chpettit19

For what it's worth, before he was fired last year, Shelton had Oneil Cruz leadoff more than anyone else on the Pirates (he had a .298 OBP, FYI). 91 PAs over 20 games with Ke'Bryan Hayes next at 23 PAs in 5 games. He used 11 total hitters in the leadoff spot before being fired in early May. In 2024, Andrew McCutchen lead the team with 364 PAs in the leadoff spot in 81 games. Followed by Isiah Kiner-Falefa (179 in 40 games), Connor Joe (60 in 14), and Oneil Cruz (50 in 11). He used 15 total hitters in the leadoff spot that season. In 2023, the leader was Ke'Bryan Hayes with 204 PAs in 45 games. Followed by Ji Hwan Bae (113 in 27 games), McCutchen (101 in 22 games), and Connor Joe (80 in 21 games). Used 15 hitters in the leadoff spot that season. Take whatever you want from those numbers.

Why would fans mention Solano or Bader when mentioning players they wanted cut? Those players are mentioned in a positive light on this site as examples of the Twins getting it right. How else would you like them mentioned? But Donovan Solano was brought in because the Twins traded Brent Rooker after 208 ABs. Was he a success? In relation to his contract, of course. But would having Brent Rooker around in 2023 instead of trading him before 2022 because you didn't get enough data on him during a lost season have been better than having Solano? Andrelton Simmons, Kody Clemens, Joey Gallo, Manuel Margot, Logan Morrison. Those are the names that I can remember off the top of my head. I'm sure there's more. If they'd replaced Margot with Keirsey they wouldn't have been meaningfully hurt in 2024, but they would have gotten data on Keirsey to save them from having him on the roster for 74 games in 2025. That's what many of us ask for. Andrelton Simmons on the roster all year in a lost 2021 season instead of gathering data on another player so you can make better future decisions. Margot played in 129 games and had 343 PAs with the Twins. Yes, I actually very much would have preferred a young player (or combination of young players) get 300 of those PAs when it was blindingly obvious from the jump that Margot was finished. Because it wouldn't have hurt the team in 2024, but it would have provided data to the front office and experience to the young player(s). Same with Bride's 80 PAs last year. And Clemens' 379. Emma is now on his last option year and the Twins have never seen him on a major league field. Now, his injuries are obviously a major part of that. But last September he played 12 games in September in the minors. The Saints schedule ended on Sept 21. The Twins played 6 more games after that. Giving him a dozen games in the majors instead of running James Outman, Kody Clemens, and Mickey Gasper out there in September would've made me very happy. Yes, fans complain about some things that aren't true. And maybe they overstate this particular complaint sometimes. But it's also not nothing. The Twins have been notoriously slow at moving on from vets. You don't have to play them 150 games in a season to still be slow in moving on from them. The Twins have been far more focused on floor/depth now over ceiling now or in the future for years. And, yes, I do think that's a problem. They've misused, in my opinion, their September call-ups every year. They never get possible future stars a taste of the bigs at the end of the year despite there being a real possibility that that player could be a key part of their team by some point the next season. I believe that's a meaningful problem. I think it's one of their many problems with developing players and being able to feel comfortable with a guy before their 3rd or 4th year when they're out of options and the team is left in no man's land on the team building front. Fully acknowledge that injuries have also played a role in this.

I, for one, always trust a Pohlad.

The Coulombe and Hoffman releases are the correct ones to check against. They were both non-roster invitees. Just like these 2. I certainly hope this is a sign of changes being made, but it isn't actually a change being made, yet. The Twins have had no problem cutting veterans on minor league deals with invites to camp. That isn't the problem many of us have. It's the ones on the 40-man (like Gallo and Margot) not being cut that we complain about. The Twins weren't relying on these guys to make the squad. They were just taking a look at them. If they were counting on them they would've given them Major League deals. This isn't a change in anything. Yet. We have to get going and see what happens during the season with guys who need to be DFA'd before we can say they changed anything.

Keaschall and Buxton 1-2 in whatever order Buxton prefers. Martin is a better 9-hole hitter than leadoff. As @Fire Dan Gladden said, leadoff only matters in the first. Get your best hitters the most at bats. Right now that's Buxton and likely Keaschall. If Wallner can carry over his successful spring and get back to his 2023/24 version of himself for a whole season then he's the 3 hitter. A number of guys we're all begging to figure it out, but Buxton is the only proven guy and I'd put him in whichever spot he prefers between the 1 and 2 holes. Keaschall has looked really good to me this spring and after his performance last year I'd give him the leg up on being the next best hitter as of today. So he gets the other top spot. From there it's filling in lefty righty hitters to make the other manager actually have to think about their strategy and advancing whoever is performing best to the top of the lineup behind those 2.

