tony&rodney

Celestino should be attractive to Oakland but I'm not too sure how they view Larnach, Wallner, etc.

Gary Sanchez has struggled mightily as a catcher. We can hope that he is able to improve in small ways behind the plate. He looked a little bit more fit today than I remembered him from all of the times I saw him last year. that's probably not true but I'm going to hope he does well. The article was very positive.

Getting two major league pitchers and giving up only one pitching prospect would be the steal of the century. Not going to happen. Position players who aren't up-the-middle are over valued in MLBTV. What if the Twins added Duran and Strotman in a 6 for 3 trade? Is that fair or realistic. I haven't thought about this too much.

Yes, this. Josh Donaldson was a force always pushing everyone especially himself and despite many fans being put off at times by his aura, players liked his energy. Correa is a star player with panache, like Buxton, and this raises the bar for the entire team. Great signing, no matter what happens.

A wonderful signing. Correa is a shortstop. This is all so confusing .... when you look at the Twins roster on November 1 and then compare it to March 17, it is difficult to comprehend what was going to be a positive outcome. About a week ago I had heard that Story was not interested in the Twins unless there were two strong additions made to the roster. Today we learn that Correa had used WAR to ask one team where they were going add to become competitive. BP and Fangraphs had the Twins around 80-84 wins this season, which meant that Correa could see a light going to Minnesota. This was not on anyone's radar. I have not heard nor read a single link (0%) connecting Correa and MN. This completely changes the course of this season. Correa is a tough out and has a beautiful glove. A question which has dogged me all winter and returned pretty much zero interest from those on Twins Daily has been the eventual budget for the Twins. I initially believed that $140-150 million was a solid number that built in a decent profit for the franchise. TD used $130 million. The recent moves, suddenly, made me question all previous speculations. This was particularly true because all of the free agents that would cost any money were gone and there was the whispering that Story had pushed the Twins aside. Correa was not in any iteration ..... .... until today and this is wonderful. Next? This signing, much more than if Story had been signed, opens up any number of options. Yes, Montas and Manaea are still being talked about, but the Twins could still entice the Reds, Marlins, Orioles, or another team with various offers. One pitcher could make a huge difference and two could mean fun comes to Target Field. The Correa addition means that the next move might be impossible to predict as well, but also mean that the Twins feel comfortable pushing their budget beyond $130 million. Correa, as someone else wrote, is a sugar boost. I love sugar.

One thought, which is neither what I can really imagine nor accept, is that the Twins already are finished putting together their 2022 roster. Everyone keeps saying this will happen and that will happen, for sure, but so far ...... Perhaps everyone has been totally off base and this is exactly the team Falvey wants for this season. I mean, we have to consider past moves as well as past non moves and look beyond our thoughts.

Did not mean to discourage anyone .... just wanted folks to know that the Twins cannot just release Urshela and Sanchez to save some more money, as it seemed some may have not been aware of the rule.

The contracts of arbitration players are now guaranteed. The Twins will have to trade Sanchez, Urshela, and others to get out from underneath their salaries.

?

Sano is a better athlete than Sanchez but he hasn't tried his hand at catching .... yet .... hmmmm.... could he block balls in the dirt?

To be fair, the kids in CA, FL, TX, and warm weather states get many more repetitions than those in cold weather states. This means, primarily, bat and arm speed as well as experiences running routes and fielding. Of course, there are players that excel from colder climates (Mike Trout), but the edge is real obvious and fairly dramatic. This is drawn from personal experience, coaching in both Florida and Minnesota, as well as time spent watching games in person. The skills are better watching American Legion in late July than watching the high schools in May. Weather does matter.

Rortvedt and Sanchez do not play the same position. Rortvedt is a catcher and yes, he needs to improve his hitting. If you look around baseball a number of teams have used catchers who have lower OPS numbers and so forth but are great with the glove. My opinion, and the Yankees agree, is that Rortvedt has a future as a catcher. Sanchez is a DH who was used behind the plate because he mashed, until it finally became untenable. The Yankees were pretty sure they could unload him because of the DH being instituted across baseball. The surprise was that he wound up on the Twins team. He has enormous power, very similar to Miguel Sano. People have asked what this means for Kirilloff and Sano. Sano likes to be in the field but his defense is poor and he was slated for DH duty for the most part. Kirilloff was slated for first base and is almost adequate in the outfield, but it looks like with Sanchez at DH, the Twins will use Sano at 1B and AK in LF. The trade weakened the team at four positions. Thus, one should not compare Rotvedt and Sanchez as catchers. FWIW, I would definitely take Sanchez at DH over Rortvedt.

It's getting late early. If the Reds are really taking both Mahle and Castillo off the market, the prices for both Montas and Manaea just went up and pretty much every team is talking with the A's. Pecota and all of the projection systems aren't worth anything without pitching and defense. The lineup for tomorrow's Spring Training game might be the roster with a couple tweaks (Kirilloff, Palacios) unless the phones start working.

