RonCoomersOPS

I think the German Bundesliga has it exactly right (or as close to exactly right as you're ever going to get). Like every other European football league, they have promotion and relegation. The two worst teams in the league are automatically relegated (and the two best teams in the 2. Bundesliga are automatically promoted), and the third worst team in the 1. Bundesliga plays a home-and-away match against the third best team in the 2. Bundesliga (the winner is either promoted or retained, and the loser is either relegated or retained). Their television deals are set at the league level, not the team level. If you want the television revenue, you're going to need to field a team that is capable of staying in the league. The German Bundesliga also has a 50+1 rule in place where 50+1% of each team must be owned by fans and not more than 49% can be owned by investors, corporations, etc. Yeah, they have teams like Bayern, Leipzig, and Wolfsburg who get a ton of money from outside parties (Leipzig actually breaks the 50+1 rule, to most teams' fans' consternation), but for the most part fans retain the controlling interest in their respective teams.. Like other European football leagues, there is no draft at all in the German Bundesliga. There is also no minor league system. Each team has its own academy that it signs youth players to and promotes from, and the academy teams normally play against smaller senior teams, semiprofessional teams, and/or other academy teams. The academy teams can be promoted if they win the league they play in -- unless promotion in the league puts them in the league immediately below the senior team. There is no salary cap in the German Bundesliga, but they do limit contracts to not more than 5 years in length. Unless I'm mistaken, this includes extensions. So if we had something like this in MLB, then the longest extension we'd be able to offer Byron Buxton right now would be four years. Likewise, the longest extension we would have been able to offer Berrios last summer would have been three years. Players with six months or less remaining on their contracts are free to sign pre-agreements with other teams (again, not longer than 5 year deals). If we had something like that in MLB, then we'd really only have until around the all-star break to figure out the Buxton situation or we might be left with literally no compensation if he left. It would be a huge, huge departure from the current system MLB uses, and none of the current team owners would take kindly to it at first, but I'd love to see what would happen if it adopted something like the German system. As it is, the German Bundesliga is an entertaining and competitive league (even if there is a competitive imbalance at the top). The stadiums are always full, none of the teams really spend their way into the poor house nor try to completely cheap out on player expense, the tickets are always cheap, the crowds are always highly engaged, and the top teams (not Bayer Leverkusen) generally make a good show of it when they play the elite teams from Europe's other leagues.

Royce Lewis was drafted by this FO, and getting rid of pretty much everyone (save a few players drafted in 2016) that is associated with the old FO is a very good idea. To do anything less, in my view, would be like stopping an antibiotic prescription early because you start feeling better.

It's not 2012 anymore, and the Twins aren't remotely in a spot where they have "no pitching in sight."

It's not really fair to say "but their peers" though, is it? Puckett only had the greatest baseball player of all time in Ken Griffey Jr., among others, to compete with while Mauer's peers included the likes of Drew Butera (no disrespect to Drew Butera intended).

"And we'll see you tomorrow night." The only person who ever said that to, or about, Joe Mauer was his mom the day before family movie night back in October 2006. Mauer's numbers might be on par with, or even better than, Puckett's, but Puckett's memories blow anything Mauer did completely out of the water, straight through the atmosphere, and into deep space. And, at the end of the day, it's the memories that matter most.

The previous owner of the team explicitly said that he moved the team to Minnesota because of the skin tone of the typical fan. Agree that the team has made progress with Latino players, but I think we have a long way to go with Black players. And, as fans and Minnesotans in general, it feels like there's still a lot of work to do to create a positive experience for both Black and Latino (and Asian, too) players.

I'd be disappointed for a little while if Buxton is traded, but I'm also going to be aware that it takes two parties to agree to a contract. There are very valid non-baseball and non-financial reasons why, as Latino and Black men in Minnesota, Berrios and Buxton could be uninterested in committing their families' formative years to Minnesota no matter how many digits are in their contract offers. Neither Berrios not Buxton are making decisions in a vacuum.

