Otto von Ballpark

You think Machado didn't try in the World Series? He had a bad 5 games. He's a talented player, but he can't simply will himself to have a good performance any time he wants. I understand concerns about Machado's style of play, but this seems like quite a stretch.

What is your basis for saying this? (FWIW, any long term deal he signs will include an opt out. He'll have plenty of incentive to keep performing even if he wants to leave.)

I would counter there is virtually zero chance of them signing a 3 year deal. However, I think it is very likely that whatever long-term deal they sign will contain an opt out after 3 years (and/or 1-2 years). Which isn't necessarily a bad thing.

I agree that I'm not necessarily eager to rely on Mejia, etc. (Especially with Mejia's health late last season.) But adding depth from the top is even better than adding depth you can cut. That's how adding a $3.5 mil pitcher might be more objectionable, to some, than adding a $20 mil one.

Discussing the money does not necessarily equal "concern" with the money as you are trying to portray. I was responding to a poster who said Perez might become the second lefty out of the pen. I said that would take away a lot of the perceived value of Perez's reported contract, as opposed to being a starter or a primary reliever. If someone's point seems absurd to you (that spending $3.5 mil is "outrageous" when we want them to spend $30 mil more), please consider that you may be mistaken in your interpretation.

At least you are aware you are over-simplifying. The fans that want the Twins to spend more don't *want* a guaranteed contract for another 5th starter / bullpen piece. You haven't caught anyone in a contradiction here. Those fans want to sign someone for the top of the rotation and the top of the bullpen, and guaranteed deals for guys like Perez and Parker do suggest that is less likely. As far as the contract details, the Parker contract isn't exactly "incentives" but more like roster bonuses. It is kind of an unusual deal in baseball. I would be surprised to see the same structure in the Perez deal, both because of its rarity and simply because I don't think they'd bother with the reported 2020 option if there was that much concern about him even surviving the 2019 season. Could be incentives, though, but I would imagine those going higher than $3.5 mil. In any case, unless the Perez contract is actually a minor league deal, its details certainly wouldn't invalidate most complaints about it here. Likewise, statements that support the signing aren't invalid either.

It seems common knowledge that it is $3.5 mil guaranteed, not incentives. I don't think it particularly matters how much is salary vs buyout (presumably the higher the buyout, the higher the 2019 option cost). I think people are objecting because $3.5 mil guaranteed buys the guy a roster spot for longer than a smaller amount or non-guaranteed deal, regardless of performance. Nick had a recent article, "Best Remaining No-Risk Starters on the Free Agent Market": http://twinsdaily.com/topic/32037-article-best-remaining-no-risk-starters-on-the-free-agent-market/ $3.5 mil and a 25-man roster spot is more risk than those options, and it's not clear that Perez offers much if any more upside.

I'm not sure there's necessarily a stark difference in those decisions, though. Given their ages, signing Machado or Harper now might be our best bet at 90 wins this year AND our best bet at achieving 100 wins in 2021. It's not like every offseason has a top 26 year old free agent with a bunch of big market teams sitting out, and we'd still have all our prospect depth from which to trade. Or targeting a controllable 26 year old in trade -- not every offseason will have a Christian Yelich on the block, like the Brewers scored last winter. Plus 2 year deals for guys like Robertson, whom you already said you were interested in, which also wouldn't cause you to lose any "ammo" for bolstering the 2021+ squads. If you want to argue against a 5 year deal for Keuchel right now, I am fine with that. (Although I could give some leeway if the front office believed in a guy like Corbin.) But that's generally not what I have in mind when I say I'd like the Twins to be more aggressive about winning right now.

I don't think that poster is predicting 73 wins. I believe they are just throwing that out there as some kind of pessimistic/negative counter-point to something. edit: which their reply to you seems to confirm.

This mystery team signed Scrappy Doo: Fan reaction was mixed.

Honestly. I don't think it would necessarily have anything to do with Minnesota -- opt-out clauses seem pretty standard these days. Heyward and Darvish got them in Chicago, Price and Martinez in Boston, etc. I tend to think opt-out clauses aren't so bad. They have a value for the player, of course, which should be taken into account in the price of the contract, but it's possible the Twins wouldn't even have to deal with the last half of a Machado or Harper deal, which seems to be a common complaint among fans (although given their ages, the latter half wouldn't necessarily be onerous either).

I'd say that list would feature a few front offices who aren't good at judging major league talent. And I'd say the Rockies might be one of them, judging by one of the worst 2017 deals (Ian Desmond). Arguably the worst deal of 2018 isn't surprising right now either (Padres, Eric Hosmer). There are good players on those FA lists, and while no one will bat 1.000 in free agency, it might be nice to have a front office who could win more than they lose in FA while dipping more than just their toes into the water. Do we have that?

Still, even if we're muddling along, we don't have to muddle along at well below average payroll. The 2019-2020 Twins would project better with Charlie Morton, for example, or David Robertson, just in case we run into some luck with the current player wave, and it wouldn't hamper anything we want to achieve in 2021 or beyond. (Might even help in 2021 and beyond, if you had to flip Morton/Robertson.)

Obviously extensions don't add talent to the current club, but they can help retain it for longer and at lower rates, making it easier to add talent later. Like the Indians with the Kluber, Carrasco, and Ramirez deals -- if not for those, their window might be over by now. And perhaps it would have been harder for recent Cleveland clubs to supplement with Miller, Encarnacion, Hand, etc. I'm not sure if the Twins have talent worth extending -- Berrios seems the most intriguing -- so I wouldn't necessarily demand the Twins sign an extension. But it's a little disappointing to see no progress in that regard, alongside the absence of aggressive moves otherwise.

