Major League Ready

Depends on if the organization believes they can fix all that is wrong with our pitching and the rest of the team for that matter in free agency or trades for 2022. Put another way, they could be influenced by their perceived chances of contending in 2022 VS putting a good product on the field in 2022 but under a strategy aimed at 2023. Under that first premise, they go sign 2-3 FA SPs and Jax probably gets squeezed out. He is either SP depth or in the BP. If the organization sees there best chance at returning to contention and sustaining that success being dependent of developing a lot of pitching, they commit to that strategy by giving the plethora of SP prospects they have a shot. This could mean they keep three spots open in 2022. Jax / Ober / Barnes and perhaps Ryan will be the plan come spring training. Winder / Balazovic or Strotman could win a spot in spring training. Jax probably still gets moved the BP or traded as Balazovic / SWR / Duran / Canterino / Enlow make their way to the ML club. So, the plan focused on 2023 would start with 3 of Jax / Ober / Barnes / Ryan but the 5 mentioned above will hopefully be good enough to take the place of the weakest link and the rotation looks quite different at the end of the season. Best case scenario is we end up trading some young pitching or some of these guys end up effective BP arms. The strategy aimed at 2023 likely means trading Donaldson in the off-season if possible and bringing Miranda up in 2022.

I am 100% with you on this one. The young SPs have looked like they can more than hold their own. I would much rather have one really good SP than a couple Pineda / Happ types. Give me Rodon (or similar) plus Maeda and 3 of Ober / Jax / Barnes / Ryan / Winder to start the season and we should do quite well. Balazovic / Duran waiting in the wings with SWR / Enlow and Canterino not far behind. A couple of these guys are going to end up booting our BP nicely. Polanco needs to stay at 2B. SS would be a good free agent investment but I could also see trading Arraez for a SS that is being blocked elsewhere. Miranda could fill that role next year and eventually replace Donaldson. Really hope they can come to terms with Buxton. We might not be a true contender in 2022 with these moves but we will be close and should be in the thick of it in 2023. That's a nice rebound.

I doubted Barnes from the start but how do you dump him when he has been quite effective. Maybe crafty lefties will be more effective now that so many players have built swings to deal with 95+. IDK but I would continue to test him at the MLB level. I should add that perhaps we should be a little more open minded to the rookies and waiver wire pick-ups that helped us go 7-3 against all the 3 division leaders in successive series. Pretty good without having Buxton / Kirilloff and Rodgers.

Do you have some basis for this strategy? ie. Some form of articles or data regarding the success rates of draft picks? My guess is that if you get outside the top 7-10 picks the success rate, at least in becoming a #1 type SP goes down substantially and when you get past the first 30-40 picks it goes way down. So, I would want to know the success rate of position players drafted in the first 30-40 positions. I think there are a lot of strong opinions formed by baseball fans with very little to support it. For example, I heard a lot of the same rumblings about the Twins not signing the very top international free agents. When, I actually went out an collected the data, the facts suggested a strategy of never spending over roughly $1.5M would yield better results. It would be interesting to construct a list of the top 30 position players (by WAR) and the top 30 Pitchers for the past decade and determine the drafting position.

The bitching about any acquisition that isn't an ace or Mike Traut is getting very tedious. Until we can fill the roster with 26 superstars. good players, especially cheap controllable pitching has great value. How much difference have Ober / Jax / Minaya and Gant made in just the past 2 weeks? The concept that #1 and #2 SPs are really important to dominance is not exactly a novel concept but neither is the need for good cost controlled players to fill out a roster.

I definitely agree we should expect a team above 500 next year. No doubt we should expect a better rotation but more importantly we need to see validation of prospect identification and development. Same for the BP. I also agree that it’s pointless to sign mediocre starters. That would be very short-sighted given the number of SPs we have ready to be auditioned. Where we disagree is that I would not try to fix everything in one off-season unless Ober / Jax and Ryan are really impressive for the remainder of the season. At that point I would go after one of the high profile free agent SPs. The reality is that in the past 20 years two elite free agent SPs have been signed by teams with roughly equivalent revenue to the Twins. Therefore, an expectation they sign two is just not realistic. The question we should be asking is not …. How do we contend for a WS next year? We should be asking what is the best strategy to return to contention. The best strategy for returning to contention is not consistent (at the moment) with a strategy focused on building a WS contender next year. They need to almost completely rebuild the SP and BP. They need to dedicate rotation spots to the numerous prospects that will be ready next year. In other words, the fastest way to build a sustainable winner is to take the time necessary to develop our own pitching. Having said this, I would much prefer pursuing one high end SP as opposed to filling the rotation with a couple Michael Pineda types even though that might net a few more win next year.

