Article: Your Turn: What Do You Want From A GM?

[DaveW]

It's not like the Twins were always bad in this area. The 2002-2010 teams were mostly based off success from the draft and player development in the mid 90s to about 2003,2004. The issue of not being able to develop players is one of the top three reasons for the Twin's struggles in this decade. Whether that's a failure of scouting, player development, or a combination of both, from an outside position it is impossible to separate one from the other.

Agreed.

[tobi0040]

Outside of Boston, nobody has done well so far with the draft of 2011. One out of three of the top 20 have developed, very few others after that.

You are somehow overlooking 4th rounder JR Graham

[d-mac]

 

Outside of Boston,  nobody has done well so far with the draft of 2011.  One out of three of the top 20 have developed, very few others after that.

Gerrit Cole, Anthony Rendon, Francisco Lindor, George Springer, Jose Fernandez, Sonny Gray, Kolten Wong, Joe Panik, Jackie Bradley Jr, and Trevor Story all say hi. 

[d-mac]

 

The right time to change? No ones likes change, until it starts paying dividends. Pride and fear conspire to tell us not to change.
When it comes to the GM, it's a matter of trust.
I like what the Cubs did. They went and got the best GM. Who then in turn went and got the best field manager.
On the other end of Chicago, their GM was faced with a need to rebuild. But he saw that he had 2 front line arms under control. So he move aggressively forward.
Houston and Oakland do well with the math majors advising. As all teams do now.
Keeping x twins around is fine. As you trust who you know.
But in moving players and in making plans (to rebuild)... My only knock on TR is that he never -ever- sells high. And alway gets caught in log jamming positions. Of course he has sold high when got log jammed in center field and catcher. And then was forced to look for help there too. Bad luck? Bad planning? How does one so conservative get caught like that? And why buy up all mediocre pitchers available, and lock them in long term.

 

Sorry, don't mean to mock you, but you lost me at log jamming. 

https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/86/f9/59/86f959ffac58dc752f9359111dd1fb35.jpg

[diehardtwinsfan]

 

My point is we can't keep crying poor about the lack of depth of resources. Right now the main poverty surrounding this club is the paucity of cleverness and intrepidity.

 

I never said we did.  I was addressing the idea that we shouldn't be drafting only hitters with our early picks due to excess risk.  This has nothing to do with trading away a backup catcher, crying poor, or anything else. 

 

You've chosen to insert, yet again, your own pet issues into a conversation that has absolutely nothing to do with them.  If you want to stir the pot, you're going to find yourself doing it somewhere else.

[diehardtwinsfan]

 

You can make the counter argument that we can't afford take a pitcher high in the draft and not have him work out vs taking a hitter. I'm all for BPA at the top of the draft, but lean toward hitting once the those "elite" amateur players are taken. High end pitching can be found all over the draft. It's more a matter of scouting and player development, IMO.

 

There's some truth to that, but most of the aces you find out there are first rounders for a reason.  There's far more risk further down in the draft.  I'll grant you that the risk for hitters is lower than pitchers, but I don't think that means you don't draft pitchers high, especially since good pitching prospects are the equivalent to precious metals in baseball. 

[adorduan]

 

That's a little unfair IMO.

 

Buxton hasn't floundered at all yet, he still is wayyyy too young to say this and he is currently doing very well in AAA. Several top prospects struggle their first time in the majors, Trout comes immediately to mind. Also, Buxton likely wasn't ready to be brought up anyways. If he is still struggling in 3 years then maybe we can talk about him being a bust.

 

Ditto with Stewart, he was a high school arm, those guys take longer to develop then the Jr/Sr college pitchers we have drafted quite a bit in the past. He was a top 30 prospect coming into this season and is pitching well as a 21 year old in A+.

 

Berrios is another first rounder who has worked out "well" so far and has a bright future.

 

Span was a very good CF for us, I don't see how you can include him in this list as well. He is a good player who will have a good career, most teams will take that 7 days a week out of their mid first round pick.

 

Gomez was never picked by the Twins, he was part of the Mets system.

 

Gibson and Plouffe haven't been all stars, but at least they have contributed and are solid players as well. You can't really call them busts.

 

If you want to talk busts, then at least mention the busts like Hunt, Gutierrez.

Overall I think the Twins have done a pretty solid job drafting in the first round IMO.

If he is struggling 3 years from now, he IS a bust.

