jmlease1

Jenkins and Culpepper keep rolling at AA, and it's awfully nice to see. Prospects that bring hope; pair that with new ownership and maybe the fanbase won't entirely walk away for a generation. Marek Houston looks like he's passing the lemon test at Ft. Myers; he's got more K's than maybe you'd like, but he's also piling up the hits, so it's a perfectly fine start for a legit shortstop. Fedko is doing great so far at AAA; GG might need a little more adjustment (he's managed to have a higher BA than OBP so far, which isn't easy) but he's holding his own after another promotion. Would like to see the Twins clear out some of their Quad-A guys at Saint Paul to ensure that real prospects get enough playing time, but they might not get the assessment and sorting done for sure until the offseason. minor league reports are going to probably be a Twins highlight for the rest of the season. In conclusion, Eff the Pohlads and Sell the Team!

A good game for the team last night. Zebby wasn't efficient early; would like to see him finish off hitters better when he gets in those good pitcher's counts, rather than missing with an uncompetitive pitch or seeing guys foul off multiple pitches with two strikes. But he was effective and held the line well against a pretty good lineup. With our bullpen...limited, it was good to see the offense put up runs early and give the team a nice lead to work with. Keaschall hasn't missed a beat at the plate and it was great to see him blast his first big league homer. Very happy to see the Twins working a pile of walks and getting runners on. Larnach is on a nice run right now and setting himself up a bit for next year...which will likely be somewhere else if this ownership stick around. In conclusion, Eff the Pohlads and Sell the Team!

You made this about Rocco. Arraez never played a day in MLB before he was called up in May of 2019, so he debuted under Baldelli. If this is about whether Rocco and the MLB staff can "develop" position players, you have to count Arraez. Wallner's bWAR per 162 is 3.3. He's got a career OPS+ in MLB of 133 to date. That's a legit starter. It just is. Lewis' biggest problem has been injury, which isn't something I would hold the manager responsible for. I'd say Jeffers still counts...care to find a new criteria to exclude him too? There's been plenty of failure, either due to guys simply being unable to make the leap or injury: Kirilloff, Miranda, Julien, Gordon, and if you want to argue Larnach I don't think it's unfair; he looks like a bench/platoon bat not a starter. Too soon to say on Lee. They haven't done enough to produce enough of the kind of guys to replace the Kepler/Polanco/Rosario type position players as those guys aged out/got too expensive for what they were. But it's not zero, and probably has a lot more to do with the minor league development staff, front office talent evaluation, injuries, and the player's real talent than the MLB manager.

Roden has shown me nothing to suggest that he should be looked at as anything other than a throw-in. He's 25 and has looked dreadful at the plate in MLB, completely overmatched. Great, he's hit very well in AAA, but we've been hearing quite a bit that the gap between AAA and MLB is very high right now, and we've been seeing in with players like Gasper, who crushes the International League and gets crushed by MLB. This deal is a big swing on Rojas, and if this front office wasn't already cooked if the team gets sold it's the kind of move that gets people fired because they sold off a reliever who has already shown he can be an impact guy on the back end of a bullpen (which is more important than being a "closer", really) that was cheap with many more season of team control for a pitching prospect with exactly 5 starts above A-ball. Who has never thrown more than 85 innings in a professional season (and seems highly unlikely to pass that this season either) I hated this move when they made it, and I think I still hate it. Right now, he looks more likely to end up as a reliever in MLB to me, so if we gave up a known MLB relief quantity for a down the road maybe reliever...UGH. I don't care about the hometown boy bit; we overrate that kind of extra credit; it's not like it was going to draw substantially more people to the ballpark. A cute story and I'm happy for it, but it doesn't make Varland untradeable. What should have made him untradeable was this kind of return for someone who filled a serious need and was cheap as hell and going to be ours for many more seasons. I hope I'm very wrong on Rojas. I hope he was undervalued and will be hitting top prospect rankings and everyone can sell me on him being a front of the rotation guy. But right now, he's a suspect. Yes, there's real upside, but to me he looks like an A-ball lottery ticket, not the kind of return you should get for a player like Varland, who has already been very damn good as a reliever this season. Someone should have said no for the Twins.

