chpettit19

Yes, they do. The Twins were better, in relation to the rest of the league, at getting on base last year than they were at slugging. So maybe someone with power would actually be the bigger improvement on the offense.

You can say it as many times as you want, but I can disagree with your stance. They also don't need another no power bat in the order like Benintendi. I wouldn't be upset with Benintendi, but he's also likely to get a longer term deal than Gallo as Gallo could use a pillow contract to try to gain some value back. The Twins need whatever kind of offense they can get. You can prefer batting average. Nothing wrong with that. I didn't say they should be knocking the door down to get Gallo. I said if they can trade Kepler and replace him with Gallo it's a net positive. Didn't say it should be plan A. Just said it wouldn't be the worst move in the world. He's an elite defender and has elite power. He's a useful player. Just not a huge difference maker. You're allowed to not like him, though. But if Benintendi is your big move I'm not impressed either.

If they can move Kepler for anything useful and bring in Gallo for Kepler's salary or lower I wouldn't actually mind that. Replace 1 elite defender with another while bringing in whatever you can get for Kepler. That's a net positive. Certainly wouldn't make the offseason a win, though. And I expect Gallo wouldn't be happy to sign for less than 10 million so he's a no for me. But for less than 10 million I'd be ok with it. What else they going to spend their money on?

Forgot about him. They realistically probably need to add 10 wins to their record on top of the wins they'll make up simply by being healthier. 10 is a lot.

I tend to be more on the "pocket protector" side of fans, but the following paragraph is inaccurate: "The Pohlads didn't "short-change" Correa. They didn't "lowball him." They made him a fair offer based on his age and production. The offer was $285 million over ten years, more per year than the Giants offer but three years shorter. There is nothing the Pohlads did differently than what most fans expected. They threw everything at Correa, minus the kitchen sink." The Pohlads/FO/whoever you want to say 100% did lowball Correa. The AAV means nothing. The fans expecting the Twins to not have the high offer means nothing. It feeling like a "fair offer" means nothing. Correa got $350 million. The Twins (reportedly) offered him $285 million. 285 being a lot for the Twins doesn't mean it isn't a lowball offer. Comparing Correa to the other SSs of his talent level made it quite clear that 285 had no realistic chance of getting it done. Lindor at 341 and Seager at 325 made it unrealistic. They were $65 million dollars short. Thus a lowball offer. Now that doesn't mean it's a bad thing they didn't offer him more. It doesn't make it a bad thing they didn't sign him. It can be both a lowball offer and a good thing they didn't sign him. I'm not upset the Twins didn't sign Correa (although I would've liked it, and would've been fine with 10/350 if that's what it took). But I am upset that they seemingly wasted time and effort trying to sign him for a lowball offer while allowing realistic targets to sign elsewhere and leaving themselves with very few free agents worthy of signing in an attempt to jump a team from 70 some wins to 90 some. The schedule evens out more next year. Yes, they're still in the central and face those teams a lot, but not as much. And more teams get to beat up on the central, and bad teams in general, now instead of having to battle their elite division foes as much. That means the good teams are likely going to win more while the bad teams will likely lose more. The Twins will, in all likelihood, have a higher win total to reach if they want a wild card spot moving forward. They've won 70 some games the last 2 years while facing far more weak opponents throughout the season due to their division, and now they're going to be playing a harder schedule so they need to improve upon the last 2 teams simply to still win 70 some games. I think we all want them to win significantly more than 70 some games. So they've got to do even more to jump up into the 90 win range I think we all want. My problem is that they wasted a whole lot of time going after someone they should have know they couldn't get for their lowball offer while not improving the team in any drastic way. Farmer and Vazquez are good enough to maybe keep them in the 70 win range. They're certainly not significant improvements. Especially when you factor in the loss of Correa. Do they even balance him out? I know the first response of many will be "if they would've stayed healthy," and I agree they were better than a 78 win team last year with better health, but they weren't a 90 win team even with better help. They were a mid-80s win team with better health. Let's say 85 wins. Then they lost a 4 or 5 win player in Correa. I'll only take 3 losses off for that and they're at 82 wins. Let's go with another 4 losses added for the change in schedule (I'm trying to be conservative here and actually expect it to be more like 7 or 8 more losses) and we're down to 78 wins. Farmer and Vazquez make up for those 4 losses maybe? Back to 82 wins assuming the entire roster of injury prone players suddenly have improved health all for the same season. Generally speaking I use 90 wins as the cutoff for any team with a real shot at competing in the playoffs. How do they find 8 more wins? That's my problem with this offseason. They've put themselves in a really tough spot of needing to find 8 more wins while watching a lot of players who would've helped with that sign elsewhere because they were set on the idea that they could get Correa for $285 million when they should've known that was a lowball offer and was never going to cut it. PS sorry for the long rant there.

