Major League Ready

No. maybe I misunderstood you. I was responding to when you said chpettit's last paragraph was not going to happen because they were not going to invest this year. I may have misunderstood because his last paragraph was about them improving their sales and marketing. You might have meant in the roster. No, I don't think you will see significant spending, especially long-term contracts. I think a new buyer would want to make any such decisions. That same principle might drive trading Correa if they could find a trade partner.

I could not disagree more. Making changes that a buyer sees as likely to improve revenue is very helpful in selling a company. Lowering operating cost is more certain to improve bottom line but improving revenue has considerably greater potential upside. We also don't know the whole plan. What if they intend to hire a marketing genius under Falvey. Putting someone in place to lead business operations is not the same skillset as leading the organization. They could also use a marketing consultant to form strategy and then hire someone to execute that strategy. I am with Chpettit on this one. It would be very advantageous for this organization to improve their ability to maximize this market.

No. I am definitely listening and have on several occasions written about the advantages of a higher payroll and even posted the results of all teams. History is clear this is true. We also definitely agree that elite free agents don’t take up as much payroll percentage for teams that are spending far more. You have pointed out a mathematical certainty and why the highest revenue teams sign the most expensive players. Here is where we differ. I understand and accept that the ability to spend more on payroll is driven by revenue. Every adult follows this principle every day. That’s not to say that teams should not occasion stretch payroll as far as they can. However, the appropriate way to study how teams in the bottom half of revenue have succeeded is not looking at teams with far more ability to spend. Did you notice the part where I tied this metric to spending capacity? You are hell bent on proving that spending is advantageous. We all agree on this. There is no argument. I am interested in learning how teams with the same or less spending ability have succeeded. That’s why I gathered this information on every 90 win team. Call success whatever you like. It can be WS winners or teams that have gotten to the WS or LCS or playoffs or 95 wins or 90 wins, we can use whatever measure you like use but looking for best practices in teams with $100M or $200M or $300M revenue advantage is conceptually horribly flawed. When you can't accept that revenue drives spending, you're going to be constantly disappointed.

I would hope he has learned from last year. He would have to be a blithering idiot to say anything definitive. What he has said apparently is there is room for a move. How does that infer a cap at a level we are probably already above with arbitration increases? At face value that would suggest there is some additional payroll capacity, would it not?

I was watching the match when McEnroe melted down and said to the chair umpire "you can't be serious" and I flashed back to that incident when I read Lewis and Jeffers for a guy with a 655 OPS. Lew for Perkins would be grounds to terminate Falvey but both is beyond absurd.

If losing Carlos Correa means they are on the same level as the WS, they have no chance of winning the division with him.

Using the number of wins/season is not a precise measure? Since 2006 one team (2015 Royals) in the bottom half of revenue has won the world series. If you want to only use 1 team to measure something/anything, go ahead. That would be a horrible methodology, but go right ahead. There have been (57) 90 win teams and (34) 93 win teams. I would choose to look at 34 or 57 teams because it is far more meaningful. However, both sets of data will tell you that the 2015 Royals did not pay a single player 25% of payroll and neither did any of the 57 teams that won 90 games. As a matter of fact, the royals highest paid player (Alex Gordon) made less than 12% of team payroll. I made absolutely no comment about if a team had won the WS with a below average payroll. That’s your focus and it's an entirely different conversation. I have been quite consistent in stating that the ability to spend 150 or 200% of what the Twins spend is advantageous and history would clearly support this conclusion. However, there is very little for teams with such a distinct revenue disadvantage to learn from teams with far greater revenue production. Is the disadvantage revenue or spending. Do you choose to spend less than Carlos Correa on a home or car or does your income dictate it? I look at teams by revenue. Payroll swings occur often and vary widely. When comparing the success of teams, it makes far more sense to compare them by spending capacity. If one team with similar revenue spends a lot more and wins a lot more the results will be telling.

Where is the "$130M cap" coming from. I can't imagine the front office failed to learn a lesson last year. I would assume they won't say anything even if they planned a slight uptick in spending because intent does not necessarily become reality.

