whosafraidofluigirussolo

"but there little question that his fastball is not a significant weapon" I don't think this means what you think it means...?

The off-season or spring training seems like the right time to consider this. They'll have a better idea of whether Rosario or Polanco will push Dozier at 2B, depending on how Polanco's taking on more SS goes and how Rosario plays once he gets reinstated.

This mirrors my feelings about the Twins shortstop situation almost perfectly. If they're going to spend to upgrade, I'd much rather they be looking ahead at a broader range of options beyond Drew. Re: Hanley Ramirez and a qualifying offer - this might be a marquee enough player and a big enough deal that giving up a draft pick won't stand in the Twins' way. I think it becomes a much more imaginable option if they end up finishing in the bottom 10 and have a protected first-round pick. Re: Lowrie vs. Drew - I get the sense that Drew has been perceived as more of an impact player than Lowrie, even if they're not really all that different, and that Lowrie's price tag might reflect that. Am I off base there?

In that light this move makes extra sense. Giving Hicks more time off while he's struggling at the plate seems better than last year's philosophy of either leaving him in the lineup to work it out or cutting him. A lefty hitter is a better complement to Hicks' stronger side and if Fuld plays CF credibly then he'll probably work for now.

I think we see Willingham's production fall somewhere between his 2012 and 2013, with the power and OBP rebounding somewhat, and he sees more and more time at DH as the season wears on. I think one of the two Jasons proves he still has something in the tank and the other one washes out. Not gonna attempt a guess at which. We see Meyer in MN at mid-season, Rosario in MN late in the season and Buxton topping out at AAA for this year. Hicks will be a lot better and will deserve to keep a starting job this year, but his on-base skills won't make the transition quickly enough for him to merit being at the top of the order yet. We won't trust the starting rotation to give the team a chance to win every time out, but they will be significantly better than last year. Nolasco will look like the team's fourth-best starter, behind Hughes, Meyer and Gibson, by year's end. I think we've put a lot of hopes on the strong minor leagues that'll re-infuse the team's core over the next couple years, but Sano and Rosario's setbacks are a good reminder that the ETA of great prospects don't represent the year or the month when all the problems get solved. The talent pipeline coming up is good, but this will be one more year of incremental progress on rebuilding, 2015 will be "when it gets interesting," and 2016 is likely when the window of contention opens. But of course there are always surprises and (all together): that's why they play the games. With the above in mind, I have a feeling that this team will probably need to add one more position player from outside the system to really complete a reliable offense. Maybe another corner bat for the middle of the order, maybe an offensive upgrade for the infield. It won't need to happen this year, but it'll be interesting to see.

Link: Juan Francisco will apparently lose out on 1B job with Brewers. I don't know much about him, but he's a lefty hitter who's been used mostly as a third baseman except for last season in Milwaukee. Below average defensively and seems to be a hacker at the plate (career 259/54 K/BB) but he hit 18 homers last year in less than full playing time. Looks a bit like a lefty Plouffe on the surface. Is he worth the proverbial kick of the tires as a corner infield option and bench bat?

I count 26 players on this projected roster. You have six infielders listed although it says '5' in the parentheses. You'd more likely remove one of the outfielders from this list than remove an infielder to get down to 25, I think...?

IIRC the Jays have two first-round picks in this year's draft and at least one is protected, if not both. That plus the idea that they suffered bad luck last year and could bounce back to contend with better pitching makes me kind of see their reasoning.

I think people need to take a big step back in how they talk about Rosario and whatever off-field issues he has. When his drug suspension was reported, it was not reported what the substance was, and with this latest report of his excused absence from camp, there is no real evidence that it's related to his drug suspension. Berardino's "source with knowledge of the situation"? One source, unnamed, uncorroborated. Not enough. You can argue that it's more than a coincidence if you want, but that's jumping to a conclusion in a way that respects neither the player's privacy nor his integrity.

Just looking over the box score and this caught my eye: Deolis Guerra - 1 IP, 0 R, 1 H, 3 K, 1 BB...10 strikes, 4 balls. In other words, Guerra gave up a first-pitch hit, gave up a walk on four pitches, and got three strikeouts on three pitches each. Efficiency!

I still don't really get the addition of Kepler to the 40-man roster. He hasn't yet hit to match his scouting reports, if I remember correctly he hasn't played a full minor-league season yet, and at his rate of progress through the minors he may run out of options before he's even ready for the majors. Not that some of the potential everyone loved isn't still there, but that doesn't look like a player who would get claimed for a major-league roster. Good luck to him, though.

Yeah, for all people talk about him as a Drew Butera clone, I'd never seen his minor league numbers before and that's real hitting for a catcher. If his bat didn't make the transition to AAA, obviously that doesn't speak well for how he's going to do in the majors, but you'd think there was some potential there to be a good backup even based on the lower-minors numbers.

The Levi Michael comparison will probably keep coming up as long as there is speculation about the Twins drafting Turner. I think it's worth noting that Michael was something like the 30th pick in his draft. If Turner has a reasonable case as BPA at the 5th pick in 2014 (and if he doesn't, I can't see the Twins reaching down for him with that high a pick), then he's in a different class than Michael and can be considered a surer thing.

