Doctor Gast

Due to bad management, a lot of burden were put on our rookies & they raised to the occasion producing to the best of their abilities. Hoping next season they'll be put in better positions to progress. Sims outperformed all of them & acted like a MLBer. Congratulations to Sims!

You will trade away a potential SP in Jax for RP prices? Doesn't make sense, Cubs won't pay SP prices. I can't see destroying our catching position by paying down Vazquez's salary in a trade, just to nullify a $10M mistake. We are loaded in good prospects in the OF & SP. It's not solving any problems only creating new ones.

Just to clarify myself to some in my statement about keeping Garver & Rortvedt & trading Jeffers. 1.) I've always stressed the necessity of picking up a promising young MLB-ready catching prospect, With the understanding of phasing out Garver as the #1 catcher to Rortvedt while phasing in the new prospect. So it's not comparing present Vazquez/ Jeffers to Garver/ Rortvedt but more like comparing in the past Garver/ Rortvedt/ promising prospect to Jeffers/ Sanchez; present Rortvedt/ Promising prospect/ maybe Garver doing some subbing in a pinch to Vazquez/ Jeffers; future promising prospect/ Rortvedt to Jeffers/ Carmargo. 2.) Under this premise there was no need to pay for an expensive FA (Vazquez) or another expensive FA after he leaves. Jeffers had more trade value than Garver & Rortvedt together, which would give us better options. I never liked how NYY handled Rortvedt yet he was Gerrit Cole's private catcher. While with TB he has hit much better. TB looking for a 2nd catcher isn't slam on Rortvedt but it's how teams manage these days. This ordeal has passed & nothing we can do about it but hopefully learn from our mistakes. And I am very concerned about how little attention is given to drafting & developing our young catchers, Which is the best & cheapest way to produce our catchers.

Great we have some common ground. I believe Urshela wasn't on the '23 roster & although Solano & Taylor contributed well with the team, I didn't consider them as core. IMO they were more placeholders for others coming up.

Why did the Twins sign Vazquez in the 1st place? Because Jeffers can't handle primary catching duties. FO's hope after trading away Garver & Rortvedt was that Jeffers could, but he has bombed. Later hoped with the help of Vazquez, Jeffers would grow into it, but he hasn't. After Vazquez leaves, we have nobody to take his place. And I'm afraid Jeffers will flounder again because we have no one in the system that can take up the slack. Going to FA agency again will not be cheap & because we have no one else I'm afraid that the Twins will extend Jeffers with a ridiculous contract because Boras is his agent for an average at best catcher. What should the Twins do? In the 1st place, they shouldn't have traded Garver & Rortvedt & traded Jeffers instead. Then the contract Vazquez wouldn't have been needed & we would gotten much more for Jeffers in trade to plug more of our holes namely pitching at the time. But that time has passed. We desperately need an above-average catcher for the future. Vazquez is gone after this season & Jeffers has 2 more years. IMO extending Jeffers should be out of the question. Since we signed Vazquez, I've advocated trading Jeffers & pick up 2 very promising young MLB-ready catcher for Vazquez to have 3 years to mentor. 2 years have been wasted but we still have one more year for Vazquez to mentor such a catcher. I don't see Falvey having vision enough past this offseason so I see the Twins not doing anything & really hurting at catching for many years after Vazquez is gone. Because picking up another decent catcher in FA will not be cheap & I don't see Falvey able to initiate a decent trade for one.

IMO motivation & lack of veteran leadership had a lot to do with performance down the road. There was a lot of complaining about Lewis's arm slot when he threw. Teach him how to throw, help him to achieve that through coaching. Don't force him in a position he doesn't feel comfortable in, that'll zap any motivation he has. I actually thought Julien improved at 2B, where he finally got to balls that normally bleed through. He couldn't make the play but still it's progress although stats paint a different picture. W/o Correa, the veteran leadership wasn't there so younger players were lost. Although FO made a lot of meaningless moves, they did nothing to really help the club while social media blamed ownership. This robs the team of motivation, w/o motivation it's a very long season.

We have basically the same core that advanced in the '23 postseason all we need to do is the same as this season fill the holes & not continue to make new holes. The CWS had a great young team the problem was that they lacked good veteran leadership w/o it they fell apart. IMO you need great veteran leadership to mentor & stabilize the younger ones. W/o Correa & Buxton for an extended amount of time, we didn't have viable veteran leadership to hold a younger team together & they fell apart. Although I don't see much change from last year (unless Falvey gets lucky & another team drops a needed pitcher in his lap).

