LA Vikes Fan

No, Sweeney may be roster fill but Liranzo has a real shot.

I wouldn't say Flaherty went for a song, but certainly for more reasonable price than most of the starters that moved today. I live in LA and kinda follow the Dodgers as my secondary team. Detroit got Thaylon Liranzo, who is actually a pretty highly regarded prospect within the Dodgers top 10. I think he's like number 8. I looked and he has an overall prospect grade of 50 with a cannon arm that rates as a 60. He's overall only a 50 because he is a 30 run rating which basically means he runs like El Tortuga. He's a catcher which adds value. Trey Sweeney is their number 22 prospect and is their shortstop at AAA. Overall prospect grade of 45. Pretty athletic guy who may stall out as a AAAA player, but there is a chance that he could break through as a utility guy or solid regular. In most years this would be considered a pretty solid return for two months of a rental starter who stunk last year. This year it's an absolute bargain.

You're right. I had the wrong guy. Too bad. Still, Cole Irvin is left-handed, breathing, and has an ERA under 5 with some starting pitching cred to his name. Who knows, might be worth a look?

Well, the trade deadline is come and gone and the Twins have picked up Trevor Richards. No, not Trevor Rogers, Taylor Rogers or even Mr. Rogers (it is a beautiful day in the neighborhood), Trevor Richards. I frankly never heard of him but he apparently is a mediocre right-handed reliever who tends to get lefties out but not righties.. Still, all hope is not lost. Some of the big boys that made the big boy trades now have to jettison players off their 40 man rosters. Every now and then, you see somebody that might be worth trying to get. First, the rules (a revision from my first blog, thanks Karbo). All players DFA'd must be placed on outright or relaese waivers. These players can be claimed with the claiming team picking up the contract. The DFA'd player can be assigned to AAA if they pass through waivers, but any player with more than 5 years of MLB service time can reject that assignment, become a free agent, and sign with any team. That player forfeits their existing contract and is paid whatever the new team negotiates. The two players below both have more than 5 years of service time so they could be signed as free agents or picked up on waivers. I don't know if the rules allow a team to call a DFA'd players agent to let him know that the team would sign the player if he rejected an assignment and chose free agency but I'll bet that type of communication occurs. With all that said, I've seen two guys who I think are worth a waiver claim or free agent call by the Twins front office. I'd love to know if anybody sees anybody else. My two are: Cole Irvin - A 30 year old left-handed starting pitcher, Irvin is 6-5 this year with a 4.85 ERA, 4.48 FIP. He has relatively low strikeout totals (6.3/9) and a relatively high WHIP (1.4), but he is left-handed and breathing and he does have 14 starts this year plus 7 relief appearances. Better than Okert? He very well may be and is on a farily reasonable contract - $2m for the season, so about 750K remaining. Jake Diekman - Diekman is at 37-year-old left-handed reliever that has been DFA'd by the Mets to make room for their acquisitions. He is not having a great year with a 5.63 ERA and a 6.12 FIP, but in 2023 he had a 2.18 ERA/3.21 FIP/1.125 WHIP in 45 innings with Tampa Bay. He started with the White sucks, so his total for 2023 is a 3.34 ERA/3.75 FIP, 1..324 WHIP. He was also decent to good in 2021 with Oakland, but not so good in 2022 with Boston and our good friends from Chicago. Once again, he is left-handed and breathing so he has that going for him, which is nice. He also leads the Mets in appearances from the bullpen. He's on a one year $4m contract, so about 1.5M remaining. He might be worth a try while Okert sat on the IL. Something has to be wrong with that guy given the way he's pitching. I would consider a claim on these these two guys and I think there will be more as good teams have to shed players to welcome new additions for whom they traded prospects. What you think of these two guys? Any thoughts on others that might be soon hitting the waiver wire or DFA land?

Here is some interesting news. The Orioles just designated call Ervin for assignment. Remember him? He was part of what we traded to get Jorge Lopez in that ill-fated trade a couple seasons ago. He has been in the Orioles rotation and is 6-5 with a 485 ERA, 4.48 FIP. There you have to run him through waivers. Wonder if he is worth a call to see if the Twins can trade for him for a non-40 man lottery ticket.

