jokin

No need for apologies... preach it brother. (It's as if I just found my long lost twin brother...)

Like the cut of your rhetorical jib, sir.

No, but it's an argument for Beane abandoning sound strategy in favor of pique,pettiness and pure stupidity.

That is me, and I'm staying on topic. 3 teams were the talk of baseball this year, making bold and shrewd moves that didn't cut their legs out from under each franchise going forward. Meanwhile, the Twins wheeling and dealing has netted them a backup catcher and a Korean lotto pick. Carry on.

I don't think the A's were one of three teams being discussed in the above thread. Please try to pick apart the Jays, Royals and Mets, as per the discussion. I'll hang up and listen.

What? The Giants have been one of the shrewdest traders and FA signers franchises out there. both in-season and offseason, for quite some time. And full of Plan B options when big name acquisitions failed (likie Zito).

FIFY

Well, there's the crux of the issue and the difference of opinion, a minor internal move here or there- or acquiring a RP closer to July 1 instead of August 1, and the Twins would have been in the postseason. So you're comfortable settling for putting things off at actually trying to win for 1 or 2 or 3 more years because the core guys are just turning 25 or 26? I thoroughly disagree with this approach.

I would hope not, but the current alternatives are not much better. I would have preferred that Hicks go in as the starting CF for the Twins, with the opportunity to build off of his limited success in 2015 and raising his value even further. And this is assuming that Ryan settled for fair value on this trade, and didn't try harder to get a better deal elsewhere, or giving up a little bit more with the Yankees to get Samuel. Meanwhile, do you have a guess on who the Twins acquire for that veteran OF spot, and what type of deal in dollars and years?

And all three were the most talked-about teams in baseball, each integrally in the conversation, and in point of fact, on how you do it right to put your team in the position to win it all. The Twins... not so much.

I'm one of Hicks' biggest critics- I've exaggerated nothing and assumed nothing in making my case- obviously, everything in this transaction is on the come for two players who have yet to define their careers. But if the Twins were seriously looking to upgrade the team, they failed on this one miserably. The OF defense now has a gaping hole, while the catcher position was only marginally upgraded. In this case, the priority at improving at catcher was to go big or go home. And to repeat, the recent track record for Cashman vs. Ryan on these types of deals speaks for itself.

Better to have tried and failed than to have turned off the cellphone when any call came in about a prospect. And to turn this thing back the other way, Preller didn't panic and hold a fire sale when things didn't work out as planned.

It still means that the Twins got the guy the Yankees felt was the most expendable, and evidently,, the 4th best catcher in their system. Only room for 3, the Yanks in effect, dumped the one they least valued, just as Ryan dumped the OF they least valued going forward. The projected WAR values for each player in 2016 just don't come close to matching up, at all... This trade does not make sense for a team that we assume is in win-now mode.

As I stated, the most games Shane ever started before this year was 30. "Splitting the load" with Robinson-level talent is a sure-fire lose-lose proposition- lower net WAR production + blocking young talent from further/quicker development chances.

And by "prospect", you undoubtedly mean Berrios?

I wish that would be the case, but Robinson somehow started around 50 games in 2015 (the Twins love to reward the gritty FA vets with bonus playing time)- Shane had never started more than 30 games in any one season before this year. If Rosario starts out the season in CF, flanked by Sano and Arcia, it will probably be less than 10 games before Robinson or whichever RH journeyman vet they sign is moved into CF- shortly after the pitching staff threatens revolt.

I said it too, Dave. Sorry, Hugh, you have exposed Ryan's big flaw in his grand strategy, and yet something he's most proud about- ie, giving up and trading a legit major league impact player at the lowest possible value, mostly as a fiscal budget-saver in exchange for expendable and easily-acquired role players. There were many of us at the time that pleaded with the organization to, at worst, retain Liriano for the remainder of the season and make the QO, and at best, re-sign Liriano with incentives while bringing in an upgrade at the pitching coach position to get Liriano back on track. And yes, Liriano has "indeed" come back with a vengeance, as many of us anticipated at the time Ryan dumped him. And many of us were involved in multiple threads and multiple pages to discuss targeting Didi Gregorius in early 2014 as a buy-low when the D-Backs let it be known he was being shopped. We had plenty of pitchers to trade that projected similarly or better to entice Arizona than former 15th round draft pick, Shane Green (he technically went to Detroit in the 3-way deal), who, in point of fact spent 6 years journeying through the Yankees farm system with mixed results before his "it's now or never", flash in the pan brief success with the Yanks. Again, although you seem to want to build up Green's perceived value, the Yanks got a 25-year old former Top 60 SS, who demonstrated elite fielding skills in 2015 and with 5 years of team control left. There's no way to spin this to make the Twins look good, Cashman got a steal of a deal, and the Twins could have had Didi anytime in 2014 for about the same cost or a little more. Hopefully, Ryan wasn't the one taken this time by Cashman in this latest deal.

Adding yet another veteran blocking presence beyond one year? I like them both, but not multi-year, which I'm sure Young will insist upon as he's already built his value with the Yanks. Meanwhile, Raburn doesn't help the OF defense.

The field for a quality veteran OF will be limited by the fact that the Twins will be seeking someone on a one-year deal which means limiting the search for Shane Robinson types or guys looking to rebuild value, and not someone who would cost a draft pick. Which means, what?- Drew Stubbs, Justin Ruggiano and Will Venable... and Shane Robinson.

It seems like a lot of assumption here on your part, and contrary to all public statements made by management, up to and including the most recent statements. Perhaps there was some code-speak to push Buck along in the process.... But.... The Rosario/Arcia/Sano opening day OF practically wrote itself into the lineup for Molitor the moment this trade was announced. I'll be pleasantly surprised, but still stunned, if Buxton is on the roster on opening day.

Again, provide evidence to the contrary. The Twins are regarded as having one of the top 3 or 5 farm systems in all of baseball. Since all of the prospects can't fit onto a 40-man roster, it seems incumbent on the Twins to deal from their position of strength and expend an extra prospect or two in a package deal to get an elite catcher, not a back-up. But you'll just keep shaking your head.

Yeah... those are the numbers that negatively sealed the deal for me. And which also seem to be par for the course for this organization. I'm waiting for the usual rationalizations at the press conference about sabremetrics being disregarded in this case, due to Twins scouts watching Murphy play dozens of times over the last 3 seasons and seeing him always giving a pretty good showing out there, "better than the numbers indicate."

So the Twins get the guy the Yankees HAD to dump? Not sure how that's something to brag about in the press guide.

Let's put the shoe on the other foot. When was the last time Terry Ryan traded a MiLB journeyman Shane Green clone for a MLB underperformer who suddenly became a 3.5 WAR SS for the Yanks (Gregorius)? (The closest TR could come to that type of trade was trading a proven near ace in- Liriano for Escobar- whose top WAR for the Twins is 2,0 WAR. I'll go with the guy with the track record.

I do understand how hard catchers are to find. That's why you have to shop around a lot harder, or bargain with more ferocity, than Ryan did in this case. (And I'll defer to Brian Cashman on this "dispute", his recent exemplary track record in obtaining undervalued talent is a lot better than yours or mine.)