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Johnny Ringo

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Everything posted by Johnny Ringo

  1. Johnny Ringo
    That is one bummer of a list.
  2. Johnny Ringo
    You know the old adage about the FO listening to the fans. Listen to them and pretty soon you are sitting with them. My guess is that this is very close to a lock. As a follow-up; any guesses who the leader in career defensive WAR might be? Hint: (on a years adjusted basis its not very close)
  3. Johnny Ringo
    I love Cruz. But one year deals for a guy at the end of his (glorious) career are not significant.
  4. Johnny Ringo
    The premise is flawed by the notion that the Twins have at least an average chance to sign free agents. They don't. Not even close. The club has had only one significant free agent signing in recent memory. Donaldson. How did they do it? He had $100mm stuck in his mind and the Twins paid it when no one else would. Any roster construction discussion has to be based upon not who we want but who we can get. For a variety of reasons, (bad weather, bad taxes, decades of playoff irrelevancy) that is a very short list. For instance, there is a best chance that the Twins start selling BOGO beer than signing Javy Baez.
  5. Johnny Ringo
    If money wasn't an object, you would take them all and figure it out. With these guys, there are no bad choices, just bad prices.
  6. Johnny Ringo
    I'm not sure I offered up any facts, but here are some facts. They spent nothing on pitching last year and got what they paid for. They were 17th in overall payroll in 2021 ( source: MLB) . They finished dead last in the worst division in baseball. They had 89 losses which sounds bad but their performance, in fact, is worse than that because they played in the worst division in baseball. They dealt a proven and very valuable asset (Berrios) in an area where they are woefully deficit (pitching) for two uncertain assets( prospects). I could go on but I guess that is enough cheery facts for one post.
  7. Johnny Ringo
    You never know about this "ace" stuff. The Yankees would almost certainly tear up Cole's contract if they could. It seems that Cole, minus the goop, is just a good pitcher. The Steinbrenners didn't pay for that. They didn't pay for the Boston performance. The Twins had a dependable "almost ace" ( let the debates fly) in Berrios and they sent him packing only because he wanted a market rate for his services and that was the only reason. As we all enter winter, the Twins enter into another long winter of their own. We have no chance to truly compete in 2022 and the Twins have no belly to spend to make it otherwise. They sell hopes and dreams and are bereft of any ideas to make them come true. Realty is often harsh. Reality is often cruel. But, this is our reality.
  8. Johnny Ringo
    In a salary cap league (of the Twins' own imposition) Kepler is expendable, certainly at his 2022 salary. He needs to be dealt for pitching and his salary diverted to more pitching. No one will take Sano at his 2022 expense. On any other team, he is a DH and a DH only. To say his defense "leaves something to be desired" must be a quote from his kindly aunt.
  9. Johnny Ringo
    Death, taxes, a Yankees loss. The route is often different but the destination is always the same.
  10. Johnny Ringo
    Reasonable minds can reasonably disagree.
  11. Johnny Ringo
    The Twins are the amongst the last to eat at the free agent trough because of climate, high state taxes, and thirty years of play-off irrelevancy . Twenty nine teams passed on him, so I am 100% sure that 99% of MLB would not disagree with me.
  12. Johnny Ringo
    In a salary cap league (the one that the Twins self-impose); yes it was inexplicable. Because it surely came out of the pitching budget. With our first half pitching, you could have had Ozzie Smith and the Holy Trinity at short and it wouldn't matter. Simmons is a 1.0 WAR guy. If teams like the Twins spend $10 million per incremental win, they are doomed. Front offices are paid to understand this stuff. So was it inexplicable? Yes. It was inexplicable.
  13. Johnny Ringo
    Dobnak's contract is an inexplicable move in a series of inexplicable moves (Simmons, Happ, Shoemaker, the discount bin bullpen) this year by the front office. Ascribing any value, either positively or negatively, to Spring Training stats is buying fool's gold. He is a nice story. He seems like a nice man. But like Astudillo, Cave and a couple of others, he has no place on a legitimate major league roster. The danger of the contract is that it places pressure, either explicitly or implicitly, on the manager to keep trotting him out there. Falvine apparently wanted to play the lotto with this signing. The team needs to chew innings this year? Fine. But that's all it should be be. Like almost all lottery tickets, this one has expired worthless.
  14. Johnny Ringo
    I have to chuckle when people say Falvey/Levine deserve a hall pass because they won the Central Division a couple of times It was, by far, the worst division in baseball . We should view this in the same way as winning our neighborhood bowling league. Congrats! You bested the gal down the street with the bad hip and Pete, from next door, who is just there to get away from his wife. The value of winning the Central? We saw that in the play-offs. We have no chance to win in 2022 and no real stomach to compete for talent at market prices. The Berrios trade ratified both of these ideas. If the front office says otherwise it is only because they are rightfully terrified of the gate next year. I agree that we should not spend on a high-priced FO pitcher next year. To what end? To win 70 games rather than 65? The good news is that I have every faith that this ownership group will religiously follow my advice.
