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Rod Carews Birthday

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Everything posted by Rod Carews Birthday

  1. Rod Carews Birthday
    Actually, here's another guy who had a down year after looking good the previous year. This guy recovered and although we traded him eventually (and sadly), he had a pretty nice career. AB G BA OPS+ Most of us aren't old enough to remember this guy though. We as fans are definitely too reactionary.
  2. Rod Carews Birthday
    Sorry. Don't know why the stats printed twice.
  3. Rod Carews Birthday
    Well, it was actually 336 AB's. If there aren't any ducks on the pond, it's hard to drive them in, and the Twins definitely didn't have many ducks on the pond in 2025. He's cheap. He has a good power bat. Outside of Buxton, we don't have anyone else like that. 2025 was his outlier season. It would be foolish to get rid of him now. I also wouldn't trade him unless I could really get someone to overpay. YMMV
  4. Rod Carews Birthday
    Mauer and Morneau might argue with you.
  5. Rod Carews Birthday
    I don’t disagree with much in your article. However, I might put in a middle ground between “good” and “bad”. Jeffers, while not hitting as many HR’s was still an above average ML hitter (108 OPS+) and Wallner, while not living up to lofty expectations, was also a solid overall hitter (110 OPS+). I think those two players can be counted on much more than the others on the naughty list. So at this point we have a black hole at 1B, a promising (although practically rookie) player at 2B, disappointments at SS and 3B. Yikes!
  6. Rod Carews Birthday
    I think that this is an important consideration. Point A: There is dissatisfaction in general about how things have been done in the organization. People’s reasons differ, but the dissatisfaction is very widespread. Point B: Six of eight candidates mentioned are current or former employees of the team. There may be others, but this is a starting point. Question: Is it really even plausible that six of the best candidates for the job are former or current employees? Cast the net a little (a lot) farther and wider!
  7. Rod Carews Birthday
    Agreed. It is bad faith on the part of the Twins to cheap out on payroll if (and we know it’s WHEN not if) they aren’t going to go all in with an amount of payroll that is ABOVE a normal amount of revenue in the future. Spend some money and try to win. It is a fallacy to think that we are tearing down to “build for the future”. It’s not in their DNA.
  8. Rod Carews Birthday
    Why do you feel that way? Wallner is pretty much our only power hitter besides Buxton. You can say that you want more team speed and defense, but someone in the lineup has to be able to hit the ball out of the park.
  9. Rod Carews Birthday
    I fear that the team is engaging in some nostalgic fantasy. The team wasn’t any better back then than they are now, and in many ways worse. Having those kinds of players on the team was largely a function of not being able to afford actual good players. Let’s not go that direction again.
  10. Rod Carews Birthday
    If you think Wallner would bring back something interesting, doesn’t that make him more important to have on the team than Martin and/or Roden, because they are basically roster filler, not starters. They may be useful, but not in a prominent role.
  11. Rod Carews Birthday
    This is not inspiring in any way.
  12. Rod Carews Birthday
    Too early to crown Culpepper or Marek Houston. Lee is the guy there now. It is his to claim. I don’t think he will. By the end of the season we may be looking for a stopgap. I hope I’m wrong.
  13. Rod Carews Birthday
    This was a slam dunk. Ryan was excellent and deserving in any year. It's too bad that the competition wasn't a bit (or a lot) more fierce!
  14. Rod Carews Birthday
    Only the laws of diminished expectations make me say that the absolute max payroll I see for 2026 is $120M, with a likelihood that it will likely be less. $160M would be a much better place to be, but I'm not seeing it. More importantly, in order to field anything resembling a team for less than $120M, one or more of Lopez/Ryan/Buxton/Jeffers will need to be dealt for payroll space in order to even be functional as a team, as the team is below replacement level in multiple spots. We get excited about Martin and Clemens, but lets be realistic. Are they starters on a serious baseball team in the major leagues? I think not. We look ahead with anticipation that Jenkins, Culpepper, et al will be powerhouses, but again, being realistic, maybe one will be really good, another pretty solid, and others will be "wonder why that player missed after such a promising prospecthood." Every year posters point to the one or two low budget teams that make the playoffs as proof that you don't need to spend a lot to be good. In absolute terms, that's correct, but again, I'm a realist. There is a very high correlation between payroll and success in MLB. Yes, the right combination of young talent and a little luck can help a team overachieve a little, and yes, it is possible to bungle a high payroll into poor results (ahem. . . Mets), but the odds are stacked a certain way and getting the payroll to a competitive number will certainly help the results.
