19 hours ago, smartfred said:

The problem I have with your list list is that you're cherry picking players that are fitting your narrative.

For example...

2021 FA Class of High End Starters

Trevor Bauer - WAR - 1.7 @ 3 years for $34 million = $20 million/WAR

Charlie Morton - WAR - 3.6 @ 1 year for $15 million = $4.15 million/WAR

Kevin Gausman - WAR - 4.2 @ 1 year for $18.9 million = $4.5 million/WAR

Marcus Stroman - WAR - 3.1 @ 1 year for $18.9 million = $6.1 million/ WAR

That's it for higher end SP's for 2021

The middle guys

Corey Kluber - WAR - 1 @ 1 year for $11 million = $11 million / WAR

Mike Minor - WAR - 2 @ 2 years for $18 million = $2.25 million / WAR

James Paxton - WAR - 0 @ 1 year for $8.5 million = INF / WAR

Robbie Ray - WAR - 3.7 @ 1 year for $8 million = $2.16 million / WAR

Drew Smyly - WAR - .2 @ 1 year for $11 million = $55 million / WAR

The Twins Picks

J.A. Happ - WAR 0 @ $8 million

Matt Shoemaker - .7 WAR @ $2 million

The Twins have had 15 different starting pitchers in 2021. Less than 60% of SP's in the rotation will end the year with 30 starts.

This means the Twins need at least 10 - 15 starting pitcher.

I don't see any logic why the Twins FO will sign a SP that will cost 15-25% of the payroll and only has a 50-60% chance to make it through the entire season.

We could have signed 2 mid tier pitchers and gambled on their success, or do what the Twins did and signed 1 mid tier pitcher and 1 low end pitcher and roll the dice.

Unfortunately the dice roll didn't end up.

The Twins Plan That Didn't Work 

• Sign elite defenders so mediocre pitchers have a better chance to thrive at Target Field
• Josh Donaldson
• Andrelton Simmons
• Buxton in CF
• Polonco is a + defender at 2B
• Keplar is a + defender in the OF

Realistically the Twins made some good decisions, they just lost the dice roll. 

Sure beats being stuck with a lost season from;

Noah Syndergaard, Justin Verlander, Chris Sale, Luis Severino and many others....

25% of your payroll just thrown in the trash.... that would hurt... I like the Twins strategy better.

I did miss Bauer at the $100MM price point. Otherwise, I attempted to list every single starter who signed a $100MM+ contract in the past 8 years? I suppose there aren't a ton of aces who are allowed to hit free agency so they are rare; however, signing isn't the only way to acquire elite rotation arms. Darvish, Bauer, Greinke and Price were all traded. Also, as the article states "as they become available." 

A lost season isn't a problem because the pitchers almost always make up for it across the entire contract. There's a big gap between winning the World Series every single year and not going to a World Series for more than 30 years.

This is all very interesting, however, it completely ignores the fact that most of these pitchers did not want to relocate to Minnesota.  Their reasons may or may not have been valid, but it is my understanding that Minnesota wasn't even on the radar as a desirable place to play.

Perhaps if the Twins had a better defense.  I had hopes that Donaldson-Simmons on the left side would tighten up our defense, but alas, it was not to be so. 

Since the top pitchers would not move here, even if we matched their top-dollar offers, what strategy do we have left?

13 hours ago, jkcarew said:

...Still, there’s great risk in mid-market teams extending huge long-term deals...

 

The article suggests that's a perceived vs. actual risk. It was once considered terribly dangerous to eat a tomato.

13 hours ago, tony&rodney said:

The Twins are not a small market team. There is money if management chooses to go that route. The payroll will not be above $160 million, so we are not competing with the New York teams or Los Angeles. It is extremely unlikely to sign Max Scherzer, agreed. There are options that will be available, however. Miami and Milwaukee both have some needs that match what the Twins can offer. Perhaps there can be some trades. Otherwise, or additionally, free agents are available who will sign if the Twins offer the correct number. 

