DJL44

I don't know why their intangibles would change. None of their personnel is different.

More likely they're heavily regressing the model than forecasting extreme outliers. 86 wins is not an outlier season. Every projection system should have to publish their error bars. Median projections are not that interesting.

All projection systems are wrong, every year. That doesn't mean they are useless. It is more interesting to figure out where the assumptions diverged from what actually happened. FYI - No projection system is going to pick a team to win just 41 games.

Me neither. Are you ready to hand him a roster spot without any real competition? Do you think he earned a roster spot with his performance last season?

Waiver-wire level talent is still pretty talented in the grand scheme of things. Diego Castillo, for example, filled in adequately when they needed him last year. Connor Joe caught the ball when it was hit toward him. Martin didn't. I think it's worth spending $2M to improve the defense even if it doesn't improve the offense.

I'm fine with giving both an infielder and an outfielder $2-3M and a major league roster spot. They shouldn't worry about cutting Helman or Gasper as both are waiver wire level talent. Maybe Zoll will figure out that he's allowed to cut players during the season and add new ones.

Martin couldn't play CF last season. Let's all hope he makes a dramatic improvement this offseason or we will see many more innings of bad OF play from Austin Martin in 2025.

If they're trying to win, yeah. It is completely unrealistic to think they can build an entire team out of pre-arb talent. They would have to be the best team in the league at drafting and developing in all of MLB by a wide margin. The other thing they could do with that money is sign someone like Duran or Jeffers to a contract that extends past arbitration. It's a huge, missed opportunity that they have ignored. The Twins are the only team in the whole league who thinks like this. It is one of the biggest weaknesses of this front office. They have to get better at assessing talent and making decisions in-season because right now everyone else is doing it better.

Age at debut Rooker 25, Bautista 23, Cruz 24, Kent 24, Posada 24, Turner 24, Martinez 23, Muncy 24, Ortiz 21, Garver 26, Altuve 21, Ramirez 20, Goldschmidt 23, Blackmon 24, Mullins 23, Pham 26, Taylor 23, Canha 26. So no, none of those guys made their debut at age 28. None of them are good comps for Gasper and Helman. Hell, even Casey Blake got a cup of coffee at age 25. For players who debut at age 28, if you're lucky, you become Chris Colabello. I wasn't thinking about pitchers, and they're different because they can move to the bullpen later in their career, but Scherzer 23, Nathan 24, deGrom 26, Kluber 25. None of those work either. Julien isn't dead, but his career is on life support. A 700 OPS with bad defense isn't playable. He should start the season in AAA, learn how to play 1B and see if he can re-learn how to hit. I have less hope for Martin because his defense was even worse, and he's never hit like Julien did in 2023. I mean, Martin was so bad on defense that he couldn't beat out Manny Margot for playing time. That's really bad. It is not impossible to find a useful player for $5M. Carlos Santana signed for about $5M. Donovan Solano signed for less than that. Profar signed for $1M last season. It's actually pretty easy to find a player under contract for $12M in 2025 who can help. You're right that there isn't much but it's not bare. I think Bader might get stuck without a team. His bat has dropped to Austin Martin levels but he's still an elite glove. They could use that in the outfield. I like Connor Joe, probably more than I should, but he'll give you solid bench play for very little money. Ramon Laureano could be useful. Jose Iglesias had a great season last year. Brendan Rodgers projects to a .720 OPS, is probably a better defender than anyone the Twins have for 2B, and he's younger than Gasper and Helman.

I'd rather start him at 2B than take the defensive downgrade at 2B everyday just to let Castro be flexible. Castro is also projected to be at least as good of a hitter as the other options, even though he's only projected to be an average hitter. Castro should be playing wherever he's a better defender than the other options. That means he should play a lot of 2B. If they can find another outfielder who can catch the ball they can play Castro there as the starter.

There is no future development benefit from the 5 guys I mentioned. I'm fine if they want to play Brooks Lee or Emmanuel Rodriguez. Those guys might get better with the investment of playing time. Michael Helman and Mickey Gasper offer no such benefit. 29-year-old AAA guys just don't turn into good major leaguers. I can't think of anyone besides Casey Blake who amounted to anything. Those are 1 in a thousand odds. Also - crappy vet does NOT have to stay with the team all season. Other teams have no trouble releasing veterans who aren't performing. I have no idea why the Twins have this paralyzing fear about releasing waiver-wire caliber veteran players. Here is where scarcity matters. Paddack is blocking pitchers in AAA who are probably better than him. He's one of the crappy veterans on this roster who is blocking the interesting rookies. However, there are many other teams who don't have 5 interesting starting pitcher prospects in AAA who would be happy to have Chris Paddack on their roster. He's not worth $7.5M to the Twins but several pitchers who are just about as good as him have signed for that much (or more) this offseason as free agents. It makes a lot of sense to reallocate the $7.5M away from pitching (where they have interesting rookies to try in AAA) to hitting (where they don't).

