mlhouse

Five things the Twins must do this offseason. 1. While I like Paul Molitor, and can even be convinced he is a good manager, I don't think he is a good manager for this rebuilding team. The team needs to find a manager that is adept at developing young talent and has the patience to work on their mistakes and lose games, this offseason. 2. Instead of fantasies of acquiring, in any manner, a top level starter this team needs to commit to its young core group that isn't even close to the majors today. Kiriloff, Lewis, Rooker, Gordon amongst others need to get full commitments from the team at the major league level. These guys need to work in with the other younger players we have on the roster and we need to find the bulk of a lineup and staff we can move forward with AND compete. Even though this will cost us losses in 2019, doing so sooner rather than later will save losses in the future. 3. THey need to move on from Joe Mauer. While Mauer is the only semblence to an identity that the Twins have and he is still a serviceable player, he can only play a position that the Twins need to work defensive limited players like Sano and Austin through the lineup. With Mauer entrenched at first it severely limits what the team can do. 4. Again, with respect to Berrios, the team needs to do the opposite of what the orginal poster suggests. While I agree that Berrios is a solid player, there is no sense in extending him while the team still has control. In professional sports, four years is the long run, and many of the variables can change in that time, and the leverage still remains if they want to lock him up next season. But there are also downside risks. WHy lock up a guy at a contract value significanly higher than what he would get under team control and then have him encounter an injury. Instead, the team should maintain their financial flexibility and then HOPE that Berrios deserves a huge contract when the period of team control expires. 5. WIth respect to Buxton, again, the proper course is just the opposite suggested by the OP. His performance as a major league baseball player does not warrant anything beyond the minimum contract offer, and an aribitrator is going to see it that way too. Give him the minimum. Make him hungry. Make him inspired. Push him to EARN more. If Buxton gets back on the field committed then he can easily earn everything that is due.

The Twins are a rebuilding team and rebuilding teams do not have "needs" unless "talent" can be listed as a need. Of their 25 man roster, they have perhaps 3-4 answered questions: 1. starting pitcher J.J. Berrios (and even his upside level unanswered) 2. 3rd-4th starting pitcher Kyle Gibson 3. 3rd-4th stating pitcher Jake Odorizzi 4. quality corner outfielder Eddie Rosario Beyond that everything is unknown and the Twins did not do much to answer those questions. Now, the real question is how will management respond. Will they plug in a bunch of mediocre players they can sign on the cheap and give us more of the same? Or will they tear it apart and enter serious rebuilding? I say they will do the former and 2019 figures to be another lsot season..

When you talk about hte "health" issue, shouldn't that be an argument to get him up to the majors as fast as you can? Every inning that he pitches in the minors is just increasing the probability he injures his arm before he ever reaches the major leagues. The Twins, as a rebuilding team, have needed to commit to developing players at the major league level and htye just seem to refuse, preferring to pretend their minor league system develops the players adequately (which has been proven over and over not the case) and playing non-prospect mediocrities instead. I get that the team believed they could compete this season but that shows that they had delusional thoughts based on a blip season of 2017. Instead, they should have committed to the young prospects and sorted them out. Find out if a guy like Romero or Gonsalves, or even Wells, can pitch at the major league level. After they moved through their prospects, then bringing in startes like Odorizzi and Lynn, or the veteran relievers like Reed and Duke to fill in were required.

I am sure that the Twins have great plans of bringing some of these guys up in the 2020's. Next season Tyler Wells will be 24 years old. If, as someone suggests, he starts in AA and then gets a whiff of AAA late in the season, then do the same the following season, AAA with late MLB call up, he will not make his real full season debut with the big league team until he is 26. Players of his potential should be entering their 2nd or 3rd year of major league baseball by the time they are 26. I get there may be some reasons they have held him back, such as his weight and conditioning, but a rebuilding team needs these prospects up to the major leagues.

Sorry, but it is idiotic to have Chris Gimenez on the active roster and even more idiotic to play him. Using a roster spot on a player like Willians Astudillo and giving him reps isn't idiotic. One player could be a potential valuable piece to the future of the team and the other not. I am not arguing that Astudlillo has the ability to be more than a replacement level player. He might, or he might not. BUT I KNOW THAT GIMENEZ IS BELOW THAT LEVEL. WHy the team continuously gives valuable playing time to mediocre players that are more than 30 years of age escapes all logic. WHen it all comes down to it, this is the real problem: We are a 67-79 team that isn't a "young team". I know that we pretend that this is a young, developing squad. But it really isn't. If you look at the players with at least 100 plate appearances, only 5 of the 15 players are 26 or younger (Rosario, Sano, Polanco, Cave, Kepler). The youngest of that group, Polanco, is 24, while "young" hardly prospect level young anymore. On the pitching staff, if you look at starters that pitched at least 100 innings or relievers who appeared in 25 games, only 2 pitchers are under the age of 25: Berrio (24) and Moya(23). This is not a "young developing team with a lot of hope for its future". This is a collection of mediocre players and we have a management group that doesn't seem interested in doing anything more than gathering a collection of mediocre players for the team over the near term. What this means is continued mediocrity and when the next group of prospects (the Lewis, Kirillof, Rooker, etc) groups will have to go through their adjustment phase, extending the losing. I have been very vocal stating that the proper way to go is take the adjustment phase NOW, not later. Lose lots of games but get the Gordons, Lewis', Kiriloffs and Rookers, Romeros, up starting Day 1 next season. Lose 100 games. Who cares. At least that gives some hope for the future.