I'd probably switch Lewis and Jeffers against lefties, but otherwise I think this is a good guess.

We've both taken this thread way off course, so let's get back to hoping Emma can figure out his swing and miss and put his zone awareness to use at the big league level. Would be very fun if he does. I wouldn't bet on it, but I can see why he's on top 100 lists.

The original discussion was about being a yes-man to Falvey. You switched it to ownership. And my original response noted the difference.

Zoll's job is to execute the owner's plan. Same thing in Colorado and Anaheim when they refuse to rebuild or trade players like Ohtani. This is how it works. FO execs are paid to execute their owner's desires. They do their best to influence those desires. They try to get bigger budgets or convince ownership they should rebuild, but they don't get to just do whatever they want. Acting like Pohlad is "stopping him from doing his job" is ignoring the fact that his job is to do what Pohlad wants. Just like the head of all 29 other teams.

He can't. He literally doesn't have the ability to trade Joe Ryan if Tom Pohlad doesn't want him to. That is how MLB works. The league has to approve every trade. If Zoll tries to trade somebody Pohlad doesn't want traded the trade won't go through. Thus, 100% of decision makers in MLB have literally no option but to do what the owner of the team wants. Their options are to either do what owners want or not work in baseball. That's it. Those are the only 2 options.

So, your stance is that Zoll should've told Tom Pohlad to pound sand and traded Ryan, Larnach, Lopez, Buxton, and/or Jeffers? Things he literally cannot do if the owner of the team stops him? Every POBO/GM/Whatever title you want, is an acquiescing yes-man to the owner of their team. 100% of them. The question is if Zoll was a yes-man to Falvey, or has the same base beliefs in team building that Falvey did.

Watched him take some fly balls in Fort Myers on Tuesday. Some ground balls, too, but that's not as useful as him working in outfield drills with teammates. He had the leg wrapped but was moving fine and a full participant in the few drills I watched.

Won a World Series. The rankings are just a tally of things like playoff appearances, division titles, and World Series wins over the last 25 years. Mike Trout and Shohei Ohtani play no factor in it. They're ranked 28th for the last decade, but the World Series win boosts them a lot as they were good the 15 years before this last decade.

What value did he have? He was hurt and awful last year. The Twins could've dumped him for salary relief, but until he regains velo and shows he's healthy and effective, there was no trading him "for something we needed." Nobody was going to give anything valuable up for the chance to see if Ober is toast.

How can they have an "over abundance" but have "most" of them be "injury prone or moved to a less premium position?" Wouldn't them being injury prone or moved off those spots mean they no longer have the overabundance? Everyone drafts SS. The Twins drafted the 10th SS in the 2025 draft. He was taken with the 16th pick. That means 9 of the first 15 picks were SS. For the exact reason you mentioned, many are moved off SS. There's no such thing as having an overabundance of SS prospects. If they all turn out well, you move them to other spots. It's why you have to be a special hitter to be a corner player picked high. Nobody moves up the defensive spectrum after they're drafted, they move down. So you draft guys at the top and move them as needed. And the reason many teams shy away from pitchers at the top is the same reason you don't like high school prospects. Too unpredictable. As @bunsen82 pointed out, the Twins do frequently take pitchers with their 2nd or 3rd pick. It's not like they aren't taking guys seen as having truly meaningful upside relatively high in the draft. The baseball draft, for most every team, is about taking who you view is the best player available. There's no such thing as a logjam. There's no such thing as having too many up the middle prospects. Teams have their own formulas for what they perceive as the best player and weigh things like pitcher injury risk, etc differently, but there aren't many, if any, teams who say "we have too many SS or OF who are injury prone or going to move down the spectrum so we shouldn't draft a SS or OF because we have too many."

Major League Gold Gloves should be taken with a grain of salt so I can't imagine we should be putting a ton of weight into minor league awards. I'm sorry, but Ty France was not the best fielding 1B in the AL last year. And Carlos Santana realistically was for more than 1 year of his career. Gold Gloves should not carry the weight they do. It's good in the sense that it's very likely he's a solid defender and not somebody who actively hurts the team in the field like so many other players in the org, but it certainly shouldn't be taken as evidence that he's "great" or "elite" or whatever people want to label him as.

