TopGunn#22

I drafted Buxton for my fantasy baseball team. We play 4 outfielders and 4 DH's. Right now I can't start him ahead of Luis Robert, Seiya Suzuki, Alex Kirilloff, Eloy Jimenez as OF, and Zeke Duran (whose playing quite well for the Rangers), Gerardo Perdomo-who, even though he's a switch hitter has to let Nick Amed Start 2 games a week against RH pitchers, Adam Duval-just back from injury, and Jaren Duran of the Red Sox who now has to squeeze in playing time with Duval, Verdugo and Yoshido. I just picked up Mickey Moniak who's in the same situation with Trout, Taylor and Hunter Renfroe for the Angels for playing time. Buxton just can't beat out any of these 9 guys the way he's playing now. I'm of the opinion that they should just put Byron on the IL and give him time to get to some definition of healthy. He is less than half the player he could be as an exclusive DH. But with this horrible slump he's terrible. If he's not healthy enough to play the field and he can't steal bases his health is also affecting his hitting. He's not really healthy enough to play right now.

Thanks Doc Bauer, for going into greater detail in how I feel about this. I agree with you 100%.

No. Who would you prioritize keeping over him?

Yes. Choosing Reardon (although I cheated somewhat and went with a $1 Worthington or Perranoski rather than Ron Davis) the only reason people would pick Reardon over Eddie G, Aggie or the best the Twins have ever had--Joe Nathan, is to save crucial dollars to have a guy like Oliva, Puckett, Carew, Mauer or Killebrew at a position. For me, in this exercise, it was to maximize star power at certain positions, true difference makers where the talent drop off from say, Allison to Oliva, was just too steep. Morneau is a value play at $3. Mack is a value play in LF at $3 because while he's not Larry Hisle, he light years ahead of Dan Gladden. The fall off at catcher from Mauer to Earl Battey means you HAVE to have Mauer. The extra one dollar is vital to spend on a player who's not just good, but a difference maker. It's also why everybody who did this picked Johan Santana as their SP. It will be interesting to see when Devlin comes out with another version of this that maybe expands to a LH & RH starting pitching and bullpen guy. Expands DH choices to include Cruz and maybe allow Killebrew to be listed at a value at 3B and DH as well as 1B. Does Lyman Bostock get listed at a LF, CF or both? And what will his value be?

YES!! Both Kirilloff and Julien should play more against LH pitchers. These guys get on base! Lewis should be playing as well regardless of the pitcher. The only factor that should matter with Lewis and Kirilloff is whether they just need a rest to give them more time to round into everyday lineup shape. A Julien/Farmer platoon is O.K. with me, but Julien just simply gets on base. He should see more LH pitching. On another topic, has anyone else noticed that Lewis does not yet have a walk this season and only had one walk in his time with the Twins last year?? He's at 100 AB's with ONE walk. The kid is talented and I believe he will be a star. But he's literally swinging at everything. He needs to be more selective.

This is a very interesting year for the Twins based on the talent in this draft, a top 5 pick, and 3 picks in the first 49 selections and a LOT of money to allocate. There are college and high school outfield bats that are VERY GOOD. There is a small but reasonable chance the Twins could have a shot a Skenes, the #2 overall rated guy and the best pitching prospect since Cole and Strasburg. And then there are these 5 guys you ran through who could all be available at #34 or #49 or even in rounds #3-#5. Falvey and Levine were brought here to develop pitchers. Most of our rotation has been traded for. Depending on how the first 4 picks fall we could have a highly rated college outfield bat, a phenom pitching prospect or a highly thought of high school outfield bat. But these pitching prospects you've listed are also very interesting. Looking forward to seeing how this all plays out. Will there be more "insider information" mocks coming out we can have fun speculating about??

Great Job Met Stadium Usher! Lost of names that are "Blasts from the Past."

P Santana $3 This is a no brainer. He's a $5 value. RP Al Worthington/Ron Perranoski $1 Perranoski or Worthington belong on the list in place of Davis. Worthington for sure has much more relevance to the Twins franchise. C Mauer $5 (Future Twins HOF. Talent drop off HUGE after Joe. Gotta have Joe. 1B Killebrew $5 I need 573 HR's. Morneau a good value at $3 2B Rod Carew $5 HOF. Clearly the best 2B. 3B Castino $1 Great glove, solid #8 or#9 hitter. Save here to pay up elsewhere SS Guzman $1 Great Value ! RF Tony Oliva $5. My all time favorite Twin and a HOF. Drop off to Allison to save a dollar too steep. CF Cesar Tovar $2 Tovar is not Puckett or Hunter (but he gets me Killebrew, Mauer, Carew and Oliva). LF Shane Mack $3 Best value by far in LF group. MUCH better than Gladden who, while being the LF for 2 World Series is nowhere near as good as Mack. If I could get Lyman Bostock for $2 I would and save a valuable dollar. DH Dave Winfield $2 (It would depend on Where Nelson Cruz slotted in and at what value if he was available). Total $33. I cheated a bit with Al Worthington/Ron Perranoski but I just couldn't have a team like this and have a closer that would blow 3 saves a week! Adding Lyman Bostock for $2 in LF and going with Randy Bush at DH still leaves me $1 short of Puckett in CF. Molitor is one of my favorite players EVER, but just can't fit him in either. This was a blast and really made interesting with the values and limitations those provided! Great topic Devlin.

