Major League Ready

Last year he had a 4.55 FIP 1.318 WHP and 6.9 SO/9. Does not sound like a front of the rotation guy to me. What am I missing?

The obvious answer is we need someone that can go toe to toe with Cole/Severino and/or Verlander/Greinke. The better question might be is there a SP realistically available right now that can go toe to toe with them. Personally, I am hoping for Charlie Morton at the trade deadline.

Seth, Do you believe the 26th roster spot will be used at least in part for auditions? Sano to DH after 2020 seems to be the logical path with Kirilloff or Rooker taking over at 1B. Sure would be nice if we got a look at them this year. Same could be true with Larnach depending on how Rosario looks the first couple months of the season. What do you think? Are these guys more likely to get an audition with the expanded roster?

Don't get me wrong ... That's a very fair point. The optimist in me wants to hope that Buxton could become the Superstar he was projected to be. I want to believe Kepler or Sano could go the way of Christian Yehlich instead of the other way. Maybe Dubnak could shock us all and be our guy that came out of nowhere or Graterol steps up big. Hey, I know it's wishful thinking but it's fun to think it could happen. We had a lot of unknowns turn out pretty well last year. How about a continuation of that trend? As long as I am wishing big, how about Donaldson does an Adrian Beltre impersonation the next 4 years and delivers 20 WAR for his age 34-37 seasons.

Fair enough on Greinke but you guys sure do bend the narrative to your liking. We are talking about the specifics of this year's market. The argument was the Twins failed because they refused to pay the premium required. Mike could not refute the point that none of the other teams that were in on Wheeler / Bumgarner were willing to pay the premium associated with those players. This specificity allows us to judge our FO vs all of the other FOs involved. Let's be clear. All of the other teams involved concluded Wheeler and Bumgarner DID NOT merit the premium required to get them away from their preferred team. Rather than concede this point Mike changed the argument to what about deadline trades.

No. You are talking about multiple years. I am talking about last year. The market is different ever year. The asking price was apparently high enough last year than none of the actual playoff ("successful") teams were willing to trade for a SP. Fact or fiction? They signed not one but two BP arms and I don't think they needed any help with position players. Also last year was the first year in a very long time where the Twins were at least somewhat legit contenders. You may count the year they crept into the 2nd wildcard spot with a team that really was never a contender but I do not.

Exactly which successful teams dealt for "impact" SPs last year at the deadline? Each year has a unique set of circumstances so you can compare just any year. I guess we could Stroman as an impact SP but the Mets are hardly an example of success. One 90 win (exactly 90) season in the past decade with 2 other seasons over 500. Obviously, Cole / Strassburg and Ryu were not going to be traded so they don't count but none of the playoff teams were willing to pay the price necessary to get Wheeler/Madbum or any other impact SP.

There really were not 5. Cole and Stassburg were not realistic. Wheeler/Bumgarner - That is a very naive view IMO. Convince Wheeler family ties don't matter? Convince Bumgarner his desire for a horse ranch in Arizona is silly? The only option in the Wheeler/Bumgarner cases was a massive over pay. What is absolutely crystal clear is that NO OTHER MLB front office was willing to pay the premium required. Therefore, you are assuming to have a superior understanding of how to build a MLB team, not only as compared to the twins FO but also every other team in on Wheeler/Bumgarner. Good for you! Seems I heard the exact same rhetoric regarding elite FA RPs last year. The FO was either stupid or just cheap from not recognizing what a no-brainer it was to sign Familia / Kimbrel / Miller / Robertson / Herrera / etc.