[Winston Smith]

11/7/2011:

 

"As we move ahead, I'm looking forward to the challenge of improving this club for 2012 and beyond," Ryan said in a statement. "We have many assets in place including a strong front office, manager, coaching staff and returning core of players. We have a lot of work to do in relation to development of our roster, but I'm optimistic in our collective abilities to ensure the future on-field success of this franchise."

 

How is this on-field success going?

[jokin]

 

11/7/2011:

 

"As we move ahead, I'm looking forward to the challenge of improving this club for 2012 and beyond," Ryan said in a statement. "We have many assets in place including a strong front office, manager, coaching staff and returning core of players. We have a lot of work to do in relation to development of our roster, but I'm optimistic in our collective abilities to ensure the future on-field success of this franchise."

 

How is this on-field success going?

 

Thanks. My TR quote file grows yet again.

Edited May 24, 2016 by jokin

[jimmer]

 

I look back at the last few off seasons and was happy at the results each time from Terry Ryan. Last offseason we all thought here the best thing to do was stand pat.  They brought in new catchers who have not worked out but Abad has been better than expected. Park has been better than expected. and PAlka is a good prospect. The year before we signed the 4th best starting pitcher in free agency and Torii, extended a Cy young calibre pitcher for 3 years and 14 million. We all thought the Nolasco signing was good at the time. This season has been the perfect storm of what all could go wrong. Mauer quit hitting after the first few weeks. Plouffe Gibson Santana, Perkins Escobar have been hurt, none of the young players have stepped up except Duffy. Nunez has come out of nowhere glad Terry Ryan kept him around. Others have slumped. The most questionable move I've seen made was the 2 year extension to Suzuki but I haven't seen many better available options that were reasonable in cost. I think most of the mess will fix itself in time. Provided some of the youngsters bounce back. Plouffe will be a solid player. Mauer will either go back to hitting or get moved to the bench in the next year, Sano will learn to make adjustments, Buxton is the CF of the future, we have bullpen reinforcements on the way plus starting pitcher options. The team has to get over the shock that they weren't ready this year and maximize the opportunities to prepare for next year.

Can you elaborate on the bold statements in your post quoted above?  

 

Who is we? I'm pretty sure a good chunk of people certainly didn't think we should stand pat.Team was below average in most (some might argue all) aspects of the game.  Standing pat would be bad even if every team agreed to stand pat too.  But that didn't happen, not should anyone expect most teams to do that.

 

Who said Ervin was the 4th best pitcher?  Who was the Cy Young caliber pitcher we extended for 3/14M?  Not sure what extension that was and we sure haven't had a real Cy Young caliber pitcher for a long time. And many thought Hunter was a bad signing. I still think it was. 

 

Again, who is we?  The Nolasco signing was bad when people thought we should pay that much for a NL pitcher for that much with peripherals like his.

 

I'm glad you think TR has done a great job with his signings/extensions. Seems the only one you take him to task for is Suzuki and then you really give him a pass on that one too. I think his FA signings and extensions have mostly been horrible. Hughes signing, first time, was a good risk.  Extending him after an unsustainable 2014 was horrible.  Park may end up being a good signing that Ryan didn't even think he would get but if it works out he certainly deserves credit. Problem is, the signing ended up making problems elsewhere.

 

We came into the season with no one who deserved to be on a 25 man ALL AL Central roster.  Below average pitching, defense and offense.  And Ryan has been in charged again for 5 years.  Worst record in baseball.  Worst record in AL by a good chunk.

 

 

Edited May 24, 2016 by jimmer

[Darius]

What I want from the Twins GM, whoever that may be, is t overly complicated:

 

1). Forget contracts and service time. Put the best team on the field and draft

the best players available.

 

2). Pound the table and let the Pohlads know what you really need to win. Specifically, top-flight starting pitchers cost a lot of money. Bargain bin doesn't cut it.

 

3). Being loyal is admirable, in many situations. But, people need to held accountable, regardless of whether or not they're on your Christmas card list.

 

4). Get with the times. Waiting two decades to catch up with trends (advances statistics, emphasizing velocity, etc), is inexcusable.

 

Basically, I want some semblance of competence.

 

Look, I get that TR is hamstrung by our ridiculously bad and greedy ownership. But, they're clearly not going anywhere, so it would be nice to get someone in here to run the team who is in the cutting edge of trends. Being revolutionary at something is really the only way an organization like this has a chance.

[jokin]

 

Last offseason we all thought here the best thing to do was stand pat.