I will give this a crack later today. GREAT IDEA by the way! I wonder if you could reissue this on another thread with some tweaks. I like the format of a RH & LH SP as well as possibly a RH & LH RP. (Ron Perranoski anyone??). I also think certain players should be given positional flexibility with either the same value or a different value at a position. For Example: Harmon Killebrew 1B-$5 but Harmon Killebrew 3B $4?? Lyman Bostock should be included and have a value at both LF and CF. Allison should have a Value in LF as should Tovar. Carew could have a value at 1B. Cruz SHOULD be listed at DH. Maybe you drop Bush at the $1 slot and find a place to list Cruz. If you added RH & LH SP and RH & LH RP would you alter the $33 salary cap limit?? What would that be? You have to admit, what makes this exercise INTERESTING is having to operate within the proscribed salary cap. Could any "values" be reconsidered?? As an example, Johan Santana could easily be the $5 prize SP, certainly if you included RH & LH starters. In this current rendition of this exercise he's just a no-brainer at "SP" especially with Brad Radke listed ahead of him. No matter what the career stats are there's no comparison between Santana and Brad Radke.

I gave a thumbs up to chpettit19 because he makes a good point, but I'll offer this counterpoint about the "wave" of talent and possibly "depleting" that wave. You deplete your wave if you get a promising pitcher (Mahle) but arm problems negates any contributions he could have made last year and this year. We still don't know what the future is for Mahle with the Twins, but in this case I'd firmly agree with chpettit19 that the "wave" was depleted. However, let's remember that Miranda had one giant season at St. Paul and a good 2nd half of the season for the Twins last year. And he's still a player without a defensive position for the Twins due to the caliber of players that would be playing 3B or 1B. His BBTV is 18.0 right now. That's not insignificant. At this point he's a clear "sell high" candidate. It all comes down to what you would get for him. If the Twins packaged him with Jorge Polanco to the Brewers for Corbin Burnes with the intent of signing Burnes to a contract extension to anchor our rotation for the 5-6 years I'd be on board with that. With Mahle, Maeda and even Sonny Gray quite possibly NOT being part of our rotation next year having Burnes anchor a staff with Pablo Lopez, Joe Ryan, Bailey Ober and Louie Varland with Paddock for depth is attractive. Would the Brewers do it? Would some team like the Dodgers just out bid the Twins for a pitcher the caliber of Burnes? Maybe so. The trade is acceptable for BBTV's and Polanco would slot in at 2B and Miranda at 3B/DH for the Brewers. Burnes wouldn't "deplete" the wave, he would boost it. You could also flip Polanco for Woodruff in a straight one for one. It's been speculated for the last couple years that the Brewers won't and probably can't keep both Burnes and Woodruff (and maybe not either). Suitors for each of them will be lining up. The Twins have enough value to make serious, competitive bids for either of them without touching Lewis, Lee, Ober, etc... It all depends what you get back. Does it deplete the wave or boost it? The Twins will be reloading with 3 high picks later this month. The draft will take place well before the trade deadline.

I agree Major League Ready. I've just seen some talk that Skenes has a "chance" to actually fall to the Twins at #5 and faced with an opportunity to get that kind of pitching prospect with the #5 pick I'd SPRINT to the podium to draft him. This centers around speculation that was posted here on TD that the Pirates LOVE Max Clark, a high school outfielder who is commonly projected to the Twins at #5. If Pittsburgh took Clark #1 then Skenes could possibly fall to the Twins. It's unlikely, but an interesting possibility.

Polanco's BBTV is 36.10. He's not a 4-5 win player anymore. His team friendly contract is also a plus. Who has needs at 2B? The Brewers, Padres and Mariners come to mind. 36.10 with 2 years of a team friendly contract could bring a pretty decent asset to the Twins. Explore a trade. See what is possible. Make a trade if it makes sense.

