clone52

I agree give him more time. I believe Corey Koskie was pretty stone handed when he started at 3B and was able turn into a good defensive 3B. The one good thing about Sano is that he has shown he can make the spectacular play, so there is hope. He just needs to figure out the routine plays.

You all act like its just the Twins choice on when to make these trades. The problem is, the Twins don't have amazing trade pieces. They only have solid trade pieces. No one is going to trade for Suzuki until they know they can't get Lucroy. No one is going to trade for Santana or Nolasco until they know they won't get Cashner, Rich Hill, Ororizza, Moore or in a pipe dream, Sale. No one is going to trade for Abad or Kintzler until they miss out on Chapman (already done), and possibly other relievers. There are some other infielders on the marker that might make it tougher to move Nunez. You could move them all super quick if you wanted to make garbage trades, but buyers have lots of other options out there right now and until those options are depleted, that is going to affect the kind of offers the Twins will get.

Pitchers don't get 8 practice pitchers with a batter in the batters box either.

What games are you watching? Pinch hitters can basically take as many practice swings as they want before coming to the plate. Easily at least 8.

I actually like the idea of limiting the number of pitching changes in a single inning to 1.

7 errors in 15 games is a damn fine 3rd baseman?

Probably easier to sign him if he's still on the team. They could sign him in September to a contract extension (basically make his option next year guaranteed). If traded, they'd have to sign him after the year and maybe he wouldn't want to come back. That said, if you get a good offer for him, trade him. If you get terrible offers for him, don't trade him. He's not holding up a sure thing prospect that needs to be playing every day.

I'm sorry, but DO NOT trade Park yet. You aren't going to get crap for him. Leave him in AAA the rest of yeah. If he can't figure out major league pitching, you can trade him for the same crap next year that you can trade him for this year. Why trade Grossman? He's cheap and controllable and far, far better than what we usually have as a 4th outfielder. I'd much rather keep him around than see Matroianni back up in the majors. Plus, he's not a high end prospect so if he only plays 2 games a week, who care. I would trade Nolasco and Plouffe for almost anything. However, if Mauer wants to leave and can be traded, I'd be okay keeping Plouffe. I'd trade Suzuki for a something, but are you willing to go into next season with Murphy and Centeno as your 2 catchers? Honestly, it might make sense to pay him $6 million next year. He shown this year that he produces better with more rest. If they trade him, make Murphy the starter and see what he can do. If they keep him, send Centeno down, call up Murphy and give him 2--3 starts per week to see what he can do. If Murphy does well, let Kurt go and live with Murphy. If Murphy stinks, maybe hang on to Kurt. I would be complete open to trading Santana. Not for garbage, but for something decent. I would be perfectly happy trading Abad, Kintzler and Ramirez. I'd be perfectly okay keeping them all as well. Relatively inexpensive and not doing horribly. Dozier is a tough one. I think Polanco is a 2B and needs to play every day. However, I'm way down on whether he will actually be a good long term replacement. Dozier is fairly cheap, signed through 2018 and a good player (maybe about to make the leap to elite if he has figured out how to go the other way for real). If they trade him and Polanco craps out, what do the Twins do? Nunez, Escobar, D. Santana - I'd be okay with any of these guys being traded. I'd make sure only 1 or 2 would be traded. Personally, I would trade Nunez because he would probably net the biggest return and Escobar has 1 more year of control. Milone would be available for a low minor prospect. If you can dump Nolasco and get a good trade for Santana, keep Milone because I think its hard to fill all 3 of those rotation spots this year. I feel its too late to switch May to SP this year. Maybe let him stretch out in the minors this year if you want to try him out next year. Bring Berrios up and let him finish the season in the rotation. Bring Chargois up for the rest of the season.

I may not know the rules to Rule 5, but I thought it was all based on minor league service time based on their age and when they were drafted. I don't think there is any way to "hide" a player by not promoting them to AAA.

Not this year, but I don't think you just dump Santana for garbage. You dump if if you can get a decent return, but $13 million in 2017 and 2018 isn't a terrible price to pay for a pitcher of his caliber.