The blunt assessment likely is premature, and I'm usually the "offseason isn't over yet" guy. But, that being said, I don't want trades so if that's their pivot move I'll be disappointed. They don't have enough prospects left to ship anymore out and have a real shot at staying competitive (unless they're suddenly going to be willing to pay whatever established player they bring in a market level extension, but they should've just paid free agents if that were the case). And they don't have a surplus of anything on the big league roster to make a trade from 1 position to boost another one so to me it'd just be moving the holes around while not filling any. I don't see any real "problem solvers" left on the free agent market. Just more 1 year deals for Eovaldi types. Benintendi would be nice, but we don't need another lefty corner outfielder, and I think he'll get overpaid for his platform year performance last year. JD Martinez would be a nice DH option, but that's another 1 year deal for a likely non-difference maker. Swanson would be nice, but I also think he gets severely overpaid. They're much smarter than me, and have way more info, so there's a very real possibility they make some moves that are helpful. But I don't see those moves, or at least not enough of them to truly make a difference, and I'm at the point where I need to see to believe that they've changed their MO and strategies that have failed miserably the last couple seasons.

Because it guaranteed them tens of millions of dollars. Those are not comparable deals to the Correa, or any FA, deal. Buxton took his deal because he's never stayed healthy and he wanted to be in 1 org for his whole career. The Twins were already Correa's 2nd team and he was here for 1 year, not in the org for 9 years like Buxton. Polanco guaranteed himself $25 million. Before that he'd made $3.2 million. He'd only played 288 major league games, and hit 23 major league homeruns, when he signed that deal. He had nowhere near the same leverage Correa did. If Polanco had stayed as a 100-110 OPS+ guy for the rest of his career that deal wouldn't be team friendly, it'd be right on the nose. Instead he jumped up to a 120 OPS+ guy and it's now been team friendly. Kepler had made $2.95 million before signing a deal worth $35 million. He took his salary from $3.125 million in 2019 to $6 million by signing that deal. And there's people all over these boards that don't think Kepler's deal is team friendly at all and would like to see him traded because they don't think he's worth his $8.5 million this year. Sano gave up 1 year of free agency in his extension. That's not exactly screaming "team friendly!" He signed that extension to guarantee himself $30 million that he wouldn't have otherwise been guaranteed through the arbitration process. A young guy from the core you didn't mention was Eddie Rosario. He didn't sign an extension and instead got non-tendered so the Twins wouldn't have to pay him roughly $10 million. Instead he signed for $8 million with Cleveland. He had made $14.4ish million with the Twins. So he got $23.4 million through his arb years. Polanco got 28.2. Kepler got 38.125. And Sano got 37.9. So the guy who didn't sign the "team friendly" deal missed out on 5 million compared to Polanco, and 15 million compared to Sano and Kepler. It's simply not the straight forward "team friendly" concept you're talking about when the players are still in pre-arb or arb years. That's why Ozzie Albies and Ronald Acuna are on "team friendly" deals in Atlanta. They wanted to guarantee themselves 10s of millions of dollars without risking a bad injury here or there, or a down year, cratering their value. And they've both missed large chunks of time with injuries so it seems rather smart of them. Julio Rodriguez just signed a "team friendly" deal that guarantees him $120 million dollars. Comparing that to a free agent deal and suggesting he signed that because he just loves Seattle so much is ignoring a whole lot of context. Like $100 million worth of context.

I wouldn't doubt that Farmer was plan A. That doesn't make me feel better because you're right and being "in on" deserves to be in quotes. They weren't "in on" Correa if their best offer truly was 285. In that case they should've been signing guys the last month. More than just Vazquez. And not waiting for everyone worth truly investing in to be gone. It's feeling more and more like plan A, B, C, and D were all "payroll reduction." If it wasn't then they haven't changed from their unsuccessful "1 year deal for over the hill vets and cross our fingers they catch lightning in a bottle for that 1 year" strategy and I want no part of that strategy anymore. I've usually been able to see some sort of logic and game plan in their strategies. Even if I didn't agree with them. I'm failing to see a decent strategy anywhere in this offseason, and that's really disappointing.

