Dman

First let me say this is a first for the Twins extending a young home grown starting pitcher. The Twins just haven't been a team to get out in front in deals like this. They especially never want to do these deals for pitchers. I guess TINSTAAP? Well they broke that mold today. IMO the Twins see what I see, a guy ready to breakout and be a top of the rotation starter. Best to strike before it is too late. There also seems to be some poetic justice since they demoted possibly their second best pitcher (if the K rate holds). So this should make up for that. I think it is a good move. Randy has the security that if anything does go wrong with his arm or body he has life changing money. The Twins get an incentive laden deal that pays for performance and let's them off the hook if he gets injured or becomes ineffective. Randy has to be a happy guy today and the Twins just as happy. Very surprised to see this today but it is nice to see our team making an early deal for once.

Like I have been all spring maybe I am over reacting but if someone suggested Berrios come out the pen or piggy back off of Happ and Shoemaker how would this board react? They had about the same ERA and WHIP last year. Berrios has better peripheral's like K rate but if Dobnak has found his Strike out pitch there won't be much of anything separating them anymore except that Dobnak keeps the ball on the ground and Berrios doesn't. I guess if you can justify that to yourselves then all is well. Randy does have SSS issues all the way around but watching him this spring he looks like a different pitcher to me. Maybe have Berrios come out of the pen?

You are correct that they could have kept Rosario if they wanted to, but they didn't want to. I believe the FO tried to trade him but had no takers. He passed through Waivers unclaimed so pretty much the whole league agreed with the Twins that his price per production wasn't worth it. That is just the reality of how all FO's see Rosario. Does that mean he is a bad player or won't have a good year or years, no, but it is hard to fault our FO when the rest of league let him pass by. Yeah eventually the Indians signed him but I am not aware of anyone reporting lot's of teams had interest. If he were this great player shouldn't someone have claimed him or more teams try and sign him? If you could hand out an award for passion, fire and not being afraid of big moments Rosario would win hands down. He is a good left fielder but not a top 10 left fielder. Given what we know and how other teams responded it is hard to fault the FO for letting him go.

I think the issue is the FO said they wanted to take best players north to start the season and it was one of the reasons they didn't take Kirilloff with them. Whether you like it or not competition means something even in spring where stats mean less than normal. The other thing is as fans, and hopefully the FO, you want your best 5 pitchers pitching to start the season. While it is just spring and stats don't matter Randy has been so dominant that right now it appears that isn't the case. I know there is only so much competition you can have against veteran pitchers. With Happs late start and Shoemaker blowing up one game and not having a great K\9 this spring it creates the feeling that they are not as ready as Randy to start the season. While i get that Randy can piggy back off of Happ or Shoemaker it seems like a waste if one of those guys gives up five runs and then Randy pitches well the rest of the way and we lose by one run or something. That isn't going to sit well at all. Don't get me wrong I like the depth and I begged the FO for veteran depth but that was before Randy K\9 Dobnak showed up this spring. I get that you can't count vets out in Spring Training and they may very well end up starting the season well but I also get why people are questioning it too. Randy has looked like a front line starter the other two have not.

I really thought Hamilton was the safe pick early in. He appeared to have good velocity to go with a good slider. He didn't appear to have control problems and yet he gave up too many hits, walks and ultimately runs. My early pick is out of the race. IMO it is Waddell's to lose. I know his ERA and WHIP are higher because of the one bad outing but he is younger than Law and Farrell and he has more K's. I have only gotten to see him a couple of times but his stuff looked like it was getting on guys fast and they were swinging over the top most every swing. Waddell also throw fairly hard for a lefty and we don't have a ton of good lefties as it is. For all those reason I would pick him. Law has been equally impressive and like Farrell has yet to give up a run this spring. I like his stuff and with the fastball around 95 and multiple pitches he has the tools to succeed. If Waddell falters then I would give it to Law. Farrell was my pick early in after he K'd all three batter he faced and I still like him over Law but the guys that matter see it differently. Not sure what it is they don't like, as his K\9 is slightly better than Law's and he has some great bendy stuff IMO. It looks like he doesn't throw quite as hard but his results have been as good as the other two to this point. Sorry to see Broxton falling off. As the competition gets tougher down the stretch here he seems to be wilting. He is in danger of turning into the weak hitter he has always been. Hopefully he rights the ship soon. SSS can lead us awry and doesn't give him much room for error to make it as the SOFM. I like all three relievers right now. I would be fine with any one of them being crowned but there can only be one SOFM.

