LA Vikes Fan

Sooo, are we convinced yet that Barnes isn't a major league starter? I was convinced a couple of starts ago but then he looked good against Tampa. looks like that was a mirage. So, who else we got?

I agree that they both need to play, but I don't think this is that hard. Arraez is the 3rd Baseman next year for 80-100 games, plays second to give Polanco a rest for 20 games, DHs a few, plays LF for a few, and is on the Il at least once with his balky knee. He winds up playing in about 125 – 140 games. Donaldson simply isn't the same guy in the field much anymore because he can't really move, so he winds up DHing 100 games and playing 50-60 games at 3B next year. Frankly, I wouldn't be too surprised if he thought about retirement because of his physical ailments and the Twins worked out a settlement of his contract but I'm probably being a little optimistic there. With Donaldson as the primary DH though, it does make things a little interesting with respect to Sano, Kirilloff, Kepler, Larnach and Rooker. It also pretty much eliminates a Nelson Cruz revival, although I don't think that was a likely scenario anyway. Bottom line, next year I would really like to see the starting lineup with Polanco at 2B, Arraez at 3B, Donaldson (or Cruz) at DH, Sano at 1B, a new SS, Kirilloff in LF, Buxton in CF, Kepler and Miranda platooning in RF, with Miranda also backing up in the infield, a Garver/Jeffers catching combo, Gordon as the IF/OF utility player, and a fight to the death between Rooker, Laranach and maybe Astudillo for that last spot on the bench. Losers go to AAA as the 27th and 28th men to join Cave, Refsnyder and Contreras as players in waiting.

Pitching. We need pitching more than anything else. Period. We should spend our money on what we need. Yes, we need a SS too but we can get away with a Jose Iglesias/Freddy Galvis type, even Simmons again IF we improve our pitching. We shoudl have 30-40m to spend on FA contracts after re-sgining Buxton which is the first priority. I think it's a better move to spend 80-90% of that money on pitching.

And he’s not bad at second. Polanco may be a top 5-10 second baseman when you combine his bat and glove. Lets not mess with that. Let’s build around that.

Well said. He’s one of the true cornerstones going forward. The big question is, who else?

Just a routine inning for Albers. No runs.

Wow, Gant got 60 pitches. That's as many as Jax or Ober got when they first came up. I wonder if they're going to give him a run of starts to see if he can be a starter? I understand that's what he wants. Given the rotation now is Maeda, Ober, Jax and ???, why not give him a chance? Especially with everyone else either hurt/recovering (Winder, Duran), really new (Strotman, Ryan), or old/not very good (Burrows, Albers, Shepard). Sure, he wasn't good in the 3rd but he hasn't pitched a lot of 3+ inning stints lately. We are into development and evaluation. Might as well evaluate whether he can be a starter. I would give him another start. I'd love ot find him an easier opponent although that's going to be hard given the schedule the next couple of weeks.

I have two words for Gant....Relief Pitcher.

Yankees show very good plate discipline through out their lineup. Our guys could learn a thing or two from them.

I know Gant was a starter in St. Louis before being moved to the pen. Looked good so far. I bet they give him about 50 pitches.

Well, not the two I would've called up but at least they haven't pitched for a few days. Barraclough hasn't pitched since Saturday. Albers threw 8 shutout innings on Sunday. Both shoudl be able to provide innings this weekend when we are going to need them. It will be interesting to see if they give Albers a start.

Who's supposed to start tonight and tomorrow in AAA? Let's see if they get scratched.

Well, at least we DFA'd Nick Vincent to bring Thorpe up and now we can bring up someone deserving to replace Thorpe. Possible Silver lining, people.

I can't watch the game but saw "Injury Delay" and then saw Thorpe replaced. Is he hurt?

I just took a look at the Cleveland lineup. Thorpe shoudl be able to navigate through this collection of offensively challenged players. I think it's fair to have some real questions about him as a starter if he can't.

Well, just looked and I guess Gordon is starting in CF and Thorpe is pitching. I guess that's some progress on the let's evaluate the younger guys train. Wish Gordon was playing SS, but at least he's playing.

This is strange. Why call Gordon up if he is not going to play? I was actually hoping that they called him up to give him a run at SS to see if there was any possibility he could play that position next year on a regular basis. This sure seems odd. All I can think of is they're waiting for some games against non-contending teams starting after the Brewers series. That would mean starting with the Tiger series on August 30. That's a long way to wait. Hopefully he will at least play tomorrow in the day game when the "Sunday lineup" is likely to be used

His rough patch shouldn't really be a surprise to anyone. He's at least a year ahead of schedule. He has potential and will be back at the MLB level. I think he has a good chance of either breaking camp with the MLB team next spring or being a May type call up.

Well said, Leviathan. If we're concerned about not playing our "best team" in games where the opponent is in a playoff race, as suggested by Morneau on tonight's telecast as a respect for the game thing, then play Gordon at SS the next two days against Cleveland and put Simmons back in against the Yankees and Boston for 4 of those 7 games. Can't decide if we have an in house replacement for Simmons at SS if we don't play Gordon. He's it for next year unless we want a replay of Polanco at SS. Not me. Polanco plays 2B every day going forward. Let Gordon play SS at least 25-30 of the remaining 43 games.

