gunnarthor

I don't think the Twins were wrong to take Stewart but I do think that in a few years, I could see Meadows being the best player and a lot of teams kicking themselves over passing on him. It seemed (from things like minorleagueball) that a lot of people were thinking he was a "boring" pick, didn't have the upside of Frazier, small HS, slow to the majors, etc.

Perhaps. We did send him to winter ball several times. But the issue for me was always health, not pop. Maybe Ramirez got him onto his program instead of one he was on here. But who knows. I'm just not ready to rip the Twins for giving up on an injury prone DH who was later implicated in PEDs when his career got turned around. Esp when you consider the payroll situation.

I haven't really looked at the list yet but it'll be interesting to see in what direction the Twins go. The Twins could probably easily spend 30m/yr on FA, if they wanted. And maybe they will. I'd be wary of really long contracts - 5+ years. But at the same time, I think you can rationally argue that we are in the next wave of team talent with Gibson, Arcia and Hicks (all complimentary players) having made the jump last year, 1st year guys like Dozier and Florimon playing well (also complimentary guys) and May, Meyer, Sano and maybe Rosario making it next year (maybe Buxton, too). So the team could start grabbing players to build with that group. I'm not sure that fits but I think you can argue it does. I'm not sure there's a lot out there to be part of the build - the rumors have had the Twins connected to younger pitchers - Hughes and Yoon - which suggests the Twins are hoping to sign someone who will be able to go with that group of young guys coming up. (Also not sure if there is some Cuban pitcher still on the market). And, of course, Ryan could resign Pelfrey (or a similar pitcher) and add an innings eater like Nolasco and have a rotation of Correa, Nolasco, Gibson, Pelfrey, Deduno (w/Albers, Diamond, Meyer, May, Hendriks, De Vries, etc all in the wings). I'd like the Twins to add one RH power bat to get some ABs at first and DH - maybe Corey Hart on a one year deal. I think TF favors RH pull power, which Hart has, and I don't think Mauer's ready to be a fulltime 1B yet. We got really bad production from DH, corner OF, 1B and 3B this year. Some of those at-bats will have to go to Arcia, Hicks and eventually Sano and hopefully Willingham is healthy this year. But the team could certainly easily add another bat or two.

Nah, TwinsNorth is right. Twins insisted on a club option, Baker didn't want that - and maybe he was right to not want it. Ideally for him, he has a solid 2013 season and then get a big FA deal after it. Twins didn't want to have him for a half season of rehab and maybe a few good starts at the end of the year. And I believe the Cubs deal would pay him slightly more if he hit some of his incentives. IIRC, a lot of fans ripped the Twins for not giving into Baker's demands and some started to imply that Baker didn't want to be here but it certainly wasn't based on anything in fact.

I think you're picking some stats that support your view and ignoring other relevant stats. As mentioned before, he was 27, had avg 115 games the previous 3 years (and missed a lot of time in 98 as well for injury), his defense was bad, some of his defenders are arguing that WAR for a 1B/DH isn't a good stat but he was still, by WAR, the 17th most valuable Twin in 2002. The team had huge financial issues - they had to increase payroll by over 15m from 02 to 03 and most fans were worried that the Twins couldn't keep Hunter (and Twins sites like ESPN had a bunch of big market fans posting how much they were looking forward to buying Hunter). Then Ortiz leaves, gets implicated in PEDs and the rest is history. As to your last sentence, in the past decade since Ortiz left, have the Twins made a similar mistake? (And, in fairness to the Twins, I suppose you should see if they have picked up rejects/DFA'd guys from other orgs and gotten value out of them).

Yeah, saw this the other day. Good for him. Wonder if he'll be able to achieve his dream of making pitchers ineligible for MVP. :-)

"Wow" is right. My God, it's like Michael Scott in Diversity Day.

That's a good point. There were protestors in 91 when Atlanta came to town (I believe the Star Tribune decided around that time to only print Atlanta and Cleveland and they did that for years. Not sure when they changed back).

Baker's another guy who I wouldn't mind the team getting but won't be crushed if they don't. He's never really lived up to his potential - even his good seasons have been wrecked by injuries - but he can be a solid starter. Not much of an innings eater though. If I recall, last year the Twins wanted to sign him for 2 years (the second being a team option year) and Baker resisted. He got a one year deal from the Cubs to build up his value. Since he spent most of the year on the DL, I suspect he'd probably want another one year deal and hope to hit it big. I think he'd like to stay in Chicago or the NL.

I understand what you were saying and didn't think you were "okay" with those names.

That line of thinking has been used before and not to good effect. When people decide that society should change racist lines of thinking, too many people say things like 'it's been like this forever and everyone's happy' or worse things.

He did have a track record - clearly he had some pop in his bat (.195 ISO for the Twins, 58 HR in about 1500 at bats) but he had trouble staying healthy. He avg 115 games from 2000-2002 and it wasn't b/c the Twins were putting him in AAA. (He also missed a lot of time, again on the DL, in 98). LeCroy (fatbeer, nice) was a decent prospect - a top 50 guy once who had several .900 OPS years at AAA. Twins decided to give him a chance at a quarter the cost. As to WAR, even by oWAR, Ortiz is only the 7th highest guy among position players and still 15th or so among all players. Raises had to go to a lot of guys. The injury prone, streaky DH was a logical cut.

