bird

Just to be different, I'm going with Chargois, Cedaroth, and Alex Meyer.

I see this as just more steady progress. Pino was an upgrade last year from the previous year with guys like Hernandez, Walters, and DeVries. Now Darnell, Duffy, Wheeler, Rogers, Johnson- all of whom may end up being AAAA guys, are upgrades over Pino. Progress.

Let's dispense with this fallacy that Gardy refused to play "the younger players" in September. Other than Pinto, which "younger players" are we talking about? He didn't play Pinto much, and it was hugely upsetting to a lot of you. It's total conjecture on your part if you believe this had anything to do with Gardy's dismissal, and in my opinion, it's neither important or a likely contributor. I also am guessing that most managers would have handed in very similar lineup cards to what we saw in September. Obvious conjecture on my part here too. Why do I think that might be the case? As much as we'd like it to be different, I lean toward the view that the baseball people, and not just Gardy, see Pinto as a poor long-term fit. After nine years in which he's been given every opportunity, it's not conjecture to say the Twins pretty much know what they have, even if some of us don't. It's always curious to me why any of us think that, because WE haven't seen enough of a prospect to draw our own conclusions, that there is some inherent flaw in how said prospect is being evaluated and handled. Can he back our starter up? Maybe. But getting him AB's at DH is perhaps counter-productive given possibly better offensive options. Expecting significant defensive improvement is wishful, wouldn't you say?

Worrying about Kepler, ABWIII and Harrison isn't on my list, since they're just as likely to become Bobby Kielty, Buck Buchanan and Dustan Mohr than to become fixtures, if they make the big leagues at all. There's a ton of angst about keeping Santana in CF until Buxton arrives, and then moving him to SS, with the argument being "we" need to see if he can play SS now. I don't buy into that angst, because I think the Twin already have a very clear picture of what Santana can do at SS, so leaving him in CF for another half-season to get both he and Escobar in the lineup makes sense to me. Sano to the OF is different to me. I'm surmising that the Twins need to see him at 3B and moving him to OF temporarily, unlike Santana, does delay his development. Until someone says he's flunked the 3B test, I hope I don't see him roaming right field as his regular position. Plouffee to me is irrelevant.

If I'm the GM, my job is to project the contribution that can be expected from Hicks in 2015. Oh, and then put a fallback plan in place. Ryan has been overly optimistic with his projection on Hicks, not once, but twice, and his fallback plan was atrocious the first time, barely adequate in round two. I just can't get myself to believe that Ryan will screw this up a third time. In my opinion, finding a two-way corner OF, via FA or trade, trumps every other need this off-season. I'm hoping they're projecting Hicks as a first-class 4th OF, although they may be first assessing whether he'll be good in the clubhouse in that role, and it wouldn't shock me if they move him based on that assessment. I'm bringing him into spring training with his clear understanding that he's battling it out for the 4th OF spot, and telling him, "tough if you don't like our projection for you, prove us wrong".

The Twins need to do a lot of things better, but identifying and drafting power pitchers is no longer one of them. Stewart, Berrios, Burdi, and Thorpe are power pitchers. Willingham fit Target Field, as does Hughes. I know it's popular to think of the Cards as being so incredibly advanced compared to other teams. I know it's popular to think of the Twins as being below average. I remember how reverently people talked about the Rays, and the A's when it seemed like everything was going right for them. And I remember, just a couple months back, still hearing about how poorly run the Royals organization was. Isn't it possible that people are a bit prone to travel to extremes about these things?

If you would, Parker, please ask the question about a Latin coach or manager in a language other than English.

Quantifying an organization's relative expertise at teaching and coaching prospects would be close to impossible. Of course, that won't stop someone who is hell-bent on promoting an agenda that the Twins are a poorly-run organization from generalizing that this is the case, and then using anecdotal examples to try to make a case. My gut tells me that the range of capability regarding player development among the 30 teams is quite narrow, but still meaningful. I'd suggest that teams who are more reliant on their systems tend to invest more resources and pay more attention to it.

That makes sense.

This isn't closer to the beginning of their rebuild plan. You can logically argue that they could have rebuilt faster, though. I look at two things that lead me to this conclusion. First, the roster has already turned over by 70%, and by this coming spring, there may be only 2-3 players that were here in 2010. Second, I see three, maybe four moves in total that make sense going into this off-season: a #2-3 starter, a 2-way corner OF, and a young catcher, maybe a BP arm I guess. I'd suggest that complaining that the team doesn't want to use the term "rebuild" is a pretty minor quibble, especially in light of how honestly Ryan has been in telling us this won't be a fast fix. And I'm sorry Steve, but exactly who is treating whom like they're an idiot? I'm not trying to pick a fight here, but isn't it a tad condescending on your part to chastise the guys on their failure to grasp kindergarten math? I really don't believe our intelligence is being insulted by them at all.

