nicksaviking

There were center options available so it was pretty odd. They must think that Brandel will be better, if not actually good because either 1) they'll ask him to concentrate on just one position this year, or 2) this new wide zone horizontal run blocking is more geared toward his skillset. Because it wasn't just the three stooges interim front office that passed on center in early free agency and the draft, after Teasley got here, he also didn't seem interested in Ethan Pocic, who was on his team in Seattle. I guess that does bring up option 3) they really like Garhardt or Samac. Seattle's CURRENT center was a UDFA.

To me, Tom's big talk sounds more like the precursor to making an actual splash as opposed to a half dozen tiny splashes. They all know signing five Josh Bell's won't move the needle in 2027. I don't trust Zoll to have the ability to do it, but Tom sounds like somebody who's already telling him, make another Carlos Correa move to put people in the seats, or next year I'll find somebody who can.

Switched my emoji from a laugh to the crying one because I think going quantity over quality and overstuffing the roster with below average free agents just to make the salary floor would be the biggest reason this team doesn't take a giant leap forward next year. And, yeah, that's obviously a real concern.

What I'm looking forward to is when the league does install a salary floor and the Twins roll out the press releases proudly declaring they increased payroll by 40 or 50M as required, but act like it was their intention to do so this whole time!

I'd also guess that when we hear "The Twins partner with Mayo clinic" or "The Twins partner with Twins Cities Orthopedic" it means these hospitals probably provide health services to the team at cost in exchange for the free marketing.

Obviously it's Tom Pohald with an assist from local media. Because....collapse?? This team has been floating around with this similar record ALL SEASON LONG. So Tom is responsible for pushing this false narrative that this team was at any point a contender this year, and this inevitable collapse would instead be better described as treading-water.

Agree that there's little reason not to call him up this year. Also agree he's more than likely to get traded. But without that option and without any MLB track record, I can't imagine it will be for much. Years of control obviously matter to this team, but stuffing the roster with veterans, regardless of their on field talent, is also a reason they don't roster rookies. With 2026 being Rodriguez's last option year, the years of control shouldn't have mattered at all last April, yet they still felt the need to roster James Outman instead.

"The Twins released Canterino in April 2025 after designating him for assignment, but the story didn't end there. Just eight days later, Minnesota re-signed him to a two-year minor league contract." My math suggests the two year contract would end after this season, so I'm guessing the club is going to want to see how he looks before committing to him again. And really, it could also be an audition for other teams too if he's truly untethered to the Twins in a month.

You're probably right that I didn't need the conviction, but I still can't remember any players with zero MLB experience making the Twins opening day roster in the last couple decades. Maybe he will get a shot, but if it's not this month, I'd put the odds well under 50%. Let's say 20%. And I think this team will be good next year unless they make a slew of boneheaded roster decisions, so I'd classify my attitude about the poor decisions as frustration more than pessimism.

I'm wondering if this Cost of Recovery includes the wages paid for missing days. If so, that was already a sunk cost in most other cases. And minimal in Canterino's case. I'm not at all being critical, I'm with most others, the organization gets kudos for sticking with and standing by Canterino.

"The bullpen route may eventually make make the most sense." I'd say the bullpen route makes the ONLY sense. With his injury history and velocity, they absolutely should not stretch him out. He might get injured again, or he might never regain his form regardless if he is a reliever or starter, but to me it would seem irresponsible to put him in the rotation. If he gets injured again while as a reliever, everyone will be sad but proud of the comeback attempt. If he gets injured again as a starter, there is going to be a lot of finger pointing at the decision makers, and it won't be entirely unjustified.

It's pretty nuts how decision makers think the veteran is the default safer option, when the track record shows there is nothing remotely safe about such a player.

Well the Pohlad's tried to tack on 500M in real estate and/or other business losses into the sale of the Twins. After hearing about that, I wasn't surprised nobody wanted to give them a bonus half a billion dollars in debt relief.

For James Outman no less.

So Will Levis was cut loose just prior to his fourth year. Looks like McCarthy and Anthony Richardson are going to stick with their original clubs despite neither team seeming to have much interest in keeping them. Maybe due to an inflated perception of value due to draft position? The NFL should start being proactive about these 'bust' type QBs because there are simply not enough good QBs to go around and this league wants to expand. And these' 'bust' type of QBs have been paying off quite frequently after bouncing around the league. Maybe from just getting out of their current situation, maybe just learning something new from someone else or maybe from getting humbled and learning how to play QB instead of relying on god given talents. Doesn't really matter, we're starting to build up enough case studies to see this is a usable source to find QBs. And not just starters like Darnold, Mayfield, Smith, Jones and Willis but capable backups like Winston, Mariota, Wentz, Bridgewater, Trubisky and Rudolph; the league needs way more of these guys too. I don't think you can incentivize teams to move on from these players, but there should be some kind of effort to get them out from being buried on a depth chart getting no meaningful reps and reallocating them to a new spot where they can get a fresh start and aren't constantly asked about not living up to their prospect hype. Maybe it's an overaction and having these guys wait 4-5 years to get a fresh start instead of 2-3 years isn't that big of a deal. Anyway, just brining it up because I once again read about expansion and thought how ludacrous it is considering there aren't enough #2 QBs to go around let alone starters.