Can you elaborate on the bold statement in your post quoted above?  I'm pretty sure a good chunk of people certainly didn't think we should stand pat.

 

Team was below average in most (some might argue all) aspects of the game.  Standing pat would be bad even if every team agreed to stand pat too.  But that didn't happen, not should anyone expect most teams to do that.

 

While acknowledging that each fan has their own expectations and tolerance level, I struggle to comprehend how anyone can back that statement about standing pat.

 

Even Terry Ryan himself listed a set of priorities for upgrading the team in the past offseason in order to continue remaining competitive in the division- which he then failed miserably to come anywhere close to achieving.

[jimmer]

 

While acknowledging that each fan has their own expectations and tolerance level, I struggle to comprehend how anyone can back that statement about standing pat.

 

Even Terry Ryan himself listed a set of priorities for upgrading the team in the past offseason in order to continue remaining competitive in the division- which he then failed miserably to come anywhere close to achieving.

I don't either and not only does he say he thought that, but everyone thought that.  The GM who failed to really address his own #1 priority didn't even think that.

[Teflon]

The ideal GM should not only be concerned with the current roster but have a well laid-out plan of position succession for the next 2-3 years, as well. After seeing the position log-jam on this year's team which required sending Sano to RF, I'm not confident that's happening. 

 

A fundamental strength for both the Manager and the GM also needs to be their ability to constantly adjust. For the GM, this means understanding how the game regularly evolves and having enough flexibility as an architect to not keep designing the same Brady Bunch house over and over 

 

http://tvseriesfinale.com/assets/bradybunch37a.jpg

 

 

 

[jimmer]

 

a. "Monster Year" or "Cy Young Year" does not equate with 7th in the Cy Young award vote with 6 points when the winner got 178 and the second 167.  One of those 2 is a fact.  And, since it was an aberration, like the Suzuki & Dozier "monster years" (read: slightly above league average) that led to extensions, regression was not only written on the wall, was about chiseled on marble.

 

b. Are you defending Pelfrey's extension?

 

c. Indeed.  Smith brought Capps to the Twins  (and made the post-season because of the move in 2010).  Ryan was the one who extended him on the December of 2011 (winter meetings) after Smith was "downsized"

Yeah, anyone expecting Hughes to repeat his excellent 2014 with his history was really just unrealistic.  

 

Bringing Capps to the 2010 team isn't why we won in 2010.  Not at all.  Rauch was more than doing the job.  When we traded for Capps we had lost one game where he had come in to close and we won that division by 6.  I doubt in the last two months, the difference between Rauch at closer and Capps at closer was worth 6 or more games.

Edited May 25, 2016 by jimmer

[Riverbrian]

There is no way that I can pinpoint where the wheels came off the tracks because I don't know who the advocates for each decision were. 

 

I will just say this

 

TIMES UP

 

I've given Terry Ryan the benefit of the doubt for many years now but for a rebuilding plan 5 years is long enough... TIMES UP. The Buzzer is going off. 

 

This front office never committed to a full rebuild and that may have been mistake #1 .

 

The search for a new leader should begin immediately and from outside the organization and in place ASAP to make decisions important for next year ASAP. 

 

 

 

 

[tobi0040]

There is no way that I can pinpoint where the wheels came off the tracks because I don't know who the advocates for each decision were.

 

I will just say this

 

TIMES UP

 

I've given Terry Ryan the benefit of the doubt for many years now but for a rebuilding plan 5 years is long enough... TIMES UP. The Buzzer is going off.

 

This front office never committed to a full rebuild and that may have been mistake #1 .

 

The search for a new leader should begin immediately and from outside the organization and in place ASAP to make decisions important for next year ASAP.

AMEN

[tobi0040]

Seth,

 

This has been a good dialogue. I was going to create a poll to shift gears from what we would like to see happen to what WILL happen at the GM spot. But I keep getting errors. Can you create a similar poll like this:

 

The options would be:

 

1) Terry resigns mid-season

 

2) Terry is fired mid-season

 

3) Terry resigns after the season

 

4) Terry is fired after the season

 

5) Terry is still GM next April

 

I am very curious to see how the posters think this will play out.

 

Thank you.

Edited May 25, 2016 by tobi0040

[Richie the Rally Goat]

Background: The team needs someone who comes from an organization with sustained success, knows how to build a culture, and preferably has worked with a constrained budget before. I'd like to go young with the next hire. Target organizations: St Louis, Pittsburgh, Kansas City, Tampa Bay, Oakland

 

Scouting and drafting: Still going to be crucial for this organization. Unless there's new ownership, there will always be a constraint on budget. The most likely way for them to acquire an ace type pitcher or power hitter is through the draft or international signings. I would want the next GM to be more aggressive with international signings.