We just don't agree on RYU. Where Wheeler and MadBum are concerned, there were numerous other teams interested in them. Any of them could have followed your suggested strategy. None of them did. Not a single one. This is not theoretical. We know none of the other teams were willing to apply your strategy. Are you asserting a superior decision making ability to all of these GMs because the facts are quite clear here. None of them were willing to make the overpay you suggest or those offers/amounts still did not get the job done. BTW ... If you are interested in an outside perspective, Mark Polisuk answered two related questions in his chat yesterday. https://www.jotcast.com/chat/mlbtr-live-chat-6742.html

Cole and Srassburg were economic reality. Wheeler and Badbum had very strong preferences to be with a specific team. Your positioning suggests they just did not want to come to Minnesota. There were numerous other teams interested in Wheeler/Madbum. Any of those teams could have offered a massive overpay. They did not. Do you suppose fans have a superior grasp of what’s best for the teams as compared to all of the GMs who did not act? They made a judgment call on Ryu which is very hard to criticize if any critical thought is applied. Obviously, The Dodgers felt the money could be invested more productively elsewhere. Kasten and Freidman have stellar reputations. Do Twins fans know better than them too? Before you condemn, consider the only playoff teams from last year that did not go backwards were the Yankees and the possibly the Braves. Houston lost almost 13 WAR and replaced it with very little. Milwaukee lost Grandal / Moose / Pomeranz / Gonzales and Thames. Their only significant addition has been Garcia. TB lost Garcia and D’Arnaud and added literally nobody. Oakland lost Anderson / Roark and Bailey while adding nobody. STLs net add is Michael Wacha for 1/3M. Washington lost Rondon and replaced him with 7 players who add up to the same salary Rendon received. Basically, the opposite philosophy you are asserting. One team basically was able to achieve what you are asserting should be expected and that team did it based mostly on financial advantage. Pretty easy to expect perfection. Another thing all together to achieve it.

What would you have done differently? Outbid the top revenue team in league for Cole? Given an 8th year to Stassburg which still might not been enough to get him away from the Nats? Massive overpay for Wheeler to get him to ignore family values Massive overpay for Madbum to compensate him for his preference to be in Arizona. Outbid the Jays 4/80 bid for a 33 y/o with a significant history of injury. Which one sounds like the most realistic or best option for a below average revenue team?

You are using 6 FTEs. They only get paid MLB compensation when they are on the 26 man roster. We are in real trouble if we have 6 guys out on average for the entire season. The cost for MiLB replacements is more like $1M. I suppose it could be a little more if we have another Arreaz arise but the FO would be happy with that scenario!

I think that's a fair take. As a matter of fact, I see almost exactly the same scenario. Where we differ is that while I would have been OK with them signing Ryu but I also have zero problem with them passing on a giving a 33 y/o SP a 4 year/80M contract with his injury history. There was a segment on MLB TV where the topic was "over/under" and they asked the panelists to predict if Ryu would start +/- 80 games over the duration of his 4 year contract. All of them said under. Hard to get angry about not making a desperate move with such a high likelihood of failure. I would rather spend the money on Donaldson in spite of our need for starting pitching.

Why would a player pass on the Twins because they had a perception the Twins have been cheap in the past If the Twins have the high offer and the player was only interested in the high offer? Sorry, your bid was the highest but I won't play for you because I don't think you have bid aggressively with other FAs?

Take a look at the ranking parameters. That might help and I am pretty sure all-stars (Berrios / Polanco) have proven themselves. This type of assessment involves a fair amount of speculation but Nick has done a nice job of laying out how he came to these rankings. The fact that's it's not an exact science makes for interesting debate.

$7M for Bailey brings it to 70.8. I rounded to $71M. Read nothing more into my post than someone said a team can't be built without the use of free agency & trades. I just found that an odd position when more than half of next years 26 man roster is a product of free agent signings and trades.

The Twins roster presently has 10 players acquired through free agency and 4 through trades. So, more than half the roster is a product of free agency and trades. $71M in payroll is committed to free agents next year. Does this sound like a team built totally from within?

That has nothing to do with his point. If your company paid you $200M, you would exercise the freedom that is a product of that type of wealth regardless of how much or how little the company was making.

