Interesting interview with Terry Ryan

[Thrylos]

This article contains some interesting statements by Terry Ryan, including the following:

 

Pohlad said last fall that Ryan’s job is safe as long as he wants it. Ryan said he appreciates the sentiment, “but everybody’s got a breaking point,” and he doesn’t believe he deserves such loyalty. “I would never hold Jim Pohlad to that statement, because it wouldn’t be fair to him,” Ryan said. “We’re losing way too many games here for anybody to put that kind of faith in anyone.”

 

I admire Ryan's admission that there is some basis for terminating him and hiring a different GM.  Maybe this is false modesty, but after reading the entire article, my sense is that Ryan is being sincere.

 

Even though I totally agree with that statement by Ryan, I have hard time reconciling it with Ryan's previous statement saying (paraphrasing) : "If I am back in 2015, Gardy will be back".

 

Those are 2 apparently conflicting statements and just about a week apart.  I don't doubt his sincerity.   The one way these statements do not conflict is if Ryan is not back in 2015...

[nicksaviking]

Honesty as Ryan demonstrated in that quote is not uncommon as it is strategically the right thing to say.  However it wasn't just honest, it was extremely frank. 

 

Usually such statements are hedged with auxillary comments like "I like the direction this club is heading" or "We have a solid foundation to build on now."  Those kind of comments always tend to sound like passive excuses to me. 

 

None of those self-serving qualifiers were here though, just a flat out statement that his team is losing too much and no one deserves unconditional job security.  Much respect from me Mr. Ryan.

[Thrylos]

I've been an advocate for a change from the top on down for a some time.  While I can acknowledge that Ryan does have talents and has begun to 'right the ship,' he saw the ship go awry to begin with.  I think the minors are in good shape and now is the time to let go.  The only worry I would have with his departure would be if the Twins replaced him internally.  I think not only is it time for Ryan to step down, I think it's time for a fresh perspective.  If the Twins are only going to replace him from within, I'd rather he just stayed.  What's that saying ... better the devil you know, than the devil you don't?  (And I'm not saying Ryan is the devil here, it's just a turn of a phrase.)

 

I've been an advocate for a change from the top on down for a some time.  While I can acknowledge that Ryan does have talents and has begun to 'right the ship,' he saw the ship go awry to begin with.  I think the minors are in good shape and now is the time to let go.  The only worry I would have with his departure would be if the Twins replaced him internally.  I think not only is it time for Ryan to step down, I think it's time for a fresh perspective.  If the Twins are only going to replace him from within, I'd rather he just stayed.  What's that saying ... better the devil you know, than the devil you don't?  (And I'm not saying Ryan is the devil here, it's just a turn of a phrase.)

 

Totally agree.  And if the replacement is the known devil heir apparent (Antony,) I'd rather have Ryan.

 

One little addition (and some food for thought) :  Top down does not begin with Ryan.  Top down begins with St. Peter.   Maybe the overall issue here is that he is not a baseball man.  Most of the other teams have baseball people in the top of their hierarchy.  Maybe that's what the Twins needs to succeed.

[TheLeviathan]

If some criticize the moves he did make, I think it is fair to look at the moves he didn't make.  Maybe he didn't have many better options? 

 

All this question does is get into a whole web of assumptions, counter-factuals, and red herrings.    Basically this question relies on this:

 

If there are options for Terry Ryan to sign, then he'd make the team better.  Except the posters asking this question never accept that there were indeed options for him to sign, so therefore he never had a true chance to make the team better.

 

The question is designed, from the outset, to prove Ryan never had a chance to make the team any better because they'll never accept the antecedent to be true.  I think there are many, many things that have stood in the way of Ryan improving the team over the years, but I also believe it's still his job to find a way to do it regardless of those obstacles.  So this entire question basically absolves him of the responsibilities to the product he put on the field, regardless of how much you disagree or agree with arm-chair GM suggestions.

[gunnarthor]

if it takes 4 years for a player to make the majors......and in Smith's time there weren't enough minor leaguers to call up....who was the GM when those guys were drafted, Smith, or Ryan? this isn't actualyl a hard question to answer. Ryan was.