Fair point. Blackburn actually looked like a decent deal for both sides. Big risk there though in that he just came back from a stress fracture in his foot, something that could go again at any time. His overall record with the As is 21 – 26 with a 4.78 ERA in eight seasons during which he started a grand total of 77 games in 81 appearances. That's less than 10 appearances a season. Guy has talent but is always hurt. His upside is he gives you 10 starts this year and pitches like a #3 or #4 starter. Certainly nothing to sneeze at, but might be hard to pull the trigger on sending a top 30 prospect just for that. I think the return reflected the risk. Having said that, there probably are a couple of guys in the Twins 20 – 30 prospect range I would have given up to get him. Sorry, I just get frustrated because when the Twins don't get someone people start posting that we could have traded for him for a bag of balls and 3 half off coupons to Arby's. At least it's better than the Athletic where any article about the Twins results in pages of posts about how the Pohlads are cheap and we should take the stadium back. At least here there is some intelligent commentary. I will say though, the constant drone of negativity gets pretty old especially when were talking about a team that is definitely in the playoff hunt and appears to be on the way up as the schedule gets easier and the hitter start coming back from injury. Thanks for letting me vent.

You know Alex Cobb hasn't pitched an MLB inning yet this season, right? And that he suffered a "setback" in rehab as well. Also the Giants got a PTBNL in addition to the 19 year old who has 66 SOs in 50 Low A innings. This guy is closer to Carlee Soto than Questad. That doesn't count whoever the later named player is an Cobb is strictly a rental, free agent at years end will pick somewhere else next year. Look, I'm as disappointed as the next guy that the Twins didn't pick up a decent starter. Let's not pretend that we could have gotten the quality starting pitcher for prospect at the back and of our top 30. Based on what we've seen, a quality starting pitcher would have cost us at least one prospect in the top 10 if not in the top five or six, plus another prospect in the top 20. I'm happy to discuss whether that was a price that was worth being paid for rental starter like Kikuchi or Cobb but let's be the real on what the price was.

No surprise there. The wheels had come off.

Available yes, but not at "reasonable prices". So far KIkuchi cost the Astros their #2 prospect who may go right into the Blue Jays rotation, and their #9 prospect. That's like us trading Walter Jenkins or Emma AND Charlee Soto or CJ Culpepper. Two guys who haven't even pitched this year due to injury - Paul Blackburn and Alex Cobb - went for top 30 guys in the Mets and Guardians systems. Trevor Rogers fetched a top 100 prospect in AAA and another AAA guy who is in the Orioles top 25. I'd like to get a quality starter too, but the prices have been high.

I think the question here is whether this guy is better than the current back end of the bullpen. In other words, is he better than Okert or Staumont? Frankly, he may be better than both of them and looks to be better than Okert or Funderburk. I would include Theilbar in that last sentence but I have a feeling he's getting better and may be back to something approximating his old self through the stretch. This guy is probably a small upgrade to the soft underbelly of the bullpen. Better than nothing, but only marginally better.

Well, I learned something today. I'd never heard of Trevor Richards that I can recall, and I'm very confident I've never heard of Jay Harry before today. Pretty exciting stuff. Well, at least we are not the only team in MLB not to make a trade the season. Wonder who the Twins will send down to make room for Richards since Dobnak is already up to replace Brock Stewart. Looks like Stewart came off the IL too soon. Maybe there is a deal in the works to move Okert or Staumont, or even DFA one of those two.

Twins acquired Trevor Richards from Toronto according to MLB Trade Rumors. Price not yet reported. RH reliever, not too exciting stats. UFA at season's end.

You're right. Kikuchi to the Astros. One more possible starter acquisition down.

Kikuchi to the Astros. One more possible starter acquisition down.

Yankees have a reported deal for Flaherty. Will trade Cortes if and when that deal is completed.