The pieces certainly don't fit together smoothly. I'm not so sure they're planning on making any more moves. I don't think they're closed off to it, I just don't think it's the plan. I think this is the result you get when depth and floor are your #1 goal and the talent level of your player pool keeps going down. You end up with a lot of guys with severe deficiencies making the roster, and the pieces not fitting well together. My expectations are that they let options determine who makes the opening day roster if there's no injuries, and then injuries determine the roster makeup for the first couple months before they consider DFA type moves. Outside of Alex Jackson, he's likely DFA'd before opening day if Caratini and Jeffers are both healthy. I think the rest of the roster is just a collection of guys who's play won't determine anything until about the end of May at the earliest. If you have options and your competition doesn't, you're in St Paul to start and waiting for an injury. Depth and floor. That's how they work until Zoll does something to show he's meaningfully different from Falvey.

He's in his last option year so there is some real urgency to seeing what he can do in the majors. Hopefully he's able to stay healthy and they give him a shot early so they can gather some real info on him before they have to guarantee a spot for him on the 2027 roster. Right now, he's the very definition of a boom or bust prospect. He's got very real talent in the field and at the plate. But he hasn't stayed healthy and his K rates have been astronomical. This is a huge year for him.

Does anyone want to argue that Trevor Larnach brings value hitting against left-handed pitching, on the base paths, or in the field? I'm going to assume not. Or at least very, very few people are going to make any of those arguments. His only value is at the plate when a right-handed pitcher is on the mound. Here are some numbers to consider: 71 out of 109 60 out of 88 43 out of 54 Those are Trevor Larnach's ranks amongst left-handed hitters against right-handed pitchers in terms of wRC+ last year when it comes to hitters with 200, 300, and 400 such plate appearances. Those are the 35th, 32nd, and 21st percentiles. Larnach having a 110 wRC+ against righties is good. It's better than it being a 90 wRC+. But when it comes to lefty hitters, it's nothing at all to write home about. And when he provides no other value and you're no longer paying him league minimum, it makes his trade value incredibly low. If the Twins are offered any of these deals they should file the paperwork immediately. Trevor Larnach does not have trade value. The Twins being so lacking in talent that he continually hits towards the top of their lineup does not automatically mean he is a valuable trade chip. Chase Petty just debuted in the majors at the age of 22 after having appeared on the back end of a couple top 100 lists. My goodness. If the Reds are offering Chase Petty for Trevor Larnach and the Twins are turning them down we need to just pack this thing up and go home.

I still hope they trade Ryan. I still hope they trade Jeffers. I've never waivered from that. I hope they do it. I also hope they use bulk pitchers on 3 days rest. I hope they do a lot of things. I wanted them to use Varland as that bulk guy last year. I wish they'd do it with Festa no matter what this year. Pablo was the exact risk many of us spent all offseason talking about. I don't think it changes the strategies at the top because I don't think their strategies were baseball based. Unfortunately. They're in a bad spot. We'll see where they go from here.

I am not comparing Prielipp to Randy Johnson in terms of Prielipp being a Hall of Famer or having a 20+ year career, but Randy was 25 when he debuted. He turned out alright. Yes, I'd prefer the Twins top prospects to debut at an earlier age if possible, because it's generally a sign of higher upside. But Connor comes with some caveats. He blew out his elbow. It happens. A lot. But he threw 82.2 innings last year. I don't know why we're acting like he threw 42.2. 83 is a solid number to build on. He went 5 and 6 innings in his last 2 starts. Could he be a great closer? Sure. But could he be a frontline starter? Also, a yes. And I'll take a frontline starter over a great closer 100% of the time. Yes, there's a chance he blows out his elbow again if he's a starter. There's also a chance he blows out his elbow again if he's a closer. Throwing a baseball really, really hard is bad for your elbow. Keep him as a starter. Get him to 130 innings and see where the chips fall.