Taken alone that statement is pretty dumb. In the context of my post it's basically hyperbole and the rest of my post makes that pretty clear. Removing the rest of my post from this quote is a deliberately misrepresentative and you are better than that. I have consistently stated the same basic message message as you have above which is let's see at the end of 2022 if this team is improved and more importantly positioned for sustained success. I have never even hinted they should have several years to get back on track and the remainder of the post you failed to include makes this quite clear. Not cool!

Your are absolutely right that the offense is not championship caliber this year. However, if we are to interpret exactly what was meant by Falvey's statement we would have needed to ask a couple follow-up questions. For example, does this mean it's realistic you can put a contending team on the field every year? Does this mean you will overcome injuries and will never have FAs that just don't work out? Does this mean that you will find pitching in years even when 90% of the available pitching fails? They promised to manage toward a GOAL of sustainability. It's just not remotely reasonable to expect any mid market team to put a true contender on the field EVERY year. They have put systems in place and made personnel decisions consistent with the stated goal if we can accept goals are not reached 100% of the time in professional sports. For fans to get so bent about a bad year to the degree some have here is IMO naive. Literally two-thirds of the teams in baseball are out or long-shots for the post season and it's early August. Are all of those organizations incompetent? Lots of things have gone wrong this year but let's not say "but you promised" by posting this type if PR statement as if they were solemn promises to contend every year. We actually might be witnessing a turn around with some sustainability right now. The farm system just got a jolt with some players with the potential to be impactful for several years. Let's get bent out of shape if the team is bad for the next 4 or 5 years as some are predicting here. I am going to first judge if the team get better over the course of the last couple months. Then, next year, I will expect multiple pitchers to assimilate to the ML level. If so, they will be building sustainable success. If not, I will be calling for their dismissal as well.

Not even remotely my point. There is no suggestion here that fans "do the work for them". The point is certainly not that fans have information and make the same mistakes. The point is that better selections did not exist and many here are more than adequately informed to know the options, including the options they endorsed that did not work out To call for better decisions when you should know they did not exist is absurd. Those who are calling for terminations are essentially saying .... I know there were no realistic options that would have been better but you should have found something that did not exist. If your employer had the same expectations, I am betting your would have some choice words to describe said employer.

This is very reasonable unless you are insisting the FO is incompetent and/or suggesting they should be terminated. Someone with the skillset to render an opinion about executive competence would never go down this path without having an understanding of the options that were present. Therefore, a much more reasonable position is to discuss the options that were present instead of calling for terminations. I would add that many of the people here spend a great deal of time following baseball and know exactly what the options were or could look them up in a couple minutes. I have no problem if someone has no desire to take the time to be informed. Just don't go calling for terminations if you are not willing to put forth a modest effort to be informed.

Me too. Does he have some incriminating photos? ?

Once again, I am going to ask what decisions they could have made that would have been better. Which FAs or players that were traded would have put this team anywhere near contention? It's really easy to point to a theoretical solution. You can get away with that on the internet. Just avoid the questions that disprove the theory. Pounding this type of poorly conceived drum in the real world does not go over well.

I have made the same point over the last few weeks. However, this team is quickly starting to look different. I would not make any predictions until the end of the season. It's way to soon to believe with any certainty that Ober and Jax are part of the solution but with what we are witnessing you have to start believing a little. Ryan, Balazovic and Winder are also all on the cusp. Then, how about Minaya and Gant. Same story as Ober and Jax but man they look pretty darn good. We have a few other guys to audition too. Now, if Buxton and Kirilloff can stay healthy with Polanco, Donaldson and Garver, that's a good core offensive group. Pretty good odds Larnach comes around too. Sure, lots unanswered right now but let's wait and see what happens the rest of the way this year before we get too down on 2022.

You simply elect to ignore hard fact. The Twins FA signings are on par with all of the other teams. It's much more telling of how ineffective free agency is on average. Did they rely on free agency or did they hope like every other team to get better than average productivity from free agents. What we should be asking is why so many people here go off the deep about spending when free agency is so ineffective, especially for teams outside the top revenue teams. Would they have been in better shape if drafting was better 5-10 years ago. Of course! This front office did not make those selections. We should also ask why so many people want to trade away prospects if developing talent is so important to below average revenue teams.

