Trov

With signing of Simmons I think it unlikely they seek Wong as well. That would drop our offense a ton, for much better defense on the infield, but will the increased defense make up for the much lessor offense?

I would pass on Bryant, unless there are plenty of other moves that come with it.

It really depends on what you value more, offense or defense? Offense Kirilloff is higher, but defense Lewis is. Lewis is not only defense but his is more of a wild card on what kind of offense he will put forward. Even if he cannot stay at short he should still play high level of defense and if he can be above average on offense he should be better overall. I really like Kirilloff and expect big things from him. However, he will be playing average defense at best from what I hear and so his bat will have to be extra special.

Essentially my point yes. Hopefully, we can start to set up a pipeline like Cleveland seems to have. I agree you never want to count on several unproven guys, but if you can each year cycle one into the 5th spot that is not a bad way to go. You can live with 1 unproved guy but not 3. However, we have seen over the years you never get through the year with just 5 regular guys but will need about 7 or 8 because of injuries.

I trust the Falvene duo to come up with what we need pen wise. They get paid the big bucks to do it, and so far the last couple years have been fine. Finding guys we never would have expected to have big innings on low cost.

One part of article that stuck out to me was, "that still leaves us giving the ball to an unproven pitcher every fifth day." I do not understand this sentiment. If you only want proven pitchers in your rotation then you will never have home grown pitchers. You will bring people through your system to pitch, because you will say, "well they are not proven so we better not put them out there." They will forever sit in the minors until they go to another team and get a chance. I am not saying who we have are ready to go, they may not be, i am not in the system knowing how close they are. My point is, at some point you need to have unproven pitchers in your rotation, and really if you can do it just one at a time I think that is a good plan. Would I be upset with a big pitching signing, no not at all, we need as much depth as possible. However, I would be fine with using some of our young guys to get a chance.

I doubt either will be signed. As pointed out the FO is not a fan of signing 30 year old relivers that are considered top of game. Too often they end up being overpaid, and managers feel like they need to put them out there in the type of situation they are paid for. Not sure Rocco would, but he did keep putting Rodgers out in saves when he had issues last year. Relievers are so volatile and at age 30 even more so. Both rely on velo, which is common for relievers and it will start to drop off at age 30 typically. How will they react to that? I know this front office typically shy away from these types of guys and piece together the pen with less expensive guys.

My wife is a Pirates fan, and it is sad to see how far they are falling and how quickly. They really need to sell the team to an owner that cares about the fans. They made their run with Cutch, but since they have sold off everyone. It is not even really a rebuild as the prospects coming back are mid-level. I do not know what it would have taken to get Musgrove, he would have been good fit at end of rotation. Kuhl would be good as well.

If it keeps him from an AL contending team great. He kills the Twins no matter what he was doing all season.

Of the list Paxton would be my preferred route. Not sold on any of the four, but Arch is a hard no.

Anyone else notice they are all 1 or 2 year deals? I wonder how many of the remaining FA are hoping for more than a 1 to 2 year deal. I bet many of the remaining guys have 1 year offers out there. I have been saying all off season, there will be very few long term deals. Most will be 1 or 2 year deals. This is because of COVID this coming season, still we do not know how much attendance will be there. The other is the CBA is coming up and I expect a work stoppage, with possible major changes to CBA. This could greatly affect what a bad contract could mean to a team. With all the unknown it is hard to agree to long term deal.

This is the exact reason I never would spend big on a reliever in FA. They are so volatile and many times get over paid. Yes, there are some guys that end up being worth it, but they are so few and far between. Closers were the thing for awhile, but teams learned the save was a such a loaded stat. I will never be upset for letting bullpen guys walk or not signing top guys. So often they end up being way overpaid.

Kluber signing for Yankees is no big deal, if he is washed up, unless that leaves a hole in rotation. I was willing to take a flier on Kluber, but being the shoulder issue was not connected to issue he had year prior it is bit of a risk moving forward. I think Yankees will be regretting Lemahieu at the end of the deal. Maybe not because he will be playing 2nd base or moved to 1st by then or DH and their stadium is still a little league sized park down the lines. I just have a feeling as he ages his numbers will drop and like many he will be overpaid. The international guys I know nothing about, but take little stock that they are SS now, as Sano was signed as a SS to. Lets hope 5 years from now we are talking about them being top young guys ready to help.

I get the steroids issue for Clemons and Bonds, but until there reported use, they were HOF players. They may not have put up the numbers late in their careers like they did, but even if you take away a couple of late years they are still HOF players. Also, if roids were as wide spread as expected, late in their careers with everyone else they were essentially on same playing field. I am not defending their use, but they should be judged by their peers at the time they played and they were two of the best at that time. If Hall wants to make an example of them, then put them in a special wing that says they used roids. I mean if you want to eliminate all that used you will be taking a lot of guys from 90's and early 2000's era that were best of their era.

Clearly a trade with Boston would have worked out better, based on the three names mentioned and how they did, assuming they would have done similar things in MN, no evidence they would have. The NY guys were all ehhh with big spikes in their careers but nothing super. I would not say the trade of Gomez for Hardy was bad, as Hardy was a good SS for years, just not with the Twins because we gave him to Baltimore for basically nothing. Had we stuck with Hardy and he was similar to what he did in Baltimore that would have been a fine trade. Really, the whole thing showed how bad Smith was. He did make some good international signings, but his trades were mostly very bad. He also made some bad international signings as well. He should go down as worst GM in Twins history.

