Nashvilletwin

A huge, huge goal/issue for the Twins organization to truly be World Series competitive year in and year out is developing their young talent to the most of their abilities. And that development, most importantly, 100% must continue, if not accelerate, upon being promoted to the big club. World Series can be won if players like Wallner, Julien, Lee, Lewis, Ryan, Ober, Varland and so many others nearly here or on the way reach their true potential. Coaches obviously play a critical role in that ongoing development. But so do other players. Our FO understands that. Culture, leadership, and ultimately young player development can be as much driven by veteran players as from the staff. The FO has assembled a strong group of vets capable and eager to show the young guys how to be a pro’s pro and build a tremendous career. CC, Farmer, BB, Santana, and Lopez all are players who show up everyday and do the big and little things to maximise potential. They are super examples and “in the foxhole” teachers for the young guys. From a “commercial” standpoint, it’s smart to pay bit extra for that: there is nothing that could possibly pay off more for a small/mid-market team like the Twins than to see their controllable, cheap talent play ball at their highest level as opposed to filling those positions and production with high priced FAs like other franchises attempt to do. Oh, and by the way, it works both ways. If the young guys are developing quickly and producing, the vets tend to catch that spark and produce at higher levels as well. We definitely saw some of that last season. So here’s hoping that CC and BB, in particular as our two highest paid players, catch a little of that spark and produce a bit more in terms of individual production this season. There is a lot to like about the FOs approach and this team’s makeup.

Agree 100%. Our overall outfield depth is not great. Thus, Gordon has a good chance to stick around a bit. If we run into a need, Kiriloff can be that fill-in outfielder. And if Severino starts smoking it, Kiriloff may find himself in that role more often than he probably would hope (but he’d still be in the show).

Balazovic couldn’t make it one more day. Sounds like the Twins are letting him move on to get another chance somewhere else. Good luck to him. With the 60 day opening tomorrow, it looks like there might be some room opening up on the 40 man if needed. Otherwise, the next addition to the roster would’ve meant some real meat would need to be cut (and, yes, given our limited MLB ready outfield depth, Gordon is still considered real meat).

Agreed. Up and comers like Festa, Raya, and Canterino - plus the other seven starter potentials in our top 20 - is why the FO hasn’t moved our top position players this off-season for a short term starter or spent big money for one in free agency. The FO definitely thinks we can win this season, but they have a much bigger open window in mind for the next several years ahead. And that window will be anchored by multiple low cost, controllable quality starters.

Love it. Festa will likely see multiple starts in 2024 as the number #7, #8 or #9 available starter (alongside SWR and eventually Canterino) in the organization. The injury risk/need for rest among our top six starters is just too high to think otherwise. So the experience he gains in those starts, plus the rest it might give to the staff, will be very valuable as he competes for a top five role in ‘25.

Kiriloff will be just fine if he produces. Santana is on a one year deal, so the long term job is there for the taking. Kiriloff should ultimately probably be more worried about Severino. In some respects, the second derivative of Santana showing up might be that it actually helps Kiriloff by taking some of the pressure off and giving him a chance to find his feet. Regardless, Kiriloff will get as many ABs this season as he deserves. Larnach and Miranda, sadly, are now (valuable from the FO’s perspective) AAA bench depth in case of injuries. It’s not clear where they even stand on that hierarchy of players considering their competition for promotions include Lee, Martin, Severino, Keirsey and maybe Bubba. If they’d like to see Target field again they’d better produce across the river. Both are probably dying to be traded to get a shot at playing every day in the bigs (ala Steer); unfortunately for them, the FO probably will struggle to find a deal that returns a valuable MLB proficient player to replace their important AAA depth role. They might be here a while. Gordon will get his chance in spring training. But, yes, more and more he looks like the odd man out. He won’t make it through waivers. I really like Gordon - he was the spark plug that led our 2nd half in 2022. However, it will be a surprise if he has not departed the organization by early May, if not before opening day. This spring training is important for him as it might essentially be his “tryout” for a major league job elsewhere.

This is the by far strongest and deepest pen we’ve had in a long, long time. On top of that, it’s incredibly cheap. Is it the best in the majors? Probably not per se. But it certainly has the potential to be a true upper echelon pen. And upper echelon pens win ball games. Here is idea I don’t see happening, but will throw it out there anyway. What about combining DeSclafani and Varland as the joint fifth starter seeing if they can pretty much go 8-9 innings as a pair in each start? This way Varland stays stretched out and we keep one of our best arms contributing meaningful major league innings all season long. That would leave seven members in the bullpen essentially covering the other four starters. It also puts a bit of a cap on the innings DeSclafani and Varland throw every fifth game, thereby keeping them a bit fresher for the season. If a starter goes down, then they each start their own games and a new reliever is called up.

Sorry for the partial double post above. Technical difficulties. Btw, is 2024 finally the year we get to see what we got for Berrios?

As things currently stand, Gordon has the last spot on the roster. That could change due to injury or trade (realistically Gordon is the only one with any real likelihood of getting moved before the season). Our “bench” in St. Paul currently consists of Lee, Larnach, Miranda, Martin, Severino, Keirsey, Thompson, and Camargo/Williams (C). Lee probably does not get the call unless there a more every day type role opens up. It’s not clear who gets the OF call first - Larnach or Martin. It might just depend on who’s hot and using up options. Just thinking about it a bit more; if Martin has the on base skills, the speed, and the super utility, he’s actually a great late inning matchup, “we need a guy on base” pinch hitter type.

