tobi0040

I actually like the vesting options. Obviously not as good as a team option. But the risk with a 35-36 year old pitchr is health. If he is pitching 200 plus seasons then that risk is zero.

150 to 1 seems like a nice wager actually. If Nolasco reverts to career norms and Ervin puts up a similar 4.00 ERA....and Meyer pulls a Harvey/Wheeler I could see us winning the division. Then we are one of 8 teams for a 150 to 1 payoff.

I would not have been thrilled if the Twins made this signing. $13M a year for ages 30-33 corner OF. He is already a negative defensive player (-2.1 dWAR the last two years). And I don't think his offense offsets that. Career OPS + of 103.

For me, $12M a year for a guy that will get you 100 IP better be as one of the top pitchers in the game while healthy (same pay as a $24M pitcher that pitches 200 IP). Mccarthy has not been. Maybe an 8 start stretch right before becoming a free agent....

Exactly, happens every year to every team. If someone can tell me one time in Twins history when the rotation on April first was the same as July first I would be surprised. I think ultimately Ervin takes starts from Pelfrey, Milone, and some AAAA types. Had they not signed Ervin, the Twins would get 30 starts next year from someone other than the five guys.

Agreed. I am not going to make a huge deal of signings some starters. Very few world series championship teams have a rotation completely made up of in-house developed players. I think the Twins had a pipe dream of that happening. Five young studs who are cheap and propelling us to a championship. I think it is a sign of progress that they re-assessed the strategy and made a change.

One would hink Nolasco and Ervin don't need a ton of guidance from their catcher. Pinto could catch those guys.

Mccarthy and Ervin both made their debut in 2005 and are about the same age. Mccarthy has an ERA of 4.09 and just 980 IP. Ervin has 1,880 IP with a 4.17 ERA. The two guys got essentially the same deal. Looks to me like that is too many years for Mccarthy.

In the case of Meyer, I think the plan with him all along was to delay service time. He is a Boras client and will never accept a team friendly deal or for that matter an extension before he hits free agency. They have set themselves up to have one of the most talented pitchers they have had come through their system locked up from ages 25 to 31 for about $25M. As difficult and hard it was to not see him last year, I can now see some wisdom in that approach. He was on 80 pitch limits and they didn't wan to burn a year of service on a year like that.

Diehard, My post was in reference to Mccarthy, someone said they would rather have him and I was refuting that cliam based on Mccarthys sub 1,000 IP in 10 years, in addition to his actual production. I agree Ervin is a workhorse.

Liriano was not coming back here. I don't think either side had genuine interest. Ervin is better than Hammel, almost a half run better career ERA. Hammel's career WHIP is 1.39. He hasn't been nearly as durable either. Granted two years versus four...

I don't neccesarily agree with that. It is clear to me with hindsight that Meyer was not coming up unless he lit the world on fire and we had to bring him up. He did that for 3-4 starts...but never did really did it. I think the Twins either wanted to suppress his service time or they wanted to give him a full year and manage pitch counts, and didn't think doing so at the big league level made sense for his development. I lean towards suppress service time. They didn't want to waste a year of control on 80 pitch count starts. Now we have a talented Boras client from 25-31 under full control. We know he is never giving us a discount and he will be a free agent at 31.

I just think it is an irrational worry that five guys are going to not need to be replaced, sent down, and stay healthy. Honest question. When has that ever happened?

Three years from now, I think Meyer and May will either be in baseball or they won't. They will either be really good or they won't. And I don't think whether they get starts on April 1 or make 5, 10, or 20 appearances out of the pen first will matter at all. The issue and bigger risk I have with the let the young guys play from day one is depth. Nothing I have seen from Mike Pelfrey makes me ever want to see him start a game for the Twins again. Same with the AAAA filler guys we have or will pick up between now and February. The reason you sign Ervin Santana is so that never happens (in addition to making your staff much better). Ultimately, We will likely have 30-40 starts next year made by guys that are not Meyer, May, Nolasco, Hughes, and Gibson. I would rather see them to go Ervin than the alternative.

But the blocking argument applies to May as well. Not just Meyer. But the moral of the story is things change. Here is a brief list of assumptions we are making regarding the blocking argument: -2014 Hughes is the guy moving forward. He has battled health issues in the past. We are assuming he is healthy again. -Gibson is a major league pitcher. He ended the year with a decent ERA of 4.43, especially given it being his first full year up. I think he is going to need to k more than 5.4 people per 9. -May is the good May from 2014, not the bad May. The guy has struggled a ton with control the last few years. If that pops as an issue again he will be in AAA real quick. -Ricky Nolasco is the pre-2014 guy. The numbers are not indicitive of a larger health issue. -Meyer is healthy and the Twins want him up here on April 1. He gets his BB's under control. -Nobody will need TJ, have a bum shoulder, etc. including Ervin Santana. I am not predicting any of things. But one of them or some other unforseen thing will happen. We will need a 6th starter and odds are before June 1.

