Major League Ready

History is very clear in that neither strategy is a viable way to build a staff for any team and it's down right incompetent for a team in the bottom 1/3 or revenue to try. There are two potential paths. Trade for SPs as prospects or before they become established or draft and develop them. The one year guys are a way to fill holes. The very top free agents SPs (Scherzer / Greinke) are great. The problem is that there are so very few of them. Plus can we afford to put 29% in one player? (Scherzer / $150M budget) Other than these very select few true elite SPs, the rest of the free agent market collectively is a very poor bet, especially outside the first year. The production is surprising low when you actually go back and chart their production. We can talk about the poor history of developing pitchers all we like. By far the most likely path to success is through developing internal pitching so focusing on less productive strategies never makes sense. I think we are about to see the FO act accordingly. The old regime no doubt failed to develop pitching and we are about to see if the new is any different.

Who are you thinking, Mike? Garver only has two years left but Polanco / Kepler / Buxton / Jeffers have multiple years left, I don't think they can get anything for Donaldson. Sano might bring a half way decent prospect considering the universal; DH is likely. Arreaz has 4 years left but could be traded given out depth at 2B.

My comments were all in the context of what they need to do over the course of this season to have a legit shot at fielding a contender next year. I don't believe and never did believe that was realistic. Anything is possible in baseball but the odds were very much against it. I am not interested in pursuing strategies that just prolong the mediocrity.

I didn't say anything about 1 year contracts. I simply pointed out that the 5 year deals have been horrible outside of the first year and a mixed bag even in the first year. I am not even saying we should not do them ... just that in the Cueto / Zimmerman type cases it hurts the team badly for 3 or 4 years. BTW ... Ray and Gausman were 1 year deals and there have many 1 or 2 year deals (Cruz) that have been fantastic.

I agree Strotman has the best shot of those three. The one I don't know what to make of is Duran. It would not be the end of the world if he ended up being a back of the BP arm but we really need that guy to live up to his potential. What about Canterino? Will we see him at the ML level this year?

They need to come up with a couple BP guys too with Rodgers and Duffey being free agents at the end of the year. They will have the budget to keep them if that makes sense but it also makes sense they try to determine which prospects start and who should be transitioned to the BP. Vallimont and Strotman seemed destined for the BP to me and if Jax has any chance, it seems like it would be out of the BP. Let's hope the pitching prospects stay healthy this year. They have enough guys near ready that it would make sense to give a couple of them a look out of the BP.

How is it ever good to get 5 WAR for $110M? We could have got Robbie Ray for an extra $5M.

Just about everyone here has consider only one possible future state strategy .... contend next year. Do you think it's possible or even probable they looked at what was needed to contend and determined that was not feasible by opening day. None of this is in the least bit surprising if they determined the best course of action was to invest big league innings in their pitching prospects as well as Miranda, Martin, and possibly Lewis.

If we venture back a few years to the last time we had a bunch of SPs get 5 years deals (2016) the results suggest we should at least be aware of the highly volatile production of free agent SPs. David Price 7/217/AAV of #31M – WAR 4.4 / 1.5 / 2.4 / 2.3 / 0 / .7 an average of 1.88 total and 1.38 after the 1st year. Zack Greinke – Has been great. The next 3 SPs in AAV included Johnny Cueto / Jordan Zimmerman, and Jeff Samardzija. Johnny Cueto had a great first year and produced an average of 1 WAR for the final 5 years. Zimmerman produced 4.4 WAR over 4 years. Samardzjia was average in 2016, good in 2017 with 3.8 War and had .2 WAR in 2018 and 1.5 WAR in 2019 and below replacement level in his final year. They had two good years total between the three of them. As an aside, Chris Davis / Jason Heyward / and Justin Upton were the top AAV position players. They were not any better.

