EternalOptimist

I agree with you that it's a bad idea to just add free agents when you're chasing a championship. I'm not saying the Twins approach is perfect by any means. Please don't interpret my comments that way. Teams only ever have a general idea of what the crop of free agents is going to be in the off-season just before their team makes its push because of re-signings, etc. If the free agents aren't stellar, you of course have to sacrifice farm talent in trades, so you should obtain quality players in free agency when you have a chance. I look to the upcoming off-season and the next to evaluate how serious the Twins are about being a contender and not just an also-ran. If they project that much of our talent will be arriving/maturing around 2015 or so, they'll need to add several solid free agents to the team instead of just fill-ins or re-treads. I believe (I know someone will correct me if I'm wrong) that the Twins opening day payroll in 2009 was $65 million. It didn't jump to its current level ($94-ish) until they moved to Target Field. While still not being at the level they should be, a difference of $30 million isn't tiny. When he says he's allowed to spend, I would not say that Terry Ryan is flat lying, but I would take everything with a grain of salt. He's reacting to constant badgering from the press about whether he's been giving a spending limit. I'd give them a unequivocal answer too. I highly doubt that he's allowed to build a $150 million+ payroll. Also, I think many people would agree that just spending money is not the answer. Would you have paid Zach Greinke that much, for instance? I don't agree with everything that Jay Jaffe says in the SI article I'm sure people have seen and discussed already (Recent results suggest free-agency is more of a sucker's bet than ever before | The Strike Zone - SI.com), but there are some interesting points. Is there an actual thread here where people discuss what signings/decisions they would have made over recent years to build this team? I realize that pieces of it are discussed in almost every thread, but I'd love to see different people's overall philosophy. (Sign these two free agents, then the next year I would have gone after this piece or that one, etc.). The discussion would benefit greatly from hindsight, but would still be interesting.

Twins marketing talking points aside, why would Ryan have done that this off-season? Whatever they project publicly, they know that the team is not on the cusp of anything. They're trying to keep the revenue coming in until the feeder system catches up. I don't think any of the free agents available were worth their price to a team in our position. They would have helped move us in the right direction, but if I put myself in the Twins' shoes, I probably wouldn't have pulled the trigger either. Also, I find it strange that people spend all of their time ripping on Terry Ryan, when there's a decent chance that he's working with one hand tied behind his back. Am I saying he's blameless? Absolutely not. Just saying that he doesn't sign the checks.

I'm with Oldgoat on this one. I would think that you could sign Morneau for somewhere in the $8-10 million range. If it's for 3 years or less, it won't keep you from doing anything else. Parmalee continues to be underwhelming, especially in high pressure situations. We've been hoping to see the return of the good 6 weeks he had in 2011 for too long. I am demoralized just like everyone else about the decline in our payroll, but I'm hopeful that they will start to spend more money as the homegrown talent begins to reach the majors. The Twins are too cheap to fill 4 needs in free agency, but it's more realistic to think they'd go out and get 1 or 2 when they expect to be within shouting distance of the playoffs.