Wallner. (As noted elsewhere) Arraez. Jeffers. Royce Lewis (yes, he's been injured and inconsistent, but his bWAR per 162 games is 3.2) I'm not going to pretend the Twins development of starting quality MLB position players has been sufficient under this regime; it clearly hasn't. But it's not zero, either. Miranda looks like he's in trouble; I suspect the back injury may have something to do with it. If he's not able to get the hard contact he needs with his free swinging ways, he's simply not going to get it done, and he's been finding it harder to even cover the plate like he used to. He's always been a bat-first player, so if he's not hitting he doesn't add much of anything. Martin is going to get an opportunity. I think he would have gotten it sooner this season if not for the hamstring injury. If his OF defense improves (he should be better than what he's shown with his speed) and he can get on base, he might still make it. Hopefully the Twins will be inclined to let him run if/when he gets on base and see what it looks like for him attacking the bases. Will he hit enough? Will he show he can be more than just a slap-hitter? He's going to get about 2 months to prove it. He's still got a decent floor with his speed and ability to get on base if he can show out better on defense. Julien is the guy who is really on the fence. He needs to be able to drive the ball and make enough contact to prove he's not a Quad-A guy. It's certainly possible that 2023 was a mirage held up by an utterly unsustainable BABIP, but it's also possible that he can get back to stroking line drives again and elevating the ball effectively, which would also allow his patience to play better. We'll see. He should get regular time to complete the season and find out. But there's little room for him if he's not hitting. He hasn't been great since his return, unfortunately. Martin seems like the most likely to stick because he's got more tools & utility. Could fill the Castro role if he's getting on base, which would be fine.

Be realistic. If the Pohlads keep the team, they're not going to eat Rocco's contract no matter how bad you think he is, because everything they're doing right now is about maximizing their own profit. If the Pohlads sell the team, the new ownership is almost certainly going to clean house, starting with the manager. beyond that, the criticism of Rocco in this game thread for putting in a crappy reliever when he got nothing else to work with is damn silly thinking.

and, of course, by 1990 they were in last place again. Part of the problem with a full-on rebuild in MLB is it might be less likely to truly work than any other team sport and certainly take longer than any other. In the NFL (a league with much better and smarter revenue sharing) teams turn it around in 1-2 seasons all the time. How often does an MLB team go from being a 60 win team to an 85 win team in a season? I do think this is closer to a tear down than a re-tooling, unfortunately. They really decimated the bullpen, and if they were re-tooling there's no way they sell off all 5 guys. There's not enough guys in the lineup that have proven they can either stay healthy and/or produce as quality MLB players to say they're only 1-2 guys away from being a quality MLB lineup. Maybe a couple of guys like Martin/Keaschall/Lewis/Lee/Larnach/Roden/Julien change that perception by season's end, but they got a lot of proving to do. (and I like some of those guys. Some of them...less) The rotation has the potential to be very good next season...if there's not another Pohlad-driven cost-reduction sale executed in the off-season. If Pablo & Joe get sent out, we're 100% in tear-down and rebuild. And you could argue that if either goes, we're in that mode, regardless of what we get back.

