Big Mike Pineda staying.

[mikelink45]

13 hours ago, Cap'n Piranha said:

I don't think you understand how prospect ceilings work.  It's called the ceiling precisely because they haven't proven it.  If they do prove it, then they've reached their ceiling.  If everything works out perfectly, Duran, Balazovic, Winder, Ryan, and SWR will all be as good or better than Berrios.  It's also a very real possibility that none of them are ever as good as Berrios, but having 5 guys with a Berrios ceiling is preferable to 3 guys with a Berrios ceiling, given that the single most likely outcome is probably that 0-1 of these guys hits the Berrios level.  With only 3, the single most likely outcome is that none of them do.

I know what you are saying and yes we want lots of potential and talent - the remaining reality is that Berrios has the Berrios ceiling and he is young and has proven it.  It will take a lot to replace him, just like we never truly replaced Santana.

[terrydactyls]

15 hours ago, mikelink45 said:

Not excited.  Let's look at the Twins at this point.  We have two veteran SP - one who is a FA and a mentor???  We have a bunch of prospects we hope will yield something good, but nothing guaranteed.  Starting rotation - Maeda, Pineda, Ober, Jax, Shoemaker.  Oh my god!  Anyway.  RP now has Rogers (IL), Duffey, Theilbar, Alcala I hope is sent down, Columbe, Colome (help), and who do we call up from St Paul?  

Yes we are closer to 100 loss than 100 wins.  

So are we excited about today?  Not me.  Not mad, just not seeing the silver lining.  Maybe because I am too old for another long term rebuild. 

I am pretty sure that I'm older than you and I am excited about the new acquisitions.  I don't think our age is a factor.  You seem to be a "glass half empty" (or more) kind of person, while I am more of a "glass half full" person.

[mikelink45]

15 hours ago, Hosken Bombo Disco said:

Honest question, and I'm not knocking Pineda for this, but who is he mentoring? Who has he taken under his wing? 

There was visible chemistry and between Ervin Santana and José Berríos when Santana was here and it did appear to be a mentor relationship of a sort. 

What are people seeing now? Describe it to the rest of us so that we can see it.

Great statement.  So easy to throw the mentoring statement out on older players, but unlike Cruz I have not seen signs of mentoring or read of mentoring.  

[mikelink45]

2 minutes ago, terrydactyls said:

I am pretty sure that I'm older than you and I am excited about the new acquisitions.  I don't think our age is a factor.  You seem to be a "glass half empty" (or more) kind of person, while I am more of a "glass half full" person.

That could be - not sure we should be one upping on age, but my 45 tells where I start.  In all the years the Twins have been here we have seen too many rebuilds and too little sustained excellence.  We had a really good team here for two years and they went over the cliff.  The answer to sustainability is pitching and it always has been.  This FO came with the sense that they would know pitching and build pitching, but they have not.  Great players in the field still cannot move the needle.  If they could the Angels with Trout, Rendon, Ohtani would not be out of the playoffs.   

If I am a glass half empty guy in this season I must be an optimist.  

[lukeduke1980]

They've invested a lot in Pineda from the initial injury recovery to sticking with him through his suspension. Maybe they have a good relationship with him and want him back and it wasn't worth disrupting that relationship for whatever the offers were.

[jmlease1]

I'm surprised that Pineda didn't get traded, but maybe the offers just weren't there. If all you were going to get is a couple of marginal prospects that you'd need to protect on the 40 man (and we're going to have a bit of a 40-man crunch this year with our system depth), then maybe it's the right call. Especially if they're thinking about bringing him back in 2022; as seen in the case of MN Twins v. Escobar...if you trade a guy it's hard to re-sign him.

But I'm surprised a team like the Padres didn't make a good offer on him. But if they didn't, they didn't. It takes two to tango. More importantly, we got rid of JA Happ.

[Twodogs]

52 minutes ago, prouster said:

You’re talking about a guy the Twins have signed in free agency twice. He’s literally the worst example you could use. 

