Zarathustra

This is the best way to put it. Well done. To those that would, with the benefit of hindsight, like to have played the market more I would ask, Have you ever been in a hyper-competitive housing market looking to purchase a house? At a point, once you see a house you like, you disregard (to a degree) the asking price, you disregard what else is on the market or may come on the market in the future, and you move decisively within your budget. After the dust settles, you may or may not have overpaid relative to the market, but it doesn't change what you now have, and if it suits your needs, you should be content. The prices (and this includes opportunity costs) are only going up in the long run while you wait. The Twins had a significant need. They had a healthy budget to fill that need. That need was filled by these signings. Let's move on with the business of contending.

1) I put this at 70 / 30 the Twins don't sign / sign Tanaka. Last year it would have been 90 / 10 and two years ago, 99 / 1 (the Nishi experience stings, in addition to deep-seeded organizational tendencies). But, although this isn't an apples to apples comparison to the Mauer signing, I suggest that a comparable tenor exists demanding this money be spent. Also, because the Twins have NEVER signed a top-flight pitcher to a sizable contract, the most effective way for TR and the Pohlads to demonstrate their sincere intolerance for what is taking place, knowing that starting pitching is and has long been now the team's greatest weakness, is to break precedent and do what it takes for Tanaka, damn the Yankees in the process. 2) Ok 3) Here is where if 1) doesn't come to pass, the Twins can still behave similarly to sway a disgruntled fan base. I put it at 70 / 30 that, should they NOT sign Tanaka, they DO sign a contract that surprises all of us, thought not necessarily with a FA pitcher. Remember, this team will be VERY cheap to field in a couple years as it is composed currently and is planned to be filled-in. 4) I'll plead partial ignorance, but can't they save potentially millions of dollars on the back end by holding Sano off for part of the year? If so, I foresee several post game questions asking when Sano is coming up being responded with phrases like, 'we don't want to rush' and 'he still has some things we'd like to see before we move him up' and 'the Major Leagues are a big step up, we want to make sure he's ready'. And, partial/total insincerity in the comments aside, I don't disagree with the decision. I don't want to see Sano walk in 2018 because he's too expensive. That's when we're going to the WS! 5) I'll take that bet, Nick.

Although the two posts above take it further and say there is, if demonstrable, a legal basis for enforcing verbal contracts, my point (and I chose my words carefully) wasn't that accountability meant charging someone with a crime, or suing them for 'our' stadium money back (although in some cases e.g. Miami, I would like to see it happen). I said they - the Pohlads, TR, even Gardy (remember the quotes from that '06 era when the Twins got bounced) - made a public contract and we, the fans - not lawyers or legislators - should hold them accountable. While they certainly don't answer to me, they ultimately answer to us. I offer that the best way to hold them accountable is a distortion of the starfish on the shore story. I'm sure several who read my comment about my declining participation responded 'B.F.D. - I'm sure the Pohlads miss you'. However, enough fed-up starfish being thrown back into the sea and we just might make some waves. Why do people excuse what's happened/ing? Participation isn't equivalent to fandom. I've read TD several times a week since its inception. I used to read Nick's pre-TD blog every day. What I don't do since '10 is buy mlb.tv (I'm out of market now), licensed apparel, or attend games when I visit MN. Go Twins.

I'm a different dude and, sorry to disappoint, am not even a real student of Nietzsche. I thought it would make for a fun, appropriate handle since forums, at least excellent ones like TD, should be about the pursuit of Truth. And calling Mauer soft.

The original post was already too long, so I stopped short on a few things. Now that it has some daylight in between posts, I hope you'll humor my adding a bit more: 1) I mentioned watching/listening to 162+ games each season during the 02-10 run. I'm not fair weather. Heading into the 2010 playoffs (homefield against the Yanks remember?), I made a commitment that if the Twins didn't make it past the first round THIS time, I would significantly reduce my investment in this team until they gave me reason to do otherwise. My participation has declined, in kind, since. And why shouldn't it for all of us? I support the institution, win or lose, not the ownership and the flagging performance of the product they disingenuously trot out. 2) The argument of the breached public contract holds outside of the vacuum of team performance. In other words, if the economic return to the tax payers could be demonstrated to be a net profit on their stadium investment (an impossible to prove metric either way), it doesn't matter. If the Pohlads had ended up losing money after the stadium was built (a distinct impossibility), it doesn't matter. The entire exercise of stadium building was predicated on the idea that the it would bring added revenue, spending, and results - a change on the field come October from what we had been experiencing. Have we all forgotten this? That was the mantra when Torii walked, when Santana leaving was a foregone conclusion, and when all the inside and outside free agents came and went unsigned since. Money doesn't buy championships, but better (read: often costlier) players could have benefited this team throughout. 3) When money was spent ('10 and '11), it wasn't spent wisely. Accountability is, again, the thread. Bill Smith is out, but we've been told that TR was instrumental in many moves/non-moves while not GM. Also, Gardy had no influence on the composition of these teams? The reason these non-diamond-nine individuals are also well compensated is because they should have high standards of performance. How have they performed relative to the public contract? Thanks for hearing me out. From a ND native, MN resident through those fat years, now a DC resident, I can't wait for things to turn around for our team. But to do so will take some measure of real accountability. Seriously, Go Twins.

This thread is about accountability. There are phases being thrown around, as has been the norm these last three painful seasons, such as 'steady hand', 'short-cut', 'panic', et al, and while they certainly relate directly to the debate about how best to remedy the downward spiral on the field, they don't necessarily address a key aspect of accountability away from it. What has challenged the endurance of my fandom most during this stretch (and I was a 162+ game watcher/listener consistently from '02 - '10, good and bad) relates to an accountability not being addressed here directly. It seems the collective memory has grown very short when it comes to our favorite team's new home. This team was right there in '06, right on the cusp of a real run in the playoffs after a series of progressing seasons, more or less. What we were told was that, until the tax payers of MN approved a stadium, the team was doomed to failure. In other words the OWNERSHIP wasn't in a position to succeed without a stadium. This wasn't implicit - these were the drums beat time and time again. BUILD IT AND THE TWINS WILL COMPETE! So, let's recap what happened: Target Field (which I love, BTW) Cost: $522M; Ownership Share = $125M; MN Share = $397M Player Payroll 2006: $63.3M...2010: $97.6M 2011: $113.2M 2012: $100.4M 2013: $82M (Prospectus) Revenue 2006: $114M...2010: $162M 2011: $213M (Forbes) Franchise Value 2006: $216M 2011: $490M (Forbes) As far as I'm concerned, the ownership made a public contract when they entered into the stadium agreement with the taxpayers of Minnesota. They explicitly stated they would increase payroll (which they did, albeit at an alarmingly decreasing rate) and they expressed repeatedly that the stadium would give them the flexibility to push the franchise forward. Where is the evidence? They were already winning division titles, batting titles and Cy Youngs before Target Field. They breached the contract and need to be held accountable. How do we hold those off the field accountable for what HASN'T happened on the field?