DFA Pagan. Sign Anthony Bass who had an ERA of 1.41 in 48 games with the Marlins last year and then a 1.71 ERA in an additional 28 games with the Blue Jays after they made a deadline deal for him. Kepler's value has cratered but maybe you could swap him and a minor leaguer to the Rockies for Randall Grichuk who has a low BBTV's value but would be a better RH outfield bat than Garlick. Any Kepler move will be superficial. Adding Bass with his track record of success and consistency would be huge for the BP and not cost the Twins anything of substance. In the end, Buxton, Correa and Polanco need to play and hit. I like what I've seen of Julien so far and a platoon of him and Farmer for 2B would be fine with me if the Twins could swing a trade with Polanco that adds something of significant value. Polanco's BBTV is 36.10. That kind of value should be able to bring something of solid value back. It just depends on who we would trade with that needs an upgrade at 2B and what we could get back.

Of those you listed, I'd lean toward Hurley or Head. I still hope Skenes is there at #5 and the Twins take him. They can focus on bats with the next two picks.

If the Dodgers can exile Thor the Twins can certainly part ways with Pagan.

One last thought regarding Pagan: The Blue Jays just cut a pitcher (Anthony Bass) who must have thought he had the right of free speech, (living in America after all), that said or endorsed something that would have required in the words of his General Manager some "reeducation." I think he was O.K. with boycotting Bud Lite and Target (Oh My!!!). Bass apologized but was still cut. In 45 games with Miami last year year his ERA was 1.41. The Blue Jays acquired him at the deadline and in 28 games with the Jays he compiled a 1.75 ERA. If I was the Twins I'd DFA Pagan and grab Bass so fast my head would spin !!!

Here are a couple of deals the Twins could consider once Polanco comes off the I.L. or this offseason: BBTV's player ratings. Polanco is 30 years old. Both the Brewers and Mariners could use an upgrade at 2B. Polonco 36.1 and Miranda 18.0 (54.10 total) to the Brewers for Corbin Burnes 50.70. (Burnes is 28 y/o). Polanco 36.1 straight up for Brandon Woodruff 30.4 (Woodruff is 30 y/o). Either deal adds a stud pitcher to our staff and addresses the eventual void left by Sonny Gray, Maeda and Mahle. Polanco 36.1 and Gordon 7.4 to the Mariners for Andres Munoz 40.5 (Munoz is 24 y/o). Another team to keep an eye on is the Padres. Musgrove, I believe is an impending FA after this season, maybe has one more year of control. His current value is 19.2 on BBTV's and he's 30 years old. Blake Snell is also 30 y/o and his value is just 4.10 (and he would give us a LH pitcher). Just a couple of ideas.

Yesterdays loss was very frustrating. But to say Duran was not available makes me curious (Stewart for that matter as well). Duran threw 38 pitches on Friday and then zero on Saturday. You mean to tell me that with an off day today (Monday) he couldn't have given the team one inning on Sunday? Really?? Stewart threw something like 28 pitches on Friday and ONE pitch on Saturday. Again, off day today and he can't give you 3 batters on Sunday? Why couldn't Jax, with an off day today come in to start the 8th and given us what he can and then hand the ball to Lopez to finish the 8th if need be and also the 9th? Especially after the first two batters reached against Pagan, haven't we all seen this movie before?? Again, with an off day on Monday, just get Lopez in there and have him finish the game!!! I've always been frustrated by Rocco's bullpen usage. Before Pagan it was Colome. Rocco just doesn't seem to manage his BP well and the buttons he pushes often have negative results. As somebody mentioned earlier Rocco had no reason to use Brock Stewart in a low leverage situation earlier in the series. Just as he had no reason, if he's been paying any attention to his results regarding Pagan, in a high leverage situation. I don't think the feed to Correa by Julien was stellar, but I do not think it was the reason we did not complete the double play. Correa is supposed to be a Gold Glove SS. Heck, he's supposed to be a Platinum Glove SS. He's GOT to make a better throw. Kirilloff has saved his butt more than a couple times this year already. Kirilloff just couldn't come up with it this time. I would take a bag of baseballs for Max Kepler right now. I would DFA Pagan yesterday And I would consider trading Polanco (who still has a fairly high value) and let Julien and Farmer play 2B. Lewis OWNS 3B now and Brooks Lee will be a fixture in 2024. There is no guarantee Sonny Gray is in our rotation next year and Maeda and Mahle will be gone. What kind of package could we get for Polanco? I may trade Miranda as well, but not Julien.

