chpettit19

Rodriguez is a good CFer. He's a better CFer than he is a hitter at this point. If Bader keeps hitting better than he has in years he's going somewhere else. Just no way the Twins can afford to pay him 8 figures next year.

To trade him now I'd need a massive return. But I'd be listening. They should always be listening. On everyone. If Baltimore thinks Joe Ryan is the key to them getting back to contention the next handful of years and they want to get him in there now so they waive Samuel Basallo plus in my face you better believe I'm listening. But I wouldn't be actively calling and trying to sell Joe Ryan at the deadline. I might during the offseason, though. At this deadline I'm selling guys who won't be here moving forward. That's guys on expiring deals and guys I can't afford/won't pay. As @Riverbrian points out, the Twins don't have the budget to keep everyone. And I don't think they should want to. This team is what most of us thought they were, mediocre. Somewhere around .500 teams shouldn't be having you fighting to break the budget to keep them together. I think they have the pitching to compete. I don't think they have the hitting, fielding, or base running. So, I'd sell off anyone who I don't think will be here moving forward (Castro, Bader, France, Larnach (I don't think they'll pay his arb raises), Vazquez, Clemens) and give all the ABs to people who might be. The rest of 2025 would be about figuring out what kind of pieces I have that can contribute in 2026 and beyond and getting them experience. Can Julien and Miranda figure it out or do I need to cut them? Does Emma look completely overwhelmed or is there something there (next year is his last option year, we need to start gathering data on him at the big league level- although I'm open to trading him if he has big value)? Can McCusker show any sort of adjustment making in the majors over 2 months? Can Martin be a 4th OFer/2B? I 100% understand why people don't want to trade away good pitching. And it's why I wouldn't do it now. But what path do people see to improving the position player side? This isn't a blip on the radar anymore. This position player group hasn't been good enough for years. They don't have the financial resources to improve it. They haven't been good at developing all around players. I'm a prospect lover, but they have a 2 year window. Letting Ryan, Ober, Lopez, Duran, and Jax walk for comp picks after 4 years of roughly .500 teams fighting for the final wild card spot would be a disaster. So, I wouldn't trade any controllable pitching now. But I'd be open to it this offseason and moving forward. If Festa, SWR, and/or Zebby look like any sort of reliable rotation option one of Ryan, Lopez, or Ober likely needs to get dealt next offseason. If Ober doesn't come back and dominate it's Ryan or Lopez.

Honestly, I wouldn't even limit it to just expiring deals. If I were in charge, it'd be guys I don't see as part of the future. I think Larnach is on the border of being non-tendered. Not because he isn't worth the 4ish mil he'll get in general, but because he won't be worth it to the Twins with the tight budget they'll be on. Same with Topa. Unfortunately, the Twins are in a really bad spot when it comes to options for upgrading the position player side of the team. I think they have the pitching to compete. June obviously saw things fall apart for a while, but I think there's enough talent there to realistically look at that side of the roster and say it's worth trying to compete for the next 2 years. But the position player side needs work and there aren't many avenues to improvement. It almost all comes down to internal development. And because of that I think the rest of this season has to be focused on figuring out who can play a role the next couple years and giving them experience. Could this team catch fire for 2 weeks again and have that be enough to sneak into the last wild card spot? Maybe. But I don't think they have any realistic shot at doing damage in the playoffs. And I'm typically a chip and a chair kind of a guy. I just think the last 11 months say this team isn't good enough and if we're being honest the position player side needs a real shake up. France, Bader, Castro, and Clemens have no future here. Give their ABs to people who might. If you're going to non-tender Larnach trade him now, get something for him, and get somebody who may have a future ABs. Maybe everyone you have here now looks completely overwhelmed. At least you know now and that changes how you do things in the offseason. I'm generally an optimist, but we have enough info now, in my opinion. This position player group is too flawed. Let's try new guys and be better prepared to make decisions during the offseason. I don't think that's what they'll do, but it's what I'd do.