The report I saw said that although both came through the minors as SS, the Mariners doubt whether Franklin stays there. A quick look at the stats seems to indicate that Miller was below average defensively at SS in his first season, but not really woeful, so maybe that can develop over time. Franklin played very little SS with Miller on the roster, which may or may not be telling. If Miller is that much better a bet to stay at SS, he's the only one I'd want the Twins to target. I'm fine rolling with the 2B depth they have.

I was guessing that the depth in left-handed relievers and marginal starters they've been accumulating might play into an attempt to trade Diamond, Duensing or Thielbar to clear up the pitching situation a bit, with one of those guys traded and the other two in the bullpen. I'm hoping for Worley to take and run with the chance to win a rotation spot again.

Statements Do Matter But that approach doesn't really have the same paradigm-shifting effect as signing two pitchers to unprecedented contracts by early December, does it? Agreed, but I feel as though the front office made the key part of the "statement" with Nolasco, and it would have been just as effective both statement-wise and roster-management-wise if they hadn't made one of the two subsequent deals with Hughes and Pelfrey. I think it's good that the team acted early in free agency, but I also think they hamstrung their own flexibility for the back half of the offseason.

I'm surprised about Sano's ranking too, but the overall presence on the list speaks well of the system's depth. To have the Twins system represent about 1/13 of the list in a league of 30 teams is not bad.

FWIW, 7/$155M works out to $22M per year, not $25. It's still a ton of money but that difference is not meaningless.

Here's a fun one for an office pool/near-future-projection quiz: in how many games will the Twins start a left-handed pitcher next season? I'd guess very few, maybe two to four over the entire season. I'd guess that Albers and Diamond are about 8th and 9th on the starting depth chart now (at least if Deduno and everyone else is in full health.) Meyer or May might even push them farther down the totem pole by mid-season. The point, for this thread, being that Albers is a player we should want to see succeed, but he doesn't appear to be high priority to receive many chances to prove himself this season.

As more catchers go off the board, it starts to make more sense for them to look on the trade market, particularly at players who might be displaced by these recent deals and who could be decent stopgaps or depth. I don't know these players too well, but I'd at least be intrigued by Rob Brantly from the Marlins (he's losing starting gig to Salty now) and Jose Lobaton from the Rays (who have acquired Ryan Hanigan and resigned Jose Molina this offseason, leaving Lobaton out of a position.) Quick look at baseball-reference indicates that Lobaton has hit a little bit in the last couple years, but has had his caught-stealing numbers plummet in the same time; meanwhile Brantly has hit in the minors, but not in the majors yet, and caught baserunners stealing at a league-average rate last year.

Damn. I preferred AJ to Salty, mostly because I don't think either of them is really worth 3+ years' commitment and I thought AJ would be more likely to agree to a one-year or two-year deal.

Hey, minor thing: Dozier will start the 2014 season at age 26 and play most of the season at 27. You're basically just a year off, but the year makes a difference when players are usually expected to establish themselves as MLB talent or not by their mid-20s.

I agree with the general sentiment in the above posts, qualified by two things: - The Twins have seen enough ups, downs and attrition with the young internal rotation candidates they've used in the past few years that I think there's some value to having one more slot filled by a veteran innings-eater even if he's no better than mid-rotation (think Correia but a little better.) - While "go big or not at all" in terms of aiming for a higher tier of pitchers was a sentiment expressed in the podcast, there was also one point at which I thought Aaron and John said basically that they wouldn't bother with most of the guys in their own top-rated tier, presumably because of the projected cost relative to performance. So then where are you aiming when you "go big"? It's probably safe to say they won't go after Garza and won't lure Tanaka, but who's in your range if you it's not worth it to pay for the likes of Jimenez and Santana?

Also, Garza, E. Santana and Jimenez are #4, #5 and #6. He estimates Santana at $18M per year and doesn't try to estimate Jimenez, but calls him a "risky signing" with more upside than the above two.

HardballTalk?s Top 150 Free Agents for 2014 | HardballTalk Ranked roughly according to the value of the contracts the writer, Matthew Pouliot, thinks the players will get (he explains a bit in the intro.) Blurbs on the first 55, the rest in a straight list format. Relevant tidbits: * He speculates on likely interested teams for a number of these free agents, and only mentions the Twins in connection with Stephen Drew (#15 on list.) I'm guessing he's not speculating on landing spots for pitchers as much because it's a bigger field with more spots open - more of a musical-chairs game. * Jhonny Peralta ranks #27; since apparently his defensive numbers have shown him to be serviceable at SS, I'm coming around to him as an option to strengthen the infield. * Josh Johnson ranks #31 and he speculates that a one year deal with $10M base and $8M potential incentives would make sense. That seems steep to me, but I wouldn't argue against the Twins doing it. * Randy Messenger ranks #46 and Pouliot notes that offers from MLB would now compete with an offer from his Japanese team to retain him, so "some team may need to commit to a three-year deal in the hopes that he’s the new Colby Lewis or Ryan Vogelsong." I'd be wary of that. * Mike Pelfrey ranks #79, surrounded in that range by Mark Reynolds, Scott Downs, Paul Konerko and Gavin Floyd. What do you think?