Trov

A lot of guys I plan to follow this year on the team. Many starters and hitters. Should be a good team until those guys get moved up.

Reports are headaches but no concussion. He past all protocols.

The hope is will not need to get into the minors depth because the young core will be good to go for a few years. This gives time to rebuild the depth in the minors. Of course if there is a bunch of injuries, or poor performances it could be a few long years.

This happens many times even with seasoned players in their position. It sucks it happened but will not be last time it happenes. I did not see the play, but if Gordon is the CF it is his ball to call and Kepler is to let up to the CF generally.

I think we could make a trade with them, but it depends on how they see our OF guys. Kepler I think would be their most interest as he is proven to be MLB level play with good defense. His bat is not as strong as Larnach could be. Do we think the loss of defense from Kepler is worth the possible upside in pitching? Personally, if Padres would give up a starter for Larnach I pounce on that deal. Larnach strikes me as a guy that will not do much for Twins as he just lacks a clear spot for this season, and maybe next but he has others pushing him to take up his spot. Maybe we can get a 3 team deal involved as well. I think at this point Twins will want to see how first week or two play out though and see how they feel about the current rotation they have.

The only non-roster guy that may make team is Garlick for Rooker. Other than that I see no changes to 40 man roster.

A few comments. The innings thing mentioned you need to remember that very few starters pitch much more than 150 innings in a season. Only 39 pitchers threw more than 159 innings last season, and Twins had only 1 of them, Berrios. In 2019, there was several more pitchers that threw over 150, but not a ton over the 150, and Twins had like 4 guys, Berrios, Perez, Gibson and Odo. Big Mike was just below 150, and we as a team did just fine. Berrios and Perez were the top innings guys with Gibson and Odo 160 and 159. So to argue that we cannot win because it is unlikely people will pitch more than 150 innings, to me, is not backed up by data. Now, in terms of Manaea, I wish the Twins would have at least asked about him, but rumors are they did not even ask, which means either they are high on what they have, or they are low on Manaea. we know they have talked to Oakland about their other starter. I do not know if Twins were low on him because maybe his numbers were inflated pitching in Oakland, a pitchers park. It could be lack of years of control affected this as well. In terms of the prospects, it is highly likely we could have matched, although I do not know if Cavaco would be the IF that got it done. More likely Miller. Maybe Manaea does well for Padres and we look a fool for not going after him. Maybe not. Maybe we actually make deal with Padres now as they are starter heavy and need OF help. Finally, I find the hype on Petty interesting. He was a late first round pick, that some scouts had as a reach. Yes, he has the velo, but even with that velo he was still 13th pitcher taken, and 5th High School pitcher taken. Sure he may be a good pitcher in future, but to slate him as the face of a pitching staff right now is some major hype. He is 7th prospect in Reds, and was around there with Twins. Maybe he will live up to that hype, but high school pitchers are generally a gamble.

The only move that I think would make any sense would be Garlick for Rooker, unless they are hoping a pitcher can sneak through, or does not care. I am not sold on Rooker having any future. He is DH only, or should be, and does not do that well either. At least Garlick will not be a complete statute in the OF and has shown he can hit lefties so he can take at bats from Kepler for until the starter is taken out then let Kepler hit later in game and play defense.

Every team has a ton of If's every year. It is always if our best players can stay healthy. If our pitchers perform well. If our team hits well. I get where the writer is going with this, but every team has the if player x grows or plays like they did in past, or stays healthy. You have an if Buck stays healthy, which then assumes he will play at the MVP level he was last year when healthy, but maybe he will be healthy but return to his young 20's form and be below average offense. So that is really 2 ifs for one player. We have ifs on health for each player, and performance on each player. No team does well if their players play below expectations going into the season.

Please provide who you wish they would have signed or traded for, instead of who they have. Lets assume the deals would have been comparable or most likely slightly more in price, and the trades would have been similar or give reasonable hypothetical trades. Then, look at the end of the season and see if your plan or the way the Twins went turned out better. Then you can submit this to the Pohlads for your case as to why you should now be GM for the Twins. As you said, only time will tell, but to assume our rotation will be terrible and other viable options would have been better makes no sense. The past results of just about every FA pitcher, outside of Scherzer, has huge question marks of either health or coming off of career years with long sustained poor pitching. Maybe the likes of Rondon, Robbie Ray, Gausman, and many others will be good with their teams, but just about every FA had red flags, either coming off of career year, history of injury, or relying on past success hoping the last year was a fluke. So many people are down on the trades or moves not made, and just assume the young guys will have 0 success and the flier guys will have 0 success, not even looking at the fact that several of the top signings this year, Rondon, Ray, and Gausman have all had long stints of average to poor years only to have recent success, entering FA years. I am not saying those guys will flop, but pitchers are volatile and some will drop off, and some will bounce back.

