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Sorry, I was responding to your idea that Gordon still had a place on this roster. The ill-will was something someone else said but it sort of fit and I'm not always a disciplined writer when it comes to narrow, focused responses.

I'll add that the Twins should have guys playing more in 2024 than last year (even if they don't reach 140 games) because Lewis won't miss the first month. gimpy Polanco was swapped out for a full year of Julien, left field could be more settled than last year, and finally Buxton and Correa both look healthier than in 2023. OTOH we were lucky at catcher in 2023, 1B is still murky and Wallner is standing right where Miranda was a year ago, so we'll have to see how things play out. That said, I don't think this org puts much stock in the 140 game threshold, as Rocco is still thinking of how injuries shortened his career every time he fills out a lineup card. The FO thinks depth is cheaper and more reliable than ceiling and that's how they're moving. So is a lot of the league, so it's hardly a novel thought.

@rv78 Going "all in" and "commitment to winning" is simply a call for increased spending. There are Mets fans out there decrying Cohen for not going all in after he just got done spending like Brewster and got nothing for it. All In is just chucking the old shiny thing when it tarnishes and reaching for the next one. You sound like you should be a Yankees or Dodgers fan. Give it some consideration, you'll probably be happier out there. On the other hand you might not, because money really doesn't buy WS wins. Here's a list of the teams in the last ten WS and where their payrolls ranked. So money does not buy trophies because in the end the hot hand beats the rich hand. Look at that list: the top payroll only appears twice. You need guys who have won, who can win again, you need talent and you need health, and you need some guys to get hot and you need a little luck. There's some potato - potahto around your "performance" question, but there's no doubt whatsoever that depth wins a lot of playoff games. Last year the Rangers had ten guys get multiple ABs in the Series. In order of WS PAs we see that Semien played 162 regular season games, Carter played 23, Seager played 119, Jung played 122, Garver played 87, Heim played 131, Lowe had 161, Taveras had 143, Garcia played 148 and Jankowski 107. So that's four guys who played 140+ and that's a majority of guys who did not. 2023 ARI had five guys play 140+, 2022 HOU had five and 2022 PHI only had three. In 2021 ATL had six and HOU had five, which is higher than usual. (I'm skipping 2020 because the extra rest during that season reduced the importance of depth after a long season.) 2019 had WAS and HOU with four apiece. The Twins had no one last year with 140 games. That's a big deal, because it's really hard to reach the post-season without a lot of good players playing for six months. But in the right division in the right year it does happen. In the 1995 WS there were only three guys total with 140+ (Albert Belle, Fred McGriff and Chipper Jones) and those mid-90s ATL and CLE rosters were front-loaded with stars (and back-loaded with callow Mark Lemke and superannuated Tony Pena types.) But both went to the big dance because of depth. This year Altuve missed 50 games due to a broken arm (same as Buxton 2021 HBP) and Yordan Alvarez slammed his hand in a door and missed two months and Corey Seager is Byron Buxton and has only ever played 140 games three times in his nine years. Yet those teams won because they had backups ready to play and didn't have to roll out unripe rookies or well past sell-by veterans. Pitching matters of course, but pitchers always get hurt and depth there is a given. Last year alone MIL lost Woodruff, ATL lost Fried, Max Scherzer and Jacob DeGrom only threw 75 innings between them for TEX. The ultra-rich Dodgers didn't have anyone start 25 games and Kershaw led the staff with 131.1 inning, but they had depth to get to 100 wins. Depth.

Gordon got his shot and established his value before the team had Castro as a utility guy, before Farmer came as the real MI backup, and before Martin (and possibly others) started pushing up from behind him. There are better options now than his poor OBP and mediocre glove and the team had moved on. This likely isn't messaging or ill-will, it's the evolution of a roster and a guy getting squeezed by better and/or younger players. Rather than ill-will it's probably a favor to him to put him on a roster that needs more flexibility and places a higher value on his CF play. Best of luck Nick, you were fun to watch and a good interview which checks most of my boxes as a fan. (I'm a sucker for speed doubles, what can I say?)

