Otto von Ballpark

The Brewers would have to clear 3-4 spots on their 40-man to make that trade happen. (It's not happening.)

Also, if you are interested in MLB.tv, I recommend not paying full price or letting it auto-renew. The past few years, if you use your MLB account to watch one of their free games of the day in April, they have sent a 50% off offer in early May. Not sure if/how that will continue with the single-team-only package, though...

This reminds me of those class-action suits that result in a fairly meaningless coupon. Offering a smaller MLB.tv package for $25 less isn't that big of a deal. I wonder if teams will start demanding a larger share of MLB.tv revenue based on how many team-only subscription packages they sell? That could hurt smaller markets. Also, the streaming games for cable subscribers by 2017 is largely meaningless for Twins fans -- FSN will be streaming to cable/satellite subscribers in-market this season, via the Fox Sports Go site/app: http://www.forbes.com/sites/maurybrown/2015/11/19/manfred-announces-3-year-deal-with-fox-to-have-mlb-games-streamed-in-market/#2715e4857a0b5d2fac6163fa

Yes. The full version is archived here: https://web.archive.org/web/20100331074828/http://overthebaggy.blogspot.com/2010/03/twins-and-statistical-analysis.html

I think his point was that the proposed trade was so imbalanced, you could actually remove thr alleged centerpiece Lucroy and the Twins would still win the deal.

Was it, though? Marichal had quite a peak, as did Roberts, Hunter, etc. Those guys were probably thought of as all-time greats during their playing days, even if some of their final career numbers were comparable to Kaat. Kaat, like Tommy John, just didn't have that, even in the 1970s and 1980s

Who's doing the overrating? Steamer (via Fangraphs) has them at 82 wins, and that's AFTER the Upton signing. Previously they were at 79 wins.

Tommy John pitched the first 1/3 of his career for Cleveland and the White Sox. And the last 1/4 of his career with the 1980s Yankees and Angels which was rather a mixed bag of team quality. True, he pitched the 1970s for the Dodgers and Yankees, although notably never won a World Series. Probably has a team quality advantage over Kaat, but only slightly -- the 1965-1970 Twins teams were very good too.

Good comp. Kaat and John are also similar in all-star and MVP voting. John too obviously could have "benefitted" by retiring much earlier than he did, but I don't think it would have mattered that much for either guy's HOF case, they were just never seen as particularly elite (outside of Kaat's somewhat flukish 25 win season). As a more contemporary example, I don't think Mark Buehrle's HOF case would be much different if he hung on for another 6 years accumulating very little.

Should note that is Fangraphs WAR. Any explanation why fWAR and bWAR are so different for Kaat? Given that no one would have had a clue about Kaat's fWAR or bWAR until many years later, I am going to say he still wouldn't have made it regardless of his retirement date. His contemporaries certainly didn't seem to regard him as a future HOF, judging by all-star and MVP voting.

Of course, almost all of those guys had postseason and/or peak cases. Kaat matching them in career case isn't terribly meaningful.

Of course, 1974-1975 were by some measures Kaat's peak seasons. Would he have been a HOF retiring after 1973?

Why not just have a shorter minimum DL time? Seems like a lot simpler way to achieve the same goal. Although I'm not sure the goal really needs achieving anyway -- if Plouffe is banged up and can't play for a couple days, does it really matter if you have Doug Bernier on the end of the bench or not? I don't think the players would be thrilled about becoming "taxi squad" guys either -- they want to play. If the Twins don't have Arcia or Santana in their top 25 this spring, those players absolutely want to hit waivers and try their luck somewhere else rather than be stuck in Minnesota another year as 26th-28th guys.

Agreed, they needed another bat, and they got one (one that just turned 28 years old too). Now they push Gose and Maybin into a competition for CF and 4th OF, which is as it should be. Should be a decent lineup, and their two weakest links at the moment (3B Castellanos and DH Victor Martinez) both have some upside/bounceback potential, at least.

I was with you up until the extension. Abad has been downright awful vs LHB 3 of the 4 seasons. I don't think he will find great success here, and I worry we might miscast him as a lefty specialist too.

Such a pitcher might be nice, but an expansion team only gets 35 picks, and only 3 guys can be selected from each team. I don't think they'd waste one of those getting a 34 year old reliever (likely non-elite, unless he majorly rebounds) for one year at $6.5 mil. They can approximate that on the FA market. Even if he performs well, flipping him midseason you'd probably be lucky to get a guy like Gonsalves or Stewart in return, so you might as well just take one of those prospects in the draft instead if available. I think they would want to load up on lotto tickets, young guys, and longer-term options. A new team can't easily get those guys elsewhere -- that's the whole point of the expansion draft.

Here are the results from the last expansion draft: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1997_Major_League_Baseball_expansion_draft#Results The top 3 picks were starting pitchers. Doesn't look like many or any expensive veterans or soon-to-be-FA's were selected. The Diamondbacks were certainly willing to pay money for players that winter too. Would be interesting to see drafting teams strategy today.

