Major League Ready

The other guy I am wondering if we should be considering as part of that depth is Morris. Then, there is Prielipp. Maybe he can be our Gil. By that I mean guy that finally gets healthy and lives up to his potential.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out. I came to the conclusion a couple few months ago there was something in the works and what made the most sense was a collaboration among all the local teams. That conclusion was not popular with the people who insisted the Twins opted for a quick buck and did not care about the future. This sounds like a great long-term solution.

Thanks! Very interesting. However, I would think the reasons for bring in Lore are much broader than creating a TV network. That said, a Twins only product is not a solution for many of us, so it makes sense the Timberwolves, Wild, and Lynx would work together on a product. This would explain why they went with an interim solution.

Yep, I am with you. I don't know what to expect but I would ride it out for now given he is going in the right direction.

Kirilloff has been good of late so why now? He looks like he is making adjustments. Plus, I don't think the best plan for Wallner is to bring him back just yet. He was stinking it up in AAA until the last 10 games. They shouldn't bring him back until he demonstrates he can sustain whatever adjustments he has made. We are going to need him next year with Kepler likely gone.

You will have to elaborate on how asking Chpettit19 if he "would have made this announcement through Provus or would you have had a team official make this announcement". This seems like perfectly reasonable question. I also asked of him and other if they would have supported the announcement with information on your website as to where one could find these broadcasts? Would you have advertised this new service? Made announcements across multiple social media platforms? How about arrange an interview with one of the local TV channels? Email your season ticket holders? I leave room for the possibility they are completely this inept but it causes me to seriously question of their plan was to release this through Provus or if he jumped the gun in speaking about it. I asked the question of Chepittit19 because expect he would not enact a plan this inept. If I assigned this to a marketing intern, not that I would, I would expect a far more sophisticated plan. We all know this but to acknowledge that PBP guys don't make these kind of announcements and more telling, they did not in support of the announcement would cause an objective person to question if this was the Twins plan.

I guess the good news is there are signs of life from Matt Wallner. Last 10 games .333 / .450 / .970 1.420 OPS

Take whichever context you like. In the 40 years Dick Bremer was PBP announcer or across all of MLB, how many times did a team PLB person announce key organizational changes, new managers, 1st round signings, etc. Never, right? Was this a inconsequential announcement? Let's say they did something this unusual. Having made a business decision to drop the source of 20% of your revenue, would you have supported the announcement with information on your website as to where one could find these broadcasts? Would you have advertised this new service? Made announcements across multiple social media platforms? How about arrange an interview with one of the local TV channels? Email your season ticket holders? If this was their plan, they are incredibly inept.

You avoided the question once again. Your "answer" provides nothing that would tell me if "you would have made this announcement through Provus or would you have had a team official make this announcement" . That was the question. When you don't want to answer a question, you say it's no longer worth debating. Could it be that you know the objective answer is that there are two possibilities. One is that rolling out the news of a new broadcast program that eliminates blackouts would have been incredibly inept which points to that it probably was not their plan or two, they really are completely inept. Are you willing to answer the question or not?

You avoided my question. Would you have made this announcement through Provus or would you have had a team official make this announcement. If they told Provus no balck-outs were 100% certain they failed him but what he was told is not an official team announcement. I listen and watch a lot of baseball programming and I never heard his comments. Is this is really how they meant to announce it, I think their incompetent. As I said, I am not completely dismissing the possibility Provus was chosen for this announcement. I don't think that this is as crystal clear as you do. However, if their intent was to kick this off via Provus, the overall plan would have been incompetent for a number of reasons. They should have waited until they could tell people where and how to buy the subscription. The information should have been on their website immediately after releasing the information. They also should have had a social media campaign kicked off in the following days. They should have had an email campaign to season ticket holders and anyone who has bought merch on-line and St. Peter should have taken interviews with media. They did none of these things which means they either had a terrible plan or Provus jumped the gun. Yes, they should have done something to step-back the comments Provus made.

So, if you ran the Twins and were announcing something as impactful as a new method of providing TV coverage, would you instruct the Play by Play announcer to get the message out or would you have a team executive issue a statement? I am sure Provus was told their plan was to end black-outs and the plan changed. I leave room for the possibility they intended to have Provus deliver that message but that would be a really half-assed plan. If that was their plan, they might be as incompetent as you believe, at least in terms of business ops.