I would guess that this is the correct answer, and I wouldn't blame him for it at all.

He's barely in this year's top five, but okay.

The 2006 Twins were probably the most disappointing team I can remember. They had everything they needed to steamroll everyone in the playoffs, and instead they (led by the most overrated manager in Twins history, IMO) collectively wet their pants as well as everything else in a 50 mile radius as soon as the playoffs started. It should have been abundantly clear at that point that Ron Gardenhire and Rick Anderson were in over their heads, and they should both have been fired.

Trade Kepler, extend Buxton, move Larnach to RF where he belongs, and ride the hottest hand between Arraez and Celestino in LF until Martin arrives (probably late this upcoming year). Get a fourth OF whose name isn't Jake Cave. Continue to invest in pitching and player development.

Yes, because they were clearly heading the right direction with Terry Ryan, Burl Ives, and Paul Molitor...

I'd still rather bring back JA Happ to cover SS next year than let Simmons anywhere near the team, but I guess if the price is right and he agrees to get vaccinated as part of his contract then we could probably do worse. I would just hope that a reunion with Simmons turns out to be extremely short-lived, because Lewis or Martin have started out hot and have taken over the position by like May 1.

I'm confused. Has he not slowed down since being added to the 40 man roster in 2017, or was 2020 a poor year and 2021 less glamorous than 2019? In any case, he's on the wrong side of 30 and you have to wonder how much longer he will be able to stick behind the plate even if you aren't thinking about his injury history. I think the best way to use him moving forward is as a trade piece.

I would much rather see us do our homework and find the next Odorizzi than blow our wad on a pitcher. Bonus points if we can land him in exchange for Jermaine Palacios. The priority has almost singularly got to be extending Buxton. Without Buxton, it almost doesn't matter who is on the mound.

Totally agree! Losing Baddoo was a huge blow to the Twins' major league outfield! Wait, what's that? I'm being told that Akil Baddoo was not, in fact, ever a member of the Twins' major league outfield, and that losing him to the Rule 5 draft did not, in any way, impact the Twins' roster or even it's short-term roster plans.

About as well as you would expect, given the makeup of the staff. Doesn't remotely mean that Baldelli (and the rest of the league) were wrong, though.

I would love it if he came back in a FO/player development role. I wouldn't hate it if he came back as a player either, but I'm not sure we have a full-time spot for him at this point.

I would personally rather re-sign JA Happ and make him the starting SS than hand Trevor Story a big contract. Story's home/away splits have been, uh, less than impressive for pretty much his entire career. Correa, Seager, or Baez might be really nice adds, but I don't think any of them are going to fit our pay structure very well and I think they'd all guarantee that Buxton is leaving. Personally, I like Taylor as the "get me over" shortstop for next year with one of Martin or Lewis getting plugged in as the long-term solution hopefully by the halfway point next year.

That, and the whole "being owned by billionaires" thing.

I'm fairly certain the billionaire team owners will be able to afford giving minor leaguers nice, comfortable accomodations regardless of which market they live in.

I'd bring back Cruz, but not in a playing role at this point. I think he'd bring a ton of value to the organization in a hitting coach or a player development type of role.

Point being that (Marty Cordova aside, sort of) many of the players we send to the AFL are not really heard from again and that calling this year's group "unquestionably the weakest group this organization has ever sent" is so hyperbolic and so clouded by recency bias that it is pretty much completely nonsensical.

Terry Ryan doesn't run the team anymore, so you can safely rule out idiotic decisions like cutting Luis Arraez right now. There's no way at all ever -- even in an infinite number of universes including those universes where Arraez is a 73 year old, 2.5 foot tall, 600 pound, chain-smoking, left-handed throwing shortstop with a 20 minute 100 yard dash time -- that the FO would just him at this point.

Please tell me about the impressive group of players we sent to the AFL in 1995 or 1996. I'm sure they were all first ballot HOFers, weren't they?