Brandon Glick

It's been a quiet offseason on the Twins' front, though they may finally be awaking from their slumber after acquiring a former Top-25 prospect from the Dodgers. Image courtesy of © Jayne Kamin-Oncea-Imagn Images In the midst of a potential ownership change that may be coming as soon as Opening Day and an apparent mandate from the incumbent ownership group to keep payroll at 2024 levels (if not lower), it isn't surprising that the Twins have been relatively inactive this offseason. It's sort of been a theme in the Al Central, though that doesn't excuse Minnesota's sloth-like performance in a key offseason after they collapsed down the stretch in 2024. Now, they've finally made a notable move, even if it isn't going to fundamentally change the course of the team or the 2025 season. Per the team, the Twins have acquired Diego Cartaya in exchange for minor-league pitcher Jose Vasquez. Cartaya, 23, split the 2024 season between Triple-A Oklahoma City and Double-A Tulsa in the Dodgers' farm system, combining to slash .221/.323/.363 with 11 home runs in 95 games. The Venezuelan native signed for a $2.5 million bonus as a 17-year-old in 2018 and was Los Angeles' top prospect over the past few seasons before falling down lists in 2024. Cartaya was at his best in 2021-22, posting an OPS over .900 across both Single-A and High-A. He hit 41 home runs between the 2022-23 seasons and is renowned for his advanced plate approach and above-average power (especially for a catcher). His defense has never been his calling card, though he has improved with his pitch-calling and framing in recent seasons, and his arm has always been regarded as above-average. MLB.com now ranks Cartaya as the Twins' 23rd-best prospect. Vasquez, 20, has played two minor league seasons for the Dominican Summer League Twins, going 5-2 with an 8.05 ERA in 57.0 innings, producing a 71-47 strikeout-to-walk ratio in 22 games (9 starts). He has not appeared on any top prospect lists and appears to be a pure-upside play by the Dodgers, who were going to lose Cartaya for nothing after DFA'ing him to make room for free agent signing Hye-Seong Kim. Notably, the Twins' 40-man roster is full and features four catchers (Cartaya, Ryan Jeffers, Jair Camargo, and Christian Vázquez). The team cannot bank on their latest addition to be their catcher of the future after a down season in 2024, though he does make Vazquez or Jeffers even more expendable than they already were. Unless the team plans to carry three catchers on their major league roster in 2025, a follow-up move shouldn't be far behind. If you want to understand why the Dodgers unceremoniously dumped Cartaya, it's not due to a waning belief in his talents (though a persistent back injury has limited his effectiveness in recent seasons). Los Angeles already has Will Smith locked down on a long-term contract as their starting backstop, while Dalton Rushing's recent emergence (now the Dodgers' top prospect) rendered Cartaya superfluous. When the team signed Kim, they had yet to offload Gavin Lux onto the Reds, making the Venezuelan catcher an unfortunate-but-necessary casualty for their 2025 operation. Looking into Cartaya's profile, there are some obvious places the Twins can focus their efforts on helping to restore him to his former status. You might be surprised to learn that Cartaya has always been more effective against opposing righties, crushing them to the tune of a .943 OPS in 2022 (compared to .722 mark against southpaws). Even in 2023, when his overall offensive numbers were down, he simply performed better against same-sided pitchers, with a .671 OPS against righties and .604 OPS against lefties. In 2024, however, that trend finally reversed, as his OPS was 79 points better against left-handers compared to right-handers. Some of that can be traced back to the fact that pitching simply improves at the highest level of the minors, as well as Cartaya's back problems. However, it's Cartaya's weakest link that appears to be holding him back the most. In 2024, Cartaya posted a 28.3% strikeout rate (21.7% vs. lefties, 30.2% vs. righties); in 2023, his strikeout rate was 29.0% (29.8% vs. lefties, 28.8% vs righties) and in 2022, his strikeout rate was 26.7% (27.7% vs. lefties, 26.5% vs. righties). Those overall strikeout numbers are pretty consistent, but his splits have been tilting in favor of his work against southpaws for years. Unless he can refine his plate approach versus same-sided pitchers, he'll continue to struggle, especially against the strikeout artists in the big leagues. Even anecdotally, Cartaya's bat-to-ball skills have been in question as he's risen through the minor league ranks, with MLB.com dropping his "hit" tool from a rating of 50 (average) prior to 2022 to a rating of 40 (below-average) in 2024. If the Twins can help Cartaya improve his contact numbers without sacrificing the quality of contact that makes him such an intriguing power threat, they may be cooking with gas. Fans should keep their expectations in check for now, but it's rare that a player of this pedigree becomes available at such a cheap price. It may not be the move that changes the balance of power in the AL Central, but, at the very least, it's a smart one. View full article

