jimmer

He has been a quality upper half of the rotation starter once.

Exactly this. Don't want to vote? Remove yourself completely from the process. Guys like this and Chass need to just stop. But people are talking about guys like this, which is what I believe they are really striving for.

The Crown, IMO, is better (it's GREAT) and it's the most expensive show Netflix ever had. Victoria, though I love it, doesn't have the production quality of The Crown had so it's less grand (and when watching a show about royalty, it's worth noting). Victoria is also more soap opera like. It's a very good story, but it's a step below The Crown. It's like like it's trying to combine Downton Abbey and The Crown. I am looking forward to them expanding on the story that was told in 'Young Victoria', with Emily Blunt and Paul Bethany (which I'd also recommend). What's awesome about both of these, though, is the acting itself. Top notch acting from both.

The Young Pope was interesting as well

Watching it now, literally. Love it so far. Had been looking forward to it for quite some time.

You forget about the bold move of getting Castro :-)

We are also in this situation because of Ryan Hunter wasn't traded. Santana wasn't traded soon enough, Span was traded for the wrong player, Cuddyer was never traded, Willingham was never traded and so on. And Ryan handpicked Smith (who got a lot of the quality talent we are counting on now in the international marker, BTW) Holding onto quality players too long and getting no value in return is a good way for a mid-small market team to stay down.

53+ WAR according to Fangraphs :-)

How do you figure that?

Oh, I don't think WE forget how good Vazquez was, just SOME do :-) In 14 seasons he had: 200+ IP nine times 190+ IP eleven times Career 8 K/ 2.4BB Career FIP of 3.91 54 WAR He really only had two bad seasons. His 1st one and his 2nd to last one. Not a HOFer, but a VERY good pitcher for sure. If De Leon is THAT guy, YES please!

Well, perhaps top 30 is a bit of an undersell. Sickels, at end of season, had De Leon as the #5 prospect in baseball (which included pitchers and position players). He was actually ranked as the 3rd pitching prospect. Now, I'm not a big fan of Sickels but many are in here and many use him in counter arguments against other prospect listings like, say, Fangraphs. So, it's at least worth taking into account, especially for those who really value Sickels opinion.

Ryan Pressly had an ERA of 3.70 in 2016, the only year in the last 3 where he pitched more than 30 innings in the majors. He also allowed 41% of inherited runners to score.

this

while certainly not as bad as our record last year, we arent nearly as good as our record in 2015. This team is bad and will be bad.

Didnt the Cubs get out of the cellar in 2015, winning 97 games, when they had, according to Cots, a 120M opening day 25 man roster payroll (12M more than the Twins 2016 open day 25 man roster payroll)?

It excludes draftees? In Sickels Sept 24 article that had De Leon 5th, the #1 pick of the 2016 draft was ranked 48th and another draftee was ranked 47th. Kirloff was 84th. Quite a few 2016 draft picks on that top 100 list.

all of this, especially the third guy

Ken Griffey Jr is the only first overall draft pick ever elected to the HOF (so the highest pick ever). Ironically, Piazza, the guy Griffey went into the HOF with, is the only HOFer drafted in the last round of the MLB draft (ahead of only 5 players). So the 2016 election produced the highest-drafted and lowest-drafted Hall of Famer. Quality MLBers come in all rounds of the draft.

Lots of thoughts on the possibility on this thread http://twinsdaily.com/topic/24666-twins-interested-in-jose-bautista/

Per Fangraphs WAR Jack Morris had 7 seasons with 4 or more WAR, Raines only had 6. Jack Morris had one season with a WAR above 5.0, Raines had 6. Jack Morris had one season with a WAR above 6, Raines had 5. . Jack Morris peak WAR was 6.2, topped by Raines 3 times. Jack Morris had zero sseasons with 7 or more WAR, Raines had 1. Dawson accumulated 7 less WAR than Raines even though he had more plate appearances than Raines (almost a seasons worth more PAs). Raines' peak was longer and better. McGriff and Raines had the same amount of season with 4 or more (6), but McGriff only had 4 above 5 and two above 6. As stated above in the Morris compariaon, Raines bests that. Radke had less seasons than Raines with 4 or more WAR, not more than Raines had. And so on, and so forth. Still not sure he belongs in though. He's a tough call (with his strong OBP and speed while having less power than one wants from a corner OF). He is a stronger candidate than some already in (Rice, for eexample) and certainly stronger than some compare him to.