Yes, Rortvedt is actually a better catcher and it isn't even close. The Yankees were forced to change their thinking on catchers last season .... by their pitchers. There is nothing a pitcher can do to succeed if they cannot throw the ball in the dirt occasionally and trust their catcher. Sanchez is no more a catcher than Sano would be. He has awesome power and may be great DH. The Yankees never trade a player because of money, they trade players because they lack the skills needed to help their team win games. The Yankees only care about winning.

Agree, and nothing to lose.

Never say never (you did not), but the past and current practices of this franchise make any free agent signing unlikely that requires years and money. Subsequently, a free agent and their agents would have qualms about the Twins unless all of their demands were met. The Twins have dug a hole for themselves by eschewing free agents. Still, I have always maintained that there is no obligation by anyone to doggedly repeat their bad habits of the past. A positive future relies on current actions which hopefully include a rejection or just release of poor practice in your past.

This all seems true. However, I am open to the idea of the post. Sanchez shouldn't catch more than a couple dozen games but there is a scenario where he rediscovers his swing and is a good DH, perhaps even returning to his previous form. However (#2), this means that our current DH, Miguel Sano, must play in the field all year. I would think there is a NL team that might see Sanchez in the same hopeful fashion and if the Twins can turn him for a prospect in a team's #20-30 range of prospects, this would be a further savings for the Twins. Ditto Urshela (San Diego?).

I'm curious why the San Diego Padres are able to spend so much more on their roster than the Twins. Seems like $30-40 million more might sound about right, but they are approaching 2X. This is partially relevant to how the roster is constructed.

Sonny Gray is a really good starting pitcher. Jose Berrios is slightly better. There - it's solved. I'm sad that Berrios isn't on the Twins roster, but I'm happy we have Gray.

I think there will be changes. By putting it out there and asking .... current roster loses 100 games, which is not a #1 draft pick anymore.

.... which still made put him among the top three players on the team. Both Donaldson and Cole are consummate professionals dedicated to their craft and focused on winning; they are delighted to be on the same team because they want to win the World Series.

You have many interesting thoughts in your comments but it was likely the Yankees who suggested Urshela because he is an expensive utility player. Both Polanco and Gordon on the current roster are better at shortstop than Urshela and we want Polanco at 2B and we want to use Gordon as a utility if/of. The Twins could have, at the very least, held back Rortvedt whom I believe to hold potential going forward.

An interesting article and a wide variety of comments that all omit a most important point of inquiry. Baseball will have record revenues, a new CBA was signed, and the curse of Covid looks to be completely lifted. This should result in terrific optimism for businesses involved in the entertainment industry, including baseball. The omission is any reference to the Twins expected potential budget. Target Field was built with public funds with the express promise by Jim Pohlad that the Twins would use the increased revenues to field a competitive team. The franchise has had strong earnings and slowly increased the budgets with a particularly increased expenditure after the Falvey and Levine hires. A low budget from the conservative Twins fans put a 2022 roster at around $130 million. It would be easy to justify a $150 million team. The Josh Donaldson signing was the first foray into spending for the Twins and before the trade with the Yankees their bottom line was near $100 million. This left room for an additional $30+ million to spend using the conservative numbers. I myself built my version of a 2022 team at $120 million. All of the talk about the problems with a contract such as Donaldson's doesn't work when you look at the numbers. When I read these comments I wonder if the Twins are tipping toward $150 million and look at the numbers. Nope, they are not. If the Pohlads had paid for Target Field with their own money it would be entirely their own deal. There should be some minimum of consideration of this history. There were a number of free agents available this year. The Twins signed Dylan Bundy. While it is possible that Trevor Story could be signed, this seems unlikely if Story sticks to leaked numbers like 6/$120 million. It is totally possible that solid trades could be made, yet no two pitchers would add any more than $18 million (Manaea, Castillo) as a maximum and the best trades would only add near $9 million (Montas, Lopez) to the expense sheet. All of these moves and keeping Donaldson would have still left the team with a roster around $130 million, the preferred number by Twins Daily. What is the direction or plan for the Twins in consideration of their possible budget? What are the numbers and justification? It is impossible to have any suggestions or justify any cuts unless there is some idea of a general range of where the limits of spending stand.

Yes, your comments are all true. Which begs the question - do fans who oppose JD also oppose excellence and winning? Inconceivable.

What does this mean? I don't understand. Others have made some references to Donaldson's attitude, etc. There have been responses that called JD "cocky", which apply to virtually all decent performers. Do you know him personally? I don't but have watched him play so many times for Oakland, Toronto, Atlanta, and for the Twins. He is intense, plays great defense, is a good baserunner despite leg issues, rarely has a bad at bat, and was always one of the three best players on his team. It was also reported how much young players enjoyed learning from him. Josh Donaldson is a winner and if one wants to see their team win, then that is the style of player needed to do so.