Doctor Gast

IMO Buxton's health management experiment failed. I'm happy with any amount of time we can get Buxton on the field. But they have to figure out how to keep Buxton 100% healthy for post season. I really like Gordon & Celestino as Buxton's subs. Both Gordon & Celestino made great strides in their game from the prior year. I expect them to continue to make strides, especially Celestino this coming season. Their subbing give us a chance to win the games that Buck misses. This take pressure off management so they can rest Buck or put him on the IL if need be. If they have Buxton 100% for the post season that's being successful PS: I feel Buck will be more fortunate & play more games this season.

Thanks Lucas for your enlightening article. We all knew Balazovik had problems with his poor mechanic due to past injuries but you explained them very well. There's a lot he can work on, hopefully he'll stay healthy & they are able to fix him.

I like your idea Nick, Correa & Boras would love this contract. I don't think anyone would come close to offer this contract with this total amount of money & years, together with opt outs. But I agree with Steve this contract could very well hamstring our club. I'd suggest a lower base pay with incentives (like an escalating price based on how many games he plays, WS, championships, awards etc) that could bring this total to the ammount you recommended. I wouldn't mind giving him these yrs. & $ if it's linked to incentives. Correa & Boras egos would be satisfied with having a record salary yet it gives the club some breathing room.

I'm fine with hitting HR but training & encouraging player to elevate their launch angle and etc due to the one year juiced ball is increasing their SOs & FOs post juicedball era. They get into the habit of what they've been taught & can't adjust to the deader ball. Buxton & Polanco are not of this group, they went their own way to make a good swing on the ball & hit it hard. Yet they are leading the Twins in HRs. That's what they should teach the rest of the players.

Whole heartedly agree with you Matt. I've been saying for a long time we need a Castro-type catcher to compliment our team. When I saw Narvaez, I decided he's the one that would fit behind the plate. We are now setting our floor, so signing Narvaez makes perfect sense to set the floor. If we sign Correa we have our ideal platoon with Jeffers. If we don't sign Correa we can pivot to a Conteras/ Narvaez platoon and trade Jeffers. If we wait around and let someone else pick him up we lose our perfect platoon partner. Give Narvaez a decent offer & let him enjoy his Christmas. He signed a 1 yr./ $5MM last season, with a down offensive season offer him 2 yrs./ $9MM.

1st I'd like to thank the one who made this topic presentation more presentable. IMO PIT would want to be more competitive this season. Thus they could be interested MLB ready SP, catcher, RFer, utility and pitching prospects. We can cover these needs if PIT could be pursuaded to trade Endy Rodriguez

Bingo Tarheel! Analytics & stats are great in their place but we have to step back from solely focusing on analytics & look at reality. And the reality is this year's philosophy was to keep the player on the field as long as possible no matter what, totally backed fired. Offense was not the problem in the 1st half of '22. Even with Correa's less than sparkling bat and the implosion of the rotation & short relief, due to injuries & ineffectiveness, our offense always kept us in the game & quite often pulled out a win. The problem came in the 2nd half, when this new philosophy of play until you drop took effect. My philsophy is when there is something wrong, fix it, Don't put a bandage on it and put it back on the field at less than 50% effectiveness where the problems get worse & breaks down. Buxton hurt his knee early instead of taking care of the problem by putting him on the IL & treating it, they'd periodically gave him rest & DHed him, didn't work, Polanco who in the 2nd half of '21 singlehandedly carried the team. But around the All-star break he hurt his knee sliding, they kept playing him with his defense & offense hurting, until he could no longer make on the field and we missed his 2nd half heroics. Arraez in the 2nd half, it was obvious to me that he needed periodic rest, he got none. His #s nosedived through the half to the point of him losing his firm grip on the Batting title. Only when the management religuished their mindset and gave him some rest that he able to hold onto his crown. Royce Lewis came onto the scene early the 1st half with both guns blazing. In '22 FO came to the conclusion that Arraez (who had no danger of running into anything) was not to play OF because of his knees. Yet they put Lewis in CF, just coming off rehab from a very serious knee surgery. He reinjured his knee & he was lost for most of the season and half of the next . Buxton, Polanco, Arraez and Lewis production was sorely missed in the 2nd half. If all of these players were managed differently, they'd have joined Correa to bring us to a division title & play offs. So, should we target Abreu? Arraez's best position is 1B, I don't see him recoup enough range to be a valid 2B. 3B? maybe if you give him a ton of blazing GBs in spring training. I wouldn't consider taking on Abreu unless you are considering trading Arraez. And I wouldn't consider trading Arraez unless you can get a much needed quality talent.