Isn't the worst case scenario that Snell gets hurt and opts in for $31m next year? I think that's the risk the Twins won't take. He does have a checkered injury history and frankly a checkered performance history in terms of innings an starts. Otherwise, I'd be right there with you. It's just hard for me to see the Twins taking that level of risk. BTW, Tyler Anderson has a 2.96 ERA, albeit with a 4.15 FIP. He's a 2/3 starter in front of a team with good IF defense. The Twins have that. I think he would slot at least even with Ryan behind Lopez and Ober.

Agreed. Snell isn't the answer and this team can't/won't take the risk of another injury leaving them with a $31m player o the 60 day IL. There are some realistic targets out there that we should be willing to spend some real prospect capital on though. By that I mean that any prospect outside the top 6 should be available (top 6 are Lee, Jenkins, Rodriguez, Festa, Keaschall, Mathews). I'd even be willing to trade two of the next 10 for the right player. The window is open this year - if we can catch Cleveland we should get the second seed. That means a bye and a likely matchup against the AL West winner in the ALDS, not Cleveland, the Yankees or Baltimore. We can beat Houston or Seattle and all of a sudden we're in the ALCS against whichever of those 3 teams survive the gauntlet (prob Baltimore). One good series and we're playing the WS. Get a real mid rotation starter - Tyler Anderson, Fedde, or maybe Kikuchi or Taillon. Get a quality reliever, hopefully LH but quality is more important - Fairbanks, Tanner Scott, Taylor Rogers, or at least the level of Erceg or Kopech. Think about picking up Luis Rengifo from the Angels. Be willing to even give up a Larnach if you need to; he and Wallner are basically duplicative and there's likely only starting room for one next year. Trade Kepler for prospects if we need to free up payroll. That will be a sad day but he's gone after this year any way. The window is open. Take advantage.

Skubal is one of the top 5 starters in baseball. Detroit can keep him through 2026. They are close, maybe even playoff competitive next year. Why on earth would they trade him? If he’s available, they can have any two Twins prospects not named Lee or Jenkins. Today.

Having Dobnak on this run, Festa showing well against Philly, and Matthews’ great performance this year on his way up the chain should eliminate the need to trade for a back end innings eater fifth starter mediocre veteran type. We can fill that role through these three guys and who knows, maybe Varland will find it again, too. Alll of this is a real step forward That doesn’t mean we don’t need another starting pitcher. We do if only to improve our trajectory and give us a chance to win the division. Winning the division and getting the second seed is a possibility this year and we should go for hard since that makes the playoff run much, much easier. It gets us a bye and probably keeps us away from the Yankees in the second round. I hope We are competing for Anderson or even Kikuchi to upgrade the rotation with a middle of the rotation type guy. If we can’t do at least that well, there’s no point in trading for a veteran starter just to eat innings on the backend. Dobnak and Festa (probably as a bulk after an opener) can do that, And Matthews and even Caleb Bousley, can you give us a starter two down the stretch. Count me in on the “trade for a starter with at least Ober level performance or don’t trade for one at all” train. I might amend that to the “Ryan level” since frankly, Ober has been better than Ryan for the last month or so.

Another one down. Eflin to Baltimore for 3 prospects. Getting more and more to look like Kikuchi, Tyler Anderson, or bust. https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2024/07/orioles-to-acquire-zach-eflin-from-rays.html

I haven't been defending Margot, but I haven't seen an answer yet to the real problem from any one else - who plays LF/DH against a LH starter if nor Margot? Can't be Larnach or Wallner with their less than sterling OPS of .583 and .143 this year, following a less than impressive .412 and .483 last year, respectively. The inability to hit LH pitching by those 2 is why Margot is on the roster. I'd love to see him gone or at least only starting against LH pitching and not brought in but we got to have somebody. We can't be in a pennant race and throw Larnach and Wallner out there against LH pitching as almost automatic outs. Maybe we dump Margot and the lineup against LH pitching has Castro in LF, Lee at 2B, Lewis/Santana/Miranda at 1B/3B/DH in various combos, with Martin and Farmer as the RH OF and 2B backup in case of injury. Essentially trading Margot's ABs for ABs for Lee. Not sure that's an upgrade, probably a down grade offensively. Requires Correa back though and I don't know when that will be unless we're comfortable with a Lee/Martin combo in the IF against LH starters. I wonder if Margot is a bad option except when considering the other options. . .