It's not a complete teardown, because Ryan, Lopez, Jeffers, and Buxton are still here (not that some of them could have gotten traded easily) but when they included Varland in the bullpen flips it pushed them much closer, and it's exceptionally reasonable to be afraid that further moves to make this team cheap and uncompetitive will be coming in the offseason without a change in ownership. I have zero faith that the Pohlads won't instruct that Lopez be traded in the offseason, flipped for prospects and salary savings if they keep the team. Jeffers would likely be dumped as well, since he'd have some value and a contract that would pay him somewhere in the $7-9M range in arbitration. At that point Ryan probably goes too since he'd be making $7M and have real value. There's nothing to suggest that the Pohlads wouldn't strip this team down to the studs, pocket the money, and drop the payroll down under $70M. That's the real concern. That if the team isn't sold, we're not done selling off players. The Pohlads are clearly uninterested in investing any more money in the Twins, and if they keep the team it will only be if they can find a way to make a consistent and significant operating profit on it again. And since they're never going to open the books to anyone, I simply don't care about their claims of $400M in debt that are sitting on it, as I have have no idea how it got there. (I suspect a great deal of it is from either business incompetence or through real estate deals they've involved the franchise in, but we will never know...and I no longer care. Screw them) The cupboard isn't exactly bare here: we have the makings of a real rotation still, and there are some key positions in place, but we haven't seen the advancement and/or health from the young position players we need, we don't know if players like Keaschall, Rodriguez, Gonzalez, Lee, etc will be ready/healthy/good enough to make a difference. Jenkins & Culpepper might still be another season away, despite their promise. And the bullpen is going to need a lot of work, even if I do think they can reconstruct a new bullpen fairly efficiently. But it's probably going to take more than 1 off-season. And losing Correa, even if he was slipping at SS while struggling with health and at the plate blows a hole in the team in a variety of ways. Total tear-down? Not quite yet (and the Varland deal sure pushed it closer to the line). But it might be coming. In conclusion, Eff the Pohlads and Sell the Team!

Sure, blame the manager for this roster. That's logical. Try and relax: if the team gets sold you'll have a new manager that you can complain about soon enough.

Ed Julien isn't one of the top 20 things wrong with this team right now. At least he got a freakin' hit last night. And as "shaky" as he supposedly was, he was still part of turning 3 DP's. But get used to seeing him: he's going to be playing for the rest of the season (which absolutely should happen, regardless of when Keaschall comes up). Hell, the way people treat young players around here I'm guessing people will be ready to dump Keaschall after he boots a couple grounders, wings a throw over someone's head, or has a 3 K day at the plate. Suddenly, there will be a clamor for Eeles or DeBarge...

I love Byron Buxton as much as anyone, and I refuse to act like his many injuries are some kind of personal failing (which often seems to be hinted at when discussing him), but the idea that the Twins failed Buxton doesn't really fit very well here. This season is really the only one where you can say it, where he's been healthy and playing great and the team hasn't been playing near his standard. Even last season he only played 102 games. Notably, in 2023 (when the team was quite good) he was injured and when he did play had one of his worst seasons as a pro. As good as he was from 2019-2022, he was hurt in every one of those seasons, and the teams were good in both 2019 & 2020...and could have used more of a healthy Buxton. The Twins failed the fans by ratcheting up the payroll in 2023 and then yanking the rug out from all of us in 2024, which led to the failures in 2025 which featured an excellent and mostly healthy Buxton season. Not really sure they failed Buxton specifically. But I'm glad he still wants to be here. I'm glad he wants to be a Twin for life and doesn't want to run from the hills. I'm glad one of the most exciting baseball players I've ever seen will still be here and give me a reason to go to the games I already paid for. In conclusion, Eff the Pohlads and Sell the Team!

Look, I don't want to see Noah Davis out there either, because he doesn't look like he belongs on a major-league roster. But let's not pretend that there are a lot of options in the bullpen right now. Who exactly was supposed to come in and throw? They wiped out the bullpen and the most competent remaining arms all threw the night before, so where exactly were they going to (hopefully) get some length? Rocco's getting fired along with everyone else if the team is sold, so maybe skip the gratuitous insults. Adams actually looked like a prospect. He's got a lot of pitches that he can throw for strikes, just not sure that he has enough quality on any of them to consistently get guys out. But it was a pretty good outing, and he was fun to watch the first 4 innings and battled through the 5th. Happy as I am to see some big flies going out, it would be nice to get some guys on base in front of them. Need to get more baserunners, draw some walks to go along with the hits, but when 5 guys have an OBP under .300 it's going to be hard. Roden looking like a Quad-A player right now; 1-13 with 6 K's and zero walks since joining the Twins. Oof.

