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Rounding Third

A blog by Andrew Thares in Twins Daily

  • Entries

    13

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    64

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    37,318

Entries in this blog

Twins Infield Projections for 2018

The Twins infield depth took a real hit when it was announced that Jorge Polanco would have to serve an 80-game suspension for testing positive for PEDs. As it stands, every Twins infielder on the Twins 40-man roster is also on the 25-man roster.   Again, for these projections I used PECOTA (via Baseball Prospectus), along with ZiPS and Steamer (via Fangraphs) to group with with my personal projections for each player in the Twins infield.   Jason Castro, C   It’s hard to find a player that ha

Twins Relief Pitcher Projections for 2018

It is time for round two of my player projections for the 2018 Minnesota Twins. In the first edition I broke down the starting pitchers, and now it is time to take a look at the bullpen.   The Twins bullpen received an added boost this offseason, after replacing Matt Belisle, Dillon Gee and Buddy Boshers with Fernando Rodney, Addison Reed and Zack Duke. Hopefully these improvements can elevate the Twins bullpen out of the gutter it has been in during recent years.   So, how good will the Twins b

Twins Starting Pitcher Projections for 2018

With the 2018 season right around the corner, perhaps the biggest topic in baseball circles right now is player projections. Whether it is for fantasy purposes, or for trying to predict how your favorite team is going to play this season, people can’t get enough of them. So, I decided to create my own projections for each player on the Twins 40-man roster, and then see how my projections stack up versus some of the other more prominent projection systems.   The systems that I used to compare are

What Needs to Happen for Joe Mauer to Be A Twin in 2019?

There is no question that Joe Mauer is one of the greatest Minnesota Twins to ever put on the uniform, and that he will one day see his number retired along with former Twins greats like Kirby Puckett and Rod Carew. Despite this, Mauer’s future as a player with the Twins after 2018 seems to be in question.   Entering 2019, Mauer will be going into his age 36 season with what will at best be a slightly above average bat and good defense. The problem is he is limited to playing first base, and the

Free Agents Who Singed for Less Than the Qualifying Offer They Rejected

The history of the qualifying offer in Major League Baseball is short, as it only came into existence at the start of the 2012-2013 offseason. The purpose of the qualifying offer was to grant compensation, in the form of a draft pick, to MLB teams that lost a key player in free agency.   Since its inception, 73 players have been extended a qualifying offer, and of those 73 players, only five of them have accepted the deal, none of which were from this offseason. The primary reason for this being

Building an Ideal Twins Lineup

After the addition of Logan Morrison over the weekend, it left many in Twins Territory wondering how would he fit into the lineup. Including the Twins Daily twitter account.     This question drew a number of different responses from Twins fans, so I decided to dive into the numbers and construct what I believe to be the ideal Twins lineup. Just as it is worded in the tweet, I took this approach from the perspective that Sano will be able to play third base this season. I also see the lineup b

Twins in Pursuit of Lance Lynn

After coming up short in their quest to sign Yu Darvish, the Twins were forced to turn their focus towards other pitchers on the free agent and trade markets in order to fill out their rotation. They have since added two starting pitchers, by taking a flyer on Anibal Sanchez, and making a trade with the Tampa Bay Rays for Jake Odorizzi.   Theses moves added just under $9M to the Twins 2018 payroll, bringing the total to roughly $118M. However, it would be reasonable to assume that if the Twins w

A Potential Upgrade for Kennys Vargas

The first few seasons of Kennys Vargas’ career have been a bit of a disappointment for the Twins. Vargas came up in 2014 as a player with a lot of potential, and was considered by many to be the inevitable replacement for Joe Mauer at first base.   Despite a few bright moments with the bat, Vargas hasn’t quite lived up to his expectations. Over his 859 career plate appearances, Vargas has a slash line of .253/.314/.444, with 35 home runs and an even 100 wRC+. While these numbers aren’t terrible,

Why a Julio Teheran Trade Makes Sense for the Twins

It is no question that the Twins top priority this offseason remains on signing free agent Yu Darvish. However, as the season nears, they may need to shift their focus towards an alternative option to fill an open spot in their rotation, especially now that Ervin Santana is expected to miss the first month of the season after having surgery on the middle finger on his right hand.   There is a lot of speculation that the Twins will sign one of the other remaining free agent starters if they fail

The Secret to Ervin Santana’s Success

Over the past couple of seasons, Ervin Santana has been one of the loan bright spots in an organization that is starved for starting pitching. In 2016, Santana put up the Twins’ lowest ERA from a qualified starting pitcher, at 3.38, since Johan Santana’s 3.33 in 2007. He followed that up in 2017 by improving his ERA to 3.28, the 5th lowest in the American League. This was a big turnaround from a pitcher who had an ERA of 4.16 over his 11 career seasons prior to 2016.   So, what is the reason for

Should the Twins Extend Brian Dozier?

There is no question that Brian Dozier has been the best player on the Minnesota Twins for the past four seasons. Over that stretch, Dozier’s 18.8 fWAR ranks 18th in Major League Baseball, and is 2nd among second basemen. His early success lead the Twins front office to give him a 4-year, $20MM deal to buy out his arbitration eligible years. This has proved to be an extremely team friendly deal, but now that the Twins are a team that is finally back in playoff contention, they just might be in d

Twins Showing Interest in Wade Miley

The Twins have made a concerted effort this offseason to improve their pitching staff with additions of Fernando Rodney, Zach Duke, Addison Reed and Michael Pineda. However, it doesn’t appear that any of those moves will be a limiting factor as the Twins look to make further additions. Earlier this week, Derek Falvey said that “he doesn’t believe the Twins have any major budget constraints to sign a much-needed starter.” This is good news for Twins fans that are hoping that the Twins will sign Y

Why Yu Darvish Will Be Cheaper Than Everyone Thinks

This offseason has been nothing short of unprecedented. It started with the 23-year-old sensation Shohei Ohtani deciding to leave Japan for the MLB, two years before he was eligible to sign without the International Free Agency restrictions. Then it was followed up with two months of absolute standstill for many of the top free agents. So, how could this season’s free agent market potentially cause Yu Darvish to sign for a lot less money than the six years and $160MM that MLB Trade Rumors had or

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