chpettit19

I mean this is just flat out wrong. Mike Trout wasn't very good his rookie season. Then he adjusted. Turned out alright. There is adapting that has to happen at every level. That's not a hot take or anything. You can go ask anyone involved in baseball and they'll tell you that. This isn't even worth anymore conversation if your stance is that rookies are expected to perform immediately and no adapting is needed.

What's the difference between the rookies being "meh" and Kepler being "meh?" Most of our arguments are that Kepler can't go up from "meh." "Meh" is who he is. He's 30, and there's no reasonable expectation of improvement. The rookies being "meh" before they've had a chance to adapt, and truly gain their footing, have at least a little expectation of improvement. Why hold onto the guy who's proven that "meh" is his peak simply to avoid using a rookie who "meh" could reasonably be their floor?

There's a nice Jayson Stark article on The Athletic today talking about the Diamondbacks, Orioles, and Reds. He frames it around "New Rule Baseball," but all 3 teams are open about how their plan was in place well before the new rules. They were just trying to get more athletic. Those teams are fun to watch. And they're winning games right now. The lack of athleticism on the Twins is such a bummer. For that reason I'm not a fan of moving Castro (he's in the same age range as most of the guys we're hoping to become the new core). I think he's a wonderful utility player. Don't want him as an everyday starter, but his speed, and athleticism is a real weapon on the bench. As much as it kills me to say, it's probably time to move on from Polanco. And the rest of those guys I'm good moving, even though Solano is steady, and a refreshing change of pace in the batter's box.

None of us are too young to remember the current Diamondbacks team. Or the current Reds team. Or the current Orioles team. Or the Rays teams from the last decade. Or the Cubs, Astros, and Braves all going young and winning championships. We all remember the Guardians going young and blowing past the Twins just last year. Miami is 10 games over .500 by playing a bunch of young, unproven guys. You don't have to go back to the 70s to remember what young teams can do. Comparing what fans are asking the Twins to do with the 2023 Oakland team is pretty absurd. Oakland ownership is actively trying to lose. They aren't trying to turn the team over to a new wave of players while spending all time high payroll amounts. Oakland being bad isn't an accident, or a plan gone wrong. It was the plan.

Lots of things I've read have suggest Max Clark may be the cheapest of the "big 5." If that's true, he feels like a great pick there. Get a chance to make up for passing on Carroll, while also saving money to take a big swing at 34, and other spots. Ledbetter doesn't really thrill me at 34. He wasn't great in SEC play, and doesn't feel like a high ceiling type guy. 2 picks in the top 34, with a ton of extra money to spend because of the lottery jump, equals a chance to take 2 massive swings this year. I don't want safe, or "high floor," guys. Go after the 2 highest ceiling players you can with these 2 picks. Ledbetter just doesn't feel like that to me. But he does feel like he fits the Twins model, so I wouldn't be surprised by that pick.

The question, to me, is what are you targeting? What's the goal at the deadline? I think the Twins being buyers at the deadline would be a disaster. They're not close enough. Lewis, Correa, Lee, Kirilloff around the IF sounds great, but Lee isn't exactly lighting AA on fire, and Lewis may be a better fit in CF. I don't think there's as much of a logjam on the infield as others seem to. Can the Twins get better at the deadline? Of course they can. But to what end, and at what cost? If they rip off a month where they win 65% of their games, and the offense scores 5+ runs in 90% of their games, let's buy. Does anyone expect that? I'm a believer in the idea that once you're in the playoffs anything can happen, but within reason. I think breaking "the streak" is important, and would be "happy" with that outcome this year. But I'm not willing to sacrifice a single piece of 2024 and beyond to do that. I hope they don't trade a single guy who has any shot at being on the 40-man this offseason. It's time to make the transition to the "young guys." If they don't think the young guys can do it they're admitting they've failed to build any sort of reliable prospect pipeline. They have a whole bunch of league average, or worse, vets on this team with no future on the club. If you can't replace those guys with league average, or worse, rookies on league minimum deals that allow you to supplement this offseason on the FA market you're doomed. Unless they're going on a massive tear for the next month, the deadline should be about transitioning to the new core. Don't blow up your chances of winning the division, and breaking "the streak," by going hog wild on selling (keep Gray, for example), but set yourself up with a chance to answer some questions about the future of this team the rest of the way. If they go in a spiral for the next month, then sell off everything, and start prepping your resume (hopefully). This deadline isn't the time to take chances on improving. Next offseason is. You just need to find out how many cheap players you have that are worthy of MLB playing time so you know how much you can splurge on the open market. The goal should be finding more guys to add to Ryan, Ober, Duran, Lewis, Julien, AK, and the rest of the league minimum guys so you can go big on spending this offseason. Don't trade away the league minimum guys for a hope and a prayer that your vets will suddenly be better than they are.

