WhenWillWeBeatNY

The more I think about the more the Royce Lewis injury has affected this off-season. If Lewis would have stayed healthy our off-season would have a lot easier decisions. Before the injury Lewis played 12 games 40 at-bats hitting .300 with 2 HR, 4 doubles, and 5 RBI’s. Obviously he was doing amazing and proving why he was the Twins #1 draft pick. Now would he have kept up that production for the rest of the season? We couldn’t find out and that’s the issue. If Lewis was able to play a full season and do well then maybe we don’t even care about signing Correa because we have a SS for the future. Or we do still go after a SS and move Lewis to 2nd and trade Polanco. Or maybe Lewis does terrible last year and shows why we should pay Correa a ton of money. Either way now we are stuck in this in between of which way we should go. Personally I love Correa and he definitely seems to help other teammates. He is a guy that will lead you to the playoffs and be a force in the World Series and he has the experience. That being said he is gonna cost a ton and we have many other prospects coming up for IF spots (Royce Lewis, Austin Martin, Eduardo Julien, Brooks Lee). We don’t want to block these guys out especially if they prove they are major stars. There is also the risk that Correa could regress and we don’t want to be stuck in a bad contract. To sum up if only Royce Lewis would have stayed healthy :( and should we really re-sign Correa/ What is the max price you would be willing to pay Correa?

I would have liked him back. He didn’t have as much success in Miami as he did with the Twins but that like you said was Miami and he was also the bench coach there instead of being the hitting coach. He signed as the assistant hitting coach with the Tigers so it wouldn’t have even been that much of a hassle to sign him. He also seemed to have a good impact on the vibe of the team.

I believe they have 3 main options here. The first is that like you said they let Farmer play SS. Which I think he would be a fine SS. The issue though is he’s a “fine” SS not someone who is going to lead you to the playoffs. The next option is sign a SS outside the big 4. The only other guy I could see is going for is Jose Iglesias. In my mind he would be a bit of an upgrade over Farmer and more of a veteran presence in the clubhouse. In options 1 and 2 I would just use these guys as fillers until Royce Lewis is healthy. It was a small sample size but he was proving last year he could be a star. The 3rd option is give one of the other prospects a chance. Although we haven’t gotten the chance to see him in the majors. Austin Martin has been tearing the fall league. He’s gonna be a big boom or bust guy. Maybe the Twins give him a shot at the beginning of the year. Or they could also do something where they move Polanco to SS (although I hate Polanco’s defense at SS) and play Eduardo Julien who has also been tearing it up in the fall league a chance at 2nd base.

These are the free agents I think the Twins should target this winter at each position of need. I am obviously not including some big name free agents in this list. This is either because I don’t think the Twins have a chance at signing them or I don’t think it would be worth the money. Let me know who I should add to list or who you think shouldn’t be taken off the list. SS Carlos Correa Xander Bogoerts Jose Iglesias Aledmys Diaz (Utility) RP Zach Britton Seth Lugo Taylor Rogers Anthony Bass Chad Green Andrew Chafin Michael Fulmer Brad Hand Corey Knebel Will Smith Trevor May SP Nathan Eovoldi Chris Bassett Taijuan Walker Jameson Taillon Andrew Heaney Tyler Anderson Martin Perez OF Andrew Benintendi Kevin Kiermier Mitch Haniger Joc Pederson Corey Dickerson C Christian Vasquez Omar Narvaez Tucker Barnhart Gary Sanchez

