Rosterman

From a news standpoint, I totally don't understand holding a press conference ON ELECTION DAY where ALL the main news is going to be 24-hour talkdown of races and winners and losers. Yes, it is sports, but EVERY news personnel gets the call on election day to work somewhere in the coverage of the campaign results. Better to have held the conference Monday a.m., or wait until Wednesday. Is someone not thinking things out?

And then you have coaches. You need a solid pitching coach to talk that OTHER realm to a coach whose main experience is as hitter. The manager should/is the ultimate "go to" guy for players. You can delegate someone as the guy to tell a player he is going to the minors, or to put out on-field fires. But ultimately, he has to be approachable to the players (but not the guy you go out drinking and bowling with, as you can some coaches). And nowadays you need someone to talk to the media, do a radio show, have skills at gatherings to sell tickets and such. A bit of charm, or lots of character helps. Be interesting to see the coaching staff, especially the two righthand men -- pitching coahc and bench coach (who has become more powerful than the batting coach, it seems).

At some point you all have a "franchise player" that is above and beyond your normal payroll,

The name Frank Viola has floated around. Denny Hocking has been getting experience in the minors. Gene Glynn, Tommy Watkins, Rudy Hernandez, Ivan Artega could come up from within the system If nothing else, would like to see Dougie and Jake move up a rung on the ladder of managerial jobs, the Twins give Cedar to Joe Vavra, and keep Tom Brunansky as, at least, the minor league hitting instructor. Bobby Cuellar would make a great bullpen coach again. Keep him in the organization for sure.

If the Twins are seriously going to pursue a free agent (or two), then the players in question are not worth the monies, if the Twins are holding fast to their payroll figure of, say, $85. If the Twins are NOT going to pursue any free agent above and beyond a mid or low level name, then go ahead and negotiate arbitration on ALL the players. Swarzak and Duensing should be trade chips (and if you had even an inkling of not keeping them, they should've both been traded for something, anything, last July). Nunez (and even Schafer) are replacable players, but both were adequate producers last season and the only reason to keep them would be that they fulfill the backup positions you need and the bench that you could use. I would rather have them, at the moment, than say Beresford and Reynaldo Rodriguez on the bench. Milone is an interesting case. He's a lefty. Would you keep him, say, over the more expensive Duensing to fil the same role in the bullpen, a long relief guy who could also step in and start (wait, Duensing became a short guy last year...what!!!!!). So, it all boils down to numbers. Pretty much ALL the Twins arbitration guys (maybe not Fien or even Plouffe) if thrown into the free agent market would make more than they can in arbitration. Which is the pain of the system. Of course, arbitration rewards you for what you have done, in the past few years, for the team you play for. SO that evens out. But unless you truly want to stay with the team and take, perhaps less monies, you say bye-bye and face the real world that may give you an equally low paycheck next year and another release after the following season.

Tough decision time. Lovullo also could have Tampa Bay in his sights, now. What do the Twins really want, and can they find a guy to play their game, that is the question. Molitor. Mientkiewicz in the learning wings as he manages in the minors (and maybe gets offers from elsewhere). Mauer really in the wings...could come-in in five years or a decade. Terry Ryan wants input into coach selection? The Twins have to figure out their minor system. Looks like Jeff Smith may not be back. They need a couple of pitching coaches, a minor league hitting instructor. Is Sam Perlozzo still in the minor league mix. How many guys currently with minor league jobs could come north...2-3-4. Someone will grab Steinbach, Brunansky and Cuellar if they don't make some decisions.

Is he available? Does he lose his salary if he signs on as a manager with someone else? Will he stay in the Cubs organization in some capacity because they are paying him, still?

Debt retirement is not my problem, it is yours. Who did you borrow the money from and how you need to pay it back is a decision you made. If you make a profit and can pay it back sooner rather than later, are we supposed to jump up and down with joy that you are saving money on your investment? If you can't make a payment, I believe you have enough invested to borrow even more, especially since you run a bank. I seem to remember mumblings that Pohlad Dad had leveraged the Twins with the largest outstanding debt that major league baseball would allow him to handle. Better to have the cash and invest in other things, than to pay off what you have...sometimes. You don't lose money on debt in business...you write it off against profits in the long run.