When did the minor league system really fail us though?  I'd say 2011.  Again, Ryan's last years had several top 100 guys - his last drafts were much better than people pretend to claim.  In 07 we had one pick in the top 90 - Ben Revere, who ended up being a decent pick.  The team has had problems since 2011 b/c of the collapse of the minor leagues (which is a normal cycle that all teams go through).

 

In 2010, the Twins got some nice support from guys like Valencia (2 WAR season) and Duensing (who lost his rookie status in 09). And that team was mostly home grown w/smart FA additions to complement it.  Trying to pin the 2011 collapse on the 04-06 drafts is greatly over simplifying the problems.

 

The Twins have had very little bang since Deron Johnson took over the draft.  In 08, he had 3 first round picks, Hicks might still be a player but Hunt and Gutierrez are long gone.  09 was Gibson, a bunch of failed flame throwers and Dozier. etc.  

[drjim]

Even though I totally agree with that statement by Ryan, I have hard time reconciling it with Ryan's previous statement saying (paraphrasing) : "If I am back in 2015, Gardy will be back".

 

Those are 2 apparently conflicting statements and just about a week apart.  I don't doubt his sincerity.   The one way these statements do not conflict is if Ryan is not back in 2015...

 

You aren't using the Sid Hartman story for the first quote are you?

[tobi0040]

All this question does is get into a whole web of assumptions, counter-factuals, and red herrings.    Basically this question relies on this:

 

If there are options for Terry Ryan to sign, then he'd make the team better.  Except the posters asking this question never accept that there were indeed options for him to sign, so therefore he never had a true chance to make the team better.

 

The question is designed, from the outset, to prove Ryan never had a chance to make the team any better because they'll never accept the antecedent to be true.  I think there are many, many things that have stood in the way of Ryan improving the team over the years, but I also believe it's still his job to find a way to do it regardless of those obstacles.  So this entire question basically absolves him of the responsibilities to the product he put on the field, regardless of how much you disagree or agree with arm-chair GM suggestions.

 

I may be wrong, but I thought the initial question of who should he have signed was in response to the assertion that he has done a horrible job signing free agents. So I think the context here is limited to FA signings, not anything else.  Given this fairly limited context, I think it is a fair question.

 

My gut tells me given how bad our team was in 2011, ownership was not going to dole out a 3+ year contract to a pitcher.  Therefore he had a bunch of bounce-back types, retreads, and guys like Corriea to choose from.  If those were the options he had, it is hard for me to say he made a terrible signing.

 

I could write several blogs about things Terry should have done differently, but I am not sold he had better FA options given the budget he likely had.

[drivlikejehu]

How big of Ryan not to "hold" his boss to the notion that at-will employment doesn't apply to the GM of an MLB team. It's just another statement in a long line - Ryan talks about accountability, he just doesn't practice it.

[TheLeviathan]

I may be wrong, but I thought the initial question of who should he have signed was in response to the assertion that he has done a horrible job signing free agents. So I think the context here is limited to FA signings, not anything else.  Given this fairly limited context, I think it is a fair question.

 

So it's not possible for the person asking the question to go back, look up available FAs, and see that there were likely options to improve the team?  Or perhaps trade targets?

 

Imbedded in such a question is the notion that there was no way to improve the team.  I think that statement is always false.  There are always ways to improve the team.  Then it comes down to the costs to do so and a myriad of other factors that Ryan has to sort through.  Either way, it's his job to sort through them and improve the product.  If he doesn't, excusing it because of assumptions over who is or is not available is a fallacious waste of time.

 

We can acknowledge the difficulty, but every thread about this sort of thing gets mired in all these useless hypotheticals rather than evaluating the result.  

[Thrylos]

I agree that part of the 2011-2014 collapse is on Ryan.

 

On the other hand, does Ryan trade Garza going into a season where he's also going to lose Santana? Does he trade Wilson Ramos?

 

If the Twins have/had those two players, how different is 2011-2014?

 

Bill Smith took a bad situation and made it so much worse. I can not see a situation where Ryan trades an up-and-coming young starter and a promising young catcher. With those two pieces, the past eight years look a whole lot different.

 

If Bill Smith did not trade Garza and Ramos, how different is 2010?   Capps and Young were major reasons that the Twins won the division in 2010.

When Ramos was traded he was blocked by Mauer.  People are arguing that Pinto should be traded in favor of Suzuki, doesn't this argument make the Ramos trade a no-brainer?

