chpettit19

Likelihood of a grievance against an MLB team for cutting a player who's hit .203 over the last 2 seasons? I'm not following at all. My understanding of the situation is that Cave was eligible for arbitration. The team never offered him arbitration as the 2 sides came to an agreement before it was even necessary. Cave agreed to a 1 year $800,000 major league deal. My understanding is due to the current CBA that deal is not fully guaranteed until Spring Training. I don't have any idea how any of that leads to even the potential that there's a grievance filed if he's cut. That's just everyday baseball operations. And Phil Hughes was traded with the 74th pick (not super high, but not nothing) to get rid of almost $7 million, not 800K. I don't see the connection there at all. This ownership group and FO release players making more than 800k all the time. They signed Addison Reed for 2 years and 16.75M before releasing him and eating more than 6 million. I'm not seeing any reason why they wouldn't be willing to release Cave if they find someone they feel is a better fit for the org in 2022 and beyond.

My understanding is there's nothing left with arbitration anymore. Maybe I'm misunderstanding what you're saying. My understanding is they signed him to a 1 year major league deal for 800K (that isn't fully guaranteed until ST). So not sure why we wouldn't see him as any other fringe roster guy on a 1 year deal that could be cut at any time. There's 40 guys on the 40 man right now. I don't think even the angriest of Twins fans think these are the 40 guys they're going into 2022 with. Not sure why Cave on an 800K deal should be seen as less likely to be cut than any other position player right now.

Feels like much ado about nothing with Cave. He's easily cuttable. They didn't give him 10M or something. I don't like him and have no problem with people preferring they had just released him, but lets not make this out to be more than it is. Less than $1M to a 4th outfielder they'll cut immediately if/when they find a better option. Now on to the other players being thrown around as preferable over Cave. Yes, Castellanos and Canha are far better options, but, again, Cave signed for 800K, those 2 are getting way, way, way more than that. They're not the same type of signing. It's like saying "why did we extend Kepler? I would've signed Bryce Harper over Kepler." Yes, Bryce is far better, but they're not comparable signings. Clint Frazier can't play CF. We need to stop that talk right now. I don't like Cave in center, but Frazier is a Rooker-esque corner outfielder. As in one of the worst defenders in all of baseball. In fact, Rooker may be the best comp for Frazier there is on the Twins right now. Better contact skills, but he's a power corner bat who's a negative asset in the field. I wouldn't be upset with bringing him in, or even him replacing Cave, but lets not make him out to be what he isn't. He's a terrible fielder. I'd take him over Cave because I'd use Gordon in CF before I'd use Cave. But I'd never use Frazier there. But let's pump the brakes on the Cave rage. He's my least favorite Twin right now, and I don't think he plays a role on a contending team, but it's not even Thanksgiving yet, and he's on an incredibly releasable 1 year contract.

Interesting to see them add so many arms. Not super shocking, and they're all guys I think are worthy of protecting, but it makes me think signing multiple FA arms is likely not in the plans. There's still a couple guys they could move on from if they find multiple guys they want to bring in, but my first thought is that they're going to turn the pitching over to more young guys than many would probably like. Or look to make trades that would have them moving guys on the 40 man.

I saw a couple that were definitely drawing the line between tanking for draft picks and tanking in general, but there were also some comments that pretty clearly, to me at least, were stating they didn't think there were any teams attempting to lose on purpose (how I'd define tanking). They pointed to lost revenue as the reason no team would tank. To me that reads as they don't see teams attempting to lose on purpose (whether for picks or rebuilding or however you want to define things) because the owner would lose money, and I disagree with that. They cut payroll so they don't lose money while they tank. So I agree that tanking simply for a higher pick isn't really done, but rewording it as "rebuilding" is the same thing to me. Teams don't tank for a higher pick alone, but they do for more prospects, more pool money, and numerous other reasons. To me it doesn't matter if it's for a better pick or not, a front office actively refusing to field a competitive team is bad for the sport. No matter what the sport is. But it's done in all of them because it allows owners to save money while their FO takes advantage of rules meant to fix other problems that open ways to improve by being bad.

