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Major League Ready

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Everything posted by Major League Ready

  1. Major League Ready
    A one year deal on RIOS would be nice but it probably takes a two year deal.
  2. Major League Ready
    I liked this prospect in concept because the contract does not extend beyond the player's prime years. However, I can't fault the FO given the scouting report. The other concept that surfaced here is that it is always good to stockpile talent. Of course, that is true until you sign a one that is a bust. Nishioka is not the first international player to bust. There is always another prospect (opportunity) around the corner but when you choose poorly, you live with it for 6 years in this case. It's also hard to bid against a team that just increased their TV revenue by $50M/yr.
  3. Major League Ready
    I am pretty sure the gap in perspectives of the "zero chance" and the opinion that this does not mean that it doesn't make sense" is a matter of perspective gained by being in this position. It won't because the people who are entrusted with these decisions develop a pretty different perspective. I went through that transformation as I took on these types of responsibilities so I am quite familiar with both perspectives. I have also interviewed hundreds of individuals over the years in the process of organizational transformation who were certain the people at the top were idiots including organizations I ran myself so I am quite accustomed to being told I don't get it. Maybe I don't get it. That's why I keep asking for examples of other GMs making such a move which would be evidence the idea has merit. The only other real alternative is that all of the GMs who have rebuilt teams did not get it either. I am pretty sure I side with management because I have experience the responsibility of a multi-hundred million dollar P&L but maybe I have managed to fake people out for 20+ years of this type of responsibility.
  4. Major League Ready
    I would LOVE to add Hamels but we need to evaluate this over the entire term of the contract in terms of prospects given up, future payroll limitations, and the potential we block prospects. We all know the saying that you can't have too much pitching. However, let's put this in context. If we add Hamels, we still have one open spot this year for May, Meyer, Milone, etc. That's fine given it is really hard to keep all of them healthy. 2016 is a bit of a different story, now we have one spot of Meyer, May, Berrios, and hopefully someone else who really steps it up. We would be essence relying on at least two of those main four going down which very likely takes us out of contention. We would also have about half of our budget ($57M) tied up in Mauer, Nolasco, and Hamels for 2016-2017 and $45M in Mauer and Hamels in 2018 when the odds are neither one of them are all that productive. The Cubs, with a larger budget, on the other hand has no contracts of this nature beyond 2016. This is not by accident. I guess I go back to looking what the rest of the league has done while rebuilding. I can't come up with a single parallel transaction. Therefore, I have to conclude other GMs are very against this type of transaction for a rebuilding team. Are these GMs incompetent, cheap or both?
  5. Major League Ready
    If the team is still a 90 loss team without Hamels, I would not touch this trade. Many of you absolutely completely ignore that this is a business. As a business consultant, I cant. It is not realistic and those responsible for financial performance are not going down this path. Having said this ... I don't think the team will continue to lose 90 games and the organization does not need to mortgage the future to put a better team on the field. For starters, rebuilding teams in the bottom half of the league in terms of revenue must improve via the farm system. That need seems largely discounted by some here. Next year Berrios should be here. Buxton, Sano, and Rosario will be here by 2016. Our future lies squarely in the development of these players. That's how we get better. I am far more concerned about drafting and development than free agency. Hughes type moves our great but we do not have the revenue level that supports building through free agency in general. Even the Yankees with double our revenue are anchored by the rate at which their elite FA signings have failed. BTW ... Most of the "top flight" staff are comprised primarily of team developed SPs and players that were acquired by sending established ML players for prospects with the exception of the richest clubs.
  6. Major League Ready
    I guess it depends on if the goal is to field a middle of the pack team for the next 10 years or build a contender. This type of move at this point in our building process might (if others perform) get us to 500. Come 2017 or 18, I would much rather have Meyer or Berrios and let's say the other two prospects are something like Burdi and Rosario and then add a FA the caliber of Hamels. By then, this team is going to look a lot more attractive to FAs. We all know prospects often don't work out but let's try to measure the impact of the two strategies. How many WAR would you project out of Berrios, Burdi, and Rosario and that's roughly the difference between these two strategies. If I were to guess the WAR for these three players in 2018 I would put the over/under at about 7 WAR. There is a pretty good chance that 7 wins is the difference between winning the division and going home in October.
