gunnarthor

I, uh, may have overrated the o-line.

Honestly, this really depends on 1) what you think the FO was supposed to do and, to a lesser extent, 2) the hand they were dealt. It is my opinion, oft stated, that the key parts were already in position and this FO simply needed to supplement a really strong core and extend the window of opportunity. Essentially, Falvey was hired to replicate the 2001-2010 run. Thus, I'm ok with them going. That said, I don't expect that they will be fired and I think we'll have a sub-.500 season next year. Even if you don't think the Twins had good pitching in the minors, they had Gibson, Berrios and Santana under team control for 3, 5 and 2 years when they took over. They had immense outfield depth (still do, but less) in the minors and majors and never traded for pitching. That's on them. Lastly, the main gripe I have on Levine is that he has never seemed to understand the value/ability of players in the Twins system or properly evaluate other teams players, leading us to lose, either through rule v or simply waivers, some pretty good players, or overpaying in trades. That, to me, is enough reason to get a new GM. As to Falvey, I openly despise the idea of bullpen games and I think it comes from him. It's boring baseball. It's not working. And it seems like our farm system is trending in that direction. I don't like watching bad baseball but I will, I hate watching bad and boring baseball, which is what he's creating.

So, where does everyone think this Viking team ends up? I think they win the North with 11 wins. But I'm an optimist. ?

That short video of Petty was something. Long ways to go but no reason not to be excited about him.

Despite my dislike of the FO, I'm not 100% sure both Falvey and Levine should go. Levine should go, no quesiton. I don't know enough about Falvey and his role do be as sure. Although the pitching failure this year and the adoption of the five inning starter doesn't fill me with much hope about him, either. As to a new GM, I'm not sure who the best but there are some deserving names out there. Amiel Sawdaye was under strong consideration before we hired Levine and has been with the DBacks, who created a great farm system. Sounds like he might go from assistant GM to GM though, so not sure he'll be available. DeJon Watson, currently with the Nats would be an interesting pick as well.

They aren't good? This is demonstratively not true. Ynoa and Gil, Wells, Graterol, Stewart, Romero, Jay, Gonsalves, were the minor league pitchers I mentioned. Ynoa and Gil and Wells look ok in the majors. Ynoa's legit. Gil could just be off to a hot start, ala Duffey, but he's only 23 and making starts for a playoff contender. Must be nice. Graterol was a consistent top 100 prospect, debuted at 20, and was the centerpiece in the Maeda trade. Romero was a top 100 prospect under this FO. Gonsalves was as well, two years under this FO, and then hurt his arm, IIRC. Stewart and Jay were top 100 prospects but not under this FO. But the FO inherited a good system with some pitching depth. It doesn't make sense to keep denying this. They were dealt a nice starting hand.

In this last season, Miranda and Balazovic have really been exciting for us. I'm a bit surprised miranda isn't up yet. Hopefully, Balazovic and Ryan are solid ML starters for us for a long time.

I'm not sure anyone is calling them idiots or clueless, maybe I missed that, but they haven't had a clear philosophy or direction since they showed up. As I mentioned above, 2020 doesn't really matter much to me on grading this FO. Others, it may mean more. Pitching they inherited included Berrios for, what, five years of team control? Gibson had another three years of team control. Santana had two more years under contract. They had a few backend arms like Mejia (arm injury) in the majors already and a bunch of young arms in the farm system, some pretty highly ranked. Ynoa and Gil, Wells, Graterol, Stewart, Romero, Jay, Gonsalves, etc. Injuries knocked a few of them out, that's always a risk with pitching prospects, but this idea that the system didn't have quality arms is simply not correct.

