Major League Ready

You are right. That's an article worth reading. I especially liked the part where he quantified how Tampa and Cleveland acquired pitching. Most importantly he noted that the players acquired in trade had never produced more than 1 WAR before being acquired. I have posted the same data here several times on both pitchers and position players as well as other playoff teams. This information is obviously not understood by many fans who insist upon the opposite strategy. The whole basis of the article is balancing the short-term with sustained success. It would appear from what I see here that the majority of fans are much more focused on the immediate. The problem is that practices primarily focused on the present significantly deteriorate the chances for sustained success. Trading impact players with 6 years of control for a rental is a suckers bet. A dozen teams will trade away long-term assets at the deadline. Only 1 team can win the WS nad there is certainly no guarantee they will win. The Dodgers traded away some significant assets and it got them nothing. The Rays (to my surprise) traded Ryan from Cruz. Do you think they would like that deal back? Now, trading almost nothing like the Braves did and getting a huge boost is a different story but one that is rarely seen. None of this suggest they should or will trade Correa. I would assume they keep him. Balancing short and long-term success would suggest it's perfectly reasonable to retain Correa. However, as the author suggests, there are many potential "right" ways to proceed.

I am happy to have a team that's entertaining and that has an exciting future. I have no delusions about this team being a top contender. The Yankees and Astros are a different level and the Rays / Angels are also better teams. I am not really sure what to expect from the White Sox and Blue Jays who both have more talent but are playing poorly. The really good news is there is reason to hope they kick it up a notch. Correa was just starting to square it up consistently. Sanchez has been a beast this past 6 games. He is batting .348 with a .423 OBP and slugging .913. Larnach will be back soon and he seemed to be waaaay better against the breaking stuff that had been a struggle. Kepler has been contributing and of course Buxton is a beast. It sure would be fun if it all comes together and this stretch of games against weaker opponents is a great chance to get on a serious roll.

Wallner has been great after a slow start. The first 11 games he did nothing. Since then: 1.222 OPS / 195 wRC+ / 371 AVE / 482 OBP Maybe they should be giving him reps at 1B to prepare for next year.

It's obviously a debatable point of view and you disagree with the FO. Most people had a very different idea of what should be done this year. Most had them pegged as a 90 loss team. Some said they did not even have a ML pitching staff. None of us could get 10 seconds consideration if we applied for a GM job yet fans love to think they have a superior understanding of what should be done. It's fun to debate what should or should not be done but we should also understand we are not privy to the plans and we do not possess the superior understanding of what should be done that we think we do.

I don't see much of a problem in LF with Larnach being very close to returning and Celstino playing very well and Garlick as a LH platoon option. Let's revisit 1B in two weeks. The best possible solution is a nice bounce back with Kirilloff who is showing signs of his old self. If not, Josh Bell would be a great solution and he could possibly be resigned if Kirilloff's wrists continue to impede his performance. The BP is something like 19-0 when we have the lead after the 7th inning so I am not sure the BP is a problem. We will see how things go when rosters size is reduced. All of this assumes we have a contender which is not going to be determined in the next 3 weeks given they are playing mostly sub 500 teams. They are not going to make any trades until they have a much better idea of our needs and contention.

Kirilloff getting it together is a big deal. Solving the problem we have at 1st base currently through 2027 would be a giant boost to this team. Cmon Alex! Can anyone comment on Alex Isola's defense? What are the chances he sticks ats a catcher and what are his strengths and weaknesses behind the plate?

I have been wondering about these possibilities as well. Kirilloff was 4 for 6 last night with a HR and a double. Alternatively, if you are going to teach someone to play 1st base why not Larnach. That would have long-term benefit. Larnach's length at 1B is ideal and him being able to play both positions going forward would be great. By far the best thing for this team would be if Lewis played 95% of his games at SS and perhaps occasionally cover CF. He's not going to be a utility player. There are two guys (Buxton & Lewis) where positional flexibility has no value. Their value is diminished if the play anywhere else. Becoming our SS for the next 6 years has waaaaaaay more value than playing part-time out of position. The response from fans was very predictable. Do fanatics want to wait for whatever it is they are fanatical about? Do we know their plan. Does it matter if they take three weeks to prepare him or make other roster changes to facilitate his return? There is nothing bewildering about this scenario when approached with a macro / long-term view but that's often not how fans view things.