The notion that Ryan will always match up against teams top arms based on starting opening day defies history. Yes, logic would say teams will commonly match up their 1 through 5 starters, but over a full season with injuries, off-days with teams skipping starts, or giving extra rest, double headers, and what not. This will lead to at times our 5 matching up against other teams 1 and vice versa. This does not mean we think he is our best pitcher, or that he will always get the start against other teams best pitchers. There is 162 games in a season, this is just 1 of them. We have no clue how other teams will adjust their starters based on their team and schedule, nor do we know how we will down the road. If this was a post-season series I would say it is a big deal, but really to me it is much to do about nothing.

To me people make too big of a deal on opening day starters. I understand the point is having your top pitcher and we would number our starters in order of talent, but after the first week or two the match ups with teams really get mixed up anyways. It is rare throughout the season teams will match up their number 1 guy every time.

I just want to point out about possible signings or trades, that in 2018, many would have loved us to trade for Chris Archer. Pretty sure many wrote about how we should. If we had, we would have lost on that trade as after he was traded he pitched terrible and was injured. The point is, pitching is volatile, they get injured, they fall off cliffs never pitching like they had earlier in their careers. Guys that looked to be on way to HOF just stop pitching well for some reason. I could list dozens and dozens over the last few decades that fit that bill. Some do it after they sign big deals. Everyone seems to think we would be better off with a vet late 20's to early 30's pitcher and assume they will be better than the young to mid 20's guys, simply because they have not pitched at MLB for long, or at all. Several years of decent pitching does not mean this year will be any better. The writer lists Cory Kluber as a signing made pre-lockout. He had a good first half last year, but injury again cost him. The last time he was good for a full year was 2018. Not much different that Archer. Rondon only good year was last year, his rookie year was decent. Many of the others listed, outside of Scherzer have had down years and outlier years. There is little reason to expect they will repeat their outlier year.

One thing I want to point out, the last 2 full season WS winners, not including 2020, where teams that no one expected even near the trade deadline to win it all. Specifically, last year, the Braves made a bunch of trades to fill holes that all paid off. That is not common for sure, but the point is, the FO has always pivoted when things were not working if they felt they had a chance. Last year was such a cluster of fails across the board early on that we had way too big of hole to climb out of. That being said, sure we did not bring in established FA pitchers, but history shows that is not the way to build your team on FA starting pitchers, most teams regret the deals they make by the end of the deal. Unless every young pitcher fails and both Bundy and Archer fails, I think they will be in contention this year. Yes, Sanchez does not make much sense, but it was needed to free up Donaldson to sign Correa. My guess when they traded Garver they did not plan to trade with Yankees, but Yankees most likely offered to take Donaldson for the SS, and the FO figured they could then use the savings to go after Story, who balked at our offer and Correa was the pivot. It is like people forget there are 30 teams all looking to do things with rosters and all the FA will just say MN is the place to go if they come calling. We have minor leaguers too. We do not see the progress that may have been made or how the team views the young pitchers. It is fully possible they see the young pitchers as better options than many of the FA out there. At some point the young guys need a chance, but if we always sign a vet to fill holes they never get that chance.

I know many have issues with lack of bringing recent established starting pitching, other than Gray. However, we have plenty of MLB, or near MLB ready prospects and brought in some flier options. With the contracts that the recent established starters got this year, I ma fine with not dipping into the FA market. We also do not know what the A's were asking for their starter right now. I give at least a b+ if not an A-. We locked up Buck to a contract that will not cost a ton if he keeps being hurt. We filled our SS hole, although for maybe only 1 year, but it came clear we were not going to fill it any other way and made a nice pivot. Too many people worry about the signings we did not make or trades we did not make, but never look at what we may have in the system, or how some long term contracts could affect us in the future beyond this year. Many long term FA contracts for pitchers have very low value after the first year or two. We also do not know if or what we offered any of them contracts and the specifics of them. Sure, if none of our young pitchers perform and the two fliers flop, then we can say we made a mistake, but if we signed all the top FA pitchers and they all got hurt or flopped we would say the same thing.

I am not anti-analytics, but I feel some take it to an extreme and that it is predictive of future performance. Many times I read due to this stat we expect something to change for this stat in the future, either better overall numbers or worse and use the term luck a lot. I will agree, the stats will show when there is outliers that it is unlikely things will remain the same, but it does not mean what will change, or it is actually will change. For example, years ago the Twins at the break were out winning their run differential and everyone said they will start losing game because of that, but very few address that the run differential could improve and only assumed the run differential would stay the same. Similar, for years I would read articles about Kepler and his hard hit rate was not in line with his BABIP, and we would expect his BABIP would improve. However, his numbers have basically remained the same his whole career. How many years will analytics people say he will increase his BABIP because not in line with hard hit rate? My point is, analytics is nothing more than a piece of data to look at and see if maybe luck played a role in the other numbers, but it does not predict future results. Even when you look at old school numbers we still never know if a player will be the same, worse, or better than what they have done, we only can take educated guess.