If anything, the past month has shown that the Twins can win and good pitching is a must. It is much easier to win when three runs is enough. This year the Twins have given up more than five runs per game, the second worst in baseball. The analysis works and I hope the Twins can agree.

On the opposite end of that, yes, it is possible to win with 3 runs if the pitching holds up, but so far this season we have scored 3 runs or less 47% of the games we have played through Wednesday night.  The 3 run rule will hold up only so long; we need to open up the offense to more than waiting for the 2 or 3 run home run.  We have a grand total of (non pitcher) 6 sacrifice bunts the entire season, and 44 total stolen bases.  When is the last time we have seen a pure hit and run out of this team?  When you can not (will not?) move runners along the old fashioned way, you need 3 hits an inning or a long ball to score any runs.  Hence the 47%.  That is the management in the dugout, not the players, and we are paying the price for it.  So we can talk about pitching all we want, and believe me, I want to, but we need a different approach offensively as well.  And this analytic group in the dugout isn't going to give it to us.  Which also falls on the FO; they couldn't wait to bring these guys in.  

*Carl Pavano and Mike Hampton have entered the chat*

Just now, Thegrin said:

This is all very interesting, however, it completely ignores the fact that most of these pitchers did not want to relocate to Minnesota...

This is the single most BS, yet extremely popular, Twins fan defeatest and apologist excuse in existence. There isn't any evidence to support the argument. The Twins just do not make competitive offers. That's a fact. They make lowball offers and the citations of agents telling the Twins to essentially stick it, are after the Twins make essentially the same lowball offer over and over again when there are already higher bids. It's exactly what they were doing with Yu Darvish and Josh Wheeler. The Twins had already been outbid, yet kept making offers which were lower than what was on the table or essentially the same as their previous offer. Kinda like Rick Spielman trying to trade up with lowball offer after lowball offer in the 2021 draft. The Carolina Panthers owner told them to stop calling "with negative value" offers. The Panthers didn't say "stop calling" period.

Why did Josh Donaldson land with the Twins? Why did Kirk Cousins come to the Vikings? Why did Zach Parise and Ryan Suter come to the Wild? Don't they hate Minnesota? Oh... they came here because they were paid the most to come here. If you pay them... they will come. Yes, Ray, players will most definitely come.

38 minutes ago, bean5302 said:

I did miss Bauer at the $100MM price point. Otherwise, I attempted to list every single starter who signed a $100MM+ contract in the past 8 years? I suppose there aren't a ton of aces who are allowed to hit free agency so they are rare; however, signing isn't the only way to acquire elite rotation arms. Darvish, Bauer, Greinke and Price were all traded. Also, as the article states "as they become available." 

A lost season isn't a problem because the pitchers almost always make up for it across the entire contract. There's a big gap between winning the World Series every single year and not going to a World Series for more than 30 years.

2020 FA Class

Stephen Strasburg - 0 WAR over the last 2 seasons and probably headed for more ($245 million)

Hyun Jin Ryu - 4.3 WAR over 2 season and $40 million = $9.3 million/ WAR with 2 years remaining and a 75% chance (due to injury) that 1 of the remaining 2 years will be lost.

Zack Wheeler - 8.4 WAR over the last 2 season and cost $47 million which is $5.5 million per WAR. He has 2 years left so that's still a 75% chance that he will miss significant time due to injury. 

All 3 guys would take up 20-30% of our payroll if we signed them to their current contract which would have been more if we a part of the bidding. Yikes that's a lot.

4 seasons to gamble on 1 player is a really tough thing to do. If it doesn't work out or Tommy John surgery knocks him out for half of his contract, Ouch.

If anything, it now makes even more sense why low market teams should continue to go after mid to low salary guys and hope they pull a Robbie Ray or Kevin Gausman out of their hat.

Happ IMO was a good gamble since he pitched in Yankee Stadium and still had good numbers despite giving up lots of long balls.

Moving to a pitcher friendly ballpark could have really been a sneaky great season for him but as we all know, it didn't work out.

At least Gant is looking good! 

