Doctor Gast

Dobnak isn't very well-liked at TD. Twins is a very good pitching organization & they see value in keeping him. If he is absolutely not a MLB pitcher he'd be gone no matter what we owe him. I see very little hope for Dobnak here at MN. But there are many teams who are far worse, with until recently ROX has been the worst. IMO Dobnak is a fit there, maybe some SP, RP at the very least the same way the Twins have been using him. There can be a book written filled with players who have been deemed unfit for MLB & even MiLB & come back & become credible MLBers with a team that takes a chance on them.

What Justin does, isn't any different than buying a house, fixing it up then flipping it only a much larger scale with companies.

I've said it a lot, players are like stocks. When you see an excellent solid company if you have a chance to buy low you jump on it. I don't care about his past injuries or past slump. I look at the person, a guy who can bounce back from anything, a guy like Correa who can eventually rally the troops, a leader who has a good grasp of the game. Unless the Twins go crazy & put him in the OF IMO his big injuries are behind him. This is the time to invest in Lewis, not when he has put in a full year of MVP baseball. Stop wasting money on expensive FA, invest it in extending our key players before we lose them. Lewis is the 1st I'd extend.

I consider core players as a combination of players who have proven themselves in '23 as valuable, foundational, leaders, and winners, who work well together. Those who are still with the Twins are Correa, Buxton, Lopez, Lewis, Ober, Ryan, Castro, Duran, Jax & Vazquez. IMO a winning formula If we trade any of them it'd greatly affect the continuity of the team.

I heard that Santana wanted a 3yr deal (he's probably tired of 1 yr deals & figures he'll try for more), which I agree it doesn't make sense & he's not going to get it, IMO once we get up the middle set we don't need a GG at 1B & aim much higher with offense.

Yeah, I really want him, We have to really show him that he's very much wanted & needed here. & make every legal effort to make it worth his while.

We should send you Tom, I like your Japanese & enthusiasm. From the beginning, I've been advocating for Roki Sasaki, I placed him right away on my TD blueprint. We are famous for our MN nice, with Sasaki we can become perennial contenders & hopefully throw in a WS. You'll be hailed as our main hero, You can have your own chef. There is no threat whatsoever of earthquakes or tsunamis. We have the highest International bonus money. Our pitching program is one of the tops. So our focus is to make you the best you can be as a pitcher & a person. Let us know if you need anything. We'll try very hard to make you feel right a home. I'd have the scenery of our beautiful nature filled with streams & lakes filled with beautiful blue eyes blonds & relaxing music. I'd show expectant enthusiasm, not meh, we won't get you anyway.

You don't cast a net in the creek behind your house in Mpls. & expect a big walleye to wander into your net. you go where the walleyes are. 1st see where the fat (an expensive player that can easily be replaced) is. Then, for example, Rox needs pitching desperately & they have holes everywhere. You go make an offer that generously fills a couple of their holes & you throw in Dobnak, who also fills a hole. There's a good market for Paddack, go & find them & make a deal. Don't expect by putting up a Fire Sale sign up, FOs will come flocking to you & offer big juicy trades that fill our needs. Don't trade away players we need, especially in the core, so to sign an expensive player we don't need. Falvey wants Santana to come back, after a career year, he's projected at a 1.1 WAR, which is his high ceiling. Miranda is projected at 1.5 WAR & that's his low floor. Santana wants a 3-year deal at +$7M, we can't afford his years or money, Miranda is free. Defense was a problem last year, the focus has to be up the middle. Margot is gone & Keirsey finally gets his chance & especially shines defensively. CF is resolved. Our biggest hole is 2B., Julien is a liability both defensively & offensively now, trade him. We can start Lewis, Lee, Castro, or even Martin, with Keaschall in the wings, we don't need him. Even with Vazquez defensively, we are in the bottom half of the league. We have to seriously look for an upgrade not only now but especially for the future. There are a few options out there, go & deal for them. IMO we could use a platoon/safety net at 1B. My target is low valued Romy Gonzales (BOS), he has 4yrs availability, absolutely mashes LHPs & very solid defensively who can play anywhere in the INF or OF. So if he's not needed at 1B (hopefully) he can platoon at RF or anywhere. Go & deal for him Our BP is packed with non option pitchers. I'm in favor of moving Jax to the rotation to replace Paddack. Our rotation should be pretty much set. We need a LHRP, we need to target Nardi (MIA), go & deal for him. Once settled in the BP Varland will take off & needs to be placed on the active roster. I love our core, don't touch the core, resist & stay out of FA. With minor changes via trades, we can be postseason battlers. FO creativity didn't work last season, it won't work this season. Don't sit around & wait. Just Go & Do It!