The Twins have been inactive this offseason. They need reinforcements. Time to go bargain bin shopping. Image courtesy of © Ron Chenoy-Imagn Images Let’s begin up top with a quick disclaimer: the offseason is young, and there’s a lot of uncertainty surrounding this team. Will fans be able to watch the team’s games next season? Will the Ishbia brothers buy the team from the Pohlads, possibly rescuing the franchise from its own self-imposed financial limitations? It’s hard to operate a team under circumstances in which the answer to those questions is a giant “maybe”. Still, the only thing the Twins have done this offseason to reshape their major-league roster is selecting Eiberson Castellano in the Rule 5 Draft. Seriously, that’s it. As a team that completely collapsed down the stretch in 2024 and is playing in one of baseball’s most loaded divisions (so long as you ignore the White Sox), Minnesota has to do something if it even wants to pretend like it’s going to compete with the upstarts in Kansas City, Detroit, and Cleveland. Having lost Max Kepler, Alex Kirilloff, and Carlos Santana (among others) already, there’s work to be done. Barring a sale to the Ishbias that gets processed in record time, the Twins aren’t going to be shopping in the upper echelon of free agency this winter. Most truly elite players are already off the board, and players like Pete Alonso and Alex Bregman figure to have suitors with much larger piggy banks vying for their services. Thus, this team will have to do some thrift shopping, though that doesn’t mean they have to resort to dumpster diving. Let’s hone our sights on a former top prospect who never quite panned out on the South Side of Chicago. Eloy Jiménez was with the White Sox for five-and-a-half seasons before getting dumped at the 2024 trade deadline in a trade with the Baltimore Orioles. He had a strong first month in his new home (.724 OPS in August), though he went 1-for-24 in 10 games in September and was optioned to Baltimore’s Triple-A affiliate at the end of the season. He didn’t make their Wild Card round roster, and the Orioles naturally declined his $16.5-million team option ahead of free agency. At this point in his career, Jiménez is a designated hitter. He’s been worth a comically bad -18 Outs Above Average (OAA) in his career, earning distinctly negative marks for both his arm and range in the outfield. He played all of eight innings in the field in 2024, and none after being traded to the Orioles. Luckily, the Twins need a full-time DH after giving 10 different players a start at the position in 2024. That rotating cast of characters contributed to a middling 18th-place finish in fWAR at the position. While WAR doesn’t tell the full story, it does a pretty good job of adjudicating how productive designated hitters are, since the position is generally void of speed (unless you’re Shohei Ohtani) and defensive contributions are literally nonexistent. Of course, being a full-time DH means that you better be productive at the plate, and that’s where Jiménez’s profile presents some intriguing upside. This was a down year all around for the 28-year-old—career-worst totals in wRC+ (78), ISO (.099), and BABIP (.285)—though he maintained a 90th-percentile exit velocity and hard-hit rate. His bat speed remains well above average, and that figures to remain true for the foreseeable future as he plays out the rest of his athletic prime. Before last season, Jiménez had always produced above-average offensive numbers by wRC+ (the same being true for OPS+, excluding the 2021 season when he finished one percent below the average hitter). The biggest question surrounding the Dominican slugger is his durability. He’s only played in 100 games in a season twice in his career, and has yet to exceed the 122 games he starred in as a rookie back in 2019. His injury history is a never-ending laundry list of lower body maladies. If a team fully dedicates itself to keeping him at DH permanently, he should prove to be sturdier than he’s shown in the past, but that’s a dangerous bet to make on a