The rankings seem fine, I guess. Notably, there is no hope in 2026 unless the team is sold. Even if all these prospects kick butt next year, they won't be up fast enough to make enough of an impact next season. (Bradley hopefully will be different, but he's not a prospect. Roden is showing nothing so far and I'm unclear why he was sought after) Mendez is off to a nice start, and you have to hope that he mostly needed a good run of health to start showing some power production. It's a reasonable possibility, but I'd like to see it stick all season before I get too ramped up on him. I'm as excited as I can reasonably be for Tait under the circumstances; I'll probably be more excited about him once we're further past this dreadful mess of a deadline and hopefully the pathetic Pohlad ownership. He does look like a high ceiling prospect at least, but as an A-ball catcher he feels pretty far away. I hope Rojas really is a prospect on the rise who was undervalued by Toronto, because that's the only possible way to make dealing Varland semi-reasonable. I guess his rank here is...fine? But I hate this trade right now, and it's definitely the sort of move that gets an entire front office fired and if this guy flames out they're going to look awful and without any cover from the stench of the Pohlad Family to cover them, because this didn't save money and was unquestionably a Falvey & Co move. Right now my confidence levels in them isn't high. In conclusion, Eff the Pohlads and Sell the Team!

Curious to learn more about Hendry Mendez; it'll be interesting to find out what kind of hitter he really is. He's clearly having a bit of a breakout season, and he's hardly old, but he didn't impress in A-ball that much, so a little curious to see AA going better. But maybe it's mostly because he seems to be healthy/playing? Is the power increase this season for real or a mirage? We can certainly use all the hitters we can find right now...

They'd have been better off saying nothing that sending out that drivel. I don't want to beat up too much on the PR department for the team, because they do well at the smaller stuff, which suggests that in the rank and file there are good professionals and all the failure and tone-deafness is coming from the top ranks (mostly ownership). But this was dumb and stupid, and shows little understanding of crisis management, which is what a deadline fire sale IS for a baseball team. They might have been able to sell this as a re-tolling with some hope for 2026 if they hadn't sold off Varland at the very end; that's the star on top of the tree that topples the whole structure. You could argue (maybe wrongly but it wouldn't be laughable) that the bullpen could be function in 2026 with Varland, Sands, and Topa as being the core to build around...but without a single proven back-end guy? Hardly. There's absolutely zero hope of re-investment without a team sale. I suspect Gleeman is right that if the Pohlads keep control into the offseason, Ryan and Pablo will also be sold off (maybe Jeffers too) as they grab every dollar they can. Joe Pohlad might like baseball, but he's only nominally in charge, hasn't shown any actual competence, and the rest of the family wants the cash. Disappointed in Falvey that he was willing to put his name to that pile of crap. Must have a nice golden parachute in place? Because there's zero chance that new ownership is keeping anyone in this regime's senior ranks at this point (maybe some of the senior folks in scouting could survive, the recent drafts have been pretty good).

I love Culpepper, and he's doing everything right so far this year, but this is literally his first full professional season. Slotting him in as the starting SS for 2026 is probably asking a bit much. It'd be great if he's so awesome in spring training that they decide to skip him another level and bring him up already, but seems a little unlikely. He's doing great, and at this rate he'll be in MLB in 2026, which is amazing (and a reflection of how much the sell-off and payroll limitations from our dreadful ownership has stripped out proven talent) but I wouldn't expect him to be slotted in from the jump. A more likely alignment will be: Lewis, Lee, and Keaschall (and who knows at 1B, but Clemens might be a possibility). Unclear how good Keaschall will be at 2B; franchise seems to have confidence he can stay on the dirt, but increasingly hard to trust their evaluations on some things. Lee is capable enough defensively at SS I think, but he's not a plus defender there. Lewis certainly has the range at 3B and has shown flashes that impress...but how consistent will he be? That might be more about his lack of health enabling him to simply play the position every day. Could be a good enough infield defense that has both questions and upside.