Rotational pass rush specialist, yeah, works for me. He started 13 games even just last year, I'd guess he was hoping to land another starting gig but this had been discussed as an option months ago.

For sure, it's hard to build up the nerve, but tough nerves should be a requirement of a GM and a manager. This franchise NEVER lets zero MLB experience rookies make the opening day roster. Maybe he'll get a late couple week audition sometime in the next month, but it's looking like E-Rod will never play for the Twins. He was never a sure thing to make it, far from it, and the Twins have lost better prospects for less, but losing a long time top 50 prospect for whatever bag of peanuts they'll get offered is a pretty big indictment on their roster building and equity management. I wouldn't fire anyone just because of this, but if we're measuring last straws, this would be more than big enough. Top 50 prospects headline trades for really good players, this was a pretty bad misstep.

I don't disagree that the Twins need to stop looking in the lower tier free agent pool just because they feel compelled to roster as many vets as possible, but what's going on now, operating at 100M payroll, is clearly not working for the Twins. In any case, I don't expect Zoll and this front office to be here much beyond the start of the next CBA. Probably for 2027, but if they are still below average at best, they'll be gone. I suspect ownership will once again look to sell the team at that point too. If parity due to a salary cap will make the Twins more attractive to bubyers, I'm pretty sure there'd be a celebration around here.

I'll side with the millionaires over the billionaires pretty much always, but not on this. The top players don't want a cap and they are the ones that get their voices heard in the union but they're just bullying the low earners. A cap and a floor that would force teams to collectively spend more than they are now, would obviously mean collectively the players on average make more money than they are now. And if the teams HAVE to spend more money overall, eventually that will mean guys are getting paid appropriately while they are still in the prime of their careers. Sorry Bryce Harper, but this would help the next Joe Ryan or Bailey Ober who didn't get paid when they were at the top of their game. Not to mention a guy like Kody Clemens who will be a free agent somewhere around his age 50 season.

I'd rather trade for a front line starter, mostly because the franchise has had very good success with that before. But, there is enough prospect equity and not enough roster space, so a high value trade better be in the works. I do like Arozarena, even if the position may not be the best fit. He does seem like a guy who has a very high floor along with a reasonably high ceiling. So many offensive players crater in Seattle, and he hasn't, so I do like him quite a bit. Maybe because of that he gives me Nelson Cruz-lite vibes. I'd rather see Houston at SS and Culpepper at 2B but the roster could still work going after one of the better free agent second basement so I get the draw and wouldn't put up a fight. The problem is that this team has to decide on Jeffers ASAP and commit to Ryan staying very early. If the Twins plan on dumping them to free up money, they have to be certain they can snag a two of the very, very, very few good free agents this year, and if we were ranking teams based on how likely they are to get the free agents I want, the Twins are going to be way down on that list. But for all my pessimism about this free agent class, I think the price tags are going to be shockingly high. I think the big market teams are going to go all out before the CBA expires and pay these guys significantly more than projected just to get a leg up on the teams that are price conscious and are waiting to see if the CBA will come out more financially favorable to them. If the owners truly are going to try to somewhat level the playing field for all clubs, the big market clubs will surely want to take one more stab at getting an edge. Especially if any kind of cap is 'grandfathered' in. The big spenders will probably give out those long term deferred contracts simply to stretch out how long they have this payroll advantage.

That's on me for forgetting Houston.

I don't see anyone saying this. Pretty sure just about everyone has moved on to Keaschall, Culpepper, Jenkins, E-Rod and Lackey. I don't want to bring in more low ceiling Josh Bells and Victor Caratinis in just to take roster spots and ABs away.

I only want to keep Jeffers and Ryan. If there were free agents I wanted, I'd happily upgrade there, but there is seriously like ten free agents max I'd want to add to the roster, and outside of Skubal I think I'd prefer Ryan and Jeffers over any of them. Maybe Seiya Suzuki or Randy Arozarena, but they aren't exactly great fits and if you swing and miss on them, then you're left with money to spend on worse players than you already had. For this spend-thrift franchise, improvement was always going to come from within. They did a poor job of acclimating several of the top young players so far this year, but we got a month left to see if they can prepare them for 2027.

I'd happily take Yandy Diaz, but the Rays have a 12M player option they'd be absolutely insane not to exercise. I'd pay him 3x that amount if he was available.

Not Milwaukee. They've brought back virtually no useful players after trading away their stars. They are winning DESPITE their high profile trades, not because of them. And this isn't unique to Milwaukee and Tampa. They're doing what the Twins and A's were doing two decades ago. Well built team with chemistry that can cruise through the regular season, but not enough top end talent to win when you get to the playoffs.