guy who might as well be the poster child for the “injury-prone” label. Those factors—coming off a career-worst season and a lengthy injury history—have pushed Jiménez to the discount bin of free agency. Make no mistake, though: this guy can still hit. He’s never fluctuated much from his solid career strikeout (22.7%) and walk rates (6.5%). His batted-ball data also portends a positive future, as his 2024 ground-ball rate (48.6%), fly-ball rate (20.8%), and line-drive rate (25.0%) were all better than his career norms. Likewise, he began to use the whole field better than ever in 2024, posting a career-best opposite-field hit rate (23.6%). A team could encourage him to expand on that all-fields approach, or they could retool his swing to focus more on pulling the ball to help him generate more power again (before last year, he hit home runs in 5.4% of his at-bats). And, for what it’s worth, he’s also got a .262 batting average with 13 home runs in just 59 games against the Twins, with much of that production coming at Target Field. He’s far from the sexiest option on the market—Alex Bregman isn’t coming to Minnesota, unless Carlos Correa has some blackmail on his former teammate—but in an offseason where the Twins are going to have to get a lot of bang for their buck, Jiménez presents an intriguing option with potential for production beyond just 2025. View full article

You ever just enter something in that box during checkout, in case something obvious is a hugely valuable and valid thing? Well, Andrew Friedman did. Image courtesy of © Jayne Kamin-Oncea-Imagn Images Happy Cyber Monday to my fellow bargain-hunting consumers. I'm fresh off my annual marathon viewing of the entire Paul Blart: Mall Cop series—the best Black Friday movies of all time, no contest—and to my surprise, MLB free agency is actually chugging along this year. Last week, the Los Angeles Dodgers signed ace Blake Snell to a five-year contract, using their wily charm and the opportunity to rub shoulders with Max Muncy, while deferring millions of dollars well into the future. Now, from the same source that said Arson Judge was going to sign with the San Francisco Giants: every notable free agent in baseball is signing with the Dodgers at a discounted price. That means Juan Soto, Roki Sasaki, Max Fried, Willy Adames, Corbin Burnes, and "about 15 other players" are all heading to L.A for a cumulative sum worth less than the $700 million contract Shohei Ohtani signed last offseason, according to #sources. Andrew Friedman, the team's President of Baseball Operations, told the media at his press conference announcing the deals that he wasn't happy about spending so much, but that he still kept the team under budget this offseason: "I think these guys are going to be good additions to our ballclub. I'm not sure we'll have space for everyone since we just won the World Series, but I'm sure guys like Soto and Alex Bregman could use some extra seasoning at Triple-A. Spending $650 million was a little beyond what we hoped, but that 50% off coupon made this all possible. Well, that and the fact that we don't have to start paying any of these guys until 2072." Per Friedman himself, every player will be getting the league's minimum salary for the duration of their contract, with $600 million of the team's expenditures this offseason being deferred for the next half-century. Unsurprisingly, their 92% deferral figure is the highest in league history, giving this Dodgers team yet another record that seems impossible to beat. World Series MVP Freddie Freeman also had comments on the matter, having gone through his own free agency saga a few years back: "This is why everyone comes to the Dodgers, even if we don't get paid until the sun burns out. Back in 2021, the Braves tried to sign me with a 75% off coupon. I was frankly appalled that they would cheap out on me like that. I came to L.A. purely out of spite. The code they entered was invalid anyway." Rumors have spread that other teams plan to contest the Dodgers' use of the Cyber Monday discount coupon, claiming that the team had agreed to most of the contracts prior to midnight on the Pacific Coast. In response, MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred told reporters that the many-time All-Stars were just "pieces of human tissue," but confirmed that MLB has now invalidated the promo code for all future transactions. View full article

