Minny505

Yeah, the fight over the luxury tax, and leaving a competitive balance tax on the cutting room floor, has been really frustrating with the MLBPA. For the most part, the rest of what they are holding a hard line on I agree with, but this one really, really chaps my ass. Fighting over the luxury tax threshold is not good for the future of the game. It does nothing to improve the fan experience. If anything, raising the ceiling without addressing a floor makes the fan experience worse. A competitive balance tax, which means a floor and ceiling, is good for the fan experience.

I was not around to see Oliva, but I'm really surprised at so many people here taking him over Mauer. Even looking back now at their careers on B-Ref, the performance of these two guys is like comparing Justin Morneau to Kent Hrbek. Mauer was a markedly better player. It is said by many pop culture observers that we are in an age of nostalgia. This would certainly follow that trend.

This. He's been about a 9 WAR player, splitting the difference between bWAR and fWAR. Maybe with his national prospect ranking levels you would expect more, but even by that he is probably only 2-3 wins short, at most, of the average. On a side note, anybody looking for content to produce? Create a list of average career earnings by Baseball America Top 100, using the year a player debuted as the data point for each spot. I would love to see that. Could also do by highest rank anytime before debut.

This is the glaring fact in the shift discussion. I've always thought the most enjoyable way to correct for the shift would be to move outfield fences back. It would result in more singles, doubles, and triples, and less home runs. It would be so much fun to see so much movement on the field of play again. I don't expect this will happen, but who knows? Baltimore could be setting a ballpark trend once again.

Great point Nick about him starting pro ball in AA. That alone is rare. That he led AA in the most important offensive category on top of that, well that's kind of absurd. For those interested in a breakdown of his swing, this is a great one > It's so Jeter-like. Unfortunately, so is his defense. That said, can't hurt to have a LF that can competently handle CF with Buxton on the squad. He probably wins some gold gloves in LF (the bar is so low in left).

I have heard insiders like Ben Clemons and Eno Sarris say this is happening, along with negotiations with the agents of FAs. They have stated that dozens of deals have already been agreed to, some with contingencies, and that they are all going to be announced within about 48 hours of a CBA being inked. Of course no specific deals are going to be leaked. That would be career suicide for any reporter who did the leaking.

This ranking all depends on his ability to stick at SS as a league average defender or better. If he does, he's probably deserving of #1. If not, he probably belongs in the 7-10 range. While his position is still up in the air, the excitement level at getting to watch this kid play again is not.

Ober the moon. Good stuff.

It really depends if it's a shoulder issue or a UCL. If it's a UCL, go for it. Drafting him to go under the knife, then pitch 6 MLB seasons for your team, is a great proposition with his level of talent. If it's shoulder or something else that looks more chronic in nature, then picking him after round 1 seems reasonable, though still risky. It really depends on the info we don't have.

The extension is a one year deal for 9.25mil with a team option. That may be a slight overpay for the market, but really only by a million or two. We'll find out this year if the contract belongs in the JA Happ column or the Rich Hill column. "There is no such thing as a bad one year contract" is a MLB axiom for a reason.

The demand for Story is higher than pre-lockout. There are more chairs than contestants at this point: -Twins -Yankees -Angels -Astros -Phillies Those are just the "NEED an upgrade at SS" teams. Throw in the Mariners and Red Sox as teams that are said to be looking to move their current SS down the spectrum and the bidding has likely already gone beyond 4/92 behind the scenes. Story probably signs for something like 6/150. I still think that would be worth it as he has been a Top 5 SS by both bWAR and fWAR over the past five seasons. Over a period of unprecedented SS performance in MLB history, he has been one of the best.

If Lewis can stick at SS as a 2 WAR player for a half dozen years, I would consider that a win. I'm just so hesitant about thinking guys can play a solid MLB level SS when they are already getting talk about moving off the position in the minors. Usually the guys that stick as MLB SS's never have those kinds of concerns.