You saw the ball get by. SO he had at least a double and the coach picked up that it could be a triple. The base runner looked to the outfield rounding second and the coach put up the stop sign and the runner momentum slowed, all the while the ball is now being kicked a bit. Tough call. Would have been interesting to see how Bumgarner would play out if the game was tied and both teams had to extra inning the thing. But it was a pretty darn good game, pitching wise for sure, and suddenly makes you question the need for starters. Just load yourself up with guys who can pitch 3-4 (or five innings) and a lot of solid bullpen arms that can be interchangeable with your upper minors.

Looks like the word is that Maddon is going with the Cubs. Now the Twins have to decide when to make their announcement so it doesn't get buried with the World Series immediate aftermath, the signing of Maddon by the Cubs, and the many players that get to announce their free agency!

I don't totally disagree with this concept, but the team does have to spend and take all the chances possible if they want to out-perform in the TC Market. They have to want my ticket purchase, my ear for the radio, my eyes on the television, my need to wear the logo on a hat and a player name on my back. What do they have to do to outperform in the TC Market. They have to win, they have to spin a favorable image, they have to make eye contact, they have to shake hands and get people out into the community more now than ever. There is a pretty diehard base of 10-13,000 season ticket holders. But where did the other 12,000 go and why. How do you get them back. Oh, and yes, the Twins do spend some of their kept 50% on bettering the organization as a whole - minor league facilities, more money on draft picks and such. They can only make so much profit without having to pay more on profits. Anything they can spend internally is a tax blessing, and some even increases the bottom-line worth of the organization. But, again, Target Field was approved and built to make the Twins more competitive, to push them into and keep them in the upper tier of teams due to quality of play, naming rights, more club seats and suites, advertising control and such. But it sounds like that unless the bodies do come, we can return to Metrodome-like rankings amongst baseball's business. I never did like the Target Field Marketing. But somehow it worked. And combined with the play of the team, if outperformed their expectations.

I'd include a package that contains Nolasco. And give us Adam Lind while you are it. Both for one year. If nothing else, trade them for prospects. But if we could dump, say, Molasco, Parmeleeeeeeeeee, throw in Swarzak if they eat some salary to boot, and another piece of a prospect for Mark B, Adam Lind and a blocked prospect of their own.

But you also run the risk of someone else gabbing Dougie for a spot if you wait too long, too. But, we also have the Jake Mauer factor to consider down the road, too.

And then we have the radio model, where the Twins want each station to pay them to broadcast games while they also keep the bulk of the ad revenue. And then they end up with theor own low wattage station that can't even cover parts of the greater metro area. I also seem to remember that the Twins have an ad revenue partnership with Fox, which ties into their corporate sponsor packages and such, where they get to keep monies from their major sponsors that advertise in all the Twins major outlets -- stadium, radio, television.....like making sure sigange is visible during broadcasts and such.

And, it seems, that the Twins are always a bit behind in the "make an offer" stage. The thinking is that a top flight pitcher is $12-14 million, when reality is that they are now $16-20 million. And maybe they thought Nolasco was one of the best pitchers on the market, rather than in the middle of the pack (everyone thought Garza and Santana would sign for more). And Nolasco, like Corria the year before, jumped at what they thought was a good offer. You have to give Ryan credit for making offers to these guys, although when they did happen (and not after the fact), the support of such offers by folks on this board were "hat is he thinking." And the days of making an initial offer and hoping for negotiation seems to have passed when doing business for the new year begins. You put the best you can out there, and then the discussion is just over the years of the contract (multiply the $$$ of the average year). Baseball is a strange and foolish business. Only so many teams can absorb a $20+ million contract each season. Only so many players will be able to get $10 million or more before the wells start to dry up. ALL teams have roster considerations, from prospects to players on the rise, to grizzled old contracts that they wish they didn't have...but paying for the guy, so we have to do something with him. But back to the above comment. Yes, Ryan seems to be that guy at the auction house that makes the opening bid. Someone raises his offer. While he is thinking about offering a dollar more, ten other people raise the bar at least 30%. But a least he can say he made an offer.

It all depends on what they are offered to resign, too. Maybe the dollars are significantly greener for some players or positions elsewhere. I would've thought the Twins might've 40-manned Guerra. They still could, although he has burned thru at least two of his option years, if not three. These are guys that were told they weren't going to be added to the 40-man, but we still want you to develop with our organization. All except Hamburger will play at a higher level next year...Hamburger having to consider do I want to relieve or start, which won't be decided until spring training ends.