There are areas in the Twins minor league system that are just too full of prospects. Take OF for example, do you see major league experience coming for Adam Brett Walker, Daniel Palka or Travis Harrison coming soon? Why would you say any of those guys are off limits in a trade. They might also have players that need to be put on the 40 man roster in the next year or 2, but know that they won't be able to put them on the 40 man roster. Why not make them available in trades if you already know you might risk losing them for nothing in a Rule 5 draft. Even starting pitching is kind of a dept in the minor league system. Do you see major league spots for all of these guys in the next 3-4 years: Berrios, Duffey, Rogers, Dean, Stewart, Jay, Gonsalves, Slegers, Eades, Thorpe, Jorge.

Honestly, it depends on the prospect. If a Santana+Adam Brett Walker netted a higher end pitching prospect plus some low level guys, I'd absolutely let Adam Brett Walker go. With Buxton, Kepler, Rosario and now Grossman clogging up the outfield (and Santana as a fill in), ABW is probably not going to get a shot in the majors for awhile. He'd be a guy I would consider expendable if you can net a better prospect at an area of bigger need.

Santana and Nolasco aren't going to bring back top end prospects, but they could bring in young quality guys who aren't a sure thing. Look at the Dan Heran or Mark Lowe trades last year. Those pitchers are not as good as Santana, but were much cheaper. They pulled in some low ball prospects who are certainly not sure things, but not bad pieces to have in the system to try and develop. Obviously the Twins would have to eat a big chunk of salary to make that type of thing happen.

A Platoon would have been a good idea. Sending Park down to AAA would have been a good idea too, but that will happen when they activate Sano. Its way to early to give up on Park.

Arcia has no fit with the Twins at all. He's not good in the OF and blocks Kepler if he does play out there. DH is filled by Park or Sano. Santana at least has value as a late inning pinch runner or defensive replacement.

What 5 positions are you talking about? Really only 4 to rotate them through. Should be pretty easy to do though. Give each guy 1 day off per week

that would work too. On the other hand, everyone knew it was only a matter of time before Rosario got sent down. It wasn't think one play that made it happen.

Whats the reward for stealing third in that situation. A base hit scores you from second either way. There are 2 outs, so there is no chance of a sacrifice. The only possible reward is scoring on a wild pitch/passed ball.

Trying Plouffe in the OF isn't a bad idea. There is the opposite side to this though. A pretty common thought has been that Sano can't stick at 3B long term. If thats true, and he does have to end up in the OF down the road, then its probably better to give him a taste of it early in his career. Personally I think he will stick to 3B for his career, but I can understand the other train of thought.

Why does this make it dimmer? Its an interesting idea. I'd like to know how people can invest in the players, but going to their website, you have to create an account before you see anything and I don't want to do that. If I invest $100 in Tyler Duffey, I'm risking that money for a potential return. If I invest $100 in Boeing stock, I'm risking that money for a potential return. I don't really see the difference.

All very good points. Not to mention it is great insurance for Duffey. If his career ends tomorrow, he gets to bank that $2 million dollars. Sure, if he earns $50 million, he'll lose out on almost $3 million, but he will have made $50 million. On top of that, Duffy can take the $2 million he gets right now, invest it and make up that $3 million lost or even more.

The Twins are kind of in a tough position. The easiest way out is for Plouffe to get healthy, stay hot with the bat and get traded. It looks like Park is legit, Mauer has bounced back and Sano obviously can hit, so they aren't really hampering their lineup if they do trade Plouffe. They can't just give him away, though. They need to get something for him. In the mean time, they have to deal with having Plouffe and Sano. Everyone keeps saying play Sano at 3rd and move Plouffe. Do any of us know how Plouffe would do in the outfield? Maybe he would be even worse than Sano is out there. I wouldn't have a problem with them trying Plouffe in the outfield, but its no slam dunk. If Plouffe is bad in the outfield, or the shift to the OF messes up his hitting, you could really hurt his trade value. Even with his size, Sano does look like he can stay at 3rd base though. I wonder if the Twins could get a decent RP and a lower level C prospect for Plouffe.

Its post like these that illustrate how ridiculous people are. You really think Nolasco pitching lights out is just as bad as Nolasco pitching horribly?

Its nothing like putting Bartlett out there. Their process is, we already have a solid 3B and we have plenty of question marks in the outfield. Lets put Sano in RF so that at least we don't have a question mark about our OF offensive production. Bartlett was put out there because we had no one else. He was a question mark. Its not like people were clamoring for him to be the everyday SS or something.

Maybe their huge mistake in judgement is thinking Arcia is hopeless and finding out in Spring Training that he has rededicated himself and is ready to become David Ortiz.