jmlease1

He's an exciting prospect and was terrific in what was his first full professional season. Sucks that he needed TJ and couldn't finish the AA season, but I think it was smart to time the surgery so he can hopefully play a full or close to full season in 2025. Deciding on a position for him is a little challenging: he has the tools to play 2B or CF, and I suspect he'd do fine at 3B depending on how his arm recovers from the surgery but he didn't get to play there in 2024 because of the injury. I'm sure he can slot in just fine in LF or 1B, but the Twins may not want to jump him down that far on the spectrum until they have a better feel for how his arm is. His power was down a little at AA, but it seems reasonable that the injury was starting to hold him back a little more. He seems to have a very good understanding of the strike zone for player his age and his approach at the plate is pretty advanced. If he can get better at punishing offspeed stuff he's going to be a pretty scary combination of power/speed/contact and that bat will play no matter where he lands. Twins have pushed him aggressively and he's responded to the challenge quite well. Hope he responds to surgery as well!

He looked like a AAAA player: good enough to wreck AAA pitchers, but not good enough to hit in MLB. He was chasing sliders and would get himself out, and added no value defensively. He repeated things in SD and KC: huge stats in AAA and couldn't even really get a look in MLB other than a cup of coffee, and both teams let him go. I mean, SD traded him for a terrible backup catcher and KC (who was going nowhere at the time) cut him. Good for him for getting things together in Oakland. Now, is it maybe easier to play for a team that has no expectations? Maybe. But he's also figured some things out in the last 2 years. But I'd push back on the idea that Rooker is a "Falvey Dream Pick". There seems to be some idea that the Twins under Falvey/Levine established some kind of hitter profile that they stick to like glue or something, and that it's significantly different from the rest of the league. Are there a lot of teams out there that don't want their hitters swinging hard?

That's an argument against having relievers in the Hall of Fame, not an argument against Billy Wagner, though. (WAR isn't a great metric for evaluating relievers, IMHO) I think the idea that relievers are a position and should be represented in the Hall is an interesting one, but already seems to be mostly done.

Most dominant left-handed reliever of all-time? As deadly at 36 as he was at 26? I can't hold the postseason against him too much: it's 11 innings over 7 playoff seasons. Rivera had 8 seasons where he threw more than 11 playoff innings. Too small of a sample to say for sure that "Wagner sucked in the postseason". He was a great great reliever, absolutely dominant year after year. And one of the things that we've seen in the last decade in MLB is that it's actually pretty hard to be a great reliever year in and year out. Wagner was great in basically every season but one, which is the one he got hurt and only pitched half the season.

Nathan had the bad luck of overlapping his relief career with Mariano. Nathan was an awesome reliever, one of the best in history, but he was always pitching in the shadow of Mariano, who was the best. And I say this as someone who despises the Yankees and their players with the white-hot intensity of a thousand suns going super nova. It's a bit like Tim Raines, who at least had the good fortune to not get the early boot off the BWAA ballot and gave people time to consider him properly and in Nathan's case after after the ballot had "cleared" a bit. Raines was one of the greatest leadoff men in history, but he played at the same time as the greatest: Rickey freakin' Henderson.. I'd vote for Nathan, who was dominant for a long time, overcoming injury and a late start as a reliever to be truly great. I'm a booster of Santana as well, because the peak was staggering. 5 straight years in the top 5 in Cy Young voting is insane, deserved both his wins and should have had a 3rd except voters didn't want to give him 3 straight and were still being fooled by "pitcher wins" as a meaningful statistic to show the value of a starter. The Koufax comparisons are fairly close in a lot of ways. Koufax has the postseason heroics to push him over and walked off on top, which added to the legend: Johan battled his way through one last season after the catastrophic injury and instead his last MLB time wasn't nearly as positive. Narratives matter in HoF voting. Johan also didn't have teams as strong and the opportunity to pitch in the WS. Hardly his fault the Mets teams weren't impressive and his Twins teams were pretty unlucky (what could have been if Liriano's elbow doesn't explode in 2006!). But when you look at their records at bRef you see a lot of the same things: lots and lots of "black type" in their primes as they led their leagues in every good pitching stat that mattered. I hope they'll both get good consideration, but I suspect they won't get through. It's not easy on these committees, and a lot of times you need a narrative (or former teammates and coaches as voters) to push you through. Both are worthy, but I think they'll be left out because the barrier is so high and there's little time or avenues to build a campaign and a narrative. Their cases would be stronger if they'd gotten to spend more time on the BWAA ballot, I think. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe the committee will see the injustice of them getting pushed off too quickly. I hope so, because they are deserving.