It's a shame and strange about the lack of depth at catcher. We'll be hurting for a long time, IMO shows lack of insight. I think there's a shift of catchers are able to play more than one position like 1B, 3B, corner OF & even Dalton Varsho (AR- C) has been playing mainly CF. Personally I'd like them focus on catching.

Miller, Cardenas, Laweryson and Hendricks have been on my radar for some time, good players. Other 2, I haven't heard of. I imagine Laweryson is gone.

Thanks Nick for laying everything out for us. It seems like the floor work has been laid down. We just have to wait & see what shakes loose.

#1 Priority keeping our team healthy- maybe the new health guy can advise the players how to get conditioned during off the season and how prepare before the game (like Cruz did). Advise management how to regularly use long relief so our rotation & short relief will remain strong, refreshed and staving off ineffectiveness & injury. Also advise management to give breaks to player when needed, especially when they're hurting. It was really sad to see them run a hurting Polanco to the ground until he could longer take the field. If a player is hurting give him rest. If that does work put him on the IL, don't keep running a player out on the field at much less than 100%. If something needs fixing, shut him down & fix it, This will give us more effeciency & more games from each player. If they fix this problem they'll fix many others weak points. #2 Priority SS- Unfortunely our past health guy didn't advise management not play Lewis in CF,so we now have a big void at SS until he Lewis can come back. We have 2 good solutions Plan A sign Correa, Plan B get a stop gap to platoon with Farmer until Lewis can come back. #3 Priority Catcher- We can't blame the past health guy on this one, We have short & longe range problem here that needs to be seriously addressed. Which I addressed here #4 Priority SP- When #1 priority is taken care of, this is no longer a big problem. But because of the ?s with health & stamina of Mahle, Maeda and Ober- a frontline SP can help us to compete and you can't have too much SPing. I don't see high leverage RP or line up as a priority, because the solution of Priority #1 will solve both of them in the most part. But yeah, another high leverage RP and an RH bat would be nice.

I began this thread very excited about a possible Jansen trade. Catching is a big need right now so Jansen is a very viable option which I had on my blue print as my starting catcher. We'd have Jansen for 2yrs but our catching problem is bigger than 2yrs. maybe 6 yrs away so lets explore Murphy. Murphy is even a better all around catcher than Jansen and he has 1 more year of availability. But there are 2 set backs, #1 he doesn't solve our long range problem and #2 he'll costs around 2 of our top prospects which could hurt us in the future. I love the brain storming that has gone on in this thread. It has changed my view as to who's my top priority to fill this deep hole at catching. And it's talkintwins suggestion of Endy Rodriguez. As I stated before that I believe Rodriguez has the potential to be a much better catcher than even Mauer. He has the fire to excel in everything he does and in any situation. IDK what PIT is willing to accept in trade but I'm sure it be a player with plenty of availability and or prospects. If we trade a couple of prospects where we have depth for a possible future HOF and that fills a deep hole for many years to come. It'd be well worth it. SS is our short range priority and catching is our secondary priority but primary long range priority with years of no solution internally. These 2 are our major concerns, all others are minor. So Flavine jump all over this one. You'll never regret it.

Thanks talkintwinsI checked Rodriguez out and I totally agree with you. When given a chance, Rodriguez jumped from A in the end of '21 to AAA in '22 and he could be MLB ready starting '23. He could become a better catcher than Mauer. He's a skinny switch hitter that had incredible offensive #s in '22 & a lot of pop, just think what he could do when he fills out? His defense is pretty good. PIT has another catching prospect Davis which they have prized a little more, Maybe if we could offer them a couple of suitable prospects they could part with Rodriguez. That'd solve our catching problem for a very long time. So I'm with you in prioritizing in obtaining Endy Rodriguez. A catcher like him are hard to come by. We need to jump all over this one.

Miranda has the best mentor in Correa so we'll have to see at spring training, then we'll see how much we'll need Farmer. Miranda did poorly his 1st call up. It was only because Lewis got hurt playing CF, that Miranda had his 2nd chance. If Lewis was used the same way as Miranda, Miranda would have spent most his time in AAA in '22.

Yes, that'd be nice, but PIT likes to hold onto their young players and they are about to make an attempt to compete so it'll be tough to pry Rodriguez away from them. But like you say it's nice to dream, but who knows

TOR isn't OAK where they'll want viable MLB ready players. The trade won't be that expensive.

