Doctor Gast

The point is that our BP was more than equipped from the start with long relief to eat up those innings. The problem is they chose not to take advantage of that resource or they were totally oblivious to what they had. There is where the blame needs to lie. P.S. Archer & Bundy weren't handled properly, otherwise they'd have been more than adequate.

Agreed it makes a lot of sense to trade from our redundancy. Kepler, Kiriloff & Larnach are down in trade value because of injury & the hyper shift. So it makes sense not trade any of them until the deadline. Arraez makes the most sense because his trade value is the highest that ever be, we are out nothing if we trade Gallo. That being said more than likely Arraez & Gallo won't be traded & Kepler will be traded for a couple of poor players & or poor lottery tickets. Our biggest hole while were pursuing Correa was SS. Now after we have moved on from Correa, has that hole suddenly disappeared? No it hasn't, & should be our #1 priority to fill. While Farmer's # are very good against LHPs (which face less than 10%) and not that good against RHPs. Farmer's splits are the 1st 2 lines. Split G GS PA AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI SB CS BB SO BA OBP SLG OPS TB GDP HBP SH SF IBB ROE BAbip tOPS+ sOPS+ vs RHP 140 425 387 39 91 15 0 6 43 2 2 20 73 .235 .291 .320 .611 124 16 12 2 4 0 3 .272 75 75 vs LHP 75 158 139 19 43 10 1 8 35 2 1 13 26 .309 .380 .568 .948 79 4 4 0 2 0 0 .327 168 1 Split G GS PA AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI SB CS BB SO BA OBP SLG OPS TB GDP HBP SH SF IBB ROE BAbip tOPS+ sOPS+ vs RHP 86 239 213 29 63 8 1 2 12 1 0 23 33 .296 .367 .371 .738 79 11 1 2 0 1 1 .343 11 Luis Guillorme is the last line. Guilorme had a 1.6 WAR while only having 297 ABs, with the Twins, he could almost double that. A SS platoon of Guillorme (against RHPs) and Farmer (against LHPs) could be a very formidable force. That'd be my second step. My 3rd step would be to pick up Nelson Cruz. A RH power bat that has thrived under our environment. He might not get as many ABs as before but I believe his ABs will be premium. Plus we'll need his leadership & mentorship. Plus I'd love to see him hit his 500th HR in a Twin uniform and he'd be a great coach when he decides to move on.

I agree with Karbo that with trying to swing up or swing down at every pitch are both wrong. You go with the pitch, barrel it up & hit it hard & you get more than your share of hits & HRs w/ fewer SOs & FOs. But you said "What I do know is that the two times through the order cap on Archer and Bundy spoiled a postseason trip." What you do know is wrong. Bundy & Archer did more than they were profiled to do. To blame them for us not going to the post season is a gross injustice. We started out the season with a weak rotation & a terrible & unproven BP. Creating a hugh chasm between SP & closer. Smeltzer was our strongest SP coming out of ST (he should have stayed in the rotation), that leaves Ober, Winder & Sands in long relief, to eat up the middle innings w/o over stretching the rotation or short relief. Ignoring long relief lead to inefficiency & injuries. To blame Bundy & Archer for us not going to the post season is almost like blaming Rodon for SF not going to the post season because he averaged only around 5.5 innings/ game. That is so old school. I'm sorry Alex for venting, but I'm sick & tired of all this "negative hype" surrounding Bundy & Archer.

Kepler should play over Gallo but because of the process he won't. Because of the situation FO has put us in we'll probably have to sell Kepler at a loss. Larnach, Kiriloff, Kepler & Polanco trade value is below what it should be & none of them should be traded. Gordon is our most reliable OF & should be kept there, he's not a MLB INFer. Arraez trade value won't get any higher than what it is now and position wise will be the least missed. So he's the most obvious to trade, that said I don't believe it will happen. To answer Ted's question about Kepler's trade worth. I say not enough.

I have to admit that I've been frustrated with Kepler during this hyper shift era. I know he tried to adjust & go the other way but little & limited success. But now I believe Kepler will be one of most benefitted players from this shift ban, once he can get his natural swing back. Larnach, Kiriloff & Kepler have had a poor season due to injury & the shift, so I'm not crazy to trade any of them. But with the stupid signing of Gallo well have to make another stupid move by trading Kepler for poor players and or poor lottery tickets. The only trade I'm open for is either Marquez (CO) or Montas (NYY). I'd rather flip Gallo but with his high salary we'll have pay someone to take him once he's available. I can't stress enough how stupid this Gallo signing is. Where we would lose someone better than him or prevent us getting someone who we really need.

I'm sure what a salary cap entails, I'm not in favor of directly limiting one's payroll. There should be a much stiffer fine & the monies are then redistributed through out the rest of the teams with strict stipulations that it'd be use for payroll. That'd curb this situation & would motivate the other teams to raise their payroll that'd some what equalize things more gives more teams to compete.

I'm not for anyone to monopolize anything just because they can. Things have gotten way out of line for too long. If Baseball can't fix it, then the government needs to.

My sentiments exactly, I'd hope that after this, the majority of non big market teams could get together to level the playing field,

A freudian slip is an unintentional error that stems from a subconscious feeling. I'm not sure what that feeling is, Maybe it was tramatic experience I had when they traded Rogers for him?

I expect pretty much what Baseball Reference projected. Verlander & Maeda are two completely profiled pitchers. Verlander is profiled as an ace work horse & Maeda is profiled as a spot starter/ long reliever that had a perfect storm in 2020. Don't get me wrong, I think Maeda is a very good pitcher and if he's eased in slowly in relief, IMO he'll be successfull & help the Twins. But if he's rushed into a starting role, it won't be good for any of us. BTW I'm completely against trading him.