 

Advanced Stats: Not really in my wheelhouse. I'd want the next GM to scout out a team of people to handle this department and get it up to speed.

 

Player Development: Another CRUCIAL part of the success in this organization. Currently I think it's backwards that most players spend more time in the lower levels than the upper levels. I'd like the next GM to create a philosophy of getting players through the lower levels quicker, and spend more time in AA and AAA to prepare them for the major leagues.

 

On-Field Staff: Has to buy in to the philosophy and culture that the new GM creates. Right now it doesn't appear that TR and PM mesh in what they're trying to do. The current 40 man is littered with young players, and PM doesn't appear to trust or use the young players.

 

Trades: They need to have free reign on making decisions for who to trade for and whom to trade away. Epstein did a great job with the Cubs trading away vets for upside players. The next GM should have the ability to do the same.

 

Free Agency: Boom or bust. Go after 1 impact player if it fits the team perfectly instead of hedging your bets with 2-3 mid level players.

 

Miscellaneous: Clear out some of the people in the organization from the old regime to bring in new people who fit the culture. "Success" at this point is getting this organization healthier by shedding old contracts and actually going through the youth movement.

im with you on the statistical analysis part. What I want most in a leader is someone to lead, who values statistical analysis, understands it, and hires a good team to run it and influence/drive philosophies centered around the team core talent management strategy. Bench coach and someone in the AGM level of role should be the stat head team leaders. GM and Manager need to be the ultimate of people/player managers.

[spinowner]

 

I want a GM who is lucky. 

 

This is huge. Certainly it's possible to make your own luck by working hard and doing good research and (especially) doing good scouting. But baseball is much more of a crapshoot than the other three major North American team sports in terms of evaluating players, especially when it comes to the draft.

I'm not going to take the time to do this research, but it would be illuminating to look at all-pro teams from the four sports and see where each player was drafted. Or, to look at it a slightly different way, find out what percentage of high draft picks did not become all-pro or even play for a team in the top level league.

Another bit of research I'm not going to do would be to look only at baseball and see where in the draft all-pro team members were chosen and which teams chose which players.

What it comes down to is that you can take the best people and the best evaluation methods and still wind up with a team on which many players have a worse-than expected season. That's what we are seeing this year, and I don't think any GM could have forseen or prepared for it. Sometimes you have good luck and sometimes you have bad luck.

 

[Brandon]

None of the below opinions are based on revisionist history. All were debated and fleshed out contemporaneously with their specific occurrences.

 

1) Hughes was already under contract- with no track record for year-over-year consistency- foolish extension. If he would have succeeded in 2015, make the QO and move on with your young arms.

 

2) A much smarter move would have been to trade Perkins at peak value- during the time when having a reliable closer was of no use to a rebuilding team.

 

3) Pelfrey was a bad move when he first signed, and a worse move when he was re-signed.

 

4) Capps was a bad trade for net value at the time (Smith as Ryan protege), and made no sense at the time of the re-sign.

1. With Hughes the options were 1. He could have a second good season and cost over 100 million to extend or 2 he could have played out his contract and been a free agent we couldn't afford or 3 the 3 year 42 million extension he did sign which put him under contract through age 32 or 33. We all loved that extension at the time.because we all thought we were getting a number 2 starter for number 3 starter money.

 

2. Perkins also provides a hometown hero. There is something to be said for things like that for the casual fan and signing him to an extension for 60 to 70 cents on the dollar so he can stay here is a gentleman agreement for a no trade clause.

 

Pelfry was a bad signing. But it occurred when we had no pitching options and as a whole inexpensive and he wanted to be here. He was solid the year we contended. That makes his cost worth it.

 

Capps, I was no fan of Capps but he cost less than other closers. I would have resigned him for less if I thought he could save 30 games a year at a cost of 60 cents on the dollar. Especially with the other financial commitments we had back then. But I would prefer he be signed as a middle reliever or not at all.

[Brandon]

Can you elaborate on the bold statements in your post quoted above?

 

Who is we? I'm pretty sure a good chunk of people certainly didn't think we should stand pat.Team was below average in most (some might argue all) aspects of the game. Standing pat would be bad even if every team agreed to stand pat too. But that didn't happen, not should anyone expect most teams to do that.