Margot is no longer on the roster. He doesn't save them any money in 2025. Vazquez is on the roster because he can play catcher. I am 100% in favor of taking the $5M they have plus the $7.5M they can save by dumping Paddack for nothing and using that $12.5M to add a player (or two) who will be worth a damn so they don't have to give hundreds of plate appearances to their AAA depth players.

Because Lewis at 1B and Miranda at 3B is worse defensively than Miranda at 1B and Lewis at 3B. As I look over the options, I become more convinced that Willi Castro as the everyday 2B is the best solution.

Do you want a list of all the potential free agent players they could have signed instead of Margot who were better than Margot? It's really long so I'd rather avoid making it. That's what I want them to do - sign someone decent. Crappy veteran vs crappy rookie is a false argument.

I am also wondering. They have to pick one of them. I suppose they can just rotate and play a different one each day, but they're still guaranteed to split 650 plate appearances between them. It's more likely that those 5 guys share 1500 total plate appearances. All it takes is one position player on the injured list and they're forced to play one of those 5 guys. There is ALWAYS someone on the injured list. Steamer Projections are out for each player Gasper .247/.343/.372 715 OPS Julien .222/.332/.365 697 OPS Martin .246/.339/.345 684 OPS Keirsey .237/.294/.358 652 OPS Helman .221/.286/.355 641 OPS Keirsey is the only one who can really play defense. Why do people want to "let these guys play" when the most likely outcome is 1500 PAs below 700 OPS and below average defense? They could go with Keaschall and Rodriguez instead. The outcome for 2025 isn't likely to be any better but at least they would be developing someone who could contribute in the future. OR they could use the resources they have to get someone who can put up an OPS > 750 or someone with a 700 OPS who can play premium defense. That's a 2 WAR improvement for this roster at a very low price.

One of those "The roof is leaking so we should burn down the house" arguments. They do serve a purpose: AAA depth. That's a real need. MLB players who are free agents usually don't have options remaining. They can't be AAA depth. The problem is one of those 5 guys is currently GUARANTEED a spot in the starting lineup. That's how little depth there is for position players on the 40-man roster. They should absolutely be looking to add another position player to the roster. They should try to trade Paddack for another one. There should be no worries about "blocking" anyone.

Mickey Gasper is your leadoff hitter? Ugh. First off, he's 29 years old (turns 30 in October), which means he's almost certainly peaked offensively and is likely to get worse defensively. For reference, Manny Margot was 29 last year. The projection systems are spitting out a .240/.340/.360 batting line for 2025. He's below average defensively at any position other than 1B. He's a below average runner. This kind of player is not an MLB leadoff hitter unless you're an expansion team. If they're going to spend those playing time resources on a player, they're better off seeing if Julien can bounce back.

Somebody needs to block the playing time of Michael Helman, Eddie Julien, Austin Martin, Mickey Gasper and Dashawn Keirsey. Those are AAA depth players, not MLB-caliber starters.

Ah, the famous our garbage players we don't want for your ace pitcher trade. I'm sure they'll go for that.

I would much rather have Lewis at 2B and Julien at 1B (or the bench)

Paddack has negative worth to the Twins. The kids in AAA are probably better. Trading him is addition by subtraction.

They haven't been particularly adept at picking over the leftovers. This year there seems to be a lot of players available in February who can help. Perhaps having an open roster spot will allow them to grab a couple useful players who want to avoid a minor league contract.

Not to mention the "regional" approach makes no sense in our global world. 100% sharing of broadcasting money (video and audio). 0% sharing of in-stadium attendance-based revenue (tickets, concessions, parking). That's the way to incentivize teams to try to put fans in the seats.

If you want Miller back you'll be able to draft him in the Rule 5 draft next December. He won't be protected.

It is important to realize that ZIPS regresses projections to the mean. It assumes that if a player is in MLB that they are good enough to contribute and will rarely predict people to have a negative WAR. Of course, in reality, negative WAR contributors happen all the time.