Yeah I don't know, pitching is variable and the season is long. My generalized feeling is that the long season benefits the younger arms as they are less likely to suffer short term setbacks or long term injury. I know injuries can happen at any age and anytime but in general younger means fewer of those issues. Honestly I think the matchups with the Twins are too close to call and injuries might decide the winner. The Sox already lost Jiminez so that hurts them some. The one thing you mentioned that might be a deciding factor is I think the Twins have greater depth than the Sox and that might turn out to be very important this year. To me on paper the Sox are younger and more talented but not by much. It should be a battle to the end. Also the Indians or Royals could surprise this year. I think it will be more of a 4 team race than most people. If the Indians find some hitting and the Royals pitching that will change things.

My guess is the Twins value Devin more than this board does and starting pitching especially lefties in our system are hard to come by, so you might be right. For me and my untrained eye though Devin hasn't been "good" since his debut, isn't a hard thrower and has likely reached his ceiling. While he has pretty strong 5th starter upside after this year we will likely have several better options. They could keep him for depth though because if they have a ton of injuries this year he is likely our best option behind Dobnak and Thorpe. So getting rid of him early could hurt later but hard to say. Like you I have not been impressed with the wild Anderson. The thing is he has elite spin rates which are hard to come by and he throws hard. His ceiling is shut down elite reliever. Can he ever gain enough control to become that? Hard to say, but given the fact the Twins just traded for him it would seem odd to just give him away without even trying to fix his control issues. I don't see them dropping him this early. Back to Law. If Derek has turned a corner and has his pitches under control and new K ability we could certainly use another shut down pen arm to start the season. Losing Smeltzer who may not even be needed this year and almost certainly not next year for someone we could use day one is the decision that needs to be made. They certainly can delay that decision since Law doesn't have an opt out but to me that is the trade off they have in front of them. I guess we'll find out what they think soon enough.

Nice, funny look at service time that also shows us the dark side of that practice.

Look I loved Eddie too and watching him you could see he loved baseball. He was an emotional and fierce competitor and a joy to watch at times. He has his warts though too and when the Twins dropped him it wasn't like teams scrambled to add him to their roster. He ended up on a team with dire needs in the outfield willing to take a chance. I am not defending the FO as much as looking around and seeing reality. The reality is small market teams get rid of players when they start to become expensive. The A's Rays, Indians, KC, etc have limited payroll and generally have to pick and choose who to spend it on. Those teams trade players early to gain value back that is less expensive. If they can't work a trade then they waive them. Even teams with big payrolls make those decisions. The Twins have a surplus of young outfielders along with Cave that they feel can fill the hole left by Rosario and so they let him go. Like you we all thought Kirilloff was ready to fill that void but he didn't look ready this spring. I don't love Cave as his 2020 was really bad but the Twins feel he is a MLB starter so we'll see what he brings this year. I agree with you that Rooker is a defensive liability. His arm accuracy and foot speed have been poor from what I have seen this spring but if you liked Rosario's power then you should like Rooker because he has more power than Rosario. IMO Kirilloff will be the most well rounded replacement but his bat needs to come around first. I get your frustration I think we all felt it when they let Rosario go but if you look around it is what most teams with our level of payroll do. If you have excess young talent in one area move on from the expensive player and allocate that money elsewhere. This isn't something new, most all teams do this. Let's just hope it works out well for our favorite team.

Man I just don't see how you can keep Dobnak out of the starting 5. One mistake pitch away from a near perfect Spring. If I would have known he was going to be this good I would've wished the Twins didn't add one more pitcher at the end. Like the Twins I had my concerns but seeing him this spring it seems like a waste to not have him start. Once again I doubted you Randy and once again you proved me wrong. We asked for hits and the team produced 13 of them tonight. Lot's of good battles at the plate and good results tonight. Robles left a straight inside fastball that got crushed for a home run and gave up hard contact to the next batter but he managed his way through the inning. I still don't trust him or his stuff but I hope he is better than I think he is. When Rogers decides to live on the edge and not throw strikes something bad usually happens and it did tonight as he too, left a nice fat straight pitch that got blasted for 2 run HR. Man he struggled against the righties tonight. I thought he was back to dominant but he brought back my doubting side. I think this bullpen is going to have us squirming this season. Maybe things will straighten out yet who knows. Alcala looks to be the most dominant of the bunch right now. It was the replacements but he was throwing it by guys tonight. Fun game to watch for the most part can't wait for the season to start.