Simple as that? There's not more to it? We don't care what kind of overall player he is, just that he has historically been a "well above average fielder?" Don't care that he's a well below average hitter now? We also don't care that he hasn't been a well above average fielder this year? This year he's been a well below average hitter, and an average fielder. But Wallner is a below average fielder so he doesn't deserve a shot. I don't see how that math works out. Yeah, hitting well in the minors is pretty much the yellow brick road to the majors. For position players, there's nothing more important, and it's what the vast majority of promotion decisions are built on. Especially if you play a corner position.

Casey would fit right in with the lower part of the Twins pen! Let's do it!

Chase Petty and another prospect or 2 is a realistic package for Gray. I wouldn't be mad at that return.

What does he need to do in the minors to show he's "good enough for the majors?" How does he "earn his way up?" What does Kepler have to do in the majors to show he's not good enough for the majors? I know you love your veterans, but if one of the young guys were playing like Kepler has been for the last 3 years you'd be talking about how they aren't good enough for the majors, and should go back to the minors. Are the standards different for Kepler? Why?

Totally fair. But that doesn't mean he wasn't really bad for the vast majority of the 2 years immediately following the Twins non-tendering him. I like Eddie. He's a fun player. But he's one of the many guys I feel get what I'd call the "Twins mediocre boost." They're solid players that hit in the heart of mediocre lineups, on mediocre Twins teams, and they get this reputation around Twins Territory that they're better than they are. I'd take Eddie on my team, but as a 6 hole through bench player, not the top/heart of the order guy he was forced to be here. He's a 1 to 2 win type player (if you're a WAR fan), and that's incredibly replaceable. Unless you're on a team full of 0 to 1 win type players like he was here. Example given: He hits 6/7 hole for Atlanta when they're going right.

FYI, he'd entered the game in the top of the 7th as the defensive replacement. Then hit in Julien's spot in the bottom of the 7th.

While I would be interested in seeing what a red hot Williams may look like in the majors, Kyle Farmer has nearly 3000 professional innings at catcher, so we're in pretty solid shape in terms of a 3rd catcher right now. Williams has 900 innings for reference.

He had entered in the top of the 7th for defense. Which lead him to hit against Whitlock in a righty-righty matchup in the bottom of the 7th, which I believe was the complaint of the poster I responded to. They appeared to think he was inserted into the game in the bottom of the 7th as a pinch hitter when he'd already been inserted in the top of the inning for his defense.

Farmer had been put in the game in the top of the inning for his defense as they were attempting to hold a lead late. Edit: should've kept reading posts and would've seen someone already said this. My bad for the repeat.

Ober is where my head goes with this, too. He's a tough one to handle this year. The only times he's gone beyond 100 innings pitched in a season in his life were his freshman year of college (2014), and 2021 between AAA and MLB. Those were 106.2 innings, and 108.1 innings years. He's at 81.1 this year between St Paul and the Twins. Twins have 88 games left. That's roughly 17 more starts per pitcher. Even if he only went 5 innings per start that's still another 85 innings if he makes every start he has left. I don't see anyway they let him jump to 160+ innings pitched this year. I don't think they'll go straight 6 man rotation with continually cycling through 6 guys in order. But I wouldn't be surprised at all to see them do a 6 man rotation by skipping a few Ober starts by plugging in Maeda or Varland or whoever isn't in the normal 5 man rotation at the time. So don't throw off the other 4 starter's timelines between starts, but sit Ober for a start every couple weeks.

I'm with @DocBauer on this one. That is not an impressive list. Which goes to show how terrible Kepler has been, and how mind blowing it is that he's still on this team. Nobody could honestly say they'd be happy to have Cave around. Cave over Kepler? What's the point? Neither are worthy of the job. Refsnyder would be a better fit as a right handed utility guy on this roster. But, again, is that really some saving grace for this team? The Rooker trade has looked bad for 1 month. It was an otherworldly month, but he's back down on earth, and back to being the Brent Rooker he's been since he was a Twin. There's a reason 2 other teams, including the offense starved Royals, waived him last year. I don't miss Brent Rooker 1 bit. He'll be 29 before the end of this season, too. No loss there. Eddie Rosario was fun, and I enjoyed his ability to make contact with pitches he had no business hitting, and how clutch he was (or at least it felt like he was clutch). He was unplayable in Cleveland. Barely playable in Atlanta before destroying everyone in his path in the playoffs. Back to being bad in Atlanta. And is now back to being pretty good. I'd certainly take him over Kepler, but he's not a difference maker for this team, either. Wade for Shaun Anderson has not turned out well. He was a heavy platoon guy his first year out there, and was really good against righties. He was flat out bad last year. But seems to have had some things really click this year. He'd be really nice to have back for sure. Wade, Refsnyder, Eddie, Kepler, Cave, Rooker would be my order on these guys. Wade being the only one I'd really want. Refsnyder just being a better roster fit as a righty bat. And Eddie just being a slightly better all around player who was more fun to watch.