Hughes and that's it...for now! Yes, shambles. We need to see May and Meyer and give them both the time we gave...say...Hicks,. Gibson is a pitcher we can move. I mean, do we want to pay him $5 million in arbitration, and eventually $9 million? Really? Do you see the numbers making that happen? Berrios and Stewart in the wings. Nolasco a free agent that can comeback, but is a wash and needs to be clean before we can hang him out for an offer. Pelfrey we can hide in the bullpen, but why not just cut ties and be done with it. Don't even think Swarzak. His time came and went, like getting more than an inning a game out of Duensing.

The Twins don't want to hire a manager for just a season or two, yet they might, and that might be the reason to have Molitor. Almost like looking at the major league roster, the Twins don't have a lot of immediate spur-of-the-moment contingencies for replacements is something happens to someone. They tend to play safe grooming people for jobs. That is one reason they fill their minor league rosters with free agents, who can step into the majors if the call came, instead of pushing forward a prospect, more often than not. Who would the Twins bring in if they needed a new president. Would they pay $35 million to bring in someone from outside? Are they totally grooming Anthony to be the next GM, or is Krivinsky the man to go to for short-term? If they bring in someone from outside, what happens to the field staff. I found it interesting that Ryan wants a say in coaches. How do you hire a coach? Which ones are the msot valuable to be on the same track as the manager? Molitor was a coach under Gardy, but he was an add-on to offer a different perspective than the majority of the other guys, some just doing their jobs like Cuellar, Steinbach, holdovers Ullger and Vavra) and some bring new insight, Bruno. Would I want to be Moltitor and told we want Mienkiewicz up, kinda a manager in training, as it seems you may not want this job for a decade? No more so than hiring Dougie and having Jake Mauer on staff as a manager in training. Both Molitor, and especially Mientkiewicz, have worked with more than enough players, even had passing professional relationships with many, that they should be able to cull together a wonderful team...an extension of themselves, not just an extension of management of the organization. Man, if the Twins went outside and had 6 coaches that have never been a Twins uniform. They would panic. If the team loses again next season, they would never ever do that again (that we suspect). Better to play it safe. But still, what happens if we get a new general manager. What happens if we get a new president. What happens if the Saints outdraw the Twins in real people in the stands?

