DaveW

Not for someone like Bailey. They would be better: 1. Having him pitch the full year, offering him a qualifying offer and taking a first round pick in 2015. 2. Trading him to anyone else who would actually offer a legit package. If Bailey was on the FA market this year, he likely would be at worst the 2nd or 3rd best, possibly the best (ahead of Garza) history shows us at the very least its going to take at least one top prospect.

They would not..... there would be about 20 other teams that would trump that in a heartbeat.

Would you bite?

It wouldn't be hard to seperate it.

Could you guys possibly expand to Vikings and Wild stuff as well? To be frank there is a big dredge of nothing on the internet when it comes to discussing those two teams, maybe bring in someone as a "jr" partner to spearhead those blogs/discussions. I imagine it could help traffic by at least 25%

If your expectations are to have Garza, Nolasco, and Hellickson as our 1/2/3 next year, you are going to be dissapointed. Can't please everyone I guess

Same old Ryan

As Rocket Pig said, they have a whole nother off-season to sign some guys as well, 2014 isn't a "go for it year" maybe the best approach is signing a low risk back end guy, shoring up the C position and seeing how Meyer/Gibson/DeDuno/Worley pitch, then sign a top guy heading into 2015. I still would LOOOOVEEEEE to snag Bailey in a trade.

You aren't going to get much back for Willingham at all at this point.

I like it! So much for all the "TR will never do anything, talk" I would love to snag one of Bailey, Garza, Kazmir still, however I am very pleased so far, and even if they don't sign another front end guy (and just a backend guy like Arroyo, Pelfrey) along with a bat somewhere I would be pretty damn thrilled.

Again, this whole concept assumes you could get him to sign an extension. As mentioned above, all players and agents say they are going go to test the market, however there are teams that are able to lock up those players before they make it to the market (See: Felix, Verlander, Kershaw (soon), Cain, etc etc etc) If you offer a good deal, the player will listen and often times take it. It takes two to tango, the Reds have been said to be looking to shed payroll, so while Bailey is "unlikely to sign an extension with them" they are probably not making him a legit offer to sign him and are choosing to invest in other areas. It reminds me of the Johan Santana situation, Johan was "unlikely to sign with the Twins" not because he was against signing before reaching free agency, but because the twins were obviously putting their assets in other places (morneau, Mauer) and weren't offering him anything close to a fair market deal. He got traded to the Mets and instantly signed a large extensions. Same thing with the Reds, they are choosing to invest in other areas. That doesn't mean another team that trades for him can't give him the fair market value (and safety) that a extension would bring prior to the season. Keep in mind, as a pitcher there is always risk of elbow/arm problems, so if the Twins offered him 6/100, he would have to think long and hard about accepting IMO.

Yes and no, at the end of the day, each of these teams are a business and it never makes sense to grossly overpay a ton more than needed for an asset. As far as it setting a precedent, it may be true, however I think most teams/agents would realize that one stupid contract like 6/120 mil to Nolasco or whatever is the exception, not the norm. While Zito was in the middle of his contract, I doubt many good agents whose clients put up similar numbers (or better) numbers than Zito were bringing up Zito's contract as a baseline/similar one to go with.

Vikings. Wild and Timberwolves in that order.

It says they don't plan on parting with a 2nd round pick (not that they wouldn't, and even Ryan said if it was the right player they would), and frankly I think the fact they aren't meeting with Santana is a GOOD thing, I wouldn't give him a 100 mil. I'd much rather they sign one of the guys like Garza who doesn't cost the pick anyways.

This forum is quickly becoming unreadable, Nick offers a reasonable and well thought out opinion and everyone has to rush in with the same old, tired, "Dohhh the Twins won't do anything, Ryan should be fired, derp" rhetoric that has been non stop. We get it, nobody likes coming off of three bad seasons, making thread after thread and post after post about how the Twins won't do anything, are a laughing stock etc does nothing to expand the conversation and frankly will do nothing but drive away anyone who would actually like to have a discussion about the Twins. It was this sort of daily garbage that kept me off the forums the majority of the second half of the season, and I know I wasn't the only one. This isn't directed at this thread as it hasn't gotten out of hand...yet.

Dude, just stop making up these arguments that aren't existing. Nobody is claiming he is going to be the Twins #2 pitcher. I said he will be the Twins #4/#5.