I'm with you Fire. By all means trade for him & put him on the 40-man. IMO it'd be beneficial all the way around. Castellano as mop-up might not work out & him having options gives us more options.

Castellano IMO isn't a true long RP, he's the mop-up guy. A guy they put in when the game is out of reach. He needs to be mentally ready for that role. Yet most certainly a necessary role to save on the arms. As a true long RP who comes in early to keep us in the game & pitching multiple innings. Usually the pen get shot then the rotation before we get to the postseason if they aren't taken care of. I'd like it better if we could work out a trade to have him on the 40-man yet have options. But that's up to PHI.

I'd think after netting over a cool $billion they wouldn't split hairs over a million here or a million there.

For me hitter is much more difficult to choose. 1st I'd limit it to WS winners, still that list would be Harper, Mack, Brunasky, & Smalley. Brunasky sticks out more, Harper to hit like that as a catcher. Mack was the best pure hitter but it's between Brunasky & Smalley who I think they'll choose being linked to the Twins longer.

Ted Schwerzler is a professional writer. While with TD he wrote many insightful & memorable articles. During his time at TD, it was also obvious that his sources grew. There are many baseball writers out there who are much more well known, that I think are full of baloney. I hope that Ted is a little prejudiced but in this article, he has brought a more balanced view of this subject, whereas before social media consensus was saying MN has absolutely no chance so trade all your International bonus money to LAD. There might have been private conversations to big markets that he wasn't afraid of them, to keep negociations open to everybody but Wolfe's press conference, to my knowledge, didn't say that he wasn't afraid of big cities, to the contrary that smaller markets were more beneficial. Odds aren't 100% nor are they 0%, they're somewhere in between. You think it's 0, I like our odds much better than you. IMO MN clicks all the known boxes & maybe some unknown ones like there aren't any earthquakes or tsunamis in MN. It's a crap shoot but MLB has given us the money which is tied for the most, Who has the presentation that Sasaki likes best (IMO has purposely left out a lot of info just to cut the BS) is the winner. So it's in the Twins' best interest to pitch one doozy of a presentation. BTW Twins' pitching program isn't going anywhere no matter who owns the club.

Santana had a career year last season playing healthy because he was playing 1B & yet he's projected with 1.1 WAR/ 546 PA. I'm not a big fan of WAR because it doesn't take enough into account the defensive factor. But at 1B where defense isn't as much of a factor, it's much more reliable of a factor of player's worth. Yet Miranda who was coming off shoulder rehabilitation played a good chunk of his time at 3B. Like Kiriloff who came off shoulder rehabilitation (played a good chunk in the OF) hurt their backs. While healthy they were phenomenal but after they got hurt they tanked. Twins moved Keaschall to 1B (he never played there before professionally) to save his arm. Secret, keep Miranda healthy by keeping him at 1B. Even with a disappointing overall season, Miranda is projected at 1.5 WAR/ 455 PA. Forget about the social media hype that Santana has any factor in the clubhouse or that we have to have his glove. Do the math, IMO Santana's 1.1 is his ceiling & Miranda's 1.5 is a very low floor. 1B is not a defensive priority but it is to the Twins because they want Julien to look passable at 2B. Secret, keep Julien off 2B so we don't have to get an expensive defense 1st 1Bman. Better yet trade him because he's a liability both defensively & offensively because the league taken away his HR advantage even if he adjusts. Santana, no matter what social media & the Twins say, was a mistake for many reasons. Primarily, it was a lost year for Miranda's MLB experience at 1B which he could become better. It saddens me when I hear this nonsense of making this mistake all over again, of paying Santana $7M+ over multiple years when we have a much better player in Miranda for free!(?) Please Falvey this shouldn't even be an option in your head much less speak it out. Please TD bros. before smashing the thumbs down, take everything I said into account even though it goes against what you've been fed.

It's very hard to know what's in the head of the Twins. They shouldn't regret a player who fell into their laps, who's the center of the core that stabilized the INF & who was the main reason we broke the curse of winless playoff games. Many players I think they wouldn't trade, they trade. Many players they shouldn't trade for, they trade for & become a main stay blocking more deserving players. Many players they shouldn't sign they sign & give them sweet deals. Most things the Twins do surprise me. Somebody is feeding this kind of crap to the media, most likely it's the FO being creative. So maybe they do regret it or more likely they are getting really bad offers on their Fire Sale & Falvey is expanding it so he can have enough money to blow in FA, instead of economically investing it in our key players, who we'll end up losing.