  15. Johnny Ringo
    I know we want to be optimists but............ We had a solid 1 and 1/2 and we traded him away. Why? Was he injury prone? No. He never missed a start. Was he out of shape? No. He was a model of fitness. Was he a problem off the field? No. He seems a rock-solid citizen. Too old? No. He was entering his prime. Why then? Why? Because he had the audacity of seeking a market wage a year out. Given this, why in the world then would we compete in free agency to truly replace him in the rotation? We won't. We will find another candidate for the Wes Johnson School of Redemption. While I am being sunny, before we decide Ober is a fixture going forward; lets all recall that he has throw exactly 74 innings of 4.00 ERA major league ball. Don't put a deposit down on the parade yet. I am not sure what the question is but Randy Dobnak is not the answer. Hope springs eternal in Twins' land. It's all the front office has to sell. Is there a chance the starting rotation will be adequate in 2022? Sure. But as Damon Runyon said " The race is not always to the swift, nor the battle to the strong. But that's the way to bet."
  16. Johnny Ringo
    As you look to 2022, Ober is no doubt a bright spot. Dobnak will be around next year only because of his inexplicable contract. Jax is a great story, I am sure he is a very nice kid and he has no place on a major league mound. Pineda will not or should be resigned. Maeda may have thrown his last pitch as a Twin. So contend in 2022? I wonder how Vegas will make the Ober/Uber line on that?
  17. Johnny Ringo
    Is anyone in the Twins organization embarrassed to be viewed by the league as a clown show? The TV broadcast team chuckled their way through Astudilo's inning. Funny? I think it's a disgrace. The Red Sox are in a play-off chase. I am not a fan of theirs but I admire their franchise success. It is incumbent upon the Twins under every baseball code to fight to the final pitch. Instead we go for laughs apparently. Right now, I regret all the equity, both monetarily and emotionally, that I have invested in this club. The Twins owe the game, and equally importantly their fans, much better than this. I did not sign up for the Washington Generals. Pass the confetti bucket.
  18. Johnny Ringo
    I went to the doctor with a similar injury and he said that I needed surgery. I told him I wanted a second opinion. He said "Ok, you're ugly too."
  19. Johnny Ringo
    I think we have discovered Gleeman's karaoke name.
  20. Johnny Ringo
    If anyone watched the Field of Dreams game last night, we are now starting to see the White Sox fully assembled with Jimenez and Robert returning to the lineup. They are a machine from top to bottom. This is what a team looks like in 2021. Doesn't it end all discussion if the Twins' FO has done a "good" job? The White Sox must look in our dugout and just shake their heads.
  21. Johnny Ringo
    The Twins "success" over the past few years has been built upon the ruins of the worst division in baseball. The Tigers and Royals were in full rebuild modes, the White Sox were emerging from their own reboot and Cleveland has been hampered by ongoing and oppressive budgetary issues. When the Twins had to play with the big boys (the playoffs); they were exposed, being dispatched swiftly and with extreme prejudice. I am not sure what success we are talking about. Falvey and Levine haven't done admirable jobs nor probably fireable jobs. But now the Twins are in purgatory. The FO won't admit, to use a real estate term, the house is a "scraper" A property that should be leveled and rebuilt. They have no chance to compete next year but to say that would be the worst defeat of all. So they will try to patch the roof one more time and hope it doesn't rain next year. In Twins territory, it has rained for thirty years.
  22. Johnny Ringo
    I say this without a trace of sarcasm, but this is the magic of baseball. People can find beauty and meaning in meaningless games. A season marred by bad play, bad luck, bad choices and bad management fades away. We embrace and cherish these grand moments.
  23. Johnny Ringo
    "There is no winning! Only degrees of losing." Danny De Vito ~ The War of the Roses For the Twins, there was no winning at the trade deadline. Selling places you at the $5 table with the forsaken and the lost. The Twins don't have a team to compete in 2022 and you have to question if they have an ownership group that will allow them to compete ever. High quality starting pitchers cost at least $25 million a year and you need three of them at a minimum. Do the Twins want a seat at that table? History, recent and distant, says no. Berrios is just Johann Santana 2.0. Twins fans have been duped by a few meaningless divisional titles. Winning the worst division in baseball means nothing. Do you think otherwise? The playoff record dashes any dissenting view. Even that empty prize seems completely unachievable now. Stack our roster versus the White Sox'. Tears shall flow into your beer. The Twins will soon celebrate the thirtieth anniversaries of their last World Series victory and their last playoff relevance simultaneously. They will do so without irony. For the Twins, it's always about "Wait til next year." That sign should permanently hang, year after year, over Target Field.
  24. Johnny Ringo
    If fairness to Jose, players are under tremendous pressure from their own union to maximize their contracts. A single negotiation can set a bar for what others get. Ballplayers develop a brotherhood and they think, rightfully, what they do directly impacts others. Sure they want the money. We all would. But there are other considerations too. Also, I find the "home-town discount" concept to be laughable. It's the Loch Ness monster of pro sports: often discussed and never seen. Jose has been the consummate pro. He works hard, takes the ball every fifth day and gives you what he has. However it turns out; wish him well. That's the one thing here that costs nuthin'.
  25. Johnny Ringo
    I think everyone on the planet knows that Donaldson is available at a price and that he wants to play elsewhere. The Twins will likely hear an offer for $15-20 million in salary relief (the Twins eat the rest) and a middling prospect just to help them save face. I doubt it gets better than that. Forget your committed dollars to him. That is gone one way or the other. It really boils down to do you want him for $20 million? The answer is of course you do. People oddly hate on him but he is EXACTLY what the Twins thought he would be in 2021. Unless he hand picked the bullpen, the blame is elsewhere.
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