TheLeviathan

Continuing to be that bad for another 5 years. The goal is to actually win and be competitive right? Not just be slightly less putrid. At least, I hope that's the goal. Losing 90 games next year doesn't make me feel good. I want to win 90 by 2018 and we don't do that by holding on to tradeable assets out of delusion. If this offseason of 2014 and you could land an Ervin Santana and another arm - you might be able to persuade me. But there is no Ervin Santana. There is no depth. You're going to overpay for anything you acquire. Not just in money but in trades. Look at things for what they are, there is only one reasonable path here.

I don't like it either. But doubling down on a bad thing only makes it worse.

If Trevor Plouffe is on this team next year I may strongly consider auctioning my fandom to some other, more deserving team.

See, I think the much more relevant question is, if the young core is good enough to compete next year, how did we manage a historic number of losses? How can a team so ready to compete next year look so ridiculously unready this year? Like it or not, the time for these core guys to develop has to happen regardless. If they do develop, we should be building the most sustainable long term effort to win with them possible. If they don't develop, we're probably screwed regardless. But I'd argue we're EXTRA screwed if we hang on to valuable assets now in some deluded attempt at contention. So, again, what is the highest percentage play for the most long term gain? It ain't riding this 100+ loss team hard hoping you pull a miracle and compete next year. The odds of flipping our record by 20+ games is incredibly low. So why gamble on that? You're gambling the value of Dozier and Santana and other moves on that hope? Why even consider that a reasonable course of action?

I should clarify. I don't like them as in "I think they'll be good", more in the sense of "I like the idea of giving them a chance to sink or swim as a part of the long-term plan". Provided we get them some defensive help. And stop playing infielders in the outfield.

Personally, I like the idea of Berrios, May, Santiago, Mejia, Gibson, and hopefully a couple trade acquisitions as a rotation. Is it world beating? No, but you're giving at least three guys there the innings they need and you have movable guys to get out of the way should Gonsalves or the acquisitions prove ready. The key, in my eyes, that we can do to help next year and the future is to address two key defensive positions (SS and C) and get those solidified. That should be our top priority.

In some offseasons this may be possible. This one? Pitching is going to be at an extreme premium. You simply won't be able to achieve that kind of turnover.

The alternative is to fill your rotation with aged pitchers that implode like Hughes. Or don't transition well like Nolasco. And then you are forced to turn to Pat Dean and Andrew Albers. And, really, how often does that "beating the door down in AAA" thing really work? At some point, they have to face major league hitting or you won't know what you have. The longer you make them wait, the less of their prime you have available to you.

This is demonstrably false. You should look up when we signed some of our recent FA starting pitchers.

I'm not advocating you ignore lottery tickets. I'm advocating that you don't retain Ervin thinking that he and a few lottery tickets suddenly transforms you. The lottery tickets are to be cashed in when July rolls around or don't do it. If you want to sign one or two to try and get lucky Jake Arrieta style - I say go for it. But I'm not sure this offseason is going to be a particularly good year for that strategy either. As for your larger point, I don't disagree that in the past we had opportunity to use those guys due to a lack of pitching talent. But we have guys coming now, filling our rotation with aging starters doesn't help us long term. In fact, it may very well hurt it. But if you're going to argue "go out and make this team better in FA", it's worth pointing out that we tried doing exactly that and it failed miserably. Because, by and large, it's a poor long-term strategy. It's more of a short term fix that you pay for a long term.

Brett Anderson doesn't replace Pat Dean. You're talking about signing your 6-8th starters. Brett Anderson gives you reason to not pitch Gonsalves or Berrios, not Pat Dean. Roll with Gibson, Berrios, Mejia, Santiago, and trade acquisitions for Dozier and Santana. Maybe try to get one upside guy you see as a good trade chip come July. (I doubt you get more than one with this market. Any upside guys are going to get seriously paid) What the team should invest in that can help both now and in the future is a defensive catcher and shortstop. Set the young arms up to succeed by putting a real defense behind them. But your depth behind your starting 5 is always going to be subject to guys like Pat Dean. But you actually put it at more risk of being needed when you have 30+ year old pitchers filling your rotation. Or the brittle likes of Brett Anderson. You want to avoid Pat Dean? Trade Dozier and Santana for some near-ready pitching depth. It won't be by signing multiple Brett Andersons.