There is risk involved. You also have to create a demand for your business model to succeed. At some point, if the tax base starts to drop, you do have to bite the bullet and give business incentives to open their doors, people breaks to purchase housing, all with the thought that the tax area core will grow and maintain and eventually create more revenue. You have to take the risk that people will buy into your plan and...invest, in themselves and their money/spending. Right now, the Twins are asking radio stations across the midwest to buy their product, and still allow the Twins to keep x-amount of ad revenue. But can a radio station, with the current team, recoup that ad revenue that they need to cover the Twins? If they believe the Twins will be successful, they will invest. But right now, it appears to be a loss leader. Does Budwiser want signage in the stadium that will be seen by 16,000 people a game, or 35,000. They re paying good money for visual hits. I am not going to pay 20,000 hit money for 16,000 hits. I may take a chance, if the Twins are salesmen, and do it. But I start to look at the Gophers, Vikings, Linx or elsewhere...even the Saints that will probably have a full house with the entry of their new field in the marketplace. Why do I, as a season ticket holder, want to renew? I get 10% off of my other expenditures if I go to a game. C'mon. Last year, you could easily buy seats for $6-10, half-off prices in many of the more expensive sections (but why even pay $20 or $50 if you can get into the stadium for the price of parking). Less season ticket holders means less cheap seats in the secondary market...as the major renewals will be for more choice seats, fans with money to spare and the need to not lose those locations when the team does turn good. The Twins can play their own wildcard, that the cheap team will thrive and ALL non-season-ticket fans will then have to start paying Twins fullprice for tickets. If the Twins continue to be bad, maybe we can recoup with group specials some of our lost revenue. And that is the kicker. Loss revenue. You don't take my $500 and say you are only going to spend $5. When I buy an arts ticket, I expect to see my money up on the stage, and like baseball they can give you more of a bang than your buck because there is often a lot of public financing involved in some venues. But I'm not paying a couple of hundred a seat for a play to see the local fan fave sing and dance on stage. I want to see a star! I want to see a mix of that on the playing field. Joe Mauer has big shoes. He has to be the guy people pay to see when the Twins play in town or on the road. He's being paid enough. I want to see solid defense, clutch-hitting, moving the runners. If the clutch hitting doesn't happen, I expect the outs to happen because of expert pitching, not base running mistakes or missed calls. I expect pitchers to make their starts, players to be in the mindset to play. If they have an injury, okay, tell us about it. If you need a rest, then let's have a roster that has a solid bench of long-relief guy that we aren't seeing a Thursday afternoon B-squad game because we want all the players to get their innings in. I want the games to be something, to mean something. Telling me that an up and comer will be the real deal (Durbin, Benson) works only if they are, otherwise the results are the same as if you threw a highly paid free agent that fails onto the field. You lost. The player gets another chance or two. But eventually you have to part ways and write off the expense, be it $12 million for a starting pitcher or a $1 million draft fee for a promising high schooler. But you move on. You don't stop signing promising players for a good rate. You don't avoid the free agent market. You evaluate WHY your system failed and make adjustments or changes. Why aren't we signing certain international free agents. Why are our promising pitchers coming up lame. Why are we drafting okay players, but they still don't make it to the bigs. What are we missing when are primary free agent pitcher signings are guys like Nolasco and Correia and they show that they are consistent (maybe) but were more safe (and then sorry) signings. Why do we wait to cut ties with a Delmon Young or a Josh Willingham. Yet we also let a Mike Lamb walk, or a J.J. Hardy go for peanuts, or not allow a Gomez t go to Rochester and try some things his way to show us what he is saying instead of jettisoning him when he won't do what we think is right. But this is about money. It doesn't seem to rollover. If it did/does, then the Twins could have a $150-200 million payroll in 2-3 years when they really need it. But that ain't happening unless the Twins can sell every seat 2-3 times in one of those seasons. It's marketing 101 folks. Say the right things ("we wish to field a competitive team and will spend our budget to do it" or "we are going to go cheap and rebuild...come along with us, support us, invest in use beyond what you have already given us as we work to achieve that goal") or shut up.

Yes, the more money you have to spend, the more mistakes you can make and cover. So you spend it and hope the mistakes don't sink you. 2014 had one major mistake sitting out the season, and three high paid players badly underperforming. One of them you write off as a franchise investment and because you got him young and you essentially are still not at the breakeven. But you were also vastly under payroll last season, too. Again, the ability to spend money allows you to gamble, maybe make mistakes, or maybe score big. You score big if all the pieces come together and you win, draw people, get ratings, corporate sponsors and such. You can play it safe, but then you end up playing to empty houses or going home from the table early.

http://m.twins.mlb.com/news/article/99486764/twins-re-sign-mark-hamburger-six-others-to-minors-deals Hamburger, Oritz, Tony Thomas, Salcedo, Mike Gonzales, Jario and Reynaldo Rodriguez resigned.

What to do with Plouffe. My own long range thoughts, he loses the job in 2015 and becomes a super utility guy for the Twins. But he will also make around $5 million, be eligible for $7-8 in 2016, and if he gets any kind of playing time, break $10 million in arbitration in 2017. Holy Cow. The Twins cannot afford to keep him, but right now he has value coming out of spring training if anyone NEEDS a third baseman. Let them worry about arbitration. Sano will need to come up in 2015. But the Twins have no stopgap, unless you call him Escobar. Or if they bring back Nunez. And that may be the main reason to keep Nunez around for now, in case the Twins do wish to move Plouffe. I wished the Twins had added Debinson to the 40-man for September and gave him a 10-12 game looksee, especially since Plouffe did go down. Deb Romero would be smart and resign with the Twins with the knowledge that he may have the best short opportunity ever to make the major leagues with the Twins this coming season, or even out of spring training if he shines like he did last time. It is nice to see that the Twins MAY have some other choices: Haar, Goodrum, possibly Harrison, or at least one of the other five low minor league guys, as the general consensus (shades of Pedro Sandoval) is that Sano won;t stay at third. It would be nice to get to 2018 without a position change for Sano, but e will see. Do the Twins keep Plouffe. Is it worthwhile to sign him to a 3-4 year deal for $20-26 million, mainly to be a backup at third, first or the outfield (and maybe short...a super Denny Hocking). Or can we restock some positions with his value to another club and just call it a wash and if we ever want him back, get him at a much reduced single or duo year deal down-the-line. Escobar is now looking like a longtime signing just for his utility value. Is that something the Twins should also consider? Plouffe or Escobar. Who would you keep going towards 2016/2017.

