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nicksaviking

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Everything posted by nicksaviking

  1. nicksaviking
    These days the word veteran gives me a bit of nasuea. It shouldn't but it does. I want no one with a qualifying offer and I want no one that would be considered a platoon partner for HIcks or Schafer. I also want no one that requires more than a one year deal, though I'd probably settle for an option year. I guess Rios still might have some upside, he had a down year, but his career has been a bunch of ups and downs. As a guy who loves baseball history, I guess I wouldn't be too opposed to seeing if Ichiro could get to 3,000 hits in a Twins uniform, though I'd like to think he could get on base better than he did with the Yankees. It seemed really strange that he lost the ability to walk when he wore pinstripes, that's generally something the Yankees encourage, and pitch selection is often something that doesn't diminsh with age.
  2. nicksaviking
    Ha, yeah but to emphasize the blandness and Minnesota-ness, milktoast is definately the correct spelling here. Do we guage the the flare only upon the surname? Or does the given name count as well, because while Davis and Brown were rather boring names by 1991 standards, they sure seemed more intreguing when the names were proceeded by Chili and Jarvis.
  3. nicksaviking
    Yeah, he does seem to be the forgotten man of those great early Twins teams. I guess I never heard of any acrimony, though there may have been some. To me it seemed like a failure to recognize his value. Those Twins teams were loaded with all kinds of great but perhaps not elite pitching with Kaat, Pascual, Grant, Perry, Chance, Boswell and later Blyleven. They may have been so spoiled rotten in pitching that they didn't realize how good they had it. I do believe the team gave him some kind of community service award this year at the annual Twins award banquet.
  4. nicksaviking
    For what it's worth, we do have pretty clear insight as to how the voters ranked these Golden Age players back in the day. Most were on the ballot for years together, though Gil Hodges was quite a bit earlier than most. In the ballots from the mid 80's through the mid 90's, the pecking order was almost always Oliva, Kaat, Wills, Allen, Boyer, Minoso and Tiant, with Ron Santo, who got in on the last ballot sandwhiched between Oliva and Kaat nearly every time. Obviously we have different numbers to look at these days, but starting in 1984, the voters appeared to always favor Oliva. His first two years on the ballot were the only two he shared with Hodges, on those Hodges was ahead. Fun side note I noticed while looking up the voting records: 1984 both Harmon Killebrew and Luis Aparicio both got into the Hall along with Don Drysdale. Harmon failed to get in his first three years (likely because voters still put a lot of weight on batting average) but made it in with the slick fielding shrotstop and the dominant righty who's career was cut short. Killebrew's career OPS was an awesome 143, while Aparicio's was a cringeworthy 82. I'm guessing that is the largest disparity between same-year HOF batters ever. Drysdale's career OPS? 45, meaing the difference between Drysdale's and Aparicio's OPS was 60% less than the difference between Killebrew's and Aparicio's. In fairness, Drysdale was a pretty damn good hitter; for a pitcher.
  5. nicksaviking
    The Twins probably haven't done him any favors by not retiring his number. If I was a voter and saw that the team he spent his formative years with didn't think he was as good of a player as Kent Hrbek, I'd have second thoughts.
  6. nicksaviking
    Since Renteria was fired he's still collecting a paycheck from the Cubs, I'm not sure if the Cubs paycheck gets prorated against any salary he'd get to be a coach with another team, but even if it doesn't, he's already getting paid this year to watch baseball on TV. It may not have had anything to do with the Twins. He may have just thought $3 million to take a year off sounds a lot better than $3.5 million to coach.
  7. nicksaviking
    Brandon Wood jumps to mind. I even thought of a Twins comp, Michael Restovich. These kinds of guys are everywhere, AND they didn't have the on base issues that Walker has. Sure the Twins say nice things about him, but they don't like him enough to move him more than a level a year, and he played college ball. He more than likely will be a 23-year-old repeating A ball..
  8. nicksaviking
    I think Duensing best represents the disconnect between fan expectations for ceiling and front office desire for stability. I don't think we value what Duensing brings to the table nearly as much as the team does, we see his role as expendable where as the team would be extremely uncomfortable not having the veteran lefty with a decent track record available to them. I agree the Twins keep him and don't mind paying for a safety net. Ironically, it may be his arb increase that takes Duensing out of all our speculative trade talks, other clubs likely don't want to pay that kind of money for a non-closer bullpen arm.
  9. nicksaviking
    I guess I'd counter with doing some research on guys in A ball who can't get on base and have trouble making contact. The Twins may not have had a bunch of pure minor league sluggers to sample from, but there are plenty of comps league wide who have led the minors in HR but failed at the MLB level. Baseball history is loaded with power hitters who couldn't cut it but dominated AAA and AA, Walker is merely doing this against youngsters in A ball. Baseball just does not have a history of minor league sluggers with an OBP around .300 who have made it. There likely are some weak hitting middle infielders who have made it when only defense was expected from them, but we're talking about a guy who gets on base less than Pedro Florimon did in the minors. I can't find any comps at all. For sluggers, OBP is the one thing that normally decreases once they make the majors as these guys don't get pitched around as often. He's not going to make it with a .280 MLB OBP, he's just not. Plus, he's in A ball, and likely will start the year there again. Any front office that makes free agent decisions based on players in A ball needs to be fired on the spot.
  10. nicksaviking
    Pretty sure Texas is drafting ahead of the Twins this year. Funny how teams not afraid to have a reasonable payroll always appear to be closer to contention.