I think Correa's response that he doesn't want to restructure is an ego thing & maybe some kind of ploy. What it really boils down to is Correa really wants to play for the NYM but at the original salary & Cohen really wants Correa but with at a restructured salary. IMO it'll eventually gets done. By signing Gallo they didn't really kept their powder dry. If they sign Correa they couldn't do anything else. I think that this FO burned up too many creative brain cells coming up with their last creative offer so if there any creativity it has to come from Boras again?.

Cool ?

Gallo is more a negative than a positive (keep him out of CF), Wallner like Garlick should be used rarely, only when needed. Our 3B, SS, 2B has no quality depth at this point but an above avg. SS that can hit righties will drastically improve this INF.

Cohen has broken the façade that MLB is fair and the luxury tax is curbing unrestraint. I hope this will wake up the other owners to unite & establish a more rigid fine. That a champion team shouldn't be bought but developed through scouting, drafting, coaching & trading. A fine should be invoked that'll help the other teams to compete with increased profit sharing.

Bingo! And how about Sir Johan Santana show our pitchers how to perfect their circle change up.

Agree 100%, FO has focused & hoarded big bats. Their strategy is hit HRs. To h*** with base running & defense. This philosophy has filtered into the drafting, coaching and obtaining players via FA. Yes injuries & fear of injuries has filtered it's way into the equation but still makes the game very boring.

Prielipp will be difficult to evaluate until he actually settles into pro ball. Martin is ready to take his next step and E Rod has a lot of potential which eventually will materialize. Noah Miller got pushed out of the top 10 by the new draftees & break out players. He's still young & he'll continue to be steady until he breaks out

Our biggest problem is health, part of it is luck & I think that part will get better. And other part is management which I hope will get better. Under those condition the whole team will get better. Hopefully Miranda will get better with Correa's mentoring but Jeffers is in a big rut, Vasquez can mitigate the problem by keeping Jeffers to face only LHPs. Under those conditions, Jeffers will improve yet his inability to throw out runners makes me wonder why FO consider him as our future. From the beginning of last offseason I was advocating to trade off Jeffers. We have no one close to the MLB in the organization (Cardenas has potential but he's far away, hopefully he'll materialize but this soon you can't depend on it). So I still advocate to trade Jeffers, we are wasting our time with him. We need to obtain an impact MLB ready catcher to sit under Vasquez.

3 yr. possibility or most likely a 1 yr. deal there was no reason to dive into long term digression. But with 13 yrs, 12yrs. or even 10yrs. this past injury does raise red flags. Hopefully the Twins saw this in the medicals & took it into account when drawing up the offer. But the fact they wanted to investigate the situation after SF balk, makes me think that maybe they didn't. NYY has already sold millions of $ in tickets, so they'll not back out of the deal although they'll try their best to reduce the years as much as possible to satisfy the insurance risk. I believe both parties are motivated to get this deal done. I'm not sure if MN is in position to make a shot at Correa even if both parties are interested.

Nice job Nick, to show us what to expect. I think the problem with Pagan, Duffy & Rogers was that they were missed profiled. MN believed Pagan & Duffy could pitch high leverage, they failed miserably from the start. SD profiled Rogers as a classic closer (able to close consecutive games regularly) which surprisingly he was elite and didn't give up a run in Apr. w/ 9 saves. He didn't give up a run until well into the 1st week in May. He had a pretty good May w/ 9 more saves. June is where he started to lose it. I was surprised that it didn't happen sooner because he's not a classic closer. SD had no idea how to use Rogers. LaRussa is old school & tried to make Rodon into a classic SP (to pitch 7+ innings regularly). Because he fell short of LaRussa's expectations he was released. Teams were hesitant to sign Rodon for fear of his injury history. SF signed him and was able to profiled Rodon correctly by pitching him 5-6 innings sometime 7 if situation was right. Because of it they reaped the benefits. I believe they can profile Rogers correctly, and they can see his true value, that's why they offered that $33MM/ 3yr contract. I'm happy for Rogers for being in SF where he'll be used right & pitching w/ his brother.

There's talk we need to sign a FA high end reliever, If we had extended Rogers it'd have been much cheaper. They blindly traded for Pagan believing he & Duffy could handle the job w/o realistically evaluating the outcome (I was absolutely against the trade from the beginning). Causing chaos just because they wanted to save a few bucks. Just because Rogers can't pitch regularly on back to back days doesn't make him worthless. Rogers got that $33MM/ 3yrs. because the league knows what he has & is willing to pay for it.

I think FO had been pretty cocky in '21 & '22 where they thought they could pick up anyone & transform them into a BP star. Thus they thought they could let Rogers go & make Pagan shine in '22 & Colume' in '21.

It'd be tough for me to give up Thielbar

I am expecting that Gray, Mahle & Ryan could give us some innings but I have more doubts about Maeda & Ober. I think a large long relief/ spot SPs of Maeda, Ober, Varland, Winder & SWR could be very beneficial by eating a lot of innings, plus taking pressure off the rotation & short relief. Sands & Ronny Henriquez could be rotating into the long relief role. This spot SP/ long relief could also be very valuable for getting our prospects feet wet w/o putting too much strain on them. And at the same time keeping everyone fresh & strong throughout the season & ready for the post season. I'm happy Craig Kimbrel is off the board.

Your article isn't too long, you did a good job. "The Proposal: The Twins receive: Rafael Devers The Red Sox Receive: Luis Arraez, Max Kepler, A Player to be Named Later " Sounds about right, Richard, for a year of Devers. I agree with you that SPing isn't our major need, yet I don't believe 3B is (IMO an above avg. SS & a high upside MLB ready catching prospect is our major need).