  7. Major League Ready
    Deshields, Schafer, and Rosario would be an interesting twist. All three can play CF or LF. Send Hicks back to AAA and let the three of them battle it out for playing time. I would like it even better if the signed Rasmus and platooned Deshields and Schafer until Rosario proved he is ready.
  8. Major League Ready
    Is it just me or is the rule V class better than most years?
  9. Major League Ready
    I would like to see some examples of other rebuilding teams trading top prospects for a player that profiles like Hamels, especially a player amongst the league's highest paid players. No way this move puts them in contention which means it has little revenue impact and you just flushed $80+ million. This is not a move that would be seriously contemplated by anyone who has ever managed decisions involving this type of money. It is also not just the profit. Lower revenue teams have to produce for lack of a better measure more WAR per dollar spent. Therefore, productive low cost assets (players) are crucial. Taking on more of these types of deals while trading away assets that are our highest probability in terms of WAR is fundamentally unproductive, even counterproductive in terms of constructing a contender. Various sources produced metrics showing the salary structure by percentage of contending teams. As I recall, none of them had a player that represented 18% of payroll. To suggest that it is a good idea to have two players around that percentage is really sticking your head in the sand.
  10. Major League Ready
    Go get Rasmus and transition Rosario in when he is ready. When Buxton arrives (likely 2016) we would have a very versatile group that can play D and steal a bunch of bases. How much more entertaining would that group be to watch in comparison to Delmon, Parmelee, and others we have had to watch patrol the OF for this team? Get Rasmus on a 3 year deal and trade him at some point if we are so fortunate to have other prospects work out.
  11. Major League Ready
    Horrible idea. The Twins would be mortgaging their future to become a 500 team (maybe). Even the contenders are very reluctant to give up the required cost in prospects. Why on earth would any rebuilding team make such a move. The answer is ... They would not and there is absolutely no way the Twins FO is giving this 2 seconds of consideration.
  12. Major League Ready
    Have to agree that Headley make sense for the Giants. However, I was listening to the MLB network yesterday and they were talking about the Giants going after Scherzer if they lost out on Sandoval. Can they afford Scherzer and Headley? I believe in holding on to SP prospects but the Giants are definitely in win now mode. They might see Scherzer and Plouffe as via and a plan to get them back to the WS. Obviously, this is very pie in the sky but it is also the type of scenario where we could realistically sell very high for once. How good would are future look with Meyer, Berrios, and Beede on the near horizon and Steward not far behind? I would offer Plouffe, Milone, and Hicks for Beede and an A-ball player. That is a bunch of cheap talent that would allow them to make the necessary roster moves to go after Scherzer.
  13. Major League Ready
    There are two pretty obvious variables here. One, how confident is the FO is that Sano will be adequate at 3rd. I heard a couple different interviews prior to his injury that sounded like they were quite confident he would stick at 3rd. If they are not so confident, why trade Plouffe until that question is answered? However, if they are confident, we get to the second variable of the return. They have a window to win more WS and 8 of the Giants top 10 prospects are pitchers. If they are desperate enough to give up Beede, I think you trade Plouffe and fill in as needed until Sano's arrival.
  14. Major League Ready
    I hope Terry Ryan does not give up anything for a player coming of a year with an OPS+ of 84, especially at $10M$ plus a year and two years of control. Ricky Nolasco and Aaron Hicks, yes. With Phil Hughes, not even a consideration!
  15. Major League Ready
    How about if we get a guy who can play defense and provide leader? Let's start with ... can play defense.
  16. Major League Ready
    One thing that consistently seems overlooked here is that before Target Field, the Twins were near the bottom of the league in revenue. Yet, people want to make historical comparisons. They should be compared to their peers which has changed from Tampa, Oakland, KC, and Pitt to the Brewers, Reds, Orioles, and Rockies. Therefore, the first thing we need to do in this discussion is define "Off-season Aggression". Will the Twins be aggressive if the outspend Tampa and KC or will they be passive because LA, NY, and Boston outspend them. IMO, there are a number of people who post here that expect the Twins to spend like a big market team. What really blows me away is that approach fails often for teams that can afford several huge failures and still have the Twins budget to work with. So, why do we want to emulate that approach when we have a huge revenue disadvantage? Let's follow the STL model. They have been consistent because they develop players and make smart trades. Acquisition as opposed to retention of FA's has been very selective. We have to be even more selective than STL as they have a revenue advantage over us.
  17. Major League Ready
    After reading the scouting reports, I am pretty indifferent on Tomas and would much prefer watching a good defensive team. Given his body type and age, he might get even worse relatively soon.