  11. nicksaviking
    So it seems as if the A's are having a fire sale, and everyone around here is crazy for defensive upgrades. Anyone interested in Josh Reddick? He looks to be serviceable defensively. I'm not sure his price, but he was basically a platoon player last year which can't help his value. Offensively, he probably is best as a platoon player, but he's the type of hitter that would seem to benefit from leaving the park with the most foul territory for one with among the smallest.
  12. nicksaviking
    Let's hope. However even if they get that prospect part right, I have doubts they'd ever sign an elite Cuban or trade for top end pitching.
  13. nicksaviking
    “We want to win, we want to win again quickly and we want to win again repeatedly in the coming years,” Hmmm, someone should probably tell Hahn now that Samardzija is only under contract for one more year. As far as the standings go, the Twins and White Sox are nearly the same distance away from being competitive, but man, a team that has stud young pitchers in the MLB rotation and is willing to use all avenues including, trade, free agency, and Cuba sure seems like they are closer to contention.
  14. nicksaviking
    And signing guys who's skills take advantage of their unique ballpark.
  15. nicksaviking
    Not a bad return, but Donaldson looks to be under-valued here. Looks like another case of the A's moving a guy before he gets cost prohibitive. Those guys have to get a new stadium, hopefully in a more prosperous section of the Bay area.
  16. nicksaviking
    They indeed may try him as a starter again: http://www.sun-sentinel.com/sports/miami-marlins/sfl-marlins-royals-trade-20141128-story.html Suspiciously I was not cited in Mr. Rodriguez's piece and the Marlins failed to give me credit for the idea though I posted it nearly 45 minutes before the article was published. No doubt if a search history was performed on Rodriguez or GM Dan Johnson's computer this page would show up.
  17. nicksaviking
    Right, his first couple of years I was of the opinioin that the Royals were wrong and he could be fixed, which coupled with Royal futility at the time of his arrival was not an outlandish assumption. I think he's too far gone to start now and if that velocity is kaput, he's possibly too far gone to pitch at all. I threw the question out there, but I do not have interest in Crow. Although I do like giving away two 40-man spots and taking on only one.
  18. nicksaviking
    Right, I've never liked the hypothetical trades that also require a hypothetical extension. One long shot is barely enough to pique my interests.
  19. nicksaviking
    Looks like Miami got Aaron Crow from the Royals for the Twins equivalent of Logan Darnell and Jason Wheeler*. Who would have been interested in that? I always thought the Royals gave up on him as a starter way too early but he struggled last year and his K numbers plummeted. *Guestimation based soley on position, handedness and close** approximation of minor league numbers. **Close is a relative term and used here loosely
  20. nicksaviking
    I'd say for every three Abreus there is a Miranda. Most of the Cubans who haven't panned out were not highly acclaimed and were unknown to many. Miranda signed nearly a decade ago and even then, a $2 million investment by the Yankees wasn't significant. The jury is still out on most of these guys, but so far the success rate of the Cuban imports looks to clearly be better than any other avenue for securing talent. You have to pay for it, but if you like safe (and the Twins surely do) few of these guys have been complete busts. At least not the ones that have a price tag of much significance.
  21. nicksaviking
    I think if you're taking on a contract you have to do it under the assumption that option years will vest. Hamels' 5 year $110 million likely will be slightly less than Scherzer/Lester in AAV, but likely not by more than a couple million per year.. As you said it's unlikely to happen, because one would have to think if they are willing to take on $22.5 million for 5 years , there would at least be some discussion about a $23-25 million per year contract for 5 or 6 years that wouldn't cost top prospects. As expected, there have been none of those whispers.
  22. nicksaviking
    Someone needs to reverse analyze past Rule V eligible players. Seeing which picks made an impact and which picks didn't can be fun, but seeing which players were eligible but DIDN'T get picked and seeing which kinds turned out to be solid MLBers seems like it would be a much better way to identify a Rule V stratagy since the sample size likely is much larger.. Who are some of the best current MLBers who at one time were Rule V eligible? Is there a position that is more likely to pan out? Power arms, good contact hitters? What level were they playing at? Were they college, HS or international signings?
  23. nicksaviking
    I agree, yet to me it looks like it's the only chance under this regime. I don't know why a team would be willing to trade for a 30-year old making $22 million per but wouldn't be willing to pay one in free agency. If this team wants to have a low end payroll, why would it matter how the contract is acquired? If there is no front office interest in Scherzer or Lester due to money and length of contract, logically there should be none in Hamels.
  24. nicksaviking
    Cole Hammels would be a great addition to the 2005-2010 Twins. A Twins team that is contending but short an ace to compete in the postseason would be a great acquistion. As it stands, a team that plans on staying in the bottom tier of payroll and still trying to identify which players will help them in the future, it's a bad move. The Twins need to do everything they can to make their own Cole Hammels, Jon Lester or Max Scherzer. If this team wants to be a perenial contender while fielding a small payroll it has to grow it's own elite pitchers, win with them for a couple of years, and trade them for more young arms to repeat the cycle.
  25. nicksaviking
    Good moves, and my comment was not so much an indictment on the team as much as it is all the posts questioning Thomas' abilities. The detracting comments regarding Cubans should probably be put on hold until they prove to not be worth the investment. People must have short memories because folks defending the Twins lack of Cuban interest were saying just as negative things about Abreu last year and Puig the year before. Among the reasons people were saying the Twins shouldn't sign Abreu last year was that his bat speed was too slow and he'd never make enough contact.
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