In what could yet be the most important Twins trade all offseason, the team announced they’re swapping more than just players with the Rays. Image courtesy of © Nathan Ray Seebeck-Imagn Images There’s a new-school adage in baseball: don’t trade with the Tampa Bay Rays. They routinely fleece teams and, as a developmental powerhouse, make a living out of turning other teams' trash into their own treasure trove. Thus, it’s fair if you recoiled when first hearing that the outwardly frugal Twins completed a trade with their American League rivals on Monday. However, this deal isn’t exactly a classic player-for-player swap. In fact, it looks like more than just a fair deal—it’s almost certainly a bona fide win-win. For those who are out of the loop with what’s been going on in Florida over the last month: the state was ravaged by Hurricane Milton. The Greater Tampa Bay area was one of the places hit the hardest by the tropical storm, and the damage caused to Tropicana Field, the home of the Rays (located in St. Petersburg), meant that the viability of the stadium for the 2025 season was up in the air. Recently, the team officially decided that “The Trop" will be unplayable next year, unveiling a repair plan that should restore the park by 2026. However, that means the Rays will need a home for next season, and a home they have found. The Rays will actually play in Tampa next season, as they reached an agreement with the New York Yankees to play at George M. Steinbrenner Field, which is the spring training venue of the Bronx Bombers. Beyond the fact that they’re downgrading to a literal spring training stadium, though, this temporary home poses another problem for the Rays, who play an outdoor summer sport in Central Florida: Steinbrenner Field isn’t a domed structure. Without a roof, they’ll be subject to the elements of nature all season. Average Hourly Temperature in Tampa (by Month) Probability of Precipitation in Tampa (by Month) Note: All weather data courtesy of WeatherSpark.com As the year progresses deeper into the summer months, the chances of unbearable heat or baseball-delaying rain storms increase in Tampa. As such, the league is making numerous efforts to move the team’s home games to different parts of the MLB calendar. So, to recap, the Twins are “trading” the right to host the Rays on Memorial Day (Monday, May 26) and the ensuing two games of the series, but in return, they get to be home for July 4. That series will start on a Friday and conclude on Sunday, giving the team the entire holiday weekend to celebrate. In addition, the team will remain in Minnesota for Memorial Day Weekend, as they’ll be hosting the Kansas City Royals for a four-game series from May 23-26. The official team calendar has already been updated to reflect this change. This is all a bizarre set of events, but the damage caused by Hurricane Milton made it necessary. The rest of the Twins’ 2025 schedule should be otherwise unaffected by any logistical hurdles. They win pretty big in this trade, even if the hope is more that it will benefit all involved. View full article

The veteran catcher and his $10-million salary could be headed out the door this offseason. What does that mean for him and the Twins? Christian Vázquez was signed during the 2022-23 offseason to a three-year, $30-million contract, which looked like a solid value for a backstop coming off a season in which he hit .274/.315/.399 and was worth 2.1 WAR. Notably, he was brilliant with the Red Sox in the first half of the season (.759 OPS, elite defensive metrics) before falling off after being dealt to Houston at the trade deadline (.585 OPS, middling performance behind the plate). Nevertheless, he was one of the best catchers on the market, and the Twins made a bet that his sluggish second half in 2022 was an aberration, rather than an omen for what was to come. They gave him one of just three multi-year deals handed out to catchers that winter (Willson Contreras and Yan Gomes being the others), and handed him the starting job out of spring training in 2023. From there, Vázquez has done the opposite of “running away with” the starting gig, splitting playing time perfectly evenly with Ryan Jeffers in the latter half of 2023 and throughout this year. After posting a -0.5 WAR combined over the past two seasons, he finds himself on the trade block once again. The Case For Trading Christian Vázquez Unlike some of the other, more productive players in this series, there aren’t a whole lot of reasons as to why the Twins should want to keep Vázquez. Jeffers, despite some calls to trade him, too, is younger, more productive, and has two years of team control remaining. Vázquez can be a valuable defensive catcher, which is an all-important skill for a backup backstop, but at his $10 million price tag, he just isn’t worth the cheddar for the penny-pinching Twins. It’s true that Minnesota simply won’t get a lot for Vázquez—this may just end up being a pure salary dump. Nevertheless, the catching market is drier than the Sahara this winter, and Vázquez was well-regarded around the game just a few years ago. With Travis d’Arnaud and Austin Hedges already off the free-agent board, that leaves Kyle Higashioka, who will be 35 years old on Opening Day, and Danny Jansen (.658 OPS in 2024) as the options on the market. Behind them is… Gary Sánchez? Yasmani Grandal (he still plays baseball?)