I think GG has shown more than Rosario, but there still might be a role for Rosario? He just turned 23, so it's not like he's exactly old, so there's still time to find more there. When he's going good, he limits K's to a reasonable level, takes walks, and flashes solid power. But he hasn't shown consistent power in a big way that his lower BA will be supported by consistent homers. So he's maybe not a traditional slugger, but at the same time he doesn't make enough consistent contact that you can't be sure he can be a different kind of hitter, bit of a tweener, maybe? He really started the season horribly. Had a fine May and an excellent June, before slumping in July. I think he needs to finish strong this year. I suspect he will not get protected in the Rule 5 upcoming...but I also don't think he'll get plucked, since he's not a plus defender, strong runner (he's ok), won't be ready to hit MLB pitching, and doesn't add much defensive flexibility. But if he finishes 2025 well, I can see him in Saint Paul to start 2026. I'm concerned that he's more like Yunior Severino than a real prospect. I'd like to be wrong there, because I've been on Team Rosario, but there are some unfortunate similarities.

I'm uninterested in seeing Urena much more and hope he's relegated to long relief (or off the roster) when other starters get back and healthy again. He's definition of organizational filler. Wallner is who he is: big power, good patience, low BA. He's still having a decent season (OPS+ of 115) in this mess of a year and has a place for the future. Nice to see Martin and Julien getting another chance; they did the work in AAA to earn their way back up even without the fire sale, so I'll be curious to see where they end. This is a good opportunity for Sands to find his form of last year and make the back end of the bullpen not a total disaster. I don't mind Topa, but wish Tonkin would go away. I didn't like bringing him back in the offseason much, and he's been injured and bad this year. I've been wrong about plenty this year, but wasn't wrong on that one. In conclusion, Eff the Pohlads and sell the team!

Twins have had some success adding/working a splitter into a pitchers mix as a weapon before, so maybe they'll be able to work Bradley's up into a better position that he can keep it working effectively. It sounds like if he has that working it makes a real difference for him. TB has an excellent development program, so it's a little chancy to say that we're going to be able to "fix" Bradley better/faster than TB would, but sometimes a player needs a new voice and new environment to have things sink in or just hearing the same message in a different way helps someone put it together. We've plucked a good from them before, worked with him to make adjustments in pitches and mix to see great success, so while presuming we can do what TB did not is probably a little too arrogant, you also shouldn't presume that anyone who TB will trade isn't salvageable or that they can't be improved either. There's a lot of talent there and it'll be interesting to see if he can put it together. I'm less concerned about the infield defense behind him right now, even if it means he's giving up some extra hits right now. Process will matter a bit more than results for the rest of this (lost) season, so if he's getting ground balls and limiting the dingers again, they can look at infield defense in the offseason. In conclusion, Eff the Pohlads and sell the team!

Man, I go on vacation and the Twins get a new pack of a prospects. This is going to take a while to sort through. (that said, I do believe I'll be starting or ending most of my comments with Eff the Pohlads until they sell the team) Looking forward to getting to know the new kids, but it's nice to see that Kaelen Culpepper and Walker Jenkins continue to roll along at AA. Jenkins seems to have found some of the power stroke that some people were starting to worry over (I assume some naysayer will be along to tell me that we shouldn't be happy about it because he plays in Wichita and therefore it doesn't count?). Both of these guys will be in AAA next season for sure, which is pretty great and fast development. (Thank god, because MLB is looking a little dire) I'm excited to see what the new catching prospects can do, but it's probably going to take some time with these guys. But it is nice to have some high/higher end prospects at that position. If the Pohlads can't get the team sold, Jeffers will probably get dealt in a further cost-cutting move, so we'll need at least one of these guys to develop quickly. In closing, Eff the Pohlads...sell the team!

No, most fans want a team that wins like MKE is doing right now. Most fans loved the Bomba Squad Twins, and they stole waaaay less bases than say the 2024 Twins. Most fans don't care how they get there, and no one was whining about how "boring" the baseball was. The team isn't good enough right now. They're not hitting enough homers; they're not hitting enough period. The starters have too many injuries and some of the young pitchers simply aren't showing out enough yet. If the Twins stole 200 bases but finished 78-82, people would be clamoring for more homers, I guarantee it.

