spideyo

If we had Butera and any other non-Mauer catcher we've had in the last few years as our #2 and #3 catchers, I'd understand the incredible irritation at carrying three catchers. But we have Doumit, who can DH as well as anyone on the team, and can also cover RF and 1b in a pinch. That gives us a whole lot more flexibility, and having Butera up here lets Gardy keep both Mauer and Doumit in the lineup without risking losing the DH spot if the starting catcher gets nailed with a bad foul tip or a hard collision at the plate. I don't know for sure, but I'm guessing Butera is a far better hitter than Gray/Burton/Burnett/Perkins/Capps/Swarzak/Duensing. As far as the 13 pitchers, it works ok right now because everybody gets time off next week so we don't need to worry so much about wearing out our position guys, and it keeps us from having to let Blackburn, Hendricks, or Swarzak start another game. Sometime in the next few weeks Capps and Walters should be back from the DL, eventually Pavano probably will, and Blackburn and Hendricks still could possibly turn things in around in AAA (y'never know, stranger things have happened). Either way, adding Capps back to the BP in some role and giving us a few more starting pitching options will make it far easier to trim back down to 12 guys. Honestly, I'd rather see a righty who can cover 1b (or 3b and slide plouffe to 1b) than Parmelee come up. We don't really need another left handed bat, what we need is a good pinch hitting option to cover for Morneau in those clutch situations vs LHP. Of course, none of the guys who could potentially fill that spot (Valencia, Chang, Hollimon, Bates) are actually hitting very well right now, so..yeah. It'll probably be Parm again, unless someone pops up on the waiver wire.

Hey, if Butera could get Blackburn to pitch like a Major League starter on a consistent basis, I'll take that! On another Liriano note, anybody else read MLB.com's recap of the game? "It's certainly not a stretch to say Francisco Liriano has been one of the best pitchers in baseball since rejoining the Twins' rotation on May 30 after a stint in the bullpen." It goes on to say that he has been dominating, and pitching like an ace. I'll give you that he's pitching much better, but one of the best pitchers in baseball? I don't think so. I would expect one of the best pitchers in baseball to make it through the 7th inning more than once in 8 games. Also, when I think "best pitcher in baseball" I think of guys who keep the bases clear, not guys who are really good at keeping the two guys they walked back to back from scoring. But hey, if the excessive praise jacks up his trade value, then I suppose let's just keep piling it on.

Can we just trade Span for Rick Ankiel and be done with this topic for good?

Regardless, the point remains the same. He's still very young, and has plenty of time to grow his skills

They have added costs because they are solely responsible for maintaining all the locker room and training room facilities, the actual playing field (which has a MUCH higher upkeep than the astroturf), and they have no other tenants to share the cost of security/housekeeping/retail/concessions contracts. Don't forget too, that they spend a considerable amount of time and money winterizing and de-winterizing much of Target Field, which is something they never had to do at the Metrodome. They also have a much larger office staff, because they handle all the planning, sales, and setup of non-baseball events at Target Field. The flip side of course, is that they also make a ton more on concessions, retail, and non-baseball events than they ever could at the Metrodome. I think in the long run, the revenue will probably exceed the additional cost, but right now they are still covering a significant initial investment to get the whole place up and running that goes way beyond just the cost of construction. Keep in mind too, that any extra profit won't just be added to payroll or the Pohlad's pockets. They have a state of the art ballpark right now, but they will need to be continually re-investing money to maintain it and improve it to keep it a state-of-the-art ball park.

Yes, he has a ways to go before he becomes a superstar, but remember, he's only 24. He doesn't have the power that Span does, but he can still get stronger. He also steals more and gets picked off less than Span.

I wasn't thinking of extra bases hits, I was thinking of the stolen bases, and the singles that would have been easy outs for a lot of other guys. If he can beat out an ugly bunt for a single, steal 2b, and then score on a single to the outfield, that easily cancels out a guy going from 1st-3rd instead of from 1st-2nd

It's a whole lot more fun to watch for sure. Hammer and Babe Plouffe are certainly swinging hotter bats than Delmontello and Valencia ever did, Burton is far better than all those RHP in the bullpen last year, most of whom I don't even remember, Carrol is a better fielder than Tolbert/Hughes/Nishi combined, Doumit is a better hitter than Butera/Rivera/Holm combined, and when he was healthy, Capps was a far better closer than our closer last year. He has one fewer save right now than he had ALL of last season. So yeah, it might not seem like we are a better team based on record, but we really are. We've made significant improvements, and have gone a long way towards setting up a team that could make the post season in 2013. If Pavano hadn't been hurt, Baker hadn't been hurt, Marquis and Blackburn had at least managed to pitch at a mediocre level, and we never put Swarzak or Duensing in before the 6th inning, we wouldn't be the worst team in baseball right now. Wouldn't be the best, but we'd be in the middle of the pack at least.

Y'know, factoring the offense into the equation is an important aspect too. If Ben continues to hit and run like he's been doing, I think any extra bases he gives up because of his arm will be cancelled out by all the extra bases he'll take on the offense.

