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Carroll and Capps for Wort?

If the Twins could do something like this with Target Field, then there could be a major home field advantage from freaking out the visiting teams.

Agreed. And I can't help but think that this keeps the players in better shape to play for the Twins. It's good to hear that Joe Benson may be getting back on track.

Your post did not strike me as racist, and I think that the response was possibly tongue in cheek. I was also a big fan of Cesar Tovar and Tony Oliva.

Great roundup. I especially like the links to the box scores.

It's good to hear that at least one other team has a crummy farm system.

Well said, Chief. I would add that a few extra losses in 2012 might result in a better draft position in 2013.

The key point seems to be that a last place team should not be spending big dollars on an expensive closer. Also, the best possible outcome will be for Capps to come back strong, so that some other team will make a good offer for him.

This is a very interesting and educational thread. Thanks, Curt.

The local government put up hard earned taxpayer dollars to build Target Field, knowing that this would greatly increase the revenue and the value of the franchise. I suspect that they were swayed, at least in part, by promises to use some of the extra revenues to increase payroll. And as others have pointed out on other threads, the Twins have significantly increased payroll. I wished at the time that the government has cut a better deal, to insure that the Pohlads did not enjoy a huge windfall at taxpayer expense. I have not studied the deal in detail, but my sense is that the Pohlads negotiating with the stadium commission was like buying Manhattan from the Native Americans. On the other hand, I am glad that payroll has gone up a lot since the Metrodome days.

If I were with the Ballpark Authority I would have held out for a written agreement that over any 3 year period, the player salaries must be at least X% of gross revenues, and would have stressed that the taxpayers' investment would greatly increase the value of the team.

Well said, Brian. Liriano has huge upside and huge downside. The Twins are desperate for an ace, but Liriano has disappointed multiple times. Liriano has great stuff, but is streaky as hell. I wish the Twins had a crystal ball.

Interesting article. Perkins seems to spend a lot of time on the internet. I wonder if he ever reads Twins Daily.

Well said, jm. And if the Twins had not shelled out for Mauer at that time, most fans would have been outraged. There is a risk whenever a team bets the store on such a huge contract. But let's all be glad that we have Mauer and not Pujols.

So far, he has not been a great starter this year, but you make a good point about the Twins not having much to lose.

This is an interesting and fun thread. May we assume that you were wearing Twins cap and shirt?

You make total sense to me. I share the widespread nausea when Blackburn is pitching, but it would be illogical not to wait and see if he might be able to get back to being a decent #4 or #5, as opposed to the Ramon Ortiz/Livan Hernandez/Jason Marquis who will be even more nauseating.

The Rays are great at trading guys who look a lot better than they are. If they want to trade Shields, there is probably something wrong with him.

It appears that there are 3 Pohlad brothers and they consider themselves equal. Here is a quote from an article in the Strib from 2010: "The brothers consider themselves equals in the overall Pohlad organization, although Jim oversees the Twins and Bill is CEO of his movie production company, River Road. Bob supervises the organization's other companies. All three sit on a six-member board of directors that governs the businesses, along with three nonfamily members who were advisers to Carl before the brothers took over." Here is a link to the article: http://www.startribune.com/business/112456709.html?page=2&c=y It seems pretty clear that the three brothers have lots of choices in investing their pooled money, including real estate, motion pictures and free agent pitchers. Like all smart capitalists they weigh the potential risks and returns of all potential investments. As for the debate about what restrictions might apply to an LLC, I would note that operationally and for tax purposes, an LLC with multiple owners is basically the same as a partnership, and the members of the LLC can easily put money in or take money out based on what investments they want to make at any given time. I would prefer ownership that is more committed to winning for the sake of winning. I like how the owner of the Tigers is paying $20 million+ this year to keep Verlander, and just agreed to pay $23 million per year to Fielder. Will these investments pay off? Probably not, but this owner really wants to win. And I suspect that if the Tigers had Johan Santana, they would not trade him to the Mets because they could not "afford" to keep him. I don't think that the Pohlads are cheap. They are typical conservative capitalists who are running the Twins like a business, and who are not willing to take extra risks because they crave a championship. I would prefer an internet billionaire who wants a World Series win and who could care less about $20 million here or there. But most owners seem to be like the Pohlads, and a lot of them seem worse.

This was a very depressing game for me. I hate it when the NL wins. But it was OK compared with the most depressing All Star game of all time, in 1968, when that butthead Jim Fregosi made a crappy throw to Harmon Killebrew, who was playing first base. Killebrew stretched like a trooper and made the play, BUT totally blew out his hamstring. Killebrew was out for the year.

7) Verlander pitches every game like he did tonight, the entire Indians squad gets a bad case of the flu for a month, the Royals lose their three best players for using PEDs, and the White Sox all have whiplash from a bus accident. 8) at least three Twins pitchers get bitten by the same radioactive spider that bit Plouffe.

I am very happy to read this. Even a #3 starter would be a blessing next year.

Here is a link to an ESPN article about next year's draft class. http://espn.go.com/high-school/baseball/story/_/id/7878486/a-closer-look-espn-60-baseball-player-rankings

His history is not bright, but if he plays next to Plouffe, then maybe some magic could hit him as well. And it would be nice to see just how slickly he can field, if only for a couple of weeks. In the meantime, I don't see the harm from sending Dozier down for a while to work on his game in a lower pressure environment. This seems like a luxury of being in last place -- the goal can be development for the future, not winning now.

Nice blog! Hopefully this chaos will eventually lead to order. In the meantime, it makes sense to keep trying new people until more of them stick.