diehardtwinsfan

I'm curious about where he would have been drafted pre-injury. I personally love some of those later round injured guy picks that would have gone higher had they not gotten hurt.

By that definition, Santiago is the mythical replacement level player... or slightly above.

I understand this... I think. But when I read your posts in particular, it really comes across that way. That could very well be me, but I'm seeing a lot of disappointment on what was done (or not done) without a whole lot of lip service to what could actually have been done. It sure looks like making moves for the sake of making moves, because when you look at what moves were there to be made, there really weren't much. They went out and got a catcher. I'm not a huge fan of Castro, but he was needed and could actually work out quite well given the natural platoon with Murphy or Garver. They tried to trade Dozier. We all agreed (and they did too) that Dozier should be traded for SP help, and from the looks of it, that would have been JDL and not much else. There were no SP FAs worth getting, though moving May back into that role is the right answer. I agree they could (and may still) get help in the pen, though keep in mind that each reliever signed is going to block one of Chargois, Melotakis, or Hildenberger (and by later this year possibly Burdi and Reed too). I don't think it would be smart to go north with 3 rookies in the pen, but making sure you have the space for some of them is (like it or not) a good idea. The reality is that the core is there now on the offense. Yes, defense needs improving, no arguments there, but that is something you're going to have to live with if you want to roll with Buxton, Kepler, Rosario, Polanco, and Sano. None of these guys are realistically going anywhere, and all need to play. But at least we won't see Sano in RF on any sort of consistent basis.

The problem as I see it was that there was little to do on the position player side. Catcher was the only place where there was a clear need where FA had a clear upgrade. Everywhere else is manned by people that need repetition. Like it or not, that's what it is. On the SP side, where the need was clearest, there were no clear upgrades in FA. Again, that's what it is... these guys have to take some steps forward. I don't like the odds, but Nick is right that a ton of things went wrong last year. You cannot discount that.

I wonder how much playing in the FSL with all those prospects affected things. I'm guessing the Twins got to get a lot of looks at Haley. He's kind of the forgotten man here, as I never expect rule V guys to pan out, but he seems to be one more talented option that can be kept in the pen this season.

I'd be happy with a few guys throwing 180. Personally though, I think Trevor May is the best bet for that. He was a workhorse in the minors. I don't see it happening this season, but 160+ is fairly reasonable I think, and I think he can get up to that magic number by next season. As for Gibson, I suspect his problem is the pitches he throws in 2 strike counts. Hopefully a new regime will change that a bit. He was an 8+ K/9 guy in the minors, and when he was hot, he was doing similar work in the majors. Yeah, I get the lack of patience, but that margin for error is much lower in MLB. Gibson has shown he can do it for some period of time. Hopefully, things click for him. In my opinion, Gibson will be the difference between a decent rotation this season and a crappy one.

I'm not disagreeing to be clear. It's a tough boat to be in. Things need to change and the Dem/Rep establishment wasn't going to do it. I didn't vote for Trump, but I'm not going to argue thus far that he has no problems destroying sacred cows or upsetting the apple cart. To an extent, that's badly needed. I'm not quite sure he's as economically illiterate as you think. He's a billionaire real estate developer and has done so on a global scale. I think he knows a thing or two about things that happen behind the scenes. The real question is whether or not he's draining the swamp or creating a new one. I don't know about Dodd-Frank that much, so I don't know if that's responsible for said bubble or not, but the Fed has been creating Bubbles for some time. The real estate bubble was largely engineered there, and you can argue some Fed responsibility in the dot com and current market bubbles as well. The worst might be the government bond bubble. Look out when that one pops as there isn't enough money on the planet to fix that one. I'm not sure if Trump is going to fix this stuff or quite possibly just accelerate the outcomes. Personally, I'd like to see Glass-Steagle brought back. I know Trump talked about that one on the campaign trail. That would be a nice start. Wall Street would hate it though.

Well, he's already talked about dumping Yellen (which I agree with, it's her replacement that would concern me). I waffle on a lot of it. I agree it's complicated and there are tradeoffs. Then again, he's been in the business of international trade his entire life and may know a thing or two about it that I sure don't This protectionism as I see it is going to cause the price of imports to rise. People who rely on them certainly won't like it. The Walton family in particular is going to be hurt by it. On the other end, it may mean more jobs. He wants to stop outsourcing jobs to other countries. It's hard to argue with that (though I have no idea if it will work), and I'm a bit surprised of the negative reaction here given that this has been a constant talking (and not doing) point of the Democrats for decades now.

Honestly, this is something people need to understand. On your standard 30 year fixed mortgage, you'll pay the price of the house in interest over the course of that loan. I get the need to live somewhere, and that a mortgage payment is cheaper than rent (or can be at least), but as soon as people get more stable they want to upgrade... banks of course want to loan you out about as much as you can possibly pay, leaving little room for everything else. Kudos. As to Mike's comments on housing, I lost money in 2008. That also leads to opportunity if you have cash. I picked up a 3 bed rental property for 10k at auction around 2010. Paid a couple more K to fix it up and I've been renting it at 600/mo ever since. It's paid for itself and then some. My current place in Indy was at the exact bottom of the market. I got lucky there as timing is everything. If you're concerned about buying and have cash, I'd wait until rates rise. Prices will drop when that happens and you can get a better price point.