I'm shocked at the number of people who suggest there isn't tanking in baseball. There 100% is and the Cubs and Astros made it more popular when they won World Series titles after doing it. Baltimore is 100% tanking. Their front office is actively trying to lose major league baseball games. As Trov pointed out, tanking in baseball isn't necessarily about getting the #1 pick. Its about adding prospects by trading many of the legitimate major leaguers you have for any prospects you can, getting a bigger draft money pool, bigger international free agency pool, comp picks, revenue sharing $, etc. Baltimore isn't playing young players to build for the future with those players or they'd have called up Adley Rutschman to get him ready for the future. They're not going to sacrifice his years of control on teams they aren't trying to win with, though. There is motivation in many forms in MLB to not play your best players or try to bring in better players. It's a huge problem and is part of what is killing the sport. The NFL undoubtedly has the most parity in the major US sports (even with the Patriots being crazy good for so long). They're able to achieve it by having large rosters (part of their game) where 1 person can't win all on their own (despite what we are lead to believe about great QBs), and a salary floor/cap situation that stops the accumulation of super teams (despite what the Rams have been trying to do). Their draft isn't a perfect science, and getting higher picks helps, but because their rosters are so big and there's so many players that need to contribute it doesn't play a huge role in teams suddenly getting good. You'll always have the Jets, Lions, etc. of the world as their owners are just terrible at identifying quality FO personnel and coaches so they're simply bad at building teams. That's very different than the Orioles hiring Mike Elias and him refusing to bring in real major leaguers. The goal isn't to get rid of teams that lose 100 games, it's to get rid of teams trying to lose 100 games. Not the players, but the FO. The players are always trying to win. Tanking is bad. Baseball has far more problems than just the draft order that lead to tanking. Namely financial disparity. The rules are largely put in place to aid low budget teams by creating rules on how much a team can spend in certain areas so the big money teams can't control things even more through their financial advantages. Until the finances are more evenly dispersed the problems won't be fixed. Baseball orgs need enough players to contribute throughout a season that they could reach NFL style parity if they'd balance the payrolls. But they never will so the rest will just be shuffling deck chairs on the Titanic.

This post and thread bring up 2 of the more interesting player evals in all of baseball I think. I'd bet there are some huge differences in how different orgs view Chapman. I don't think anybody would have him ranked any worse than #2 in baseball as a defensive 3B (him and Arrenado are head and shoulders above everyone else), but I'd bet there is some difference in how people see his bat. He's a Sano-esque K machine with a low BA so it really comes down to the views of his power and patience, and how sustainable they are. I think he's a clear upgrade on Donaldson at this point in time as a complete player (he was actually in the 76th percentile in sprint speed which is surprising for a 3B), but I'm not sure what I'd be willing to give up for 2 years of him. The 2nd interesting player eval is Miranda. Fans around here are very excited about him, and for good reason, but he hasn't exactly sky rocketed up national prospect rankings. I may have missed an update somewhere, but I don't remember seeing him on any top 100 lists even at the end of the year/after the year. Having not been selected in the Rule 5 last year shows there weren't any MLB teams that saw him as a prospect who was going to put up the numbers he did last year, and evaluators haven't seemed to shift too dramatically in their rankings of him even after the big season. That certainly doesn't mean he's not to be viewed highly by folks here, but it's interesting. Chapman has a career 120 OPS+ and wRC+. If Miranda puts up those kinds of numbers in his first 5 seasons we should all be very happy. There's 0% chance Miranda can do what Chapman does with the glove. The question really is if Chapman has been figured out by the league and his decline with the bat is real or if he's going to bounce back to a hitter who's 20+% better than league average. And I think you'll find drastically different answers to that question amongst FO personnel.