When the Twins signed him in free agency the Twins were headed in a different direction than they are right now.  So the example is different that it was back when they signed him.  I mean the Twins signed Josh Donaldson to the richest free agent deal ever for the Twins.  Do you actually think they would resign him again? Or anyone for that matter at that price?  So the example has to be taken into context.  Just because they signed Donaldson a couple of years ago surly doesn't mean they'd do it again this year.  Just because they signed Pineda a couple of years ago to an FA deal doesn't mean he will be resigned again.  You are assuming that the Twins are still trying to win 100 games next year, they aren't expecting that, and let's be real, neither are you so yeah you can't compare the two.

[twinfan]

Pineda probably wasn't worth trading because his recent outings have not been pitching deep into games and we probably couldn't get anything. Hopefully he is healthy and will sign with us after the season since we definitely need starters who have been there. Jax and Ober have potential but need to go deeper into games. They should be stretched out to 100 pitches each to see what we really have.

[bean5302]

Personally, I think the whole "mentor" thing is way overrated.

[ashbury]

1 hour ago, bean5302 said:

Personally, I think the whole "mentor" thing is way overrated.

Concur. If mentoring is needed, there are coaches on staff. And if mentoring was really that crucial, those coaches would be earning millions, not middle-class salaries - there is so much at stake that teams would pony up the dough if they really saw the return on investment.

[Craig Arko]

A) I am a mentor to STEM undergraduates. They appreciate it.

B ) I hope they re-sign Pineda. 

[ashbury]

2 hours ago, Craig Arko said:

A) I am a mentor to STEM undergraduates. They appreciate it.

B ) I hope they re-sign Pineda. 

If I think of college as a model for baseball mentorship, then Michael Pineda is Bluto Blutarski to Edwar Colina's Flounder and Griffin Jax's Pinto.

[RpR]

2 hours ago, ashbury said:

Concur. If mentoring is needed, there are coaches on staff. And if mentoring was really that crucial, those coaches would be earning millions, not middle-class salaries - there is so much at stake that teams would pony up the dough if they really saw the return on investment.

Mentoring is a state of mind and personality, NOT some thing you create or buy.

[Mike Sixel]

3 hours ago, ashbury said:

Concur. If mentoring is needed, there are coaches on staff. And if mentoring was really that crucial, those coaches would be earning millions, not middle-class salaries - there is so much at stake that teams would pony up the dough if they really saw the return on investment.

I suggest reading player comments and articles....coaches saying things is very different than coworkers and friends and mentors. Are the coaches that aren't the manager earning millions per year? 

If mentor programs don't work, why are there so many? Why are so many looking for mentors in the work world? I'm really baffled anyone thinks mentors don't matter in the real world. 

[ashbury]

38 minutes ago, Mike Sixel said:

If mentor programs don't work, why are there so many? Why are so many looking for mentors in the work world?

... why do they pay so poorly, and are generally handled on a volunteer basis, and with high turnover accepted?

Look, I don't dismiss the value of mentorship. I do some of it too. In the consulting firm my daughter works at mentorship actually is a paid aspect of some positions, and is true in many other fields. I benefitted from the project leader at my first job, and many other times.

I just note that the benefits are too often highly subjective, and in baseball a good mentor given credit for helping a team win (Nelson Cruz, Twins 2019-2020) suddenly becomes unable to help a team win (Nelson Cruz, Twins 2021).

I'm glad if young pitchers look up to Pineda and gain from talking with him. But a portion of the perceived value of mentorship comes from the satisfaction it gives the mentor. If the FO wants to sign him to an extention, and calling him a mentor makes him feel good about the organization, that's OK but I'm going to call it what it looks like to me.

[Craig Arko]

31 minutes ago, Mike Sixel said:

I suggest reading player comments and articles....coaches saying things is very different than coworkers and friends and mentors. Are the coaches that aren't the manager earning millions per year? 

If mentor programs don't work, why are there so many? Why are so many looking for mentors in the work world? I'm really baffled anyone thinks mentors don't matter in the real world. 

Meh. They probably don’t get Deadpool, either.

[jorgenswest]

Would offers of players likely to be DFA’d had been worthwhile?

I am sure they had some bar in mind for his remaining value to the team and that bar must have exceeded any marginal 40 man roster adds.

After the deadline I don’t want them to say that no one offered anything they value for him. How would that help? Instead they said that they appreciated his value as a teammate. I prefer that response.