  18. Major League Ready
    I watched the AFL Championship game on TV today and Rosario was really impressive. He went 4-5 with a HR, double and 2 singles. The HR was blasted pretty good, the double was a bullet over the RFer's head, the two singles were right on the button up the middle and in his 5th at bat he scorched a line drive but right at the RFer.
  19. Major League Ready
    There are several points of concern but I still like this kind of move in concept. By that I mean taking a risk an international prospect makes the leap to MLB. The FA contracts for proven veterans are requiring the years be extended to a point where it is almost certainly a problem, especially for teams with revenue levels in the bottom half of the league. It is also crazy to think about how much power this team could field in the near future. A team with Sano, Tomas, Arcia, Vargas, Buxton, and Dozier. Wow! If Walker pans out it would be really crazy. If the Twins were going to do something out of character this is where I see them taking a shot. It's also the only big move I see as being modestly realistic and fitting into a long-term plan. Let's hope this is where JP and TR take their shot. Sometime between now and 2015 you add Sano, Buxton, Meyer, Berrios, and Rosario and you have a contender very soon.
  20. Major League Ready
    The more interesting aspect of this conversation to me is the percentage of these 6+ year deals that end up being somewhere between bad and horrible. The rate of failure is actually good news for teams like the Twins because the high rate of failure provides small and mid-market teams the potential to compete. I think some are using what Mauer would get today is a relative measure of how the deal is playing out but that is a micro view. It offers little in terms of developing strategy. How most of these deals play out explains why teams outside the top 10 in revenue don't sign them. The question to me is how should the Twins use the revenue advantage they have over teams like Tampa and Oakland to improve on their models. That's how I see St. Louis. They just have about double the revenue delta in comparison to the Twins.
  21. Major League Ready
    For some reason quotes don't appear when I click on quote. Anyone know what's up with that? Anyway ... I was listening to the MLB network on satellite radio and it came up that Rasmus has some issues with attitude but the mention. I agree on the club option but if we were willing to overpay the 1st year, and the option was attractive enough, the extension might fly. Not likely but I would like to see this type of creativity at least attempted.
  22. Major League Ready
    Rasmus is a good candidate to take a 1 year deal to rebuild his value and he would have to like his odds of staying in the line-up here. My question would be is he a head case that we don't need? How about a 1 year deal with an option for a 2 year extension. That way, if he works out, he would be a trade asset as Rosario, Kepler, and others are ready.
  23. Major League Ready
    I would hope that Arcia has enough desire to improve that it would not require financial compensation to convince him to show up early and work on defense. I would also like to see him show up 20 pounds lighter.
  24. Major League Ready
    It is quite presumptuous to assume Joe Maddon has the skill set for the "top spot". That skill set is substantially different than the Manager position. Maddon has absolutely no experience is such a role to suggest he would excel in such a role. None if us know nearly enough about his abilities specific to this role to suggest it would be a good idea to reorganize the organization to accommodate a Maddon hire. There was absolutely no way someone with Jim Pohlad's business background was going to make that kind of rash move so it makes very little sense to be upset the Twins did not offer Maddon the top spot.
  25. Major League Ready
    I don't know enough about Tomas to say with any certainty he is the right move but he makes the most sense for rebuilding. It would be like adding another top prospect. The only bad news is that if he flames out he is a payroll burden that would be a problem for a very long time and that would detract from what we can do when we are contending again. He sure does fit. We could platoon Hicks and Schafer in center until Buxton is ready. That gives us a late innings defensive replacement and pinch runner as well. If Walker, Kepler or others work out one of them or Tomas becomes a great trade chip which adds additional fuel to the rebuild. If we get really lucky, Hicks finally finds it or Schafer breaks out. Neither one of them is going to become an all-star but they do have ceilings that if reached would net a good return given they are CFs. If not they remain good 4th outfielders. We simply don't have the ability to outbid teams with $75-$175M more revenue than us for Scherzer or Lester so that is a dream. It will also require 5-6 year deals so they will very likely be in their decline when we are ready to contend or are contending. I like the idea of bringing on Anderson as a bounce back candidate on a 1year deal with an option for a 2nd year or even a two year deal if the price is right. He could be the next Kazmir in which case we have a trade asset or even better, Nolasco gets back to his norm and we trade him if Anderson rebounds.
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