If you are adding Derek Law who are you taking off of the 40 man?

Yeah Dobnak has been awfully dominant this spring seems hard to keep him out of the starting five but hopefully Shoemaker does well.

I have to believe Rogers, Colome, Duffey, and Alcala all have spots. Robles likely as well since they are paying him 2M they aren't going to cut him loose this early. So that is 5 out the seven right there. We haven't seen Colina pitch this spring so seems unlikely he would be a legitimate option but if he is still in camp maybe? I already had Thielbar and Stashak penciled in to start earlier. They are both on the 40 man so would seem to have the inside track. I guess the question is are they willing to bump someone off the 40 to add Law or Waddell? They both have pitched really well the last couple of times out. Would they replace Thielbar with Waddell? Seems early to do something like that and Waddell doesn't have much MLB experience and seems to have just learned a new pitch or how to make his pitches more effective so maybe some time at AAA before adding someone like him? Law doesn't have an opt out until August but he has pitched really well this spring so far. His WHIP has never been this elite before in fact if you look back at his stats he generally had more hits than innings pitched and plenty of walks to boot. If he has better control of his pitches and the new found ability to miss bats he could be a force in the pen. Spring means so little it seems almost impossible to know if this is something he can keep up or not but if the Twins think he can again would they add him and drop or trade someone from the 40 man? It looks like they will be evaluating those 4 guys to the bitter end to see what makes the most sense. Stashak does have options so they can move him around. Not sure if Thielbar has any options left or not but the only way I see them moving him is if they were to add Waddell so lefty for lefty. Gonna be some suspense to the end of the month.

Thank you! Well at least I don't think I am crazy. The 2019 spray chart shows a ton of ground outs between first and second and when you look at flyball outs it is interesting that at least in 2019 they are fairly evenly distributed which doesn't fit my narrative. The hits or line drives, especially home runs are skewed to right as well. Like you said there is no 2020 and 2019 was his best year especially HR wise 2018 is fairly similar as well just not as many HR's. OK so I can see I am over-reacting some but not completely off base either. He is hitting balls to the right side approximately 2/3 to 3/4 of the time it is the groundballs though that are skewing that as he hits those to the right 80 to 90 percent of the time. The fly balls are fairly evenly distributed which boggles my mind but the data proves my assumptions wrong there. I still think there is more he could do approach wise but what do I know. Obviously the Twins have a strategy they believe in and are going to stick to it. It just burns me to see Max hit the ball on the ground to the right so much and become an easy out. Teams are shifting him for a reason though especially in the infield as he hits almost nothing on the ground to the left. I still think there might be value in trying to go oppo to at least move the shift some, but maybe it is over the fence or bust and they don't care about those easy roll over outs.

If that is the spray chart then I am just going to shut up. Is there something that shows the spray chart for outs as well?

I can't believe my eyes on those spray charts. I haven't seen him hit anything to the left side all spring. Even when I watched games last year granted I don't watch all of them or every single play but I don't remember him getting a hit the other way only home runs to right field and the occasional hit to right. Maybe my memory is bad. Is there a chart for balls hit that includes outs. Something feels off here to me.

HIs start in 2019 was electric and then he fell off. If he fixes the bat he is one of the more exciting outfielders in the system IMO. Decent speed, good build, likely good defense. If the bat is there the Twins got great value out of that pick. I will be watching him closely this year.

I agree with your analysis on Gordon but unless you see Lewis starting next year one of the infielders has to go next year. It looks to be either Blankenhorn or Gordon. Blankenhorn better fits the Twins, hard hit rate, homer prone bat than Gordon, and Gordon is nothing special defensively either. While I agree he has value I don't think it is enough to keep him past this year. While I concur just cutting him makes little sense they could try and trade him but it probably makes more sense to see if his bat can lift his value. At any rate they could decide to move on from him sooner rather than later depending on how they see things, but to your point Smeltzer makes more sense.

Believe me I thought about it but figured they would try one last time to build more value from him before trying to trade him. He has options so could be an up and down backup for them if they want but yeah I could see them moving on as well. Just depends on how you see things.