Mudcat Grant then Worthington

I'm a big fan of analytics, analytics has revolutionized MLB. Analytics is here to stay. Here is a rant by Will Clark. I especially don't like his language but he has something very important to say. & I hope the new owners will take note. https://www.sfgate.com/giants/article/will-clark-sf-giants-analysts-message-19822038.php As I said, Analytics has revolutionized MLB. But many have gone crazy with it, taking the heart and soul out of the game of Baseball and morphing it into a cold fantasy game driven by stats, where how things look on a spreadsheet is much more important than the reality of results. IMO Baseball needs to be managed (coaches, managers, FO, etc) by players who know & have a feel for the game while still having people to assist with the analytical part. Baseball is played by real people so there is are so many variables & intangibles that analytics can't analyze. Farhan Zaidi had striped SF of its tradition, along with its heart & soul & putting analytics front & center. IMO many teams have allowed analytics to take over the game. Prioritizing HRs & practically abandoning all other aspects of the game because HRs is what really counts in analytics. Managers can no longer go with their gut feelings. catchers are supposed to go by spreadsheets & transfer what analysts tell them to call, Forget about having a feel for the game or command of the field or be praised to be able to do so. The route that Farhan Zaidi took did not produce winners. Many teams are like SF where they have really good teams on paper but can't win. They often do weird things on the field & in the offseason but it makes perfect sense on paper. I don't consider myself as old school, I like the changes & ABS can't come soon enough. I love baseball, Buster Posey is a baseball guy, who loves the game & he has gut instincts that only baseball guys have. SF made the right call.

Cubs also signed Carson Kelly (C) which limits our options

Great article! That gives great hope. Loves these guys' attitude. Even though they won't takeover the Twins right away. Hope it affects how the FO reacts this offseason.

Hope the Pohlads would be as excited as everyone else & be very reasonable in their dealings. A change can't come quick enough. & hope that the brothers know more about baseball than the Pohlads.

Yes we aren't that far off. I was open to take on Bauer because I thought our clubhouse was solid enough, we really needed him, he was cheap, he had changed & he was a competitor. Right now IMO he isn't an option.

I thought Bill Amick would have been taken before we got him in the 2nd round which makes us fortunate. While Lewis still at 3B so far with Lee probably taking over, eventually Correa & Culpepper moving there. It'll be a pretty crowded position. But I wish him well, you never know what pans out at the end. It's good to know that we have him as a good option if & when we need him.

I'm sorry Greg, IMO clubhouse chemistry is super important, The change in clubhouse chemistry last season was the difference in correcting the plane in a nosedive & crashing. The loss of Polanco, now Kepler, later Vazquez maybe Correa or Lopez maybe more core players. And you think adding Grandal & Pham will help us? 1st their bad chemistry, 2nd they cost more than I'd want to pay for them & 3rd they aren't that good & IMO we can do much better elsewhere or in-house. Twins had great chemistry when they got Donaldson. But even so they couldn't take Donaldson & we took a big hit in trading him. But thanks for the interesting article.

If you follow me at all, you'll know that I'm very pro '23 core that did so well in the postseason that easily could be competitive with minor trades here & there to fill the holes this & last season & very much against Falvey's creativity of subtracting from the core, creating more holes while not filling prior holes & adding where we don't need it. I never said that they're never competitive, there are times when things fall into their laps but I don't count on them doing it independently on their own. Yet I remain hopeful every year that something could fall into their laps (Roki Sasaki) despite their bunglings.

We had a very competitive core that was very successful in '23. In '24 we were creative & tinkered with the core, traded needed players to afford players we didn't need. Where did that get us? Now they want to be more creative & disrupt more the core & bring in more outside players to fill positions that our own in-house players can do. We need a strong rotation, keep the core. Why do we want to weaken it? We need to be strong up the middle: Buxton & Keirsey at CF. Correa at SS, Lewis at 2B & Vazquez & Jeffers at catcher. We have been very fortunate at catcher that both Vazquez & Jeffers remain healthy because we have nobody who can cover them. If we eliminate Julien at 2B we'll become much better defensively. The right corners we have become more offensive. We have very good support group & people off the bench with Emma & Keaschall ready to be called up sometime during the season. IMO we need to stop being creative & make minor trades to fill our holes to supplement our core. Trade away our fat to make budget.