KirbyDome89

Of the crew you mentioned I'm comfortable with Schoop moving forward. He seems to have bounced back and having his bat in the lineup is certainly a plus. Cron has been about what I expected, low OBP, high K with some pop, and capable of handling 1B. Cruz has been the anchor offensively. Parker has appeared in 11 games but has only 9 IPs so I don't think anybody knows what the Twins have in him. As far as Perez goes I'd say enjoy this while it lasts. I'm not confident in Perez being a competent pitcher all season, or even sticking in the rotation, but if/when that happens MN won't have to give back his contributions over his last 4 starts. Ultimately this team did bargain hunt. The bullpen isn't good, and there were plenty of arms available as well as ample $$ to make it happen.

Anybody else feel a little guilty about checking out of some of the games over the weekend? Baltimore is so bad I opted for the NBA playoffs rather than watch the Twins pound a minor league team. MN doesn't have to apologize for feasting on a historically awful team. They did exactly what they should've and they'll likely need all of those wins they racked up the last two weekends. That said, this week will be a much better indicator of where this team is at.

I think this is where a vast majority of us are at, the only difference being varying degrees of comfort with moving on from Castro.

This looked like what those Toronto teams in 14' and 15' used to do to the Twins.

Teams wins while Castro is behind the plate are about as relevant as pitching wins, i.e. they're not.32 PAs isn't a SSS? 39 innings caught apparently was for Willians.It's convenient that the minimum PAs for catchers in determining these rankings was set at 32, that just happens to be the exact number Castro has on the year. Castro can't hold Mauer's jock when it comes to handling the bat, there's no need to even mention the two in the same breath. His OBP as the 8th hitter is the ultimate SSS, but even worse his numbers are being mashed together with far more productive hitters in the bottom third and he's being given equal credit for the aggregate stats. Pitcher ERA while each guy is catching doesn't really tell us anything. That point was made clear when Castro's rising CERA was excused due to Stewart and Romero tanking the rubber match in Houston.Yes, he's a superior pitch framer. That's never been questioned. I don't see many arguing that Castro isn't a major league catcher. The point being made is that he brings far less offense to the table than either Astudillo or Garver, and a majority of his defensive value is tied to pitch framing. Castro's m.o. isn't that of a guy who's going to gun out runners or smother balls in the dirt. If Astudillo falls off or Garver gets hurt than of course having Castro would be great. The versatility of Marwin and Willians allows Castro to take up an active roster spot without putting the team in a bind. I won't cry if he finishes the season with the team, but I'd like to see more of Garver/Astudillo, and if the Twins get a decent offer, and the duo of Garver/Astudillo continue as they have, then I certainly wouldn't lament a trade. There are a lot of reasons the 19' Twins are playing better than their 18' counterpart, Castro is way down on that list. Yeah, it's a coincidence more than anything.

I at least expected this team to compete I guess. They rolled over last night and didn't bother to show up to tonights game. There has to be a missing persons out on Marwin at this point...

The early return on Perez hasn't been great either. So we hope he lasts as a back end starter all year? Then we hope either Stewart or Romero become stable enough to stick in the rotation? Those are two huge question marks and even if the Twins luck out there are two remaining spots to fill. It also doesn't address the desperate need for front end arms. It's a bad situation.

It's hard to blame coaches/usage when Mejia was handed a 2 run lead and a clean inning.

I'll take 6-4 too but their record shouldn't mask the issues the pitching staff has had to start the year. There were plenty of posters pointing out that a rotation with a penchant for short starts and a below average bullpen could be a serious problem. Perez doesn't look like he belongs on a major league roster, let alone the starting rotation right now, and Odorizzi continues to implode after getting through a lineup twice. I guess we can cross our fingers and hope that Pineda stays healthy/effective and Gibson finds the same stride he did last year.

According to Schoop during a ST interview that wasn't the case. He could just be unwilling to admit it, but I'm not sure why that'd be.

IMO the W-L record doesn't mean much of anything over those years. All of those rosters suffered from underperformance and a lack of talent, especially on the pitching side. There are much better measures of Sano's value to this team; using the W-L record over the last 4 seasons seems a bit disingenuous.

No, likely not, but he would fill a much greater need. I think it's more likely that the bullpen will cost this team wins than the 10th man on the bench, so that's where I'm coming from with tamping down a bit of the hype surrounding the Gonzalez signing. Look, the Twins upgraded at a position. I'll always be happy about that and I'd love to see similar moves in the future. My only point was that the upgrade came at a position that was further down the list of needs, and so the gap between the production they could've expected vs. the production they can expect moving forward very likely doesn't move them to a position where they're .500 at worst.