Making the playoffs is the ultimate goal according to analytics. The sample size of a 1 game Wildcard or 7 game series is small enough that a weaker opponent still has a decent chance to win. (Yes... what's happened to the Twins in playoffs is extremely unlucky). 

I don't understand the gap you're referring to as winning the WS every year versus not going to the WS in 30 years.

It's to be expected that the Dodgers, Yankees, and other large market teams will make it.

Look at the Tampa Bay Rays and Oakland Athletics on what they've been able to do as far as making the playoffs versus their divisional rivals.

Boston and New York should never not make the playoffs with their salary and with how much the Angels spend, they should dominate teams like the Athletics. 

Also, where is the ace that's on the A's or Rays? Rays don't have one! A's don't have one! 

I really like your post though, it's a great conversation to have with fellow Twins fans!

Quote

Well, everybody knows big free agent contracts never work out though, right? Wrong. Big name, free agent starters are almost always worth it. This is for two reasons. First, they often perform at ace levels even if they decline a bit, but if they take a major hit or injury, they almost always bounce back as a solid starter in the rotation. The money is virtually never totally wasted like it often is on mediocre or low cost starters. 

Thanks for posting this and providing the data to back it up.   I read something about five years ago stating this, it's good to have the numbers.

There is inherently more risk to buying pitchers who perform in the middle of the pack, and this contributed to the mess we saw in the latter years of Terry Ryan at the controls.  

2 hours ago, smartfred said:

2020 FA Class

2 hours ago, smartfred said:

2020 FA Class

...Stephen Strasburg - 0 WAR over the last 2 seasons and probably headed for more ($245 million)...

...All 3 guys would take up 20-30% of our payroll if we signed them to their current contract which would have been more if we a part of the bidding. Yikes that's a lot...

...Making the playoffs is the ultimate goal according to analytics...

...Also, where is the ace that's on the A's or Rays? Rays don't have one! A's don't have one!...

 

RE: Strasburg - I missed Strasburg, too. He's a good case of when it all goes wrong due to injury. I was thinking the Nationals locked him up prior to hitting free agency. In reality, Strasburg opted out of the 4 years remaining on his deal from 2016 on November 2nd and was signed by the Nationals again on December 9th, though the Nationals and Strasburg were already in discussions prior to the opt out date. He needs to be added to the list so I will edit the article to bring him in, along with Bauer noted above as I think that's fair. Strasburg's contract is interesting as there's some speculation the Nationals outbid everybody else by miles and Nationals' offer is filled with deferrals, as is typical of their complicated mess. Boras started the negotiations at 6 yrs $180-204MM as an ask.

RE: Twins payroll. The Twins are spending $20-30MM less than reasonable for their market size. I haven't advocated for the Twins signing 3 top starters, either. That would be unreasonable. I'm just saying the Twins are already spending the same amount of money on an annual basis as signing 2 top starters. If they get absolutely nothing (0.0 WAR) from a starter (say like Strasburg), they're in exactly the same boat as if they sign Pelfrey, Correia, Hughes and Milone for about the same money.

RE: Goal is to making the playoffs. Analytics has no goal. Analytics is just methodology for evaluating players. The Twins' goal, I believe, is to play .500 or better and have a chance at winning the division (potentially make the playoffs). The goal of almost every other team in baseball, I believe, is to win the World Series. Winning the World Series vs. making the playoffs are two entirely different goals because playoff baseball pitching bears little in common with regular season baseball pitching.

RE: Ace on the Rays and A's? When those teams are making playoff runs, they do typically have pitchers performing at ace caliber levels who are also often later traded away for talent because the Rays (Price, Archer, Shields, Snell, Cobb, Kazmir) and Athletics (Gray) can't afford to keep it. Oakland doesn't have the kind of identifiable ace pitchers they've developed, but they've also not been to a World Series since 1990 and haven't won a playoff series since 2006 (they won a Wild Card game in 2020). A team full of #3-4 starters can get you to the playoffs... they just usually don't advance you in the playoffs. The two Twins teams that went to the WS? They both had ace pitchers (Viola, Tapani). It wasn't a coincidence.

