Major League Ready

I think you have a nice idea here and I think it would appeal to the Twins. The posting fee might not count as salary. Unfortunatley, the twins have to follow GAAP and I doubt the IRS would accept the accelerated write-off. So, it would appear the expense is going to be amortized over the lenght of the contract. In other words, the expense will be there but no recognized as salary. Of course, this is just my interpretation. I don't really know.

So if we could swap teams with the Angels or the Rays, which would you take. How about the Yankees or the A's?

As I said earlier, this raises some interesting questions. However, we don't have even remotely close to enough information to draw any conclusions. For starters, we are looking at a single year and there are many transactions and/or anomalies that could acccount for the difference. At first I though maybe theyhad an unusual way of accounting for revenue sharing but that does not make sense looking at the numbers and how do you account for the enormous difference in operating cost between the Yankees and the Dodgers? Bottom line is that you can't jump to conclusions about operating costs with the very limited detail we have at our disposal.

I am not sure how you are calculating these numbers. There is a 98M dollar difference in revenue to payroll with the Pirates and $123M with the Cardinals. The Yankees show a $241M differential and it does not show up as NOI. Regardless, I was asking the same question as you. Why does it cost substantially more to run one club over another? However, when you look at the reported NOI, it would appear it does. Why? We don't have nearly enough information to conclude anything.

Depends on how much variable expense is associated with the incremental revenue. I have not seen the financials but I suspect only a small portion is variable. For example, is there any varaible cost associated with the additional $25M in TV renenue the teams will be getting next year. How much of their alloted 52-54% the Twins spend has little to do with the Macro view of available dollars to acquisition the available FA talent. That is a micro prospective. It is a measure of their available budget right room now. It is a not a relative measure of their ability to spend vs other teams on an on-going basis. More importantly, our desired strategy should be the one that produces the same level of productivity for roughly $4M average for players on the 25 man roster as the $9M/man the Dodgers and Yankees can spend. If we were the Rays or the As we would need to figure out how to do that for roughly $3M/man on the 25 man roster. These ratios are not going to change much. So, I would suggest we should be really focused on drafting and development. When we get really good at drafting and development, we should sell high to continue to replenish the farm system. That won't be popular but there are a couple models that suggest it is effective. We should also follow the Rays model of locking up key individuals very early. This is a bit risky too but a much better risk than signing guys past their prime for big $$$. They might even fail at the same right but the mistakes won't cost nearly as much.

The incremental revenue has Everything to do with. I am making a point of market economics. You are calculating how much payroll room a specific team has at a specific point in time which has very little to do with how the total available dollars impact market economics . The point here is relative ability to spend on payroll and/or free agents. Total revenue is not germane to that discussion. The relative ability to spend is determined by the incremental revenue. If Team A has $50M more in revenue than Team B, they can spend and additional $2M per player on their 25 man roster. If two teams each generate $50M more than the Twins, collectively they have $100M in revenue more than the Twins to spend on their payroll. More importantly, when competing in the FA market those aggregate dollars represent the collective advantage of those teams in payroll/free agent spending. That’s the macro view. If you prefer a micro view … The cardinals have roughly an incremental $50M, they can retain or sign in free agency four players at $12M/yr where the Twins roster will have to be filled by a league minimum player. On a side note, the reported net incomes make no sense to me but without the detail that’s no surprise. I would not expect operating costs to vary dramatically but the reported NOIs suggest a substantial difference. Should the FO, scouts, travel, etc be substantially different from the Cardinals to the Twins? What is the variable expense? Yet, if you look at the revenue and salary information I posted earlier, this roughly 50% theme seems to hold true. Given it appears to exists in several teams, I am inclined to believe there is a reason