In my perfect world where we have a higher salary cap and our FO will actually spend FA money on the bullpen I’d get Andrew Chafin and Rafael Montero. I’d then pick up a high SP and move Maeda to the bullpen. Giving us: Duran Montero Lopez Alcala Chafin Thielbar Maeda Jax/Megill Now being realistic the odds that we get even one of these guys isn’t going to be high. That being said our bullpen can be good. The biggest starting factor is the starting pitchers. We dealt with a lot of injuries last year and had guys like Bundy and Archer that would only go 4 innings. Our bullpen ranked 3rd in most innings pitched. The more opportunity you give your bullpen the more likely they will screw up. I’m going to insert a picture here that sums it up. And look at at the correlation. The 2 bottom teams are the World Series contenders and 4 out of the bottom 6 were in the championship series games. Compared to the World Series winners the Houston Astros pitched 169 less innings than the Twins. That equates to 18 full games worth of bullpen pitching. Part of it is injuries and part of it is Rocco being Rocco but either way if we want to have a good bullpen no matter who we have we need our starters to pitch more innings. The next thing our bullpen needs is a strong leader/experience. We have a lot of young guys in our bullpen and a guy like Chafin who has been in the league for a long time with plenty of great years. A guy like Montero would also bring in experience especially playoff and World Series experience. He’s been in those big situations and know how to deal with pressure and will be very reliable. Finally the third factor is our rookies/guys back from injuries. If Alcala can make progress and become more effective after his injury. In my scenario I moved Maeda to the bullpen. I did this because coming back from his injury the bullpen would be less stress on his arm. Maeda has also proven effective in the bullpen while with the Dodgers. Other rookies like Jax and Megill if they keep improving could make a big impact. Overall, there are many factors that can affect our bullpen but I do think that our bullpen will be better in 2023.

I’m aware. A few others are as well. I mentioned it in the post that even though they aren’t prospects anymore I included them just because we haven’t got to see them play enough to see there true potential.

I was bored and thought it would be fun to put together a full lineup of all the Twins top prospects as if they all eventually make the majors (although I know this chance is very small). I know Kirilloff and Larnach aren’t prospects anymore but because of injuries I don’t think we have got to see them play enough to really see what their potential is so I included them as well. As for position players it looks like this could actually happen in a few years. I had no idea as who to put at catcher as we don’t have really any standouts prospects behind the plate. If you guys know of someone in the organization who might fit that role let me know otherwise hopefully we draft or trade for some C soon because we have no one right now. For pitchers I basically took who I think will be the starting pitchers and threw all the rest in the bullpen (I know that a lot of the guys I put in the bullpen are actually starters) Let me know what prospects you predict will take over positions in the following years. 1st: Alex Kirilloff 2nd: Eduardo Julien SS: Brooks Lee 3rd: Royce Lewis RF: Matt Wallner CF: Emmanuel Rodriquez LF: Austin Martin C: DH: Trevor Larnach SP1: Louis Varland SP2: SWR SP3: Marco Raya SP4: Jordan Balazovic SP5: Josh Winder RP: David Festa RP: Ronnie Henriquez RP: Cole Sands RP: Blayne Enlow RP: Steven Cruz RP: Connor Prielipp RP: Jaylen Nowlin CL: Matt Canterino

Topic Suggestion: Should the Twins to full win-now mode this season and next season or go into a small rebuild year? I think this would be a good topic because we are at a crossroads this off-season. We have the money available to sign a big name like Correa or an SP. We can make moves in free agency that I think would make us a playoff team. On the other hand though we have prospects like Royce Lewis, Brooks Lee, Austin Martin (currently tearing it up in the fall league) on their way up. We also have many young SP’s although unproven. We could trade away guys like Polanco, Kepler, Urshela for even more prospects as well.

I agree with you that Gordon will mainly be a OF utility. I don’t think we need to acquire any IF utility however because Arraez/Miranda can play anywhere in the IF except for SS. In the case that our SS goes down then we can just have Polanco as a temporary SS. As for the Dickerson signing I do believe he is an upgrade over Kepler and Larnach but only slightly. Dickerson is more proven and has had many solid years. While he can’t play CF Kepler or Gordon can take the roles in case/when Buxton gets hurt. The main thing for me that this signing does is just provide options in case of injuries, options for when players underperform, and makes other players available to trade. The biggest downside to this signing is like you said Dickerson may not be much of an improvement especially if Larnach lives up to potential or Kepler returns to 2019 form. The other downside is blocking play for prospects. Gordon played very well last year and I know he is utility but I almost want to give him a starting role. And Larnach and Kepler are right there too.

Thank you!

