Althebum82

I see the Athletic is projecting him to land first with the Cardinals, secondarily with the Twins. That has me scratching my head saying, "Why here?", as I play out in my mind the visions of a past-his-prime player being added to this roster. Which is exactly why it is likely to happen, sadly. He is not a solution at 1B or 2B for which to pay a premium. Sorry, this is an easy "no thanks" from me at any price.

The thought of this happening has my head uncontrollably shaking. Having said that, if he accepts 2026 Taylor Rogers money, gee, how could we go wrong signing him? We all saw how gloriously that reunion worked out......

Oh boy, a blast from the past with the Dietrich Enns mention! You're correct in thinking it takes someone with unique character to succeed in this role. However, I do believe that Kendry Rojas was our version of this in 2026, albeit in a limited number of innings. Having said that, it would be my personal preference that he be stretched out to become a starter.

He would not be the first person in the history of the working world to issue an apology because it is expected to move forward as part of an organization. Asserting innocence in the face of unproven accusations may be an accurate approach, but ultimately it becomes a futile strategy if one wishes further pursuit on the established path. However, ultimately what a sad development it is for us as baseball fans that this whole narrative is a topic of conversation.

Orze and Acton have a history with our new pitching coach which may have an impact on their roster status good or bad. Yes, Paredes was in over his head but who among us even knew he was part of the organization at this time last year? Too early to give up on him. I sure do hope that I have seen the last of Tristan Gray and, sadly, Matt Wallner. I also have lost all patience with Royce Lewis. It is now a well-established fact that nobody else wants Alex Jackson.....but I suppose the Jeffers free agency sort of makes him for now more valuable on the roster than he is otherwise worth.

Interestingly, as soon as I saw the headline the first name that came to mind for me was Jack Anderson. After his demotion to St Paul his success in the bullpen continued to reaffirm the glimpse that we got of him in a Twins uniform. So, an experiment was done to see if he also had the potential to return as a starting pitcher. Alas, that wound up being a disaster over five starts at the close of the season. Still, I would be interested to see if he could be a steady contributor next season's bullpen.

Big Dog, this is an incredible compilation, especially the pitchers! It is amazing how many this franchise has briefly used and then readily discarded. However, there may be other teams have this same restless attitude to roster strategy over the years. I did come across Max Kepler who played 41 mostly over-the-hill games with Arizona and could be added to the hitter list as well.

What a mess that 2025 trading deadline bloodbath created. At the time I complained about the apparent no-value additions of Outman and Roden, because bringing them in created more confusion in the outfield plans in addition to the anticipated bullpen woes that dragged through to this year's deadline. So, maybe my whining was only partially right, Roden has shown that he can belong. We still have an outfield mess even with Outman, Fedko, and (from 2025) McCusker taken out of the picture. If Roden gets moved to 1B, then let's make the clean break to move on from Royce Lewis and let some other team put up with his pattern of underachievement. Also, I don't expect Roden to be traded.

Great article! I found myself agreeing with each grade. The game has evolved into the search for “value discoveries “ and it’s cool when you find one, but too commonly a futile exercise that looks incredibly stupid.

You know he has not publicly complained this year about playing second base but last year he expressed his displeasure pretty succinctly. After three seasons of offensive performance below expectations (conceding that injuries partly contributed to that), it’s time to move on. He is what he has been, and it’s unrealistic to project any further improvement.

Begrudgingly have to agree. As bad as I thought the decision was to bring him back I thought it was even worse to give any runway to Outman and Roden . But because they were acquired at the trade deadline it was pretty clear they had to have every opportunity to prove their inadequacies. Happy to have Larnach prove me wrong, but sadly stills waiting for Roden to go away.

Fans used to grumble about Mauer as a first baseman, but since he retired we have had 33 different guys play first base now over 8 seasons. Only Sano and Kiriloff played there in half of those seasons, cementing the apparent franchise mentality has been that first base is a throw-away position for which we do not intend to pay top dollar to fill. Why would we expect to have any long-term solution in 2027?

Those are some pretty damning numbers for Wallner's last 30 games especially in an offense-happy league. Rogers was a reasonable signing off of a decent, although past-his-prime, 2025. Just watch the Cubs sign him next year and squeeze one more great season out of him before he reverts back to retirement-ready numbers in 2028 (a la Caleb Thielbar). All Josh Bell has done is lead the team in RBI for the season. I really hated the signing the first two months especially, but it seemed like once they removed the glove off of his left hand his offense took off. Do I think he should come back? Not really. It is becoming harder and harder to watch one dimensional players, even though they have clearly been a part of MLB since it began, even before the DH role was created. Sigh. How much patience can Royce Lewis be shown? Remember the comments from Derek Shelton that once he was announced as manager Lewis was one of the first players he contacted? So, yes, he will be back. We have seen him more healthy this season than previous years. It seems hard to expect, though, improvement despite his gaudy entrance into the league. I do not expect him to survive 2027, however.

Sure, why not? Unfortunately, we have three regulars in our starting rotation that either need to be replaced or significantly improve next year. Unless Raya as a reliever is the next coming of Jhoan Duran (maybe he is), his proposed future is of little relevance to filling a most critical need for this franchise.

Given the state of this team's current starting pitching rotation, Kremer's effort this game is a very welcome sight. Four games away from the wild card spot and four teams ahead of us....this club is not dead yet, but also does not have enough juice to look full of life either. If they can take the series today, we can at least still consider them somewhat entertaining.