 

Garza was going to be gone as a free agent and was not going to be around to help in 2011-4.

 

And, for the sake of argument, lets say that you had Ramos & Garza from 2011-2014. 

 

Would Ramos start instead of Mauer?  No.  So you would replace Suzuki with Ramos in 2014.  That's a wash.  Maybe a few PAs off Butera and some DHs?  1-2 wins better each season from 2011-2013?  (So we are looking at 98, 95, 95)

 

If you had Garza, you would not have Pavano in 2011 and 2012, Correia in 2013 and 2014.  Fair assessment?   Here are comparisons:

 

2011: Pavano 9-13, Garza 10-10

2012: Pavano 2-5, Garza 5-7

2013: Correia 9-14, Garza 10-6

2014: Correia 7-14, Garza 7-7

 

So 1 more win in 2011, 3 in 2012, 1 in 2013 and none in 2014.

 

So total with both:

 

97 losses in 2011

92 in 2012

94 in 2013 and

91 (projected) in 2014.

 

and missing the post-season in 2010

 

That's the math of those 2 trades.

[Thrylos]

You aren't using the Sid Hartman story for the first quote are you?

 

I think that it was a Berardino story.

[jokin]

 

 

Regarding the trades, Meyer will be starting game 1 of our next playoff game and Span has aged/regressed a ton.  That was a great trade regardless of when Meyer is up.  

 

I doubt there's a bigger Meyer-backer, long-term, than myself.  And trading him for Span was a deal that had to be made.  I may be mis-interpreting your comment,  but I beg to differ on the "Span and the theory of an aging player and a ton of regression".  While it's bound to happen as his career continues on the wrong side of 30.... this year he's topping or matching every career category in his slash line and in his OPS+... moreover, he's already at a career high in SB with a month to go in 2014 (and a highly successful Steal rate for someone at age 30, his wSB is also at the career-high level from five seasons ago- 2010 was the only year with the Twins that Span was significantly above league average in wSB- and at or below "League Average" wSB for a leadoff hitter for 4 out of 5 years with the Twins wasn't offering the club much help at that spot in the order.  Another measure of baserunng, "Spd"- [“…Stolen Base Percentage, Frequency of Stolen Base Attempts, Percentage of Triples, and Runs Scored Percentage.”] .... rates out at "Excellent" and Span's number this year is only topped out by his 2008 season ).  

 

Aging regressor?  If you look at how this season is going, he's really gone "Back to the Future" in his regression, "regressing" close to his career-best numbers from six seasons ago at age 25 in 2009.

 

http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/s/spande01.shtml

[nicksaviking]

I've been an advocate for a change from the top on down for a some time.  While I can acknowledge that Ryan does have talents and has begun to 'right the ship,' he saw the ship go awry to begin with.  I think the minors are in good shape and now is the time to let go.  The only worry I would have with his departure would be if the Twins replaced him internally.  I think not only is it time for Ryan to step down, I think it's time for a fresh perspective.  If the Twins are only going to replace him from within, I'd rather he just stayed.  What's that saying ... better the devil you know, than the devil you don't?  (And I'm not saying Ryan is the devil here, it's just a turn of a phrase.)

 

I agree that while I want a fresh start, I'd rather have Ryan than Anthony.  I'm not even sure he's the devil we don't know.  Ryan was out of office for the first half of the year, one would have to think Anthony was behind the poor roster decisions that plagued this club from spring training through June.  Hopefully that was his audition and the powers that be think that was a large enough sample to no longer consider him a GM candidate.

 

I don't think Ryan wants to make hard personell moves like firing Gardy (well really, you'd have to be a sociopath to enjoy firing people I guess).  I also don't think Ryan views his tenure as GM as a long term gig any longer.  I might think that if Gardy has to be replaced against his will, Ryan may step down rather than go through the process if he only planned on being GM for one or two more seasons. 

[nicksaviking]

 

2011: Pavano 9-13, Garza 10-10

2012: Pavano 2-5, Garza 5-7

2013: Correia 9-14, Garza 10-6

2014: Correia 7-14, Garza 7-7

 

So 1 more win in 2011, 3 in 2012, 1 in 2013 and none in 2014.

 

So total with both:

 

97 losses in 2011

92 in 2012

94 in 2013 and

91 (projected) in 2014.