If you look back I think you will find that my statement was less of "if they should" vs what they have actually done. It is a very rare thing when a mid-market team signs a Carlos Correa type free agent. The White Sox biggest contract is Benintendi's contract at 5/$75M. The Guardians is Edwin Encarnación @ 3/$60M. The Royals is Alex Gordon @4/$72M. Of course, the Tigers signed Prince Fielder to a 9/$214M contract which is a shining example of why modest revenue teams don't sign these deals. Of course, many teams have signed bigger deals to extend franchise players. Every Teams Largest Contracts

Which is why I expressly stated "Payroll Capacity" vs simply payroll. Would you not agree that they way to measure the viability of paying one player a large portion of the payroll would be to look at every team with X amount of wins or playoff teams and then see if they had a player that reached that threshold based on the team's payroll capacity. Judging payroll capacity is not exact but it would be reasonable to use a percentage of revenue. BTW ... I have stated more than once here that producing cheap talent enables free agent spending or extensions. If I was Falvey, I would have met with the Pohlads when they announced the salary cut and presented them with a list of 90 win teams in the past couple decades. The list would include the percentage paid to the top player and the top 3 players. That list would illustrate that teams are not successful paying one player 25% of payroll capacity and explained to them that this could be done this year but going forward they would likely have to raise payroll keep the roster together as a result of arbitration increases. The net he would have communicated is that payroll will have to go up a bit in the next couple years (26-27) if they want to keep their young core and Correa. Put a different way if they want to retain enough talent to contend. they will likely have to raise payroll back to 2022-23 levels. I say likely because it's possible the young pitching takes a big step up and it's possible Rodriquez, Jenkins and Keaschall change the equation making it feasible to trade Pablo Lopez and a couple of the more expensive arbitration eligible players.

The problem is not that it's a trick question. The problem is identifying anything less than winning the WS as a failure. Yes, it's the ultimate goal but nothing is going to make sense if the measure of success can be expected once every 30 years. Of course, that's assuming spending does not influence success. Any analysis of this type requires some assumptions. We can debate if 90 wins or 95 wins is success but nothing is going to make sense if you use a standard rarely achieved. We can certainly look at those teams as additional insight but it does not make sense as a standard of success. I gathered the roster construction and spending for free agents on every 90-win team in the bottom half of revenue for the last 25 years. Actually, I have set-up the data using wins as a variable so I can sort on number of Xwin seasons and overall winning percentage of every team. This provides a very good indication of how various methods of roster construction have succeeded. The teams that produced the most success from free agent spending significantly outproduced the average WAR per dollar spent. This should not be surprising.

If it's reasonable that would suggest it's a model proven to succeed. Name a mid market teams that has succeeded in the past 20 years while paying one player 25%. The closest would be the 2019 Nationals who were above average in revenue but not so far above that it negates any value for comparison. They paid Max Scherzer 21.5% of payroll. Their next two highest paid player represented a combined 22% so the three of them were 44% of payroll. The Twins will be paying Correa/Lopez and Buxton roughly 55%. If this was a good model there would be several examples of it succeeding. There are not. Actually, teams don't even try. The argument would be that front offices don't understand it's a good model.

This narrative that trading an established player means that the team should just go into a full rebuild is a bit of an overreaction. Did the Brewers "trade everyone else" when the traded Burnes after winning 92 games in 2023? No. They went on to win 93 games in 2024.

I have actually posted previously that Correa's salary was viable within a $140M payroll if they could produce enough pitching. In addition, I don't think they can trade him between the no trade clause and injury concerns, However, I can't come up with an example of a team that sustained any success with a player absorbing 25% of payroll. It's pretty hard for me to take a stance supporting something that has never or very rarely been successful so I would not take a position that we have to live with it if we could find a good way out like they did with Donaldson. BTW ... When I say 25% of payroll, I mean 25% of payroll capacity not actual payroll. Of course, capacity is harder to discern. If a team is spending 25% on a player but still has capacity to increase spending, that 25% investment is not impeding further additions or keeping players that are becoming more expensive through arbitration.