No, it doesn't. The reporting on pretty much every offseason, and trade deadline, for this FO has felt like they don't have a real plan and are kind of making it up as they go. Last deadline felt more planned, and I was hoping that'd lead into a more planned feeling offseason, but that hasn't been the case so far. I fully admit it's a fool's errand to judge these things from the outside based on whatever reports we get, but being a fan is sometimes foolish. My real problem is that this feels like a payroll reduction they're trying to cover up with leaks and reports for as long as they can, and I find that unacceptable. Even if they end up spending 130-150 million it's likely going to be a collection of over the hill vets, and I'm done with that. JD Martinez is intriguing, but if him or Vazquez are the biggest signings in an offseason where you have 60 million to spend and a 40-man full of young, cheap players you've failed. They can salvage a few decent signings still, but it's hard to see any chance of this offseason not being extremely disappointing. The fans deserve better.

The quote was actually "The Twins appear to be regrouping after losing out on Carlos Correa, so Swanson’s likely out." So, does regrouping make you feel any better? That 1 sentence may have pushed me over the edge from "we'll see what plan B was and give them the rest of the offseason because they couldn't have possibly not had multiple backup plans for the 100% certainty that Correa wouldn't sign for 285 million" to "fire these guys now because plan A was clearly to sign Correa for no more than 285 and there was no real plan B."

Mike Trout and Aaron Judge are both winning MVPs with the seasons they've had if they're in RF. I agree, having guys up the middle who can hit is an advantage, but having guys on the corners who can still hit, but also field like up the middle guys is also an advantage. And it's the ultimate goal. Collect as many "tools" as possible. You want everyone to be a 5 tool guy. All I'm saying is that having too many shortstops isn't a bad thing in and of itself. Having Swanson for 6 years and having Lee and Lewis both turn out to be star SSs in the bigs is a fantastic problem to have. Cuz now you have SS quality defenders at 2B and 3B (or I'd put Lewis in the OF).

Well yes, but the goal is still to accumulate as many guys who can play up the middle as possible. I don't understand anyone arguing that the Twins shouldn't bring in a top flight SS because they have Lewis and Lee (some even mention Martin and Miller). Guys having to slide down the defensive spectrum is not bad. Tatis already has his deal, but he's not a good fielder at SS. His hitting with what I'd guess is above average defense in RF (or CF or LF) based on his athleticism is more than worth his contract. Bogaerts better not lose anything off his bat even if he is playing SS. It's an awfully big drop from SS to DH, though. I'd guess there's a middle step and he's not a DH in 4 years. Especially since Machado is likely to opt out after next season if he hits anything like he did last year. Mookie Betts got a bigger deal than Correa and he plays RF. Aaron Judge is also a RFer with a bigger deal than Correa. Superstars get paid no matter where they play. Mike Trout is going to move to a corner pretty soon I'd guess, is he less valuable to the Angels when he does? I'm pretty sure they'll feel he's plenty valuable with his bat no matter where he stands on the field.

That sounds pretty great to me. Why wouldn't you want 5 shortstops? Well 4 I guess since there's only 4 infield spots. But 4 shortstops and 3 centerfielders sounds pretty ideal to me. You wouldn't be happy with Correa, Lindor, Turner, and Bogaerts in the Twins IF? Wouldn't be happy with Buxton, Trout, and Rodriguez in the Twins OF? The goal should always be to stockpile up the middle players. Bogaerts at SS (for a couple years), Kim at 2B, Machado at 3B (why is he even in this discussion? He's been a 3B for more of his career than he was a SS), Tatis is going to the outfield.

I mean, to be fair, Freeman was in Atlanta for 12 years. It was a bummer to see him leave their because he was such a big part of their team for over a decade, but let's not act like he was gone as soon as he cleared arbitration. Anytime you keep a player in your jersey for over a decade you're doing pretty well.

That's fair. I could be completely misremembering, but I thought the last I saw on Soderstrom was that he was moving out from behind the plate more. And Susac is a couple years away which works perfectly for the A's since they'd be ready to trade Contreras and/or Langeliers by then! But if I'm misremembering on Soderstrom it makes more sense since he's just about ready to hit in the bigs.

I personally don't think him being in RF would make a difference. It would add an extra wall for him to run into, and he'd still go all out towards CF on any ball hit there. But, to me at least, where he plays in the OF isn't the concern because he gets hurt doing non-outfield things more than he gets hurt doing OF things now. Running the bases, standing in the batters box, etc. I'd leave him in CF because him playing CF as well as he does is a huge part of his value. Unless you told me moving to a corner would get him to 130+ games a year, but I don't think it would, unfortunately.

