alexlegge

Even if a billion coincidences happen - perhaps involving nerve tonic, gigantism, and a great player on a competitor stumbling into a mysterious vortex - and the Twins somehow win all their remaining games.....even if all that happens AND they open the playoffs with 7 straight victories, I wouldn't give them better than 1 in 10 odds to beat the Dodgers in the World Series.

likely wouldn't have mattered since Seattle has a far better intradivisional record at present. No biggie here, though def something worth keeping an eye on with these late-season series

and for the second straight year, we lose 2 out of 3 in Seattle...with both losses on walk-offs (pretty sure that happened last year too)

It probably tastes better with cookies than with cheese!

If anyone can mail the Twins this Burger, I won't complain.

Brief attempt at optimistic pessimism: IF the Twins lose this game and fail to make the playoffs, then this game will be a microcosm of the whole year: everyone might've expected them to keel over, but they've instead proved themselves to be a formidable big league club with real entertainment value and a lot of fight in them.

It was a poor baseball play, but excellent ballet footwork as the title of this article alludes to. There's gotta be a trade partner out there who values that. How about a three-way trade between the Twins, Alvin Ailey, and some rebuilding team looking to get creative (lookin' at you, Angels)?

I think there's a very good chance he'll become the highest paid catcher in the game if he hits free agency. Keep in mind that the best catcher and the highest paid catcher are often two different players. Currently, the two highest-paid catchers are JT Realmuto and Sean Murphy. Murhpy signed an extension in 2022. Realmuto re-signed with the Phillies this past year as a free agent. Over the last few seasons, he has been worth slightly more than Jeffers - though not by much. Given Jeffers age, I think it's more likely than not for him to end up with a higher AAV than Realmuto. Given inflation, it's not crazy to think that he'd come close to Realmuto's previous free agent contract with the Phillies - at least in AAV. That contract was 5 years, $115M. Jeffers is the same age as Realmuto was when he signed that. I'd predict Jeffers to land something more like 3y/$60M or 4y/$75M, either of which would make him the highest paid catcher in the league* *(edit) this remains accurate, though based on the numbers I'm suggesting, Jeffers would likely only be the highest paid catcher for one or two seasons. Raleigh signed an extension a couple offseasons ago with a pay structure that kicks his salary up to $20M in 2028 and $25M in 2029. Unfortunately, we just saw why he's worth so much.

Thanks, this is definitely a better breakdown than the cursory one I did! To some extent the different WAR columns in the Fangraphs article aren't very helpful in applying to Jeffers. Inevitably as a catcher, a steep decline will be anticipated and factored into a longer term deal. However, he's probably likely to produce more than 2 WAR next year. If I had to predict, I'd say 2.5, though leaning further toward 3 than 2. I wonder if Ben Clemens included players who accepted qualifying offers in the model (probably not?) and/or if there's another iteration of this which does. I'd also be curious to know the cost per WAR specifically among one-year "prove it" deals which have grown in popularity over the last decade. Ultimately, it all boils down to the fact that the $23M qualifying offer is likely to be very close to what his actual 2027 value relative to free agent salaries is expected to be. Perhaps it's a slight underpay or overpay, but likely not by much in either direction. And yeah, as you stated, the big reason for him to reject it is about the total guaranteed contract, not AAV (which would almost certainly be less than the QO if he signs for >2 years)

The $25M might also be a high estimate given catchers' tendency to have shortened careers and injury accumulation. I imagine that brings down their free agent value a bit. But not a crazy amount. Seeing him land an AAV in the 15-20 range wouldn't shock me, especially if a team signs him for 4+ years. Definitely hard to predict though. I don't recall any big-name catchers hitting the market recently, so Jeffers will actually be a pretty interesting test case assuming he does.

How many free agent catchers of Jeffers caliber have hit the market recently? My calculation here is by the books. It's likely that he'd end up making at or near the most of any catcher in the game assuming he hits free agency. This values increase over time.

Fangraphs has an excellent primer on the dollar value per WAR among free agents. Let's rely on this model since it's basically the only one available. Let's also assume that Jeffers will be worth at least 2 WAR next year (this is a reasonable assumption; from 2023-2026 he has averaged 2.2 WAR, a number likely to increase during the next two months). Assuming that production and utilizing the Fangraphs value model, he'll be worth at least $25.7M next season - that dollar amount would mean zero inflation whatsoever and Jeffers adding exactly 2.0 WAR. Moreover, the beauty of the qualifying offer is that it's only for one year. Basically, $23M is bit lower than what he's likely to get offered as annual value in a longer free agent deal. So it's highly unlikely he'd want to accept it, and a very reasonable, low-risk investment for the Twins even if he does. It certainly shouldn't be the kind of thing that dissuades them from holding onto him at the trade deadline on Monday...but it might.

This is a breath of fresh air for sure. Picking up Gomez and Nance early in the year have been savvy moves. Yay, they've been surprisingly competent for month! 👏 Imho, it's actually worth appreciating Varland more than having nightmares about him. Dude's a St. Paul native who helped the Twins break their playoff losing streak. Even in a hitter-friendly park in the AL East, he's been cartoonishly dominant all season. His bWAR of 3.3 would rank first on the Twins by a wide margin. His July ERA of 0.90 wasn't even his best monthly ERA.....in fact, it wasn't even his second-best monthly ERA. It was his third best out of four. His worst monthly ERA was 2.40 in June. But even that is misleading; June was actually his most dominant month on a per-batter basis. It also happened to be the month in which he coughed up the only homer he's allowed all season, accounting for the earned run bloat.

Yes, Buxton's absence leaves the Twins weakness vs. left-handed pitching more exposed. No, none of the internal options are going to be of much help in addressing that weakness. But no, it's not particularly devastating. To be clear, it always sucks to lose Buck to an injury. That has been true for a dozen seasons. But it usually sucks more when he's playing hurt and underperforming. He's always been a streaky performer on the field anyway. In some ways, his biggest strengths right now are his most consistent: team leadership and clubhouse presence. This team seems like a tight-knit group really fighting for each other - I have no doubt that the chemistry has contributed to their modest success this year. And despite being on the IL, Buxton still traveled with the team to Seattle. I love that.

It certainly proves that he's serious about spending on A.J. Minter. That's something, which is more than you can say about any player acquisitions by the Twins dating back to at least the 2023-24 offseason.