Man, you just know everything. The best way to do every single aspect of a MLB team. How is it possible you are not running a MLB team. Trades, roster construction, in game planning, medical, free agency, BOP strategy and everything else about the game and the business. I have been down this path countless times with employees of clients who think like you they know everything. Never once found that to be true. It's possible Provus was given permission to discuss this but it most certainly is not certain.

You are making an assumption. I have seen similar statements many times made by employees of clients who I know for a fact did not authorize them. I had to sign NDAs with every client to assure them I was not letting any cats out of the bag. This was big news, worthy of a press conference or official statement. While it's remotely possible Provus was authorized, this kind of statement is made my team executives, not broadcasters.

What do you think the odds are that happens in the next 4 months?

The first rule for anyone who has ever done this kind of work is to have the facts before drawing a conclusion. If I knew why they opted to wait a year I might agree with you. It's just really hard to imagine that they did this for no reason. I will be right there with you if it turns out they gain nothing by waiting a year.

The Padres have not produced exactly one 90 win team since the turn of the century and the Dbacks have not been a model either. That said,, their model looks good. The Twins were not prepared to launch their own channel. Perhaps they should have been but we can't judge this until we see what they roll out next year. I am not going to bitch that the Twins are poorly run because they did not throw their paying customers under the bus until we see their long-term plan.

All of this when your position is they should have told every customer we don't care that you have chosen services to meet all of your needs, you need to buy an additional service. By the way, we are doing away with every option that would allow you to bundle sports coverage with all of your other desired services. First rule in sales or any business for that matter is to keep your existing customers. When did the twins organization say they were doing away with balk-outs. Corey Provus is not a Minnesota Twins executive and he has no standing to make statements on behalf of the organization. He should have known better and I would guess someone from the Twins informed accordingly.

Streaming requires no commitment so anyone switching can move on if something changes. Bally's also announced the new contracts they have so anyone interested in switching would have assurance of the status of Bally's contract for at least the rest of this season. By next season this market will evolve and there will be new / modified options.

I did say Comcast did not need Bally's as much as Bally's needed Comcast, did I not. What's your point? Was it not reasonable for the Twins to believe these parties would work something out? Comcast is suffering from cord cutters, are they not? Is this not additional incentive for people to cut the cord even if it's in the form of something like Fubo. Comcast cuts the Twins and the Twins somehow don't care about their fans but had they cut every Comcast customer as well the customers of every other service that would be just fine. Sounds to me like the people who elected to not have coverage are mad that the twins did not throw paying customers under the bus. Somehow it would be good business to prioritize potential customers who have been unwilling to pay for coverage.

That's convenient positioning. People did not rush out and get cable. They had services in place and those services consisted of programming far beyond the MN Twins. The alternative would have been to force everyone of those Comcast subscribers and those from every other service to go purchase an additional service. The vast majority of these subscribers value the other programming and would have been forced to purchase incremental services. If that's not the case, switch to Fubo or DirecTV or whatever. What's the problem. Arizona's deal is $225. What if you are also a Suns fan or want other TV programmng? This type of deal has a limited audience because for many it's an incremental expense and it makes more sense to switch to Fubo or DirectTV streaming. BTW ... Comcast and Bally's really need each other so the Twins believing they would come to terms is not exactly far fetched. Comcast less so than Ballys but this promotes more cable cutting.

Thank you! The twisting gets tiresome. The original post complained that Comcast and Bally's only cared about the almighty dollar. Wow. What a surprise that a business is concerned about profit, Then, let's forget that anyone here could get the service if they were willing to pay for it. Therefore, they are concerned about dollars which of course is reasonable. Yet, somehow it's unreasonable for others involved in a business for the purpose of making money to be concerned about profit or for that matter survival in the case of RSNs and cable providers are getting hurt badly as well. When expectations are that other parties should do something we won't, there is no hope for logic to prevail.

Good point! It does seem a little silly to be outraged that a business is concerned about profit. Anyone here not care about what their job pays them? Anyone not want to make more? This situation was exacerbated by cable cutters. In other words, people concerned about money. I certainly don't have a problem with that choice but let's be realistic that the rub is money for everyone concerned, the teams, the RSNs, the carriers, and the consumers. Why would it have been more acceptable if the team had forced every current fan paying for coverage to be forced into the situation that prompted Riverbrian to start this thread? He sure did not seem to like it. Yet, the majority here seem to think it would have been just fine had the twins forced this situation instead of Comcast and Ballys.