If it makes you feel any better … The only playoff team from last year that improved significantly was the Yankees. It would not be unreasonable to say MN had the 2nd best off-season so far of last year’s playoff teams. Houston lost Cole and has done nothing else. Washington lost Rendon and added players that would be considered dumpster dives with perhaps the exception of Will Harris (3/24) Dodgers lost Ryu / Hill and added Treinen. Brewers lost Grandal / Moose / Pomeranz and added Garcia Tampa lost Garcia / D’Arnaud and added nobody Oakland lost Roark / Bailey You could make a case Atlanta had a better off-season. The lost Kuechel / Teheran and replaced them with Hamels and Will Smith. Even everyone’s favorite STL has added a total of two one year deals for a total of $8M. Obviously, STL was not a playoff team but generally respected. Perhaps their unwillingness to participate suggests something.

I know … None of these guys drop off-right? If we go back a few years and look at long contracts, I am sure they all did great until their last year. Starting with 2016 their were several guys who got 5,6, even 8 year contracts. Chris Davis, Johnny Cueto, and Jason Heyward. Too bad we missed out on them. Jordan Zimmerman may have only produced 4.4 WAR over his 4 years but you really can’t say he dropped off. Of course 2015 was the year of Max Sherzer. He and Greinke are the reason teams have hope in these deals. Of course. 2015 also had Lester and Sandoval. Lester dropped off but he will be a decent 4 over the last half of his contract and Sandoval is still playing somewhere right. 2014 Ellsbury and Chin SOO Choo got 7 year deals in 2014. Of course Cano came out of that class too. It looks like he will only be bad for 5 years of his deal. 2013 was the first Greinke deal which he opted out of but he remains the guy who stands out in this crowd. That year also had Josh Hamilton and Melvin Upton getting 5 years each. They darn near produced 5 WAR between the two of them over their contracts and had Hamilton not been cut you could probably have said they did not fall off. Sanchez got a 5 year deal that year too. He was great the first year too but it’s hard to deny he did not suck the last 3 years of his contract. 2012 had some big signings we missed out on. Pujlos and Fielder came from that class. Jose Reyes came from that class as well and he was at least serviceable for the last 3 years of his 6 year deal. CJ Wilson rounds out that year but I am afraid there is no way to sugar coat that he was bad the last 3 years of his 5 year deal. Looking back at how all of these huys have only been bad in their final year it’s hard to imagine why the Twins don’t spend whatever it takes.

Just for kicks I was going to go to the Dodgers site to see if their fans thought Theo / ownership / and the rest of the front office were incompetent based on their lack of moves when this popped up. I especially loved the part about hitting a payroll number. https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2020/01/stan-kasten-discusses-dodgers-offseason-cole-spending.html

Is the 8-9M per WAR we see used as the "value" of free agents calculated based on historic production by free agents or is there some other formula?

According to this article they no longer have an ownership interest in any banks. Regardless, you did not give to much thought to your conclusion on "operating cost doubling". The annual interest on $225M is 12-13M. That's a fraction of their total operating cost. Did you mean the portion of operating costs directly associated with Target Field? http://www.startribune.com/pohlad-family-ends-direct-ownership-of-banks/285895611/

You need to rethink this argument. My position was/is that if they were going to take $100M out of their pockets, I prefer they gave it to a charity. In that scenario 100% of the $100M goes to charity. Your contention is that a higher percentage would go to charity if they gave it to the players. How does that work? This statement is yet another demonstration of how the wild biased of fanaticism interprets something this straight forward in a manner that has zero logical basis. You do understand that the players would have to give away 100% of the money to equal the scenario.

I have not seen any post that suggesting financial necessity. Owners and pro athletes are all in this to make money. Gewt used to it. This is also not a complex financial equation. It makes all the difference in the world if you are the Yankees or the Twins. When the Yankees spend $257M on payroll as projected for 2020, they are still going to be very profitable. The Twins would lose in the neighborhood of $100M. We are dealing with estimates but how complicated is it that a team with $400M in incremental revenue will not be losing money money. The scenario suggested here is that small market owners take huge sums on money out of their own pockets while large market teams make $50-100M/yr. If an owner was willing to take $50 or $100M out of their pockets, I would sure hope they would donate it to supporting military vets / battered women shelters / homeless shelters / cancer research / children's hospitals etc. than add a couple players to their team.