That was fun, depressing, and rather accurate all at the same time. Not a big basketball fan, so I mostly follow the wolves by chatting with my buddies, and reading articles in The Athletic. But those comps seem pretty accurate. And that's not encouraging.

You don't see any difference between the wear and tear on one's knees playing 8 innings of defense and hitting 4 times a game with maybe 1 trip around the bases included? Just the jogs to and from CF for 8 innings is as much wear and tear on his knees as an average offensive day.

Oh, so you've just defined BP how you want to. Got it. I follow now. You know they have live pitchers in the cage, too, right? I mean unless you think someone is actually getting on the Target Field mound and throwing real pitches like they're in a real game during the season. That doesn't happen. The only difference in what you're describing is the lighting/backdrop. They have real human beings who go into the cage and throw real baseballs in the cage, too. But I get the disconnect now. Yeah, I understand that's what you want. And, as this conversation started, we will never agree on that. That's fine. We're well aware of our differences on that subject. And we'll never agree on that last sentence either. Since you're still mad after they've publicly stated what Buxton is doing today. So, like I said from the beginning, what they say really doesn't matter, and hasn't changed anything. You're still unhappy. You want them to do things the way you want them done, and it doesn't seem you'll be happy until that's the case. Unless they play better. Which has been my point all along. All that really matters is what they play like.

I wish he'd play great instead of just feel great!

Why do you keep saying "Doesn't take outdoor BP" doesn't actually mean "doesn't take outdoor BP?" Like I honestly want to know. That's not a sentence I've ever said. They have cages inside. You know that, right? They can take batting practice (I assume we're both meaning batting practice when we say BP) inside. That's where that velo machine you want him to use is. Why are you attempting to make it sound like I'm saying something I'm not? Byron does his batting practice inside. Why is that a crazy idea? If I'm remembering correctly, Mike Trout only does his inside, too. Yes, extreme example, but I'm confused on this obsession with the word "outdoor." You do accept that "doesn't take outdoor BP" doesn't mean "doesn't take BP," right? Like those are 2 different things? You've added the word "outdoor" to that second quote multiple times now. I've never had the word "outdoor" in that second quote. I mean you can go back and look at the comments you've quoted of mine. You've added that word in some weird attempt to make it sound like I've said something I haven't.

You know they have cages inside right? Like lots of players take BP inside? I mean you know there's a difference between not taking outdoor BP, and not taking BP at all, right? You using the same quote twice there is literally changing the meaning of what was talked about in the article, and what I said. Again, the word outdoor feels like it's getting a little too much emphasis here. Why are you so obsessed with him doing it outdoors? Do you think there's a lot more BA in Buxton? You think if he took more BP outside instead of inside that lifetime average would .280, or what? Why? Is the velo machine what was needed, or just something you want him to use? What's the difference between the velo machine, and the regular machine? I honestly don't know. Do you? How high does the regular one go? Do you think outdoor BP would make up for the velo machine, or does it have to be both? Who says the manager has no interest in it? Is it possible that Rocco, Byron, and the rest of the Twins staff, knows his swing, his routines, and what he needs a little better than you or me? Your argument has gone from "they don't do enough work" to "they're doing the wrong work." I'm sure one of those is right.

1. Anytime. I aim to please. 2. We'll just never see eye to eye on the fact that "at least they tried" is nothing more than you assuming they aren't trying now. "If they don't tell me they're doing it, they aren't doing it" is an interesting stance. But point 1 means I'm all good with you taking that stance, because that's just how you fan. 3. First, how does he get his timing back against live pitching without playing? Bold strategy, but I'm sure it'd work great. I'd definitely move him down the order, though. Second, you've clearly taken the quote "in a while" to mean more than the IL stint he had that the article immediately talks about. But I admit I have no idea what "a while" really means. Do you know if he's a big velo machine guy normally? This isn't exactly his rookie year. When he's been going well in the past was he doing a lot of velo machine work? How about extra early BP, and extra cage time? Is that what's best for Buck to get on track? I'll admit I don't know. Funny that you take "eschews outdoor batting practice" to mean he doesn't need/take regular BP. Especially funny since, following the comma, it says that he does targeted work in the cage instead. It's almost like they're telling you the type of work he does, but you don't care anyways because it's not the type of work you want him to do based on all your inside knowledge of Buxton, his swing, and his routines.

You're welcome! Wasn't even a reply to you, but I'm glad you enjoyed it. I understand that's your, and others, issue. I don't get that issue. I don't get what you want him to say though. "I'm terrible, I should be fired" or "we suck, and never going to get better" aren't ever going to come out of his mouth. And even if they did I don't expect it'd make you any happier. But to each their own. "We aren't playing well enough, and need to change what we're doing" has come out of his mouth, many times. But that hasn't made anyone I know of feel any better. But maybe there is a magic phrase in there somewhere.