Interesting target. I'd think it really depends what the Twins are looking like in 2022 and if they'll be in the mix for winning the division or not. If not then it's really a trade for 2023 only which would make me a little more hesitant as there's no reason to believe the Twins would extend him. If you can get him for a reasonable package I'd be all for it, though. Not sure Jeffers would be of any interest to the As, though. The post isn't suggesting the Larnach and Jeffers package as much as giving an idea of the quality of player needed, but the As have a right handed hitting catcher who's young and better than Jeffers so they'd be unlikely to want him. I'd guess they'd want some young pitching in return. Twins certainly have that so wouldn't be against moving one or 2 of those guys, even if I'd prefer to keep them all if possible.

This feels like a bit of an awkward comparison. As you said, Detroit has been rebuilding and that means they were looking for very different things in players and making very different evaluations than the Twins were. Baddoo turned out better than anyone would've guessed, including the Tigers. He'd never played above high-A and hadn't played in basically 2 years. It turned out terrible for the Twins, and everyone knew there was a chance he'd be taken, but nobody expected him to step in and be a 2 WAR player last year. Nobody. Not 1 single person. The Tigers being in rebuild mode meant they could take a shot on a super athletic kid and not care if he struggled for a year because they weren't trying to win anyways. The Twins were trying to win. Going into the year it was reasonable to expect Cave would help the Twins more than Baddoo. Even if I don't like Cave, it was a fair assessment and decision. Keon Broxton isn't worth debating. He's not a 5 tool player, he's a 2 tool player. He's really good defensively and can run, but he's a worse hitter than Cave. Besides being a true CFer, he brings no worth to a major league team and he will never get a major league deal again in his life. I thought Happ was a solid #5 pitcher selection, he'd been above average for years and it was reasonable to expect him to eat some innings and give the team a chance to win as a back end starter. I didn't like the Shoemaker deal, though. Also didn't like how they put Dobnak in the pen, but I don't get why it's bad that they helped him develop another pitch, though. Him becoming a "strikeout pitcher" was him improving his slider and it basically becoming a whole new pitch to him. He couldn't control it well enough and he got rocked, but it's never a bad thing to add a legit pitch. The FO has made some terrible evaluations, but they've also made some very good ones. Like I said to start this, it's hard to compare the 2 orgs. I don't have a problem with the frustrations, but I think it's tough to say the Tigers have done things correctly and the Twins haven't when they were attempting to reach very different goals. The Twins failed miserably last year (after multiple successful seasons), but the Tigers haven't succeeded yet. Will be interesting to see how the rest of this offseason plays out and what the teams look like going into 2022.

My main curiosity was if you meant this specific signing or organizational moves in general over the last 5 years or whatever. As nicksaviking posted right above me, Detroit doesn't seem to be in any better situation than the Twins and have been much worse over the last 5 years so I'd be interested in your comparisons on the 2 orgs if you feel like sharing.

Are you referring to the teams in general or this specific situation when you say Detroit did everything right and MN made a lot of mistakes? Curious what you mean by that.

Totally agree they aren't established. But when it comes to building a team if they just sign veterans to take all 26 spots on the roster no prospects can ever establish themselves. I mean "here" in the sense that they have little to nothing left to prove in the minors and they're penciled into Twins roster spots to some extent or another in 2022. How good the Twins are the next 5-6 years depends on these guys. They're the core and they're here in the sense that they're going to start taking most of the ABs and throwing most of the pitches in the near future. There are definitely a lot of routes the FO could take. I think they've already established that going into the offseason their plan is retool. You don't trade for nothing but close-to-MLB-ready players last year if you're planning on a 3-4 year rebuild. That just throws off your timeline. Whether they're successful with making more moves this offseason to complete their retool is another thing. I canceled my season tickets for next year because I don't think they'll resign Buxton and I'm not going to invest if they won't. But that wouldn't even signal a rebuild. I don't think this FO will ever go drastically outside their evaluations and price points to sign guys and that means they'll miss on many targets. But I don't see that as lying about the retool vs rebuild, I think it just means they're overly risk averse. This will be one of the more interesting Twins offseasons in a while, and I hope they make some quality moves, but we'll have to wait and see and continue to debate it all here.