Adding a proven LHP who doesn't get beat up by any righty who can hold a bat is the biggest need for this bullpen, other than decent health. Heck, the Twins don't need to get lucky and have good to great health from the bullpen to have a strong group, just not have every coin flip go against them. Varland is for sure going to be in the bullpen. Will he start the season there? I suspect he will, and the team will risk Henriquez getting grabbed by someone else. But that's just a hunch. We'll see where Topa and Stewart are health-wise: if 100% healthy they're in the 'pen. If not, maybe we see Topa stashed in AAA for a few weeks to work his way back and Stewart on the IL. The basis is there for a strong bullpen, especially if they add a LHP. Funderburk is decent depth that way and Moran certainly has the talent (but may need some AAA time to get used to pitching again).

I liked the pick at the time and haven't changed my mind on it, but there's still all the usual risks associated with a high school pitcher. He's got plenty to work on but has absolutely flashed the talent that made him a high draft pick. I wouldn't have him quite this high (it's almost all projection right now, so to me he's more like a top ten guy rather than top 5) but I get the excitement and interest around his ability. He needs innings and reps IMHO. Hopefully he stays healthy and can throw 90-100 innings and improve his command. I think he'll start back in Ft. Myers, but will move up to Cedar Rapids by midseason at the latest. I'll be curious to see how he does against LH hitter this year; he got bashed around by them pretty good in 2024, so figuring out which offerings can help him against lefties will be part of his development process this season, I think. Should be an interesting year for Soto. He passed the "lemon test" I'd say; this season will tell us more about what his path looks like as a prospect.

I'll be curious to see what Topa signed for, but I'm not surprised they are bringing him back. Hopefully they've got a good feel for his medicals and he'll actually be able to really pitch for us in 2025. Talent and ceiling are there, but the health has to be a concern. Hopefully we got him under projections too. I probably wouldn't have tendered Tonkin at $1.5M, but I'm fine with bringing him back at $1M. That's barely above mininum salary, seems fine for a guy who can compete for a middle relief role. It's sad that we have to be so tight that 500K matters so much, but that's where we are with the ownership.

Headrick and Henriquez are already on the 40-man roster and were not subject to the Rule 5 Draft. They are pre-arb, so we could non-tender them a contract and waive them at no cost. If they sign a new contract for 2025 and we later waive them, we're still on the hook for their salaries if no one else picks them up. (I think)

I think we're a season too early for this article. 2026 it'll make more sense to me, especially if Walker Jenkins continues his rise and Emma has been knocking the cover off the ball in AAA and gotten some time in MLB in 2025. While I'm enthusiastic about Emma's ability and think he'll get plenty of opportunity in the Twins OF in 2025, handing him a starting job seems...aggressive. I like seeing prospects earn their way in to MLB opportunities by destroying their level, rather than being handed a job on scholarship. The lineup could use a little more RH thump, but 1B/DH seems to be the most logical place to do that...and even if the team cobbles together the payroll space to add that type of hitter and they play some corner OF, I don't know that it makes Larnach or Wallner redundant yet. Healthy, Larnach is a pretty solid outfielder, so if his turf toe (which always sounds dumb, but is a really painful injury that makes running challenging) is healed, he's quite capable of handling LF. Wallner is very well suited to RF with that cannon of an arm, and if we have Buxton patrolling CF it will help him for sure. Wallner has produced in the lineup. Aesthetically, he's going to infuriate a segment of Twins fans for as long as he's on the team, but the stats really don't lie: dude can hit, and can produce like you need a RF to produce. OPS+ of 149 is a serious number. That's better than any player on Cleveland last season. the reason to move either is if someone makes you a trade offer you can't refuse. not because they're redundant.