Lucas Giolito had a 3.41 ERA in more innings than any Twins pitcher not named Ober or Ryan last year. Not sure that's a "reclamation project" exactly. We're not talking about Chris Archer or JA Happ here. If I had it my way 3 of those inexperienced guys would throw multiple innings every 4th day as bulk relievers like they did with a handful of guys in the minors last year. But they don't ask me what I'd do with the team. As it turns out, what the newest Pohlad they found has to say about the direction is the only thing that matters. I'd have 8 guys scheduled for 100+ innings with health and performance this year and take a bunch of the load off the 1 inning relievers while not expecting those "young" guys to get through the lineup multiple times until they show they can succeed in multiple innings. I'm all for playing the young guys. I don't care about the Ws and Ls this year (obviously prefer more Ws). But the guy at the top claims he does care. And if he does, then their best chance to gain more Ws is to sign somebody like Giolito or Littell. That's all I'm saying.

I think it should be, but it isn't. I want them to pick a lane. I said it at the deadline. I said it at the beginning of the offseason. Middle of the offseason. Now. I agree with you. They should rebuild. But more so, I just want them to a pick a lane. I'd prefer the rebuild lane, but if they prefer the "judge us on wins and losses" lane, the "meaningful September baseball" lane, then get in that lane. Lucas Giolito is a legitimate major league starting pitcher. A team trying to win starts the season with Lucas Giolito in its rotation, not Taj Bradley or Mick Abel or Zebby Matthews or David Festa. I'd have preferred they traded Ryan and Pablo and had all those guys in the rotation because they're rebuilding, but they didn't and they aren't. Once you make that decision, then fully make that decision. Taj, Mick, Zebby, and David have all debuted already. At 22, 23, 24, 24 years old. They all have things to work on. None of them have shown enough to be in the opening day rotation of a team trying to win in 2026. Yes, I'd prefer they rebuild, but they aren't. And I'd prefer they actually try to win if that's what they're trying to do instead of playing the middle ground and not doing either. Pick a lane. I don't need you to spend 150 mil on an opening day payroll this season, but don't do this nonsense "roll it back while picking up a bunch of cheap relievers" routine. Pick a lane. That's what I'm asking. They say they've picked the "compete" lane. Spring training is here. The new head man is in place. I'm going to take them at their word. If that's their lane then it's the one I'm going to view things through. So, I want them to get in that lane. And that means getting legit major leaguers for the opening day roster.

No, I don't think they should be trying to contend. I think they should have gone full rebuild, and a potential elbow injury to one of their most valuable trade chips is the exact risk they take by not doing it over the offseason. It sounds like they're just being cautious with Pablo at this point, but this is a good reminder to all the "they have the same value at the deadline" people out there who don't think there's any risk in holding Ryan and Pablo. A blown elbow takes their value to 0. Immediately. Likely for the length of their remaining contracts. Yes, I am speaking to the mixed messaging of ownership, but also just the mixed team building strategy I think they've been taking since the deadline. I said it deadline day. I didn't think they were going full rebuild then. I thought they were trying to thread the needle. I don't know if that was the intent, but it's ended up being the result at this point. I never thought anyone in the org would come out and say that success in 2026 is vital to building future successful teams, though. None of that matters, though. They're "trying" to win. They could announce surgery for Pablo tomorrow and they aren't trading Ryan the day after. This team is "trying" to win. So, bring in another arm. Bring in more talent. Depth. That's the point now. The Twins are going to need more than 5 starters this year. If they are trying to win this year, they are going to need their rotation to carry them. Like nearly 100%. The lineup is unlikely to do much heavy lifting. The defense will do no lifting. The bullpen will do no lifting. It is almost all on the rotation while the lineup, I'd guess, has some nice stretches where it provides some nice support, but also goes ice cold for other stretches and they only win games where the rotation is superhuman. That means you need to go 10 deep in rotation arms because every team goes through 9+ arms a year. Bradley, Abel, Zebby, and/or Festa can't spend the first month or 2 getting their feet under them in the majors. Your best bet for guys coming out of the gates strong are veterans who've been there and done that. But they have to be in camp early. So, you need to sign them now. You can't wait until a week before the season and bring in Giolito. If they actually have money to spend, like they claim to. And if they're really trying to compete, like they claim to be. Go get more talent. The talent that is still available on the FA market are guys like Lucas Giolito. Go get him. Or Littell. Go get more talent.

Pablo getting an MRI. If they're still trying to compete, yes, they should look at bringing in another starting pitcher. No matter what the results of that MRI are. Their rotation has to be lights out. Has to be top 5 in the AL, top 10 in baseball if they're going to compete. They can't rely on Zebby, Festa, Abel, or Bradley being good. Or Ober even at this point. They need another starter if they're trying to contend.