Like I said in the above, it just does not make sense. One "critic" of mine talked about the "valuable 40 man roster spots they have", yet the Twins have populated those spots with guys like Bobby Wilson, Taylor Motter, and Matt Belisle. In the September call up last season Luke Bard and Nick Burdi should have been called up. This season Reed for sure, Anderson probably. They have roster spots for Belisle and other other team rejects.

Again, Andrew Vasquez has a career minor league ERA of 1.52 and K/9 of 13.44. Statistically he dominated at Ft Myers with a 1.51 ERA and 52 strikeouts in 35 innings. So what does our "brain trust" do with Vasquez? Send him back to A+ of course. Now Vasquez does not have the most powerful stuff, and I saw him (and Lewis Thorpe) have a very bad outing last year, but why keep a 24 year old pitcher at the same level after he has such performances? Seriously. What is wrong with the Twins system that they continuously make these decisions? It would be different if he was younger, 21 years of age or that htey wanted him to convert to a starter or they wanted him to learn a new pitch. But that isn't the case. After "re-dominating" Ft Myers and having even better statistics in AA (1.16 ERA 17.1K/9) and then continued this success to AAA (1.59 ERA 18.9K) he gets "rushed" to the major league level in September. Vasquez should have started in AA this season and then when the idea that they needed David Hale, Oliver Drake, or Matt Belisle went through their heads should have been recalled to the big leagues instead. That is 36 additional appearances that Vasquez could have been used, and most likely performed better than any of those 30+ year old mediocrities that have no chance of being part of the future of this team. How anyone can explain this with any rationality is beyond me.

Why? If minor league players were not being paid enough, there would not be enough minor league baseball players. The supply of players is not a problem.

Who is our catcher now? I would have pushed Mitch Garver in 2017 and found a younger backup type catcher. I guess I disagree with our front office that the backup catcher should be at least 34 years old and hit under 200.

I think the biggest failure of this front office regime is that they have not properly evaluated the overall talent level of the team and thus many of their decisions have been "wrong". It is hard to understand this concept, because individually there are mostly solid arguments for most of the decisions. For example, select any of the free agents this team has signed, from Jason Castro to Logan Morrison or Lance Lynn. While I do not think that they all were good decisions (I particularly think the Castro signing was a bad decison, amongst others), at least there is some level of merit to the argument for signing the guy. But these guys just were just good enough to get to mediocrity and very few of them figured in the long term plans of the Twins. Then came the consistent signing of every waiver wire cast off from other teams at teh expense of bringing up our own prospects and developing htem at the major league level. What should have been done was to gut all of the pieces around the young core of Buxton-Sano-Kepler-Rosario etc and bring up players like Garver and Romero, get all of the growing pains taken care of with lots of losses in 2017, and maybe into 2018 and hope that this talent was good enough to be more competitive. We would lose, get top picks, and hopefully be able to bring up solid prospects over the near term to fill in the remaining spots. Some of the prospects would have been successful, some not. You move on from the nots and find new talent. FInally, as in 1987 and 1991 you bring in a few veteran pieces to fill in the holes when the players mature. I think that the Twins need to do a complete rebuild were the only two players on the roster that are "safe" are Eddie Rosario and JJ Berrios. I think they need to have just about every one of their prospects on the major league roster from day 1 next season, including Royce Lewis, Alex Kiriloff, Nick Gordon, Romero, Gonsalves, LeMonte Ward, Brent Rooker, and Luis Arraez. This team might lose 100 games, but if the talent is any good they will improve each game, and become an entertainingly competitive team by the end of the year. Rebuilding takes time, so the next couple of years might show lots of progress and lots of weaknesses. Hopefully, like the 1987 and 1991 squads, you can figure out how to fill in the weaknesses over those developing seasons, such as replacing Jimmy Eisenreich (unfortunately) with Kirby Puckett.

Doesn't take much defense to play against poor hitting teams.

Listen, this FO is starting Chris Gimenez at 1B. Want to see one of the major problems with this team? Here is their position players with more than 100 AB's at AAA Rochester with their age and AAA BA: 1. William Astudillio 26 (with Twins) .267 2. Nick Buss 31 .239 3.Chris Carter 31 .187 4. Jake Cave .25 (with Twins) .259 5. Jermaine Curtis 30 .200 6. Taylor Featherstone 28 .167 7. Nick Gordon 22 .212 8, Zach Granite 25 .211 9. Juan Gaterol 30 .284 10. Jeremy Hazelbakker 30 .188 11. Jon Kemmer 27 .224 12. Taylor Motter 28 .182 13. Jordan Pacheco 32 .163 14. Gregorio Petit 33 .268 15. Leonardo Regginatto 28 .207 16. Brock Stassi 28 .211 17. Kennys Vargas 28 .240 18. LaMonte Wade 24 .224 And the players with few than 100 ABs are not much to write home about either. While a couple of actual prospects had poor season, this FO has stocked out AAA team with absolute rejects. I get what the purpose of AAA is, but the guys this FO selected almost appear to be sabotage. How can they be so inept, up and down the AAA lineup, unless you are trying to be inept??????

