Major League Ready

I might be the biggest advocate on this board of the need to develop or trade for prospects that produce for 6+ years instead of two years. However, the twins can absolutely have sustained success in the wake of the trades that were made. That will depend on a few of the young guys coming through and realizing their potential. They need to create a rotation between Ryan / Ober / SWR / Varland / Winder / Balazovic / Prielipp / Canterino / Festa and Raya. who knows maybe they take a pitcher at 5 this year in the draft. If they can develop starters, they will have the financial flexibility to sign a top of the rotation free agent. They have so many position player prospects that a few can fail they need to create a group of core guys between Correa / Buxton / Kirilloff / Miranda / Lewis / Lee / Larnach / Walner / Rodriquez / Martin and Salas. The trades were a short-term benefit and likely a long-term loss. That can be overcome by trades like the Arraez trade if they can get present and/or future value for the established players that will inevitably be replaced. That's why they should trade Kepler and eventually Polanco. They might just have enough mid rotation starters to trade someone at the deadline and they have a couple pitchers that will at minimum net a comp round pick. Plus, they got lucky and moved up to 5 in the draft and they have a comp round pick. There is a good chance we have a good team for the next several years. They will need a couple stars to emerge if they are going to be a dominant team.

There might actually be a competition for the final spot among position players between Larnach / Martin, and Julien. That could be interesting to watch as spring training unfolds.

Depends on several things. 1. How good are twins at the 2023 deadline. 2. The return for Lopez. 3. How good are Varland / Winder / SWR / Canterino / Balazovic / Prielipp / Festa and Raya looking. If 3 or 4 of them are absolutely dominating in Milb, it would make the move easier. 4. What is his ask. 5. How does Maeda bounce back and Paddack could be ready by then. How does he look at that point. 6. How well are Ober / Ryan pitching. 7. Their willingness to really pony up next year and spend on a top free agent pitcher. The dollars will be available. They have Mahle / Gray / Maeda / Pagan / Gallo and Taylor coming off. They will likely trade Kepler and Farmer or decline Kepler's option. They can also non-tender farmer. That's a total of $61M coming off if they were to trade Lopez. They can spend half on one pitcher if they can fill four spots in the 2024 rotation between Ryan / Ober / Paddack / SWR / Varland / Winder / Canterino / Balazovic and Festa. Perhaps Prielipp and Raya become options during the 2024 season. Perhaos they extend Gray or Maeda on a shorter deal. Put Nola or Severino and the front of that group and you have something.

Spring training starts in 32 days.

Squirrel's point about the value of this trade having multiple levels makes this an interesting case. Arreaz did one thing extremely well. However, when the Twins look at how they replace him, it's not a simple player to player comparison. He was a below average defender and base runner with little power and he did not hit LH pitching well. The key to how this works out with a guy that fit in wherever they had room will be how they cover his ABs in aggregate. Can Kirilloff provide better defense at 1B and equal offensive production. Can Julien provide an equal OBP with more power and therefore a higher OPS / wRC+ along with above average base running and equal defense. Can Martin provide similar OBP with better defensive value and great base running. Will the additions of Lewis and Lee squeeze Arraez out? In other words, will the players taking his ABs collectively cover the offense of Arraez while gaining in other areas? The more I think about it, the more I think they can cover his departure.

It would be easier to identify the guys that won't DH. Other than Farmer and Jeffers, just about everyone could get at least a few games at DH. Gallo gets a few DH days if he is playing like he did in 2019 or 2021. 2022 Joey Gallo is only in the lineup when he is playing in the OF.

I understand where you are coming from and two teams can both win in a trade. The scenario could play out many ways. Petty could end up being a 3/4 and it's no big deal. If Chase Petty turns out to be an ace, I would not view it as a good outcome unless the twins made a deep push in the playoffs this year and Gray was instrumental. Granted, the odds of Petty becoming an ace are long but two years of a good pitcher in years where we did not contend is not a good swap if we could have had a better pitcher for 6+ years. It would be just our luck!

Ryan for Cruz was a fantastic trade. Getting out of the Donaldson contract while getting Urshela and Sanchez was darn good. Duran for Escobar is looking good as well. The Sonny Gray trade could come back to bite us but it will be 4 or 5 years before we can really assess that one.

His career OPS against LHP is 685 and wRC+ is 88. I would rather have Garlick on the bench with all the other LH hitting OFers. Garlick's OPS against LH pitching is 839 and a wRC+ of 126.

I posted the exact same position as Mike. No way would I have traded Arrez for Lopez straight-up. Those prospects absolutely made me change my tune. Success for a team with a significant revenue disadvantage is absolutely dependent on acquiring/developing prospects regardless of its via draft or trade. Nothing is remotely close in terms of importance. So, to place no value on prospects would pretty much guarantee failure on a long-term basis.