This is mostly straw man arguments. The group of chaff that Brock brought up weren't being relied upon in 16 and weren't reason for the optimism of 17. They weren't parts of the core of the support staff. They are a distraction. I completely disagree that this FO should be considered good because of their record. My opinion, which I've held for years, is that the core they inherited was going to be good, no matter what. It wasn't a question of being good, it was a question of supplementing and extending. They failed on that. The only post on here that I think has some merit is chpettit19's point that the pitching had been ok and might be again. As bad as it is this year, I'm willing to bet they don't have those answers. In fact, it looks like the FO's strategy is quantity and bullpen games.

There's a different thread for stock tips!

I mean, you and I have had this discussion too much to keep at it. But, no. I think it's fair. You don't. Whatever. The same terrible players drove this team to the playoffs in 2017. It would be one thing if the FO came in and acquired all the talent but they didn't. They had to supplement the talent and extend the window. They mostly failed on this. It's not really debatable, actually. (And I think the injuries in 2016 were bigger than the injuries in 2021.) As to your thoughts - Byung Ho Park, John Ryan Murphy, Kurt Suzuki, Ricky Nolasco, the desiccated husk of Phil Hughes and Glen Perkins. Only Suzuki made the top 10 in PA in 2016. Nolasco was horrible although he'd have been the fourth best starter on this years staff. Hughes only pitched 59 innings (didn't he have an elbow injury?) and Perkins only pitched 2 innings. So I'm not really sure what the point of pointing out the chaff on the 2016 team was worth. And then the draft thing. Again. Yeah, Stewart, Gordon, and Jay didn't turn out how we wanted them too yet the FO would look a lot smarter if they hadn't let Ynoa, Gil, Curtiss, Chargois, Baddoo, Wade, Anderson, etc go. And if they hadn't wasted their many #1 picks. Remember, this FO has said that they saving money and playing games with the draft pool lets them acquire more first round talents, like Enlow. It hasn't really worked out yet. Lastly, we haven't really talked about how this FO has failed to spend the money it has that the previous regimes didn't have. So even the free agency failures aren't really comparable. So at the end of the day, I'm baffled on how you can say this FO has been good unless you think the core they inherited wasn't going to be good except for something they specifically did. Like hiring a certain coach or changing the pitching philosophy. But, for me, the biggest mark is not just that the 2021 Twins suck, it's how ridiculously bad the pitching is. The orioles are one of the worst teams ever and their pitchers have outperformed our pitchers by 7 WAR! For a FO that was supposed to know pitching, that's a really bad sign.

Without getting into this too much because this really is an eye of the beholder thing but how you value 2020 might really impact on how you value this FO. To me, 2020 was basically nothing. It was a third of a season, small sample size. I got knocked around a lot this offseason for not giving Maeda the credit some thought he deserved for his second place Cy Young finish. The season happened, but there's not a lot there to give weight to the FO, in my opinion.

And that's the other side of looking at things. I completely disagree but to each his own.

The 2016 team was bad, no doubt, but it was also hit with injuries. If you go back and look at TD, most of us thought that the 16 team was going to make the playoffs behind that core. The key players that won in 17 and after were already in place by 16. The 16 team only had four players manage to get even 400 PA compared with 10 for 2017. The top ten players in PA from 16-17 was mostly the same, with Nunez, Plouffe and Suzki going. And the pitching that the FO inherited took most of the starts as well. So I would disagree that they inherited an awful team. Rather, I think it was pretty clear they inherited a team with immense upside that was had a horrific season because of injuries and hard adjustments to the majors. If Ryan had been GM in 17, they still would have made the playoffs. If they had hired Amiel Sawdaye, they would have made the playoffs.