 

and missing the post-season in 2010

 

That's the math of those 2 trades.

 

I'm not sure that I disagree, but I don't recall you ever using Wins by a starter as a valid statistical measure.  It kind of seems convenient for your arguement here.

[tobi0040]

So it's not possible for the person asking the question to go back, look up available FAs, and see that there were likely options to improve the team?  Or perhaps trade targets?

 

Imbedded in such a question is the notion that there was no way to improve the team.  I think that statement is always false.  There are always ways to improve the team.  Then it comes down to the costs to do so and a myriad of other factors that Ryan has to sort through.  Either way, it's his job to sort through them and improve the product.  If he doesn't, excusing it because of assumptions over who is or is not available is a fallacious waste of time.

 

We can acknowledge the difficulty, but every thread about this sort of thing gets mired in all these useless hypotheticals rather than evaluating the result.  

 

The context was FA signings and nothing else.  I went back and looked at the 2012 free agent pitchers.  Even with the benefit of hindsight it is hard to say who should have been signed.

 

Highly doubt we had the budget for:

 

Greinke, Anibal.

 

Was not going to sign here:

 

Kuroda - only wanted to play for LAD or NYY

Pettitte - NYY or retire

 

Terrible contract:

 

Edwin Jackson, Scott Baker, Dan Haren (league average for $13M), Dempster, Marcum

 

Tried attacking our manager with a bat:

 

Lohse

 

With the look of hindsight, the best we could have done was probably Ryu or Colon.  That was 6/36 so I doubt we had the clearance, especially for an unknown player.

 

 

http://sports.yahoo.com/news/mlb--2012-mlb-free-agent-tracker--position-breakdown.html#SP

[tobi0040]

I doubt there's a bigger Meyer-backer, long-term, than myself.  And trading him for Span was a deal that had to be made.  I may be mis-interpreting your comment,  but I beg to differ on the "Span and the theory of an aging player and a ton of regression".  While it's bound to happen as his career continues on the wrong side of 30.... this year he's topping or matching every career category in his slash line and in his OPS+... moreover, he's already at a career high in SB with a month to go in 2014 (and a highly successful Steal rate for someone at age 30, his wSB is also at the career-high level from five seasons ago- 2010 was the only year with the Twins that Span was significantly above league average in wSB- and at or below "League Average" wSB for a leadoff hitter for 4 out of 5 years with the Twins wasn't offering the club much help at that spot in the order.  Another measure of baserunng, "Spd"- [“…Stolen Base Percentage, Frequency of Stolen Base Attempts, Percentage of Triples, and Runs Scored Percentage.”] .... rates out at "Excellent" and Span's number this year is only topped out by his 2008 season ).  

 

Aging regressor?  If you look at how this season is going, he's really gone "Back to the Future" in his regression, "regressing" close to his career-best numbers from six seasons ago at age 25 in 2009.

 

http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/s/spande01.shtml

 

A lot of truth to this and I could have articulated the reason for the trade better.  But just because Meyer has not come up yet, you still do it 10 times out of 10 (which was the assertion).

[Thrylos]

I'm not sure that I disagree, but I don't recall you ever using Wins by a starter as a valid statistical measure.  It kind of seems convenient for your arguement here.

 

I do not use it when I am discussing how good a pitcher is, because it is not appropriate in that context.  This is a discussion about record, which is all about wins and losses, and I cannot find a better one to use other than W-Ls.  Want to use WAR comparisons instead?   Can do that, and it will say the same thing

 

Here:

 

2011: Pavano 2, Garza 2.8 (Diff: +1)

2012: Pavano -0.8, Garza 1.2 (Diff: +2)

2013: Correia 1.6, Garza 1.4 (Diff: 0)

2014: Correia 0.2, Garza 1 (Diff: +1)

 

So: 97, 94, 95, 90

[diehardtwinsfan]

 

I think Terry is too loyal to Gardy and I wish he had more power in the organization to not allow Santana and Pinto to play out of position in a throw away year (probably an owner issue ). But I doubt we would find someone better at drafting, trading, and signing guys than Terry Ryan.  So I would probably keep him and can Gardy.

 

I think Terry would be a very good boss to work for. He doesn't seem to meddle much, which is why Gardy gets away with some of the things he gets away with. Terry lets him do it. I'd have sat Gardy down and said "you will play player X" on more than on occasion now.