SWR pitched pretty well overall, but could not finish off Bregman, who clobbered him. Was not his best inning, but he did some other good things out there. Alcala still gonna Alcala. He'll look great for weeks and then have a game like this that will tear your hair out. Nice to be on the other end of it I guess? Clemens made a bad read on Wallner's deep fly, but the BoSox Duran made a good play on the ball as well with a quick throw. If France comes through there or Vazquez doesn't GIDP it wouldn't have been a big deal. (still hoping France will get moved out, since I see no future for him here) A good win against a good team. Sort of encapsulates the team's season: good enough to beat good teams, bad enough to lose to bad ones, never know which squad will show up.

I think that's fine, and I agree that he should be expected to have command issues as he's finally getting back on the mound for real baseball after years of missed time for injuries. But it's a reminder that maybe he's not ready to get thrown up to MLB just yet, even though the stuff is elite. I think he's a really exciting prospect, and would be fine with him coming up to AAA. But I'd pump the brakes on him joining the MLB bullpen

Look, by missing the playoffs for the 4th time in 5 years (which is certainly the way this season is going), Falvey is probably going to be on the way out with a new owner. But most of what's in here...where are the facts? What specifically did Falvey stab the fans in the back with? That suggests he lied to people at TwinsFest, and I'm pretty sure that telling them he thought this team could compete wasn't a lie: a lot of people thought this team could compete. Where's the evidence that other teams and/or their players are out of Falvey? Twins fans may be done with him (mostly for not actually winning) but there's zero evidence that Twins player or other teams or other team's player's dislike or mistrust him. Where's the evidence that he grabs credit when things are good and hides when it's bad? He meets with reporters regularly, and that's never seemed to change. Where's the supposed "closed door" policy? Because he hasn't gathered up fans and given them the opportunity to throw rocks at him this year? Falvey and his team are probably all going to lose their jobs when new ownership comes in, and while I like a lot of things they've done here, the record doesn't give them enough to say they deserve more time and a new regime to work under. (I still blame ownership the most for where we're at; they totally pulled the rug out from Falvey and the front office by cutting payroll after the 2023 season) They've done some good things in rebuilding a barren farm system, and broke the playoff losing streak. But it's more than fair to say they haven't won enough to keep going. That said, some of these accusations are ridiculous.

How many useless outs did each guy have by bunting to move a guy from first to second? How many times did they attempt to bunt for a hit and make an out? It's lovely that Hrbek bunted for a hit once a year or so, but hopefully he didn't attempt it very often, because dude was not fast and it wasn't going to work. No one is complaining when a guy bunts for a hit. but as valuable as runs are, you score more of them when you don't sacrifice outs for a base. Weaver's teams don't make the argument for the tactic you think they do: look at who was actually making the sacrifice hits: Belanger and Blair, two fast guys (and Belanger was a terrible hitter with zero power, while Blair became a terrible hitter with little power) who were on the team for their defense. Before the DH like half of the O's SH's were from pitchers, and after the DH like half of them were from Belanger & Blair, because they couldn't do much else. Notably, by the end of the 70's Weaver's O's teams were consistently under 50 SH's in a season, not in the 70's. The people who want the next GM to build a team that bunts a lot are going to be disappointed. The people who want a manager playing for 1 run in the 4th inning are also going to be disappointed. Can they add more speed and guys who have a more varied skill set at the plate? Sure. And we've seen with picks like DeBarge that they're not opposed to drafting a fast guy who is going to add his offense by stealing bases, etc. And yes, having more guys who can lay down a bunt when you only need 1 run to win it in the 9th or extras is probably helpful (notably, it's just as useful to send the ball well into the OF with a runner on 3rd and less than 2 outs in the same "just need 1 run to win" situation) But there's this obsession over bunting around here that's simply inconsistent with winning.