The turn around actual began at the end of 2016 season when they traded Chris Sale and Adam Eton. Of course, Sale was a considerably better player than Berrios. They did exactly what so many people here absolutely deplore and insist would be the ruination of the team. They had seven years straight of being well below 500. They did a good job with draft picks and Keuchel has worked out well. He is not exactly the level if elite FA that many here presume is an absolute must for this team to contend. Let's just not pretend the Whitesox did not go through a rebuild. What the Whitesox rebuild illustrates is that trading away "Berrios / Sale / Eaton type" players greatly accelerates the process.

There are many teams sustaining a model that rarely involves signing 4+ year free agents. Those same teams trade for guys with multiple years of control but they are never the type of established front of the rotation guys called for here. There should be several examples from Tampa Bay / Oakland / Milwaukee / Cleveland if your premise is valid. How many can you name?

And not one single team thought the Twins were wrong! It just shows how difficult it is to forecast the development of these players. Johan Santana was a rule 5 and Tatis Jr. was traded for James Shields and Shields was quite bad.

The Royals won the WS without an ace.

Actually, there is no denying it went very poorly but blowing it suggests there were much better options. I have asked twice now for those who are calling out the pitching acquisitions to articulate a plan (in hindsight) that would have put this team in contention. Pitchers that were actually traded and free agents we could have signed. Were we going to get Wainwright away from STL? James Paxton pitched 1 inning Garret Richards’s has a 5.22 REA and a WHIP of 1.65 Drew Smyly has been decent with a 4.5 ERA / 1.45 WHIP / .6 WAR Corey Kluber pitched 50 innings and is now on the 60 day IL Charlie Morton has been good but his geographic preference is well known so that was not going to happen. Mike Minor has an ERA of 5.39 and .3 WAR Jake Odorizzi was a popular choice here. His 4.95 ERA and 0 WAR would not have helped. The guy I wanted (Taijuan Walker) has been good but he got no support here when I floated him as an option. We could have traded for Blake Snell like so many here insisted was a no brainer. We could have given up a bunch of prospects for a replacement level player. The same is true for a lot of the BP options. Rosenthal / Clippard / Romo / Etc There was nothing wrong with the Simmons signing. He has had a bad year or is in decline. We should not sign most free agents if the possibility of decline makes it a bad decision. Sometimes reasonable decisions don't pan out in baseball. There is a credible argument that the choices that were popular here would have left the team in worse shape going forward.

Should we put much weight on him being a first round pick given he was drafted out of High School? I look at his AA and AAA performance and don't see much. My take on what we have seen with the Twins is a mediocre FB and mediocre at best secondary pitches. If he had plus control that might play but his command is suspect too. I have no problem with them giving him a spin but I don't see anything that suggests he needs to be kept for the remainder of the season if they have other options like Moran for that roster spot.

Sure would be nice to see Canterino come back strong and get a look in September.

It's only one week but the new rotation and BP members gave us reason to believe in a much better brand of baseball for the remainder of the season and a much better product next year. Sure would be nice to see similar pitching this week. More help is on the way too. I would not be surprised if Joe Ryan is moved straight to the big club. If not, we should get a look at him and a couple other pitchers soon.

I agree. However, there are also fans who want to see the best product available right NOW. They either don't understand the benefit of giving prospects playing time or they just don't care. We hear from some of those folks here. They spend money to attend games which gives them a voice. The team has to cater to that audience as well. There is also a certain duty to put a our best players on the field to maintain fair competition for playoff spots. We also can't just trash these guys (cut or bench them). Sure they still get paid but it's not the way to treat players if you want any chance of signing free agents in the future.

The last couple games gave me a little more hope for next year. I did not see ML pitchers in Jax and even more so in Barnes. Ober looks to have more ceiling. However, they have all shown very good command. Minaya has looked very good too. These guys along with Joe Ryan and a couple others will make the rest of the season very interesting to watch. Establishing these guys plus a couple free agents and 2022 looks much better. Contention better ... I doubt it. I agree the more effective plan is to continue to establish the numerous pitching prospects we have over the course of 2022. Martin / Miranda also likely start to play a role in 2022. Add to that a healthy Buxton and Kirilloff and it should make for an entertaining product in 2022.