This entire post is filled with sentiments you'd never want from your financial advisor. Imagine you're investing in the stock market, last year you got really lucky with a flukey investment that paid off way more than you thought. In the Simpsons Homer invested in Pumpkins, got a huge windfall in October he was too stupid to recognize as dumb luck, and then figured he'd cash in around January. Reminds me a lot of your post. You're deliberately ignoring that last year was dumb luck. That this year is the product of exactly what you have been advocating. We bought ourselves a FA rotation. We invested in FA filler rather than giving innings and at-bats into potential for the future. You want your financial advisor to tell you to double down on the fluke rather than looking for long term payoffs. You want to push your chips in (you only have so many at-bats and innings) on the off chance of a fluke rather than on something sustainable. Adding starting pitchers from this lousy class of FAs will be done at a ridiculous price relative to the talent and will deliberately take innings and opportunity away from younger pitchers that might help you in the future. Keeping one of them (Santana) also removes a valuable trade chip to do the same. Retaining Dozier does the same. You can't know who is going to help you in the long term without investing in them at the big league level. Clogging the roster with minor upgrades on the offchance you have a flukey year again is terrible advice. It's the kind of advice I'd fire my financial advisor for. It's low-percentage gain, high risk, and largely unsustainable. I hope to god the Twins agree and finish this rebuild the right way rather than flushing opportunity down the hole on some fairy tale of competing. The fans will come back when you win. Not when you manage to lose a little less terribly, but still badly.

Except we haven't been giving up because the talent isn't there. We've been plugging our rotation with FA mercenaries for years and where has it gotten us exactly? Inspirational speakers are full of empty platitudes that sound good on the surface but rarely make for good advice in reality. I'd argue that's exactly what the "don't give up on 2017" crowd are giving us. And I don't buy it. And, again, this offseason is a miserable suck fest for talent. There is no "go for it" even if you wanted to. These guys that we think you can buy on the cheap are going to get inflated deals because the talent available is that putrid. I'm not waiting around for a guarantee. I'm waiting for reasonable, good percentage chance times to be aggressive. Being aggressive for the sake of it is stupidity. Just as being passive for the sake of it. I hope Falvey doesn't heed any advice that says press the pedal down for 2017. I hope he presses the pedal down when the high percentage opening presents itself. Not full speed into the back of the first semi he sees, because "dammit! try to win!" is somehow a good way of operating.

Not true. Personally, I feel like we have the young bats that we'll need to form the core of our lineup. I also think there is a good chance all of them will need time to refine their approach and their game to be the hitters I believe they will be. 2017 is likely to be that adjustment year for many of them still. So while they are still developing, it's best we don't dump resources into short term fixes in some blind effort to "compete" in 2017 when we can better spend our resources towards 2018. And invest innings and at-bats into players that should be ready to compete then. Dumping a bunch of innings into short term fixes at the expense of long term gains is precisely how we got our 2016 season. Haven't we learned our lesson?

I've already said a lot on this issue so I'll keep it simple: acquire pitching assets that will be helping you for the long term. I endorse finding a good defensive catcher and gambling on high upside guys to trade for future assets though.

I would agree that PI has become muddled nonsense at all levels.

The corner did not run him off the ball. The ball was thrown inside of the two players and the corner had inside position. He literally would have had to stop playing defense and move aside or allow the receiver to run over him because of the position of the throw. He had his head turned, looking at the ball, and held his ground. He's allowed to do that. The refs don't have to know where the ball is supposed to be thrown, they just have to know that the corner is entitled to hold his ground too.

If they had thrown a flag on that for PI, I'd be asking the same question: "What the hell is a cornerback supposed to do?" He had body position...is he supposed to step aside so the WR can go around or through him to the pass? Sorry, but if that ball is placed towards the pylon or the back corner of the endzone, it's a touchdown or a legit call. That isn't a bad call by the officials, that's a bad throw by the QB.

Leidner gets more excuses and cover for his failures than any other QB I've ever seen. At least that I can recall. I thought him being a fifth year senior, totally healthy, was all it was going to take? Why is there always a new excuse?

Leidner first round pick is as preposterous a take as anyone has had in years.

We could've just posted "Ervin" and locked this sucker.

Put me in the Kendall camp early on.

I hope we see an organization-wide change in philosophy. And I hope one of the core principles is to be less rigid. Let's find a way to make whatever skill set, repertoire, delivery, or anything else that works for a player work better. As opposed to decades now of trying to mash everyone into one mold that we think works.

Sudden regression wouldn't be very sudden if you had lots of signs it was coming, I dno't think Santana will suddenly regress in 2017, but by 2018 we could be talking about a significantly less valuable performer.

Yeah, this team is "blah".