beckmt

Given Garver's concussion issue, it is great we have a couple of catchers here. Can see why the Twins went for Grandal (though is looks like more of a value play). Both of these two catchers are at least 2021 prospects. Either or both could be good, but hope the Twins find more depth here. Fact the both Gordon and Gonsalves find themselves out of the top 10, shows how much this system has grown over the past two years. Next wave is hopefully coming, and maybe we do not have the number of top end prospects of the White Sox, but Twins certainly have the depth in the system. That is a good sign.

I am far more concerned about the pitching than the hitting. Twins seem to be able to develop decent hitters, pitching well. Tools there will be fastball speed, control, command of secondary pitches, etc.

Work on the mental side of the game with the younger players. Cut down on the silly mental errors some members of this ballclub seem to do. Make sure there are defined standards that your players are expected to follow, and make sure that there are consequences (like a couple of days on the bench) if you do not. You don't want the players to be safe and non aggressive, but at some point they have to cease being stupid.

Only other thing this contract has going for it, it makes it easier to trade a starter if Twins are overwhelmed with an offer for Gibson or Orderizzi.

According to MLBtraderumors contract is $3.5 million plus incentives plus a 2020 option or .5 million buyout, so contract is actually $4 million plus. Only thing going for it is the Perez is young and has maybe out of the Texas bandbox may pitch OK. Or maybe the FO saw something. If Perez is like last year this contract will be a waste of money, and with this money it will be harder to cut him early.

From what I have seen, the feeling is he will start in Ft. Myers and move up if things go well in May or June.

Mets offer was supposed to be 4/60, Don't think the Twins went that high, guessing like 4/52 or 3/42. That was not going to get it done.

More worried about the mental state if Twins blow a bunch of saves early. Stat says you were ahead, something the White Sox and Orioles were not. Dodgers stat was because of Jansen struggles and missing early, Brewiers also until they got their bullpen sorted out and used more of Hader.

I also have a hard time with the 80 - 82 win projection. Bullpen is the key and I like a lot of the rest are concerned here. Twins I believe blew somewhere in the neighborhood of 25 saves last year. 4 - 5 blown saves in April could set this team a long way back with more a of 'here we go again' type of mentaility. I would take great pains to avoid this line. I understand the relievers could be good or bad, but this division is up for grabs and Twins should be making more moves. I like the new coaching staff, but it should be given an incomplete until we see how in works in game situations. Resource allocation seems to be light, but would wait until middle spring training to see how it works out. Just no more after spring training is 2 weeks old signing players and bringing them in, they just do not seem to be ready by the season opener.

I am hoping the Kirloff makes enough noise in camp to at least force the FO to start him in Pensacola. Most of the invites are just to bring them in early to work with them and let the better prospects get their feet wet in a major league spring training regime. I expect most of the prospects will be sent out when minor league training camps open, which is the first or second week of March. Any of them that do not would be a sign they have opened some eyes of the major league staff.

Yes, but I would not put my faith in pitchers 30 and older that are not already pitchers rather than throwers who will lose velocity in the near future.

Twins are going to need starters in 2020, that requires some of their prospects to stay starters. Some of the higher velocity low stamina pitchers need to be converted to relievers and moved very fast this year. some of the prior relievers, may still have a chance, this year will be defining for them.

problem here is the players and the agents. Owners keep asking for a hard salary cap as a bargining tool for concessions elsewhere. Players need to force a minimum spend on the owners to force owners who are just raking in profits to make their teams more competitive by spending money. Say 100,000,000 is the minimum (new TV contracts will make this amount seem small) (and this may include taxes and benefits). Maybe reduce FA to 5 years (even though this will hurt small market teams) or end the manipulation of service time. Biggest issue is there are three types of players, stars and superstars, who want big money without caring what it does to the team, midlevel who make good money, but a lot of them are paid more than they are worth, and the fillin-ins, your basic replacement level players who seldom make much (in relative terms), and the minute they make more that a couple of million are usually the first cuts if a younger player is close to as good. I do not know how to handle this, but the owners can easly play groups off against one another, plus the new statistical data which is traceing player decline to the 31 - 33 age range instead of older. This is not counting the minor leaguers who at the lower level get a raw deal or many who want to go forward having to play in independent leagues for peanuts. Maybe you have to get a higher luxury tax factor to prevent teams with large markets from just ignoring the tax and buying the better players. Otherwise maybe go back to 16 teams, force all teams to spend like 250,000,000 a year and end this charade.