11 hours ago, Brock Beauchamp said:

How is it "cherry-picking" to use WAR, which is generally regarded as the best catch-all single stat to measure a player's value?

Sure, most players decline in time but it's not a guarantee to happen with high-end pitching, just look at the likes of Verlander or Greinke. They may have declined from "elite" but they're still quite good.

Cheery picked which pitchers he used and I complete contraxrs.

Just now, old nurse said:

Cheery picked which pitchers he used and I complete contraxrs.

Okay, fair enough.

8 hours ago, bean5302 said:

The article suggests that's a perceived vs. actual risk. It was once considered terribly dangerous to eat a tomato.

It’s an actual risk in the real world where resource constraints exist.

It’s not a risk in an academic/theoretical sense if you assume no constraints on resources.

In other words, it is, in fact, risky for the Twins. (Again, doesn’t mean it can never be justified.) Meanwhile, it’s not risky for the Dodgers and the Yankees. For them, it’s smart, because when it does go wrong…and it can go wrong…they can simply spend good money after bad to get themselves out of the whole.

13 hours ago, BD57 said:

Agree with some of this.

 

By & large, baseball pays guys for their track records, not their potential - not like the NFL, where guys with potential get big money early.

 

Of course, the NFL is also dealing with younger guys who potentially have their "prime athletic years" ahead of them.  In most cases, the "big money" pitchers have already put up at least a couple of their "prime athletic year" performances in the previous team's uniform . . . "How many of those years do you have left?" is the question. 

 

We couldn't come to terms with Johan when he was clearly one of the best pitchers . . . how'd that contract work out for the Mets?  I suspect they were hoping for "more than they wound up getting."  

 

That's the risk of giving an established starting pitcher a "big" contract . . . . you're paying for performance you didn't receive, in the hope you'll get enough similar performance in the future to make it worthwhile.

 

A team has to have the ability to "cover for a mistake."

 

The Twins' income structure is nothing like the Yankees; it's much more of a challenge for the Twins to absorb a mistake.

 

What baseball "needs" is to pool ALL revenue . . . National TV, National Radio, AND Local TV & Radio.   The big markets won't agree, of course - "We get paid for our product, people are more interested, willing to pay more, etc.'

 

The counter to that is "Without the 'other' teams - like the Twins - you have nothing to broadcast.  Whether you like it or not, the only reason you have broadcast rights to sell is because we exist ... so we're as much a part of you getting that money as you are."

 

Like I said, the Big Markets will never agree.

When you judge by being paid by track record prior to signing  the free agent contract it would be infrequent that the Twins overpaid for a free agent. Without looking too hard Odorizzi would be it. That was a bit of a gamble the Twins made to snag a draft pick. Over the previous 3 seasons Colme was the 35th best reliever by fwar  Happ was worth more than the contract. 

Can the Twins afford to pay an "ace?" Yes. Any team can. The question is what can they surround them with. According to the contract numbers in the original post the average "ace" FA contract from each year is 27, 26.5, 26.5, 27, 27, 28, 28, 26.6, 25.4 29.75, 30, 30, 31.5, 31.5. The average annual money for all the "ace" deals is 27.75 per year (I didn't include the 2M per year deferrals for Scherzer as that isn't a typical deal and isn't what anyone is actually talking about when they talk about signing players to these deals). I think 150-160 is a reasonable enough payroll target for the Twins. We'll go with the top end 160.

Having 1 of those guys takes up 17% of your payroll. Having 2 of them takes up 35%. Having 1 would leave you with about 130 million to spend and having 2 would leave you with about 105 left to spend on the rest of the team. The question isn't whether or not they can afford any of these guys, or even whether those guys are worth their money. The question is can you build a world series contending team (or division winning, or whatever your goal is) with 1 "ace" and 130M or 2 "aces" and 105M. There's 24 or 25 other spots to fill. Don't have time to run the numbers right now, but that's the discussion that should be happening.