Remember, this hypothetical draft is for NEXT winter. I don't know why, but that's what it is, and it's very confusing. In any case, Jepsen will be a FA then, Plouffe will only be a year away from FA, same for Nolasco and two years for Mauer, Perkins, Milone, etc.

Me neither, I just brought him up to explain why I'm not that worked up about Berrios specifically (the thread topic), but I am worked up about the Twins approach across a number of guys. Sorry it would up making this another bullpen thread, although to be fair, Seth alone started two bullpen threads today.

I get that's their stated reason for not signing a FA reliever, but that still doesn't explain random marginal low-K reliever Aaron Thompson both getting first crack at the pen (for half a season!) and then needlessly occupying a 40-man spot at the end of the year while you don't have a true long reliever. Still doesn't explain spending money and a guaranteed roster spot on 33 year old Stauffer to replace Swarzak as the spot starter and low leverage reliever. Still doesn't explain calling up O'Rourke and not using him (or worse, using him vs RHB). Still doesn't really explain locking in guys like Duensing who have no future here (and very little present). Still doesn't really explain keeping guys like Tonkin and Achter around on the 40-man roster forever with little desire to even look at them. Well, any move can get crushed here, I wouldn't let that say much about the Jepsen deal. But the opportunity in 2015 wasn't all trade. It was offseason 2014-2015 (Stauffer), it was who they were giving innings to throughout the season (Thompson). Some of those weren't a big deal at the time since we weren't likely to compete, but as the season wore on, how about pulling arguably our best reliever for a spot start in August? How about a similar offseason approach this winter? Just like the opportunity this winter isn't all Bastardo at 3/18, there were plenty of other guys, perhaps better, moving around cheaper than that earlier this winter. Some perfectly fitting the Twins stated bullpen ideals (veterans on shorter commitments). And you could dismiss practically any bullpen move as not likely to be a difference maker, but teams still make those moves to try to improve, as they should.

2015 draftees are automatically protected (as would 2016 draftees, since the hypothetical draft is next winter). Actually, would Gordon be automatically protected too? 2014 draftee, but only 18 when signed that year.

Interesting idea, but it seems kind of silly to try to predict it a year in advance. The 1997 teams certainly didn't have to do that. Might make more sense to do it as of November 2015. I'd say there's a decent chance you wouldn't want to protect Park next winter, and possibly Burdi, Murphy, and Polanco too. Actually, next winter Dozier will only have 2 years and $15 mil remaining on his contract, Escobar will only have 2 more seasons of control, Gibson 3, probably still protect them but you could possibly make a case not to if they have disappointing 2016 seasons. Also note that there were only 70 slots in the 1997 draft, and no team could lose more than 3 guys, so it's not liked one organization could be ravaged. Might be more interesting to think about who we might lose -- for next winter, using your protected list, that might be Meyer, Walker, Stewart? Or Gonsalves, or Turner? Depending on how their 2016 seasons go, I am not sure we'd really feel that loss too much.

If Rogers is viewed as a potential member of your opening day 2016 bullpen, and he's going on your 40-man roster after the season anyway, then why shouldn't he get some opportunity if only for evaluation at the end of 2015? Especially when he has to begin adapting to a relief role, and we were without a true long reliever at the time anyway. And there wasn't much outcry for Achter by August and September, after he had already been passed over for so long the writing was on the wall for him. If he's one of the first on your offseason chopping block, who cares if he gets buried for a better pitcher. A large part of this is identifying what pieces you need, trust, and want to keep, and prioritizing accordingly, and the Twins don't seem to be doing that much in the pen. First of all, again I am not limiting it to September, there was plenty of opportunity and need to improve the pen before then. A September call-up may not be a big deal, but it was the Twins decisions in August, July, June, etc. that reduced the potential opportunity here to a September call-up. Just like it was the Twins decision not to pursue Sipp, Kelley, Lowe, Benoit, K Rod, Cahill, etc. that reduced the TD debate du jour to "Bastardo or bust". Really, I am just trying to get a handle on a strategy and what this team thinks is important. In isolation, you can always make a case for a particular guy staying down in the minors, or not signing a particular FA, but the Twins have done these things so much lately in the pen, even while competing and hopefully putting together another contender, it amounts to is a lot of inaction and a lot of complacency.

Yeah, it gets back to the philosophical thing. I wouldn't necessarily care about adding a FA reliever if I felt like this team was really working hard to improve the pen (and not necessarily at the expense of the rotation). They've obviously been drafting relievers, but closer to the MLB level it seems more like they are just doing the same old, same old, and crossing their fingers hoping for those draftees to come in and save the day. I don't think the MLB bullpen should really be subject to the exact same long-term "rebuilding" strategies as, say, the lineup or the rotation.

Until Piazza, the HOF had gone 13 years since it last inducted a catcher, but I'm not sure anyone cared all that much. Assuming Mauer retires at the end of his current contract, there will only be 7 years between him and Pudge hitting the ballot. And with the overall backlog and steroids era issues, I wouldn't be so confident that Pudge sails in that quickly. Posada might get some love at the same time as Pudge too, and Victor Martinez could hit the ballot at the same time as Mauer.