IndianaTwin

In terms of playoffs, I’d say we are already better, though only incrementally. 1. We have 26 year old Berrios vs. 25 year old Berrios. One could argue in favor of regression, but he should still be on the upside of his career. 2. We have 30 year old Odo vs. 29 year old Odo. One could argue in favor of regression, but he’s probably on the flat part of the career curve and he’s been remarkably consistent. 3. We have Pineda instead of a bullpen day. 4. We have 25 year old Dobnak with potentially a whole season under his belt vs. a 24 year old Dobnak with five career starts. And he could be outpitched by Smeltzer, Graterol, or others. Given the holes we had five weeks ago, I’m encouraged with what’s happened so far. With the amount of offseason left, I’m quite encouraged with what still could be.

Nice take. I suspect that a lot of this has to do with the unusual health that the Twins benefitted from with their starting rotation last year, but a sense that I had with Rocco and Wes is that they were really good at putting guys into a position where they could succeed.

Concur, Ted. I’d love to see someone take a step back and look for the trends they see since the new guys have come on. Here are a few hypotheses I’d suggest: 1. An emphasis on new approaches when it comes to staff (Rookie manager Baldelli and his emphasis on rest, a pitching coach from the college ranks, etc.) 2. A reluctance to back themselves into corners with long-term moves. We’ve yet to see a contract more than three years, right? Folks may grumble, but I don’t think we’re going to be grumbling about having four years left on an overpriced contract. 3. An emphasis on making multiple moves that nudge the needle as opposed to making single big-splash moves. For example, last year included five free agent signings in Cruz, Schoop, Cron, Perez, Gonzalez, and six if you consider that Pineda was really a 2019 signing. I didn’t count the trades in July 2019, but in both July 2017 and July 2018, they made a higher-than-average number of trades in comparison to other teams. 4. Often getting a little more, sometimes using options to do it. This is related to not backing themselves into corners. Rather than committing to two years to Cruz and Perez, they sign them to a year with an option. Then, they make the smart choice on picking up Cruz and walk away from Perez with very little outlay. In Cron and Schoop, they effectively did the same. By signing non-tender guys, they effectively got two years (or more of control), but decided at a later date that they didn’t want the additional years. If I could summarize what I’ve seen, it would be to say that there emphasis is on incremental change that keeps options open. That’s not everyone’s style, but it happens to match my preferred method of managing life, so I can say I like it a lot. I’m also intrigued to see where we end. It’s only Dec. 5, and I think there’s still a lot of moves they will make.

Goulik, I’ll accept your rebuttal and add another data point. Last year, the Twins spent more than $50 million on free agents (I’m including Pineda’s entire $10M in that figure, because even though he signed the previous winter, it was really with 2019 in mind, anything he provided in 2018 was a bonus). They just did it over six guys — Cruz, Gonzalez, Cron, Pineda, Perez, Schoop. Naysayers can bellyache that they didn’t break the bank on a huge signing, but I see the wisdom in spreading the risk. And now we receive word that in addition to shrewdly getting Odo to accept the QO (after having shrewdly trading for him a couple years ago), they’ve supposedly shrewdly gotten Pineda for 2/$20M. So they’ve spend $28M so far for next year. I’m like many in saying that I hope they still get MadBum, but even if they don’t, I’m still okay, because I have a pretty high degree of confidence that they are going to have a couple more smart adds.

It’s been 25 years, but I’m remembering something like most of these. Remember that it was the mid-90s. Allison, Bostock, Carew, Disco Dan Ford, maybe Eric (Soderholm), Frankie Sweet Music, Gaetti, Hrbek, Don’t Remember, Don’t Remember, Kirby/Killebrew, Lombardozzi, Marty (Cordova), (Al) Newman, Olivia, Pagliarulo, Quilici, Rodney/Radke, Sorrento/Stahoviak, Tony, Uhlaender, Wynegar, Don’t Remember, Yount (needed some help), Zoilo.

Rotoworld.com on Yimi Garcia of the Dodgers. I mean, formerly of the Dodgers: "While he pitched primarily in low-leverage situations, the 29-year-old hurler was actually quite good for the Dodgers in 2019 -- posting a 3.61 ERA, 0.87 WHIP and 66/14 K/BB ratio across 62 1/3 innings. He was only projected by MLBTradeRumors.com to earn $1.1 million through arbitration. Garcia should generate plenty of interest on the open market and it would be surprising if he didn't wind up with a major league deal."