Any time a player slips through and has good numbers later on everyone thinks why did we let them go. This is one where many let him go, and really any team had a chance. I have a feeling if our now FO was in place this may not have happened. They have found some scrap heap pitchers lately themselves. Sometimes it just takes the right fit.

The article limits the options to these two. I would say Cruz. That is because it is for 1 year. We have options to fill similar rolls in our systems. I would not want to clog that with a big deal for Ozuna, who may never live up to contract. His up and down seasons scare me, and even more when his best season was on a short contract season. He really only had 2 outlying seasons of high OPS. You list he had three over .775, and one of those was only .800, not like the over .900 of the other two. The big question, do you think for 18 mil a year for three years worth his expected numbers over what Rooker or Larnach would be expected? It is not always what the player can do for the price, but will the cost difference be worth what they would do compared to likely replacement. Cost of Rooker or Larnach will be for 2 years min 17 mil less, and for third year most likely at least 15 mill less. Can you spend that money each year on say a starting pitcher or another postion? To clarify why I said 3 years is with Cruz to 1 year the 3 years is the difference of the contracts.

I have said from beginning, if the price is right you sign him. You have possible internal replacements so not like you will miss out on signing someone else who is a DH if you sign him to a spot. However, if you pay too much to where you feel you need to ride him no matter how he does then that is a mistake. Basically, the front office needs to decide, what is the number they will be willing to just let go if father time finally wins. If Cruz falls off the cliff, you cut him and be fine with the loss of the money. The main question will be, how much that is, and will Cruz accept it? That is always the issue for mid-market teams, if they invest too much money into players that just are not that good, can you walk away from the contract? Even big market teams run into those issues with mega contracts. Albert in LA is one that comes to mind. He has been basically replacement or worse for 5 years now, but he makes too much money for team to just cut him. It makes little sense, you are paying him so much, and he is worse than an average player, why pay him to make your team worse? His last 4 years he has had a negative war, but made over 100 mil. That is a big price to pay for negative war. So that contract cost them in WAR and he makes so much you feel you cannot cut him and pay a replacement, so it cost you double. As long as the Twins will not put themselves in the that type of situation, bring Cruz back. He does have value in club house, from all reports, and that is something to consider too.

I am not a cord cutter, mainly for sports purposes because you cannot rely on getting the sports you want, mainly from contracts of local rights. I would not compare it to victory sports though, because that was where big media, Fox, would not allow big cable companies to carry the Victory as a normal package, without raising the price of other Fox media at the time. By choosing to cut the cord you are choosing to limit your chances of watching the games. It is not the same.

Cleveland may have pitching that they keep turning out, but they have ZERO offense. They were barely doing anything on offense before, now they have even less. No need to ever pitch to Ramirez because he will have no protection. There is almost no way Twins and Sox will be neck and neck for division and one will have a WC spot for sure, because the other three teams will all be near 100 losses I am guessing.

Very few teams around league have done much, outside of San Deigo and now Mets. So many big pieces yet to move. I think many teams and players are waiting to see how COVID affects things, and who will be like Cleveland and have a fire sale, or who will try to make moves with teams selling.

I just want to point out the contradiction you have. You address Story playing at Coors and that may be a problem, but then address that D.J. LeMahieu has done fine, which is true. However, then when talking about Sonny Gray, in just next section, you say, " It seemed likely that a resurgence was to be expected for Gray once he got out of the Cracker Jack box that is Yankee Stadium." Essentially saying it is offensive park, like it is. Well where has LeMahieu played after Coors? You basically say LeMahieu did not have drop off after leaving Coors so we should not worry too much about Story, who I do worry very much about him not playing half his games there, because LeMahieu did fine. Only to then talk about how once pitchers leave Yankee Stadium they are expected to do better to, meaning hitters crush there. You cannot have it both ways, just saying.

I was too young to remember the trade. I was told about it when I got older about how bad Herr was. A trade like this would never happen in todays game. I think it shows how important a players desire to play for a particular team is important though. If your heart is not in it, you will do well. Also, paying attention to how they may affect others in club house is important.

Personally, I think Rooker has very little value as an asset. Following your factors I just do not see him that high. He is old for a prospect that has very limited MLB time. Not all his fault as he was behind some decent players. We are loaded in corner OF/1B/DH type guys that he slots into. Yes, he can hit for some good power, and in his very short time he had some good hits, but I fear a player like him will get scouted and that will drop his hitting. He reminds me of Josh Willingham. He can hit HR, strike out a ton, and is basically a statute in the OF. Really, he only has 1 asset and that is power. Yes, that is important, but everything else is working against him. He has little to no trade value, he is aging, he has no defense, and no track record. If Cruz does not resign, and they do not go out to sign someone else, I could see him be the DH, and that is where all his value is.

How does ZIPS even work? The Maeda projection seems the most odd. Not saying he will perform to level of last year, but to project bull pen appearances is just odd. I do not trust these at all as any kind of prediction. It feels like they just look at player history, and generally career arcs of similar player histories based on age.