All stats, even traditional ones (even offensive ones, even pitching ones), needs about three years of data to tell us what the players true talent level is. To create a good 'mean'. Doesn't mean we toss out a players performance for one year and say it didn't happen, just means that the way he performed that one year, either offensively, defensively or hurling the ball, may not be what his true talent is. One year defensive metrics can be used to gauge how a player did that year and defensive performance, just like offense and pitching, can fluctuate. The worst thing Fangraphs did when explaining defensive metrics was explain the obvious (that obvious thing being that more data gives us a player's true talent level). They should have just reminded people that it's the same situation with all stats, not just defensive metrics. They do say one years worth of defensive data can tell us what the player did that year (particularly DRS, which is why I prefer to use that). They talk about 1 year and 3 year samples as being stable, meaning one year to tell us what the player did for that year (yearly performance) and 3 years to get a mean (measure true talent level). 'The other thing to remember is that DRS isn’t going to work well in small sample sizes, especially a couple of months or less. Once you get to one and three-year samples, it’s a relatively solid metric but defensive itself is quite variable so you need a good amount of data for the metrics to become particularly useful.' Right there it says one year. Having said all that, defensive metrics will get better (but still better than eye test or errors/fielding %), just like better offensive metrics have been created (like wRC+) that are better than what we used to have.

Tom Hardy's 'Taboo' premieres today on FX 'Victoria' premieres on Sunday on PBS after Sherlock And The Young Pope premieres Sunday on HBO.

The DEF rating at Fangraphs takes into account position. It has a positional adjustment. It's why only 3 qualifying RF have a positive DEF. It's also why every 1B has a negative DEF score (because even the best 1B defense doesn't give more value than average defense at shortstop) Max had a positive DRS in RF (+5) and right around average UZR (only slightly below zero, not enough to say below average). DRS and UZR are the stats to look at when comparing Max to other RF (or any player to other players at the same position). So no, Fangraphs DEF stat wasn't really hating Kepler's defense, it was adjusting for position.

As soon as Dozier goes back in time and has even better seasons than he had last year starting from age 23 all the way to age 36 he can be in the same conversation as Killebrew. Dozier is an all around player because of one year. Interesting. At age 29, He has a career slash of.246 BA, .320 OBP, .442 slg% (107 wRC+ ) and is an average fielder. Interesting.ONE year of hitting 40 HR at age 29 for Dozier and all of a sudden we read things like he's a better all around player than HOFer Killebrew. ONE year. You're right, if they don't get a ton for him, they should keep him while he falls back to his normal self (still good, but a drop off in value) and then leaves as a FA. Cause, of course, he'll be a key component to losing 90+ the next couple years while our not so great farm system struggles to provide pitching we could have gotten in a trade for him.

I don't necessarily have an issue with the idea Palmeiro deserved to get in, some interesting info that makes me think others who still aren't in are more deserving: OPS+ Palmeiro: 132 Larry Walker: 141 E Martinez: 147 Sheffield: 140 Manny Ramirez: 154 and from Today's Fangraphs chat: Pud Galvin: Many voters are ok with voting for suspected PED users into the HOF, but nobody is clamoring for Raffy Palmeiro to get in. Why is that? He’s the best batter not named Bonds or Bagwell not in the HOF and has a better case than all non-Bonds/Bagwell/pitcher currently on the ballot. What’s up with that? Dave Cameron: You are wildly overrating Rafael Palmeiro Dave Cameron: He has a career 130 wRC+. Edgar Martinez is at 147. Larry Walker is at 140. Sheffield is 141. Manny Ramirez is 153.