Simms was not expected to contribute anything to this club by most fans & maybe even the head honchos. But by his extra effort, he helped to make us more respectable, keeping us in games & winning games he started in a disappointing season. In a disappointing season, Simms is a bright spot as a rookie.

Like I said it was a lose/ lose/ lose deal. MN lost, SEA lost & Polanco lost. The ridiculously bad season that a healthy Polanco is obvious that he had a terrible time adjusting away from MN where he gave his all. Plus being tormented by the fans there. The MLB highlight '24 commercial of Polanco robbing a hit to start a DP that killed an opponent rally is a constant reminder in what can do defensively from a player better known for his hitting.

Unlike you Nick, I don't think the season was won or lost by blowing out or losing some games to poor teams. But by what management did or more importantly, didn't do. We started out in better shape in '24 in better shape than we had in a while, after having good success in the '23 postseason. We had a great core with great chemistry, healthy Buxton, Correa, Lewis, Polanco, Miranda, Kiriloff with promising Wallner & Julien. Only a hole left by Gray that could be filled with the stepping up of Ryan, Ober, Paddack & picking up of a mid-rotation, inning-eating arm via trade, to take off the pressure off the BP & rotation. If done nothing we'd still be under budget. FO did nothing to fill that hole but added frivolous salaries that did nothing to help, and some were even detrimental. IMO our season would have been worse if not for the surprising effort of our rookies SWR, Martin, Festa & Matthews. Because of the lack of depth in the rotation SWR, Festa & Matthews were abused that manifested in poor performance towards the end of the season. Margot was a total waste, Martin was a rookie that needed to be eased into CF & while adjusting to MLB pitching, he needed to face only LHPs but veteran Margot had that special treatment & because Margot was subpar at CF, Martin had fulltime CF duty while Buxton was down. That really weighed him down. W/o Margot, Martin would have faced only LHPs & Keirsey would have handled the lion's share of CF & RHPs duties. Keirsey's hitting could not have been any worse than Margot's but his glove would have really helped, while gaining valuable experience for the future that was wasted on Margot. Although Lewis has been a good leader under Correa & Buxton & under short periods carried the team. But while they were down for any amount of time he folded & we were depended on veteran Santana for leadership. There was a lot of hype about Santana's leadership & clubhouse chemistry that'd replace Polanco, when he was acquired. But that never happened. When we needed him the most, he did nothing to help turn the ship around. While watching Polanco highlights all you'd hear was Mr. Clutch & he was the heart & soul of the team. I know Polanco would eventually leave but this year was not the year. The Polanco trade was a lose/ lose/ lose situation doomed to fail from the start. Making us weaker. His leadership, chemistry & clutch hitting was sorely missed. Before the deadline all our BP acquisitions failed & we needed a LHRP. All we needed was a simple trade that never happened & what they did was a laugh. What I'm talking about isn't hindsight but something I've preached all season. & I have even mentioned the poor philosophies that have hurt this team.

I was dead set against the Rogers, Rooker/ Paddack, Pagan trade. In '22 we desperately needed a strong BP. extending Rogers on a reasonable contract made perfect sense. but FO out-smarted us by picking up a promising young SP & a RP they could turn into a closer together with Duffy. Everybody knew Paddack's arm was going to fall off but that didn't stop them from showcasing him & Pagan. We wasted our money on them in '22. Paddack wasn't going to be around long enough to show any gain (only loss) so they extended him with a generous contract. Paddack's hype was he was going to fill the Gray hole in innings & production (that didn't happen). Falvey is more concerned about looking good than the good of the team. That said, we won't get anything for him in trade, FO will still want to see more in return from him & we still need veteran depth in the rotation. So IMO he'll stay here in the rotation until he can't.

Agreed, IMO the problem wasn't salary it was management. If FO had an extra $30M they would have spent it on the likes of Hoskiins, Montgomery & MAT. The culprits were bad player evaluation, bad philosophies & inability to initiate necessary trades. Yet the Pohlads supported the sources of our problems which tells me that the Pohlads are ignorant of the game & they are ignorant because they don't care. If they don't care how do they expect us to care?