Moustakas to the Reds.

I don't remember ever not liking baseball, and it was sealed by being a seven-year-old in 1973 as Hank Aaron chased Babe Ruth. I remember coming home from school each day to check the paper and see if he'd hit another. My older brother was a Cardinals fan, so I started in that direction, with Lou Brock as my favorite. Sometime during the 1973, the man who would become my brother-in-law convinced me that the Twins were a better team to follow, and tuned me in to WHO Des Moines ("coast to coast, border to border, and then some"), which was a key cog on the radio network, and I latched on to Tony Oliva as my new favorite player, since Paul had dibs on Rod Carew. I was a die hard as a kid during the 1970s, with a particular highlight on June 26, 1977, that I wrote about in a Game Thread intro at: http://twinsdaily.com/topic/26496-game-thread-twins-indians-62517-1210-cdt/?hl=thread. Interest waned a bit for me during high school in the early 1980s, but I was sucked back in in 1987 and will go on record as saying that I was optimistic enough in spring training 1991 to have changed my answering machine to provide daily updates on how good they were going to be that year. Though being a Twins fan has been a constant since then, things were certainly cemented when my first son was born. My wife was working evenings at the time, so that gave me the opportunity to teach my son the alphabet by explaining that "B is for Bostock, C is for Carew, D is for Disco Dan Ford," etc. It worked, and he's become even more of a geek than me, though living in northern Indiana where Cubs games were on so many days when he came home from school has sentenced him to that lifetime of misery. I would be remiss, however, in not taking the opportunity to also give props to Twins Daily. This web site has taken a Twins fan to an entirely different level. Thanks, all.

We had the regulars — turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy, salad, rolls, etc. But let’s be honest. That was all just warm-up for my wife’s pumpkin pie.

“...he’s turned himself in to a decent/quality 3B...” So if the 30-year-old has improved himself to 0 DRS, why would we assume the 26-year-old at -5 can’t get there?

Since this discussion has morphed into talking about both corners, it's worth noting that the Rays have DFAed Jesus Aguilar, who is one year removed from a 3.2 WAR season. That would save money on Cron.

Great stuff, from someone who has rarely met a spreadsheet he didn't like. (Okay, that's not true -- I've met some spreadsheets which were done horribly, but you get the point.) I think the differences in state taxes could make a difference for wise advisors, but I'm not as convinced on the cost of living piece. The difference in the value of a dollar really only affects the amount they spend. For most people with contacts large enough for the state tax to make a sizable difference, they SHOULD be living on a small enough portion to be investing the bulk of it.

Nope, pay me. You live in California. Mine’s only 3.23 percent.

Context: 1. When Schoop was signed in December 2018, Sano had offseason question marks, having had the traffic incident with a cop and had missed the end of the 2018 season. 2. At the point Schoop was signed, Gordon was not considered ready, and Arraez wasn't generally seen as an option. Without those, Gonzalez was probably their best option at 2B. 3. Sano would miss the first part of the season, meaning Gonzalez had to fill 3B for the first month and a half. 4. When Sano returned on May 16, Schoop had started 36 of 42 games at 2B, allowing Gonzalez to start 30 of 42 games at 3B. 5. Through those 42 games, Schoop's OPS was .823. That's impressive production from (mostly) the 7 hole on a team that would have an .833 OPS for the year in a league where the average OPS was .762. 6. Though Schoop would only start 64 of the remaining 120 games at 2B, he still ended up with an above-league average .783. His presence allowed Arraez and Gonzalez to move around, spelling others and allowing the team to start someone other than Cave when Buxton got hurt. So no, Schoop didn't carry the team offensively, but he wasn't asked to. What he did do was fill a significant hole without tying up future money. And from what I can tell, while playing well defensively. I also don't recall hearing anything negative about him as a clubhouse presence. I don't know what their other options were on the free agent market at the time, but I think it worked out quite well.