Thanks for this comment. The total emphasis on immediacy absolutely blinds many people. How many examples are there of guys like Tatis Jr or Corey Kluber? Our own Jhoan Duran took 2 1/2 years. A year or 3 years is far less relevant than what they turn out to be. I would much rather wait 3 years for a guy that produces 5 WAR than get a 2.5 WAR guy that's ML ready.

I read the one from fangraphs that someone linked earlier. It made me feel pretty good because there was no emotion involved. It was a well thought out and well-crafted assessment of the trade. There were a couple others that had a similar point of view but were not articulated as well as the Fangraphs piece.

IDK if they simply are not willing to sign a SP to a long-term deal. However, it's been a very long time since this team had so many positions covered by low-cost players. They project right at $100M for 2024 assuming they trade Kepler or don't pick-up his option. That's estimating Lopez at $8.5M. An additional $15M or $20M or even $25M for him or Nola / Severino / Mahle is just not a problem provided the other spots in the rotation are covered by some combination of Ryan / Ober / SWR / Varland / Canterino / Festa / Raya / Prielipp / Balazovic. That still leaves them room to cover arbitration increases and fill a BP spot. Farmer and Polanco will also be replaced by prearb players so that's another $13M that will become available. This FO has never been in this position, so I am not going to assume they won't sign someone when they have never been in a parallel situation. Nobody thought they would sign a $200M free agent either. The dream scenario for me is they get Nola next year. That gives them Nola / Lopez / Ryan and two of Paddack / Ober / SWR / Varland / Winder / Canterino / Balazovic and perhaps Festa / Prielipp and Raya by sometime during 2024. That should result in very good depth and a couple guys moving to the BP.

I pay much more attention to what the national guys think. They are far more objective.

It's nice to see that the some of the national writers believe this deal pretty heavily favors the Twins. I have been an advocate of trading Arrez for all the reasons mentioned here and the articles about the trade as long as the return was strong, and this was a very good return. I see it as fairly close to a wash short-term but two high ceiling / athletic prospects could make this very favorable long-term.

Having a rotation of #3 starters gives you a good chance of making the post season. The problem is matching up in the post season once you get there. Arraez was just not good enough to get an Ace. It takes a package that is really going to hurt to get an ace and we can't make team's agree. They want to keep them as badly as we would like to acquire them. The return of a very good pitcher a top 100 prospect and a third player with a high ceiling is a very good return. Obviously, this trade has the potential to good badly just like any other trade. However, the addition of two high ceiling prospects provides the potential for this trade to be very productive trade for the Twins. I hate to lose Arraez but this is the type of deal, especially with Julien, Martin, and Lee getting close, that can make us better for many years.

Will they try to extend him? Does this result in Martin or Julien making the team this spring.

Pitchers get hurt. Texas traded Clause for Kluber and got nothing. SanDiego traded multiple players for Clevinger and got nothing. Sale has been hurt. Johnny Cueto was hurt or underperformed 5 of his 6 year contract, etc. There is some luck involved.

Is an exact balance ideal. Wouldn't it would be advantageous to start the game with an extra RH bat if they had someone on the bench that fit that role and then substitute that person out later in the game as the situation dictates. They have an advantage in 2-3 ABs and then substitute later in the game back to a balanced line-up. When they make that substitution, they gain one more AB with a favorable match-up.

I hope they are able to pull off a trade for Arraez or Polanco but it makes more sense to wait until the deadline. It's a lot easier to let one of them go if Kirilloff is healthy and/or one of Martin or Julien is up and playing well. This is how the Rays and As compete. They do it over and over while we say we can't produce young talent like them. Why can't we use depth like they do to bring in additional young talent?

Could not agree more. Trading a great player with 3 years of control for a player with 2 years of control is bad to start with but the whole point is to get that player that truly makes a difference. Lopez is not that player. I would rather take my chances with Eury Perez if they would trade him.

It took Carlos Gomez 5 years to figure it out. Adell has a little over 1 year of service time. Point being he would not be the 1st to turn it around but how long will it take?

What if Max Meyer or Eury Perez were the main piece coming back? Add Joe Mack and I would jump on that deal.

A couple years ago I read an article that listed the top international bonuses of all time. I looked all of them up and came to the conclusion it made absolutely no sense to sign the $4M+ players. The Twins history with the $2M plus guys certainly does not inspire confidence. Of course, they can't spend the entire allotment on guys that are $100K although I saw the Brewers had signed 29 guys. The best course of action based on the information I looked at a couple years ago would be to sign four or five guys from $500K to 1.5M instead of one at $4M. Then, spend a couple million on the $50-200K guys. Of course, that ideal scenario would be very difficult to pull-off when they are competing with 30 other teams for a limited number of prospects that get $500K-$1.5M.

I read somewhere that they had a nutritionist for him. They also had a grand plan for him to get in shape the year they experimented with him in the OF. The appearance is that he is just not that committed. He repeatedly showed up for spring training out of shape even with 10s of millions on the line. Some guys are more committed than others. I Never liked the extension because he appeared to be someone who is not fully committed.