Loosey

I agree with your assessment. I’ll take it a step further and say they are the most irrelevant professional sports team in Minnesota. The Vikings are always going to be #1 mainly because the NFL is a machine and knows how to market their league and teams. The Timberwolves recent success and superstar Ant has moved them past the Twins in the past few years as #2. The Wild I would put as #3. Even in the 4th most popular pro sport in the country in Minnesota hockey is always relevant and the team is always a playoff contender with a star and better marketing. I also think the Lynx popularity and relevance today is greater than the Twins. They win, they have a devoted fan base and have perhaps the best player in the league. So that leaves the Twins at 5th not far ahead of the Loons. The Twins should be #2 or #3 even when bad, but their issues stem much deeper than the team on the field. When you have an ownership group that doesn’t care, eventually that will trickle down the casual fan base. The Twins and MLB’s marketing is awful. Byron Buxton should be a superstar. But the team hasn’t embraced him as that nor shown the national baseball audience how good he really is. I’m not a marketing guy, but the team needs to find a better way to market the team starting locally. The other teams appear to be involved and out in the community much more often, maybe the Twins are, but they do a bad job of showing it if that’s the case. They have done the opposite instead. It’s hard to watch them on TV, and most people literally had no idea how to watch them early in the year, largely because the team didn’t do anything to help the fan base with that. We had to figure it out ourselves and many gave up trying after their poor start. Unfortunately for the Twins the only way they will become relevant in our own market, let alone nationally will be to put an exciting, successful team on the field but that doesn’t seem like it’s going to happen for a long time after recent events. So, if they can’t stay relevant in Minnesota, how do they stay relevant nationally. This is all an internal issue that needs to be fixed but likely will not anytime soon.

So a large contingent of the Fanbase will be unable to watch the games on TV (Comcast). Were the Twins unaware that Comcast and Bally's agreement was up less than a month into their season? Did they just assume all was well and that everyone would happily re-up? Ownership of this team is messing up on multiple levels. This isn't even a baseball operations issue, this is something that supposedly very smart, savvy, rich business people should know how to navigate. If they were messing up this much on any of their other business entities the boards would be going crazy. And to make matters worse, this does in fact trickle down into the baseball operations by not allowing them to spend as they should be able to in order to be competitive.

This is not really anything new from the Twins. And if I had to guess, the FO has been in contact with players they want to sign and teams they want to trade with but their markets won't be set until other signings happen, so once some more activity happens, then the Twins will pick up.... I hope. Outside of keeping Gray I don't see any other players the Twins would have realistically signed off the board yet.

I think there is a difference between refusing to play CF and not being comfortable out there or disliking it. If Kepler were the Twins best CF option and the Twins told him, they understand it's not his most comfortable spot but they need him there to make the best lineup I'm sure he would play. I get Lewis's agent making statements about CF. He got hurt there and he has traditionally been an infielder. He needs to get his client to a 2nd contract as healthy as possible. But if he were healthy and the Twins needed him there I doubt he refuses to play. That being said, Buxton is the best option and having the Twins come out and clarify what is going on with him not being able to play CF other than the vague reason's fans have been given would help answer much of this.

I think initially us as fans were enamored by the 100MPH fastball since we hadn't seen someone with that type of power come through the Twins organization. Now half the Twins bullpen can touch 100MPH and is almost a pre-requisite for a back end reliever in the MLB. And even more so, like you said, if it doesn't have movement it isn't going to be too tough for most Major League hitters.

Overall, I think the Twins should be happy with this trade. Graterol would likely be a solid reliever in this current bullpen and probably in the Jovani Moran or Jorge Alcala role. But at this point I personally would have him behind Duran, Jax, Lopez when closing out games. Maeda has been a good starter when healthy and was very good in 2020. So using hindsight, anytime you can get an above average starter for a 7th inning reliever with upside you make that trade.

I'm having trouble find a loss on the schedule....