In constructing my blueprint, I tried to blend my own style with that of the current management, which seems to 1) seek out value; 2) stay away from long-term commitments; and 3) not spend a disproportionate amount on any one player. I also like to go with known quantities and maximize flexibility. All that said, here’s your starting lineup for your 2020 World Champion Minnesota Twins (at least for eight or so random games scattered throughout the season as Rocco keeps playing Roster of the Day, but you get the picture): 2B: Luis Arraez (0.6) (L) SS: Jorge Polanco (4.0) (S) DH: Nelson Cruz (12.0) ® RF: Max Kepler (6.3) (L) 3B: Miguel Sano (5.5) ® LF: Eddie Rosario (8.9) (L) C: Mitch Garver (0.6) ® 1B: Eric Thames (5.0) (L) CF: Byron Buxton (3.5) ® That brings the starting lineup in at $46.4 million. During the offseason, I did dangle Eddie Rosario in trade, but wasn’t able to get what I wanted in return, namely a starting pitcher. I sent a very nice Thanksgiving basket to Jonathan Schoop and gave him the cell numbers of all National League GMs. Similarly, I gave serious consideration to re-signing C.J. Cron, but decided to save a couple million by non-tendering him and signing Eric Thames at $5M instead. In seeking flexibility, I like the idea that Thames can also play some corner outfield. In reality, he’s keeping the seat warm for the midseason arrival of Rooker or Kirilloff. As mentioned above, I do like known qualities, so I reminded Jason Castro of the very nice 3-year, $27 million contract we had offered him a couple years ago. He said, “Thank you very much, and yes, I would be glad to continue mentoring the fine folks you’ve put together. I’ll take that $6M contract you’re offering, particularly because you’ve added the optional second year at $5M, with a $500K buyout.” Marwin and Ehire will be back as well. The remaining outfield spot will be a spring training contest. The prime candidates were Jake Cave and LaMonte Wade Jr., though I also took a flyer and signed Benny (The Jet) Rodriguez to a minor league contract. Whichever one wins will bring my bench total to $18.6M as follows: C: Jason Castro (6.0) (L) U: Marwin Gonzalez (9.0) (S) U: Ehire Adrianza (3.0) (S) OF: Cave/Wade/Rodriguez (0.6) (L) When it comes to the starting staff, I re-emphasize that I don’t like long-term contracts. I also don’t like starting the season with a rookie in the rotation. It’s very difficult for them to last an entire season, and I know that this past year was an exception in having my top five guys get nearly the entire season’s worth of starts. Knowing that it was going to take a longer contract than I was willing to commit, I still stayed active on Cole and Strasburg, helping to drive up their contracts for other teams. That allowed me to circle back to a rotation that is built on depth while not overcommitting to any individual player. First, in remembering that Berrios doesn’t turn 27 until May, I penciled him in as my No. 1 starter. I thanked Mr. Odorizzi for accepting the qualifying offer and offered him a raise. That is, I offered him a 3/$45M contract, but front-loaded it for him to be $18M/$13M/$13M with an optional 4th year at $13M on a $1M buyout. I thought the freedom of having a couple more million to play with next year as my core hits arbitration harder would be a good idea. I like the guys with no qualifying offer, so I signed Dallas Keuchel at 3/$39M and Hamels at 1/$15M with a $500K buyout on second year at $15M. That rotation of Berrios/Odo/Keuchel/Hamels/rookie was looking pretty good to me until I was watching MLB Network and heard that Kenta Maeda is honked that the Dodgers are thinking about making him a full-time reliever. Turns out I was headed to SoCal for Christmas vacation, so I gave Andrew Friedman a call and met him for breakfast. Over eggs benedict served in a hubcap (because after all, there’s no place like chrome for the hollandaise), he told me that their folks still think Fernando Romero has potential. He was also seeking to shed a little salary and pick up some prospects. He showed me this spiffy web site, baseballtradevalues.com, and we cooked up a trade that got me Maeda for Romero, Gabriel Maciel and Blaine Enlow. I feel loaded with young outfielders, and while including Enlow hurt, I do have a number of starting spots filled for a few years. Maeda is only guaranteed $3.125M for each of the next four years, but he’s got heavy incentives. If he gets 30 starts and 170 innings, that climbs to around $10M, so I slotted him in there. That gives me Berrios/Odo/Keuchel/Hamels/Maeda at $61M, counting the $500K buyout on Perez. For the bullpen, I started with the givens of Rogers, May, Duffey and Littell for a combined $8.4M. Romo agreed to come back at $3M. If I signed Wisler ($0.6M), I’m going to use him, and with that group of starters plus Dobnak, Graterol and others, I decided to slot Smeltzer in the pen to give me a second lefty. That left me with one more spot. I thought about going with the Rochester shuttle, but that’s going to be tougher to do with the 15-day IL rules, etc., so I scoured the list of available free agents. Michael Wacha was sitting at home playing PacMan when I got him on the phone in mid-January, a bit peeved that no one had called. He thought maybe I was calling to get a reference on Marcell Osuna, so he was impressed when I said I was interested in him. We switched over to conference call mode and May and Littell got on the line. They told him about how they had struggled as starters until they met the Mighty Wes. They sold him on being able to eat walleye-on-a-stick in the bullpen while waiting to pitch, and he almost offered to pitch without a contract. I reminded him that the MLBPA would never go for that and insisted that he accept a deal at $5M. That gave me a total of $17.6M for the bullpen. Mr. Pohlad was a little concerned when I brought that $143.1M total to him, particularly with some likely increases coming in future years because of arbitration, but I reminded him that we’d only hit that total if Maeda pitched well enough to get $7M in incentives, that we had some very manageable future contracts, that Cruz and Castro would be gone with their $18M, and that Odo’s salary would drop by $5M in 2021. He thanked me for a job well done and agreed to pick up the tab on all the donuts from the local Amish bakery that I choose to eat.