So wait, fewer better guys, but no one that gets injured? Got it. Just staple that list to the end of the thread and we'll come back and see how it looks in a few years. BTW, no contracts over $350m, so that locks out a lot of the guys you think are somehow available to a flyover team like MN. This is going to sound condescending, but it's meant well: just about everyone gets hurt. Who do you think will sign some huge deal and then stay healthy for the length of it? Specifically, what names? It doesn't happen or they cost everything and the contract clauses all run in the player's favor. All pitchers will miss time in any four year window, and frequently it's substantial time. Fielders are less often on the major stuff but very often on the little stuff that diminishes performance but lets them limp through a year like Kepler's busted toe in 2022 or Correa's foot or Pujols' plantar fascitis or Trout's back or Judge's whatever (I'm working from memory) or Otani's elbow or WS hero Cory Seagar who is already hurt before this season starts or Cody Bellinger's random sucking or Altuve's broken arm or Bryce Harper's arm and the list rolls on, year after year. By the time you know a guy is reliable and excellent he's either locked up by his first team or getting older and breaking down. They want the most money just as they enter the time when their parts aren't young anymore, and for the few Soto guys the contract IS the sort that hampers team options. I think the Twins do OK with injured players when they know they are fragile. Have you read the Buxton deal? They are paying him something like half of what he'd make if he could be counted on for 140 games a year. Correa is getting more money, but after the fifth year (age 33) he has to perform to lock in those (diminishing) dollars at the back end, and he has to do it every year. If he doesn't have a starter's number of plate appearances (eg 575 in 2029) or finish in the top 5 for major awards then he's out on the market at age 34-37 coming off a bad year. We can sign him for less or be done with him, but he's only here past age 33 if we want to play him 500+ PAs a year, so not necessarily a burden. That's how to write a contract for an injured guy. They've also done a couple of recovery year contracts for Tommy John pitchers (Pineda, Paddack, maybe others) where they sign him for nominal money for the recovery year and get the first year back at a discount. These unicorns that make top dollar and perform to that level and don't get hurt, they don't change teams in their 20s very often. It's why the Soto deal was so large, why trading Betts was so bizarre for a wealthy team like BOS, and why teams with money write such absurd deals to get these guys. How many of those Freddie Freeman $162m contracts to 32 year olds (a guy who missed real time when he was 25 and 27 BTW) were you clamoring for? I would have signed that one in a minute, but he wouldn't have come to MN for that money, he wants to win. So keep in mind that this is harder than you think, that players who aren't "that way" are rare and expensive and not often available. The next time you wave your arms around like this be certain to include a few names and contract values with the rant. It'll slow you down and make you appreciate the challenge in putting a roster together.

The chaos in revenue streams is real, and wide-spread. Even if they know they only had to take a 15% haircut for this year there's still no certainty about 2025 and beyond, Chances are good that cable money will be even lower then so the next deal they get from Diamond could be lower still. This question is still open for the long term, and it's not clear that streaming money will completely fill that gap. I don't expect any answer for this until they open up the CBA after the 2026 season and work it out then, and that could be very messy. Consider this: no one has suggested a model that will replace all the lost cable money that's even remotely realistic. The best bet might be expansion fees, but that's a one-time cash infusion. Where is this magic 10% a year money coming from? Also, the deals people want to sign are mostly not for a single season, so they extend into these coming years of confusion. On top of that you need to start extending some guys like Ryan, Duran, Jax et al and you'll want to save some headroom for them on the 2026 payroll. Listen I know that it's frustrating to watch, but give credit to Joe Pohlad for the risks he's taken in the past year or two. They didn't predict spending that much in 2023, but they did it even though they were in the last year of their TV deal, even as this money question was not getting answered, even as their entire roster went on the DL in 2022. When Correa was available they wrote the check. They wrote the check for Buxton. They traded cheap young players to get expensive starting pitchers. It's not Carl Pohlad running this team anymore, so acknowledge the progress before dragging out your old Calvin Griffith hair shirt. The lamentations are tired.

