Otto von Ballpark

TC Bear looks good in those pre game HR derby contents. Of course, they bat somewhere behind 2B for those.

Shouldn't it be the reverse? Santana should be more likely to get send down because we have Escobar to take his place. A team with a lack of viable shortstops (say, the 2011-2013 Twins) would be more likely to have to suffer through the current Santana leash.

Agreed, we already have several relievers stashed in AAA.

Bernier is still on the 40-man roster. As is Schafer. (And of course, Stauffer.) Not that I endorse Dave's plan -- I think the team can continue stashing Graham in the back of the pen (with a quick DL hook) and still get Oliveros a look.

They can already call someone up in case of a doubleheader. This plan of yours still leaves us with 13 pitchers if they want at least 7 "real" relievers, or if they go down to 12, it's an even thinner pen than before (imagine if they only kept 6 "real" relievers, and were hesitant to use that 6th starter in relief). I'd probably just have a quick DL hook for any of the current starters, like Nolasco is facing presently. None of them are really good enough to force out there if they might be less than 100%.

That's not how one would logically "punt" the DH spot. It means to just put a guy there from your current roster even though it accomplishes little. They are delaying actually addressing the position. Now, this happens all the time in baseball, and I'm sure they think this delay is for a good reason (get Vargas some AAA at-bats) although I'm not sure how good the reason is when it seems clear that getting everyday AB for Escobar and Santana (and Nunez some AB too) is a benefit they were seeking (starting all three of them over Vargas at DH even before Kennys was sent down), as well as having 13 pitchers and theoretical positional flexibility (even though Escobar's is mostly wasted right now, and Nunez's is completely wasted).

On that note, Punto also never started a game in the #5 OR #6 spots in the lineup for the Twins. (And only very rarely started in the #7 spot, I think 5 times in his whole Twins career.)

Elite RP are over-rated. So they will cost more than Meyer and Arcia, and they won't be worth what they cost.

Pressly is the only reliever with options who is likely an option for demotion at this point. Milone could go back to AAA after Thursday's game, if they want. So they could send down Pressly for Thursday, then recall Tonkin for Friday. And then they could recall Pressly or Milone if Nolasco hits the DL (as the injury would negate the 10-day requirement).

For the record, Nick Punto never started a game at DH in his MLB career. He also only started 3 games in the OF (1 CF start in each season from 2004-2006). Which makes the Escobar plan even more bizarre. It's like they decided in advance to give him prime Punto-like playing time, but 2B and 3B are locked down (a rare situation when Punto played here) and SS is reserved for grooming a younger guy who had a big year last year (also a rare situation in Punto's time).

"Punt" really doesn't mean to give up. Even football teams don't really give up when they punt. punt: to equivocate or delay. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/punt I'd say the Twins are definitely equivocating or delaying at the DH spot right now.

Danny Santana this season: .222/.240/.299, .539 OPS Pedro Florimon, MLB career: .204/.266/.300, .565 OPS Santana's 2015 BB% and K% are worse than Florimon's career marks too. Not saying that I'd rather have Pedro back or any such thing, but if Santana's defense is still a work in progress at SS, he's performing at a sub-Florimon clip right now.

Vargas's K rate is still below Arcia's career rate. Equal to Santana's this year. And actually just a little worse than Escobar's this season (less than 5 K difference over 140 PA).

That said, I'm with Brock that relievers are over-rated. Remember when some thought the 2010 Twins needed relief help? Their relief acquisition did fine, but was a complete non-factor down the stretch and in the playoffs. Not that Chapman wouldn't make this team better, but he probably won't help that much more than the usual Jesse Crain and Jon Rauch types that get traded every summer, or possibly even some minor league promotion. No need to overpay for him. (And no, he wouldn't come here in exchange for Meyer and Arcia. I'm surprised Duensing hasn't been thrown in to that deal.)

You did say his "k/9 is down" which is kinda silly when it's still at 15.3 (exactly even with his career rate). You might have a point about the H/9, although it's a pretty small sample at this point. He had comparable numbers after 22 innings in 2013, plus 3 HR allowed, and it was hardly a red flag.