Fans have the luxury of complete focus on the present. However, this complete focus on the right now is why many fans would be absolutely horrible GMs.

Yes, this is somewhat functional. You already have Celestino as back-up OFer and Gordon's playing time would be in the OF as well given Urshela / Arraez are IFers. This means you replace Arraez with Lewis at 1B. Arraez has been a lot better there than I expected, BTW. The other options are replacing Urshela at 3B or Corra at SS and he plays 4 days a week. I don't see the gain over Arraez and he certainly is not an upgrade over Correa. So, in very rough terms we gain a little when he replaces Urshela, break even when he replaces Arraez, and go down a little when he replaces Correa. The immediate impact of him going down when Correa returns is not exactly a big loss, It's not at all difficult to understand why they are opting to further prepare him for a return that is likely not far off.

If the pitching holds together and the offense gets going it will be a tough call on keeping Correa. If they are not a serious contender, it will be very hard to pass up a great return on Correa who is going to opt out unless he plays very poorly. They started down a path when they traded Berrios and that path was a transition year in 2022. More to the point, the Twins are not spending $300M or even $250M on one player especially when they have a good replacement ready. Of course, it's possible none of the serious contenders needs a SS and the return is not there. However, there is a pretty good chance Royce Lewis is our permanent SS on Aug 1. It's also possible Urshela / Arraez or Gordon get traded and he spends the rest of the season in a utility role. I would bet he spends 1/2 of the year with the Twins in some capacity and opening day next year will be Lewis at SS.

How does any of this change the question I posed. One of Arraez / Urshela / Sanchez / Gordon / Celestino would have to go. Which one are you getting rid off? Sending down a pitcher would require you go with 6 bench players and 12 pitchers if you are not cutting one of the 5 bench players I mentioned so which one of those 5 are you cutting to keep Lewis?

You are solely focused on keeping Lewis so you are only considering possible angles with looking at the end game which is they can have 5 bench players. Sanchez / Arraez and Urshela are obviously not going anywhere. So, are you going to send down Gordon or Celestino?

Congratulations on actually thinking through the options before coming to an opinion. You even realized there were other inevitable moves. Miranda’s reassignment is coming soon unless he gets it together very quickly. Who should we send down when all of the necessary moves are complete? Arraez is not going anywhere? Should we release Urshela? That’s not happening. How about Celestino? If anyone has earned the right to stay it’s Celestino. Sending Gordon down at this point would be a real slap in the face and he is the most versatile bench player we have. Are we going to keep Larnach down? This move is not even a little surprising when you consider the alternatives and the fact that Lewis will be our SS soon enough and continuing to play SS is best for him and the team.

Interesting comp. Hopefully the 25 HRs last year was not an aberration. Steer should have a considerably better offensive upside. Punto had a 646 career OPS. Hopefully, Steer is a solid 100 points better than Punto. He screams utility guy but could evolve into an everyday player. They should have a lot of guys who can play multiple positions. (Gordon / Martin / Steer and perhaps Polacios) It will be interesting to see how that shakes out.

Vallimont and Strotman are candidates to be removed from the 40 man if necessary. The good news is we have had a bunch of pitching prospects improving their status and looking like they will be ML players. The mid season promotions should be plentiful.

I would not feel too bad about being off on this one. How could anyone have predicted he would be this good after not playing for two years? This is a really big development for this team. We don't have another SS in the system that will be ready anytime soon.

I think you have to look at these trades in 2022 terms and then 2023 and beyond. The net for 2022 is we lost Donaldson and Garver. Many insisted this would be a big downgrade but neither player is playing much above replacement level so they certainly were not going to do much to elevate our chances of making the playoffs. Yes, Donaldson has a wRC+ of 118. However his OPS is 722. We would be just as well off with Arraez at 3B. Correa on the other hand was a very big upgrade. Yes he had a slow start but he was hitting great before he got hit by the pitch that put him on the IL. Looking beyond 2022, Sanchez is a free agent and Urshela will be non-tendered if he has no trade value. They are gone. So the net change is one more year of Garver and one additional year of Donaldson at age 37 for $21M and an 8M buyout in 2024. As I have said from the start, I like the odds of Miranda being better than Donaldson in 2023 straight up given Donaldson will be 37. However, the real comparison is $21M and Miranda vs Donaldson. That’s an absolute no brainer. Of course, we also would have had Garver in 2023 so I guess you could say we traded a year of Garver for Henriguez. That may be a great deal or a bad deal. We will have to make that determination down the road. We also gain $8M in payroll for 2024. As of today, these trades look to be a slight net gain in 2022 and great in terms of 2023 and beyond.