First off I want to say hello to everyone as I am new to Twins Daily. Otherwise my payroll blueprint is below. I believe there is 3 main directions the Twins FO can take this off-season. One of them is signing a big SS free agent. obviously this would have to be one of the four (Correa, Turner, Swanson, Bogaerts) Another way is signing a stopgap SS while we wait for Lewis/Martin/Lee and go bigger on pitching. The last way is classic Twins, not signing a big SS and not signing much pitching. Trade away Polanco, Kepler, Urshela and go more into a rebuild mode I based my payroll blue print on the stopgap SS and sign pitching option. I’m going to explain some of the big signings below SS: Starting with the moves I went with Jose Iglesias at SS. I think this would be the perfect stopgap as he is older and won’t be looking for a huge contract but also has pretty good offensive and defensive numbers. LF: In left I decided to go with Corey Dickerson. I also moved Kirilloff to RF and Kepler to utility. I have him here just to act as a safety net for injuries. Especially with Kirilloff’s wrist this move would create enough depth to where Kepler could be traded also. Backup C: For the backup or even starter I chose Christian Vasquez. Vasquez has a cryptic tweet that sounds like he won’t resign with the Astros and even though he loves Boston I think we can pay enough to get him here. He has solid defensive and offensive number especially for a catcher and also has two World Series so comes with a lot of playoff experience which is something our team lacks. SP3: In my payroll this would be the biggest signing of the season and that would be Chris Bassitt. Let’s be honest with ourselves we won’t be able to get a big name like Rodon or DeGrom. A guy like Bassitt however is still a very high SP arm. He also has been pretty healthy over his career and considering almost everyone of our SP’s last year was hurt at sometime this would be great plus for us. RP: For the main bullpen acquisition I chose another Met in Seth Lugo. I think we need one more strong arm for our bullpen and that person can be Lugo. Another move with the bullpen is with Bassitt taking up an SP I moved Maeda to the bullpen. I think it will still take Maeda some time to recover and a bullpen role can help lessen the toll as well. Maeda also showed he can be effective out of the bullpen when he was with LA. To finish off the payroll I resigned Michael Fulmer, he isn’t anything special but will get the job done. Otherwise a substitute for this signing could be Andrew Chafin. This signing would make the payroll go a little over the 140 million mark but I think it would be worth it. Chafin has better numbers than Fulmer and is also a lefty which would be nice for our bullpen. Chafin has also had many successful years in the league and can be a leader for our rookies. Trades: Kepler and Polanco are obvious candidates on the trade block. I think we should hold off till the trade deadline to trade them. Starting with Polanco he has had some very good seasons but then fell off. This has been due to mostly injuries. If he can stay healthy he can produce. Kepler also had a down year last year. Like Polanco we have seen the potential of Kepler. The biggest for Kepler and also Polanco is that the shift will be banned this year. Both hitters who are very pull happy will definitely benefit. On the other hand dumping Kepler and Polanco’s contracts free up more money for us and let me prospects play. We will just have to see what happens. Finally I’ve seen people posting about trading Bailey Ober. This is an absolute no go for me, I know he has limited stats but him and Joe Ryan I think are the 1-2 SP punch of the future for the Twins. I’d like to hear your thoughts on the payroll in the comments. This gets me excited to see what we do because we have so many options. Payroll Blueprint Position Player $ (in Millions) C: Ryan Jeffers ($0.70M) 1B: Luis Arraez ($4.50M) 2B: Jorge Polanco ($7.50M) 3B: Gio Urshela ($9.00M) SS: Jose Iglesias ($5.00M) LF: Corey Dickerson ($6.00M) CF: Byron Buxton ($15.00M) RF: Alex Kirilloff ($0.70M) DH: Jose Miranda ($0.70M) 4th OF: Matt Wallner ($0.70M) Utility: Nick Gordon ($0.70M) Utility: Max Kepler ($8.50M) Backup C: Christian Vasquez ($8.00M) SP1: Sonny Gray ($12.00M) SP2: Joe Ryan ($0.70M) SP3: Chris Bassitt ($20.00M) SP4: Tyler Mahle ($8.00M) SP5: Bailey Ober ($0.70M) RP: Jhoan Duran ($0.70M) RP: Jorge Lopez ($3.00M) RP: Jorge Alcala ($1.00M) RP: Seth Lugo ($8.00M) RP: Griffin Jax ($0.70M) RP: Kenta Maeda ($9.00M) RP: Michael Fulmer ($3.00M) RP: Caleb Thielbar ($2.00M Dead Money SP Chris Paddack (injury) 3.00 SP Randy Dobnak 1.50 Total: $140.30M Budget: $140M Your payroll is 0.21% over budget

A change of scenery will be good for him. I think he will keep doing what he does which is get hot for a little bit but then cool down. Always has been an extremely streaky hitter. Loved him when he was going good though.