  15. Rod Carews Birthday
    Why would the Twins do that? They have at least TWO left-handed OF prospects that are well ahead of him in the system, plus a right-handed one (that actually is a better fit). IF they decide he’s a first baseman, AND he makes the transition well, AND he continues to hit, AND the Twins don’t lock up first base in another way, PERHAPS he will appear sometime in 2026, but surely not opening day. If he does, it means that the Twins have completely cheaped out, AND it probably wouldn’t be great for his development. If he has a decent AFL season, move him to 1B (and hope he develops more power) and put him at AAA. Let’s see what he can learn before we get too excited about his debut.
  16. Rod Carews Birthday
    Short answer: Yes. However, the job probably comes with tempered expectations for success. If I were signing up for the job, that is certainly something I would stress with my new employers. Unfortunately, for the new manager's resume, his career will start with a lot of ugly even with that grace from the front office. With Buxton, Ryan, and Lopez still on the team, they won't likely be 100 loss terrible, but if those guys are traded it could be a record setting bout of futility. An ridiculous amount needs to go right for them to even sniff .500 ball, and that's not the playoffs or truly competing. If they keep those guys and add something meaningful (plus a whole bullpen) they could potentially touch .500.
  17. Rod Carews Birthday
    Absolutely! I would hope that the Twins would want a better overall season (with much more consistency) from Julien if they imagined him to be a part of the future team. An average OPS+ isn’t very exciting, especially when it comes in fits and starts without consistency. In Julien’s first year, he was much better than that. Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like he will regain that pace. Clemens, on the other hand, may have some usefulness as a utility guy IF he can be more like the surge Kody than the scuffling one. Unfortunately, I think that the Twins will hand him a job next year and watch Clemens turn back into . . . . Kody Clemens. The Twins have done that many times in the past. Here we go again.
  18. Rod Carews Birthday
    I would argue that setting players up to make the transition from one level to the next is crucial to their success in the majors, and that IS ultimately the AAA manager’s job. No one actually cares about wins and losses in AAA. It’s all about development of skills and preparing them to be ready for the majors. It’s also where those missing fundamentals should be addressed, not from the major league manager’s bench.
  19. Rod Carews Birthday
    I think this is an excellent article. Firing Baldelli was necessary because someone had to go, but the problems start quite a ways upstream in the system. A GREAT manager might gain a couple of games difference in the final outcome and a TERRIBLE one might lose a couple, but managers in general get way to much credit and way to much blame. If two teams are equal, the manager might make the difference, but this team has a very long ways to go to even approach equal. We need baseball players, and not unrealistic expectations on the next guy to don the managers hat.
  20. Rod Carews Birthday
    One of the main problems with any of the candidates who are a part of the current system is that the biggest complaints involve development and training parts of the job. We need better fundamentals! So hire a guy who is already there and didn’t do it from that seat (or in AAA like Toby G)? Our players can’t make the transition to the majors! So hire people who have already failed in that endeavor? Hunter or Cruz! Does straightening out this mess seem like an entry level job to you? If offered the job, they would be wise to turn it down. For nostalgic and loyalty reasons it is easy to get excited about people already or formerly here. However, if forward progress is going to be made, we need someone with experience from the outside — and yes, it might cost some money. I would also hope that conversations would be had with the Twins’ four or so most established good players — Buxton, Lopez, Ryan, and Jeffers — to get some player level input. I don’t know the right name, but experience is critical if we hope to compete any time soon.
  21. Rod Carews Birthday
    Stolen bases are fun to watch, particularly when there isn’t much else going on. However, all of this new-found running hasn’t helped the winning bottom line. So for me, fun to watch, but we need some actual hitters.
  22. Rod Carews Birthday
    That’s nice praise coming from a praise who seems to be a really knowledgeable baseball guy. My guess is that he thought it was really fun to play next to Buxton in the OF and that likely gave Byron a few extra points.
  23. Rod Carews Birthday
    Agreed. But there is a difference between “Will someone want the job” and “will the right person want the job”.
  24. Rod Carews Birthday
    There is enough wrong with this team that a new manager probably makes very little difference.. It would seem like a very bad job to take right now, which probably limits the candidates.
  25. Rod Carews Birthday
    I like this article a lot. It’s a “where could we go from here” article. It definitely beats the doom and gloom of the moment. Certainly, these things can’t all happen at once, but it seems likely that at least one or two could. That won’t put us back in contention in 2026, but it could hopefully give us a building block to go on from there. For me personally, I think that the starting pitching situation will be the thing that helps the most next year. I think the raw material (and established material) is there to be successful. I also, however, fear that there will be some ugly trades coming. The bullpen, unfortunately, is going to be horrible, barring a real spending spree and a lot of luck. With the exception of Taj Bradley, I don’t see much coming from the experienced returns from the deadline fire sale, but I do think that Jenkins and Rodriguez could be strong first year players. Hey! A guy can hope, can’t he?
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