[Cap'n Piranha]

On 7/30/2021 at 8:35 PM, Twodogs said:

Yeah you are correct, they could, but they won't.  I mean Hand is a local kid and they wouldn't give him 10 mill for one year, (and they needed a back end bullpen guy really bad this off-season, and they were supposed to contend this year!) so why would they give Pineda a 2 year deal worth 20 mil? (When they won't be in contention) I mean the chances that the Twins give him 2 years is almost nil.  I could see them offering a 1 year 7 - 8 mil with incentives and some other team will give him that 2 year 20 mil, like you said, and he will be gone.  

1--Falvine doesn't care about if a kid is from MN when they're deciding to sign, nor should they.

2--Hand had a very concerning 2020--he didn't give up a single homerun despite an under 30% GB rate, and his velocity had dropped below 92.  His swinging strike rate was down to 10.5% (lowest since 2015, the last year he started games), while his contact rate was up to almost 76% (highest since 2015).

3--Those concerns have amplified in 2021; Hand has been worth only 0.2 WAR across 42 appearances, is striking out less than 9/9, while walking almost 4/9.  His GB rate is improved, but still under 40%, and he's now giving up homers again, leading to a 4.3 FIP and a 4.69 xFIP.  His velocity has recovered to be back over 93, but that hasn't been enough to help his swinging strike rate (lowest of his career at 7.4%) or his contact rate (above 81%.highest since 2015).  And all of this is despite having a .239 BABIP, which is the lowest he's had since 2013, when he only pitched 20.2 innings, which means there's even further regression potential.  Falvine were right to not give Hand $10M.

As for Pineda, I think the FO believes they can compete in 2022 if things go right, but they don't want to sacrifice competitiveness in 2023/2024 in an attempt to compete in 2022.  As such, signing Pineda to eat innings next year, so you're not forced to prematurely promote Duran/Balazovic/Winder/Ryan, but can instead bring them up when they're ready is a good thing.  It also raises the floor for 2022, in case things start to go right (Maeda is closer to 2020 Maeda, Rooker becomes a top 5 DH, a fully healthy Kiriloff takes a leap, Martin forces his way into the lineup a la 2019 Arraez, and a couple of other signings work out).  As such, while I'm not saying Falvine WILL sign Pineda for 2/$20M, I don't think that's more than double what they would do, as you're implying.

[Cap'n Piranha]

On 7/31/2021 at 6:42 AM, mikelink45 said:

I know what you are saying and yes we want lots of potential and talent - the remaining reality is that Berrios has the Berrios ceiling and he is young and has proven it.  It will take a lot to replace him, just like we never truly replaced Santana.

What's more valuable to the organization?  A guy who puts up 4 WAR in a season where the team loses 90 games?  Or a couple of guys who might put up 1-3 WAR each in a season where the team wins 90 games?

[LA VIkes Fan]

Pineda stayed because they think they can re-sign him to be the #3 starter at a reasonable rate. I agree with the move if they re-sign him. One less thing we have to find in the last half of this year, or over the winter. 2 years, $20-25m. 

By the way, I wouldn't be surprised if they re-sign Simmons. The Twins aren't going to pay the kind of money guys like Story, Baez and Seager will get We don't have another SS in house, Polanco is just a fill in there on defense, and we don't have one close. Riddle in AAA, Palacios in AA? Neither ready for next year or maybe ever. Simmons may stay. 1 year, $8.5m.   

[singlesoverwalks]

There was obviously a market there that we could have taken advantage of. It was just a failure to manage the logistics of getting that many trades done on the part of the front office. They're focused on their own baseball genius, not on the management side of things. The more glamorous Berrios and Cruz trades captured their attention, and then they ran out of time. A good manager would have delegated most of the legwork to some assistant GM; take what you can get and move on.

It's the usual B effort from this current GM. The Nationals and Cubs are good examples of better run front offices in sell mode. They got their work done.

[mikelink45]

1 hour ago, Cap'n Piranha said:

What's more valuable to the organization?  A guy who puts up 4 WAR in a season where the team loses 90 games?  Or a couple of guys who might put up 1-3 WAR each in a season where the team wins 90 games?

A guy who is only 27 and can help us win 90, like he has in the past. 0

[Cap'n Piranha]

4 hours ago, mikelink45 said:

A guy who is only 27 and can help us win 90, like he has in the past. 0

How's that quest for 90 wins going this year?  What makes that likely to turn around next year?