I think Devin makes the most sense as well. With Thorpe having a 4th option year they have another lefty to back up Happ or the pen. Maybe they also like what Waddell has done and see him as upgrade to Devin as well, hard to say. At any rate he doesn't fit on the roster past this year. So if they think they can do without him as depth then he would make the most sense. I don't see him clearing waivers though. He could be a legitimate back end starter especially for a rebuilding team. Hopefully they can work out a trade for a lottery ticket.

His regular season numbers aren't that much different though except for slugging. He has about a 230 BA except in 2019 he gains about 100 points in OBP with his good eye at the plate. Yes he does hit more HR's in the regular season and HR's do beat the shift but that is about the only difference. The extra HR's also up his batting average slightly from the spring numbers. He is who he is at this point. The BABIP will never normalize for him with his current approach. It will stay the same because he hits directly into the shift. The breakout talk should go away. If you are OK with his current level of production then I guess he will be fine but he could be a lot better if he used the other half of the field it is there for a reason. If he used it, It would also would give him a chance to normalize his BABIP and potentially break out, but I digress.

I guess I was surprised to see Derek Law in there as Stashak has been pretty good in the regular season. If Law does have an opt out though I guess that might make sense. His stuff has looked really good this spring borderline elite even but who is getting bumped off of the 40 man to add him? Anderson, Smeltzer, Ober? If you want to add him, somebody has to go because I don't see him on the 40 man right now. Would have been nice if the OP told us who they thought would be gone or try to get past waivers because I had Law starting in the minors and coming up in case of injury mainly because the 40 looks full. If he has an opt out then I guess a decision needs to be made but I will be curious to see who gets let go or has a phantom injury to start the season.

He did OK last year with a 760 OPS but the main thing that saved him were the 22 walks he took and two HR's to start the season. If you saw how Tampa played him yesterday you can see why he will always have a low BABIP I think it was the lowest in baseball. Everyone was shifted to the right they had the second baseman playing shallow outfield. Centerfielder was to the far right and the right fielder was shaded to the line. The outfielders could play deep because the second base man had part of shallow right field covered. Max would need to hit a laser over the first baseman or shortstops head that couldn't be caught by the second baseman just to get a hit to right field. Right field is so crowded he virtually only has three outcomes a walk a Home Run and an out. He has been making a lot of outs lately. Now imagine a player that could use the opposite field and raise his BABIP? Honestly he might be an All-Star player. He makes contact a good percentage of the time but he hits it literally to the same place every time. Didn't Moustakis have to reinvent himself because he couldn't get hits because of the shift? I think Max needs to do the same thing. The BABIP information is telling us something. He is too predictable and the shift is beating him.

Please. please Twins get Max to hit some balls to the opposite field. Pull side is totally killing him. Please. please do it soon. Today it was two two ground outs to the second baseman and one easy pop fly to right field. It has been the same scenario all spring long. How many times do you need to see it to know it is not working? He needs a different approach . I am begging you have him hit oppo or else replace him he is a one trick pony at this point and its not working anymore. His BA and OBP and OPS prove it is not working. Please change it ASAP before you destroy him.

That is a nice analysis. May, will be missed but Alcala could step into that role. Like you I think Romo is pretty easily replaced by Colome. The hope would be Robles replaces Clippard but I just don't trust Robles yet. I have seen some pretty hard contact off of his stuff this spring, but hopefully he can come back. No one is going to replace Wisler's 2 month of production from last year at least not ERA wise probably not even Wisler himself. So that is problematic in this equation. Maybe there is a mystery man out there but I don't know who that would be at this time. It still looks like a strong pen but the best replacement options don't appear to be on the 40 man. The Twins never gave Colina, Chalmers or Ober any chances this spring. Not sure why but can only assume they aren't ready? Law, Farrell, and Waddell all have K9's over 15 this spring and have looked pretty dominant granted mostly against the replacement players. Still all three look like they could be good replacements if anyone falters. Unfortunately they won't be options early as they would need a 40 man spot and if they are actually good you want it to be a spot they can keep not just for injury. Maybe Colina and Chalmers are ready and they have seen enough to know that and if that is the case maybe they have two solid option on the 40 man. I thought for sure they would want to see how Ober's stuff played this spring but I guess I was wrong there as well. If the Twins get what they need out of Robles and Colome I think this pen should be close to as good as last years that is assuming no regression from Duffy and improvement for Rogers and a healthy season.