they don't need the roster spots so badly that there's a real reason to non-tender Headrick or Henriquez. I mean, we weren't exactly short of space for the Rule 5. I honestly have no idea whether Tonkin can handle higher leverage roles at all, so my inclination is to non-tender him because a) I doubt he'll get more on the open market, so he'd still be an option to re-sign if you want, and b) it's really hard to know just how impactful he can be. He looks like just a guy, might be useful to pitch 1-2 innings of middle relief, but limited upside. he was pretty good for the Yankees, and they cut him. He was bad for the Mets and smoke & mirrors for the Twins (ERA was ok, but that WHIP?) but both are very small sample sizes. 2023 he was...ok. $1.5M shouldn't be an issue but on this team, with this payroll, and these owners...it is. Topa has one excellent season and a lot of injuries. But he was excellent in 2023, and looked good in the tiny sample we have for 2024. Higher ceiling, lower floor. I would tender him, but we'll know what the Twins (who know more than me) think of his health based on their decision. If they non-tender Topa it'll be because they think he has little to no chance of being health in 2025. If they keep him, their assessment of his medicals says he'll pitch.

The talent level is high, but I agree: we do need to see whether he's capable of pitching deeper in games and holding up the 2nd and 3rd time through a lineup consistently. What do his pitches look like after 75 of them, and can he get through one more inning at that point? I know he's had some injury concerns, and maybe we'll find that keeping his workload down in his development stages will pay out with better health now that he's closer to MLB (and eventually in the majors) but we need to see him throw in the 6th inning a lot more or he will look more like a reliever to me too. He is really talented though! I think Morris and Lewis are both more advanced as starting pitching options (and Festa and Matthews for sure), but Raya might get a shot before either because of his addition to the 40-man. I can live with that, because they're not all that far off. A starting pitching pipeline pecking order of Festa, Matthews, Raya, Adams, Morris, and Lewis is pretty good and opens up flexibility to move Paddack for salary relief if needed

here's the thing, though: as long as we don't move Jax back to the rotation (which I maintain would be a dreadful mistake) we don't need Stewart to be a savior. With Varland moving into the 'pen it should also reduce how much we're counting on him or Topa to be healthy and whatever we get out of them is whatever we get. Duran, Jax, Sands, Alcala are all pitchers capable of throwing in high leverage roles. Varland can be used like Sands was last season: lower leverage early, increasing leverage roles as he proves his capability. Stewart lands as a 5th guy at the back of the bullpen instead needing him to be the 2nd or 3rd. That's the advantage of Jax stepping up (and staying in the bullpen) and Sands and Alcala being healthy and impactful. If we can find a LHP that is acceptable against RH hitters, this bullpen should be quite good. Unfortunately, you simply can't run out a guy like Okert, who might be death to lefties, but makes all righties look like Mookie Betts, any longer. Moran will likely need some time to get back into a groove after the injury and surgery, Funderbruk isn't reliable enough yet, Thielbar looks cooked even if we wanted him back, and Prielipp needs more minor league innings. But if we can get that solid LHP to add to this bullpen, they're going to be in good shape even if Stewart or Topa aren't ready for Opening Day. No more Jacksons, no more Okerts. keep Jax in the 'pen where he can be great.

The more I think about it, the more sense it makes to have added him to the 40-man. Pitchers at AAA with any kind of upside are vulnerable, and even if Adams might not be able to make it as a starter (and he's further down on the pecking order of Twins starting pitching prospects) he's absolutely going to get a shot, and if it doesn't work for him starting in MLB he'll get a chance to relieve. Having been durable and effective in the minors already most teams could find a spot for him in the bullpen this season even if they're not ready to have him start for them. Other teams (rebuilding ones) would take a chance on him as the 5th guy, have him be a swingman, etc to see if they can get some value off the Twins draft and development. He's got value and probably would have been taken. Seems like a good idea to protect him, even if he's not as hot a prospect as Morris or Lewis. It'll be interesting to see how the Rule 5 Draft goes. Those 26-man slots are precious.

Who was the 7th starter in 2024? Festa, who had 3 starts and 12 1/3 innings in AAA in 2023. Right now, the rotation is Lopez, Ober, Ryan, SWR, Paddack (unless traded) with Festa or Matthews next up. Both have passed Varland at this point. I don't think there's a real problem in having a prospect like Morris, Adams, Raya, or Lewis be 7-10 on the options list. Varland does not need to stay a starter, and the Twins don't need to sign another back end veteran waste of money starter.

Early nominee for the Preposterous Statement Award!