[Twodogs]

12 hours ago, Cap'n Piranha said:

1--Falvine doesn't care about if a kid is from MN when they're deciding to sign, nor should they.

2--Hand had a very concerning 2020--he didn't give up a single homerun despite an under 30% GB rate, and his velocity had dropped below 92.  His swinging strike rate was down to 10.5% (lowest since 2015, the last year he started games), while his contact rate was up to almost 76% (highest since 2015).

3--Those concerns have amplified in 2021; Hand has been worth only 0.2 WAR across 42 appearances, is striking out less than 9/9, while walking almost 4/9.  His GB rate is improved, but still under 40%, and he's now giving up homers again, leading to a 4.3 FIP and a 4.69 xFIP.  His velocity has recovered to be back over 93, but that hasn't been enough to help his swinging strike rate (lowest of his career at 7.4%) or his contact rate (above 81%.highest since 2015).  And all of this is despite having a .239 BABIP, which is the lowest he's had since 2013, when he only pitched 20.2 innings, which means there's even further regression potential.  Falvine were right to not give Hand $10M.

As for Pineda, I think the FO believes they can compete in 2022 if things go right, but they don't want to sacrifice competitiveness in 2023/2024 in an attempt to compete in 2022.  As such, signing Pineda to eat innings next year, so you're not forced to prematurely promote Duran/Balazovic/Winder/Ryan, but can instead bring them up when they're ready is a good thing.  It also raises the floor for 2022, in case things start to go right (Maeda is closer to 2020 Maeda, Rooker becomes a top 5 DH, a fully healthy Kiriloff takes a leap, Martin forces his way into the lineup a la 2019 Arraez, and a couple of other signings work out).  As such, while I'm not saying Falvine WILL sign Pineda for 2/$20M, I don't think that's more than double what they would do, as you're implying.

But Colome has performed so much better?

You guys are praying that they sign Pineda, but I don't see it.  I think he will be elsewhere next year.

[Cap'n Piranha]

9 hours ago, Twodogs said:

But Colome has performed so much better?

You guys are praying that they sign Pineda, but I don't see it.  I think he will be elsewhere next year.

Where did I say Colome was a good signing?  You said Falvine should have signed Hand, and I gave you all kinds of numbers as to why they shouldn't have, and why signing him would not have done much, if anything, to help this year.  Would Hand have been better than Colome?  Probably, but that's hardly a high bar to clear.  Furthermore, Colome's numbers in 2020 were better than Hand's, outside of k rate, so there was no reason to think the drop off would be this precipitous.  Stop making Strawman arguments.

I'm not praying they sign Pineda--I'd like them to, as a way to provide stability to the back end of the rotation, but there's myriad other options the Twins could pursue to get a veteran 3rd/4th starter for 2022.  Perhaps he will be elsewhere, but given how little interest there apparently was at the deadline, I think this idea that someone is desperate to acquire him and will willingly outbid the market by substantial enough a margin to render any Twins offer unacceptable is specious.

[Dman]

I think the Twins wanted an Escobar like return to let Pineda leave and no team wanted to pay that for a rental that might not be back.  There is no guarantee they can or will re-sign Pineda but I have to believe that is the plan otherwise they would have let him go for a bucket of balls.  No way do they want to pay his remaining salary if they don't want him back next year.  That just wouldn't make sense especially for the money conscious Twins. 

If he pitches well this next month I would bet they approach him with an extension and he signs.  If he performs poorly then maybe they look at other pitchers in Free agency and see if they get something better for Pineda money.  He still needs to perform for the Twins to want him back.

The Twins were only trading players for overpays and apparently no one wanted to overpay for Pineda so they didn't get a deal done.  If I were them I would have likely done the same thing.

[Thegrin]

Myabe my good sense is gone, but it looks like Big Mike has regained his touch, since he returned.  I wouldn't be a bit surprised if he pitches well for the rest of the year. 

[Major League Ready]

2 hours ago, Dman said:

I think the Twins wanted an Escobar like return to let Pineda leave and no team wanted to pay that for a rental that might not be back.  There is no guarantee they can or will re-sign Pineda but I have to believe that is the plan otherwise they would have let him go for a bucket of balls.  No way do they want to pay his remaining salary if they don't want him back next year.  That just wouldn't make sense especially for the money conscious Twins. 

