August J Gloop

There aren't any current 40-man spots for relievers. Considering the number of decent options still on the market, they're just waiting until they can 60-day Lewis and Paddack. If they then like where the price sits for Moore or Chafin, they'll get to signing. Ken Giles might be good choice vs Fulmer. He's apparently healthy now. We'll see.

2-8 in any 10 games is weird no matter who you play. HOU didn't go 6-0 against the Twins last year because they're a good team and the Twins were a bad one. It was just a fluke of baseball that they didn't wind up 2-4 in those 6 games. Two of the teams HOU had a losing record against were sub .500 teams. AND HOU went 11-10 in April on the way to 106 wins. And only one of those games even featured a starter from this year's rotation. That was Joe Ryan vs Verlander in JV's best start (maybe) of the year. While it's possible Winder will make a start or two, I doubt He's really being considered for a spot this year. The bigger point though is that April really isn't some unicorn month. Good teams can struggle in April and vice versa.

The object of the game is not getting on base. It's advancing baserunners to home. The whole 'he gets on base' scene in Moneyball is a well directed scene and effective for the movie's distillation of the philosophy. But look at it this way - Gallo has 1.8 x more PAs in his career to Arraez. Yet he's got 1.9 times as many total bases. Doesn't sound like much until you put it to scale. if G and A both have the same number of ABs, 500, for example A: 205 TB. G: 234. That's 20 runners closer to home over a season, many of whom are auto scored since such a high percentage of his hits are HRs. Obviously, Gallo would be better if his slug was matched with better contact. And Arraez would be better if his contact was matched with better slug. But then again, that's why the twins might be getting a deal on Gallo. Minor increases in contact will yield much bigger payoffs than hoping for more slug from Arraez. And they're basically paying only for defense. That's also why Arraez was 'only' worth a #2 and two prospects rather than somebody's ace.

Assuming his wrist works, Kiriloff is far and away the better hitter. He has the skills to win a batting title, but with actual meat in it. Think 320/390/450 kind of guy. Twice as many homes and more doubles than luis. And no need to make provisos about his D at first. That potential alone is worth the risk of trading Arraez for pitching.

On the right contract he'd be a good add. But I think the Jo Adell idea floated elsewhere is the better play. Has a chance to blow the doors off on value, but won't be an expensive misfire if he flounders. Profar is a great example though of misunderstanding the OPS+ and WRC+ 100 scale. 100 Doesn't mean 'acceptable'. It means exactly league average. League average for MLB is top 10% (at least) of all baseball players on the planet. So a player who can OPS+ at 90 is 10% less than league average. It doesn't mean 'bad'. Profar is a slightly below average hitter, with lots of positional flexibility. I do question his rostering when he cant play center, though. I'm more into that potential match with KC on Michael A Taylor.

It definitely says a lot about PR's actual baseball knowledge when he credits Terry Ryan with the 2-8 scale. The rest of it is equally lazy.

I enjoyed watching Arraez and am glad he had his career year with the Twins. I hope he has a solid MLB career hitting 275-320 with 15 doubles and 6 homers. While I'd have preferred a second pitcher, creating more depth to the MilB system opens up a path to trade elsewhere for more. Maybe now they feel more comfortable sending Brooks Lee for a tip-top starter. Perhaps another deal can even be made with Miami. They still need league average hitting. Might they like to try a whole new outfield of Gordon, Larnach and Kepler?

Arraez went to first because it was the last hope of a position he wasn't a butcher at. Turns out he did pretty good at it and has upended the depth chart a little. The reason I'm in favor of trading him this offseason is because it was after an up year. His value is going to careen all over because he has limited extra base potential and isn't fast. MLB RN has Arraez as the 9th best 1B, which is pretty good, but also means he wouldn't be THAT hard to replace, since to be a top 1B you need power. https://www.mlb.com/stories/mlb-now-s-top-10-first-basemen-right-now Just Lopez seems like it's not worth the trouble, though. Now imagine some sort of 3 team deal that involves Arraez, Kep and 4 or 5 of your favorite prospects not named Royce Lewis (cuz he's hurt and Correa likes him) or Miranda (Correa adopted him) heading off to Pittsburgh and Miami, returning to the Twins: Cabrera, Luzardo and Bryan Reynolds. That would be a trade worth sending Arraez out for. Luis is good. He's just the most replaceable good player on the roster. But no sense in replacing him with someone only as good or even a little less so.