I'd disagree with most of this. They didn't trade Berrios for a couple of low-A prospects. They traded him for 2 guys in AA who both have legit chances to debut in 2022. They didn't trade Cruz for a couple of low-A prospects. They traded him for 2 guys in AAA. 1 has already debuted and one should debut in 2022. That's not a sign of a rebuild, that's a sign of a retool. They were very open that they'd trade people, but only for players in the high minors or major league ready. They traded Happ for a major leaguer with another year of control. When they traded Berrios they most definitely had a #2 or #3, his name is Kenta Maeda and he'd been the runner-up for the Cy Young the year before. Him getting hurt a month later doesn't mean he wasn't there at the time. I don't know how you define "consensus all-stars," but Jorge Polanco should be seen in that light. Byron Buxton is most definitely in that category skill-wise. Mitch Garver as well. Josh Donaldson is right on the border of that. Those 4 all have injury concerns and that's certainly a factor, but the offensive cupboard is far from bare. I'd also argue against the idea that it'd be a waste to spend big FA money this year. I'd argue the opposite. The core is there, but even if it wasn't it's still never a bad idea to bring in talented players. By that argument the Padres shouldn't have signed Manny Machado or Eric Hosmer when they did (Hosmer was a terrible deal from the jump to be fair). The vast majority of the Twins young talent is in AA or AAA and many are ready, or near ready, for their shot in the majors. Even by your idea of having a new core foundation this is the time to spend. I'm not a fan of all of our young players, but the "new core" is here. Kirilloff is here. Larnach is here. Rooker is here. Polanco is here. Jeffers is here. Kepler is here. Miranda is here. Ryan is here. Ober is here. Winder is here. Strotman is here. Alcala is here. Arraez is here. Lewis is here. Martin is here. Wallner is here. SWR is here. Those guys won't all make the opening day roster, but that's the next core. Some players will be moved and some won't turn out, but that's the next core. You can make arguments on what you think of all those players, or how good that core is, but the core is here. If this core isn't good enough they're in for a long rebuild and it's going to be a bad next 5 years. That's why the FO only brought in high minors or MLB ready players at the deadline. They weren't lying, they made moves to compete immediately, not 3-4 years down the road. They added to their young core. I'd argue this is the perfect time to spend large FA $ as they will have so many pre-arb players expected to play large roles. They can afford Buxton and some arms as the new guys come in on super cheap deals. Time to spend (and trade) for 2022 and forward.

I'd encourage you, and anyone else, interested in working in sports to start now. Like St Peter did, get jobs at school. Look into different analytics companies for a job doing video review next season (some did remote work this year, but that may change next year so maybe not possible). Even if it's not baseball. PFF does their video review remotely so you can get a job for them anywhere. And be ready to work those jobs for pennies with crazy hours. Follow, and interact with, as many people on Twitter and other social media sites as possible. Give them your ideas and become a regular respondent so they know who you are. Writing for TD is a great situation for you as well. Go to the Winter Meetings (this year being more difficult, obviously), but get down there and take interviews, shake hands, get your name out there. Don't expect to get a job, but learn from the process. Learn what teams are looking for and how to interview better. Learn the history of the sport you want to work in. I mean as much as possible. And not just the players, but how the game was played, CBA changes, FO strategy, pitcher usage, lineup construction (assuming baseball is your preferred sport), everything. Teams can find a ton of kids to come in and work for nothing and do the grunt work. They want the creatives who see things from a different angle and can bring them new ideas. To do that you need to know what ideas have already been out there. Everyone you're competing against knows the new stats so throwing around WAR numbers won't impress them. Create your own. Even if it's not great, have it be new. Challenge the norm in what you write for TD and how you interact with team officials on social media to stand out. And, like St Peter said, and you're saying here, just get your foot in the door. Start in the minors. Start with the northwoods league. Start wherever you can as soon as you can. St Peter is an exception, not a rule. The sports industry is cutthroat and the sooner you get in the sooner you can learn and advance. Don't wait til you're done with school to start looking for internships and jobs. No offense to St Johns (it's a good school), but you'll be going up against people with much more impressive names at the top of their degrees. Don't bank on that degree meaning much. It's all about getting in, building connections, and impressing with the work you do once you're in the door. Don't put off waiting to get in the door. Kick that guy in now! Good luck. It's not easy breaking into the sports industry, but it's also not impossible. If you're smart, willing to work for nothing early on, and good at expressing your ideas you have a real shot. Take every chance you get to add another bullet point to your resume. You never know which person you meet at which tiny job in the industry will set your path up the ranks.