Let's look at this a bit. First, the 02 Twins were a small payroll team and the great concern was that Hunter wouldn't stick around. That team made the playoffs and upset the A's. Ortiz was the 9th most valuable position player by WAR on that team, 17th if you include pitchers. He had some injury problems and he was streaky. He had a a sub .700 OPS through July 8th. He had a terrific two week run where he hit 8 of his 20 home runs and slugged the crap out of the ball and then posted a sub .800 OPS in Aug/Sept. And he wasn't that great in the post season either. So the Twins thought LeCroy could pretty much do what Ortiz did the next year at a lower cost (and they were right, LeCroy put up a 116 OPS+ and 1.2 WAR and didn't stay healthy). They had a lot of players earning raises - their payroll jumped from 40m to 55.5m from 02-03. They couldn't keep everyone. The move made sense and Ortiz was later implicated in PED use at the same time in somehow started playing a lot better and remained healthy.

The United States has a storied history of mistreatment, cultural degradation, forced assimilation and racism against Native Americans. Even names like Braves and Chiefs tend to promote the "noble savage" stereotypes of Native Americans. ACLU of MN had a small post on this: Why the name the Redskins (and others like it) need to go :: ACLU of Minnesota

Um, you really think this board needs some new reason to rip on the Twins? Personally, I think if the Twins had taken as much PEDs as the Yankees and Red Sox they'd have done better in the post season.

SI linked to this story earlier today. Is Chief Wahoo Finally on the Way Out? | Chris Creamer's SportsLogos.Net News and Blog : New Logos and New Uniforms news, photos, and rumours Posnanski also had a small column out about how offensive Chief Wahoo was but I don't have that link.

The rumors at the time was that Willingham might get back a back end prospect type - Sean Gilmartin of Atlanta was mentioned. While Willingham was having a nice season, he still had 2 years on his contract, which, in his case, was a negative. If he's having a healthy year this year, he should still be able to net something similar. To the second point, there wasn't a lot to pay dividends in the future. Pelfrey and Correia were brought in to eat innings and make starts. The future of the rotation isn't on them. The Twins just needed some arms to get through the year.

Well, every year the Twins are going to bring in pitchers and hitters. As for rookies debuting next year, I'd bet that Sano, Rosario, Meyer and May all get up next year. (Personally, I think Buxton comes up this year, too, but that's just a wild guess/hope thing). I think what Brock is trying to say is that you don't want to make a signing now that hurts the teams flexibility when that core needs some help. I know you like Ellsbury, for example, so if the Twins spent a 7/142 (Carl Crawford like deal, which is what Boras has suggested as a starting point), the Twins would be paying over 21m/year for a guy who will be a declining left fielder (and perhaps declining quickly based on his skill set) when the core is ready to compete and getting raises. I think the Twins would be better off by using FA to plug holes that a good team has - think of 2010, when the Twins added a 4WAR pitcher, a 25HR DH and a strong MI to a pretty decent nucleus.

Except he didn't say this roster.

Jack - Would it be possible, without giving anything away, to explain how you yourself may or may not be involved in certain parts of baseball operations? For example, last year we saw several good prospects jump levels - Buxton, Sano, Rosario, Stewart to name a few - do the stat guys get involved in suggesting someone be promoted or stay? Secondly, on the FA signings, when you were talking about mistakes, are you suggesting that you may say something like "signing player A for 5 years is a mistake b/c (according to our stat model), he's probably going to break down well before those 5 years are up"?

Well, frankly, after the top 5 or so teams, just having two premier players is going to get you ranked pretty high. Looking at Sickels lists, those prospects are not evenly distributed. Just looking at other teams with a top 20 guy, Seattle has 3 in the rankings (4, 75 and ?? for the injured pitcher) so do the Indians and Mets but the Cards look better than all 3. A's have one player (Russell at 15 but nothing after him), so do the Tigers. Rockies have 2. Royals have 4. I think Cards, with two premier guys in the top 20, should pretty easily slot into most top 10 rankings.

Nice write up, Seth. I really like Felix. Hope he has a big jump next season.

Well, the Cards still have Taveras who is one of the few prospects who could, if healthy, push Buxton for #1 overall. And Wong and Martinez are still considered prospects for next years purposes, although both have basically graduated.

Well, I guess it's a general impasse. You can't finger things that should've been done other than "it's a low bar." Even ignoring the draft (since all teams get one, I guess?) I think the trades, waiver claims, promotions, and rule v picks show that he hasn't fallen behind the times. I think it's ridiculous for people to clamor for improvement without specifics. What did you want? 91 losses? Would that clear your bar? Sign some vets and lose 86 games and draft 10th? It makes no sense to say suggest, as you are seem to be doing, that improvement is only shown by the ML teams record. The Twins are rebuilding. They need to get the young guys playing time. Ryan's been the GM for two years. Cubs and Astros have been rebuilding longer and losing more. Are their GMs failing?

It's not a bad idea. I think Willingham's value will be higher at the deadline. I know next to nothing about the minor leaguers you're targeting but they seem the "type" of guys we should go after, if not the exact ones (Martinez for example, isn't on Mayo's top 20 Rangers list and Sickels ranks him #20 as a possible bullpen arm). I don't think SF makes that trade and Deduno and Swarzak have no trade value. I don't like Capuno at all. A one year deal is ok I guess but I think he's done. Mauer is going to be the catcher most of the time so we have to figure out a firstbaseman unless we want to platoon Mauer and Pinto between the two (I don't think Pinto's bat will be good enough there). Corey Hart might be interesting one year stop gap. Could have some decent RH pop for a midseason trade and then move Plouffe across the infield when Sano comes up? Not sure. I have no faith left in Parmelee. A bit more in Plouffe but not a lot more.