They're likely not bringing back anyone who can help next year for those expiring deals. That wouldn't be the goal, though. Get whatever prospects you can and clear out guys who aren't part of the future. Running back this same team for the 3rd straight year doesn't make sense. They need to be realistic about this position player group. It's incredibly flawed and not good enough. And they can't afford it anyways. They can't keep the payroll under 155 without dropping guys from the current 18 under contract plus the 3 you want to bring back. And they aren't going to run that big of a payroll. So, who are you trading away in order to keep Castro and Bader? Lopez? 2 of Duran, Jax, Ryan, and Ober? Unless you think it's realistic that the payroll is going up while their attendance continues to nosedive, it's not realistic that they're bringing those guys back. So, now they're carrying them for the rest of the year in the hopes of finishing around .500 and sneaking into the playoffs with no real chance to advance or do any real damage. That is the short sighted plan. Clearing out the guys with no future on the team to give ABs and innings to guys who actually have a chance to be around moving forward is the long term plan. Castro and Bader are gone unless you're trading some arms. And if you're trading some arms you better really believe in the pitching development.

I think that very much depends on the hitter. Kyle Schwarber has a 203 wRC+ left on left in 144 PAs this year. You taking him out of the leadoff spot to go all righties in the lineup? Shohei is at 150 wRC+ in 135 PAs. James wood 146 in 133 PAs. Kyle Tucker 144 in 129. Juan Soto 144 in 119. CJ Abrams 136 in 102. Rafael Devers 136 in 147. Matt Olson 127 in 101. Corbin Carroll 113 in 101. Bryce Harper 110 in 106. Brandon Nimmo 108 in 105. Sal Frelick 106 in 113. JP Crawford 105 in 107. Going all righty, as the Twins love to do, also allows the pitcher to get more comfortable. It is different throwing to a lefty than a righty. You use different pitches and focus on different parts of the zone more. If you have to adjust back and forth between your pitches more and bounce between different parts of the zone with all your pitches more, it's harder to get into a groove. I've never pushed strongly for Larnach to get lots of ABs against lefties because he was never all that successful against them in the minors. Wallner was, though. He was super successful against them in the minors. So, I've been one of the vocal contingent around here about defying the years of data. Because it shouldn't be about macro analytics, it should be about micro. It should be about that specific hitter. Gunnar Henderson is my go to example. The Orioles wanted him to be a star. When he came up he played everyday. No matter who was on the mound. He was awful against lefties his first year. A little less awful his 2nd. And an absolute star against them his 3rd. I just listed 13 guys with over 100 PAs left on left this year with above average production. They shouldn't be sat against lefties simply because of a hundred years of data. Because it should be about the specific player. The question is whether or not the Twins have had any lefties worth giving a shot to. My argument has always been that Wallner's minor league production and early major league success meant he should play everyday to me. Even if/when he struggled against lefties early. If you think he can be a star let him try to develop into a star. Should the Twins platoon Jenkins from the jump because of the data? Or let him try to be a star?

Where you getting the money for extending those guys? Castro isn't accepting that deal, by the way. Tommy Edman just got 5/74. You're going to need 12-15 a year for 5 years to sign Castro. Lewis: 3 CC: 32.8 Lee: 800k Keaschall: 800k Jeffers: 9 Bader: 12 Castro: 14 Buxton: 15.1 Wallner: 800k Larnach: 4 Lopez: 21.75 Ryan: 6.5 Ober: 7 Festa: 800k Coulombe: 3.75 Sands: 1.1 Topa: 2 Varland: 800k Jax: 5 Duran: 8 SWR: 800k That's roughly 150 mil in payroll for 21 roster spots. Even if you fill the rest of the roster with league minimum guys you're at essentially 155 mil in payroll for 2026. I don't think that's a likely scenario. Not all 21 of these guys are coming back next year. Bader, Castro, and Coulombe are pretty obvious trade options. To me, not trading those guys and hoping to be .500 at the deadline, and likely still have 3 or 4 teams to jump to win the last wild card spot, just to get smacked in the playoffs with a clearly flawed team is short sighted. How do you improve upon this team in the offseason? Even if I give you a $160 million payroll for next year, how are you improving this team with the final 5 roster spots and only 10 million to spend?