If he pitches well this next month I would bet they approach him with an extension and he signs.  If he performs poorly then maybe they look at other pitchers in Free agency and see if they get something better for Pineda money.  He still needs to perform for the Twins to want him back.

The Twins were only trading players for overpays and apparently no one wanted to overpay for Pineda so they didn't get a deal done.  If I were them I would have likely done the same thing.

I am surprised moving his salary has not come up before.  Maybe I missed it.  Does anyone really believe they got a great offer and said "no we would rather pay the $3.7M left on his contract because we have been making boats loads of profit the last two years"?  Have we really come to the point we are so anxious to complain that we just ignore the brutally obvious?

[Brock Beauchamp]

2 hours ago, Major League Ready said:

I am surprised moving his salary has not come up before.  Maybe I missed it.  Does anyone really believe they got a great offer and said "no we would rather pay the $3.7M left on his contract because we have been making boats loads of profit the last two years"?  Have we really come to the point we are so anxious to complain that we just ignore the brutally obvious?

Definitely possible, for sure. It’s also possible teams were aiming higher and Pineda simply fell through the cracks.*

*except for the Cardinals but god only knows what they were doing at the deadline 

[Twodogs]

On 8/3/2021 at 9:30 AM, Cap'n Piranha said:

Where did I say Colome was a good signing?  You said Falvine should have signed Hand, and I gave you all kinds of numbers as to why they shouldn't have, and why signing him would not have done much, if anything, to help this year.  Would Hand have been better than Colome?  Probably, but that's hardly a high bar to clear.  Furthermore, Colome's numbers in 2020 were better than Hand's, outside of k rate, so there was no reason to think the drop off would be this precipitous.  Stop making Strawman arguments.

I'm not praying they sign Pineda--I'd like them to, as a way to provide stability to the back end of the rotation, but there's myriad other options the Twins could pursue to get a veteran 3rd/4th starter for 2022.  Perhaps he will be elsewhere, but given how little interest there apparently was at the deadline, I think this idea that someone is desperate to acquire him and will willingly outbid the market by substantial enough a margin to render any Twins offer unacceptable is specious.

First off I really don't give a flying you know what, what you think.  I'm telling you what I think!  If you don't like it then don't like it.  But don't sit here and try to be condescending towards me because you don't agree with me and my thoughts.  Because you think based on your fantasy team that you know you know you know how things would have turned out, you don't!!  I can say that Colome did so poorly that the twins had to rotate one guy after another at the back end of the bullpen.  Hand was good enough to pretty much be the guy and even when Washington ended up not being that good Washington was able to trade Hand because he still had value, had anyone offered the Twins a bucket of baseballs for Colome they would have taken it.  So don't sit here and tell me about how Colome was a better signing than Hand would have been.  You don't know, I can speculate that Hand would have done better than Colome, and then I can reach and say maybe in this situation in Minnesota he might have done a little better? Maybe worse, but not worse than Colome and he would have had value at the trade deadline had the Twins still been in this same mess.  

 

So the Twins brought Berrios up through their system to be their guy. He was their best pitcher, the guy you put up against other teams best pitchers.  You get rid of him what's the point of keeping Pineda??  He's on an expiring contract you are praying that the Twins re-sign him so salvage some sort of rotation next year, but they traded the best they had, so who's going to go up against Scherzer, Cole, etc.... Berrios now for that matter who's going to go up against him from the Twins? Pineda, Maeda?  I mean come on, I'm pretty sure Pineda sees it too that's why, unless he feels like he doesnt have the stuff to do better than being with the Twins that I'm pretty sure he's probably thinking dang if someone offers me something elsewhere, at least a good team he will be gone.  No he probably won't leave the Twins for Pittsburgh, but if the Angels come calling or Seattle, etc.... The Twins will have to overpay to keep him in those situations and why?  Might as well go with the young guys, since you gave up on the guy you delveloped to be that guy then it's time to develop some new guys and keeping older #3 - 4 starters around just gets in the way of that.  Maeda is signed for a few years so he might be here still when this new crop develops, but Pineda will not be and so now you are suggesting that he just gives up his ability to compete for something because now it's going to take the Twins a couple of years to put together another staff to make a run again. 

 

Don't talk down to me to tell me what to think!