But how many of "us" posting on here could have built a team on limited funds that won 6 division titles in 9 years. If you are going to blame Ryan for the failures of the team, you better give him 100% credit for the successes.

Yeah, his age isn't an issue at all unless we are talking about signing him to a 6 or 7 year contract (we aren't) An ERA+ of 95-105 with 200 IP is worth more than 1 year 3 mil.

Those are the exceptions to the rule.

The Twins have proven to cut bait with SP before (sometimes a bit later then we prefer) but they do it, even when decent money is owed: Marquis and Blackburn are the two recent examples. Nishi (position player) the same. That shouldn't be a concern when you are only paying him 5-6 mil for only 2 years. As far as altering the off-season plans, he is the guy you plug in at the back end of the rotation. The only one he really sort of prevents you from signing (HOPEFULLY) is a backend guy like Arroyo, it doesn't preclude you from the garza's, Santana's, Kazmirs, Ubaldo's etc of the world.

Every player in a contract year are intent on hitting the open market....until they are offered an extension that makes sense. Again, if the Twins trade for him and offer him 6/95 (basically tearing up this years 4 mil in arb contract he would be owed) Do you really think he wouldn't listen/seriously consider? (The extension more or less would mirror the Sanchez contract)

You talk about signing Salty coming off a career year (with two solid years prior, above average for the C position) yet talk about signing Navarro, a guy whose 4 seasons prior to last years "break out" combined for a Drew Butera esque .594 OPS over 800+ PA If you want to give him 2 million to be your backup or whatever, fine, but don't expect anything out of him, and at that point Pinto better be able to be the everyday guy both offensively (not as worried) and defensively (very worried) otherwise the position is a disaster and you are in the same or worse place heading into next off-season with likely less options. Frankly Salty and AJ are vastly superior options to Navarro.

2008 Liriano: 3.91 ERA 108 ERA+ (78 IP) 2010: Liriano: 3.68 ERA 112 ERA+ (198 IP) 76, 78, 80 were his other ERA+ in the three down seasons. 2008 Pelfrey: 3.72 ERA 113 ERA+ (200 IP) 2010: Pelfrey: 3.66 ERA 107 ERA+ (204 IP) 78, 78, 81 were his other ERA+ in the down seasons. Now, I think Liriano is a "better" pitcher then Pelfrey and has more upside, however I think the gap isn't as huge as some like to make. You can say what you want about Pelfrey, but you can't deny that those two seasons above (200 IP and a sub 3.75 ERA) don't qualify as "good"

Nobody is going to confuse Pelfrey with Roger Clemens, but he did put up the highest k/9 rate of his career last year coming back from TJS, he had 63 K's in his 81 innings when he got "recalled" to the big leagues. While 6.0-6.5 k/9 rates isn't fantastic, it isn't terrible as well, especially if you are talking about your back end rotation guy. Again he isn't some fire baller who is going to give you double digit strike outs, but he isn't Nick Blackburn or Kevin Correia as well. Strike outs cost a premium on the market, (Just look at the Edwin Jackson contract for an example) and this is fine, as you mention and has been mentioned, signing Pelfrey doesn't stop you from signing/trading for a guy with more strike outs (Garza, Bailey etc) It's not the best example, but I feel its worth bringing it up. Prior to 2013 I advocated signing a pitcher to a very similar contract, it was a guy who had an ugly 2012 ERA, but whos advanced numbers painted a story that he got unlucky, it was a guy who had talent and had success in the majors prior to an injury. That guy was Francisco Liriano, while the comparisons/pitching styles are different, its not hard to see a couple similarities here as a buy low/decent upside signing. Give me that 7 days a week over giving a guy a contract until he is 40 at 10 mil a year (3 years) where there is zero chance of improvement. Again I think there is a pretty solid chance Pelfrey produces just as much as Arroyo over the next two years (even more so over the next 3 years) for literally a fraction of the cost.

Did I say 3M anywhere? I think i was saying 2 years at 5-6 mil per season. (I'd also prefer a team option for 7 million (500k buyout) for the 3rd year, in the case that he turns it around. Pelfrey is only a guaranteed rotation spot for the first few months of 2014 if he signs, the overall contract wouldn't be the worst thing in the world to shed (ala Marquis, Blackburn etc) That's the nice thing about Pelfrey vs a guy like Arroyo, if he sucks/regresses you eat a third of the money.