 

That said, I'd probably qubble on the signing guys part, but I do think he knows what he's doing when it comes to drafting/trading.

[diehardtwinsfan]

 

On the flip side, he's also the guy who was in charge during the time when the minor leagues atrophied and left the Twins with little to prevent the half decade (at a minimum) disaster we're in the midst of.

 

This is fair criticism. He left Bill Smith with an org tied together with shoestring and duct tape. I'm not sure I liked where Smith went with it, as I think there were better options, but no question that several of the drafts leading up to the 2011 collapse were pretty bad. There was nothing in the high minors to replace guys with, and the ones that did work out (Plouffe and Dozier) took a while. Keep in mind though, it isn't as though the experts were raving about our system at that time. They said it sucked, and it did. That's why I'm pretty encouraged by his approach right now.

[jokin]

 

 

I think Terry would be a very good boss to work for. He doesn't seem to meddle much, which is why Gardy gets away with some of the things he gets away with. Terry lets him do it. I'd have sat Gardy down and said "you will play player X" on more than on occasion now.

 

That said, I'd probably qubble on the signing guys part, but I do think he knows what he's doing when it comes to drafting/trading.

 

 

This post requires installation of a Multi-Like button. 

[Mike Sixel]

I don't care who he didn't sign, for the sake of this discussion......look at every FA he signed in the 2000s, when his job was to close the gap, and tell me if you think they were good signings or not more often than bad signings......I agree with Brock, I don't think he did a good job. Since I don't know what limits were or were not placed on him, I can only judge outcomes of guys like tony bautista and others.....

[Willihammer]

There are going to be ups and downs from draft talent - that's why diversification is important. The Twins have been behind the curve on new avenues of growing their talent pool - that is Ryan's greatest fault IMO.

 

Since 2011, Ryan, like every other GM, had a chance to 1. Go over the Twins international spending limit to stockpile the top foreign prospects, 2. get a slice of the Cuban and Japanese talents before the market corrected, 3. trade prospects in an era where they were overvalued, and 4. leverage the Twins protected draft situation to sign premier free agents.

 

A rebuild that relies so heavily on the draft and minor league development is going to be slow and aided by losing. That's all Ryan knows, so that's what we got. If the Twins are going to avoid these wild cycles in the future, they need to find someone who will seek out and identify new avenues of growing the organization's talent outside of the draft.

[diehardtwinsfan]

 

The buck ultimately stops at the GMs desk on player trades.  Smith deserves some criticism.

 

However, the GM is often working at the recommendation of scouts and other advisers, and the ones that Smith had to work with are largely the same ones that are still working under Ryan, including Ryan himself.

 

This is true, but I don't think it's fair to say that we know what Ryan's recommendation was. Bill Smith was in charge and could do what he wanted. If I were a guessing man, Ryan recommended no trading Garza, Ramos, or aquiring Sano.

[Brock Beauchamp]

I do not use it when I am discussing how good a pitcher is, because it is not appropriate in that context.  This is a discussion about record, which is all about wins and losses, and I cannot find a better one to use other than W-Ls.  Want to use WAR comparisons instead?   Can do that, and it will say the same thing

 

Here:

 

2011: Pavano 2, Garza 2.8 (Diff: +1)

2012: Pavano -0.8, Garza 1.2 (Diff: +2)

2013: Correia 1.6, Garza 1.4 (Diff: 0)

2014: Correia 0.2, Garza 1 (Diff: +1)

 

So: 97, 94, 95, 90

You're intentionally ignoring 2008 and 2009 when the Twins lost and won 163, only to have the honor of a depleted Twins team going up against the Yankees again the time they won. That's convenient.

 

Garza's influence would almost certainly have been marginal in 2010 when the Twins were very good but it's ignoring reality to mold your argument to exclude his potential impact on the 2008-9 squads that were fringe contenders.

[jokin]

A lot of truth to this and I could have articulated the reason for the trade better.  But just because Meyer has not come up yet, you still do it 10 times out of 10 (which was the assertion).

 

Again, no disagreement here on that assertion.  (Of course, this laudable Span-Meyer move became peripherally a part of a deeper bungle in stripping the Twins of any major league starter-level talent in CF in one week on Ryan's part, and not acquiring a suitable CF placeholder- which is still hampering the Twins in late 2014 with their ROY playing out of position).

