TheLeviathan

I think a positive clubhouse with good chemistry matters. I've yet to hear how anyone thinks Morales will do that. It's more that his mere presence next year will somehow manage to impact subsequent seasons. If you want guys to be mentors, you don't have to pay them 8M for a couple years. You can find some on 1 year deals for that.

Sorry Chief, I agree with you that the team should always try to win, but the notion that this team is going to contend via anything other than the minor league studs is just misguided. They have too many holes and not enough money to fill them any other way. And that's not unusual, that's what teams do to go from rebuilding to contending. They need their young, cheap, impact talent to come up and be....well....impactful. It won't happen without that.

Hughes was signed when 2016 was still a legit target for contending, before Sano and Buxton's injuries. Signing Morales now, knowing 2017 is now a more likely target is exactly what I'm saying it is - a patch.

He's a rookie, but his bat and raw power looked legit. Any negatives you might throw at him are kind of mitigated by the fact that his OPS this year is 150 points better than the guy people want to give a hefty pile of money to. Morales is a better hitter than this...but Pinto likely hasn't hit his ceiling either.

Just to be clear, since you're using a word I brought up as a way to distinguish two different kinds of signings - Morales on a 1-2 year deal isn't what I would call a "supplement". He's a buy-low patch at that point. Which has it's merits certainly, depending upon how you and the club feel about Pinto largely. But Morales is not the same kind of signing as Hughes and Nolasco where you are signing for both the present and the contending future. He's just a patch that everyone knows is gone before serious contending happens. I'm not sure anyone has suggested he's anything but that, even those in favor of signing him again.

One of my favorite former Twins. Great story.

Oh cmon Psuedo, nothing jumped the shark you just stopped following your own arguments. Morales would be a patch signing. Your Pitt examples were to supplement the core, Morales is not a supplement. He's a patch. Just like Pelfrey or Correia or Willingham. He's not Nolasco or Hughes - those are two different kinds of signings and you and others are muddling them as the same thing. I'm a huge advocate (even when they fail so far like Nolasco has) in signings designed to supplement the team now and long-term. 100% behind them. Patch signings of old players for several years? No. No thank you. And these are not the same thing. The Overbay comp was about the ridiculous notion that a winning clubhouse matters down the line.

Last year is the key. Those are supplemental signings - more akin to Hughes or Nolasco. (Moves I am 100% behind) Guys you know won't block anyone for quite some time that are meant to be part of the success. Morales is closer to Pelfrey - a short term patch. Signing him for a year or two is almost nothing like the Pirates adding Liriano and Martin. What you have been suggesting is more akin to the idea that 2010 Octavio Dotel was the key to the team's turnaround in 2012. Or Lyle Overbay in 2011 was somehow intregral in that run because of some sort of cultural nonsense. The key was giving at-bats/innings to Alvarez, McCutchen, Harrison, Walker, Marte, Morton, Jones, etc. prior to that season. Then they left room open for guys like Gerrit Cole to come up and be a factor. Then it came down to those young players succeeding.

Frankly I think a one year deal is extremely unlikely. If he wants a "make good" deal...why on earth would he want to do that in Target Field? He'd be far better off doing what Cruz did and finding a place that has both a need and an ideal situation for him to regain value. I don't think that's here. It might be and he might sign a one year deal, but it's a dubious premise at best. Here's the reality about a 2 year deal - it's just like Willingham. You won't be able to deal him until July of the second year. You are basically closing off the DH spot for 1.5 seasons. If that's something you're comfortable with for the other reasons you listed, fine. Personally I'd rather see Pinto/Arcia/Vargas get the bulk of those at-bats and sign a legitimate OF.