Polanco and it's not close.

I like it. Jo and Larnach can do a 50/50 until Lewis comes back.

And we've settled onto why it's best to trade him and let someone else deal with that instability. Unfortunately also why it will take more than him to get a big return.

I mean Arraez is only 25. But I understand my word choice has been confusing. We'll say that Arraez has potential to be a lot better.

Yep. You can't possibly think that people are clamoring to acquire Arraez based on the idea that 2022 was the end of the road up? Maybe we understand the concept of prospects a little differently. He's graduated off the MLB Pipeline list, sure, but he's still prospectively a great hitter. As in he's currently got one pretty good skill, and showed some potential for continued growth. What folx would be trading for is the projection that Arraez will keep adding OPS the way John Olerud or Mark Grace did. Otherwise, he's just not that valuable. His WAR outlook hinges on his ISO. Will it be .100+ or around .080? As you can see in his career, that's been the real difference maker. If he can make that .120-.130, he's a bonafide superstar hitter. Most guys need to get that closer to .3 to be nearly as good. But that's still in the realm of projection. Ergo, my statement that he's technically still a prospect.

Cutch would have been nice. I think his choice to sign with the Pirates for roughly the same money tells you where his competitive heart is at. He feels the end and wants to have a smooth transition to retirement. I don't fault him for that one bit. He's only played outside Pennsylvania 1 year, and it wasn't that much fun for him. I think it's a great way to celebrate a great career, one more year being loved up by your best fans. I will say that the Gallo thing is getting way too much angst off this crowd. Dude has mostly been a great hitter in his career. He takes an unorthodox approach, but for the most part it's worked. Sure 2 out of the last 3 seasons have been a bit crap, but who hasn't had some of the worst days of their lives the past 3 years? Sandwiched between those two dud years? a pretty great one. He was a 4 win player in 2021! Heck we got folks in here talkin like Cutch would be a better bet. Joey Gallo put up more WAR last year than Cutch. In fewer plate appearances. While posting career lows in almost every offensive category. It's been since 2017 that Cutch has posted 4 wins. To answer the headline's Q: Zero. The Twins needed Cutch exactly zero much. He'd have been a nice luxury.

Arraez is still technically a prospect. Teams trading for him will do so because they believe they can unlock some value via power or slotting him into a position that they have a real opening in. His trade fate was sealed when he couldn't play left field. He's miscast at first, even if the initial results were encouraging. The team has 3-4 guys floating around MLB-AAA who better fit the first base profile, starting with Kiriloff. The Twins have a better defender and likely pretty good hitter at every single position on the diamond, so Luis becomes a bit of a roster problem. Add in that the fans are attached to him, and it puts him in value limbo. It's clear that there are multiple teams who want him, so that's good. Hopefully it's taking a bit because there is a bidding war. When it's all said and done, Arraez should be headlining a nice pitching upgrade situation.

Showing confidence in their ability to help him rebuild, and have the head start on an extension if they like the results. It's an easy choice.

The Twins could get Sale for being willing to pay his contract. The only reason to send anyone back would be since you're gonna clear the roster spot anyway. Put a prospect in the deal and the Twins get one of the Sox best prospects or half off the contract.