I agree with @Linus, SWR doesn't have the ceiling of Zebby or Festa, but he's made the adjustments at the major league level and has the better floor right now. Festa looks like he's figuring things out a little recently, but still hasn't quite gotten things to click with his consistency, and Zebby has been hurt so we'll have to see where he's at when he gets back. If they can make adjustments and lock in consistency they have much higher ceilings because their stuff is better. SWR looks like he can be a solid 4th/5th arm in a rotation. I wouldn't want him starting a bunch of playoff games for me, but internally developed 4th/5th rotation arms are valuable, too. Especially if he can continue to take the ball every 5th day more often than not. He absolutely looks like a developmental success story at this point, just without a super high ceiling. I wouldn't be looking to move him at this point unless somebody is blowing me away with an offer. Outside of Paddack and Coulombe, I wouldn't move any pitching until the offseason when the whole team could get a massive reshaping depending on how the rest of this season goes and what kind of shape my offense is in and how realistic I think it is I can rebuild that side of things in the next 2 years.

This is a false narrative. You apologize to Joe Ryan in there already, but he disproves your point from the start. He's gone more than 5 innings in 11 starts already this year, and each of his last 5. Festa has gone more than 5 in his last 2 and 3 of his last 5. The Twins haven't limited Ober in years and weren't limiting him when he was actively injured so why would we assume they're going to limit him when he comes back? SWR going deeper depends on the offense giving him cushion. So, we can probably assume he won't be going deeper because they don't tend to do that. And I agree Zebby will likely be limited. But that's 3 out of 5 who I see plenty of reason to believe they'll be allowed to go longer than 5. Since that's what they've been doing.

Roman Anthony is 21 with a 109 OPS+ early in his MLB career- 25.5% K rate in AA as a 20-year-old, 19% K and BB% in AAA at 20 years old, 19% BB rate, 21% K rate in AAA as 21-year-old Jackson Chourio had a 119 OPS+ as a 20-year-old in the majors- 18.4% K rate in AA Marcelo Mayer struggling a little out of the gates in the majors but had a 25.8% K rate in AA at 20 and 19.7% at 21. Lots of people wanting Dalton Rushing around here- 20.7% K rate at AA at 23 years old. Augustin Ramirez- 19.4% K rate at AA at 21 years old. Jenkins is a little extra patient, but not passive. He's not Emmanuel Rodriguez. Emma had a 31.7% swing rate at AA. Jenkins is at 44% this year, 49% last year. But he doesn't swing at crap. He has a 14% called strike percentage so it's not like he's taking a ton of strikes. For comparison here's the called strike percentages for AA from the guys above: Ramirez: 13% Rushing: 13% Mayer: 12% Chourio: 15% Anthony: 20% Here's their swing percentages: Ramirez: 49% Rushing: 46% Mayer: 50% Chourio: 49% Anthony: 39% Roman Anthony was much more patient or passive than Jenkins and struck out even more in AA as a 20-year-old. Had 19% K and BB rates in AAA as both a 20- and 21-year-old and is still mashing in the majors at the age of 21. He was slugging much better, that part is true. Although, getting some batted ball data on Jenkins could also help tell a better story there. And it's such a small sample size that 1 extra home run jumps his slugging to an acceptable spot. If he keeps doing what he's doing and adds 1 HR in every 67 ABs to the numbers he's currently putting up he's doing what the rest of the top prospects in baseball are doing at AA. There's so much more to determining if a guy is ready than just looking at their K and BB rates. Especially in such a small sample size. He doesn't need to hit .330 with a .500 slug and 14% K rate for a month to say he's conquered AA. He can keep doing what he's doing with 1 extra home run or a couple extra doubles and be just fine.