Has anyone actually ever tried to ask MLB for their written consent to broadcast the game? Maybe they just say “go ahead”. But seriously, $40M a year in the grand scheme of things isn’t that much. Honestly in the world of steaming YouTube should try to get a contract for every team currently with Bally’s. I know grandma and grandpa will be confused how to watch a game but I think the handful of games they produce are pretty good. If they get rights to every game I think they could invest in more interactive type of content. With that sort stuff they could add in stadium type stuff when you have the you tube app on your phone and your at the game. I think Ballys going bankrupt could offer MLB the chance to really change the way a game is broadcast. MLB has a chance to be ahead of the curve in the way a baseball game is aired. One idea that current play by play guys would hate, is let people use YouTube’s stream and individuals broadcast the game on their own YouTube channel. Imagine TwinsDaily having their own writers calling a game. It would sort of be like Manning cast, but anyone could do it! Covid showed us you don’t HAVE to be at the game to call it.

I've written this before, but the Twins have a ton of options to make big trades, but first they need to know where the replacements are at. Brooks Lee, Royce Lewis, Kiriloff and to a lesser extent Austin Martin could come in and a take over for some variation of Polanco, Arraez and Kepler. But until we know if Lee and Austin can play above AAA, Is Lewis healthy and back to his late May MLB self and is Kiriloff's shaved down wrist bone OK, i really don't think they can do much right now. With all that Arraez is probably the one who is most likely to go today. He is position-less, and could probably be replaced with guys currently on the roster. at about 90% replacement value.

Jared Allen is not the same as Trevor Bauer. Jared Allen was/is extremely well liked in the community and in the locker room. Jared Allen made some dumb mistakes with alcohol and drinking and driving when he was young. He figured it out by the start of his 3rd NFL season and it was never an issue again. When the Vikings took their "chance on him" he was 2 or 3 years removed from any of those issues and had matured a lot by then.

I agree with you partially. I think the Twins have players to trade for front of rotation starters. However, the players to backfill them are question marks for the time being. Arraez, Polanco and Kepler specifically. For them to be moved for a starter someone needs to take their place. Lewis, Lee, Martin, Kiriloff are unknowns today. Maybe in July we will see Brooks Lee looking like a future all-star and have the freedom to trade Polanco for a starter, or maybe Lewis comes back and can be a 3rd baseman/LF and move Miranda to 1st which frees up Arraez. Lots of moving parts that are too unknown for a team that looks like they are going all in to trade away known commodities as of now.

If they stay healthy the Twins will have 2 superstar players in their prime for a fraction of what many expected them to be paid. Buxton on the open market (if healthy) could demand $250M+ and obviously we know someone is willing to pay Correa $350M if it weren't for his physical. Good on them,

I play men's hockey with a recently retired MLB player. I will ask him how the taxes work. He's pretty open about sharing some of the stuff i had never known about when it comes to MLB and perks, etc.

I have always been a proponent of "NO SALARY CAP" to protect owners because I don't care about the owners money, they are all billionaires and am happy for players to get their piece of the pie. However, this offseason has sort of shown that if you essentially have unlimited funds you can overpay every other billionaire and just completely buck the system. So I am now leaning toward not only a cap but a hard cap of sorts. Even if a Cap of $300MM was set only a handful of teams would reach it, but other teams would likely spend more because the teams that cap out woudln't be able to continue to buy more players. This in effect would probably hurt the super stars like Correa a bit and limit them from reaching those $40M figures were heading towards but would probably end up being good for baseball in the long run.

Yes

The more we hear about this I think 2 things happened. 1) The Twins got played by Correa/Boras. 2) The Twins fans got played by the Twins. 10 years/$285M is a massive contract and in a vacuum looks like the team is finally ready to play with the big boys. But when you expand and take a look at the deals Turner and Boegarts got $285M really wasn't going to get the deal done. If that's what the Twins budgeted for him back in November before the other deals came up out they should have shifted gears the minute they decided not exceed. Correa and Boras were going to milk every last dollar they could out of whichever team was willing to pay it. They let the Twins think $285M close (which is probably was at one point) but they knew it would end up being more. The Twins probably knew that as well and stuck to their guns. If the Twins really are interested in Swanson they should have shifted their energy to him before the Correa contract in order to not let him take all the leverage which he was now as the last star shortstop...

