compete against all 29 baseball teams. I've seen David Freese win a world series. I've seen Brock Holt hit for the cycle in a small sample size. Build a base of 25 players who can play... find yourself in playoff contention and acquire at the deadline additional pieces that can improve us even more (on paper of course). I have no opinion on Lewis or Kiriloff... I am excited about them just like I was excited about Sano and Buxton. What I want is for Lewis or Kiriloff is win a job when the time comes and not be handed a locked down job and allowed to struggle while they learn on the job. I want them to be Juan Soto-esque when they knock down the door to further deeper our roster. I leave it to the front office to decide what prospects they can part with and which ones they can't if it takes a trade to acquire the right guy. It doesn't matter to me what avenue they choose to staff the roster next year be it trade, FA, waivers or promotion but I do expect every single guy on the 25 man roster to be competitive for a starting role. Anything short of that... I'll assume that they didn't learn their lesson from this year. I'm not willing to watch a guy hit .130 and play every day any more. I'm tired of LaMarre and Kinley getting roster spots and not being utilized because they were not good enough to out perform a guy hitting .130

I think the time is now. We have cheap potential in Buxton, Sano, Kepler, Polanco and Rosario. By being collectively inexpensive they have the flexibility to be priced as depth. Buxton is priced like he's a 4th OF... so call him the 4th OF and go get the 1st or 2nd OF.

Prepare for success and Prepare for failure If Buxton, Sano, Rosario, Polanco and Kepler all take a step up like you suggest. Having those acquired pieces to support that core is preparing for success. If Buxton, Sano, Rosario, Polanco and Kepler let us down. Having those same acquired pieces to turn to is preparing for failure. 25 Man Roster... Don't waste a single roster spot. Try to improve each roster spot.

I just want Falvey and Lavine to listen to me... and only me.

I just want to point this out. I don't recall any thread in Twins Daily history that didn't have posters on both sides of a discussion. There could be a thread about stopping the practice of water boarding old ladies over jay walking offenses and you'd find a couple of posters who are adamantly for the practice. I'm pointing this out, just to say that there is no such thing as a combined voice here.In other words, your list above, could truly be comprehensive with almost no limits. It's a little misleading, to point at Verlander, Tulowitski, Lucroy, Darvish and Ellsbury as examples of Twins Daily posters getting it wrong because there would be a chunk of posters getting it right in each example.

And... The Brewers have most of the team coming back, payroll space and trade chips to work with. They can take a bigger swing at starting pitching this off season and be even stronger next year. Stearns is making that team bullet proof. They will be back. They can survive injuries and some poor performance.

Where are our Superstars? We don't have them because we stopped at Trevor Plouffe and said that's good enough.

I get that... but my point was that they blew their thick in the OF to fill a catcher hole. Which basically left them thin everywhere. The Brewers kept that OF thick and are playing Erik Kratz right now at the Catcher position. Outfielders consistently out produce catchers at the plate. Murphy had the potential to hit 10 home runs? Hicks has 30-30 potential. I was against the trade the moment it was announced.

The Rockies only two scored two runs off of Jeffries. So... so far so good.

They were covered. It wasn't luck in my opinion. If Cain blows up in their face... they still got Santana and Broxton in the minors. It was a no risk move. It's only money if he fails.

The starting rotation isn't as important as it once was. Starts are getting shorter and the bullpen is coming more and more into play so Stearns went out and put together a killer bullpen to cover an average but not terrible starting rotation. As for defense... They ain't bad but it kind of shows that moving players around for better matchups and better bats can overcome average defense as long as they can make the routine plays.

The Hicks trade is a prime example of doing it wrong. Hicks was dealt from a supposed position of strength (OF) to fill a supposed position of weakness ©. Hicks was depth and insurance... he finally started to show us something in 2015. By removing Hicks off the roster... When Buxton struggled and Sano couldn't find fly balls... options to change your course was removed. Just like that a position of strength was a position of extreme weakness and we are on the waiver wire to find Robbie Grossman. If Terry Ryan would have thought like David Stearns... He wouldn't have had to trade Aaron Hicks. We could have walked into 2016 With Buxton and Hicks in the same OF along with Rosario and Sano. Sano could have been moved back to 3B quicker with Hicks as an option. We wouldn't have had to be as patient with a struggling Buxton.

Can the Twins add a Cain and Yelich equivalent this off season. Maybe... Maybe Not? It doesn't matter... the Twins just need to move on from the old way and try to improve each roster spot. The old way was saying we got Trevor Plouffe at 3B and moving on to finding a bullpen guy cheaply. The old way this off season would be saying we got Rosario, Buxton and Kepler so there is need to trade for Yelich because the OF is set. Or saying Jake Cave did alright this year... He can be the 4th OF and then moving on to find a 2B. The Brewers had Braun, Broxton, Santana, Phillips plus... Thames, Perez and Villar who could also play OF. They didn't say... We got more than enough OF... They added Cain and Yelich and utilized the options available on Santana and Broxton. They gave Bruan a first base mitt to use in spring training. They improved when and where they got the chance and didn't let players become etched in stone at static positions to block the possibilities. We don't have to trade for an MVP type like Yelich... We just got to trade or sign someone who has ability and make it work. We can give Kepler a first base mitt to create space. We got the DH position to use. Buxton and Cave have options to stash in AAA for even more depth. The Brewers, Dodgers and Cubs have figured this out... the rest of the league has to catch up to them now. Gather your assets where you may. The new manager just needs to be able to figure out how to handle the "good problem to have".

It is one of the most impressive GM performances that I have ever seen. This is exactly what the Twins should do... Starting Right now.... this... off season. Falvey should be calling his old friend from Cleveland David Stearns and have those philosophical discussions just to soak it in. It isn't just Cain and Yelich. He built a killer bullpen to support a weaker rotation.

Agreed Ball is in their court.

Actually making contact and pulling off the ball for a 3 hopper would be progress. If it's pitch recognition... I'm not sure how to fix that. We might as well start auditioning CF's. Getting hot at the end of 2017 gives me hope that he can recognize and be disciplined. If he's trying to park everything. That can be fixed quickly. Like turning on a light switch. Just stop doing it. When I watch... His upper cut is pretty severe. Launch Angle might kill him. Kind of like that guy in softball who hit a home run once and then spent the next month popping out to short with those big mighty swings. I'd like to see him simply level off that swing and try to keep his bat in the zone a little longer. May or May not work... Thank God we have coaches other than I to work with him.

I agree with this as well. If Buxton would stop trying to jerk outside breaking pitches into the left field bleachers for a 5 run homer with the bases empty. I believe he would become immediately the player we want him to be. That's the light switch in my opinion.