Maybe we are looking at some trade options. That could be why we are stocking up on mediocre pitchers.

Twins have a lot of marginal players at the bottom of the 40 man, probably not an issue. Hoping the Twins brass saw something. Seems a little expensive if he will be released at the end of spring training. We shall see. Maybe a different pitch mix, that has been discussed where I have looked.

Until you have a hard salary cap, you will have these issues. This is the essence of big market vs small market teams. In this world to help you have to make the luxury tax penalties much higher to keep teams from going over unless they are going all in for one year. Since it is unlikely baseball will have a hard cap, you need to have both a minimum salary spend and a luxury tax level that is closer to the minimum salary spend, with an over penalty of at least 50% of the overage. This might not work, but is would lower the difference between the haves and the have nots, and prevent teams like Miami from just pocketing money, because they can and then get rebates to help the profits.

I am not so worried about blocking Gordon, but I am worried about blocking Lewis and Javier along with Polonco. Do not see it happening and would rather have Harper and move Kepler to 1st.

Last I saw we are the thirteenth market area in the United States. This seems more midmarket than low end. Maybe on revenue we are in the bottom 10, this would be more due to the Twins TV contract than any other factor. However putting 500,000 more fans in the seats will certainly raise the revenue to at least add on decent contract (assuming $40 a seat, not counting concession sales, etc).

in the competitive years, after other competitive years Twins should average around or over 2.5 million fans, that should be plenty of incentive to get it done. Plus they should get a new TV contract in a few years.

You will not get Joe Fan back without putting a winning product on the field. This is not hockey or football which has a big natural base to draw from. Please give the fans some hope and at least put some more money into this franchise. It is possible some money is being reserved for extensions of key young players, if that is the case, let's get it done.

Cleveland bullpen was one of the worst in the league last year (along with the Twins). If you want to monitor Allen's market and move when you feel the value is good I can live with it. This team lead the majors in blown saves last year and is young. The last thing I want to see happen is to start the year, blow 3 - 4 saves in April and have this team collapse into a here we go again mentality when you go to the pen. This is too important a position to just hope things work out if you intend to compete this year. If you do not it is a different story, but at that point you encourage other organizations (White Sox) to overspend this year, hit the jackpot and be looking at the same area other teams in this area are at. Good enough to be decent, not good enough to win or win divisions.

Allen could well be toast from Cleveland's overuse. He might rebound, but do not think Twins should take the chance, except on a very team friendly one year deal.

I feel they need to sign another reliever as the bottom end looks weak. I also favor Vasquez over Moya. Maybe a better utility player than Moya and one less pitcher and have Astudillo up. Would like to have seen what Austin can bring for a full season, but the front office does not seem very sold on him, so I guess barring Cron having a very bad spring, he is gone. Worried about the lack of OBP type players, as this club looks like it could have problems scoring if the ball does not leave the park. Pitching rates to be better, but would like one more stabilizer in the pen. At least this club has hope if at least one of Buxton and Sano rebound to be upper 80's to low 90's in the win column.

This is not counting the number of probable doubles Buxton turns into singles and keeps runners from advancing, saving runs. Or the extra outs the pitcher has to get, because your defender does not make a play where others should. Your post is almost like defense does not matter, I have seen the simulation run in stratomatic baseball about 30 some years ago. The number of extra outs and runs this player gave up put his club into the 5+ runs against category every game. That is unsustainable in baseball (or you win about 60 games). Yes, you can hide bad defense at some positions, but the middle of the diamond will cost you a lot of the time. Defense is more than the number of hits allowed, it is also how many of those hits are for less bases than your poor defensive player will allow, this keeps double plays in order or at least requires more than one more single to score the runner. Baseball stats take range into effect, but do not know if they calculate how many bases a batted ball should get and how many hits it takes to score a run with a premium defender at the position. In the infield, you also have to include balls knocked down preventing other base runners from taking 2 bases instead on 1. These are big differences and I do not know how much of this is calculated in the runs saved category.

No! NO!!! NOO!!!! Gibby is on the wrong side of 30 and when he loses a 1 or 2 off his fastball, he will be quite hittable. If you want this route, tag him at the end of the year. Much safer route and you get some compensation if he leaves (and you can do this to more than one starter if you are worried).