You're in Portland, right? I was looking at relocating that way prior to 2008 and it was bad. Even after that, I'd think housing has caught up.

Has anyone ever made 8M in their first year of arb? I think that's a big high personally. To Brock's point, ML contracts are guaranteed, so WHEN the payout happens shouldn't be as big of a deal. But, there is something tied to years of service and those numbers, so to make that work, they have to go up to an extent. That's where the arbitration metrics are derived from. You might be able to do a 1 time signing bonus of say 10M to reduce those back end numbers a bit (especially the FA years), but I think the arb years are a big reason why that's discouraged.

Next year may be an opportunity to lock up one spot in FA. The names slated to be there certainly look good. But yeah, I think they'd have to trade prospects for good young pitching as an option. Then again, Berrios could turn into that guy, Gibson could turn back into 2015 Gibson, and May could pick up where he left off. Suddenly, that window would look very close. That's a lot of hope there, but not unreasonable hope either. But if that doesn't happen, you're right. They'd need to.

well supposedly, a lot of those Mexican car plants are to build the smaller cars at a better price point, or so the official word is. The big thing, I suspect, with Trump is that if he has his way, imports are going to get more expensive while taxes on exports (which according to Trump is something we do) will hopefully drop. The other note is he's been kind of trashing the dollar a bit. Inflation is already creeping back into the market and the dollar is dropping, all of which will likely benefit exporters in the short term. Companies that are heavily dependent on exports might get a nice bounce, even if the market takes a hit. It still looks like a major top is forming, so a 10-15% correction in the market in the next few months is another very real possibility.

That's what posting from an airport does... it didn't register that it posted... Now that said, I am flying first class today sooooo........

So you bought a liquor store? Any Twins Daily discounts? We may need them come July

Since none of us know, let's just accept that no one knows instead of assuming that the FO is incompetent or not. I agree that they failed to get the trade done, but that one data point doesn't say whether or not these guys know what they are doing or not.

Well, Mauer cannot be traded (and wouldn't fetch anything if he could)... Dozier shouldn't be replaced (unless he's traded). The real problem is SP. I'm more upset that Santiago will likely be there pushing one of May, Mejia, or Berrios out.

I would argue that the Pirates might be a decent fit as well. Their 2B production was pretty bad if I remember right. But the Yankees are a great fit. Only real draw back is that their best pitching prospects are hitting AA this year. That doesn't really help us in 2017 or even 2018.

funny you mention that... they got that reputation under some guy named Friedman...

My two cents. Dozier is a much better player right now... as was stated, his career WAR is significantly more with a similar career arc to date. As well, for all the talk about risk, Forsythe is also working on a career year, except that he didn't put a couple of 4 WAR seasons prior to that. He's also a year older. The control is the same. The Dodgers got a lesser player and absorbed more risk for JDL. Honestly, that tells me more about what LA thinks about JDL. It seems as though they were pretty intent on giving him up and him up alone. It also tells me that the FO was doing the right thing by sticking to their guns. Perhaps there was a better offer on the table, but I'm doubting it (sorry Dave, I know you trust your source, but I do not)... not anything of significance at least, and the FO was smart to hold back.

I don't understand the dislike for Escobar. He never got healthy last year, but he was pretty good as an every day SS in 2015. I'd give him another shot there before I closed that door, as I don't think his health issues were due to playing every day.

I don't think you're alone. I like him a lot too. As Brock put it a while back, he's looking like he will be sneaky good. He's that guy that isn't necessarily going to excel at one or two things, but he's likely to be better than average at everything. My main concern was the second half offensive drop off. Was that just that he was tired? Was it just the FSL (which is a tough hitters league), or was at an issue with skill? If it was something along the lines of fatigue, you're looking at a player that can be better than average defensively while putting up an .800 OPS and getting a fair amount of steals. That's a really good player.

Honestly, I want to see a lot more of Park and Vargas. Both of shown flashes of being able to be pretty solid contributors to the team. There's potential there. It won't get unlocked sitting on the bench, and both have little to learn in AAA. I want to see Mauer sitting a lot more, both for his health and because we need to see what have in those two. If Mauer wants to play more, the occasional game at 3B when Sano needs to rest is one way. Defensively, there's not much different to 3B and 1B, and we all know Joe has the arm for it.

Honestly, I've got to think May is ahead of Berrios. He's actually had some success as a starter, which Berrios has not. He was demoted to the pen out of need, not because he couldn't cut it. My big gripe is Santiago. I'd rather struggle with May and Berrios in the rotation then to hand a spot to Santiago, and since he just got a 8M contract for a year, I don't see that happening. Perhaps F&L think they can flip him for a C prospect if Hughes surprises. I'm just skeptical. I wouldn't give up anything other than org filler for him.

While English needed Lasik, I'm waiting for pretty much every ball player to undergo the process as a performance enhancer. I suppose there really aren't much in the way of long term side effects (which is good), but I'm not really sure what to think about that.