Correa would not bring a #1 SP straight up and you definitely are not getting the other pieces you mention so that trade is a fantasy. You have also just taken a position that an additional $17.5M won't make a difference. Yet your solution is to spend another $17.5M. Do you see the problem with your position?

I was thinking the same thing but here is why I don't think it happens. It would be done to reallocate the payroll to a position player(s). The problem with that logic is Pablo would be replaced by the 6th SP option so the drop-off in production (WAR) is going to be significant. What position has the greatest potential for gain. There are no glaring weakness where the money could be spent in a way where it would yield greater production than spending it on Pablo. In addition, Pablo is under control for 3 more years so there is no hurry. If, and it's a big if, Festa, Matthews, and Morris (maybe Prielipp/Lewis) continue to shine, trading Pablo away becomes easy. This could be done at the deadline or next off-season with the benefit of having more time to see if the pitching pipeline actually delivers.

$29.75M is coming off between Kepler / Farmer / Santana / Margot and DeSclafani so they don't need to cut other players to cover the cost of these increases. Therefore, it's not accurate to say "the savings don't have to come from somewhere" because the savings are already accounted for in expiring contracts.

If Buxton, Correa, and Lewis are not part of the five because of injury you obviously need the other 5 to play everyday. Then, you need a bench of players who can cover multiple positions and hit well-above average against RHP all on a very limited budget. Just not realistic and you get crushed by LHP and you have a team that can't match-up in the playoffs.

Cleveland has had far more 90 wins seasons than the other two. Detroit has managed only 4 in the past 2 decades. SanDiego has had some success recently but has been one of the poorest performing teams in the league over the last 20 years. They better in the next couple years because they are definitely not set-up for any sustained success. They have one of the worst farm systems in MLB and they are going to have a lot of dead weight going forward. Machado's salary goes from $17M this year to $25 next year and then 7 more years at 37M in his age 34-40 seasons. Darvish is 38 next year. They are paying Bogaerts through age 40. Profar and Arrez to free agency and Kim after next year. I would bet the Twins have substantially more success than the Padres over the next 5-10 years.

The Fangraphs rankings were quite different but the author chose to ignore them. There were 3 Twins (Correa/Buxton/Lopez) with higher fWAR.

The answer is not a strategy that yields two less wins and a weaker playoff team. More to the point. He has a no trade clause that he is highly unlikely to waive so what's the point?

Really? Let's do the math together. Player 1 produces 4 WAR in 80 games and we get 1 WAR out of his back-up. That's 5 wins. You will have to explain how taking the player that produces 2 WAR means they would be more likely to get in the playoffs. The scenario we just described would mean the team with player 1 wins 3 more games than the player you describe.

The same way Cleveland went from 76 wins in 2023 to 92 wins in 2024 without a significant trade or free agent signing. A little better health than the last couple years would help. They need to fill two SP spots between SWR/Matthews/Festa/Morris and Paddack need to be productive and reliable. Lewis needs to get back on track and a couple of the other young guys need to emerge as reliable bats. Wallner and Larnach looked like they could be steady bats. They are entering the stage of their careers where they need to prove they can be relied upon. E Rodriguez making the show early in the year and producing would be huge. He fills that BU CF role, provides speed / defense and a guy that can hit LH&RH pitching. He could be a huge difference maker. 250 games combined from Correa and Buxton would really help. Is this a reasonable expectation. IDK but it would sure help to not just reach 500 but 90 wins is insight if these two guys produce. I guess we should add Lopez pitching well to the list. The team has invested a large % of payroll in these three guys and it's almost a prerequisite they get production from them if they are going to contend for the central.

I will take player 1 and back him up with a player that produces 1 WAR and end up with 5 WAR instead of 2 and then hope that I have player #1 back for the playoffs which would significantly enhance the team's potential in the playoffs.

IDK that they are less willing to extend but they have not had the players to extend where Atlanta produced great extension candidates. They did extend Kepler/Polanco and Sano. I am 100% with you on the value of extending players. Just look at the value per $ of Jose Rameriz vs Carlos Correa or even Buxton. I am hoping Jenkins / E. Rameriz and Keaschall become great extension candidates. None of the current young guys look like great candidates with the possible exception of Lewis.