Feels like a pretty routine claim, then waive and see if you get him through but don't care if you don't move here. Expect we'll see a lot more of these.

Doesn't it take some sort of struggles to be a breakout candidate? The original post clearly states they're looking at prospects who weren't in the top 10 for the Twins who have the chance to jump into the top 10 next year with some improvement. The entire point of this is to find somebody who has had struggles and project them as having a decent chance at jumping up. Like Miranda who had higher expectations when he first got to the org, but struggled, then had a breakout. This exercise doesn't exist with prospects that haven't struggled. Yes, "realism" says that almost every prospect will fail to ever breakout. It's why so few prospects ever make the majors. But what's the point of saying "hey, I think Martin may be really good in 2022?" He's a top prospect, he's expected to put up numbers. It's not over the top to suggest prospects won't break out. But it's also not fun or productive. The original post laid out some reasonable reasons why one could expect those players to see improved performance next year. At least provide the reasons you think they're wrong as other posters have. Do you think Sabato struggles with breaking balls? Do you think Strotman struggles with his command? Or do you just want to point out that prospects fail at incredibly high rates?

Seem like 3 pretty reasonable picks. I wouldn't be surprised at all to see Strotman make his MLB debut next year, and would actually probably be disappointed if he didn't. Not that he's going to be a top 3 arm in a rotation, but I think it's reasonable he can replicate Ober type production and it's never bad to have multiple guys who can make competitive MLB starts at the back end of your rotation. Steer showed more pop than I think anyone was expecting while maintaining his strong strike zone control. That's a pretty good recipe for jumping up prospect rankings. Sabato maintained an elite eye, but had huge contact struggles early. Being a DH only type puts him behind the 8 ball, but if the end of the year was signs of things to come he should reclaim his top prospect shine quickly if he's posting more 1.000 OPS months.

I think Marte is an interesting player for the Twins. I'm a big advocate for outfield defense and hate the Twins continually running out below average defenders who can't run in a league slanted more and more to fly balls and extra base hits. A defense of Marte-Buxton-Kepler would be great for run prevention and with Marte and Buxton at the top and Kepler hitting where he should in the 7-9 holes I like it offensively, too. Interesting plan and would be happy with it even if I think they should focus on a SS in FA instead. Not an Ehire fan. Solid glove and doesn't kill you with the bat as a utility guy, but him having to cover 70+ games at short doesn't sound like a winning formula to me. I just think Mondesi isn't someone I'd go after as I think the Twins can compete in 2022 and he's too big of a question mark to add to the question marks they have with health and prospects getting chances. I'd prefer a big name SS and some trades for arms which may open up the chance of Marte being the other big money FA signing over a FA arm. He's a real interesting piece, but I'd prefer to lock SS down with a more certain thing than Mondesi. Unless they can get KC to give him up for some of our excess corner talent. I wouldn't be mad with Mondesi, but he wouldn't be my plan A through D.