He's capable of playing multiple positions and he'll be the first in line to slide into a starting spot at nearly every one of them should injury or ineffectiveness occur. I'm not sure there's a better definition of utility. Yeah, he's a league average offensive player, and a clear improvement over Adrianza, but nobody is contesting that. My point was that his addition doesn't now set the floor for this team at a level above .500.

We agree that he helps solidify the active roster, but IMO he doesn't cement this team as above .500. I'm with Chief on this one, he's a nice utility guy to have, and I'm glad the team made an upgrade, but I don't think he really moves the needle much in either direction. There's no doubt thats valuable, but I think his potential impact is being a bit overstated.

Baldelli's confidence aside, with Perez, Odorizzi, and Pineda as the 3-5 starters they may be overworked regardless.

"There was a time when giving some fresh faces looks in relief would have made sense, but that seems like a poor plan to open a season in which you hope to compete." I might entertain some glimmer of hope that they add another arm if this team had acted in way that signaled their intention was to compete this season. Honestly, there was ample time, money, and opportunity to improve the roster, and they passed. We're a couple days away from the start of ST games, at this point I think we have to accept that this is very likely the roster moving forward. Hopefully I'm wrong, but if there's serious interest in Madsen, Warren, or Vincent I'm not sure how a deal isn't done at this point. Not that I'm particularly high on any of that trio, but what's the hold up? They found 4M for a bad back end starter in Perez....

So ditto for Kepler here; buying out arbitration and one FA year with the potential for one more. I'm pretty neutral on this deal, as I'm pretty neutral on Kepler in general. If they had planned to start locking these guys up this winter, the lack of activity in the trade market and FA makes even less sense to me....

Exactly. I'm cool with the deal, in part because I'm a big Jorge fan, but the Twins are only committed to buying out one FA year. If that year, and the two options, are at or near market value it isn't a "team friendly," deal, which again, is fine.

Not all question marks are equal. Do you believe the Perez signing has the same odds of going belly up as signing Soria or Ottavino and slotting Romero into the rotation?

A little bit of both, though I'd add the qualifier this option rather than an option. IMO adding a question mark to a group rife with them doesn't make much sense, at least not if the goal is to improve.

I've wanted to do something like this for a while. I'd probably move the powder blues higher but in total I think you nailed the rankings. I'm still in my 20s so my affinity for the blues is purely "retro," but I loved it when they did the "Turn back the clock," uniforms. I'm also a big fan of the 73'-86' Home jerseys mainly because of the red hat/navy bill combo which I'm a sucker for. To me the pinstriped whites and road uniforms are the Twins I grew up. The creme alternatives were the next best thing after that set was retired. I feel like I'm in the minority here, but I'm not a fan at all of the new home whites. To me they're incredibly blah. As for the new alternates, a friend at work described them to me as looking like "those cheap knock off jerseys you buy at Target." I don't know if I'd go that far but they definitely add to the "meh," feeling I have towards the current uniform grouping.

I'm in total agreement that the pitching depth has serious questions, but isn't that more of an indictment of the Perez signing rather than a justification for it?

I wasn't aware St. Peter was part of the local crew clapping back at fans for having the audacity to criticize an embarrassingly low payroll. We've been "putting up with," ownership that has failed to properly support star players, and zero playoff success over the last 15 seasons. Just sayin' Dave....

Instead of tethering themselves to expensive, inescapable commitments for players on the higher tiers (which, as we've learned time and time again, carry no assurances) the front office is making deals on its own terms. Apart from the Britton deal and potentially Kimbrel's would any of the relief contracts handed out this offseason damage future spending in any significant way? Honestly, there were a ton of short term deals this club could've struck with far superior talent. Also, what assurances do these bargain bin acquisitions provide? These aren't your garden-variety bargain bin signings. There's a deeper methodology in place, and I'm sure I'm only scratching its surface. The silver lining to this resource preservation is that it will give them extreme flexibility leading up to the trade deadline. Flexibility was the spin last offseason, I vote for something new this year... The goalposts keep moving in regards to when we can expect this organization to act as though they're invested in fielding a truly competitive team, and also when we should hold the FO accountable for the product on the field.

Thats totally reasonable, I'm just much less confident that a big move is coming. Admittedly I'm a little more jaded after witnessing what was supposed to be an even better class struggle to take hold. I haven't given up on Buxton, Sano, or Kepler by any means, but there will always be another wave of talent coming. Saying we need to wait for its arrival is just a distraction from a mediocre at best on field product. In a vacuum all three signings are justifiable. In reality this team needs more. It's certainly beaten to death, but there's an effort right now to find any reason other than stinginess to explain the current situation. We can agree that it's tiring, but we also don't need to rationalize the lack of spending as patience or a savvy long term play, not that you're advocating strongly for either.