#FireMollie #FireRyan #TotalSystemFailure

All of these lovely hashtags have been making the rounds with the Twins off to a lackluster start to the season. Lots of opinions, ideas, and ways to fix the Twins have been floated around by casual fans, up to legitimate Twins writers. Today, we’re going to tackle the #FireMollie and #FireRyan crew.

My biggest question is: what does that fix right now? It's very obvious that a lot of the younger players were not as ready as everyone initially thought. While I don't disagree that some form of Molitor/Ryan will probably be let go, or asked to step down soon, that doesn't change the fact that this seems to be a systemic failure within the entire Twins organization. If you want to fix that problem, you need to find the real source. I don't think it's only Molitor & Ryan, I think it goes much deeper than that. There's plenty of blame to go around, and the players should be held accountable too.

Jose Berrios, Alex Meyer, and Byron Buxton appear to be talented players. They also appear to be at a AAAA level right now. While Berrios and Buxton are young, Meyer is starting to fall out of that category at age 26. Trevor May seems to be carving out a relief role for the foreseeable future, while Meyer has again dealt with fatigue, and command issues. When Ben Revere and Denard Span were shipped off for May and Meyer respectively, Twins fan wanted to get something of value from two of their favorite players. While May is trending up, Meyer doesn’t seem to be trending at all currently.

Miguel Sano is definitely not making the splash many fans had hoped he would this year. Byung-Ho Park has stolen the spotlight from the young player, which might be for the better. Spotlights only amplify flaws, and Sano has struggled in a few different spots this season. His outfield defense has been…sub-optimal, and his hitting hasn’t been as dynamic as it was in 2015. Sano’s offensive stats are down across the board, and his WAR has plummeted 1.7 to 0.5 since 2015.

While firing both Molitor and Ryan seems to be the easy “solution,” I’m not on board with it unless it comes with sweeping changes across the entire organization. Jim Pohlad needs to sit down and look at what the plan is going forward. What players are you planning on building a franchise around. Which players can you trade to get your team back on track. What managers, general managers, and other coaches can you get to put your plan into motion. This isn’t just at the major league level, this should start down with the E-Town Twins, and work its way up to Minneapolis.

I personally think Paul Molitor has been dealt a tough hand, and has done the best with what he has. I also think Terry Ryan has tried his best to re-stock the minors and build another winner. That being said, I don’t know if Ryan, in particular, is the best man for the job anymore. His best today might not be what his best 9 years ago was. Time will tell who’s right or wrong, but firing TR and Mollie today won’t salvage this season. No, the problem lies deeper than the just the GM and manager.

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