I was pretty sure I had them right and then I see this. The streams were crossed and now I'm wrecked again.

Plus the move to high A is when pitchers start improving too. You get some separation between the throwers and the pitchers, and guys are better able to exploit poor plate discipline. He'll be seeing better arms and need to lay off the stuff that can't be driven, so I hope he's a guy that can learn. Perhaps our minor league staff learned their lesson with leaving Arreaz alone, and messing up Martin before leaving him alone, but the fact is it's not a lock that everyone makes that jump to plate discipline and a lot is rooted in a guy's willingness to listen and change. I don;t know anything about this guy, but I'm with @Doctor Gast and think he's as ranked about high as he'll ever be, so maybe move him on for something we need if any other org falls in love with him.

Regarding Nick Gordon's achievements to date, his fielding numbers weren't great in 2022 and he doesn't have the supporting seasons to indicate that his 111 OPS+ that year wasn't an outlier. In his entire minor league career he only hit over .300 once (in 21 games in the AFL in 2016), he has only reached .350 OBP at one stop (.381 in 42 AA games in 2018) and in his big 2022 MLB season his BABIP was .340 which was well over the league average. And honestly there's no reason to project it to come in above the MLB average of .306 for this year. In short, he'll have the spring to prove his glove still plays around the diamond and that his doubles power can offset his weak OBP skills. It may or may not get him in the lineup at Target Field, but as an audition for other teams he'll probably prove he's useful to someone.

Kirilloff will be fine if he's healthy, or he won't. It's on him, as he's got a clear open window to step up and claim his spot. Many guys never get a chance as clean as this one, so I hope he's ready. I could easily see the FO trading Gordon to an org that is thin in CF for a bag of balls and lunch money (which is to say a 19 year old "live arm".) It'll be a sign of how great an organization we are and how much we care for our guys, and free agents will talk about it next winter when they sign $2.0m deals to be part of this clubhouse. Miranda won't be traded even if he spends the whole year in St Paul. We don't have many RH bats near ready in the org and he can use this season to reset as a 1B/OF/DH to be ready when Santana leaves or fails or whatever. He has been the type of guy they like so he only needs to return to level after injury, and that's easy to imagine happening this year. Larnach is the one I have trouble seeing a future for. They'll certainly leave him in St Paul to work on things, but ERod is coming and other callow youth are on his heels. Even if there are injuries Martin has passed him for the next shot at a long term gig in the outfield. So unless he figures out a lot this year and hits the living bejesus out of the ball there's a real and frightening chance he's going to be on the Balakvoizspelling career path in a couple years.

Miranda and Gordon are both redundant on this 2024 roster (see Castro and Santana) so while they could make the squad I see Miranda's option as a ticket to St Paul. Similarly I believe Martin starts the season in St Paul to work on defensive consistency and doubles power and stays there until Buxton goes on the DL. Gordon's season in the sun came before they had Castro on hand, so I really see his opportunity coming in ST, not the regular season. So that kind of means the decision rests on the balance between how well Miranda plays and how easily they think they could get Gordon through waivers. I'm skeptical that other teams see Gordon as much more than, say, a less proven Bubba Thompson with a suspect glove in CF and no power to warrant any time in a corner OF spot. EDIT: Martin? Oh yeah, I should mention him. He's going to be a fine CF or utility guy. Maybe not great, but good enough to leave in the leadoff spot for a few years until someone takes it away from him. He'll see a bunch of pitches and run around on the bases and play defense where the openings appear. By June he should be here.