Good for Buck. Back in his home state and gets to put on a show for his family and friends. Like he said, once in a lifetime opportunity. Glad to hear he's taking advantage of it. Hope he puts on a memorable performance.

Bader's option is mutual. If he continues to have his best offensive season in years he's going to decline his side and hit free agency again. Clemens is 29 and has a .629 OPS with a .152 BA since the start of June. He's back to being Kody Clemens. He has no future here. If you're going to call up Sabato and give him playing time, then give him all the playing time and see what he can do. Don't waste ABs on Kody Clemens.

While I agree he looks off-balance, he's still hitting absolute bombs. The HR he hit in Miami was 430 ft. That didn't "barely reach the fence." The one he hit off Pop to the bullpens at Target Field was 420 feet the other way. Those are his last 2 HRs. Those are absolute bombs.

I don't think the idea of trading Ryan (or Lopez or Ober- not right now on him, obviously) is crazy at all. I wouldn't do it right now, though. I think you get to this offseason and start making some tough decisions then. Ideally new ownership and FO is in place by then, but even if it isn't (feeling more likely by the day that it isn't), a hard look at the org needs to be taken and decisions need to start to be made on where the future of this team is headed. The Twins have Ryan, Ober, Lopez, Duran, and Jax for 2 more years. There's not many teams out there with a better front 3 to a rotation and back 2 to a bullpen combination than that. But the position player side of this team is incredibly flawed. And that 5 man pitching group is only around for 2 more years. That sounds like a long time, but it really isn't unless the front office starts making some real changes. My concern is on their options for making real change. As is well known, they're not exactly selling out Target Field every game. And I don't see that changing for the rest of the season. So, I'd guess big free agent signings won't be the way they fix the offense. Trading away a bunch of prospects to get MLB talent is essentially betting the house on the next 2 years. I hope they don't do that, because they'd need to hit on every trade and they'd need to make 3 or 4 of them and have them all stay healthy for 2 seasons. They could turn it over to the "youth" and enough of the prospects hit big and hit big early. Or they can keep running it back with close to the same roster while filling in with one-year, low-cost vets that provide average at best bats and continue to fail offensively and waste the 5 names above. Coming out of this stretch with a bad MLB team that hasn't won anything since 2023 and a handful of comp picks would be a disaster. If you can turn Ryan into 2 top 100 prospects plus more this offseason you absolutely should consider it. Shoot, if you can turn one of those arms into Samuel Basallo and a lottery ticket at the deadline you should be thinking about it awfully hard right now. I get not wanting to lessen the rotation by trading one of Ryan, Lopez, or Ober, or hurting the pen by trading Jax or Duran, but what's the point of having those 5 when you score 2 or fewer runs in 1/3 of your games and miss the playoffs 80% of the time? How are you going to improve this team before those 5 guys leave with no money to spend and most of your prospects already on the big league team? 2 years isn't as long as it sounds.

My point is more that it's the talent that's the problem. How many hitting coaches you want them to go through with the same players? The players are the problem and the guy who brought the players in is the guy who has to go. Him firing and hiring hitting coaches doesn't solve the problem. The average life span of an MLB hitting coach is less than 3 years. They get fired because they're the easy scapegoat for their bosses who failed to provide them with talent. Matt Wallner is a streaky hitter. Always has been, always will be. Ty France isn't a great hitter. This is who he's been for years. Bader is a bad hitter. His 99 OPS+ is wildly above what he's been the last several years. Clemens is a bad hitter. He's never put up an above average batting line like he has right now, him coming back to earth was always going to happen. Bride never should've been here in the first place. Lee is having as much success as anyone could ask for. Correa is struggling so that's a mark against the hitting coach. Buxton is having his 2nd best offensive season ever. Vazquez is doing exactly what Vazquez does. Jeffers is being Jeffers. Lewis has been broken for a year and isn't around long enough to establish any kind of rhythm anyways. Castro has his best OPS outside of the nonsense 2020 season. Keirsey isn't a major leaguer. This is who these guys are. The hire that isn't working is Falvey and the position player side of his roster. You can hire whatever hitting coach you want and they aren't turning anyone outside of Correa into a better hitter than they're showing. Every hitter currently not named Correa (or Wallner recently) is either meeting or exceeding recent career performance. This is who these guys are. They're simply not very good.