The batters he's facing aren't that great, but he's getting strikeouts and keeping the ball in the yard. Good signs. Means he's healthy at least. potential to make a big difference

Cabrera and Luzardo would be the dream get for the Twins and definitely worth Lee as the central part of the package. I don't know the full package, but the Twins absolutely could build it. The rotation would be solid (with at least two , could go 6 deep at all times, with the other stating options taking turns at Spå Bullpën to keep them arms light. Rotation - 1 - Grey, 2 - Ryan, 3 - Luz, 4 - Cab, 5 - Maeda, 6 - Mahle I like the idea of moving your most talented starters to the middle of your rotation, because it maximizes their seasonal value. (Against an Ace you generally need the Ace to have a bad day anyway to win so why not burn the bad start against a shut out?) I don't really think the Twins Rotation can be all that optimized, since everyone is all kinda on the same basic above average level. Cab and Luz bring potential for #1, but their floor is still good for the Twins outlook. Bully would look something like this: Ober as SP 7, rotating in and pitching 5 innings frequently. Pagan as the DFA ready long guy. (Emilio has to pitch his way out of the doghouse in these low leverage innings) Thielbar, Moran, Jax, Alcala, Lopez and Splink at the back end. I would Sign Matt Moore and bring back Fulmer to beef the Bully up. That would mean a DFA for Pagan, and likely AAA for Moran (unless Alcala is still slow to recover). If a 5 Man is better, you could still do the rotating starter with Kenta and Mahle and Ober all recovering from tough health years. SWR, Louie, Blaze and Henriquez would all be doing their best to knock on the door.

Trade values don't exist in a vacuum. While BTV sees all teams as able to access the same pools of players, it's obviously not real life. The Marlins would be adding wins with that trade, and not subtracting much from their pitching potential. While the fish would technically be losing potential Win value, as it stands at leas some of their talent will be rotting at AAA, wasting their value entirely. And losing erodes talent, so Lop and Luz might be worth less by the deadline. But if the Marlins insisted, the Twins could toss in a prospect like Lee to get it over the top. Or Two if they don't want Arraez. Or they could take Rogers instead of Luzardo. That being said, I wasn't saying that's the only route. I'm just saying that the Twins extra bits would be sure fire starters for the Marlins, so a deal can be made there without really hampering the Twins pursuit of the ALC crown (and eventual playoff success).

Yes, but yet we could jettison all 4 of those guys and still feature 10 batters who are able to OPS+ well over 100. My point in the suggestion is that Miami is in a really bad place and the twins have enough knocking at the door to help them out with established big league bats. It's a good match for a trade.

It can barely be believed that Max would have been the Marlins 3rd best (OPS+) hitter last year. The Twins should be offering a little 'instant offense' package of Garlick, Kep, Gordon and Arraez. They could get Luzardo and one of Cabrera, Rogers or Lopez. That would be a pretty good deal for them, as they clearly don't have the cash to bring in decent hitters, and just sent away another contributor. The Twins would probably have to pick up most of the salary on that, but it could work. Miami might want to get a prospect, then they can't have Gordon.

Outfielders get hurt at a much lower rate than infielders. What's more likely is that a young man too eager to get on with his career exaggerated the progress of his rehab and was still vulnerable to reinjury while he was playing. (Or perhaps his first surgery was not sufficient). Lewis is fast and seems to have the bat speed to be a high OPS kind of player. He projects to be a rangy outfielder with a strong, accurate arm. It would help the Twins to get another long-term high end bat in the lineup. Moving him to a Left/Center/DH rotation with Bux and LHH LF could keep everybody fresh. What my point on Lee is that his projected hit tool is 100% valuable right now, but it's just as likely to not be that in actual practice. If good pitchers are available for him, do it. Not shop him to anyone for anything. If I say Alacantarra and Kim N says Lee, I'm still talking is my point. If he gets to AA and ops 1.002, I say good for you, kid and live with it. Hopefully Alcantarra is winning another cy young.

I'm not trying to say he sucks. I'm trying to say that like most of 'the best college hitters in the draft' he will not likely be a great MLB hitter, just an ok/good one. But right now if he can be the center piece of a trade for a controllable top flight starter, it must be done. If he was gonna stick at short, Id say keep him, but he ain't.

Lee strikes me as a perfect trade candidate. Get him out while he still seems like a prospect who could center in a top level pitching trade. I'm pretty sure AA will quickly disabuse folks of that notion. He's likely to be a serviceable major leaguer, but not one you'd trade for Sandy Alcantara.