This is what I love about these threads! So now, we've been rebuilding for six years? According to spy cake about two comments earlier, we were at five years. Let's get an auctioneer online. I bet we can get this sucker up to ten years before noon. I know this sounds entirely unreasonable, but I'm sticking with it. After their first 90-loss debacle, they embarked on the rebuild. That means that, in my flawed mind, this off-season coming up will be the FOURTH off-season of the rebuild. Yes, the progress is unsatisfactory to almost everyone here. But to now count up to six years? What am I missing?

It's hard not to get overly excited about Jake Reed, continuing his outrageous dominance by striking out four of six batters in two innings, then being described as filthy by his manager.

Not sure if you meant to affirm or refute a point here, but this is a very extensive list of ex-Twins, most apparently not as forgettable as I thought.

We very much agree that the Twins have not traded away assets with good results over the years. Revere and Span verdicts are not in, don't you agree? As for your noble attempt to create a hypothetical hindsight WS team? Boy, I'd have to look at the windows of availability, the injury patterns, contract info, etc., but my instincts tell me this still would not have done the trick, even if by some miracle all those players agreed to sign with the Twins. But maybe, and a very good try, thrylos. But I think the argument still holds that the only truly plausible method for extracting a team from the depths like what the Twins were in is by taking some lumps, starting the rebuild via draft and Int'l and then hoarding those prospects, filling holes opportunistically with other team's rejects and stopgap FA types, and then, at the end, when some surplus is finally in place, acquiring a few final pieces via FA and trades. I know perhaps most here think the Twins have not had a strategy. I think they are sticking with the one they've had all along. Outside of a few understandable stumbles along the way, they're making progress. We're about to see if Ryan will take aggressive steps here at the tail end of the rebuild.

Disagree. Twins have drafted (or signed internationally) impact arms (Stewart, Berrios, Meyer via Span, May via Revere) and impact bats, when the draft order was in their favor especially. But let's assume the new stadium generates $250M annually. Can you do an exercise, looking back at which FA's were on the market, and build me a WS team with a budget of $125M annually? There's really only one plausible way to pull yourself out of a down cycle, and that's via the draft and international markets as your primary pipelines, supplementing via FA and scrap heap, and trading from what meager surplus you have, as you go along. "There are no shortcuts".

The Twins emulate the Cards in one way: they both view the draft as a means to save money, as opposed to simply a means to spend it. The Cards Director of Scouting, who has been in place for a couple of years now, puts in in plain terms in the article. Drafting is cheaper than FA acquisitions. The Twins should attempt to emulate the Cards, among other teams, when it comes to getting more value for assets they choose to let go. I'm theorizing that the teams like the Cards take more preemptive steps to trade away surplus at points in time where they still have leverage. I think about the fact that 42 former Twins played MLB baseball this year. One would think we'd have more to show on our roster or in the minors for those 42 players. The Cards have had an incredible run recently of late-round picks coming up big. Maybe they have a secret sauce, but I'm not completely convinced about that. Like most teams, including the Twins, they have a specific "style", or process, that they use to select players. I'm reminded of my experiences in the asset management business, where a certain manager style does well in one cycle and poorly in another. While I'd hardly call the Card's late-round success a product of luck, I'd suggest they may not be able to sustain their recent run of success. It's hard to outsmart and outwork the competition, and the playing field has been rather dramatically leveled with the new CBA.

Definitely agree. Ervin Santana would not have been enough to convert the Twins into a winner in 2014, even with the other off-season moves. But it's perhaps a different story here in 2015, and he may not have the qualifying offer price tag.

This is an example of a move a team declined to make that provided multiple benefits: a top 10 prospect, a potential impact player getting an earlier chance perhaps, and a bunch of cash.

It only makes sense that a proper analysis and assessment of a club's future takes into account young talent that's in place as well as elite talent that's on the way. I would be inclined to think that BP's ranking is fairly reasonable. However, I'll be very surprised if the Twins didn't shoot up the rankings in the next couple of years, especially if Santana, Arcia, and Vargas turn out not to be flukes and Sano and Buxton become the players they are projected to become. Only time will tell, but I remain hopeful that the Twins, when they assess where they're at this fall as they do each fall, determine that the timing is right to make what I believe is now only a handful of very doable moves to put themselves into position to once again field a sustainably excellent team as early as 2016. A two-way corner OF, a #2-3 starter, and possibly a young catcher would be what I have in mind.