With all due respect, I think some of you are simply not willing to consider anything that challenges your assumption that the solution is spending more. You did not even look. The revenue is clearly listed but you were not looking for a comeback to support your position without actually considering the information. I put the numbers in a spreadsheet and pasted below. The aggregate incremental revenue of the teams above the Twins in revenue is $822M. The aggregate incremental revenue of the top 10 teams is $718M. If the 5 teams at the bottom of the list don’t convince you that spending is not the key to success, I don’t know what will. There is only a handful of medium size FA contacts among them. And, those contracts were put in place when they were ready to contend. The Twins spending before they started rebuilding is consistent with the teams nearest them in revenue. TEAM ------- Rev --- Pay --- Diff --- TOT Yankees ---- 471 --- 230 --- 257 Dodgers ---- 336 --- 217 --- 122 --- 379 Phillies------- 279 --- 165 --- 714 --- 444 Red Sox----- 274 --- 150 --- 60 --- 504 Cubs--------- 274 --- 104 --- 60 --- 564 Tigers-------- 262 --- 148 --- 48 --- 612 Giants------- 245 --- 140 --- 31 --- 643 Angels ------ 239 --- 128 --- 25 --- 668 CWS -------- 239 --- 119 --- 25 --- 693 Blue Jays---- 239 --- 117 --- 25 --- 718 Cardinals---- 239 --- 115 --- 25 ---743 Rangers----- 239 --- 114 --- 25 ---768 Nationals---- 238 --- 116 --- 24 ---792 Mets--------- 232 ----- 73 --- 18 ---810 Braves------- 225 ----- 89 --- 11 ---821 Mariners----- 215 ----- 72 --- 1 ---822 Twins-------- 214 ----- 75 --- 0 Orioles------- 206 ----- 90 Reds--------- 202 ----- 107 Brewers----- 201 ----- 83 Rockies ----- 199 ----- 72 Astros ------ 196 ----- 22 Arizona------ 195 ------ 89 Marlins------- 195 ------ 36 Padres------- 189 ------ 67 Indians----- 186 ------ 77 Pirates ----- 178 ----- 79 Athletics---- 173 ----- 60 Royals ------ 169 ----- 81 Rays -------- 167 ----- 58

Now you are just purposefully ignoring the point. Does the incremental revenue of the top 10 teams add up to an additional $682M or not? Collectively, these teams have $682M more in revenue than the Twins. So, if the point is ability to afford good but not elite players (ie. E. Jackson) Some of them can afford two more players of that type and some of them can afford several. No matter how you slice it or dice it, these teams generate $682M more than the Twins. That $682M/yr is available to absorb a very limited number of good or elite FAs. Put another way, however many $13M players the Twins can afford to employ, those top 10 teams can employ that many plus 52 more collectively.

MLB Team Values: The Business Of Baseball - Forbes: This link shows a delta of $682M for the top 10 teams. I had pasted the numbers from another source into a spreadsheet quite awhile ago and I can’t find that link now. That showed the difference was just shy of $800M. I see some of you honed in on an irrelevant portion of the post, that being the average/team. I guess that’s my fault because the average/team really had little to do with the point. The salient point is that those 10 other teams have an aggregate $682M to spend. All teams with revenue in excess of the Twins is $725M. The aggregate difference was meant to be the point here because that’s what the Twins have to battle in free agency and perhaps more importantly they have to overcome that difference in terms of production/dollar of salary.

The top 10 teams average roughly 80M more revenue than the Twins. That's about $800M in ANNUAL incremental revenue. They could be a bit more aggressive but they have to produce more per dollar spent. Top free agents simple don't follow that equation. Mid-markjet teams need to get production from risk/reward players (ie. Indians / Pirates) You would have to overlook a great many FA failures to say it is indefensible. There is a long list just from last year. Pujlos Hamilton Bourne Swisher (was not a failure but not exactly a difference maker either) Jackson Dempster Several other 2nd tier SPs The failure rate among FAs is very high. You can easily afford that risk/failure when you are one of the teams where an extra $20M is 15-20% of the incremental salary budget you have relative to the Twins. We should also not compare the dome years to the present and we should put the increased revenue in perspective (see above). Until 3 years ago the Twins were at the bottom of the league in revenue. It is not a surprise they did not spend back then. The first year in Target Field they spent $23M on Joe Mauer which they could have never done in the dome. This also put them in a position where they had $47M/yr invested in Mauer/Morneau. Adding a top FA the last couple years would have meant having $65M or more in three players leaving $45M for 37 other roster spots. Morneau and others are off the books now. So, let's see how wisely they can spend the available budget.