Wow there are a lot of notions in here that are really misguided. 1. A "winning culture" being needed to help a rebuild is bunk. I can't think of a rebuild that happened successfully that didn't rely on game-changing talents to turn that corner. How "winning" their locker room culture is overblown. Pittsburgh didn't finally break their playoff drought because of a "winning culture" - it broke it because McCutchen is mighty good at baseball. Talent is what turns bad from good, not how delightful the cubhouse is. And I'm a firm believer that locker room culture is important, but it doesn't apply here. (Not to mention it doesn't have to cost you what the Twins are paying Morales right now to get some clubhouse guidance for young players) 2. I've said before that good teams minimize the number of bad players they have moreso than load up on great players. It's Brock's point but flipped a bit. The problem is a guy like Morales doesn't always give you that 2-3 WAR player for a price that makes sense. Great teams need a handful of guys making peanuts being those players and have to be careful that when they do fork over a lot of cash, that the player they gave it to earns it. Right now the Twins are getting hosed on Morales in terms of that value. I'd also suggest taht regardless of whether you are worried about Pinto or Arcia or Vargas is irrelevant - investing 8-10% of your payroll into a DH is generally not a wise decision unless you KNOW that guy is making an impact. We can safely say Morales is not that type of player. 3. Getting too comfy resigning players that aren't the best fit or use of resources because they "like it here" leads to stupid mistakes. See: Pelfrey. 4. Prospect blocking DOES happen. One of the things that made the 2000s Twins successful is that they generally made way for the young players that were better, be it Mauer, Morneau, eventually Bartlett, Cuddyer, etc. AAA players can't "force" themselves past an established, well paid veteran very easily. Good teams don't intentionally throw hurdles in front of those players. They might have good plan Bs or moderately priced place holders but they don't flop 10M down on someone and say "Guess that AAA guy is going to have to beat them out!" - now you've muddled economics with talent as well. So I really dislike it when that comment is flippantly thrown around. No team just sits an 8M dollar player because some guy in AAA is doing alright, not very easily at least. 5. Dman is right, most of this talk is based on a HIGHLY unlikely premise. Anyone really want him for 3-4 years? No? Then we really don't disagree that much about this. Sorry to go all DocBauer on that post, , but just felt a bunch needed to be said.

Very true, but if it's an August deal that almost certainly means far less value. I guess I'm still foolishly hoping for a deadline deal.

This. Though Hammer and Morales only have two weeks to turn around their inept play of late. They are unlikely to drum up value even with a homer binge.

I guess that depends on your definition and that varies. I've always thought if it primarily as the 90s and early 2000s. I think when you look at OPS+ being 112 vs. 116 despite a significant gap in OPS, tells me there was a difference in the eras they played in. (Edit: I suppose park factor could be huge in this too)

The point was that Jeter's offense has to be seen in light of the era he played in - which had record offensive numbers. His OPS+ is roughly the same as Ripken's and defensively it's no contest IMO. Larkin should also at least be in the conversation.

I'll take Ripkin over Jeter - Jeter played in the juiced era (not saying he did, just inflated offense everywhere) and was not the defender other top contenders were.

How many rounds were there? 12? Anything more than 2 is just foolishness.

His agent is Boras. "On the cheap" isn't in his vocabulary, I think people are being a bit pie-in-the-sky on these hopes. But the FA market is a funny thing.

That's just it - Morales doesn't look like the kind of guy that is going to have a long and healthy career into his 40s. Extending him (granted at a far less dramatic price) worries me for the same reason Fielder getting 10 years should've worried someone. Morales doesn't exactly scream "athlete well into my 30s" by his build. No offense meant, just an observation.

Honestly, I doubt he's listening until it's at least 1/10. It would be a considerable pay cut for him to take those offers. And if he's trying for a "make good" 1 year deal....wouldn't you think he'd want to do that somewhere he could pad his stats? (Ala Cruz in Baltimore) I'd rather toss something like 3/15 at Span or someone else than throw the kind of money at Morales that I think it would take. But I could obviously be wrong about what it would take.

I honestly can't see Morales signing for anything less than 2 years. If you want him for one more year you might as well hand him the QO then.

I'd kind of like to see this signing. Force Hicks to RF where he's likely to be long-term (assuming he has his stuff straight by then). Parms over in LF. Let DH go to some combo of Pinto/Arcia.

Doesn't that depend heavily on the years and dollars? Guys that are basically 1B/DHs are not the hardest guys to find. Especially not if you want to pay them 10+ million a year.

Vargas isn't the guy Morales would be blocking next year, it'd likely be some combination of Pinto/Arcia/Mauer. At least until September or so. Which is why Morales makes no sense since he likely wouldn't sign for only one year. Plus...what's he done so far to make us want him back at this point?

The Mastro and Presley decisions were more about CF depth when all we had was Bartlett and Hicks on the roster. Fuld was a gift dropped in the Twins laps that they didn't deserve. I don't remember anyone complaining about getting him, he bailed the Twins out of some serious roster mismanagement.

Since an extension certainly means more than one year.......no. Please no.