 

Who said Ervin was the 4th best pitcher? Who was the Cy Young caliber pitcher we extended for 3/14M? Not sure what extension that was and we sure haven't had a real Cy Young caliber pitcher for a long time. And many thought Hunter was a bad signing. I still think it was.

 

Again, who is we? The Nolasco signing was bad when people thought we should pay that much for a NL pitcher for that much with peripherals like his.

 

I'm glad you think TR has done a great job with his signings/extensions. Seems the only one you take him to task for is Suzuki and then you really give him a pass on that one too. I think his FA signings and extensions have mostly been horrible. Hughes signing, first time, was a good risk. Extending him after an unsustainable 2014 was horrible. Park may end up being a good signing that Ryan didn't even think he would get but if it works out he certainly deserves credit. Problem is, the signing ended up making problems elsewhere.

 

We came into the season with no one who deserved to be on a 25 man ALL AL Central roster. Below average pitching, defense and offense. And Ryan has been in charged again for 5 years. Worst record in baseball. Worst record in AL by a good chunk.

When we signed Santana the free agent starts were 2 150 million pitchers, Shields, and the Santana then there was a clear drop in talent and we paid 55 million. That was a good deal.

 

Hughes had a Cy young calibre season and signed a 3 year extension for number 3 starter money. At the time we as in twins daily participants were happy with these signings.

[jimmer]

1. With Hughes the options were 1. He could have a second good season and cost over 100 million to extend or 2 he could have played out his contract and been a free agent we couldn't afford or 3 the 3 year 42 million extension he did sign which put him under contract through age 32 or 33. We all loved that extension at the time.because we all thought we were getting a number 2 starter for number 3 starter money.

 

2. Perkins also provides a hometown hero. There is something to be said for things like that for the casual fan and signing him to an extension for 60 to 70 cents on the dollar so he can stay here is a gentleman agreement for a no trade clause.

 

Pelfry was a bad signing. But it occurred when we had no pitching options and as a whole inexpensive and he wanted to be here. He was solid the year we contended. That makes his cost worth it.

 

Capps, I was no fan of Capps but he cost less than other closers. I would have resigned him for less if I thought he could save 30 games a year at a cost of 60 cents on the dollar. Especially with the other financial commitments we had back then. But I would prefer he be signed as a middle reliever or not at all.

we didn't all love the hughes extension when it happened. Many people hated it because the chance for repeat was extremely unlikely. Also you forgot some options. We could have traded him if he had a good 2015. We could have let him go at the end of FA or made him a qualifying offer if he was worth it and got a pick if he didn't sign. Lots of options and our GM picked the worst one because he had an out of body season. Most GMs look at a players body of work, see a season out of character, and don't bet it gets repeated.@ Edited May 25, 2016 by jimmer

[alarp33]

 

1. With Hughes the options were 1. He could have a second good season and cost over 100 million to extend or 2 he could have played out his contract and been a free agent we couldn't afford or 3 the 3 year 42 million extension he did sign which put him under contract through age 32 or 33. We all loved that extension at the time.because we all thought we were getting a number 2 starter for number 3 starter money.

2. Perkins also provides a hometown hero. There is something to be said for things like that for the casual fan and signing him to an extension for 60 to 70 cents on the dollar so he can stay here is a gentleman agreement for a no trade clause.

Pelfry was a bad signing. But it occurred when we had no pitching options and as a whole inexpensive and he wanted to be here. He was solid the year we contended. That makes his cost worth it.

Capps, I was no fan of Capps but he cost less than other closers. I would have resigned him for less if I thought he could save 30 games a year at a cost of 60 cents on the dollar. Especially with the other financial commitments we had back then. But I would prefer he be signed as a middle reliever or not at all.

This is basically all factually incorrect and awful revisionist history.  Who loved the Hughes extension? Why didn't Perkins get a no trade clause if that was part of the agreement? Pelfrey wanted to be here? Maybe because they gave him $12 million and elsewhere he would've had a tough time finding a minor league deal.  

 

[USAFChief]

 

This is basically all factually incorrect and awful revisionist history.  Who loved the Hughes extension?  

For the record, that part, at least, is factually correct.

 

Go back and find the initial "Hughes extended" thread.

 

Virtually unanimous approval on TD.

[alarp33]

 

For the record, that part, at least, is factually correct.

 

Go back and find the initial "Hughes extended" thread.

