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ashbury

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Everything posted by ashbury

  1. ashbury
    Lane Thomas is having a career year at bat. He seems below average on defense, so if he regresses even a little he's basically Kyle Garlick, a bat on the short end of the platoon; there's a reason lefty corner bats predominate. I would not give up assets to get him.
  2. ashbury
    Next headline for Randballs Stu: "Weird Commentator Calls Twins Weird." The capsule summary (I don't subscribe so I can't see the full exposition) seems to nail the dilemma for the Twins FO though.
  3. ashbury
    Not being someone the FO is constantly looking to replace is some form of security. At present he's not going to lead the team anywhere, but it's not urgent to replace him either. Many aspiring players would dream of doing so well. I think of Eduardo Escobar, who developed some significant pop during his tenure in a similar role. He got too good, in fact, and we had to part ways via a (productive) trade when he approached free agency time. That's Castro's upside, to me. That is still not "long-term" in the way that Royce Lewis and Brooks Lee are viewed as prospects, or Joe Ryan and Pablo Lopez and Bailey Ober are. Players who stand to end up with a half-decade or more as full-load contributors.
  4. ashbury
    A lot of Willi Castro's current value is that he has a minor league option remaining, and has insufficient service time (3+ years at present) to refuse an assignment. Gordon by contrast can't be sent down, neither can the older veterans. Roster flexibility for the AAAA type of player makes someone less dispensable. If you view a couple of years as "long-term plans" then yes Castro has made it. As soon as he can't be sent down, and scuffles for a couple of months, he falls out of the plans. He needs to find one more tweak to his offense to make me think more highly of him than that. It could happen.
  5. ashbury
    My hope, based on nothing really, is that surgeons tend to be conservative, and the so-called "cleanup" involved some judgment and given the results another procedure which will be a little more aggressive is planned for as soon as the season is over. If so, it's still just a hope that it works. Something is terribly wrong at present.
  6. ashbury
    Do the Twins just basically punt on investing much in trying to sign young players for the DSL?
  7. ashbury
    Wait, you see yourself in the fictional character portrayed in the article? Hint: the writer wasn't satirizing either "side" of the trade itself.
  8. ashbury
    There's a reason he hasn't put up big innings pitched numbers: he's been placed on injury status (scroll to the bottom at the linked page) so many times 2021-23 that the Guardians renamed it the Aaron Civale List, in his honor. Send them Mahle for him. They might accept him, TJ surgery and expiring contract and all, as the better injury risk.
  9. ashbury
    I think you know what I meant by "crippled". Crippled by overt action in July. Perhaps "consciously depleted from current levels" would be more accurate? Yes, the OF is not what the FO thought they were drawing up in the winter. In any case, I don't see this as a WS winning team either, and fixing that on the fly is too expensive. I just want to field a roster in the post-season (if we have one) that is representative of what got them there. It's kind of like when minor leagues have a playoff between the first-half champion and the second-half champ, except the first-half team no longer even faintly resembles what got them there. I'd like that our presence in the post-season not be described as bush league.
  10. ashbury
    League-wide in 2023 the usual platoon splits are in evidence: Our Twins exhibit the same trend, except our lefties are even more extreme and just aren't hitting, period: "Now tell me one I haven't heard," you say? https://www.baseball-reference.com/leagues/split.cgi?t=b&lg=MLB&year=2023 https://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/split.cgi?t=b&team=MIN&year=2023 (Ignore the yellow markings - I screwed up taking the screenshot and am too lazy to redo it.)
  11. ashbury
    Gah, I double posted somehow. Mods, feel free to delete.
  12. ashbury
    Personally I'm somewhere in between the extremes on what to do at the deadline. I don't believe our post-season chances are very good and changing that outlook would be super-expensive, so any "buy" actions should be for expiring contracts and only if it can be accomplished with assets like rule-5 eligible prospects who may not be protected this year anyway. It might not be possible to swing any trades like that, and probably I'm fine with such outcome. But conversely I do think our chances of reaching the post-season are good, and in that situation I do not want to enter Game 1 with a crippled roster; I think that's an insult to paying fans in attendance. So, no to trading away Gray at pretty much any conceivable price. Perhaps we can interest another team in 25-year old prospect Seth Gray? All this assumes no ridiculous offers, in either direction and about any player. Of course I'd listen to those. Chip and a chair doesn't quite describe my view. Just, play the hand you're dealt. The AL Central determines my view for 2023.
  13. ashbury
    Yes we swept Oakland but each of the games looked like it was in jeopardy and the sweep might have gone the other way. It's maddening not to put away an opponent of that caliber when you can. It's like watching the box scores for Dallas Keuchel in his time with St Paul so far - yes the ERA is shiny, but he's allowing runners on base (or putting them there, WHIP 1.4) and just generally not putting away these AAA hitters like you would hope for someone who may turn out to be needed. The results in both cases are what you want, but the forecast of how it would go against the next level of competition isn't as rosy. I think that's where the glass half full / glass half empty discussion is coming from. We swept Oakland, yay, three wins closer to the post-season, against teams who won't be Oakland.
  14. ashbury
  15. ashbury
    If I were chief of baseball operations for a team, I'd try to rein in the urge to micromanage, but I'd set out a general principle to my GM that anyone not on his 40-man at age 25 and above is either at AAA or else has been given The Talk: "we think you might be a good coach someday, and if you would like to continue your playing career until then we'll find a spot for you to work with the younger players coming up and teach them your good work ethic by example." And then I'd want my GM's monthly written report to me to contain a section on "25-year old non-roster player progress" for the occasional exceptions to this rule. IOW, concur. Why TF is Seth Gray or DaShawn Keirsey in Wichita? Make a decision - give yourself some meaningful AAA data to make that decision - and even if you guess wrong there'll be another crop of 25-year olds this time next year.
  16. ashbury
    This explains a lot about the "business" side of signing draft picks. #20 suddenly looks like a smart pick, at less than 10% chance he actually signs. I mean, by #20 you'd otherwise be picking someone not on any other team's radar anyway. So, go sign whoever you would otherwise have taken, as an undrafted free agent, and others, to fill out whatever low-minors roster gaps you still have.
  17. ashbury
  18. ashbury
    Gray starts and wins Game 7 of the World Series. Book it. (I've said elsewhere I would not entertain offers for Gray.)
  19. ashbury
    Yes, it definitely takes everyone time. 😀
  20. ashbury
    Has the Cleveland game started yet? I really hope they lose.
  21. ashbury
    Joe Mauer's contract always was an albatross that the team had to work around.
  22. ashbury
    My recollection is that the reason was, um, a little more down to earth and non-baseball related than that.
  23. ashbury
    Somehow my fact-checking editor failed to alert me that I omitted "against LHP." I meant, against LHP, in case I was unclear. Against LHP, he's had 18 PA. Just the lefties.
  24. ashbury
    So far in the majors, Julien has been given a paltry 18 plate appearances. Those 18 have been, ahem, unrewarding. But that hasn't been his track record in the minors.
  25. ashbury
    You blew it by not asking anything about his name. I bet he never gets tired of that line of questioning.
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