Brandon

This season they can afford the salary. But in 2025 payroll spikes up quite a bit. Only Kepler is coming off the books and Lopez’s increase in salary alone more than swallows up the savings there. And the arbitration class and I think Correa is at top salary that year too. 35 million. So I think the bigger concern is next year. I’m just surprised we didn’t try harder for Burnes. But the trade deadline could be a factor for us this year. We have more to trade. Texas will have extra starters as they come back from injury. Someone else may have a starter available too. We can acquire someone on an expiring contract for the post season run. There will be fewer starts for the new ace to get injured before the playoffs and we will know how likely we are to be in and if we are going to be competitive.

Really the Twins fortified their depth. And really fortified it at this point. My complaints are why didn’t we offer JD Martinez a contract to add a major bat to the lineup and I get it a lineup of 80 RBI guys that is deep is cheaper then paying for thump. With the spike in salaries for 2025 I am not surprised we didn’t sign a starter because there aren’t many good ones looking for a 1 year deal. We are well positioned to trade for one at the deadline. Lots of depth in our system and we added a top 100 prospect. The Rangers will have pitching to trade this deadline, especially if they sign a starter still in free agency. Let’s see how this plays out but it’s not a bad situation for the Twins to be in. They can add salary in season and have assets to trade.

Too bad the value seeking Twins couldn’t get 2 Carlos Santana’s for the price of 1? The Twins should have a Carlos Santana bobble head night and give out a bobble head of the One who collaborated with Rob Thomas on that 1999 hit “Smooth”. That would be hilarious.

Woods-Richardson = Stroman. That’s all.

Encarnacion-Strand I think he does

Canterino also intrigues.

I think if he is on the 40 man roster and I haven't checked then he will have a chance to be up at the end of the year. If there is a need and he earns it he will be up as well for a playoff push. but otherwise, I see him debuting next season. Need to keep those option years as long as possible.

I like that the Royals are putting real effort into fixing their team. Their player development only got a few players developed with too many failing. It’s good for their fans too. They should have more young talent then they do but atleast they lock theirs up. I guess they recognize that this wave isn’t going to get them over the top but they are trying to see if they can squeak into the playoffs and see what happens atleast once with this current group of players.

Santana and descarwhatever are around 10 million with the tv contract we should have the other 15 million in budget. Yes there are other cheaper aces maybe we could get.

The Royals don’t have a Hockey team and NBA team to siphon even more money away from their Baseball team. While I think they had the money to resign Gray if you take out Santana and Desclarini especially. That is annoying but good for the Royals for spending some cash. They are still behind the Twins but much better than they were. I wonder if the Taylor Swift affect is helping them too financially.