Meyer is on his way but Stewart and Berrios won't be here for what might seem like an eternity. The FO is feeling the pressure from the media and declining attendance. They might appease the media short-term until the story turns to the obvious. The obvious being one good starting pitcher is not going to make us a contender anytime soon. Let's hope they don't sell out our potential for a nice long run of good and potentally great teams for the sake of putting a passbale product on the field now. Pay big on 2-3 year deals or 4 years if absolutely necessary or go after a Tanaka. Our system is deep with very young talent. We will have the opportunity to trade prospects to fill holes 3-5 years from now.

I had a prettty good idea that was the case. It was evident not long after I started following this forum.

This was not my intended point but an excellent point none the less. Your point is actually a better depiction of the divide here. Everyone has their own idea of what should be done. That is very evident here and drives the debate. Some think signing Ellsbury would be a great move and others think it is a terrible idea. Some look at where we are and say fire everyone, we have not produced any good players. Others look at the situation and say, well, we didn’t produce any good players for a while but now we have a loaded farm system. Why is it better now? Do we still have refinements to make? Actually, Puck’s response perfectly illustrated my point. Of course, anyone can determine if they don’t like the food or the car. They might even have some constructive input on improving the food or car. However, to presume to know how to run the restaurant chain or the car company is an entirely different premise. And, I have no problem with the complaining. I hate the problem myself. I just think the tone should not be “those idiots in the FO” when there are likely things we don’t know or don’t understand. I fully recognize we do this in sports. You could even say it is part of being a fan. I have my own disgruntlements and believe some of the criticism is justified. To be completely honest, I support the FO because I have been in TRs shoes, not in MLB but organizations of the same size and a couple considerably larger. That experience tells me we all of us would have a considerably different point of view if we had full access and his experience.

No, it does not and the people here are very knowledgable baseball FANS. I emphasize fans for a couple reasons. One, we have a distant view and a fan's viewpoint. They are two different things but both result in a distorted viewpoint. Two, because we lack the extensive professional experience of the Twin's FO and Terry Ryan in particular. We can certainly question and debate direction, strategy, management style etc, and make a very good arguments for a different approach. However, the indignation that is so common here could be tamed down a bit. We are hobbyist and to presume we know more than the people with considerable credentials in this professionals is a bit naracistic. We don't need credentials on the internet. Everyone gets an equal voice. We need not have managed a P&L of hundreds of millions of dollars. We need not have negotiated contacts worth 10-100 million dollars. We don't need to have any management experience at all or degrees in finance or MBAs. We need no professional baseball experience at all to participate. However, if you don't have these credentials the first presumption should not be that the people who do are the ones who don't understand.

The organization failed at drafting, development and trading for a few years and now we suck. Anyone that has ever done organzational consulting will suggest that none of us are remotely close enough to conclude who is to blame or exactly the core cause of the failure. Smith and Ryan are responsible by definition. The question of why we are bad does not concern me as much as the question of if they have rectified the problems. They now have one of the best farm systems in all of baseball so I would be inclined to believe they have made some changes that are working. Part of that is their international signings. I certainly would not relax where drafting is concerned. Yes, they must be better at drafting but not because they won't as you say draft bigtime FAs. They have to be better because half of the teams in baseball generate more revenue than the Twins. Actually, I really can't conclude what they will do going forward where FAs are concerned. Until 3 years ago, the twins were at the bottom of the revenue rankings and bigtime free agents simply were not feasible. Spending last year would have been futile. Ryan made the right call where this is concerned and is still criticized by the same people who came on here and insisted the FO was incompetent because they did not sign certain FA SPs who ended up being bad or horrible. They also made a couple of agressive trades with Span and Revere. They also drafted heigher ceiling pitchers. Do I think the Twins management is perfect, not at all but alot of the things people won't stop complaining about have changed or are changing.

I think this is a very smart approach. The FA market is pretty darn thin and would be a big mistake to go 4 or 5 years right now. An agressive 3 year contract as you have suggested has a good chance of landing SPs that will make a difference without risking our future. One of the changes I would like to see instituted is to extend key players early in the careers like the Rays have done. I hope the are really agressive with Sanatana and Hughes on 3 year deals. Add those two guys and this is a much better team.