At first I was disappointed the Twins didn't sign here and still am sort of. 10 years was a contract length I thought would have been acceptable at around $30MM per year. I thought 10 years would be a long time and had already wondered what a $30MM shortstop would look like in his mid to late 30's. But 13 years to me is crazy. He will be 41 when this contract ends. My son is 11 years old. To think someone having a baby today will have a teenager by the time this contract expires boggles my mind. In addition to that my 11 year old will be 24 years old at the end of this contract and some kid his age will likely be the best player in the major leagues at that time. If the front office is who balked at 13 years, I get it but they likely won't be here in 13 years so the end of this contract wouldn't be there problem. It likely was ownership who finally said "no". So the Twins have money to spend obviously, will they spend it now? And if so on who?

I don't blame this front office for not paying for 13 years, what I do (or eventually will) blame this for is not seeing that they likely were be played by Boras and sitting out of free agency hoping Correa decided to stay. At some point it had to be clear they likely were being used to get Correa maximum value. Even if they offered him 10 years/$285MM and he didn't say yes, that should have been the sign Boras and Correa were going to be using teams to get him to a figure they wanted. I also assume Bora gave them a figure they wanted and it wasn't met until last night. Now Swanson is going to be overpaid simply by being the last man standing and the Twins will still be paying a shortstop $25M a year assuming that is the pivot. And if it is, it should be Swanson + a pitcher.

Hoping someone can answer this (or confirm what I am saying). Jim Pohlad is not THE owner of the Twins, the Pohlad family owns the Twins and I assume Joe is a part of that ownership group. Jim just happened to be ownership's face of the franchise and core decision maker? Now Joe Pohlad is the face of the ownership group and decision maker? So I assume if Joe wants to increase payroll budget (hypothetically to say $175M) he doesn't need to get "permission" from uncle Jim to do that? I assume Minnesota Twins LLC are part of the overall Pohlad portfolio of companies and there is some sort of budget for this particular company, but from a running the Twins perspective Joe now has final say on financial decisions. Is that correct?

I feel like this small sleeve patch would have been a an amazing hat logo, if they made the flags white and lettering navy blue.

I don't know. I like them. I think the M hat would be better without the star, but overall I have no problems.

Whatever happens the Twins should give him a deadline to do a deal. Every team knows what Correa is and a reasonable idea of what it will take to get him. The one thing the Twins cannot do is wait around until late December while Correa makes his decision and pits teams against each other. I know fans won't like it but I think the team should give him a December 1 deadline, if he doesn't sign go put in the work to get Swanson, Turner or Boegarts. Waiting around will hurt the team, especially if he they wait and he signs with the Cubs on Christmas and all other options are gone and the team is then stuck holding $90M in unused payroll which will then be used to overpay for lesser guys (assuming most big names have signed) exacerbating the loss of Correa.

Based on what I have read the Twins want to know if they are signing Correa or not soon so they aren't playing catch up in a diluted talent pool later in the year. So hopefully by Thanksgiving weekend we have a Correa answer because everything they do hinges on that one way or the other. That being said they do need to get one of the top 4 SS's in my opinion.

Time value of money in this case is a benefit to Correa and detriment to the Twins. All things considered equal if the Twins and another team offered the same years and money, but Twins front loaded, the Twins would win that bidding war due to the fact "a dollar today is worth more than a dollar tomorrow". But in a sense if the Twins have money to burn in the first few years where they don't need to spend that on other contracts it helps the Twins in that way to have more on hand available later. It's a good way to manage cash flow, but lose out from an investment standpoint. It all depends on circumstances.