diehardtwinsfan

Perk, Dozier, Santana, and (maybe even Parmelee) are all a part of the future. Why on earth would they sell on them? I could see Perk simply b/c relievers tend to collapse abruptly, but the rest are young and cost controlled for quite some time.

I doubt the Stros had Correa ranked too much lower than Buxton. They don't do this otherwise, and I think so far, from that end, their strategy wasn't bad... On the flip side, Berrios and Walker are turning into much better prospects than what people thought too, so the Twins probably got the better end of this deal (and this comes from a guy who wasn't happy with this pick).

Given the injuries, I'm a bit surprised this hasn't happened already... It's one way to get rid of Gardy's fascination for no hit all glove guys... Though I don't think Ryan wants to get in the habit of ticking off his manager either.

You are right in that I wouldn't walk out with the turkey because it is wrong. Where I think your argument fails is because you assume that there's a standard of right and wrong that we can all agree on. Even in the turkey analogy, there are plenty that would justify those actions for the very reasons you specified, or for other reasons altogether. It's the penalty that keeps people from doing it. That said, there's a huge difference between shoplifting something that someone else owns and a group of really rich people getting together to setup rules to suppress a labor market and then providing very little disincentive for a handful of said owners who choose to go about and pay market value for the labor, and that's what is going on here. There's nothing inherently wrong with the Yankees looking at the penalty and deciding that it isn't severe enough to deter the behavior. This isn't morally wrong. The rules allow for it. The Yankees will pay the penalty, and they know it. I also suspect that there would be very little outrage if this were the Twins behaving in that capacity. I also suspect most of us secretly want our team to be doing this.

I wasn't watching it when it came out, so I missed most of this... I'm a bit surprised though that it didn't do well. I started watching and from start, right up until the end, I was always looking forward to the next one... Season 4 struck me as a 'tie up as many loose ends as possible' type thing.

Then no amount of AV software would have fixed it. They setup a portal and didn't secure it... dumb.

Then I misunderstood you... My apologies.

The problem is that all the risk lies with the player. I'd argue that Morales could have gotten a multi year deal at a similar amount (Drew as well for that matter) had there been no draft pick compensation tied to it. Instead, two guys who were above average players ended up not playing because of this rule. Making it lower isn't going to make the problem better, it makes it worse putting more players into this situation. I don't see it happening. I think compensation for smaller market teams with FAs leave is a good thing, but it is not good for baseball when players when good players are unemployed.

They can't. He would have had to have been on the roster day 1 for this to happen.

I'm pretty sure steroids were always against the rules (and against the law I might add), MLB chose not to test for them... big difference. This is a situation where the rules don't provide any sort of disincentive to stop the behavior... I'd add also that it's not like this wasn't predictable or anything either. It was pretty obvious from day 1 that this was going to happen.

I'm not sure the analogy applies. The reason you don't walk out with the Turkey is b/c the penalty is severe enough to deter you. The rules state in this case that you can overspend your cap money... but they place a penalty to supposedly restrict you... problem is that the penalty does not deter. This is more like speeding than shoplifting.

Yeah, but was really only away for about a day I honestly don't expect much of anything from any of them this year, but I do think that Rosario and Hicks will likely start in AAA next season. I'll be very unhappy if they don't add some CF depth this offseason or do so by a Bartlett experiment.

I'd say this is an issue for guys who signed long term deals and are 1 year in... not so much for guys like Hammer, Suzuki, or Morales. It's kind of expected in that scenario. Perkins, Nolasco (not that he'd fetch anything), and Hughes would be a different story.

This is your site Seth That said, I may not personally be too interested in Nate Roberts, but I like reading about these guys. If you are talking about someone I don't care about, I just skip it.... Not too hard, but guys like Roberts can suddenly click on something and become decent players. Dozier was a great example of that a few years back. There should be no rule limiting who we talk about. This forum would be a lot less populated if we did.

Unethical, yes. Cheating, no. The Yankees are following the rules. They pay the penalty willingly b/c they think it's worth it. And as I said earlier, I have zero doubts about this being unintended. They want a draft. Best way to do that is to ruin the current system.