Yeah, but he hasn't actually pitched that much. He lost his job as a closer so he wasn't getting save opportunities, and they've had four lefties in the pen since April, so he wasn't getting many shots as a LOOGY. A few good innings and those numbers would start to drop considerably.

We totally do need more pie.

You're kind of making my point. They aren't going to want to pay for a bad product much longer, but that only makes it MORE likely that the twins won't stockpile prospects. If this team loses 99 games again, they aren't going to fix it by loading up on hotshots down at Beloit and E-Town. We could have the best prospects in baseball, but if our major league team sucks, it doesn't matter. Prospects don't sell major league seats. NO ONE that was drafted this year will have any impact on attendance in 2013. Sano, Hicks, Rosario, Michael, and Arcia will NOT sell a single ticket at Target Field next year, unless they buy one themselves. I'm not saying the Twins should be completely depleting the farm system, but they MUST be willing to pay for a team that's going to do better than 3rd place in a weak division. They have far too much invested in Target Field to allow it to fall to Tampa Bay or Cleveland type attendance numbers. And you are right, that first and foremost the Pohlads are interested in making money. That's how running a business works. If you aren't interested in making money and you own a MLB team, you won't own that team for very long. That's why I think they'll be willing to go get a Grienke or Hamels type. It would pretty much guarantee a bump in attendance for 1/5 of your games, and also mean that your Brand gets talked about more on the national sports shows, which drives up TV watchers (and revenues), generates more T-shirt and jersey sales, increases the number of "baseball tourists" coming to minneapolis. You've got to spend money to make money.

As long as he can hit the cutoff guy and doesn't just airmail a rainbow to home plate, I'm not worried at all about his arm. There have been quite a few balls that he caught that would have been doubles or triples easily had he missed them (and most likely would've been missed by Doumit/Plouffe/Parmelee/Mauer/Komatsu/Thomas/Mastroianni)

For all the bad things you can say about Mauer's contract, at least when his contract runs out we're going to stop paying him. Thanks to the wonders of Deferred Payment, which I don't believe the Twins have ever used, guys like Bobby Bonilla will be making millions decades after their craptastic contracts technically run out.

Does Blacky still get his full paycheck even though he was optioned down?

If you add Grienke, make Diamond your #2, you probably still have enough left to pick up a pavano-esque veteran to compete with Hendricks/De Vries/Walters/Duensing/Swarzak/Manship/Maloney/Gibson/Baker/Blackburn and whoever else is down in the minors that I forgot about. That does give us a fair amount of options, and if our offense hits next year like it's hitting now, we could easily be talking about getting that one last piece to win the division a year from now. From a PR standpoint too, signing a big FA like Grienke makes a ton of sense, because it tells your fan base you want to win NOW, and aren't committed to 3-5 years of rebuilding until our latest draft picks show up. From a stats standpoint, it might make more sense to save the money and invest in prospects and grow a championship team for 2015 and beyond, but let's face it, sabrmetric nerds and stat geeks are not the ones paying Joe Mauer's salary. The average baseball fan doesn't give a rat's ass about some 20 year old kid in Florida and how we should be patient and wait for him to lead the team to future championships. They paid $40 for their seat, $20 on parking, and $10 for a beer, and they want to see a win TODAY.

With Duensing essentially a starter (if he recovers from the ankle) and Perkins essentially the closer, the only lefty we really have to rely on in the bullpen is Robertson, and it is way too early to predict his long-term success. If they think they can move Capps or he won't be coming back from injury, and they plan to have Duensing stay in the rotation the rest of the year, I'd say go for it. He did pitch fantastic in the 9 games he was with us before. Claiming him won't really put a significant dent in their payroll for next year, and it might give them some more flexibility to deal with our rapidly depleting pitching staff. Heck, if he pitched at his career averages, and the rest of our BP pitches like they've been doing most of the year, we could probably try that 4 man rotation thing, and just yank everyone but Diamond out after 5 innings.

I think he's more valuable to other teams than some realize. In MN, we have a lot of high-defense, high-speed outfielders. We also have a lot of (theoretically) high production left handed bats. How many other organizations have both those things? Now, left handed bats and speedy outfielders don't win us championships, but they do make Span much more replaceable.

I keep hearing people talking about the Twins getting a younger Pavano-type, mid-range starter rather than investing a big chunk of cash in a #1 guy. I think that's what they tried to do with Marquis. Do we REALLY think it's a good idea to do that again?

I'm sure the Yankees are scouting him right now, but I'd bet large money that he never wears the pinstripes. It's not gonna happen.

They sent De Vries back down because at best he would only get one more start in before the All-Star break. At this point, it isn't gonna kill the team to give Blackburn one more start to see if he can recover any kind of value. By the time we come back from the All-Star break, Pavano, Walters, and Capps will be eligible to come off the DL and it's not out of the realm of possibility that we'll have made some kind of trade. We may be able to kick Blackie out of the rotation and still keep De Vries down in AAA to develop further.