Move makes sense. Time to give Larnach a re-set since he's hitting .162/.263/.222 over his last 30 games. Also time to see if Gordon can hit MLB pitching well enough to have value. Also gives Rooker more time in the OF to see if he can exceed Josh Willingham's defensive value. Cave reminds me of the player Carlos Pena in the movie Moneyball. Management wanted Art Howe to play Scott Hattieberg at 1B and Howe kept putting Pena in the lineup until the FO traded him to Detroit. It may be that the only way we'll get Cave out of the lineup for Gordon is to trade or DFA Cave and get him off the roster.

I agree with you, Vanimal, but I think they are auditioning Garcia and Garza for next year's bullpen. I think the FO sees them as pitchers who could impact next year's team so they are auditioning them now. It wouldn't surprise me if one or both started off next year in the Twins bullpen. Now that doesn't explain Nick VIncent instead of Hamilton or Moran. I think that has to be 40 man related with the idea being that Vincent is expendable when/if they have to start DFAing guys to get down to 40.

The on field lineup IS pretty well set for next season. The only issue really is choosing 6 of the following 10 actual or potential Twins for basically 6 roster positions - LF, RF, 3B, DH, and 2 bench spots (assumes we pick up a FA SS, Arraez is one of the non-assigned bench spots as a Utl, and have one C on the bench): Sano, Larnach, Rooker, Refsnyder, Cave, Astudillo, Donaldson (trade candidate), Miranda, Gordon. Nelson Cruz reunion. My prediction is we keep Sano, Donaldson, and (1) either Refsnyder or Cave as the 4th/5th OF but not both, (2) either Larnach or Rooker as the 4th/5th OF/part-time DH but not both, and (3) either Astudillo or Gordon as the Utility IF but not both, and (4) either re-sign Cruz or keep the loser of one of the other 3 battles. I say we should keep Larnach (OF/DH), Rooker (OF/DH), Refsnyder (reserve CF/OF) and Gordon (Utl IF). Love me some Cruz but he clogs up the DH position instead of us running guys through it for half days off and he hasn't hit at all for the Rays. Miranda starts 2022 in AAA and is the first injury call up. Cave is the AAA CF and comes up if Buxton is hurt. Astudillo is the odd man out. The pitching staff? Good luck with that prediction. I will be impressed if someone can give us 13 names (not unnamed FA) as the opening day pitching staff for the 2022 season and get even 11 of them correct.

How would you guys rate Larnach compared to Rooker? I know there is a relatively small sample size for both but for some reason to me it just seems like Larnach has a pretty good chance to be a solid regular with a reasonably high ceiling whereas I am about ready to write Rooker off as a possible contributor over the next year or two. That strikes me as a little unfair to Rooker since he's only had about 120 MLB ABs, but he has looked pretty overmatched. I guess the fact that Larnach started out well, then slumped, and is now coming back gives me hope that he can adjust and be a productive MLB hitter where Rooker never really had that strong start and can't seem to adjust is influencing my opinion. Perhaps too much. What does everybody think of the comparison between the two? I am curious because I think the way next year's roster is likely to come out there is probably only room for one of them given their defensive shortcomings. P.S. I completely agree with Brock that Kirilloff is far and away the best of the three. I think that assuming his wrist fully recovers, Kirilloff's likely floor is a .275/.340/.450 guy with 15-20 HRs, while his ceiling is that of a consistent >.850 plus OPS guy with 25+ homers a year who can actually play a respectable or better defensive 1B and an acceptable or better corner OF.

I live in LA and Simmons was a bit of a head case when he was out here. He skipped the last 10 or so games last year because he just "wasn't feeling it" with the Angels out of contention. Admittedly, those were weird times but it was very clear at that moment he wasn't coming back. Him being a head case isn't a reason to cut him. Him being a head case and having an OPS of .560 with an OPS + of 59 should be enough to at least put him on the bench and forget him. Add in that he didn't get vaccinated, got Covid, caused the team problems, and helped derail this season and it is a little surprising he's still on the team. I understand that the reason he wasn't traded is no else wanted him at the trade deadline, like at all, which should also tell us something. Frankly, he should be gone but we have no one to replace him. Kind of reminds of a certain QB... Look, there' s nothing wrong with making a choice. That's everyone's privilege (not a right in the legal sense, a privilege). There's also nothing wrong with that choice leading to a consequence in society/with your employer, etc. There is no free lunch. When you make a choice, you also choose to live with the consequences of that choice. Cutting or benching Simmons because he isn't vaccinated and posts weird stuff on the internet is probably too severe of a consequence. Cutting or benching Simmons because he can't hit water if he fell out of a boat, has declined from a great to an above average infielder, the team needs to play guys to see if they have next year's SS anywhere in the system, and because he isn't vaccinated and posts weird stuff on the internet is not too severe a consequence. MLB is like most employers; the more valuable you are the more outside BS the Club will tolerate, the less valuable you are the less outside BS the Club will tolerate. Simmons is not very valuable right now.

I agree with you on Arraez. Good reason to keep him out of the OF. He probably needs to stay at a few days a week in the infield and a day or two at DH so he can stay on the field.