[bird]

In my opinion the biggest contribution of Ryan to the current mess was not the farm system atrophying, that is over stated as there was still some talent on the farm and young pieces on the mlb roster, but the fact he didn't provide better resolution to the Hunter and Santana situations at the 2007 deadline. He had an opportunity to move guys that weren't going to stay and punted, did a half baked sell job instead, and limped to mediocre a finish leaving Smith in a tough spot to begin his tenure.

 

I think this is spot on. The Twin's farm system "atrophied" to middle of the pack status. It has never been as bad as Detroit's, Chicago's, or the A's systems are right now. Several factors contributed to the system reaching its low point. The draft order was the biggest culprit, but not the only one by far. Ryan's share of the blame for that is not large, IMO. And since then, the budget's gotten much bigger, the whole department is clicking, and the draft order will be favorable for the 4th year in a row. Which means Ryan's soon in line to get TOO much credit.

 

The problem that led to the Santana debacle and other such catastrophes is still there IMO. The lack of a disciplined and strategic approach to managing player assets is Ryan's Achilles Heal in my view. It's been masked by his accomplishments at getting something for fringe assets like Hollins and Fuld. 

[Mike Sixel]

I think this is spot on. The Twin's farm system "atrophied" to middle of the pack status. It has never been as bad as Detroit's, Chicago's, or the A's systems are right now. Several factors contributed to the system reaching its low point. The draft order was the biggest culprit, but not the only one by far. Ryan's share of the blame for that is not large, IMO. And since then, the budget's gotten much bigger, the whole department is clicking, and the draft order will be favorable for the 4th year in a row. Which means Ryan's soon in line to get TOO much credit.

 

The problem that led to the Santana debacle and other such catastrophes is still there IMO. The lack of a disciplined and strategic approach to managing player assets is Ryan's Achilles Heal in my view. It's been masked by his accomplishments at getting something for fringe assets like Hollins and Fuld.

 

birdwacher's best post ever. he should probably retire right now,

 

seriously, I agree with every word here. Every. Single. Word.

[TheLeviathan]

The context was FA signings and nothing else.  I went back and looked at the 2012 free agent pitchers. 

 

No one was talking about 2012 and that kind of tangent is exactly why that question needs to go away.  The comment was made about Ryan's long history in FA and he's been pretty putrid in his results going back more than a decade.  FA is just not Ryan's strength and that's all the comment was saying.

 

When Kevin Correia might make your "Top 3 signed Free Agents" in easy fashion...it's hard to argue with that.  No matter what hypotheticals or red herrings you want to throw out there, Ryan has never utilized FA well.

[gunnarthor]

 

 

This is fair criticism. He left Bill Smith with an org tied together with shoestring and duct tape.

I don't think that's completely fair.  Sure, Hunter, Santana and Silva were leaving and that was huge.  But, as posted elsewhere, Garza, Slowey, Perkins, Liriano and Swarzak had all been top 100 guys and all but Swarzak were in the high minors at that point (or the majors).  At the time, pitching was considered a real strength of the team but that they couldn't develop bats.  The team was still mostly young with guys like Mauer, Morneau, Span, Cuddy, Baker, Garza, Bartlett, Casilla, Kubel, Blackburn, Crain, Slowey, Boof etc still in their prime or entering it.  They also had a shut down bullpen.  That core went to two striaght 163 games and then exploded in 2010.  That wasn't exactly shoestring and duct tape.  

[Brock Beauchamp]

I think this is spot on. The Twin's farm system "atrophied" to middle of the pack status. It has never been as bad as Detroit's, Chicago's, or the A's systems are right now. Several factors contributed to the system reaching its low point. The draft order was the biggest culprit, but not the only one by far. Ryan's share of the blame for that is not large, IMO. And since then, the budget's gotten much bigger, the whole department is clicking, and the draft order will be favorable for the 4th year in a row. Which means Ryan's soon in line to get TOO much credit.

 

The problem that led to the Santana debacle and other such catastrophes is still there IMO. The lack of a disciplined and strategic approach to managing player assets is Ryan's Achilles Heal in my view. It's been masked by his accomplishments at getting something for fringe assets like Hollins and Fuld. 

Great post.