This isn't really a fair summary of Cameron's comments at all. In describing the problems with the team's talent, he said "Eduardo Escobar is their starting left fielder, they've given significant at-bats to Jordan Schafer, their pitching staff is not good, their bullpen is bad outside of Glen Perkins". Which are all fair points when discussing the 2015 Twins season to date and/or present roster. His generic trade suggesting was trading non-top prospects (as you mention) for "a capable #5 starter and a major league left fielder, maybe a decent utility infielder or something." When pressed about predicting what kind of moves Terry Ryan specifically might make, he guessed if they were to go after a pitcher, it would be a guy who throws strikes and doesn't strike many guys out. He said it wouldn't be wise for them to get into bidding for Hamels or Cueto. "Maybe they call about Mike Leake who is a free agent at the end of the year and isn't pitching well enough to command a huge return." Or Kyle Lohse. Although he said again that such a move wouldn't be very helpful to the Twins unless they came along with other useful pieces (like a starting OF/DH), that they really need to add 3-5 players if they are buyers. Ervin Santana wasn't mentioned, so I suspect he forgot about his return, but that's a forgivable sin. You can listen here, the Twins discussion lasts from the 10:30-20:30 marks: http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/fangraphs-audio-the-return-of-the-return-of-dave-cameron/ My takeaway is that, while I expect that national writers won't always get the nuances of every team correct, is that there are some preconceived notions about national writers (and Cameron specifically) at work here.

Actually, I am not using the ignore list. But it's nice to know it's there, in a "break glass in case of emergency" way. Thankfully this forum doesn't have any voices that really require blocking in that manner.

I didn't realize there was an ignore list option, thanks. Something good has come from this thread!

Yeah, he's been bad, which has made the Everyday Escobar LF/DH plan all the more strange. Plus Polanco could soon fill the AAA SS spot...

Well, Arcia was hurt, and doesn't appear to be MLB ready yet, so I don't think it's a developmental question for him at this point. (Could be soon, but I'd be rather surprised if they demoted him for anything more than essentially a short extension of his rehab.) They are using Escobar in LF too so I think it's pretty obvious they are trying to get his bat in the lineup every day, and it's fair to debate the merits of that (especially as they continue with Santana at SS). And given their history with DH's, I think it's also a possibility they are holding young potential DH's to a too-high standard, as compared to utility players (or theoretical utility players like Nunez).

I wasn't surprised by the result once I saw it was a deep fly lofted in the direction of Chris Colabello.

As to the 40-man roster, I believe the Twins kept a ton of pitchers on the roster over the winter, including a bunch of relievers that are rather buried (Oliveros and Pryor were on the roster all winter, plus Achter and Darnell). But I wasn't terribly sold on Cola's hot April 2014 either -- he wasn't pulling the ball much, which seemed like a bad recipe for a guy with his profile. And glancing at his spray chart, he's doing much the same thing now. So I am not losing any sleep over him. But he sure is fun to root for!

Brock, I wasn't necessarily saying the Twins made a mistake in not retaining Colabello, or that he's going to keep up this hot streak, or anything of the sort. I was mainly just responding to this comment of yours: To me, that's too simplistic. If the 24 year old with upside is Chris Parmelee circa 2012, and the 30-something journeyman is Chris Colabello circa 2014, I don't really have a problem with taking a look at the older player before the younger one has his 500 PA or whatever. Provided we don't release the younger player or anything. Colabello's chances of creating future surplus value for the Twins were about as good as Parmelee's. Now if the 30-something journeyman is Ryan Doumit circa 2014, that's a different story -- there is little potential for surplus value from a Doumit. Admittedly those Doumit types are a lot more common than Colabello types. For the 2015 Twins, with Mauer, Vargas, Arcia, Hunter, and Sano -- yeah, I don't really have a problem with letting Cola go. I would have been upset if the 2013 or 2014 Twins had done that, though -- we had the roster room and we didn't have that many immediate options.

I think people have been disagreeing with teams/managers and making predictions since the beginning of the sport. No, I don't think it's a "modern" phenomenon, there are just obviously new and different ways to interact with other fans in the modern world, so perhaps you notice it more.

That's what I expect too. But on the other hand, they have already promoted Hicks and demoted Vargas as the team was doing well, although those moves were definitely easier decisions than most. Danny Santana might be an easy decision pretty soon, and Arcia should be too once he gets back to normal.