Is 2018 11th round pick Michael Helman a legitimate prospect?

Don't forget Ollie Drake.... I mean he is only 31 years old and on his 5th team of 2018 and all, but who knows maybe he can turn it around and have a real part in the future of this team.

If the Twins don't move Kirillof, Gordon, Lewis, and Rooker to the majors next season they are insane. Sure, they will struggle, but you stick by them. Let them work it out. By the end of the season they will most likely be showing progress. We may lose even more games than we did this year, but getting this cohort of prospects in all at once is important. If after 125 games or so they are not figuring out then they are not high level prospects. We need to stop pretending that high quality major league prospects cannot jump to the majors without moving through every level of the minors.

I also agree with the FO on this decision. Let Buxton shut down and heal. WHy risk an injury that could permanently derail his career? If Buxton is smart he understand what is at stake for this off season. He needs to do everything he can to improve. Based upon his career to date, this is questionable.

What value does Chris GIminez serve this team? That is why you do September call ups so that guys get some opportunity to perform at the big league level. Even the inning he pitched today was wasted.

Normally I am a critic of the service time thinking. "We can't promote Brent Rooker too quickly because we could lose a year of service time", as if the Twins are scared their players will be successful (and they will have to pay them). But in this instance, a lost season for both Buxton and the team, I see no benefit worth losing a service year over. Let him idle down the season and rest. That might be the best curative for him. Get him in a great workout/conditioning program, and hope he can be back next year totally healthy.

My brother in law is friends with the Mauers. He says they have been preparing for retirement for the past year. And that Mrs. Mauer is strongly in favor of it.

This has to be a resounding F. I get all of the excuses, but if you look at the Twins roster how can you grade it otherwise? This FO has done almost NOTHING to rebuild and develop this team moving forward. In the positional player group, the only player who is not a 30+ year old free agent to be (Logan Forsythe) that this FO has added is 187 plate appearances of Jake Cave. On the pitching staff, Jake Odorizzi and Addison Reed are all that remains of their additions. I guess you could add Jason Castro, who will be a 32 year old light hitting catcher being paid $8 million to that list too. THis is two years of work by this front office. And to get to a point were we are "only" on pace to lose 87 games, we have virtually ignored developing our prospects. The talent in this organization is deep in the bowels of its minor league system, but at the pace this FO moves them we are several years away. This means that they will come up piecemeal, all require significant adjustment to the major leagues, and extended rebuilding.

Why the Twins would want a 32 year old journeyman 2Bman next year is beyond me. I guess some of you are truly committed to mediocrity at best. Here is the deal for all of those waiting for 2020 for Lewis-Gordon-Rooker-Kirrilloff: why wait until 2020 to have them go through their adjustment phase. Start the season with them in 2019, stick through their ups and downs, and if they are true prospects by the end of the season they will be playing well. Waiting just makes 2019 another losing season with mediocirites like Forsythe. Makes 2020 another losing season as the young players go through their adjustments. Look at what the Braves have done with Ronald Acuna, Ozzie Albies, and Dansby Swanson. And now their fortunes are turning around. If the Braves Front Office operated like the Twins, those guys would still be in the minors or maybe in Dansby's case just breaking in(at 24 he has 3 years of MLB experience).

Trying to figure out how Lewis' progress through the minors makes Carlos Correa's look sluggish. Correa played A+ ball as a 19 year old in 2014, same level as Lewis at the same age. But we will see if Lewis plays for the Twins as a 20 year old. Correa jumped to AAA to start the 2015 season as a 20 year old, then was called up by Houston and had 432 plate appearances that season. Most likely, the Twins will continue their conservative approach, despite losing, and Lewis will go to AA next season, AAA perhaps the following with a 2020 debut during the season. IF that happens, you can see the difference between the Twins approach and successful MLB team's approaches.

The missing bat issue is a problem that has plagued Stewart each step up the professional baseball circuit. And, the issue is pretty simple. His fastball has decent velocity and he has good command of it. But, his slider stays in the same plane so professional hitters have no problem making contact with it. As he moved up the levels the contact level has increased. To become a major league pitcher Stewart needs to find a way to change the planes of his pitches. I think he needs to adjust his arm angle to get more snap on the slider so it sinks rather than just sits there to be hit. I also think that Stewart cannot do this because it creates too much stress on his arm.

Good luck to Kohl. I hope he does well and makes the Twins take notice of him and give him an extended chance.

When the risk is zero, it isn't a gamble.