Welcome to Twins Daily! Why do you think moving him to RF would allow him to play more? It's an interesting discussion we've touched on a little around these parts, but I'm always curious to hear people's reasoning for things.

Interesting that Oakland wouldn't want Contreras in return. I never quite know what they're doing out there, but Contreras/Langeliers sounds like a real nice catcher combo for the next 5 years if I'm Oakland.

How is moving Cronenworth to 1B terrible mismanagement of talent? The ideal IF is 4 SSs so you're above average defensively at every position. Terrible mismanagement of talent is having players play positions too high on the defensive ladder, not too low. A CFer playing LF is a plus while a LFer playing CF is a minus. Moving him down the ladder just improves their defensive strength. Ha-Seong Kim had 1 fewer PA than Kyle Farmer last year. He had 4 fewer hits, but 18 more walks. He had 3 fewer HRs, but 4 more doubles. He scored the exact same number of runs. Struck out 1 extra time. Hit .252 compared to Farmers .255. Beat Farmer in OBP .325 to .315, but lost in slugging .386 to .383. He had 4 fewer total bases. Tell me how that's a significant improvement on Farmer? That's my point. They're almost exactly the same hitter. All getting Kim does is strengthen the floor in that you now have 2 of the exact same hitter who can play 2B, 3B, or SS. Kim is a better fielder, but he's no better hitter. That's my entire point. I want someone who's better than Kyle Farmer if I'm going to make getting a SS a priority. Trading for the exact same guy does nothing but improve their backup infielder. That's pretty low on my priority list. Like way at the bottom.

I had forgotten about Perez. That's an interesting option as well. Trades would always be my last option during the offseason (why give up player value when you could sign a similar player for just money?) but if the FA market doesn't go the way they want he's a very intriguing option.

From what I've read he's looking for a starting role. Part of the hold up is likely also how much time they're willing to promise him. Rumors are that he doesn't want a "time share" like the Twins prefer, but wants a 3+ year deal where he's the clear cut starter and gets to catch as much as he can handle. But Correa signing would certainly also help.

Or they need to adjust their math and be better at predicting what it will take to get guys and not waste time on guys who's market they won't be willing to pay up to. Every team reaches a cutoff point on every player eventually. The question is how high your cutoff point is. The Twins sometimes feel like they drastically underestimate player's markets.

The Twins have numbers they're willing to go to on everyone they're interested in. They know which ones they can fit into their budget in what combination. They are pretty notorious for not going above their number on guys. Especially someone like Vazquez. They wouldn't overpay for him even if they weren't in on Correa. There's no reason to assume they were significantly under market on Vazquez. What do you base your assumption that "it was a low ball number" and not at an "appropriate level" on? The house analogy is missing a lot of context. Were the furnace and car upgrade planned purchases with in depth pricing done to have a good estimation of what each would cost, or at least what you're willing to pay for each? Cuz the Twins, and every team, have done that math. The Twins aren't suddenly going to offer Vazquez twice as much because they miss on Correa. They know what they feel his worth is and the max they'll go for him. They know that max fits next to the max they'll go for Correa. The decisions weren't made independently, but the math doesn't change anymore. If either market goes above their already determined maxes they walk away.

Why do you assume they aren't attempting to get a catcher or trade Kepler while also negotiating with Correa? There's already multiple reports that they've offered Christian Vazquez a contract. Many reports about talks with multiple teams on trades of multiple players. They don't need to draw a deadline on Correa to make other deals. They can work on multiple things at once.

My guess is San Diego doesn't see themselves as having too many in fielders and Kim slides over to 2B with Cronenworth moving to 1B as they pair with the left side of Machado and Bogaerts. I also don't see Kim as a big enough improvement on Farmer to really make it worth it. If the Twins aren't getting Correa, or similar star level player, at SS I don't see why they'd spend much time trying to sign Iglesias or trade for Kim or whatever other mid-level SS people want them to get when they already have a mid-level guy in Farmer to cover until Lewis is back. Only reason to get a non-star level SS is if they don't think either Lewis or Lee are capable of being their SS of the future. Lewis looked ready to me, and I'd prefer they use resources elsewhere if they can't bring back Correa. Farmer is good enough to cover SS until June when Lewis can take over. Go get a C, right handed OF bat, or arms if you can't get Correa. Unless you plan to move Polanco, Kim doesn't make the team significantly better.