1) I think Grienke is more likely, but either way I think they should go for it IF they can cover their other issues 2) I wouldn't count on either Baker or Gibson next year, in the same way nobody really counted on Scott Diamond, PJ Walters, Liam Hendricks, or Cole De Vries to be in the rotation (or even with the major league club this year. It would be a wonderful surprise if Baker could spring back to form and Gibson could finally fulfill his potential, but we should be planning that they'll be pitching for the Red Wings or on rehab assignment all year long. 3) Span is far more valuable to other teams than he is to the Twins right now, and his internal value will only decrease as guys like Benson, Hicks, and Buxton move up through the minors. Let's cash him in. 4) I'm actually ok with Carroll/Casilla/Dozier covering the middle infield. It certainly could be improved, but it doesn't need to be for next year. Carroll and Dozier are both under contract for next year, and Casilla isn't eligible for Free Agency so he won't cost much. I'd rather we go with what we got right now and start looking to upgrade at the trade deadline next year (if we're competing) or the 2013 offseason. 5) Trading for relievers wouldn't make sense. I'm all for them bringing in some low-investment FA's over the offseason though, if only just to create some competition in ST. We might stumble on another Burton, we might get another Zumaya. Worth a cheap gamble either way. 6) I want to see Pavano pitch healthy this year. He has done well for us in the past, I'm not quite ready to give up on him entirely. Duensing is much more valuable to us as bullpen guy who can be a LOOGY, a long reliever, or a spot starter. Locking him into the rotation limits his usefulness to this club, and he isn't really much of an upgrade over De Vries or Walters. 7) Had we gotten a native-spanish speaking sports psychologist (or team of them) on our staff in 2008, Liriano could have won three Cy Young's by now, and Casilla and Gomez could be perennial Gold Glove all-stars. I'm all for passing Liriano off to somebody else if they're willing to offer us something decent, but it does really bother me that we've had three guys in the past few years who had fantastic raw talent and have been maddeningly inconsistent, largely because of mental issues. I hope we keep seeking out young latino hot shots, but I hope the Twins really take a hard look at their organization and see if there are things that need to be changed so we don't have these situations come up again. I'm going to add to your list: 8) Where does Plouffe play long-term? He largely landed at 3b because Valencia/Burroughs sucked, and Revere earned a starting spot. That doesn't mean it's the best spot for him long term though. Assuming Span gets traded, you end up with an opening in RF. If they want to go back to the "Plouffe as an OF" plan, that hole could shift to 3b. Right now I don't think we have anyone in the minors that we could even pencil in as an everyday player at RF or 3b. It may come down to which hole is easier to fill, rather than where Plouffe can actually play best. 9) Capps is as good as gone as a closer. A lot of the bull pen decisions will hinge on how they plan to cover that role next year. Let's just hope they don't guy buy another closer.

I would go for it if we could work an extension deal out. Span is probably overall a better player right now than Revere, but he does have a history of concussions and other head issues, and I think eventually Revere will at least match, if not surpass his value. It would also be a lot easier for the organization to pursue OF outside the organization if they could actually give them a starting position. Alternately, you could send Plouffe out there and go after a better defensive 3B. As far as Parmelee goes, I like the kid but he is going to have more success and sooner in a different organization. I REALLY doubt Mourneau will be going anywhere anytime soon, and when he does we have Mauer, Doumit, and occasionally even Plouffe that can play 1b. As a left handed thrower, he isn't that useful to a team that doesn't need a 1b. As a left handed batter, he could be very valuable to a team that doesn't have 4 lefties and a switch hitter who are everyday players (and hitting decently). While I know Grienke could get a ton of money and probably pitch for just about any team he wanted to, every interview I've seen and everything I've read about him makes me think that he is the rare sports star who will NOT sign the biggest deal he possibly could. He has made it pretty clear he does NOT want to play in a huge market like NY. His agent might hate it, but I think if you offered him a fair deal and a good situation, where he isn't going to have camera crews and reporters following him constantly and isn't going to be pressured to be a big public presence, he'll take it. Also, if a guy doesn't want to deal with the anxiety and pressure that comes from playing in NY or somewhere like that, I'm gonna guess he would be perfectly ok avoiding the stress and anxiety of dealing with free agency. Now, this would be the stupidest deal in the world if we didn't have a long-term deal lined up for him. We have no business renting a player this year. But if Terry Ryan could check off one HUGE thing on his 2013 to do list in July, everybody is gonna be a lot happier.

uhh...Terry Ryan has a huge team of scouts, analysts, and assistants across the world. He's not doing it all himself, he's just the only guy giving soundbites. Now, could they make upgrades to his support staff? Of course! But he's been focused more on trying to fix the team on the field first. And I think he was made interim GM because they knew they needed Bill Smith out of the role, and couldn't afford to take the time to do an exhaustive search for a new GM. After this season, who knows? It's quite possible that there are already candidate lists being made, behind the scenes conversations being had. Personally, I'd rather them have Terry Ryan as a stop gap measure to at least keep the ship from sinking entirely while they actually take the time to evaluate and find the BEST permanent guy, rather than them just immediately signing the first guy they could find outside the organization and throw him right into the mess Bill Smith made. And Bill Smith IS a businessman type. That didn't work out so well.

I voted for everyone I saw on the ballot who was no longer with their listed team