Gordon will break with team. His versatility on defense will carry. He can play all positions on defense, other than catcher. No one else on that list can do that. Although he may not be the best at them, he can be backup CF or SS if needed. That holds a lot of value. As for 4th OF I am not sure if Larnach will get it simply because Twins may want him to get regular at-bats. I think he would still get plenty of at-bats if he breaks with team though so I do expect him. I do expect Godoy as well with using Sanchez as normal DH they will want to have a 3rd catcher, although they have done the DH being backup catcher before without a 3rd so he is not a lock.

Good article. I know the baseball world has fell in love with high velo, and at time ignore good output despite the velo. Of course high velo can be effective, but it mainly just makes up for poor performance in other areas. Although I could never hit high velo, I believe changing of speeds and location is always more important that just speed. I have seen hitters turn 100 plus MPH around. For MLB hitters when you know it is coming and it has little to no movement hitters can do it. However, when a guy loses his velo and still is productive, I believe they will pitch for many years because they know how to pitch. They know how to work the hitter, hitting corners, mixing speeds and locations, keeping the hitter off balance. I have seen good hitters hit good pitches because they expected it. If I was running a team, you can start with velo for a pitcher, but if a mid to late 30's guy has been around with low velo and keeps being productive I do not care. I do not care if a guy pumps 100 or 85 MPH if both get an out, they both get an out. Now, I feel it is much more of a risk if a guy was throwing mid 90's then is only throwing 90 and has no track record of success with the decreased velo. To me that is where you need to be worried, because he has not shown he can get by with reduced velo. Smith has clearly shown he can do it.

If his bat plays at MLB level they will find a place for him to play. If he needs to move to OF, or push his way into 3B and push them somewhere. There are many guys that could have played SS but others were better so they took other positions. It is not like if Lewis is MLB ready he will sit in minors because other guys can play the position too. If he is the best player at the position he will play.

TOS is not a career killer per se, the article points out some it is, and what appears to the the more recent guys, but not everyone falls apart. No one really improves after it, but you also have to keep in mind there may be other factors like age that plays into it.

I do not mind the move, as a cheap flier that if he is not healthy or not affective he can be cut, but if he is healthy and can make any kind of return to his prime years he will be a great back of rotation guy. You are not counting on him to be a main guy. At this point he is more a possible depth guy that could regain something. I will not expect much from him, but who knows. What worries me most is that he had thoracic outlet syndrome. I read an article that claims most pitchers that get surgery for this do recover to previous performance prior to surgery, but there has been several big names that had big numbers prior to their surgery and no where near what they did after. It may be that they were already regressing for other reasons. I hope he makes a bounce back and can help us out, but not expecting much from him.

I do not want anyone in front of Buxton that will hurt his speed. His speed is one of the biggest tools he has. He turns singles into doubles and doubles into triples. I love Arraez for his .OBP, but I think he is better suited lower in line up because of his ability to hit all over the field. He is one where you can do hit and runs with runners on, or he will work counts to allow for steals if you have a runner that can steal. You put him on base in front of Buxton some times you will take extra base hits, or stolen bases away from Buck, which limits his scoring potential.

I personally would like to see Gordon get some type of a chance. He has shown in his career he takes time to adjust to each level, but once he does he hits above average, but with not great power. If he can add plus defense to LF based on his speed, and can hit decent, I think there is value there. I would love to see Gordon get a real chance to see how he does. Maybe we cannot afford that, but as pointed out, no one is clear LF every day right now.

I see Urshela as the backup utility guy and Arraez getting most of the starts at third, unless he is terrible on defense there. Miranda may get time there too. Maybe Urshela has a bounce back year, but that is less likely as he is getting older.

I personally have never been entertained by a manager or player throwing a tantrum. Umpires get balls and strikes wrong way too often. They put in replay to fix the calls they get wrong on the field, save for a few cases, but yet to fix the call they get wrong most, because it is hard to get right. Umps may be about 90% on the ball strike call, and even if you think 90% is good enough, they are actually around 50% on close calls. So they get the easy calls right 100%, but it is basically a coin flip on the boarder line calls. What makes it even worse, they will adjust what they call based on the circumstances. If the count is 0-2, and the pitch is close the ump is more likely to call a ball, just like if 3-0 they are more likely to call a strike. Also, if they just called it one way and a similar pitch location they will call it the other way, again if boarder line. To say having bad calls be made is part of the game and what is entertaining about it, to me means you do not like the game because you do not care about the players making the difference, but you want the umps to get people angry.