I agree with this. I think another dangerous precedent we've set as a community is to discuss this 52% thing as if it's some hard and fast annual rule. I get it that the Twins brought it up. It's clear that some people, rightly or wrongly, have come to expect that it should be happening every year. I get the frustration that spending less causes. It's entirely understandable that maybe most of us don't believe the franchise will ever over-spend its payroll budget should that situation present itself. Everyone is entitled to their own values on the subject. No doubt, the Twins have bungled the payroll question with us. They may be guilty (or not) of implying certain promises during stadium negotiations. Certainly they failed to do anything remotely clever to manage our expectations. And now, DSP comes out with another stupid statement, and it's understandable why some are hell-bent on taking it at face value, and for those people, it may be hard to understand why others don't. It's a disturbing comment, clearly. The most defining historic characteristic of this organization, in my opinion, is that it is horrendous at PR, and to me it's no surprise that St. Peter surfaced from that part of the business. Here's the deal: regardless of "what side" of the payroll issue you're on, or how you feel about your county commissioners and the Pohlad family regarding the stadium decision, or what your take is on the issues I've mentioned, It's time to move on, isn't it? Let's see what happens going forward. Let's stop parsing quotes and trying to read between the lines of every comment that gets made and see what happens here. Maybe guys like me will be disappointed, or maybe the next guy will be pleasantly surprised, but let's put the tar and feathers aside for now and see what happens going forward.

OK, for the fun of it: Looking back, who would you swap out? 1. Buxton v. Hicks 2. Sano v. Revere 3. Berrios v. Valencia 4. Stewart v. Ramos 5. Meyer v. Angel Morales 6. Gordon v. Swarzak 7. Polanco v. Gutierrez 8. May v. Bromberg 9. Rogers v. Mulvey 10. Burdi v. Tosoni When I posted a similar list for #'s 11-20 I think a couple of my pals here thought I was trying to make a point. What a beautiful list we have here in 2014 compared to what we had to work with four+ years ago. That's the point of the exercise. But I suppose lots of varied conclusions might be drawn from it. Here are some things I personally would or would NOT conclude from comparing the two groups: 1. I would not give the GM very much credit for the improvement, as there are about five dozen employees contributing to the scouting, drafting, signing, and development process. 2. I would not conclude that the Twins are way way better than other teams at this stuff. 3. I would conclude that, contrary to frequent opinions posted here, the Twins are pretty damn good at this stuff now. 4. I would conclude that draft order has both positive and negative influence on what the list looks like, and to pass judgment on an organization's performance without considering this hugely clouds the truth. 5. I would conclude that the fairly common generalization about overrated prospects, that "well remember, we thought player X was pretty good back then, so..." doesn't stand up to scrutiny very well. For example, I don't think anyone thought that Swarzak and Bromberg had similar ceilings to, say May and Meyer, or that Valencia was going to ever be more than a serviceable starter at best. 6. I would conclude that neither list supports or refutes an argument for trading prospects for established MLB players. 7. I would conclude that the very top prospects very very frequently end up performing within the articulated range of expectations. For example, Swarzak was thought to have a ceiling of back-end starter and a floor of mop up guy.

The velo vs. K question is intriguing, but I've been more curious about whether there's any truth to the notion that the Twins bring up pitchers through the minors with a tendency to have lower K numbers that are NOT related to a lack of talent. I don't know if any conclusions can be drawn in absolute terms from this, but I thought it was interesting: AAA Rochester Team ERA 3.53 2nd of 14 teams Team WHIP 1.29 3rd of 14 Team SO: 2nd of 14 AA New Britain ERA 6/12 WHIP 6/12 SO 4/12 A+ Ft Myers ERA 4/12 WHIP 6/12 SO 8/12 A- Cedar Rapids ERA 9/16 WHIP 4/16 SO 5/16

I'll continue to disagree, tobi. Spending 50% of revenues on payroll in each and every one of the last four years would not have brought the sustainable results we all want to see. Following the Yankees' formula doesn't produce sustainable results. If you doubt this, take a look back and build a roster of FA's that you think would have competed against KC and Detroit for this year's title, using $120M as your annual 52% budget. In my opinion, the Twins have not yet been in a position where that kind of payroll spending would have made sense. But we're getting there, and we'll see if your understandable skepticism is justified.

You and I share a similar perspective, I think, on what would pass as aggressive. As I've stated, I think St. Peter needs to be pulled aside by Jim Pohlad and told to shut up. And while I find his comments troubling, I'm not terribly concerned about them. I believe the opinions of the baseball people about moves they can make to get better will resonate more strongly with the Pohlads these days. We're not necessarily talking about commitments of $200M to make a splash here. I believe there's another factor that will come into play. The boys have kids that are hanging around town now for the most part, and I doubt the sons care to have their kids and grandkids saddled with the kind of insults and vitriol that they were subjected to themselves. My understanding is that back in the early 2000's a lot of the talk about unloading the franchise centered on how ownership of it might impact the lives of those family members. I really believe that Jim Pohlad, in particular, wants to have a winning ball club soon.

I think it's entirely reasonable to wish they'd pay down the loan a little slower and beef up the product.