Someone has to update. Where is Pelfrey on the 40-man, by the way.

I still shake my head remembering those Santana runors when trade talk was happening with the Red Sox. Lester, Crisp, Masterson, Lowrie, Bowden was one, I think, but the Twins were holding out for Ellsbury and pairing that demand with Bucholtz. Of course, Melky was listed in the trade talks where the Twins Hughes and was it Kennedy that was killing the deal. The Twins could go after a Masterson. They could start May in the bullpen, as many starters do in their major league careers. If Nolasco comes out hot, you dangle him for something, anything, as his salary is not totally ridiculous and he is a proven starter, but let's not have him taking up valuable roster space here. You could also look at Gibson, who is not a youngster, and is a dependable guy, but if also starts the season hot, he is a trade chip. Seriously, look at Kyle and tell me that you will be paying him his arbitration wages down the line (which is also the question you ask of Dozier as a trade chip...is he a $7 or $9 million dollar player...like is Duensing worth $4 million and Burton not worth $3.6, is Plouffe worth $5 million?) What the A's do is not only look at what a player is doing, but can we truly afford to keep them when they hit arbitration, which actually awards players more money than free agency, especially if you just a solid everyday non superstar. You gat something back for them and then allow the other team to make the tender/non-tender decision. I'm not totally sold on McCarthy or Masterson as 3-4 year contract guys. Someone like Santana would ask for a contract equal to Nolasco (the evils of having that contract out there on your staff). We don't really need to pursue a Saunders of Floyd. If they are still out there when spring training happens, you can always do a minors free agent looksee and if they thrive, then worry about roster decisions. So it is a juggling act. Heck, you could even trade Hughes. Or extend him. Right now, no one should be safe (even Mauer) on the Twins roster if the right deal could be made, the problem being that few are knocking on Minnesota's door asking about the players and offering anything of worth. Teams may want our prospects, especially if they can jettison their own questionable contracts or players who will be in a tender/non-tender environs in a season or two. That, e don't need. In your research, are there any other names out there like Hughes was with the Yankees...getting to expensive to keep with the hometeam, coming off a bad run, still young, but could surprise people if given the chance in an environment that they may find livable, even if the team id playing last-place ball whenever anyone else starts? The Twins did sign Nolasco, Pelfrey and Hughes last year. Could they sign Santana. Would they have been as well off with Garza? Who would've come here (the magic question) and do gooder? I think the killer was that we didn't have to see Kris Johnson, Yohan Pino, Sam Deduno, nd in the dregs of September Anthony Swarzak, starting games for the hometown team. Those starts could've should've been put to much better use for anyone that might be in consideration for the future, not being on the 40-man roster be overlooked.

I found it interesting the remarks about setting a coaching staff. The manager is the on-field boss, but the guys he surrounds himself with give their input and also have long leashes on doing the respective jobs so the manager doesn't have to do it all. The need to hire a field manager and the staff selected will impact the Twins from the top all the way down to the rookie league. There's at least three names from this year's coaching staff that could remain. There's three names of guys you could easily keep in the organization, from hitting instruction, to field manager, to roaming coach. There 2-4 guys I would consider for major league spots in the minors for sure, amongst them Dougie, Jake, Gene, Tommy. Even Sam Perlozzo would be a good choice for a bench coach. You could argue that the Twins could elevate Artega or Hernandez to the bullpen coach position, or bring in Ray Smith or Jeff Reed after their long tenure with the Twins. But any of these guys has to work with the new manager, be he in-house or out-house. I get the impression that the Twins still want someone who will keep the Twins Way going forward, not create ripples in a system already in place, but compliment it. And any other outside candidates will also be considered for other jobs in the Twins organization, or with the current field staff, if they wanted to jump ship our way. Is the December Winter Meetings the time that you need to have your field staff totally set? I think you can continue to make some deletions without field management approval, as well as add the necessary folks to the 40-man. You can also sign lots of non-roster players, who sort themselves out in spring training anyways. The big thing is to be able to set you AAA, AA and both A-ball staffs. Anyone catch that they hired Valezquez to be a pitching coach in the rookie league?