The elbow concern is valid, but would likely show up in a physical if there is structural damage. As with most MLBers, I don't worry too much about lingering elbow injuries, unless it is a UCL problem that doesn't get addressed. The UCL doesn't seem to be mentioned anywhere, so I believe it is not a risk factor, pending physical, but to each their own. As the research by many smarter people than you or I has repeatedly pointed out, you can disregard the home/road splits for Rockies players. In fact, more players put up better numbers after Coors than get worse. This is a good recap from a few years ago > https://roxpile.com/2020/02/24/coors-field-colorado-rockies-offense-effect/3/ That doesn't include DJ LeMeheiu, who has been better, and Nolan Arenado, who has put up the exact same wRC+ in a Cards uni as he had during his Rockies career. Allstar caliber FAs, by the nature of the FA market, are overpaid and bring risk on the backend of the contract. Story is no different. If you aren't willing to overpay a FA Allstar, then you are rarely going to sign a FA Allstar. 5/$100mil seems very fair. I'd even go a bit higher. He probably deserves something close to Correa, Lindor, Semien money. In that light, $100mil/5 seems like a steal. In an era of unprecedented SS greatness, he's been one of the Top 5 in baseball over the last four years. That's a long way from $20mil AAV to fall before his value falls below the cost of the contract.

Story, playing with a bum right elbow for almost all of 2021, was still a 3.5 WAR SS. He played at a 5+ WAR pace per 600 PA from 2018-2020. That is elite. A healed up elbow puts Story as the best, most reliable player on the Twins roster for 2022. He is rarely injured and played elite defense his entire career prior to the elbow injury. He is projected as a 4 WAR, 30hr, 10sb, gg contending SS, in 2022. His upside is better than anyone on the Twins not named Byron Buxton. At 29, he has the bat to move down the defensive spectrum as his defense declines, but he has been so good on defense he likely has 3-4 years before that move will have to be made.

The value of Glasnow is incorrect on the trade simulator. It is not recognizing that he is out for 2022. Cut that AFV in half, add a couple million more for salary, and you get a player with a median surplus value of roughly 7. Duran alone should be enough, more than enough for the cost-conscious Rays. If the Twins can work out some sort of reasonable 4yr extension thru 2025, with a team option, that is guaranteed based on IP for 2024 and 2025, I'd pull the trigger. Without the extension though, not a chance.

I would prefer Donaldson and Garver get first dibs on DH to keep their bats in the lineup when they are not in the field. Donaldson is an elite hitter and Garver has shown that as well over the last few years when not playing injured. Sano is a solid 3rd option, which is not a great place to be. I kind of want to see a straight up trade with the Brewers for Houser. It has a chance for the Carlos Gomez trade to come back around and even the score. (Gomez traded to Brewers for essentially two negative career WAR relievers. Gomez was later traded to the Astros for a package that included Adrian Houser. It would be a bit poetic if the Twins traded for him.)

I strongly disagree with the notion that Rich Hill was a cheap signing with limited upside. He was coming off a run of three seasons where, per inning pitched, he was among the elite pitchers in MLB. Therein lay the rub with why the Twins could sign him for cheap. He was a dominant starter when healthy, but that injury and injury risk is why the Twins could afford a pitcher of that caliber. If Hill was expected to throw 150+ standard Rich Hill level innings, he would have been a $15-$20mil pitcher. Instead he was expected to throw 60-ish innings and only cost about $4.5mil plus incentives. Pineda is another example of a pitcher whose recent performance, prior to them signing, brought with it an upside of excellence and was really only available at a price the Twins could accept due to injury and injury concerns. Those are the very kind of signings the Twins need to do more of. Those are low to medium cost signings, where the ceiling is excellence. Those signing are very different compared to the Happ, Shoe, Perez signings, where the upside is reliable, average-ish pitching. That means basically any performance short of their upside means you might as well let a AAA prospect have those innings.

A floor would absolutely make a team like the 2021 Orioles more competitive. The floor is not designed to turn rebuilding teams into playoff contenders, it's to turn more 65 win teams into 70 win teams. It condenses the outcomes of all teams closer to 500. It's not likely to put an end to 100 win teams or sub-60 win teams, but it will reduce their frequency. For the league as a whole, there is likely to be more teams in the September race, not from the rebuilding teams suddenly contending, but rather from them winning an extra game every month against teams that are contending, resulting in a tighter distribution in wins from the top to the bottom of every division.

Excellent post. You missed Rortvedt, so it's actually 5 of the 16 hitters on the 40 likely to be in the minors on opening day. Throw in Rooker and you have 6, though I think they keep Rooker on the MLB roster to be their RHB platoon OFer. Maybe the plan is to sign a SS and start the season with Miranda in the rotation for starts on the MLB roster? That would make 13 provided everyone is healthy. In that scenario, the MLB ready depth at AAA that is on the 40 man on opening day is rough. An injury in the first month will be reliant on a waiver wire pickup. Not a good place to be in April. I suspect a backup something to start the season either at AAA or MLB will be acquired before the season begins, in addition to a starting SS. Hopefully that backup can handle SS as well.