Nice job putting this together, Brandon. The first thing that came to mind for me like some others is that "ace" SPs are a significant advantage in a short series. I can also appreciate that you first have to get to the playoffs and this formula has worked. I am sure they hoped they had an ace or a couple 2s along the way but that has not happened. Of course, you can always rent a Jack Morris. The plan does not end with "solid starters". There are options once you get to the tipping point. My biggest complaint is that we have simply not drafted and develop much for pitching, period. For that matter, the entire farm system suffered from a few bad years in a row. Gunnarthor gave me a little different perspective but I would be calling for wholesale change if it we not for the fact the FO sure does seems they changed something because they have turned the farm system around. We are also drafting more high ceiling guys. I don't think we would have seen Stewart and Gonsalves picked a few years ago. I would still like to see them recruit some guys that have proven to be exceptional evaluators of SP talent.

This is a pretty pragmatic view but Mackey's point here is pretty sweeping. I do this type of thing for a living and it is essential to benchmark the organization and make adjustments. And, while there is definetly merit in a policy of hiring from within, it is also essesntial to bring in new talent with a fresh perspective. Their contribuition goes beyond their individual contribution. They can make everyone better. For example, we have been exceptionally poor at developing SPs for quite some time. IMO, this is the number one contributor to our futility over the past few years. At some point you have to either replace or supplement the staff that has proven to be ineffective in this specific area. I would be recruiting hard from the teams that have been effective and offering a handsome salary to attract those people. I would love to know what the twins have done in terms of melding scout with analytics. It is not much of a leap to believe arming scouts by training in quantitative analysis would make for a better scouting dept. These things don't cost much and the bottom line is competing against big market teams requires more production per dollar of salary.

He did not say it was the main problem. He said it was the most disappointing. They are two completely different things.

Wow! Did you entirely miss the point. I recognize the difference and actually started to point out the difference but it was already a long post an within the context of the point being made it did not warrant further explanation. I have written here in the past that Hughes is one of the few SPs I think is a realistic option. Obviously, Target field and the AL central will be benefit Hughes. I would consider it a good sign if we get him. However, it does not change the two points being made in the previous post. One, that there are very realistic options. The theorists here say just go do it. Two, Some of the names being thrown out as much better options are not necessarily better. (ie. Lincecum)

It is easy to solve our pitching problem when speaking theoretically. How many 1s/2s are available? Who would you get specifically? Let's keep in mind that there are only a couple teams in MLB that would not want to add a 1 or a 2 and they all have an extra $25M this year. Tanaka – I like the idea but I fear the TV money is going to make the bidding on him crazy. It would be great but it is unrealistic to think we are going to outbid several teams with far deeper pockets. Shields – KC has an option and will exercise it. Jimenez – He has been good this year but his 2013 ERA is about 2 full runs better than 2012/2011. That’s a bit scary but he is probably our best shot. Kuroda – Are we going to outbid the Yankees? Lincecum – His aggregate ERA for the past 2 years is 4.79. Not really even close to as good as Correia. I don't for the life of me understand the love. Hughes – He has been up and down. His aggregate ERA over ERA over the past 4 years is 4.66. Pelfrey’s 4 years prior to TJ averaged 4.27. Johnson is high risk/reward. Great signing if we have two others we can’t count on at least in theory. Lester – Red Sox have an option they will exercise Garza is a head case. He has not lasted anywhere because he is a clubhouse cancer. No thanks. Kazmir - Might be our 2nd best option. That is really thin folks considering how many teams will be looking for pitching. We have to be realistic that we will probably simply get outbid by one of the major markets. They only realistic target for us in terms of a difference maker is Jimenez if you accept that Garza is not worth the headache and his other teams have all come to that conclusion.

David Murphy has had an offf year but he has been a pretty decent player. What do you gents think about attempting to sign Murphy for outfield depth?

I agree but desperate times require desperate measures. On Pelfrey, I first wrote 2/10 but changed it thought back to last year and realized someone is going to give him 2/12. The FO made a mistake thinking he was going to a ML pitcher at the start of the year but he was decent the last half of the year. Pelfrey would not be my first or second choice but there is as good a risk that he will uptick this year as several of the SPs who got 6-7M last year. Many people here asked why in the heck Correia got 2/10. Well, he was better than some who got much more and a lot better than some who got the same or slightly more.