I tip my hat to specialiststeve. He hits the nail on the head. Reptevia also made very good observations. To me, it's always been most obvious is certain situational hitting AB's but it's like a big scab that the hitters just can't stop scratching. They seem to have no concept of the strike zone (although, to be honest, certain umpires like CB Buckner don't either) and as specialiststeve pointed out, they are all tremendously pull happy with their front half flying open on every swing. The only two hitters that I see willing to take an outside pitch to the opposite field consistently are Kirilloff and Lewis. This team HAS to have Correa and Buxton hitting for them to score runs and both have been atrocious this year. Popkins can't be as good as Correa claims with the results we've had. Kepler hasn't been able to figure anything out since 2019. This is an organizational philosophy that analytics be damned is FLAWED. They need a hitting coach with a Paul Molitor approach. Every Twins hitter should study tape of Freddy Freeman. He's as consistent day to day as anybody.

I see little to no value in Garlick. I'd rather have Kirilloff taking an AB against a LH pitcher than see Garlick. Kepler has proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that he will no longer hit a lick in a Twins uniform. Maybe a change of scenery will help him somewhere. I'd trade Kepler to the Rockies straight up for Grichuk if they'd do it. Grichuk would be an upgrade from Garlick. I'd also offer Larnach to the A's straight up for Esty Ruiz. Larnach has a higher value on BBTV's due to more power and RBI potential, but Ruiz has 30 SB's in 63 games played. He would be a switch hitting CF who would give us a speedy guy at the top or bottom of our order and allow us to manufacture a run or two occasionally. The dynamic of "speed" can sometimes jump start a lineup that otherwise tends to be moribund (like the Twins). These minor moves would introduce some elements the Twins don't have right now (a more consistent RH OF bat and SPEED) while not moving anything of major value in the Twins system. Larnach still has a value of about 18.0 in BBTV's. That's pretty good. But I'd rather sell high on him while still having someone like Wallner around as Larnach/Wallner is rather redundant. The Twins also have Rodriguez on the horizon as well as a strong possibility of a highly rated outfield prospect with the #5 pick in the draft later this month.

I agree about the hitting coaches. Something is not clicking when your team is leading MLB in strikeouts. We seem to have zero situational hitting ability. That's an awareness that coaching should stress. I kind of like the idea of approaching the Rockies for a guy like Grichuk. Not sure if the deal could be bigger, but wondering what the Rockies would think of Larnach? Grichuk would be a better RH hitting corner OF option that Garlick. Having a Grichuk/Wallner platoon would be an improvement. It's time to move on from Max Kepler. Maybe Kepler for Grichuk even up.

There are certain guys I'd be willing to move on from NOW. Kepler and Larnach come to mind. If I was trading Larnach straight up for Esty Perez from the A's I'd do it to get a speedy, young CF'er at the top of my order who would create some havoc on the base paths. I'd trade Kepler for a bag of baseballs and bring Wallner up. This removes two OF'ers who i consider dead weight while adding two others who are younger. Perez gives us speed. Wallner gives us power. Those are moves that could help right away without moving a Spencer Steer type of player. The additional BP arm needs to wait until closer to the deadline. Nobody is trading that kind of asset until they can maximize their leverage. Who knows, maybe Jorge Lopez will get his "stuff' together and if Stewart keeps doing what he's been doing and Theilbar does what he's capable of, the BP becomes a strength again. The biggest thing holding this team back are the "stars." Correa is absolutely lost at the plate and Buxton, despite all the tender loving care is back on the IL. Polanco has been underwhelming to this point. The hope on offense now rests on Kirilloff and Lewis. Unless Correa, Buxton and Polanco REALLY pick things up the Twins are going to continue to struggle offensively.

I like Skenes at #5 if he's there. Pick him, put on the big league team end of the season in the BP to protect him, then put him in the rotation next season. Other than Skenes, Crews would be quite a surprise, but shocking things always seem to happen in the Major League draft.

I would like to see the Twins take Skenes if he is there at #5. I like the idea of having the next Gerritt Cole at the top of our future rotation. Mahle is out with Tommy John surgery and probably won't be back next year. Maeda, when he does come back should be in the BP, and Sonny Gray is not a lock to be resigned. With hitters coming up like Kirilloff, Lewis, Julien and Lee, I'd like the Twins to swing for the fences for a SP prospect like Skenes. That said, the idea was pretty interesting to deal with the Pirates for Keller and Bednar. Especially with the team control both pitchers provide and the possibility of signing each to extensions. Keller is a quality major league SP who looks like he's finally figured it out and Bednar is a solid, dependable BP arm that would give the Twins the back end they envisioned with the acquisition of the disappointing Jorge Lopez.

I'd do that deal umterp23! Even at a slight overpay.