As things currently stand, Gordon has the last spot on the roster. That could change due to injury or trade (realistically Gordon is the only one with any real likelihood of getting moved before the season). Our “bench” in St. Paul currently consists of Lee, Larnach, Miranda, Martin, Severino, Keirsey, Thompson, and Camargo/Williams (C). Lee probably does not get the call unless a more every day type role opens up. It’s not clear who gets the OF call first - Larnach or Martin. It might just depend on who’s hot and using up options.

Castro currently is a more proven commodity as a 4th OFer. Having said that, as a super utility player he, on paper, he is better suited for the role than Gordon for all the reasons you mentioned. However, Gordon had two attributes that Martin does not have: 1) big league experience and 2) he’s out of options. Let’s see what happens during spring training. It’s not the Twins MO to break camp with rookies like Martin or Lee. But, if Gordon gets traded or if there are any OF injuries or (I’d like to think at least) Martin has a scorching camp, we could see him sooner than later. Regardless, the young man is going to be 25 before opening day: it’s time we see him in the bigs! But it looks like he will still need to earn the call up across the river.

Agree, with the pipeline. It is looking deep and solid (not spectacular per se). I wonder though if there are any true #1s in the system at the moment besides Lopez who might show up by 2026? At the moment I think Ober (who if he throws 160+ innings this year may well be a really good #2) has the best shot. Maybe Raya? Re SWR, if he topped out as a reliable 180 inning 4.25 ERA #4 type from 2025 -2029 we should be ecstatic.

Let’s not go overboard on the sudden munificence of KC’s ownership. They have a big vote coming up on increased sales taxes to fund a new downtown stadium. Sound familiar? Witt=Mauer. It’s a business model that the small/mid market teams see fit to apply every 25 years or so. Nothing wrong with that - I’m glad the Twins did it; smart move.

Agree. Besides they need the votes to approve the sales tax increase for the stadium. So sign your homegrown young star to a long extension. It’s a great strategy that’s been proven to work - look at Mauer.

Royce Lewis today

Nope, I meant Camargo. An above average receiving and hitting backup C who starts 30-40% of games and is getting paid league minimum is gold. It would be nice if Canterino turned into a bona fade starter as well as Raya and Festa.

Someone just posted elsewhere on the TD that, according to one of the major analytics outfits, the Twins pitching staff in 2024 projects to have the overall fourth highest WAR and the highest in the AL (with, btw, the second lowest pitching payroll above only Oakland). Wouldn’t that be nice if that actually happened.

Duarte and Bubba appear to be the most likely candidates. They probably have the best chance to sneak through waivers. I don’t see Gordon or Balazovic being waived at the moment - the Twins as an organization have invested so much in each of them. Post spring training they could be waived or traded, but I think each will get the chance to earn a spot on the roster over the next 8-9 weeks (or else increase their trade value). Larnach, Miranda could also be on the block, but both are very important depth pieces going forward. I’m sure they both would welcome a trade if it gave them the chance to play everyday.

Check out the top 20 prospect list currently being posted. It looks like 9 of our top 20 are pitchers. Now, that doesn’t mean anything about quality per se, but it’s been a while since we’ve seen that depth. Remember, we still have three young potential studs in Ryan, Ober, Varland to go along with Lopez. The starting pitching pipeline is solid - certainly vs. what we are used to around here.

By “starter” I meant capable of 30-40% of starts. So, yes, a “backup” catcher in the modern MLB and certainly for how the Twins are currently managed is basically a starter. Camargo is on the 40 and appears to be a better receiver than Stevenson. He’s the “backup” of the future, but a cheap “backup” catcher who can comfortably start and hit with only a little if no drop off from one of the best offensive catchers in the league is pure gold.

Assuming Raya and Festa are in the top six, that would mean nine out of our top twenty prospects are pitchers, with all or most of them still projected as starters. To go along with Lopez, Ryan, Ober and Varland, it would seem that over the next several years we will have a solid, young, fairly cheap, controllable, and deep starting corps - something we haven’t been able to say for a long time. Hopefully, one or two of those nine could develop into a true #1, although it’s not clear who might be the candidates for that.

Careful, you’ve just touched the third rail. You might be better off saying you want to cut social security. Hahaha. I’ve written similar things before on the TD and it tends to rile up our fellow TDers. The Production/$ Spent value ratio is a real thing to a budget conscious small/medium sized market team. Here’s hoping CC improves his ratio this season. Anyway, such a move is off the table for ‘24 (and possibly beyond/forever given his salary and no trade clause).

If our #4 and #5 starters can give us 25 starters each of 5-6 IPs giving up 2-3 earned runs each outing (so an ERA of about 4.5), I’d take that with a shutdown pen behind them any day. We’d probably would win about 30 of those 50 starts.

If those four, plus Raya, Festa and Camargo turn into solid starters by late 2025, with one or two becoming all star candidates in the future, the Twins will be in a very strong position. The window is open now, but getting bigger over the next several years. Hats off to the FO for not decimating the pipeline to go all in the near term, but instead keeping our future while building a very competitive (AL Central heavily favored) and entertaining roster for ‘24.

Other than losing Gray, this lineup is substantially superior to what we began with in 2023. And way more fun to watch. And if Ober, Varland, and Paddack progress as we think they can, the starting staff will be improved overall even with DeSclafani. Most importantly, we have not traded away our controllable, cheap young talent - whether in the bigs already or on the way. We should be favored to win the division in ‘24 with an even brighter future ahead for several years.