? Suffice to say, it’s a seller's market for catchers, even if that catcher is Christian Vázquez. Of course, any prospective partner would need to have two things to complete this swap with Minnesota: money and a need for a defensive-minded catcher. Vázquez is both expensive and still solid with the glove, mostly thanks to his 84th percentile skill as a framer. He also possesses above-average pop times and blocked ball rates, giving him the kind of profile that most young catchers don’t have. Looking at similar trades from the past, it’s easy to see that the Twins won’t make out like bandits in any potential Vázquez deal. Six years ago, the Cleveland Guardians traded a 31-year-old Gomes to the Washington Nationals for Jefry Rodriguez, Daniel Johnson, and a player to be named later (Andruw Monasterio). There’s a reason you haven’t heard those names since. If you’re willing to go further back, in 2010, the San Francisco Giants traded multi-time Gold Glove winner Bengie Molina (at the trade deadline) for Michael Main and Chris Ray. His brother, José Molina, was traded from the Angels to the Yankees in 2007 for Jeff Kennard. More recently, in 2022, Christian Bethancourt was dealt to the Tampa Bay Rays (from the Athletics) for Christian Fernandez and Cal Stevenson. Are you starting to get the picture? Even if the Twins do convince a trade partner to part with a prospect or two, they’re going to be nothing more than blind dart throws. Still, the salary relief that will come from offloading Vázquez—as well as any potential developmental benefits with Jeffers taking over full-time behind the plate—will be worth it. Potential Trade Partners The Chicago Cubs stand as perhaps the most obvious suitor for Vázquez, what with their need for a veteran partner for Miguel Amaya and the fact they were very likely the runner-up for Vázquez back in ‘22. They have plenty of payroll space to accommodate him, though the Twins could swallow some extra salary to get at a high-upside flier in the Cubbies’ loaded farm system. The San Diego Padres, who could lose Higashioka in free agency as they focus on retaining players like Jurickson Profar and Ha-Seong Kim, would also make sense as a destination for a veteran receiver on a one-year deal. Their pitching staff is loaded with experienced pitchers, including Yu Darvish and Dylan Cease, each of whom would probably prefer to work with an established catcher with proven defensive bona fides. Unlike the Cubs, the Padres don’t have ample room to take on Vázquez, so the Twins would have to be comfortable eating a large portion of his contract. Elsewhere, the Tampa Bay Rays (looking for an upgrade over Ben Rortvedt), Boston Red Sox (in need of a backup for Connor Wong, drafted Vázquez in 2008), and Chicago White Sox (in need of literally everything) all could call Derek Falvey with an offer. However, each of those teams is facing some fundamental issue—be it payroll concerns, bigger roster needs, or general competitive spirit—that could hamper their interest. Of course, a mystery team could always enter the mix, but unless Minnesota is really willing to eat a majority chunk of Vázquez’s salary in 2025, the list of suitors will remain limited. Conclusion Christian Vázquez has failed to live up to the size and scope of the contract he signed a few years back, and the emergence of Jeffers gives the Twins another option as they shop around the veteran in an attempt to slash payroll this offseason. Vázquez remains a solidly above-average defensive catcher, which will matter to teams who invest heavily in their run-prevention units like the Cubs, though his miserable, declining bat will keep the Twins from acquiring anything other than a low-level flier in a trade. The best-case scenario for Minnesota is probably having to only eat $1-2 million of Vázquez’s salary next year. Still, enough teams are in need of a catcher that someone should present a fair offer, once they strike out on signing Higashioka or Jansen in free agency. It won’t do much to help the roster, but a trade of Vázquez should help the Twins free up some valuable space on the payroll. View full article

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