yarnivek1972

I highly doubt Santana, controllable for two more seasons and relatively inexpensive, clears waivers.

Have Belisle close for two weeks and then flip him. Have Perkins close the following two weeks and then flip him. Ideally for players that are at least a year or two away from 40 man status.

If my memory serves me correctly, just because a trade isn't announced by 4 pm edt, doesn't mean it hasn't happened. Any number of reasons can delay an announcement.

A manager trying to keep his job probably wouldn't. It will be interesting to see if Molitor changes his ways now that the FO has thrown up the white flag. Will he sacrifice player development in order to try to squeeze out an extra win? Those are the kinds of things the FO will notice as well.

I wouldn't call a 26 year old with 2 plus years MLB service time a prospect. I'd call him a career AAAA player.

I'm having a very difficult time figuring out what your goal is by trading Kepler. To get a minor league prospect? Trades like that just don't happen. Kepler is more or less still a prospect himself. I'm not sure I have ever heard of a prospect for prospect trade. A proven MLB pitcher? For Kepler? Now? No way. He's not going to fetch that kind of a return. Not controllable AND proven. You could probably get a rental for Kepler, but why do that? Kepler has the best OPS vs RHP of ANYONE on the Twins roster. Including Sano and Rosario. Literally, the only flaw in his game is not being able to hit LHP at ALL. Against RHP, he hits for avg and power. His BB walk rate is good. His K rate is fine. If the Twins coaches can't help Kepler improve vs LHP, they need different coaches. Kepler will probably never hit LHP as well as RHP. Most lefties don't. But he doesn't need to either. He just needs to be serviceable vs LHP. Even a modest .600 OPS vs LHP would make his overall numbers outstanding. Kepler has a .190 BABIP vs LHP. That would seem to suggest he's had some bad luck against them this year as well. Some of it is being a predictable pull hitter, true enough. But .190? That's insanely low. Just doing a little "what if" math, if Kepler had a BABIP of .275 vs LHP, even with no additional walks or extra base hits, his OPS vs LHP would be close to .600. That works out to 6 scratch/bloop/worm burner singles instead of outs. Morneau didn't hit LHP that well right away either. I don't think he was ever sub .400 OPS against them, but I also don't think Kepler is going to continue being THAT bad against them. It wasn't until Morneau had been in the league 3 years that he started hitting LHP well.

Polanco stopped hitting before he "stopped" fielding. If anything, his struggles at the plate have affected him in the field. For the first two months, everyone was raving about his shortstop play. Clearly, something has turned this into a throwaway season for Polanco. The question is can he recover from it and be a quality MLB starting infielder. Stay tuned...

Are you suggesting trading Kepler? Why? He's probably the second best all around hitter on the roster. Yes, he needs to improve vs LHP. But he's young enough to believe he can.

Next time the CBA rolls around (actually, it might not need Union approval), MLB should think about having a floating trade deadline. Have it float so that it always falls on either the last Monday or Thursday of July. There is a limited MLB schedule today. Barely half the teams are playing. On a typical Monday, it's more like 75-80%. The fact that today is the trade deadline is 100% the reason why. Some teams could be 3-4 players short at any given time. It's a logistical nightmare. Now imagine if today was Saturday. Probably be playing two games short players.

I would say that Tom Kelly added 3-4 wins to the total every year with his moves. And Kelly developed players. Larkin, Harper, Mack, Knoblauch, Lawton, Hunter, Jones, Koskie, Mientkiewicz. All prospered and improved their games at the MLB level. That's been missing since he left. Is there really anyone you can point to since Kelly retired and say "this guy was so-so when he got here, but he sure did develop into a nice player."? Mauer, Morneau and Cuddyer came in with uber talent. Frankly, none of them (Morneau maybe) overacheived or improved at the MLB level.. Mauer is essentially the same hitter now as the day he came up. AJ Pierzynski maybe. The pitching track record is less successful, but IMO a large part of that was the organizational philosophy of drafting pitch to contact types. Big strikeout guys cost more, after all.

I would assume Garver moving around more is directly connected to Jason Castro being under contract for the next two seasons. Also, in this day of 3, MAYBE 4 man benches, the days of a back up catcher only being able to catch are probably over.

I would expect Enns to be up as soon as Colon or Gibson moves on. As has been mentioned, he's as good as anyone not named Ervin or Jose that the Twins have trotted out there this year.

Something that has to be considered an oddity are Rogers' platoon splits. He has a lower batting avg vs LHB but not nearly the spread of 2016. He's done a far better job throwing strikes. Although, I would imagine some of his walks vs RHB were intentional or semi-intentional. But Rogers has allowed 3 HR to LHB in just 50 or so PA. In over 110 PA vs RHB, he's allowed 3 HR as well. Obviously, a much better ratio vs RHB. Would seem to suggest that he has hung a couple breaking balls to LHB. Rogers was pitching far over his head this year. Right now, his season ERA is about where it probably should be: 3.8.

Ok. So, I've been on vacation all week. My online time has been pretty small in general, even less on this site. What's up with Buxton? A week ago he was supposedly on track to return Tuesday.

Maybe it is just anecdotal memory, but the Twins don't seem to play Oakland well, especially in Oakland. Point being, I wouldn't be looking at this series to make up ground, especially with no Ervin, no Jose.

So, now with 3 teams ahead of the Twins for the second wild card spot, is it officially time to go in to sell mode? There are two additional teams within one game of the Twins also. SELL, SELL, SELL!!

The situation lingered two months longer than it should have. At least.

If Molitor preferred vets, wouldn't he have wanted Mejia sent down?

Wouldn't Garcia get Breslow's 40 man spot?

My opinion really hasn't changed since he was struggling in late April. You probably stick with him until he prices himself out of a job and a viable candidate comes down the pipe. LaMonte Wade might be the viable candidate. And he's probably ready by the end of 2018. Which is about when Rosario figures to get pricier.

Not sure how bringing Vargas up helps against LHP. Buxton is expected to be activated Tuesday.

We can only hope that a good thing that might come from this is that it could finally be the end of the line for Craig Breslow.

I'm not sure I would call Santiago (at least as a Twin) or Gibson incinsistent. They have been consistently bad. The good outings are the outliers.

With due respect to Ken Rosenthal's source, it makes no sense to get that close to a trade and have it hung up on medical issues in the case of Nick Burdi. I find it hard to believe they didn't already know he had TJS and what the potential ramifications of that were.

Hanging chads?