I think we will have to disagree. I have lived through guy after guy being penciled in as a lock in the winter and seen any number of things happen every year. What we know in December is always completely different from the reality of the following June. It happens every year. The blocking argument has never been a problem. I think many are nervous since Meyer didn’t make it up, but I think it was never in the cards. Nobody thought Pino was a better prospect than Meyer. Here is a brief history: In 2010 we had Blackburn, fresh off an extension and a good 2008-2009. Back to back 200 IP at 4.00. Young guy, going to take a step forward. He went out and put up a 5.42 ERA. In 2011, Duensing was locked in. He was our best pitcher in 2010. Pavano was always going to be good because he had the one good year. Liriano was back to being Liriano. Blackburn was a bounce back guy, they made excuse after excuse about his arm and it taking away his best pitch, hitters were sitting on his fastball but he was healthy now. Duensing put up a 5.23. Pavano’s ERA jumped to 4.30. Liriano’s went from 3.62 to 5.09. Baker and Liriano only pitched 134 IP each. Blackburn had an ERA of 4.49 and only pitched 145 innings. In 2012, we had hope Liriano was going to bounce back. You could pencil in Pavano for at least a league average 4.50 type ERA and he is an inning eater. Duensing was a guy we needed to give a look, bounce back guy. Well Liriano put up a 5.31 ERA and logged 100 IP. The new found health did not seem to help Blackburn, he had a 7.39 ERA and logged 98 innings. Duensing proved to be more 2011 Duensing, 5.12 ERA and only 109 innings. Pavano, well proved to be not a guy that could log innings OR be productive (6.00 ERA in 63 innings). In 2013, Scott Diamond was our best pitcher and going to the guy, he was locked in. Big Pelf was brought in to stabilize the back half of the rotation. Gibson was going to emerge. Huge upside potential. Diamond put up an ERA of 5.43 and only logged 131 Innings. Gibson struggled as most rookies do, 6.53 ERA in 51 innings. Pelfrey was awful. 5.19 ERA in 152 IP. In 2014, Ricky was the a huge get. We were making excuses for Pelfrey. 1st year back from TJ….then he hit his groove for 6 starts, then he wore down….We could get help from the farm as early as June. Deduno was actually pretty good the year before. Maybe he was a gem we found. Ricky had an ERA of 5.38 and was shut down, only 159 IP. We got a whopping 23 innnings of 7.99 ERA out of Pelfrey. Turns out he isn’t any good. And Deduno’s ERA jumped to 4.60. In my humble opinion, having one extra guy that starts April 1st getting quasi starts in a long relief role until he steps into the rotation is a fine strategy. It could actually be a great way to break a guy like Meyer in. Not to mention the depth and talent upgrade Ervin provides. I clearly approve.

I think the picture will be clearer. Theoretically, one of the two could get 30 starts. The other could have 50 bullplen appearances, or 10-20, then move to the rotation and get 15-20 starts. If that does not happen, it is on the Twins and was likely going to the case whether or not we signed Ervin.

Of the pitchers you listed, Ervin is better than Porcello. Healthier than Kazmir and Latos. And almost all are going to get more than four years and $55M. Cueto, Zimmerman, Jeff S, Price, and Greinke could all get in excess of $100M, some approaching $150M. The reality is we weren't signing most of those guys either way.

I guess the difference for me is that I think Meyer, May, and for that matter Gibson can be #2 or #3 starters in this league. But I know Ervin can. Huge difference. We just can't load up on I think's and hope they all turn out and stay healthy (on top of the others staying healthy as well). I think with the rotation spot, pen, inneffectiveness, and injuries. One of Meyer and May should earn a rotation spot on April 1 and hopefully the other will start appearing from the pen and transition to another spot when someone gets hurt or falters. Both could get 25+ starts or at least appearances this year.

Giving a guy that has averaged less than 100 IP over ten years and has a career ERA of over 4.00, a four year deal is wreckless in my opinion. His ERA in 2013 was 4.50 and in 2014 was 4.05. Even if we go off a small sample size in 2014, he still has the health issues. You can take a shot on the same production from Anderson or Masterson on a 1 year deal. Really no reason to give that guy 4-48.

I think as Seth alluded to, they have seen too many prospects get hurt and wanted to hedge. And Nolasco turned out not to be the guy you can pencil in for 200 IP and a 4.10 ERA that we thought. Granted the injuries weren't all pitchers, but seeing Buxton and Sano lose a year. Stewart was shut down, I think Meyer had some tightness in his last outing if I remember right. I think the lets just sit on our hands and wait for the future line of thought has changed. In hindsight, they should have offered a 30 year old Ervin 4 and 48. He probably would have taken that. But I guess I am not shocked that in ther first real foray into free agency, the Twins did not commit $125M to three pitchers in the same off-season (already had Nolasco and Hughes signed at the time)

I wanted to expand on the 2017 payroll. I agree that Ervin should not hinder absolutely anything moving forward. I count six guys post arbitration on the 2017 team. This assumes we extend Hughes at $18M and Dozier is making $10M. I think those are somewhat conservative. Mauer 23m Nolasco 12m Ervin 13m Hughes 18m Perkins 6.5m Dozier 10m Total 82.5m Potential/guys in the mix: Rotation Gibson Arb1 Meyer Rookie May Rookie Berrios Rookie Stewart Rookie Infield/DH Sano Rookie Gordon Rookie Vargas Rookie Outfield Hicks Arb1 Rosario Rookie Arcia Arb1 Buxton Rookie Pen Too many rookies to list If you assume every arb1 guy is still here at $3M and the rest of the roster is filled with rookies, I get a payroll of $102.5M. We had a payroll of $115M in 2010. A modest 1.5% inflation would allow for a $128M payroll in 2017. I have a gap of $26M. $12M off the books in 2017 (Nolasco) and $36M more after 2018 (Mauer and Ervin). The timing makes perfect sense.

Agree on McCarthy. He has not pitched 1000 innings and has been in the league 10 years. Not the type of guy you give a four year deal.

A team inching towards 500. Then add potential upside of Sano. Buxton. Meyer. May. And berrios.

Levi, They really missed on Meyer though. He didn't give up a single earned run for the twins. He was en fuego