So would I, OAK would want prospects and the cost will be high. Maybe a Lee & Lewis in the trade, too expensive

I has been rumored that TOR will trade one of their catchers for some time now. According to a few Blue Jays podcasts this evening stated that TOR will more likely trade Danny Jansen. They have also said they have had quite a few offers for Jansen. Jansen is pretty good both offensively, defensively & is good with the pitchers. FanGraphs Season Team Level G PA HR AVG OBP SLG wOBA wRC+ WAR 2022 TOR MLB 72 248 15 .260 .339 .516 .363 140 2.6 One gave 2 trades rumors and one of those were the Twins. This trade rumor was ridiculous it had the Twins giving up Kepler, Balazovik & Sands for Jansen. Although this trade is ridiculous it gave me hope that the Twins were interested, hopefully they can come up with a better offer. The Jay are interested in top end pitching (we really don't have), a CF, perferrably a LH hitter or LH hitter in general. We have quite a few LH hitters. I've had my eye on Jansen before the Jays officially announced their openess to trade. What do guys think? View full rumor

.I said I agreed with the way SF used Rodon. Rodon pitched 178 innings in 31 games, that averages less than 6 innings/ game, That means he pitched some games more others less depending on pitch count & situation. The BP gets exhausted not because the rotation isn't pitching enough innings, it's because the BP is utilized with 5-6 RPs pitching 1 inning each and long relief is forgotten. Long relief is our greatest asset, many games we can have a SP going 5-6 innings and long relief goes 3-4. Tighter games you can throw in a couple high leverage short RPs. There is no stress on the rotation, long relief or short relief. Neglecting long relief is what caused exhaustion on our poor short relief which translate in overstretching our weak rotation. And that's how that worked.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

Very interesting article Nick. I've always looked at investing in FA as investing in the stock market, and the pitching market is very volitile. There's a lot of hype, spinning data from agents so you'd buy high with peaking pitchers. Like the stock market as a buyer you can't get fooled by the hype, you normally don't buy high (or you lose your shirt, if you're lucky break even), you do your due diligence. 1st you look at the CEO, you need more than a great product you need a great CEO to manage it. 2nd you need to look at underlying conditions that affects the data. I have 2 baseball examples 1st Ray, in '21, TOR saw something in Ray that the ARI wasn't doing that they could fix, they didn't fool around they went out and got him . 2nd Rodon, in '22 here I think that SF got lucky, they took a chance and that they only managed Rodon differently than CWS. With Rodon at first I was leary of his injuries but later I dug deeper and relealized something. At CWS LaRussa was old school, he wanted his SP to at least come close to complete their games. Rodon didn't fit his mold so even though Rodon had great #s, LaRussa let him go w/o a QO. I believe a lot of Rodon's early injury problems were due to him being over extended. I changed to be an advocate for the Twins to pick up Rodon if they managed him differently than LaRussa. Right now Rodon is blue chip, his stock is high with a lot of suitors, the Twins will have to pay a premium for him to come here. I'm not up on Eovaldi, is there something more that can be unlocked?Would he be a good fit? I don't know. Right now I'm not intrigued.

I expect with a normal spring training, Gray will be in shape & give us more quality innings than last year. Ryan, with a full year under his belt, I expect more quality innings. Mahle, since there seems to be no impingement, I assume he suffered from "dead arm" and will prosper under different management. The rest leaves a lot to be desired. Maeda, I'm sorry he's not going to be the Twins savior. '23 won't be a shorten season, although spring training is normal, which gives him a leg up from the pitchers last season. Yet my expectations are that he if resembles Archer's #s he'll be good. Because of his absense, Maeda needs to be put in long relief, eventually put in to spot start and see if he can profile into the rotation some time before the end of the season.Because of injuries Ober didn't progressed so I'd put him back as long relief/ spot starter along with Varland, Winder with SWR in the wings. Our rotation should be better and our short relief should be much better but if long relief isn't properly utilized then all that means is instead the whole pitching staff starting to crumble in early May, it'll start some time in June. Either way we can forget about post season. If we stay with Baldelli's formula of strictly relying on short relief then we need 2 more good SPs and maybe 2 high leverage short relief and keep Ober, Varland, Winder and SWR in AAA.

I imagine they'll extend him but there's no rush.

Indeed there is a very robust market for Hanniger. A few might need him more than us.