That's the thing though: elite relievers do repeat, and that's what makes them elite. It's when you're paying average guys big money and expecting them to be consistent year after year that your bullpen ends up being a mess. Alcala, Sands, and Varland haven't shown they can get there consistently yet but all the signs suggests that Jax and Duran are elite relievers. Jax hasn't had a poor year as a reliever and should be right in his prime. Duran hasn't even turned 27 yet and while last season wasn't up to his standards, he was still a quality reliever showing what can be reasonably looked at as his floor. The Twins need to add a LHP for the bullpen; counting on Funderburk or Moran to fill that role from the jump is asking too much and too risky, especially when veteran help can be found without breaking the bank. But they may already have their multi-inning reliever in varland, who looks to be well-suited to throwing 1-2 innings of relief to bridge those middle innings. I wouldn't count on Topa/Stewart because their health is too iffy, but the odds are decent that one of them will be able to add good innings this year. But when you have Jax & Duran for the highest leverage innings out the gate and Alcala and Sands coming in behind them, you have the basis for what can be an excellent bullpen. They were really good for most of 2024, just got ground down in the second half by not having enough consistent innings behind the top 4 guys. Sands and Alcala were both good last year. legitimately good, with the peripherals to back it up.

Do they love Rortvedt? Dude is a good defensive catcher, but he can't hit either. TB isn't interested in Vazquez because of the salary, but I doubt they're all that thrilled with a sore-kneed catcher whose slugging is lower than his on-base %.

Morris is doing very well. I really like seeing so little variance in his splits between LH and RH hitters; so many prospects struggle with one side of the plate as they get to the high minors and so far Morris seems to be able to handle it with his variety of pitches. He's been remarkably consistent so far as a pro; outside of that first stint at Cedar Rapids (where he gave up a lot of hits), his numbers at every level have looked pretty similar. If he can get his K/9 back up around 9 and bring the BB/9 back down closer to 2 than 3 while continuing to keep the ball in the park like he has, you have to like his chances. I'm impressed with how well he's done so quickly: he's gone from low A to AAA in 2 seasons and just turned 23 in September. It'll be interesting to see where he falls on the pecking order as starters are inevitably needed in MLB. He has to be behind Festa and Matthews; both have had a taste of MLB and are on the 40-man. He might be more ready than Raya, but Raya is on the 40-man already so depending on how things are going injury-wise, that could keep him down longer? I'd probably go Festa, Matthews, Morris, Lewis, Raya, Adams, Nowlin (if he stays) in terms of readiness, but Adams or Raya could jump ahead on the call to MLB in 2025 if there's a 40-man crunch. It sure does make it easier to move on from Paddack knowing that we have guys like Morris waiting in AAA.

Moran is an interesting case, but he's also got a bigger contract, correct? Maybe a team would try to grab him in the Rule 5, put him on the 16-man and then send him to the 60-day IL at the start of the year? But it still occupies a precious 26-man slot at a tight time of year with a player that isn't going to contribute. I think it will be tough for a team to take a player with a history of wildness coming off a major injury to slot into the 26-man.

I think part of what we're seeing is that it's difficult to take a position player in the Rule 5 draft with almost every team running a 13 man bench for position players in MLB. Unless your Rule 5 selection can come in and play at least some fairly early you're putting your squad in a bad position. Pitchers are much more likely to get taken if someone is in AA or AAA, might have some utility in the bullpen, and could serve as the 8th guy. Winkel could get taken by a team who doesn't like their choices for a backup catcher and has nothing in AAA, but it seems unlikely. Olivar was a guy I was worried about a bad team taking and trying to stash for a season to send him back to the minors next season, but he's probably too far away from being ready to contribute especially since his catching skills need work. I thought they might protect Rosario, but since he's never played above AA, is a poor defender, and K-prone, it would probably be tough for a team to hang on to him for the full season on the 26 man. Nowlin might get grabbed; I would definitely go there if I wasn't a contending team: he's left handed with some upside and could float in the bullpen all year for a bad team (CWS?) while the staff works on his stuff, command, etc and sends him back down next season. But he's probably behind Festa, Matthews, Lewis, Raya, Adams, and Morris in the starting pitching pecking order so it's probably not a great loss if someone takes a flier on him.