I think this depends entirely on how you view the hand they were dealt. I think you and I disagree on this but they were given a team with a nucleus of Buxton, Sano, Kepler, Polanco, Berrios, Rosario along with solid vets in Santana, Gibson, Escobar, Dozier and a few up-and-coming prospects who, while not core quality, were good in May, Rogers, Duffey and Garver. The team was a year removed from nearly making the playoffs. They were also gifted a solid farm system and the first pick in the draft as well as a supplemental first rounder. That core was going to win, no matter what. The FO's job was to keep the window open and support the core. I think they failed pretty substantially on both of those parts. You can disagree. I think the marks against the FO are pretty strong - they clearly did not understand/properly value the talent they had in the system. In their first season, they didn't have any clear direction on what the team could do - they tried to trade their best player before the season started but failed and were sort of mocked for overreaching. Then they decided to go with what they had and even traded for another starter before completely reversing their position and trading for the future while the team went ahead and made the playoffs despite the FO, not because of it. They then extended Molitor and changed their minds a year later. No idea of the direction they wanted. The talent they lost - especially in 17-18 - really hurt the future of the Twins. The pitching pipeline failed to develop. The drafts have been mediocre. I've seen enough even though I'm sure they'll come back next year.

I think Mike and Bean are about right. He's a real ML quality pitcher, which is in tragically short supply around here. He'll have some great games and some duds. He's not as good as Berrios but in his career season, he could be an all-star. COVID pushed back his debut so that's a big problem, he's still got to go through the ups and downs of adjusting to the majors. I love that he pitches quickly. As to how valuable he'll be, I think that depends on the Twins pitching philosophy. It seems like he could be a 200 inning pitcher but the Twins might want him to be a 130-150 inning pitcher.

I'm already there

I'm sure if we let the opponents load the bases a few more times, those numbers will go down. But, yeah, this is arguably the worst twins pitching staff in decades.

Not the pitcher who can't miss any bats?

This was pretty predictable

I've been impressed with HBO Max. Easily my favorite streaming service. I'm ready to cancel netflix but the wife opposes that.

I think Nick's plan is probably something we will likely see and mean that we're a 70 win team next year. 1) Ober and Pineda have combined for 33 starts, about 160 innings, and 1.6 WAR. Unless we expect a significant improvement and health from both of them next year, those are back of the rotation pitchers. 2) I can see why Nick suggested the names he did, it sounds like a very Twins move. Corey Kluber (36 next year, 1.2 WAR in 11 starts this year), Charlie Morton (38 next year, career year this year), Alex Cobb (34 next year, 1.2 WAR in 15 starts this year), Andrew Heaney (80 ERA+ this season) are not #2/3 pitchers. They are 4/5 type pitchers and there's a lot of risk. Twins can't win if the best they have are 4/5 type pitchers. 3) I'm all for trading Kepler and Arraez to get pitching. I'm not sure the Twins are good at identifying pitching but we pretty much have to do this. Also, I think it's time for TD to stop fawning over Maeda's 11 random starts for the Twins in 2020 in a weird season. He's now given us 32 starts at 109 ERA+, 173ip, 1.8 WAR. That's solid but those aren't numbers you want from someone you expect to be a 2/3 starter (which he isn't). 4) Dobnak. For the life of me, I cannot understand this FO's infatuation with Dobnak. Great story and all, and I'm glad he will make millions off the Twins, but he's a really bad pitcher. Playoff teams don't rely on Dobnaks.

I meant better career from the trade date. That said, I wouldn't be surprised if Graterol surpassed Maeda's career WAR (either b-r or fangraphs). It's mostly a question of innings. But as you know from this past off-season, I was the low man on Maeda even before this season. Still, I think the trade made sense for both teams. (I also see that someone remembered that we threw in a draft pick. I had forgotten that. That's two picks this FO has traded away. I hate that.)

I think the FO has bad ideas about starting pitching - specifically, they want to turn games into bullpen games with the starter going five or so innings. Even our minor league pitchers aren't throwing many innings. Berrios will easily lead the Twins in innings pitched this year and, when/if Pineda comes back, we will still only manage to get three pitchers over 100 innings. That's the staff that the FO has envisioned and created for us. Expect a lot more of it the next few years.

Yeah, just let him pitch. Everyone gets knocked around. Let's get some innings.