I think the answer to all of these questions is always that you have to develop minor leaguers. Whether you draft them, trade for them, sign them internationally, pick them out of Ubers, or whatever. You need to develop your own talent and have them be good from almost the jump to be competitive. Even the Yankees and Dodgers do. Walker Buehler being an "ace" on a pre-arb deal allows them to do so much more with their already significant financial advantage. Add in Seager, Smith, and Bellinger on pre-arb or arb deals and it's outrageous. The Rays and As compete because they have young guys who contribute more than their contracts say they should. Too much discussion is based around free agent signings. Free agents are the compliments to your young core, not the other way around. So, yes, the Twins can afford those big deals, but it doesn't mean anything if their cheap guys are garbage. Just ask the teams we ran out there with a cy young award winner, 2 MVPs, an elite reliever, and a young stud #2 arm that also couldn't win in the playoffs.

On 9/10/2021 at 9:57 AM, chpettit19 said:

Can the Twins afford to pay an "ace?" Yes. Any team can. The question is what can they surround them with. According to the contract numbers in the original post the average "ace" FA contract from each year is 27, 26.5, 26.5, 27, 27, 28, 28, 26.6, 25.4 29.75, 30, 30, 31.5, 31.5. The average annual money for all the "ace" deals is 27.75 per year (I didn't include the 2M per year deferrals for Scherzer as that isn't a typical deal and isn't what anyone is actually talking about when they talk about signing players to these deals). I think 150-160 is a reasonable enough payroll target for the Twins. We'll go with the top end 160.

Having 1 of those guys takes up 17% of your payroll. Having 2 of them takes up 35%. Having 1 would leave you with about 130 million to spend and having 2 would leave you with about 105 left to spend on the rest of the team. The question isn't whether or not they can afford any of these guys, or even whether those guys are worth their money. The question is can you build a world series contending team (or division winning, or whatever your goal is) with 1 "ace" and 130M or 2 "aces" and 105M. There's 24 or 25 other spots to fill. Don't have time to run the numbers right now, but that's the discussion that should be happening.

I think the answer to all of these questions is always that you have to develop minor leaguers. Whether you draft them, trade for them, sign them internationally, pick them out of Ubers, or whatever. You need to develop your own talent and have them be good from almost the jump to be competitive. Even the Yankees and Dodgers do. Walker Buehler being an "ace" on a pre-arb deal allows them to do so much more with their already significant financial advantage. Add in Seager, Smith, and Bellinger on pre-arb or arb deals and it's outrageous. The Rays and As compete because they have young guys who contribute more than their contracts say they should. Too much discussion is based around free agent signings. Free agents are the compliments to your young core, not the other way around. So, yes, the Twins can afford those big deals, but it doesn't mean anything if their cheap guys are garbage. Just ask the teams we ran out there with a cy young award winner, 2 MVPs, an elite reliever, and a young stud #2 arm that also couldn't win in the playoffs.

Payroll is what you set it .

4 minutes ago, chopper0080 said:

Payroll is what you set it .

Yes. And in the real world it's based on real numbers and 150-160 million seems reasonable. If your expectations are the Pohlads spending Dodger type money on payroll and lose 10s, if not hundreds, of millions of dollars a year you should probably find a new team to cheer for. "There's no cap so they could/should spend more" is a tired, nonsensical, and unrealistic argument.

It is always a question of how much you can afford to lose vs. overpaying for lesser production. Big budget teams can have tens of millions released, waived or on the disabled list. The Twins can afford to have $10-20 million not producing, and they bite-the-bullet when names like Mauer or Donaldson are getting overpaid compared to expectations, but at least they are on the field.

I often have little problem over paying home grown talent, since you have gotten lower-payroll production out of them in the first place. It's why he Twins should've kept players like Cuddyer, Nathan, Hunter...even Santana and Koskie, when they went for greener pastures. You pay them because of their past, present and future worth as franchise people.

It's why many of us hated Jack Morris and his one-year of taking a check, but the results were, in the end, more than worth it.