Some thoughts: There's a substantial chance that DeSclafani is not ready on April 1 and he stays on the DL or in St Paul to open the year, and at that point he'd need to pitch his way onto the 26 man. Great if he can, but better if he can't because it means someone else is throwing well with the big club. I am still curious to see how they clear spots on the 40 man to accommodate the new faces. Perhaps they do make a trade to shuffle the deck. It would certainly be good for guys like Gordon that are buried, but it could change where we see depth and risk. (Edit: here I am implying Nick gets traded, not that we somehow rid ourselves of enough 2B or CF depth that he becomes relevant.) Playoffs can be won with OK starters that make no mistakes and a huge pen that can defend small leads. Examples abound, but no matter how good the pitchers look on paper they have to avoid giving up multiple runs and the offense has to put some runs on the board. Modern playoffs don't require a ten inning Jack Morris shutout, just a solid outing that keeps one of the best teams in the game mostly off the board so your guys can stay within striking distance. These days it's high risk game of velocity and home runs, not 1968.

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Gah, I wish people would stop looking at BBTV for anything. Look at that from any angle other than MIN: Miranda isn't very young and has had one decent year and injury problems, DeAndrade is a single A toolbox and ranked well outside our top ten, Theilbar is straight up old and was running out of gas at the end of last year after missing May and June with an injury, and Luis Castillo is a stud being paid something near or below market rate. You might be able to pick up an average but injured #4 SP like Desclafani as a salary dump, but not a valuable player and certainly not a week after they already salary dumped from their starting pitching depth. And this whole discussion assumes that Snell outperforms the cheaper Castillo over the short or long term, which is not a given. BBTV is a plague.

Santana is here in a Gallo role to provide a floor under the roster they want to run out there. Last year they added Gallo and MAT because they had concerns about Buxton playing CF, their lack of power hitting, if any of the young corner guys were going to pan out, and a serious goal to never feature an outfield as bad as what disgraced Target Field in 2022. This year it appears they are not as concerned about CF but they do want a safety net under Kirilloff and Miranda at 1B. Santana isn't great but he's going to provide a good glove and unterrible hitting in the event that Kirilloff isn't ready and Miranda was a comet. And just to be clear I liked the Gallo signing last year because I too was worried that the 1B and CF and LF plans looked weak and wasn't too sold on Kepler's backups either. Solano was eventually signed but there was no guarantee he was going to do any better than Santana will this year. At any rate Gallo did do what was asked on defense and was kept in the batting order far past the point where he should have been. Good on Falvine for signing him, good on Joey for his glove and effort, frown on Rocco and Falvine for his playing time after Father's Day. For 2024 I want a guy in hand that can hit lefties, play a decent 1B and who won't act like a child if the kids do step up and claim the playing time. Gallo only did some of that last year and Carlos can probably beat his performance. I just want Rocco to learn from his experience so this can turn out better than last time.

Yeah, but no. For every time some guy comes out of nowhere to stomp you in the playoffs you have another case of Berrios getting pulled in the fifth. It all averages out in the end, and even if it doesn't you kind of don't care what the other guy does as long as the guy you get does what he's supposed to.

I don't think the Braves have the rotation depth to get rid of Fried and still get deep into the playoffs. If you remove him that puts a 1.0 WAR guy in the #5 spot (and even less lining up behind him in AAA) and assumes Chris Sale is going to fill a spot all year without injury and 400 year old Charlie Morton doesn't die in his sleep. In the NL East that's not going to hold up through Halloween. They can;t go that light in the rotation regardless of cost.

Always? Do you hear yourself? 2022 was only 18 months ago.

Good piece. The thing this latest news calls out is the instability of everything and how little time MLB has to assemble a far-reaching plan to replace the RSN revenue model. There's a chance that Amazon funding a good enough outlet for RSN streaming will blow up any chance MLB has of making their offering good enough to displace it. If a bunch of teams start opting for 50% of what they got before and MLB hasn't got a wide enough list of games to sell who will pay for their offering at, say, $25 if Prime can get it for you at $20? So much uncertainty, so little time, and not enough teams in trouble to slow the whole mess down. All but three teams have 2024 deals, right? Gonna be an interesting couple weeks...