I am wondering how all of the people who had coverage would have felt about being left high and dry had they dropped Bally's. Another broadcast company was not going to sign a contract without exclusive rights. Therefore, the alternative was to force everyone to buy a streaming service in addition to whatever service (ie. Comcast) that they were already paying for. Reasonable (not perfect) alternatives exist for those who opted not to pay for Comcast / DirecTV, etc. Granted eliminating blackouts for in market games would have made those alternatives better but I doubt a large percentage of those people unwilling to pay $139/year for out of market games were going to sign up for a package of all games, given that package was going to be considerably more. Perhaps not double but like somewhere around $240 and that's just the Twins. For most people the solution needs to address multiple sports. There are already streaming services that cover several sports and you can bet more are coming as the NBA and NHL seek alternatives. If Bally's and Comcast's can't agree to a solution, Comcast customers have many other alternatives. Isn't that what you do when a service no longer meets your needs?

He is league average for the year but 50% below average in May. Shouldn't they give significant consideration to how players are performing currently as well as for the year when making this type of decision. The stats for May are below. Margot has actually been slightly better than Julien. If Larnach can play the OF now, there is no reason for Margot to play against RHP and if they limit Margot to playing against LHP he will be fine. Of course, there is also the aspect the question of what's the best way to get Julien on-track. A reset in AAA is probably best for Eddy BTW ... Santana has been pretty decent the last 6 weeks. # Name Team PA BB% K% BB/K AVG OBP SLG OPS ISO Spd BABIP UBR wGDP XBR wSB wRC wRAA wOBA wRC+ 1 Max Kepler MIN 100 8.0% 16.0% 0.50 .281 .354 .506 .859 .225 2.2 .314 -0.1 0.1 -0.2 17 5.1 .374 146 2 Willi Castro MIN 117 9.4% 17.9% 0.52 .267 .342 .429 .770 .162 7.8 .317 0.3 0.2 0.0 16 2.8 .339 123 3 Carlos Correa MIN 114 8.8% 19.3% 0.45 .255 .316 .471 .786 .216 4.5 .291 0.1 0.2 -0.2 16 2.6 .338 122 4 Jose Miranda MIN 99 4.0% 13.1% 0.31 .280 .313 .462 .775 .183 2.4 .286 -0.1 -0.2 -0.2 14 2.2 .337 121 5 Ryan Jeffers MIN 103 6.8% 31.1% 0.22 .198 .275 .495 .769 .297 2.9 .208 0.4 0.2 0.1 14 1.8 .330 116 6 Carlos Santana MIN 103 11.7% 14.6% 0.80 .242 .330 .407 .737 .165 2.5 .250 0.0 0.1 0.0 13 1.3 .325 112 7 Trevor Larnach MIN 73 8.2% 20.5% 0.40 .209 .274 .388 .662 .179 0.7 .208 -0.1 0.1 -0.1 8 -0.9 .293 91 8 Kyle Farmer MIN 38 5.3% 18.4% 0.29 .235 .316 .324 .639 .088 3.0 .296 0.1 0.0 -0.7 4 -0.5 .292 90 9 Byron Buxton MIN 51 7.8% 29.4% 0.27 .213 .275 .383 .657 .170 5.9 .267 0.4 0.1 -0.3 5 -0.8 .290 89 10 Alex Kirilloff MIN 67 9.0% 31.3% 0.29 .167 .239 .383 .622 .217 1.6 .167 0.0 -0.3 -0.1 6 -1.9 .272 76 11 Manuel Margot MIN 60 6.7% 11.7% 0.57 .232 .283 .268 .551 .036 5.1 .265 0.2 -0.1 0.3 4 -2.7 .252 62 12 Austin Martin MIN 15 6.7% 26.7% 0.25 .214 .267 .286 .552 .071 7.5 .300 0.1 0.0 0.4 1 -0.7 .249 61 13 Edouard Julien MIN 85 11.8% 36.5% 0.32 .187 .282 .200 .482 .013 5.6 .318 0.0 0.1 0.8 5 -5.1 .232 49 14 Christian Vázquez MIN 58 0.0% 24.1% 0.00 .089 .103 .107 .211 .018 2.4 .116 0.1 -0.1 -0.4 -3 -9.7 .096 -44

The only OFer that needs to be moved up to AAA is Rodriguez. They don't have any utility prospects in Wichita making a strong case for a promotion. DFA Margot and bring up either Walner, Martin, or Keirsey and that takes care of it. Hopefully Brooks Lee pushes the issue but he needs to put together 6-8 weeks before we need to cross that bridge. When we do, hopefully they can find a trade partner for Farmer before the deadline if he plays well enough to merit a trade or he could be DFAed as well.