This is a solution looking for a problem. Plan M may be a little too high in the alphabet. There are a lot of better options potentially available to the Twins for a solution at SS, some long term, some short term. Sign: -Trevor Story -Andrelton Simmons (prime bounce back candidate in 2022 according to many league wide nerdy analyst types) -Jose Iglesias Trade: -Paul DeJong (rumors are the Cards are not looking to deal him) -Taylor Walls (stud defensive SS in minors...rumors are the Rays are open to dealing him) -Ramon Urias (my fave target...rumors are the Orioles are looking to deal him before he slides down the defensive spectrum, as he is still a passable SS, and loses his trade value)

And if UZR is not your flavor, he had the worst three year run of any SS on defense according to OOA during the still early Statcast era. I don't want to see him at SS at all except in an emergency, extra innings, sort of situation. Let Gordon be the primary backup. Let Arraez be #3 on the depth chart. I truly believe neither of those guys would be worse at SS over 150 games than Polanco.

This is the best way to state the proposition of trading him. If he can actually bring back an asset or two, a Nelson Cruz-like package, then deal him. Otherwise, you keep him. Yes, that's aiming high. His bat is worth keeping unless a couple prospects that slide into the Twins top 20 is the return.

Donaldson is hands down the best hitter the Twins have. His performance so far has absolutely lived up to the contract. The Twins would never compete to sign a player of Donaldson's caliber if it wasn't for the injury concerns. His profile gets closer to $26mil a year if he's a consistent 145ish games a year player, even at his age. Those numbers are the best of the best. Getting more time at DH will hopefully help him stay in the lineup more often. It worked in the last couple months of the 2021 season. Not opposed to trading him, like anyone, I just seriously doubt the team can get even reasonable value for him. Trading him away opens a huge void in the middle of the lineup. I'd rather salary dump Sano if that is the goal. Like Mauer, Donaldson's contract is not really preventing the Twins from getting better. Even the most Pohlad-friendly budget estimations show the Twins have at least $40mil to spend on the 2022 team.

Eno Sarris mentioned this past season that he believes the Statcast xBA, and other expected rates, incorporates Sprint Speed as part of the algorithm.

The more I read about, and dig into the metrics for, Dylan Bundy, the worse I feel about the signing. It's the exact kind of signing a team like the Twins should not be making. The upside is a 4 starter. The downside is JA Happ in the first half of 2021. Bundy is a perfectly reasonable signing for a team like the Mets who are looking to compete and need a 5th starter who has some MLB history of being perfectly reliable in that role, rather than relying on the volitility of a AAAA guy in their system, or the volitility of 25 year old, B- level, SP prospects. There was a line spoken by the great Eno Sarris a couple months back on his podcast where he was quoting an anonymous GM (obviously not with the Twins) that said, "I don't want to sign a guy like [Dylan Bundy] to be our fifth starter when we have prospects to be our fifth starter. When we go into free agency, we want to sign upside and give those prospects a chance if the FA signing fails." That is how the Twins need be approaching free agency. If the FA pitcher kills it and the team is contending, you ride them to the end. If the FA pitcher is killing it but the team is out of it, you get a great return in a trade. If that FA pitcher is hurt or terrible, the team is likely out of it anyway, giving a prospect some valuable MLB experience (after cutting the FA pitcher if terrible). Getting reliable innings does almost nothing for the Twins. They have plenty of "5" starters (meaning prospects). They need to go the high risk, high reward with FAs. Bundy is just high risk, moderate reward. I don't mind FA pitchers on one year deals for $10mil or less. Rich Hill was exactly that, but of the high risk high reward variety. Even Michael Pineda was that in practice, but of the high risk, high reward variety. Matt Shoemaker was sort of the same thing, but of the kind that fails. Oh well. Prospects got some valuable experience in his place. That's a good signing. FWIW, I'd rather sign Matt Shoemaker again. No, that is not hyperbole. Shoe at least had a decent finish to 2021 with some noticeable adjustments under the tutelage of pitch whisperer Brian Banister.