One problem with this restriction: most teams with equivalent or less revenue than the Twins haven't done well, overall. Most WS are won by higher-revenue teams, and most WS appearances are by higher revenue teams too. A few similar-revenue teams have had a stretch of competitive regular seasons (including the 2000s Twins), but very little postseason success. Many more have achieved less. It's not necessarily a strategy that the Twins should be locked into following, if they don't want to. A few of those teams would have probably been better served to be more aggressive at times. In fact, the most recent smaller-revenue team to win the WS (Royals) were rather aggressive, in the Wil Myers trade. Yes, they won the WS after Shields left, but they still had Davis (whose 5 years of control was an underrated asset after his initial bullpen success with Tampa), and the Royals did reach game 7 of the WS with Shields which likely helped them win it all the next year. (A key to that deal was that Myers was projected as a corner player, which likely capped his future value, so this doesn't necessarily mean the Twins should flip Lewis -- but it's still a general example of aggressiveness.) The Brewers are another club that's shown some aggressiveness, with some results -- in 2011, they made it deep into the NLCS after acquiring Greinke, and then again last year with Cain and Yelich. Obviously no one would say the Twins should aim to compete with Chacin and Miley as our top starters, but again the general idea is there are potential benefits to aggressive moves (including helping to cover areas of the roster which turn out weaker than expected, like the Brewers SP after the Jimmy Nelson injury). Aggressiveness won't always work that well, but even then, it doesn't always hurt either. The 2008 Brewers made the playoffs but failed to advance after acquiring Sabathia, but they ultimately didn't pay too much of a price (Brantley eventually became pretty good, but the Brewers built their own pretty good OF by that time too). The recent Diamondbacks haven't advanced past the first round with Greinke, but his contract isn't really inhibiting greater success. It's not necessarily a bad idea to try to follow the less aggressive path of the 2000s Twins again, or the more recent Pirates and Reds teams. You could build a team approaching 90 wins and hope for some luck -- the Indians certainly came close in 2016. But it's not the only way for markets like ours, and after the experiencing this path in the 2000s, recognizing that competitive windows can still be limited no matter how "sustainably" you try to build in a smaller market, and needing a jump-start out of the 2010s doldrums, I think a lot of Twins fans might welcome taking a more aggressive chance today, and they wouldn't necessarily be wrong. Mind you, that aggressive chance has to be smart -- not just signing any 30+ year old FA to a long-term deal, or dealing valuable up-the-middle prospects for strictly short-term returns. But targeting younger guys like Yelich in trade, or FA like Machado, could absolutely qualify. At this point, so could a successful extension bet, like the Indians did with Kluber, Carrasco, and Ramirez. But I'd hope that our front office has enough skill to do something more than biding our time with modest 1 year deals.

So what's the plan, if the young talent flops? Just muddle along until 2021 or so, when Lewis and Kirilloff are hopefully up and producing? Note that we don't have to just sign 30+ year old, "win now" FAs. We could be using our resources to acquire or lock up younger assets for both the current "window" and the potential Lewis/Kirilloff window.

While Lynn wasn't a disaster in absolute terms, I think he could be considered that, relative to expectations. He averaged 2.8 bWAR per season in St. Louis, then produced 0.3 in 20 starts for the Twins. And while Lynn did get traded, it was based on his St. Louis reputation -- in other words, he was traded despite his performance with the Twins, not because of it. And some might argue a corner guy like Austin, who is 27 years old and out of options this spring, is more of a suspect than a prospect too. (Yes, I do realize we also got a rookie ball pitcher in the deal. )

Well, $3.5 mil probably gives him a longer leash than $1.5 mil, so he could tie up that roster spot for longer, regardless of whether his performance warrants it. Also, the context of the post to which you were responding was the "opener" idea, which is in part a strategy emphasizing optimization and efficiency. $3.5 mil for an opener -- an a suspect one, at that -- runs a bit counter to that. $3.5 mil for a league-average starter (which is what Perez was in 2016-2017) would be good value -- although I'm not sure it would be a great asset. Ultimately doesn't move the contention needle much, and teams aren't exactly going to surrender much talent for it in trade either.

Not only would you have to cite an extremely small sample (11 IP), you'd also have to trust ERA over peripherals in that small sample, or even just RA9 (ERA plus unearned runs). Perez still only had 5.7 K/9, 4.1 BB/9, and 4.09 RA9 in those relief innings.

I assume the poster meant decline the option, but then re-sign Ervin at a lower salary. (Not that I endorse such an idea!)

FWIW, Ryan signed Hughes at age 28 too. Pelfrey was only 29.

FYI, Morris was a 3 year deal, but the player could opt out after the 1st or 2nd year. (They were player options.)

Or Mejia, who ended 2018 on the shelf too... Still, they could aim higher.

Hasn't been announced, but this seems doubtful. The Sanchez deal was kind of unusual -- a MLB deal requiring a 40-man spot, but with a split salary if he didn't make the 25-man. I suspect the Perez deal is more straightforward. Especially if it has a second year option as reported, it doesn't seem they would bother with a provision where he could get cut in spring training. I suppose some of the salary could be in the form of incentives.

Perez is 27 now, but turns 28 as the season starts. Same as Odorizzi last year. Even if Perez returns to his 2016-2017 form, is that really worth much? Roughly league average ERA+ accounting for ballpark. Odorizzi fetched a pretty marginal trade return with similar performances, and was of questionable value on the field to us last year too. What exactly are we aiming for here?