True and of course they need a SS. They would have needed to get Scherzer and Ray to have a realistic shot at a playoff run beyond the first round. So, that's $65M AAV for two SPs and another 50M AAV for the BP arms and a SS. Obviously, not remotely feasible. If they felt they could spend $50 total, I am sure they discussed what it would cost in prospects to make up the difference in what's needed. They don't even have the premier prospects teams want for established difference makers so the cost would be several of our top prospects. San Diego traded 10 prospects and the players they traded for were relatively highly compensated. My guess is that their conclusion in terms of how they could build a contender is VERY different than the strategies that have been discussed in numerous threads here. It's not surprising their actions thus fat don't match what most posters here think should be done. My guess is that they looked at the relative probability of succeeding at putting together a contender by opening day and completely ruled out that path. My guess is that they also evaluated a path focused on 2023 and determined the odds of success, especially sustained success were much greater if their planned focused on establishing a couple more SP prospects in 2022 and transitioning Miranda / Martin and possibly Lewis to the ML club. I would guess they imagined a scenario with Buxton / Polanco / Garver / Kepler / Kirilloff / Miranda / Martin and 4 homegrown starters and Maeda back as a great core. Now they still have $50M to supplement whatever additional pieces they need. They could also move a portion of Donaldson's contract, pass on Sano's option and have $70M to spend. I am sure they asked themselves if it was reasonable to expect they could come up with 2 SPs from the group of Balazovic / Duran /Canterino / SWR / Enlow / Winder / Sands and came to the conclusion that a patient approach had a significantly higher probability of sustained success.

They can discuss all they like. They just can't execute.

I agree in concept. Small and mid market teams have routinely gone through stages where they move veterans and develop young players that will be part of their future. However, this is not at all what happened with the 2019 Twins. They brought in Cruz, Schoop, Gonzalez and Perez and they didn't trade away any of their core. The Twins are in a rather unique position this year. They have a pretty good core of position players. They don't have any veteran pitching. Maeda will be back next year but will he be effective? They have a number of pitching prospects that could/should debut this year. Will they invest a year in developing homegrown pitching or do they try to fill 3 slots through free agency/trades and and keep them on the sideline?

Of course, those teams were important historically. I should have asked the relevance to free agency or roster construction today. The game is vastly different, the financial elements are vastly different and how teams are managed / constructed is vastly different. Perhaps I should have said that managing as they did 50 years ago would leave a team in the wake of those operating in a modern way. That's not to say I care for some of the modern practices but winning today requires a team adopt those practices. One of the practices that has become most prolific is the emphasis on developing young / controllable / inexpensive players. There is an assumption in this thread that the Twins are tentative. It could be that they are planning developing pitching this year and have no intention of filling the roster with mid-level free agents.

And what happened 50 years ago is important how?

I agree it would have turned out great had they signed him. Would Buxton have signed a modest deal given his potential? He also was a number 9 hitter that did not do much to indicate he was going to be a great offensive player. So, I am by no means saying it would not have been a good idea. Just saying it's not surprising either side might not had been inclined much less both sides.

If we toss out Buxton's first season when he had wRC+ of 5 and look at the next 3 seasons, he had a wRC+ of 86 / 92 & -2. Buxton played in exactly one-third of the games played. Is it at all puzzling the team did not extend early on? It would have been great if they had because it probably would have been a great deal. Would Buxton have signed the type of deal his performance to that point would have merited? IDK but it's not hard to understand why the Twins did not extend him early on like an Azuna or most recently Wander Franco. If they were going to get it done the time was probably after the 2019 season. However, he once again played in only 87 games. It's not surprising they were reluctant to bet big at that point and it would not be surprising that Buxton would not sign when he had the opportunity to greatly improve his value. I guess what I am saying is that this situation is not exactly an enigma.

So, I suggest that successful teams are almost always constructed in a given way. You feel compelled to counter that claim and in the process provide one piece of information while completely ignoring if what I suggested had any merit. In other words, you completely ignored how the team had been constructed which was the entire point. Now, you have a real problem with me pointing out all the FACTS. How is it a problem to debate the hard facts? Isn't it reasonable that we should all want to know what has been successful for other teams instead of just assuming a given strategy will be successful? It's quite easy to go to Fangraphs for any team in any given season and determine which players contributed the most and how they were acquired. How can anyone take a hard stance like so many do here in terms of how the roster should be constructed without studying the construction of successful teams. Everyone just assumes the people in charge are ignorant and incompetent based on their assumptions of how things should be done. How does it make sense to be put off by someone asking that we examine how these successful rosters were constructed? That would suggest you just want to stick to your view regardless of the facts.