I actually think highly of Ellsbury. Unfortunately, the timing is absolutely horrible. Signing him or a player like him at this stage of team development and Mauer at the same age with 5 years remaining on his contract would be incompetent IMO. We can quibble over the definition of fact. I think there is ample evidence to consider it a fact that many FAs don’t don’t pan out from day one. An even higher percentage will decline substantially at the end of their contract and speed players are even more prone to decline in terms of relative performance. I don’t believe next year is lost at all. However, the original OP did not ask what “you” would do to be competitive next year. He asked “what would be your plan for bringing our beloved Twins back to relevance?” How this is interpreted is an illustration of the real basis for the different perspectives seen here. Some are all in / got to get better right now. Others are looking at it as a multi-year process. Next year does not look so bad to me if SOME of the following happen. Starting with position players because it is easier to project 1B – Abreu / Mauer / Morales / Morneau / Reynolds 2B – Dozier plays somewhere near his 2013 2nd half performance SS – Florimon – Will not hurt us if he does not get better but could be aleauge average offensively if he can learn to lay-off pitches in the dirt 3B – Plouffe gives way to Sano by June and become a utility player in the lineup against LHP or gets traded. C – Pinto does not have a sophomore slump DH/OF – Willingham has an average or better year DH/OF – Arcia hits as projected. Could be great if he learns to lay-off high heat. CF – Presley is no prize but can hold down center until Buxton gets here. As long as we are hoping …. Hick’s starts out well at AAA and makes it up by June. OF – There are several decent FA OFs. One of them on a 3-year deal might be a goiod idea. OF – Rosario start out hot at AAA and is here by June. Pitching – God helps us. SP - Worley or Diamond returns to meet expectations. I guess to quantify that means an ERA between 3.6 – 4.0. SP – Correia gives us exactly the same as this year. SP – Tanaka is the big move I think makes by far the most sense. The TV revenue increase is likely to make the bidding on him crazy so I don’t like our odds even if TR is aggressive. It could get out of hand. SP – Next best move would be a very aggressive 3-4 year offer to Jimenez. SP – Phil Hughes won’t transform our team but he would be a solid addition SP – Josh Johnson as the high risk/reward addition. SP – Pelfrey on a 2-year $12M contract. Insurance policy. He should be at least serviceable back of the rotation SP now 2 years removed from TJ. SP- Consider Swarzak or Duensing to move to a spot in the rotation. SP – Try Hendriks in long relief. Management – I don’t blame Gardenhire. He did not have the players to win and he did not get dumber since being MoY in 2010 and 3 times R/U for MoY. However, it might be time to try something new. The question TR needs to answer is if Gardenhire is the right guy to guide the development of Sano/Buxton/Arcia/ Rosario/Meyer/etc. The only thing that went right this year was Dozier’s second two-thirds of the season and Correia gave us what we expected. We are due for a handful of the positives above to come to fruition.

Wow, really. The common complaint has been for "big name FAs" That is not at all what has lead to Cleveland's success. They got a bunch of very cheap FAs. It’s called dumpster diving when the twins sign anyone who is not a marquee name. Kazmir … $1M Rayburn … $1M Hill …………. $1M Giambi … $750K Capps ……. Minor leauge / Not on the roster Franciso …. ? Minor Leauge / Not on the roster Hermida … Minor Leauge / Not on the roster Santos …… Minor Leauge / Not on the roste They did sign two relatively big names, three if you want to count Meters given they paid $7M/1YR for him. He has pitched 11 innings and is off the active roster. Bourn has stunk it up. The other (Swisher) is doing a pretty good job but he is played a modest part in the turnaround of this team. None of them got the 5+ year contracts required to get the players many feel are the only difference makers. The pitcher in their starting rotation acquired via FA (Kazmir) got by MLB standards got the bare minimum for a FA SP. ($1M) Had the Twins acquired just Correia and Kazmir the complaining would have been as rampant as Pelfrey / Correia. Masterson was traded for back when he was establishing himself. He is pitching above his career levels. Of course, he is in his prime so this is what you hope for. Jiminez was a shrewed trade. He was acquired when he was really inconsistent. Of course, he has good stuff and has developed consistency. McAllister came up through their system. Nothing to do with FA. They set a plan in action when they were bad to rebuild over the course of a few years.