Major League Ready

They are at $110M for next year plus whatever incentives Buxton and Maeda earns so $115-$120M. It makes no sense to add a SP unless its a top of the rotation guy (better than Gray / Mahle) which is $25M-35M. How much do you think they will spend?

Don't look now but Jermaine Palacios has a .337 ave and an OPS of 1.034 for his last 100 ABs. He has gotten better and better as the season has progressed. Sure would be nice to see him perform this well for the rest of the season.

It's not that big of a mess. Bundy and Archer's options will be declined. The starting 5 will be Gray / Mahle / Ryan/ Winder and either Maeda or Ober. Smeltzer / Dobnak and eventually Paddack will be inexpensive depth. I suspect 1 or 2 of them will be multi-inning RPs.

I would much rather finish 2nd in the division with a 100 win than get into the playoffs with an 84win team. In other words, how much we leverage the future should not be driven by the fact we are in first place. The goal should be to build a great team, not sneak into the playoffs because we play in a division that is very weak this year. Do we want to be good for several years or make the playoffs for 1 year? That said, anything is possible so plug the biggest holes which is the BP.

No ... Pittsburgh / KC and Detroit have been bad for a prolonged period. They have not been a position to be buyers which is a very different scenario from what you are implying or the situation the twins find themselves. It's reasonable the Twins would be buyers. The question is how much should the Twins leverage their future for this team? The teams you mentioned have had absolutely no chance. Wasn't the article you are referencing specifically about position players? If so, how is that relevant to the Twins situation? We have recent examples in the Clevinger and Kluber trades where those players were hurt and provided nothing while those teams gave significant long-term assets. Clase for Kluber, Miller / Naylor and Quantrill for Clevinger. Snell has not been of significant value and of course there is always the Shields for Tatis jr.

So let's do something really stupid instead of executing a plan with the best probability of success. BTW ... he number of prospects that "survive has very little value in measuring the impact of trading prospects for elite / established pitching. That measure would be exclusively the prospects traded for elite pitching. When you look at prospects returned for pitchers like Sale / Clevinger / Kluber / Shields, etc you will find a much higher frequency of success. I cringe every time someone uses the failed prospects argument in this context because it is quite misquided.

or just trade him for the best prospect you can get and trade for pitching with what we already have.

You assume. I just made several posts regarding the 40 man roster crunch and advocated they trade some of those prospects already on are that will need to be added. I have also stated directly more than once I would upgrade the BP. My objection is with those who would trade Kirilloff / Miranda or Winder.

You seem to be suggesting the twins trade away players that will / should be important for the next several years in order to improve a "incredibly flawed" team for the short-term. I guess that's fine for a fan to be obsessed with the right now. If you are a GM / PBO, it's a good way to lose your job and also make sure you never get another one at the same level.

When did I ever suggest they stand pat? I just don't support the unprecedented type actions being suggested here where we trade of 5 players. It is pure fantasy. Name a team that has ever done what is being suggested. If we are that bad off they should be selling.

No, he once was a good pitcher. Now he is a mediocre pitcher.

If the team is so bad as to require this many additions they should be a seller. Can you name one instance where a team ever added nearly this much at the deadline. That should be a good indication if it's a good idea.

We could paint any scenario we could possibly come up with in the same negative light. We could have traded for Clevinger and hoped he would not go down with an injury like he did or many other established players who were traded and injured. We could have signed Patrick Corbin and hoped he did not turn into a bad pitcher like he has. We could have signed Anthony Rendon instead of Donaldson and hoped he did not turn into a pumpkin and on and on. The same negative crap was said about trading Donaldson. Several people absolutely insisted we got worse. Well, since Miranda got it together in late May his OPS is 300 points higher than Donaldson. Now we have a better player going forward and an extra $20M to spend on pitching. What they need is reasonable health and players to perform to the capabilities. No kidding players will have to play well for the Twins to be good. What a concept! Guess what ... That scenario is true no matter what strategy the team pursues so all of this is nothing more than finding a way to be negative.

It starts with them getting some injured pitchers back. They are missing Ober / Paddack / Alcala / Maeda and Dobnak. Hard to say what Dobnal provides but it's worth mentioning. Get Winder back as a permanent addition and replace Archer / Bundy with a top of the rotation free agent and add a back of the BP free agent and you have a very different pitching staff. Of course, the response will be that the Twins won't spend on pitching. I would suggest they have not spent big on pitching but they have never been in the position they will be next season. They will only have roughly a $73M payroll and they will already have Gray / Ryan / Wider / Ober / Maeda, eventually Paddack plus Smeltzer / Dobnak for depth. The only hole to fill among position players is catcher and who knows maybe Hamilton impresses the remainder of the season. It's not like Palacios is horrible and Lewis should be inserted by mid-season. Miranda and Kirilloff are night and day better than they were to start this season so their emergence makes us better next year. Those two also collectively save us $30M which could be invested in pitching. They could also afford Willson Contreras. Yes, they need to execute on landing a free agent SP and RP but that's all they need to do to make this a darn good team next year. So, we will see if they are just dead set against spending on pitching. Keep in mind, I am the guy who was against such a move in previous years. I have a totally different opinion now because of the situation I just outlined. There is a reasonable chance the FO will also be much more open to spending on a top free agent SP. How does Musgrove / Gray / Ryan / Maeda / Winder sound for a rotation with Ober / Paddack / Smeltzer / Dobnak for depth? An infield of Kirilloff / Polanco eventually Lewis and Miranda. BP of Duran a LH free agent / Alcala / Jax and three among Thielbar / Megill / Hamilton / Moran / Sisk / Schulfer / etc. We could also use Two of Ober / Paddack / Smeltzer / Dobnak could be used as multi-inning RPs. This all fits within a roughly $130M budget. This looks like a better team than we have at the moment to me.