He just got hired. Pretty hard for his bosses to have just fired the previous guy because they blamed the failure of the offense on that guy and then turn around and blame the failure of the same hitters on this guy. At some point the Pohlads will say "wait a minute, maybe it isn't the hitting coaches. Maybe you've built a bad offense."

Very strong winds?

Coors Field. Obviously. (This isn't sarcasm or a joke. That is literally the park they say it wouldn't be a homer in.)

I think he's super boom or bust and not much in the middle. But, mostly, I don't think he can stay healthy and if I could get top 50 global prospect value for him I'd get it. I honestly have no idea what kind of value he has across the league, though. I don't expect him to be traded, but if another team sees him as super valuable and would give up a big time piece for him I'd move him without thinking twice.

No, it's counted in there. There's 3 other dead money spots for him (21.5), Dobnak (3), and Tonkin (1) that don't show on here for some reason.

No, he's in a "dead money" slot on the blueprint form that I was unaware wasn't going to show up on here. I assume because he's hurt. I would've put him in a rotation spot had I known that the format didn't come over the same.

Nobody out, guy on first has a run expectancy of 0.87. 1 out, guy on second has a run expectancy of 0.67. Teams score fewer runs with 1 out and a guy on second than they do with no outs and a guy on first. Sac bunting is a bad strategy. There's a reason teams don't do it. Those are the numbers for this year, but they're roughly the same for the last several years. The numbers for 2021-2024 are 0.90 and 0.71. For 2015-2019 they're 0.91 and 0.71. Your odds of scoring go down when you bunt a runner from first to second. The number of runs teams score go down when you bunt runners on 1st and 2nd to 2nd and 3rd. 1st and 2nd, no outs has a run expectancy of 1.55. 2nd and 3rd 1 out has a run expectancy of 1.41. Giving up outs is a bad idea. There's a reason teams stopped doing it. Especially early in games. It hurts your odds of scoring, not helps.

I don't expect them to trade Alcantara, but I also don't expect it to take a top 10 to 15 global prospect to get it done if they do. The Athletic had an article yesterday where 40 execs were polled on who the best starters, relievers, and position players they think will get traded are. Alcantara was the player mentioned the most overall. By far, apparently. I wouldn't have guessed that, but that's what the article said which is why I included him here because it's apparently an actual possibility he gets dealt. I think a top 50 global prospect is enough to build a package around. If Miami sees Emma that way. They may not value him that highly. None of us can know, but Fangraphs (42), MLB (46), and Keith Law (19) all just released rankings with him still in the top 50. I think you can build a package around a top 50 global prospect, SWR, Raya, Morris, pitcher Culpepper, Winokur, DeBarge, Gonzalez, Schobel, etc. that gets Miami listening awfully closely. If they sell at all. They're the hottest team in baseball so they may be the ones calling us about Joe Ryan in 3 weeks trying to sell us on Robby Snelling and Joe Mack.

Tigers fans interested in voting for their team for the all star game. Twins fans interested in complaining about their team. I'm confused on what you're confused about. This is what happens every year. The teams winning the most have the most invested fans who go vote the most and get the most starters.