I see the Mondesi idea thrown around here a lot and I'm curious why people aren't scared off by his injury history and below average offense. I agree he's a good buy low candidate with upside, but the reports I've seen say the Royals don't plan to trade him unless they get a pretty darn good package, and the Royals have proven to be quite stubborn (haven't traded Merrifield despite everyone saying they should) and they feel they're ready to compete now. I'd think Mondesi and/or Witt could move to CF and be a stud defender there as well. But my real question is do you think it's wise to have Buxton who's only played more than 100 games once in his career and Mondesi who's really struggled to stay healthy the last few years as 2 of your 3 up the middle guys? That's a lot of faith in 2 incredibly injury prone players. And I'm all for bringing Buxton back with the injury risk because of the ceiling he's shown. Mondesi's best OPS+ season was 115 (wrc+ was 113) in 2018 in 75 games. He's definitely got a ton of potential, but I wouldn't give up any of our young pitchers for the hope he can become an above average bat and stay healthy. Add Arraez, Donaldson, Kirilloff and his wrist, and even Polanco and his ankles to the mix and you're looking at a top of the order with way more real health questions than I'd like.

Agree with the idea that the Twins, and every team, should be open to making deals to improve at the deadline, but this wasn't Atlanta trading for a bunch of stars to fill in for their injured and arrested stars they lost. Duval was the only one of the 4 who was really having a good year before they got him (still only a 100 OPS+ with Miami, 104 with Atl). Joc was below average before the trade and after. Eddie had been horrible in Cleveland. Soler was almost unplayable (76 OPS+) with KC. If the Twins made these types of moves at the deadline I don't think most fans would be praising the FO after the deadline for "going for it." I mean these are basically the deals they have been going after at deadlines, these ones just happened to work out way better than anyone could've guessed, especially in the playoffs. There's not a human on the planet who would've predicted the numbers Soler and Rosario put up for Atl after the first halves they had. I love to see Eddie succeeding and hope the Braves win this thing (Freddie Freeman deserves a ring), but this wasn't some huge swing the Braves made. They took a flier on 3 guys bouncing back a little and 1 guy maintaining. Duval maintained and Soler and Rosario took off to heights nobody would've guessed. Good for them, but not exactly a blueprint that can be replicated frequently.

I like it. As a general idea and plan, not the exact thing that will happen. I think a sizable shakeup would be good. I hope the FO is learning and will make adjustments. Hopefully it includes watching the playoffs and seeing how much just putting the ball in play helps teams. Smoltz keeps saying "pass the baton" over and over and it's what I hope the Twins look for in hitters moving forward. I just don't think you can sustain success with a lineup of more HR or K guys than guys who cut down their swings and put the ball in play with 2 strikes. I hope they've learned over the last 5 years and make a bold statement this offseason to change some things and go into 2022 with a team that can compete. I think it's possible and moves like the ones here (not a fan of paying Baez 22 a year, though) would go a long way to getting things straightened out.

I don't think they need 3 other pitchers. Ober and Ryan and the rest of the prospects are going to get the #4 and 5 spots. And I think that's the right call. Pineda has been every bit a #3 pitcher in his time here and there's no real reason to think he won't do it again in 2022. I 100% agree that you can't contend with him as your #1 or 2 (although the playoffs this year have been anything but a showcase of starting pitching), but spending 8-10M on him as your #3 seems quite reasonable. I don't see Paxton or Foltynewicz as having the upside of a #1 or 2. Besides 1 insane outlier season from each, neither has ever been better than Pineda so I don't see why they'd provide any hope of filling the #1 or 2 spot in a contending rotation. I think we mostly agree. If Pineda is the best, or second best, pitcher the Twins have going into 2022 they weren't really trying to contend and they shouldn't pretend they were. I just don't agree that bringing in any of the 3 you named (outside maybe Thor as the #2) would be a better indication that they're trying to contend or give them a better chance to contend. The team I'm promoting is one that doesn't spend big money on multiple FA starting pitchers, but trades for at least 1 young-ish, controllable arm that can slide into the #2 spot. Many have mentioned Marlins pitchers as targets and I'd trade just about any of our corner guys to them to get one of their guys. The Twins have too many corner guys and not enough up the middle defenders or starting pitchers. I'd spend money on the up the middle players and trade for the pitching.