SS has been a pleasant surprise for the org as a whole this year. It was considered a weakness, but Santana and Escobar stepped up, Polanco is having a great season, and they drafted Gordon. I think there's a short term/long term consideration here. Santana's value is at SS. I really think that long term he has to remain there (though to be clear, I'm still expecting him to turn back into a pumpkin). I don't have too much of an issue letting him play in CF as a stop gap, but not as a long term solution. I don't see them fixing CF this year, so playing in CF with Fuld for the next couple of months is what I think will (and should) happen. This offseason, I'd toss a 1 year deal at someone in the FA market to be a stop gap CF and let Buxton/Rosario/Hicks vie for supplanting him in 2016 or in 2015 as an injury call up. Santana should return to SS. For 2015, I'd probably hand the job to Escobar and keep Santana in AAA (unless by some chance he doesn't regress), but I eventually see Santana taking the role and Escobar serving to as a rotating infielder giving Plouffe, Santana, and Dozier a day off once every 4 games. Given that none of the org CF guys have done much past AA (and only Hicks has had a good season there), I really think that the Twins need a 1 year deal for someone in CF. I'd much rather have a mediocre CF blocking a decent prospect who we are screaming for a call up then to have this situation play itself out again next season. I'd expect between Rosario, Buxton, and Hicks that at least one of them could prove themselves ready for the role in 2016. The only issue I see here is that Buxton will likely be in AA and Hicks/Rosario will be in AAA, so Eddie may still be playing some 2B to get regular at bats.

If you make your way down through Indy, send me a PM...

Thorpe looked more like what we'd hoped we would see. He didn't go 5 innings, but 4.2 with 8Ks, 1 BB, 5 hits, and one unearned run is a pretty good day.

Yeah, it isn't cheating, it's terrible rules... and I don't buy for one minute that people didn't realize this would happen. This is nothing more than a calculated attempt to force an international draft. If they wanted it to be successful without an international draft, it could have been implemented differently.

Pretty good summary. I'd note with Suzuki that the Twins do have a replacement in Pinto. He's just going to have to learn some of that defense at the ML level, though his bat should more than compensate for some of those deficiencies... If the Twins are trading, they are out of it, so developing Pinto at the ML level makes sense given that his bat is ready now. With KC, there's replacements who are more than ready to take his place. TR will have no leverage here, so I'm guessing at best we are looking at a Sulbaran type prospect, but I wouldn't be surprised if he was traded for cash considerations either. With his resurgence, he's a decent 5 starter, and some teams really really really need something like that right now. With Duensing, we lose the ability to add his name to sweeten any trade for one of baseball stars... Loss to TD is immense.

He's basically the opposite of Hicks and I think both could stand to learn a bit from each other to balance out their approach. The guy isn't selective at all, and he's swinging out of his shoes it pitches that he cannot hit, whereas Hicks doesn't swing at hardly anything. I'd say the two could learn a bit from each others' approach and could both turn into pretty fine ball players if they did.

Mike, these guys aren't getting promoted in a vacuum, and I'd think that guys like Carlos Gomez and Delmon Young can provide a reasonable amount of caution when it comes to just promoting guys. It's a pretty big gap between the talent they see in the minors and what exists in the majors. The only other guy on the 40 man who could have fit this need was Vargas, and he's slumping in AA right now. I like him as a prospect and I think he's going to turn into a Kendry Morales type guy in MLB, but it does no bit of good to send a guy struggling in AA to the majors so he can struggle/not play there. Gardy certainly won't play him much (look at Polanco), and in this case, rightfully so given that he has far better options at 1st than what he had a short. I understand wanting to see the kids, but overall, you can lose years of development by just throwing them into the fire. As a fan, I'd must rather see them when they are ready and producing with the team maximizing the value of their service time than to waste it watching them struggle when they need more seasoning like what they did with Hicks.

I'm guessing this gets adjusted in the next CBA. It isn't good for the players or baseball as a whole. It either gets done away with altogether, or there's going to be a way for players to sign by ST with a lesser compensation pick or a way to punish the team offering the QO to make them think twice about offering a QO. I'm not sure guys like Drew or Morales should have been offered one at all. What I do think is that if a guy like Trout was in that position, no one would think twice about giving up the first rounder... They just need to find the balance.

I'm not quite sure where the 'can't hit a fastball' thing came from. He struggles with high heat. He's shown that he can hit quite well in stretches. That's quite different than not being able to hit a fastball.

When he's on, he's a middle order bat... when he's not... well, you don't want him in the 9 spot. Hopefully he can figure out a way to minimize his weaknesses more... even the ability to foul off those high strikes would increase his likeliness of getting that hittable pitch lower in the zone. My biggest complaint is that he is Gardy's refusal to let him work through his slumps. I hope they let him play the rest of the year and allow him to adjust his mechanics a bit. I really do think he could be that other corner outfielder, especially if Hicks fails. His defense is decent in the corner, and I'd think that a Parm, Buxton, Arcia OF in a couple of years would be a nice balance of bat and glove.