The Twins came into the offseason with very few needs as a whole. They were set to lose Gray and Maeda and Mahle to free agency. This was planned in advance with Lopez extension and the return of Paddack with his extension and the development of Varland. To get into the season the Twins felt that they needed at least 1 depth starter to make it to at least the trade deadline where they could trade for the pitcher, they need for the post season run. That is how I view what has happened so far anyways. The cable deal won't be approved by the bk courts till the summer is what I am hearing and hopefully in time for the trade deadline. The Twins traded Polanco for 2 prospects including a top 100 (#79) on mlb.com top 100 prospects and a pitcher the Twins were interested in drafting. (this is a trend where the Twins like to acquire players they wanted to draft, Pearson and Banuelos are two of them) They also got a middle reliever and a back of the rotation starter and 8 million to pay his salary down to the Bundy level. Now the Twins have 6 starters they feel they can rely on to start the season. They have coverage for when one of them gets injured. And the rotation is now set for going into the season. They also freed up the blockage of players in the middle IF so Julien and Lewis get all of the playing time they can stand, and Farmer is there as a backup. Lee is waiting in the wings for his opportunity. and the middle IF is now set. The Twins freed up just enough payroll space to sign Carlos Santana to a 1 year 5.25 million deal. This is a solid depth move in that he is a good defensive 1B and he is a solid if unspectacular hitter. He is a prototypical Twins hitter in the mold of a 20 HR hitter with 80 RBI potential and the Twins like to fill their lineup with these types of hitters because of their lower cost but with a full line up of hitters like this the lineup becomes stacked and that's how they remain a top 5 in the league offense year after year. He also hits LHP well and is a switch hitter and can fill in as a DH as well. lots of subtlety improvements and benefits with this signing. (I still prefer JD Martinez) but Santana is an upgrade and if Miranda tears the cover off the ball and forces his way into Santana's role, we can trade Santana easily enough as well. For the bullpen we went into the offseason knowing that we were going to lose Pagan. The rest of the bullpen seemed fairly settled. I was wrong. The Twins traded for Topa, signed Staumont and Jackson to Major League deals and claimed 50 relievers off of waivers.... ok maybe not 50 but several and I will probably miss some if i label them here but here goes. Alexy, Jepsen, Duarte and ...... so now the bullpen should be done as well as we should have lots of depth as we will likely need some innings from most of these guys at some point this coming season. That brings us to the OF. the Twins have said they want to bring in an OF to back up CF. I guess they do not want Castro or Gordon doing that or Martin either. I imagine that if Taylor is affordable enough the Twins could bring him back and have extra depth there. That would complete the depth for our team where we would have a solid enough replacement at every position on the team. This brings us to the last piece of the puzzle. The Twins have said that the budget would be an issue this offseason. As a result, the Twins did not go out and get the ace level starting pitcher. We did bolster our prospect depth and there is a cable deal in place to be approved by the bk court. I think when that happens the Twins will look to acquire a top of the rotation pitcher for the post season run. Overall, the Twins didn't have many needs for the offseason and the big one (getting a Gray replacement) didn't happen. It feels like a failure of an offseason, but the depth is there. The Twins have succeeded in adding solid depth. There is still offseason left to sign (Taylor) or 4th OF who can start in CF. And there is still the possibility of the Twins trading for that top of rotation starter, if not in the offseason, then at the trade deadline. Having this flexibility leaves me to say that this offseason is a B- with the possibility of an A or A+ when they get that top of rotation arm. How do you feel about the Twins offseason so far? How do you feel about my critique of the Twins offseason? Please let me know.

Gallo was signed as a knee jerk reaction to not signing Correa after he signed with the Giants….. getting Correa was why the Twins went over budget last year since they were already making moves because he “signed “ somewhere else.

I think the Twins want to pick up their impact starter at the trade deadline. Montas could be available again if he excels and Cindy back steps. As one example.

Overall I’m not a huge fan of this deal. But He does have value.

His below average years are 2020 and 2021 when Covid got players to stop conditioning and get out of shape. He has since rebounded the last two years to be an ever so slightly above average hitter. I expect a 99 - 105 OPS season from him.

I was initially bummed by the signing but he is basically Cuddyer with the bat. Expect a .730-.760 OPS I prefer Solano at that price point. I was hoping to get Martinez. But the more I think about it the I realize I should expect nothing more than average. I guess I’m getting spoiled with the Donaldson, Buxton extension, Correa and Correa again signings.

May.be, they started with an open slot and filled it with a lotto ticket and then they filled it with a AAAA player with an option. Thus incremental improvement

Incremental improvements

I expect the Twins to sign either Ryu or Martinez. There are still many players without contracts and fewer teams left to sign them. I don’t remember the names of the other starters available still.

If the ask was Polanco and Raya for Burnes then someone in the front office should be fired for not jumping on that trade. If the money was an issue then including another prospect for cash or an include a salary like Farmer or Castro would offset any increase in payroll. That would be an all in go for it kind of move to say we are going for it. The extra 50,00-100,000 tickets sold will help offset the salary difference too.

We traded for Odorizzi towards the end of the offseason and for some reason no one was competing with us We got Maeda cause the Dodgers had too many starting pitchers and we were going to be part of a three team trade we got Sony Gray because Cincinnati was cutting costs and we gave a good prospect Paddack is injury prone and coming off a down season Lopez we just got lucky that the Marlins had extra starters and needed offense. These deals are all timing as any team could have swooped in and made better offers. We didn’t lose any of these trades. It was all about timing.

That’s only a 4-5 million increase. For the talent increase it’s a bargain

Hall and Ortiz were both bottom of MLB.com top 100 prospects. #97 & 99 I think

Timing is everything on trading for starters

and a competitive round draft pick. that feels light unless they think the SS Ortiz is likely to be a star. I like Minnesota's return for Polanco better.