I suspect that the Twins will try to bring Santana back if he will play for the same kind of a contract. A Lewis/Santina/Miranda every day 3B/!b/DH group would be a real strength of the team. RF will be open next year for Wallner, Larnach, or Martin, with Lee at 2B and Castro in LF.

Aren't there two sides to this coin? Margot is a poor hitter against righties and poor pinch hitter. Point taken. The other side is that we still need Margot or someone him because Larnach and Wallner are equally bad or even worse against lefties than Margot is against righties. We don't really have a third OF who can be an everyday player because of the platoon splits these guys all have. That assumes that Buxton and Kepler can hit both sides, a little questionable in Kepler's case. I see two short term solutions and a longer term solution. The first short term solutions is to move Castro back to LF once Correa and Lewis are back. 2B can be handled by a combination of Lee and Julien or Lee and Martin. Miranda plays 5 days a week at 3B/1B/DH, Lewis and Santana each sit once a week and the roles of Larnach, Margot and Wallner are reduced to bench players playing 2-3 days a week. Effectively, this reduces the playing time of Larnach, Margot, and Wallner and gives it to Miranda, Castro and Lee. Are we sure we want to do that? The second is to leave Castro at 2B and platoon Margot, Wallner, and Larnach in LF. That means fewer ABs for Lee (almost none). Also, the urge to play the two LH hitters might crowd out Miranda from some ABs at the DH spot, which is a mistake - Miranda is a better hitter than any of those 3. The longer term solution is to trade or release Margot, and either commit to running Larnach or Wallner out in LF against LH pitching or make Miranda a part time LF against LH pitching. Castro is the everyday 2B and Lee becomes the UTL IF for the rest of the season playing 2-3 days a week at 2B or SS, very occasionally at 3B since Lewis and Miranda handle that spot. I personally like this approach because it gets ABs to Miranda, Larnach, and Wallner instead of Margot and Lee. Bottom line is if we get everyone healthy there won't be enough playing time for Larnach, Wallner, Margot and Lee to get regular ABs if you assume the Twins will give regular duty to Kepler, Castro and Miranda. There is also no place for Farmer. Something's gotta give. It will be interesting to watch the next few days t see if there's a move made that opens up the logjam a little in return for pitching,

Castillo is now in DFA land, and Lewis is ready to come back. Camargo is the easy first choice to go down. What about when Miranda is ready and then when Correa is ready? Pick two of Julien, Lee, and Martin to go. None of them are hitting great, but at least Julien has an OPS o in the .500s over the last 7. Both Lee and Martin are below .400 in the last 7. Moreover, Lee looks lost at the plate, always in between on fastballs and expanding on breaking stuff. Also, do you want to keep Lee up when he won't get many ABS once Lewis is at 3B, Castro at 2B, and Correa at SS? The HD spot will be covered by Mirnada and Larnach/Wallner and Mirnada backs up 3B. NO real place for regular ABs for Lee. My guess is that they play Lee at SS for a few games to see if he can handle the position at the major-league level. That also gives him a chance to start hitting. If he can't play there or doesn't pick up at the platet, I would be surprised to see the trade out be Miranda and Correa in, Julien and Lee out with Martin staying on the roster to be the backup centerfielder. Should be interesting.

SWR may be better than we thought. I was happy because he was convincing me he might be a good #4 or #5 starter. Now I'm wondering if he has a #2 or #3 kind of ceiling. Having him with Lopez, Ober, and Ryan all controlled for the next 3-4 years gives us a great base for the rotation. Now, if only we could trade for a playoff type guy . . . Nathan Evoldi or Tyler Anderson anyone?