Too often a franchise gets caught in a budget crunch, so to speak. But is it really a budget crunch? I go back to the 55%. I'm sorry, a team spending $150 million on payroll as 55% of their budget isn't paying the from office equal to a team spending 55% on payroll from their $500 million budget.

And, the years you underspend vs. ... well, baseball is in a financial mess but somehow they seemed to weather the disaster of 2020 for dollars, and the lighter pocketbook of this season, too. In the end, franchises keep going up-up-up in value, something Carl Pohlad was fully aware as he always borrowed other's people money against his team.

If players won't come to Minnesota unless we overpay them, and the players we are overpaying are not really worth overpaying to come to town, then why not overpay our own bright prospects who have been a aprt of the system and then the club for 4-5-6 years.

On 9/13/2021 at 2:27 PM, chpettit19 said:

Yes. And in the real world it's based on real numbers and 150-160 million seems reasonable. If your expectations are the Pohlads spending Dodger type money on payroll and lose 10s, if not hundreds, of millions of dollars a year you should probably find a new team to cheer for. "There's no cap so they could/should spend more" is a tired, nonsensical, and unrealistic argument.

Spotrac has the Twins payroll as 117 and change. They have the 12th highest payroll in MLB as Atlanta at 147 and the Padres as the 8th at 175. I feel it is a bit disingenuous to assert that there is not a reasonable argument to be made that the Twins could increase their payroll by 50 mil and still only be 10th in MLB. It isn't 200 mil like the Dodgers, Yankess and Mets or bust. There is a middle ground that the Twins are choosing not to enter. 

How do you give Price, Corbin and Strasburg F's and conclude Top FA starters are not risky?

Risky or not risky, the Twins almost always have done free agency the same way. We have X amount of dollars to spend and plan to use it on free agents to fill xxxxxx roles.

How about just once, they try something different. We have X amount of dollars to spend and plan to use it on Xxx. We will fill the remaining holes with the internal options even if they are untested. Internal options, who let's be frank, may not pan out, but likely are no more risky than the desperate aging vets we'd end up singing in late January anyway.

7 hours ago, chopper0080 said:

Spotrac has the Twins payroll as 117 and change. They have the 12th highest payroll in MLB as Atlanta at 147 and the Padres as the 8th at 175. I feel it is a bit disingenuous to assert that there is not a reasonable argument to be made that the Twins could increase their payroll by 50 mil and still only be 10th in MLB. It isn't 200 mil like the Dodgers, Yankess and Mets or bust. There is a middle ground that the Twins are choosing not to enter. 

That 117 is what their payroll is after dumping money at the trade deadline of a lost season. All of those numbers are based on current rosters, not the start of year payroll numbers. The Twins started the season at a higher mark. But that's not the point. The point is the first comment of mine you responded to had me literally saying I think they could reasonably be in the 150-160 range. All the percentages I presented were based on a 160 Mil payroll (almost 50 mil more than the disingenuous number you presented here).

What is even more disingenuous is you then stating that the "payroll is what you set it," which seems to be a pretty straight forward disagreement with my numbers. If it wasn't then I'm not sure why you'd choose my comment to respond to. It seems more that you simply felt like complaining about the Twins payroll and chose my comment to base your complaint off then call me disingenuous for already having used the general payroll range you wanted. You're not arguing against anything I've said you simply tried to piggyback off my comment to complain about the Twins payroll numbers, provided disingenuous numbers, ignored me twice using the payroll range you wanted, and that, to me, is exactly what I was talking about in saying that those complaints are tired.

If you want to have a discussion on payroll sizes I'm more than happy to, but you better bring TV deal amounts, ticket, concession, parking amounts, revenue sharing amounts, sponsorship amounts, and a whole lot more beyond "hey Atlanta is currently 12th and the Padres are 8th so the Twins should be in there simply because these 2 random teams are at these places." Not to mention that Atlanta is only going to make the playoffs cuz the rest of their division is trash, and the Padres aren't going to make it at all. Guess those higher paid players aren't guaranteed to win more games. Who would've thought?