I don't know that I agree Paxton or Foltynewicz have upside. Throwing hard doesn't automatically equal upside. They've established they are not front of the rotation guys. They're fighting to re-establish themselves as ML pitchers in general let alone front of the rotation guys. Pineda isn't giving "decent pitching." He's been well above average in his time with the Twins. I think you're maybe more focused on the flashy radar gun numbers than the actual results. Pineda isn't blowing people away, but he stops teams from scoring runs much better than the average ML pitcher. That's the goal. Prevent the other team from scoring. He does that. He shouldn't be the best pitcher the Twins have for 2022 if they're trying to contend. I think we very much agree there. But having him in the #3 spot is absolutely good enough to contend. In fact the Twins had the 2nd best fangraphs WAR in all of baseball for pitching staffs in 2019 and 2020 combined with him in the #3 spot. If the Twins are trying to contend they absolutely need to bring in better arms than Pineda, but taking a shot on Foltynewicz or Paxton for cheap should absolutely not be viewed as a better attempt to contend than having Pineda. Signing any of the 4 guys we're discussing as their best pitcher is 100% not a legit attempt to contend. They need somebody better than anyone we've mentioned to be their #1 and Thor is the only one with a legit shot to even be a #2. But Pineda is still a better option for building a contender than Paxton or Foltynewicz. Paxton and Foltynewicz should be the end of the offseason so sign him for cheap and cross your fingers guys, not any sort of sign of a plan to compete. They're younger, harder throwing versions of Happ and Shoemaker as back end, inning filling lottery tickets. I also think their best path is to develop the young guys, and if I were the FO my focus would be locking in the middle of my defense and top of my lineup (Buxton extension, Polanco extension, sign a big name SS) while figuring out which corner guys I want around and better balancing my roster. I'd much rather they trade some corner guys for pitching than sign a number of arms. But if they sign arms I don't want Paxton or Foltynewicz as anything other than competition with Ober and Ryan for back end roles or high velo bullpen options. If I signed Foltynewicz it'd probably be with a plan to let him rip for an inning at a time and see if he can pull a Liam Hendriks and reinvent himself as a shutdown reliever.

I find it interesting that you'd be more impressed with a Thor, Folty, or Paxton signing than bringing Pineda back. Pineda is a far more predictable pitcher and they would likely feel comfortable expecting an ERA+ between 110-125 next year. Thor was no better than Pineda in 2018, significantly worse in 2019, and has thrown 2 awful innings between 2020 and 2021 combined. And he'll cost about twice as much probably. Folty was out of this world (143 ERA+) in 2018, but other than a league average 2019, he's been below average every year of his career, including 24 starts with an ERA of 5.44 this year. Paxton was incredible in 2017 (140 ERA+), but has been worse than Pineda since. Including an awful 21.2 total innings between 2020 and 2021. Feels like based on actual performance Pineda is the much safer pick for competing next year than taking a flier on 3 guys who either haven't been good or haven't even really pitched the last 3-4 years. Don't really understand the idea that signing Folty or Paxton is a sign they're trying to contend while bringing back the significantly better pitcher in Pineda isn't. Pineda has been an above average pitcher in his time with the Twins. Including being their #3 on pitching staffs that had top 10 ERAs the last 2 years. I think you're significantly underselling how well he's performed in his time in MN.

I feel like Kepler for Manaea is exactly the type of move the A's like to make. Last year of control on a pitcher they aren't going to pay for 3 controllable years of a player at a position of need for them. That's Oakland 101. Manaea hasn't been some sort of world beater. He's basically the same talent level of pitcher as Kepler is an outfielder. I think it's one of the more realistic trades you'll see around here. I do agree it's very unlikely Verlander would come here, though. And Gray certainly has a chance to beat those numbers, but he's not getting 20M a year or anything crazy.