The prices are based on this year, but the strategy behind my moves would be to set the team up for 2026 and 2027. It's a retool, not a rebuild. I don't want to blow it up, but I don't want to just keep running things back with this roster. I'd use the rest of 2025 to gain information on young/inexperienced guys and give them experience. Then use the information gained to make additional offseason moves. Alcantara trade package would be centered around Emma. Harry Ford trade would be centered around Larnach and Castro. Jenkins, Keaschall, Culpepper, Prielipp, Hill, and Soto prospects that I wouldn't put in those trades. Otherwise everyone is fair game. SWR would be on the table in both negotiations as well. Clemens is DFA'd as he's turned back into Kody Clemens and has no future here so him being bad serves no purpose while Martin, Julien, McCusker, Miranda, etc. can provide information on if they do have futures here so them being bad can at least serve a purpose. Bader traded for whatever you can get. The infield positions can be rotated. Get Keaschall time at 1B/2B (they said he won't play OF because the medical people said no for this year so I won't argue with the medical folks). Julien at 1B/2B. Miranda 1B/3B. If Culpepper and/or Gonzalez keep doing what they've been doing they'd get a September callup from me. DFA Miranda, Keirsey, McCusker, Julien, Fitzgerald, or whoever shows they have no future with the team in the mean time if that's what's needed to add them both to the 40- and 28-man rosters at that point. If Gasper gets his feet figured out, he'd get 3 weeks of real ABs from me to see if he looks anything at all like he does in AAA or if he's getting DFA'd over the winter. Or during the season to try somebody else. Coulombe traded for whatever you can get. Wentz DFA'd. Paddack traded for whatever you can get. The thought here is that this pitching gives you a chance to be great if you can get the offense to the 10-12th range in baseball the next 2 years. I don't know that this collection of hitters has any shot at that, but spend the rest of this season figuring some things out about a few guys. Because if the answer is that none of the guys sneaking up on, or already reaching, arbitration are guys who can hit in the top 5 of a playoff lineup then you probably need to blow things up during the offseason because you're going to lose all your pitching before the lineup is ready. If you have to blow it up this offseason you can turn around and spin Alcantara into a big time prospect package if he has a great rest of the season as he seems to be getting himself straightened out. You can sell Lopez, Ryan, Ober, Duran, Jax, and Varland for an entire farm system worth of prospects. I realize many are ready to blow it up now, but truly blowing it up means trading all the pitching. There's no sense in keeping them around for the next 2 years if you don't have any position players. So, I'd like to spend the next 3 months giving all the ABs to guys who may have futures here to see if there's anything there. I know many have given up on them, and are probably right. But unless you're advocating for trading Lopez, Ryan, Ober, Duran, and Jax then I don't know what else you can do the rest of this season besides run with the pre-arb or arb 1 guys and see if there's any signs of life. Unless you're going to blow up your farm system trying to trade for offensive pieces for the next 2 seasons to match the pitching and Buxton/Correa timelines. I think that's an awful idea as the likely outcome is you end up with a playoff series win and then an awful team with an awful farm system come 2028. But it is the other option. C: Ryan Jeffers ($4.70M) 1B: Luke Keaschall ($.8M) 2B: Brooks Lee ($0.80M) 3B: Royce Lewis ($2.30M) SS: Carlos Correa ($36.00M) LF: McCusker ($.8M) CF: Byron Buxton ($15.00M) RF: Matt Wallner ($0.80M) DH: Ed Julien ($.8M) 4th OF: Dashawn Keirsey Jr ($0.80M) Utility: Jose Miranda ($.8M) Utility: Austin Martin ($0.80M) Backup C: Harry Ford ($.8M) NA: Dead Money Here ($0.00M) SP1: David Festa ($0.80M) SP2: Joe Ryan ($3.80M) SP3: Bailey Ober ($4.30M) SP4: Sandy Alcantara ($17.3M) SP5: Simeon Woods Richardson ($0.80M) RP: Jhoan Duran ($3.70M) RP: Brock Stewart ($0.80M) RP: Griffin Jax ($2.60M) RP: Travis Adams ($.8M) RP: Cole Sands ($0.80M) RP: Justin Topa ($1.30M) RP: Louie Varland ($0.80M) RP: Cycle through arms ($0.80M) NA: Dead Money Here ($0.00M) Payroll is 28.41% under budget

I'd trade Emma for Alcantara.