There are 8 teams on pace to win 99 or more games. (Yankees / Astros / Angels / Brewers / Mets / Dodgers / Giants ) That's a lot of very good teams without considering the White Sox are very likely to rebound and the Rays / Blue Jays have the personnel to win a Championship as well.

Looking at the game logs I noticed he started off very slow and had one hit in the first six games. Since then, he is hitting 383 with an OPS of 1.300. Wow! He will be suspect until he can get that K rate down but this is encouraging. Does anyone know if his defense has improved?

The FO is in the middle of an extensive rebuild on the fly. They are instituting several long-term replacements. Position Players 1B – We all knew this was Sano’s last year 2B – Set with Polanco. SS – Correa is a great 1 year add helping to put a good product on the field in the midst of a rebuild. Lewis is the near future. 3B – Donaldson simply was not part of the solution. He is continuing to decline. A lot is riding on Miranda. If he does not make it Steer and CES are relatively close but I assume the front office was planning on Miranda with Urshela as a bridge they could non-tender or trade. LF – Vacated waiting for someone to step-up. For those who wanted to keep Rosario. He is literally one of the worst hitters in all of MLB this year. 4th OF – Celestino was on the door step with other possibilities as well CF – Signed Buxton to be our franchise player. Rotation At the end of last season we basically had one solid back of the rotation guy (Ober) who still needed to prove he was for real. We acquired Ryan at the deadline and hoped he would live up to his potential. Winder looked ready last year and. He got injured and made the opening day lineup. They added a couple bounce back guys (Bundy / Archer) to get us through this year and provide an opportunity for Balazovic / Canterino to also step up. Bullpen Also needed to be pretty much completely rebuilt. Duran looks like he can be dominant but this was quite uncertain at the end of last season. Jax has also shown the signs many of us hoped for in moving him to the BP. There are still several others possibilities in the farm system. That’s a massive amount of rebuild. It made no sense to operate as a “Real Contender” in terms of trades and free agents. Their plan was very obvious by the way they approached this season and their confidence in the system is looking pretty astute at the moment. We are on the cusp of being quite good for several years. That just does not happen immediately. I am very please and hope you are all as well with having a good product to watch while they simultaneously build a team that can seriously contend for the next several years. BTW ... Keep in mind that moving Donaldson and building a homegrown pitching staff will enable the team to spend significantly on free agents especially if Lewis can man SS. They are not going to have any glaring holes so the expenditures can be on impact players instead of fielding enough SPs to keep us in games. IDK how they will spend but they will be extremely well positioned. I never expected them to be a real contender out of the gate. Therefore, I am very pleased to see all of these changes / developments necessary for them to become a contender are looking very promising.

They have won 8 of their last 10 and they have a bunch of important players hurt. So do a lot of teams but 8 of the last 10 with this many injuries is a team I would not be discounting.

Great to see him get a shot. Welcome to the show Mark Contreras!

Again, I agree with much of this and I am not sure how MLB players think because I have not managed in that industry which is quite unique. I have had responsibility for thousands of other skilled employees. They tend to have an employee centric bias in how they view management actions. They don't want to be treated that way should their performance suffer at some point. They share an ominous fact which is that their careers are short and they all want as much longevity as possible. They are well aware of minority of guys that got better in their early 30s and they want to believe they can extend their careers. Again, I agree Bundy should not get the kind they gave veterans last year given the depth of young guys. I just don't agree it's a good idea to cut Bundy without giving him an adequate chance to right the ship.

Wallner could be this year's Miranda. As I recall, Miranda success was reported to be influenced by better plate discipline. I was thinking the same thing about the Pitching at cedar Rapids. They have quite the rotation and it's good to know there is another wave behind Balazovic / Canterino / Enlow. I follow Corbin Carroll and I hate the Cavaco pick more every time I check on Carroll's progress. It would ease my pain if Miller turns out great but I just can't help envisioning Buxton / Lewis and Carroll together. That trio would manufacture a lot of runs on the base pads and be insane on defense.

He has been more effective than I expected. It seems to me he is one of those guys that is effective the first time though an order. Maybe it's that funky delivery.