 

Virtually unanimous approval on TD.

 

I guess I can only speak for myself.  I hated it the moment it was signed, and I also hated extending Perkins with 3 years left on his deal.  The Perkins one was "safer", but both were so totally unnecessary 

 

 

*Fairness in conversation, I kinda liked the Nolasco signing

[USAFChief]

 

I guess I can only speak for myself.  I hated it the moment it was signed, and I also hated extending Perkins with 3 years left on his deal.  The Perkins one was "safer", but both were so totally unnecessary 

 

 

*Fairness in conversation, I kinda liked the Nolasco signing

I disliked the Hughes extension myself.  But most here liked, or loved it.

 

Fairness in conversation:  I disliked the original Hughes signing (which would have been a fantastic deal just based on the first year if they had just left it alone), and kinda liked the Nolasco signing as well.

 

 

 

 

[Otto von Ballpark]

 

With Hughes the options were 1. He could have a second good season and cost over 100 million to extend or 2 he could have played out his contract and been a free agent we couldn't afford or 3 the 3 year 42 million extension he did sign which put him under contract through age 32 or 33.

Those "options" are at best incomplete.  If Hughes had a second good season, the surplus value on his first two seasons in Minnesota would have been great, and his trade value with 1 year, $8 mil remaining could have been through the roof -- look at what Samardzija fetched in trade (twice), Cueto at the deadline, etc.

 

If he played out his contract and was set to command $100 mil as a free agent, we would have gotten incredible value out of his original deal, had numerous opportunities to shop him in trade if we weren't competitive otherwise, and at least collected a comp pick when he left.

 

We basically flushed away all of the potential surplus value of his original deal, just so we could control him for 5 more years (at significantly higher salaries) instead of 2 more.  I liked it at the time, but looking back, it was a pretty bad decision, even without the knowledge of Hughes' performance since.  It doesn't really matter if Hughes had repeated his 2014 season in 2015-2016 after signing the extension -- any benefits to our competitiveness those seasons would have been the same under the original contract.  And his trade value, with 3/39 remaining on his deal, would have been notably worse than with 2/16, 1/8, or 0.5/4 remaining, if we tried to trade him under the original deal.

 

And of course, even if Hughes repeated 2014 once or twice more, it is doubtful the Twins would have been unable to afford him, had they wanted to.  I already pointed out upthread that the very month the Twins extended Hughes, they committed $97 million for 7 pitcher seasons.  They absolutely could have afforded a 5 year, $100-110 million deal for a single pitcher if they wanted.

[Otto von Ballpark]

In short, the original Hughes deal offered a ton of utility.  It wouldn't take much to be worth 3/24 as a starter, or even a reliever if necessary.  And basically every offseason and trade deadline, we would have had the option of trading him (either as a starter or a reliever) if we weren't competitive, fetching a good return from another team looking for a short-term solution.

 

Once we signed the extension, though, Hughes became almost impossible to trade for a good return, or send to the bullpen.  His contract was no longer pure short-term solution -- it also contained a long-term liability, which would scare off a lot of trade partners, or at least lower potential returns as compared to the same player on a shorter, cheaper deal.  Even if Hughes was great, if the team sucked, we couldn't really capitalize on his performance anymore.

[diehardtwinsfan]

The big thing with the Hughes deal is that moving out of that band box in NY to a pitcher friendly TF was supposed to help reduce his HR rate, making him a more valuable pitcher.  In 2014, he looked like he took a step forward as well.  His peripherals were also favorable, it wasn't like he did that posting a Joe Mays like 5K/9 while doing what he did.  There was some dislike to the contract, but yeah, in general most of TD was pretty happy with both signings. 

 

Lest we also forget, pitching was pretty thin at those times as well.  Tyler Duffey had a decent season in AA with a K/9 under 7 (no one expected his peripherals to continue to improve as he rose up the chain).  Meyer was the closest to the bigs and even then he was a bit of a question mark with a high BB rate.  May was in the majors after a surprise season in AAA, but was really bad.  Berrios received a handful of starts in AA and watched his K rate drop pretty significantly.   Like it or not, counting on all of those guys to progress (and not get hurt) is risky in and of itself.  Hughes was the first decent pitching season we saw in MN in several years. 

 

This was, like it or not, a risk proposition.  You can add 3 more years to a young pitcher at a reasonable rate.  If he performs again, that contract is easily tradable.  If he regresses, it's still tradable.  Hughes fell flat on his face.  That's the difference.