Apparently, you did not see my earlier post in this thread. I listed 10 players including all the ones you mentioned that have expiring contracts or were otherwise certain to come off the 40 man and I listed 6 others who were good candidates. The point was that removing those certain to come off only gets us down to 38 and there are 7-8 that should be added.. Garlick / Cotton / Romero and Colombe are arbitration eligible. That's quite different than an expiring contract and all of these players are not key players but not all of them will be or should be non-tendered. How can Dobnak show he can pitch unless he remains on the roster? They will not and should not just flush Dobnak and if they do there is a reasonable chance he becomes a back of the rotation starter or good long reliever. Having to make decisions on players like Columbe / Garlick and Dobnak would suggest a 40-man roster crunch. Now, I think we can agree losing any of these players will not be remotely devastating, but depth has value which has been quite evident this year.

Neither one is going to be traded.

I would not trade Kirilloff / Miranda and would be unlikely to trade Canterino / Wallner / SWR / Steer / Varland. I would hope to get 2 good RPs with a pool to trade from of: Yannier Cano Jharel Cotton Sawyer Gibson-Long Brent Headrick Edouard Julien Jair Camargo Austin Schulfer Cole Sands Jovanni Moran Ronny Henriguez What do you think? Would Julien + another prospect and SGL + another prospect net good 2 RPs?

I didn't think so either until I actually looked at who would come off and who needed to be put on. As I wrote earlier, there are 48 on the 40 man now and 10 that for sure need to come off. Obviously, that only leaves 2 spots. I came up with the list below of 13 who arguably need to go on. I believe that's a "crunch". Matt Canterino Matt Wallner Simeon Woods-Richardson Spencer Steer Louie Varland Sawyer Gibson-Long Blayne Enlow Brent Headrick Edouard Julien Jair Camargo Austin Schulfer Caleb Hamilton Evan Sisk I would not argue that SGL / Headrick and Camargo probably don't need to go on the 40 man but we would still need to find room for 6 additional players.

I think these 10 guys come off for sure at the end of the season .... Archer / Bundy / Duffey / Smith / Sanó / Godoy / Correa / Contreras / Urshela / Sanchez and any of these 6 guys could be off ... Cano / Strotman / Cotton / Romero / Henriquez / Pagan They probably won't non-tender Pagan but they might. With additions I would expect they need to clear 16 spots so it makes perfect sense they trade 2 or 3 guys of the 6 above or players among those who will need to be added at the end of the year. Makes a lot more sense than losing a couple guys for nothing.

Here is the ranking of Twins top 10 hitters by OPS since the date (may 20th) you referenced. Jose Miranda .906 Luis Arraez .870 Jorge Polanco .859 Carlos Correa .853 Kyle Garlick .818 Alex Kirilloff .796 Gio Urshela .781 Byron Buxton .746 Nick Gordon .742 10 Max Kepler .698

Do you have anything to say other than management is stupid?

There occasionally are players that take less than the max they can get to be somewhere they really like. However, those players are not represented by Scott Boras. Lindor said no $300M+ was not enough and Soto just said $400M+ was not enough. Judge who will be 31 next year just said not to $225M. It's not completely impossible Correa would take a little less to stay here but him taking a significant discount, especially less year, is very wishful thinking. Most players are going to fight for every dollar they can get. Also ask yourself if Houston is a poorly run team and then ask yourself why a team very likely to be a top contender does not extend him. They had the exact same situation in terms of a very good prospect that was ready. Lewis has the most value at SS. We have a very good young 3B, 2B is covered, he is not playing CF, and he has far less value as a corner OFer. I think it would be far more impactful top spend the money on a front of the rotation SP and probably have money left over for a good BP arm.

In the last year and a half they have added Ober / Ryan / Winder and Smeltzer as starters. Duran and Jax in the BP There are a several guys that have a reasonable shot at joining the big league staff next year and several others (Prielipp / Povich / Hajjar / Festa / Gibson-Long / Varland / Headrick / Medina / Sisk / and Schulfer that have a good shot beyond next year. The recent results and the current pipeline are far better than what we had the 20 years prior to Falvey / Lavine. Yes, they traded for Ryan and Smeltzer. That's an even bigger plus IMO because they improved the team long-term by trading rental payers.

Kirilloff is the 1B going forward and Arraez is the 1st back-up. Miranda will be at 3rd when they trade Urshela or nob-tender him so this argument makes no sense. I might add that after Miranda slow start he has come on to hit 300 since 6/1 with a wRC+ of 147. Teams don't trade rookies that hit this well even if they are below average defenders. Of course, there is always the possibility he improves defensively.

There are endless examples of trades or free agent signings of highly regarded players that have failed. That does not in in itself mean the strategy is better or worse than another strategy. The question we should be asking is how have mid market teams with 90+ win been constructed. That is arguably the only relevant outcome that should interest us. Were the most productive players Drafted / Intl Signings / Free Agents / Traded for as prospects or were prospects traded for established players. We can easily loojk up any successful team on Fangraphs/ I have put substantial effort into understanding how mid and small market teams have acquired their high contribution players. Have you actually studied these teams or are you assuming you have the answers because something make sense to you intuitively. Go to Fangraphs and look at any of the playoff teams built by teams with equal or less revenue to the Twins. Count how many were drafted or acquired as prospects. In almost every case 85-90% of the players over 1.5 WAR were drafted or prospects acquired by trading established players like Escobar / Pressly / Clevinger / Kluber / Sale / Eaton, etc. 5-10% or modest price free agents. Elite free agents and established players acquired in trade are 5% on average.