You undermine your own arguments pretty significantly when you take gratuitous shots at Rocco for a) executing a strategy that everyone in baseball is following, and b) Rocco showed quite clearly that given a starting staff capable of going deeper in games he let them go deeper in games. The "spreadsheet" attacks on the manager are tired and lame, and certainly don't sell me on offering arbitration or a raise to Michael Tonkin, who is very very average. he had a career best stretch with the Yankees...who waived him in August. Someone will give him a chance, and I'm even ok with it being the Twins, but there's a dozen guys like him every year looking for work on cut down day. So spending $1.5M on him doesn't exactly make my sock roll up and down. I mean, Happy Birthday Michael Tonkin! You seem like a marginal middle reliever with minimal upside, but seems ok if you've really figured out a way to get the occasional LH hitter out consistently.

I loved Torii Hunter. He was a delight to watch play...most of the time. And he was a really really good player, and it was pretty impressive how he continued to be a good player well into his 30's, and having one of his best seasons at 36. But he's not a Hall of Famer for me. he technically played 19 seasons, but the first 2 don't really count (1 game as a defensive replacement, and 6 games? nah, let's start in 1999). But in those seasons Torii was most often a quality starter, falling short of all-star levels. He made 5 all-star teams, but probably only deserved maybe 4 of them. He won 9 Gold Gloves, but some of them were on scholarship and reputation for sure. The peaks were never really there. he's the epitome of the Hall of Very Good. And that's fine! he was an excellent player for a long time and did a lot of wonderful things on the field. But Andruw Jones is a borderline case and he was as good offensively as Torii, better defensively, and he's still borderline. Torii was more consistent than Jones, but in every other way, Jones was the superior player. And I hated Jones and his teams, and loved Torii. but the only thing Torii has on Andruw Jones was availability.

None of the pitchers did anything to impress. Disappointed that De Andrade didn't get to play. I assume he hadn't actually recovered well enough from the injury to get on the field? Still a bummer, but hopefully he can get right over the winter and be ready to get back at it. I still like his potential at SS, he's one of the guys in the system that I think could actually stick there, but he'll need to keep developing (and hit) as he goes. Solid job by Rosario. Good to have him get some additional swings in after missing time with an injury. He'll need to the power to flow again in AA, but it was good to see him making a lot of consistent contact. And maybe the OF reps will help him be less...bad...out there. I like his RH bat, but I'd like it more if he could get closer to average in the field and the Ks will always be a concern. Ross definitely helped himself after a slow start. He really hit the AA wall hard, so maybe this helps him into next season. he has to show he can't get bullied in AA as a hitter next season in order to advance. The defense is solid enough, but not so superior that he can make it as a no-hit defensive specialist. he doesn't need to be swinging for the fences: doubles power is enough, but he needs to be able to get there consistently with a solid BA. no one feared him in AA last season and he got overwhelmed. he needs to do to AA pitching what he did to the AFL.

He's a fascinating prospect. The ceiling is very high for him, but he's also got bust potential if he can't improve his spin recognition and he's certainly got some real development work to do. I suspect the big challenges for him will be at AA and higher when he starts facing more advanced pitching, but he's off to an intriguing start and did just fine for 19 at Ft. Myers. The combination of power and speed is a lot of fun. I tend to think he's going to end up in the OF rather than stand on the dirt, but he looks like he could be a legit CF and with his length it'd be awfully fun to see him stealing homers at the wall. I like this kind of pick from time to time. While you don't want to fill your system with too many boom or bust picks, it's also good to stretch from time to time and take a risk on a high ceiling player like this. I feel like the overall draft strategy of the franchise is in a pretty good place: they're looking for inefficiencies, they're generally drafting for talent over need (but without totally ignoring need). they're not afraid to take some risks, and they don't seem to be dogmatic. (for example, while they've been drafting a lot of college pitchers, they haven't been afraid to take a high school pitcher that they like. Same with the hitters. They'll take a swing at a guy like Winokur in the 3rd round, but they're not doing it in every round.) This will be an interesting season for Winokur. He's had a full season of pro baseball. He's had some success, but also had some challenges. he's had to deal with picking up a knock or two. There's loads of talent, and I'm looking forward to seeing how he applies it. I'm guessing he starts back in Ft. Myers with a midseason promotion to Cedar Rapids, but I wouldn't be shocked if he went to A+ from the jump.