@JD-TWINS I was with you until you claimed Gordon would head north with the varsity because he'd been a first rounder. We gots lots of those, but what we need are ball players and Gordon will need to hit to earn the big uniform. In fact Larnach and Martin and Miranda and Gordon will all be working to show they can hit in 2024, and the rest of the roster will be doing the same. We've got a bunch of guys that had bad years (Correa, Buxton, Vazquez, half of Kepler, Larnach, Kirilloff) and a bunch of others that showed one good year (Lewis, Julien, Castro, Wallner) and they all need to prove where their true level is. The division is a wasteland, so a clear path to the playoffs is open as long as they can play up to their potential talent, stay healthy and not get distracted. Draft pick history won't carry much water when there's a playoff spot on the line.

It's more than that, because that was true last year and they were still throwing cash around like drunken sailors. The difference this year is the uncertainty around so many teams' revenues. MLB has to get a broadcast plan out there in the next few weeks, or at least route the bones of what the plan will be to the owners, so that they can nail down their budgets and start making some plans. There are too many good players on the sidelines, and too many holes on teams that should be spending money to have things stagnate much longer. Moves will be made.

And this doesn't address the annual Who will be the reclamation find of the year? Last year it was Stewart, and this year's candidates include Staumont, Jenson and Stewart (who still has to prove that last year wasn't a fluke.) So there are more options than just these guys to populate the middle innings.

We haven't added the Solano (2/21/23) and Taylor (1/23/23) and Castro (12/20/22) and Gallo (12/16/22) vet augmentation to the roster for 2024 yet, and that's an important part of solidifying things to roll into the regular season. These guys aren't necessarily intended to play a lot of innings, but they really help keep the lights on and the momentum moving downhill when starters inevitably get hurt. We're talking about CF, the RH hitting corner guy and maybe an SP and another bullpen arm or two, but to date they've really only picked through the relief rag bin (Jensen, Staumont, Alexy.) In the past these guys were mostly added late in the winter, and that seems to be a few weeks behind schedule this year because of a slow market in general and the unsettled budget problem in MIN particularly. but there's plenty of time to make a trade: MAT came to MIN on Jan 23 last year, Pablo Lopez on Jan 20 and Correa on Jan 11 so we're still well within that time frame. It's way too early to complain or get too comfortable with the roster as it stands because we've never been ready to go a month before spring training. It's not how things have ever worked, so let it play out a bit.

I agree Ryan and Ober are solid MLB starters, so adding a young star or two to the current set really lines up the Twins for a bright future. I'd reach to get a Luzardo and also try for one more Miller/Woo/Keller type to fill in the back of the rotation to ensure we keep evolving as Grey and Maeda and such move on. But adding a short contract guy like Fried is pretty optimistic. If we don't have money to keep Polanco or Kepler then we're really going to face problems extending Fried followed by Ryan, Ober, Luzardo, etc. The notion of trading that much future for one year of a guy like Fried is not a solid plan unless we get to the World Series or we get an extension signed, and that extension not something ATL felt they could nail down. I don't see how MIN would do it when those deep and smart pockets could/would not. That's why I prefer spending more for more years of control (Luzardo over Fried) and especially so when it would cost a big chip like Lee. (Also, there's no way Luzardo comes to MIN for Polanco, $10m and Festa or SWR. Every team in MLB would make that deal in under ten minutes, which means that it's probably not enough. )

MLB did an excellent job creating BAM back when they needed to produce and stream their games. It's still out there, very capable and owned by Disney/ESPN, which provides an excellent foil to Amazon's interest in putting MLB games on Prime at some sort of discount. Bezos will get a chunk of games for this season to show what he can do and what he'll charge, but it'll just be a one year opportunity. In 2025, when most teams' rights are available again, I expect MLB to assemble most of those into a uniform package that can be sold in such a way as to remove most blackouts and attack the revenue collapse caused by the RSN demise. Whether it be Amazon, MLB.TV or parted out to someone else, that offering will be a big part of the new longer term revenue model for selling games to viewers. That's when we see the new world.