Yes Santana's defense is better but he has had forever to perfect it & like Nick said 1B defense doesn't carry much weight. While Miranda, Kiriloff & Julien & has had very time there. Finally, keep Kiriloff & Miranda at 1B & keep them healthy to improve our offense. Trade Julien if we can get good value from him because IMO I doubt he'll return to where he was before the pitchers adjusted to him & when Kiriloff starts showing what he can do, then we can start to think about trading him.

Lawson fits perfectly into Falvey's style, so I say absolutely not. The farther away from that style the better.

Totally agree. We have a lot of options at 1B W/O Santana. Miranda's inefficiency is injury-related, when injured fix him we have others who can fill in. Don't go long periods of sub-performances. During that period I didn't hear anything about any injury but how bad he was I knew something was wrong, why didn't Baldelli?

How refreshing! Common sense. What Falvey does best is somehow spin stats & hype & shift blame through social media.

Totally agreed. Not a surprise, Flavine was a waste of resources. Cutting Levine was a financial move either way he should have been cut earlier because Falvey did what he wanted independent of Levine. I like Levine & wish him well. I don't expect anything to change with all the firings because of what was needed to be done was not done & won't be done. Firing of Watkins & Conger would be the only significant move left undone if they were really serious about making any impact.

For the last few years, AL Central quality of competition has been very low while the NL West competition is crazy while teams try to keep up with LAD. But I agree CLE player development is very good that makes them competitive.

Besides Falvey & Baldelli being the ones that should be fired. Watkins & Conger should be. Because of Watkins's terrible job as 3B coach & Conger as failure of our organizational catching development.

I had doubts about Popkins when we signed him. afraid because of his HR success that he'd be good only to support this all-or-nothing-hitting approach. But hearing testimonies of him helping players to adjust away from this approach I changed my mind. FO was very clear that they'd double down on their philosophy no matter our SO problem. Spring training focused on Falvey's all-or-nothing approach. The league had the book on Falvey's all-or-nothing approach. SOs increased but HRs greatly decreased. Twins' offense plummeted & slumped. Popkin was blamed for their struggles to take away attention from the real problem of faulty hitting approach. Baldelli declared the change of hitting approach to players taking better ABs. Popkins did a great job of incorporating the new approach that turned the Twins around and talks of firing Popkin stopped. After the absence of veteran leadership of Correa & Buxton, the offense began to wane. When offense wanes & we need to score runs the tendency is to focus on hitting HRs. The offense reverted back to their old ways & the Twins went into a tail-spin again that they never recovered. To take the focus off the real problem again, Popkins has become the sacrificial lamb. Popkins is a good hitting coach, his only fault is obeying orders. Firing Popkin will not make us better.

SD has good player evaluations that's why they make good decisions in spotting good talent & problem spots. Beyond this, Prueller is great at initiating necessary trades, Falvey is terrible at both. These are the big differences between our teams. Twins should have dumped Falvey & find a FO more like Prueller.

Should we move on from Levine? Not necessarily. You hardly hear from Levine but the little I hear from him makes sense, but Falvey does the opposite. Falvey does what he wants, Levine has very little say in what he does. So I don't blame Levine at all with Falvey blunders. Since Falvey is resigned, Levine is of little use. So I expect that Levine will be another sacrificial lamb before Falvey's bad philosophies & inability to initiate necessary trades.

Oh, Mike, I've never said I dislike Jeffers at any time. I've always said I've liked him, Through unbiased observation I don't see him having the stuff to be a primary catcher, no matter how much Falvey wants him to be. He's played much less than 100 games at catcher this season & he still can't maintain any productivity. Any productivity wanes as the season progresses. My opinion is consistent & IMO he hasn't proven me wrong.

Jeffers is an excellent backup catcher, his bat & especially his glove are much better when he is played less & efficiency goes down more when he's used more. His trade value was high last season & he's not a extension candidate because he's not a primary catcher & he'll be expensive as a Boras client, so I advocated to trade him. I would have kept Rortvedt than signing Vazquez but since we did I'd have picked up a potential elite MLB-ready catching prospect for Vazquez to mentor. Even though Jeffers is FO's choice, he still should be traded.

Good luck with that. Unless he is dropped in their lap & they are sold. It won't happen.