Had I said adding a premier free agent is never an important contribution … You would have a point. This started with how successful teams were constructed which is why I tried to be very specific with the assumptions and parameters. The assumption was a team of equivalent revenue and the parameters were how the players that contributed the most were acquired. I even broke free agents down to the elite (Scherzer) type and more modest priced FAs given the emphasis here on premier vs lower priced FAs. Are the Nationals an equivalent team in terms of revenue? Do they have enough incremental revenue to pay for Scherzer and Donaldson abd have the Twins budget left over? Yes, the do. Let’s ignore that as you have here and get to how the team was constructed. What would be far more relevant to how the Twins should be constructed is how all of SUCCESSFUL below average revenue teams have been constructed but let’s use the Nationals anyway. The Nationals sucked bad enough to get two #1 picks in consecutive years and they drafted a couple superstars in Harper and Strausburg. They also traded for Trea Turner a year before he got to the majors. Then, another 1st round pick named Anthony Rendon was established two years before Scherzer was add. He produced 7WAR the year they won the WS. We have not even mentioned Juan Soto who produced 4.9 War and he was a product of their system. Howie Kendrick who was signed as a free agent for an AAV of $4.4M had the 4th highest WAR among position players that year and Victor Robles another product of their system (Int) was 5th. Adam Eaton had the 6th highest war among position players but it was 2.4 WAR which is significant. He was a FA signing and made 8.4M that year. If we were to sum it up. Their best position players were drafted and one as traded for as a prospect. The most impactful free agent the year they won was a $4M/AAV signing. In other words, there were no major free agent free agent signings. They got great production out of a low cost free agent and they let their superstar player walk in free agency the year they won the WS. It’s pointless to even bring up these hard facts because bias prevents many people from even considering the facts and making a legitimate attempt to understand how successful teams are constructed. If you look back on my posts this fall, I have mentioned more than once that establishing our pitching prospects would position us sign an elite FA. Obviously, I am not saying that adding a Scherzer is not great but you have to have the rest of the team before the addition of Scherzer matters and there are plenty examples around the league. The lower the revenue, the higher the correlation to this premise. To suggest the Twins are in a similar position to the Nationals when they added Scherzer is waaaay out there even if we ignore their revenue advantage. The only way they can overcome that revenue advantage is to build a staff from within. It would also help if Miranda is what we hope and they can shed Donaldson's salary.

Aaaaah yes. Now I see what you mean. Of course, it's reality. None of the other teams in the bottom half of revenue sign those types of free agents either. I don't expect it just as I don't expect an average person to purchase a million dollar home.

The best examples I can think of for that strategy would be the Angels / Phillies and Mets. That has not worked out as a matter of fact it's failed miserably? Of course, those teams have $100M+ more revenue than the Twins but there is not a team of equivalent revenue that has done what you are suggesting. At least not if we are talking Donaldson level and up. If it's such a good idea, why is this true. The small markets like the Royals certainly did not remotely follow this strategy in route to winning the WS. Obviously, the Rays and As never do. What examples of success am I missing?

A $100M signing is inconsequential to you?

I knew I could count on you to completely ignore hard evidence, and provide a reactionary response while ignoring that within these facts lies a blueprint and rationalization for what should be done. If it's not go all in right now it can't possibly be a good strategy. Gotcha! There is an alternative where the put a good product on the field now while not completely blocking the pitching prospects from getting plenty of time at the ML level. They find a good but short-term fix at SS. They could even get 1 high quality SP and another Pineda type. Good team this year while retooling the roster / establishing pitching / transitioning a couple position players and leaving some payroll flexibility for final pieces. The position players could include any of Martin / Miranda / Lewis and a couple other guys that showed signs last year. Contrary to popular opinion, our future success has little to do with the team spending every possible dime. As a matter of fact, THIS YEAR that's probably counter-productive to sustained success.

Buxton or no Buxton, they need 3 SPs, a couple BP arms, and a SS. They also need to transition a corner OFer prospect to the majors this year. Transitioning a 3B is also just around the corner too. I would say they have some rebuilding to do with or without Buxton.

If you actually go back and construct the rosters of playoff teams for the past decade while identifying how they were acquired (as I have) you will find that the source of the most impactful players for mid and small market playoff teams were drafting or trading established players for prospects. I have posted that info in the past. Yes, there was some supplementing with free agents. However, it should be noted that virtually none of them were top of the market free agents. Many of them were modest signings that overperformed. There are 5 players acquired as prospects for every player acquired as an established impact player and that's a generous estimate. So, if the Twins are a player or even two away, you would have a point. The Twins would have to build a considerable portion of their team via trading for established players or signing free agents. How many examples of mid market teams can you find that added the number of players the Twins need through free agency and trades? Please educate those of us who are unaware of these past examples of success.

Hard to understand this one. I can accept if they invest in the future by devoting this year to retooling. However, if that's the case, give Contreras or Boyd a shot or just cut Cave and make a trade for someone with upside.