No matter how well he hits in spring training, I think it’s safe to say that he needs at least a few more days of Triple A “seasoning” or to “work on his defense at 1B.” Probably about 16, 17, whatever it takes to avoid a full year of service.

Also, don't forget the time value of money on your first example. I did a simplified version of an investment calculation, and at a 7 percent return, 30-30-12-12-12 virtually matches 20-20-20-20-20. (I'm assuming Mad Bum can invest all of it and use the proceeds from prior contracts for groceries and new motorcycle gloves.)

Fourth tab, section 3.7.4, subpoint C.1.a. Or something like that.

This is not a Josh Hamilton or Josh Hamilton-post comment, but a general one to Sconnie and all the other moderators: Thank you. To have moderators make statements like "we should be empathetic of our neighbors" and "we are a community" speaks volumes about this site, and it makes me grateful to be part of such a group. That spirit comes through in all the work you do. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

What I take away from Sconnie's comment and the insights from BigGentleBen is that empathy doesn't have to be an either/or situation. Empathy for others isn't a zero-sum game. In other words, it's possible to have empathy for both the daughter and wife AND for Hamilton, but for different reasons. My son has dual diagnoses (not involving addictions, at least to our knowledge). He has made choices that have had negative effects on others (not violence), and I will empathize with those people who have been negatively impacted. But to my dying days, I will also empathize with my son, even while not condoning those actions, while trying to help him find ways to reduce/eliminate his negative behaviors, and while attempting to hold him appropriately accountable.

From Rotoworld.com... The Twins are expected to issue a one-year, $17.8 million qualifying offer to right-hander Jake Odorizzi, according to Jim Duquette of MLB Network Radio on Sirius XM. It doesn't come as a surprise, but Odorizzi has a decision to make as he stares free agency in the face. The qualifying offer tag could make a real impact on his market. It's possible Odorizzi returns to the Twins, if not by accepting the qualifying offer, but on a multi-year deal with a lower AAV. Odorizzi, 29, is coming off a strong year in which he posted a 3.51 ERA and 178/53 K/BB ratio over 159 innings. SOURCE: Jim Duquette on Twitter Nov 4, 2019, 3:28 PM ET

Guess what song just played on the oldies station I'm listening to...

Thanks. So what might that look like? Good as he's looked, I don't think there's a realistic likelihood he starts in the major league rotation with only 5.1 IP in Rochester to date and 9.2 IP with the Twins, none of them in a start. I also don't want to see him start the season in the bullpen. So how about something like about 18+ so starts at Rochester, targeting about 100 IP? For context, he had 47.2 IP in 9 starts this year, so that's a smidge longer outings. (With the new 26th man on the roster full time, will teams still get to add a player for a DH. If so, I could see him using a start or so that way if the opportunity arises). And obviously, if he's pitching lights out and the need arises at the big club, you consider him in the context of your other options. That takes you to around July 10-15. At that point, assuming he's earned it and the team is in contention, consider bringing him to the majors for the final 40 innings or so. If he hasn't or they aren't, go ahead and fill out the 140 or so with minor league starts.

Have you heard the 140 IP limit "officially" referenced in relation to Graterol? Or just making that assumption based on past patterns? (If the latter, I don't disagree with you, and I'd probably make a similar guess -- I'm just curious if there have been actual statements to that effect.)

Let's hope his career can still come together one piece at a time...