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I take the Green Line to work every day between the Twin Cities. Light rail gets a bad rap from guys in Elk River who think cowering in fear of Minneapolis is something to brag about, but it’s 20 minutes there, 20 minutes back, and I can listen to podcasts about war or baseball. Recently, while waiting for my train at the Prospect Park station, something caught my eye. Was it a food wrapper? No. An empty tallboy? No. It was a by god $10 bill. I picked it up, put it in my pocket, and tried to think of something I could do with it. As tempting as a fistful of Beef-and-Chedds from Arby’s is, this is found money. I do OK, it should go to a good cause. In the end, there was only one right answer. Carlos Correa , if you return to the Minnesota Twins, I will give you ten American dollars. Now, I’m aware that your asking price is quite a bit steeper. I’ve read the interviews with Scott Boras and the copious hot stove analyses that say Minnesota is in play, but still an unlikely destination for your long-term services. One thing I’ve also noticed: not a single GD one of them mentions paper money. This $10 bill I found? Cold hard cash. By the time you get to the end of this sentence, it’ll be worth more than every crypto scam and Twitter combined. And I’m telling you right now: You can have it. Just sign with the Twins. I’ve watched enough bad shortstops over the years to know that your services are needed, especially with Royce Lewis’ health in question. The Boy Geniuses clearly agree and have already put together a competitive offer for your services. I’m putting $10 on top of what they’re already prepared to give you. Talk to Boras. Mull it over with your family. Take some time. I think you’ll agree this offer is fair, sound, and selfless. I thank you for your consideration. (We can do the handoff at Arby's, too. First Beef-and-Chedd? On me.) Regards, Stu

In 2021 Jorge Lopez was not a good pitcher. To be fair, he really hadn’t been a good pitcher in the 102 games he’d thrown at the Major League level. Across three organizations Lopez tallied a 6.04 ERA while working 350 innings. That is why, after starting 25 games in 2021, the Baltimore Orioles moved him to the bullpen. Lopez was acquired on a waiver claim from the Kansas City Royals, and now was gifted an opportunity to work in relief at 29-years-old. The results couldn’t have been better. Across 44 games, Lopez racked up 19 saves and a cool 1.68 ERA. His strikeouts jumped to double-digits per nine for the first time in his career, and while the walk rate held steady, he stopped allowing home runs. It earned him his first trip to the All-Star Game, and Baltimore parlayed the success into a solid return featuring Cade Povich and Yennier Cano. Then Lopez got to Minnesota’s bullpen. In 23 games, he lost a hold of the closer role, recorded just three saves, and posted a 4.37 ERA. His strikeout rate tumbled while the walks ticked up and he allowed more than a hit per inning pitched. To say it was a complete reversal of what was expected to be acquired would be putting it lightly. As a whole, the chief change for Lopez was to stop throwing a four-seam fastball. He used the pitch less than 5% of the time last season, and instead funneled his energy into a sinker. The pitch has gained more than two miles per hour in velocity, averaging over 97 mph in 2022. It’s been an absolute weapon, but clearly things changed a bit with Minnesota. Looking at the numbers, it’s not clear that Lopez changed a whole lot with his pitch mix. The slider and changeup usage has risen since joining the Twins, but not by more than nominal percentage points. The key difference looks to be in pitch location. For whatever reason, Lopez utilized the lower portion of the strike zone with the Twins. Newly adapted thinking has suggested that fastballs up in the zone, depending on spin rates, can cause additional issues for hitters. With Lopez throwing a sinker, any amount of run could be manipulated to travel back within the zone as well. Any team acquiring a new talent is likely to make tweaks or suggest options, but caution would seem wise with an arm going so well. It’s also possible that Lopez made changes to his location, tunneling techniques, or sequencing on his own accord or the game calling from Minnesota catchers. No matter who is responsible for the changes having been made, it’s clearly imperative that both sides get together and figure out a better path forward. Due to his bouncing around early in his career, Lopez is under team control for two more seasons still. The Twins absolutely want him in their bullpen if he’s the Orioles version, but they can’t afford him to turn back into what he was as a starter, or be as hittable as he was down the stretch in 2022.

Eight Twins Players Become Free Agents The end of the World Series triggered the official commencement of the offseason, meaning that the following players automatically entered the free agent market: Michael Fulmer, RHP Gary Sánchez, C Sandy León, C Billy Hamilton, OF Aaron Sanchez, RHP Aside from Fulmer, a solid deadline pickup for the bullpen, and Sánchez, who ended up being the team's primary catcher, these are all random midseason veteran pickups who played roles for the team out of sheer desperation. No big losses, although Fulmer will be an interesting target to pursue. Elsewhere, Carlos Correa opted out of his contract as expected. He'll hit free agency once again in search of a monster deal eclipsing $300 million. I wrote about what it will take to re-sign him as part of a three-part "Future of Shortstop" chapter of the Offseason Handbook. Anyone with a Twins Daily account can download that chapter for free. Finally, there were three players whose team options the club elected to decline, all as expected: Miguel Sanó, 1B ($2.75M buyout) Dylan Bundy, RHP ($1M buyout) Chris Archer, RHP ($750K buyout) Bundy and Archer were underwhelming bargain-bin free agent signings for the back of the rotation. Sanó's legacy with the Twins is, of course, much more lengthy and complicated. Probably worthy of a deeper examination in time. But for now, what matters for now is the way it ended: with the Twins paying $2.75 million to be done with him. Twins Pick Up Sonny Gray's Option There was one team option that the Twins were more than happy to pick up: Gray will be back next year at a $12.7 million salary. This was a no-brainer and a big part of the reason Minnesota was willing to give up Chase Petty for the veteran right-hander. Gray currently projects as the standalone #1 starter on the 2023 staff. Improving upon that situation should be a top priority for the front office this winter. Will they make an offseason addition who surpasses the Sonny Gray Threshold? We explored free agents and trade targets who could provide a legitimate top-of-rotation upgrade in the Starting Pitchers chapter of the Offseason Handbook, available to Caretakers. 40-Man Roster Shuffling Clears Room In addition to letting several players loose into free agency, the Twins also cleared up some 40-man roster room through waivers and outrights. Here's a quick rundown to catch you up: LHP Danny Coulombe was outrighted from the 40-man roster and assigned to the Saints. So were LHP Devin Smeltzer and RHP Jhon Romero. C Caleb Hamilton was claimed off waivers by Boston. SS Jermaine Palacios was claimed off waivers by Detroit. OF Jake Cave was claimed off waivers by Baltimore. All of these many removals from the 40-man were offset by a litany of players being removed from the injured list at year's end, so the Twins end up with 37 players currently rostered as illustrated in the grid below. Highlighted in red are eight clear candidates for removal, via non-tender or waiving, so the Twins will have no trouble finding room for new additions. The deadline to make contract tender decisions on arbitration-eligible players falls on November 18th – next Thursday. On that date we'll learn whether we can lock in or remove a few of those red-shaded names above, including Gio Urshela, Kyle Garlick, Emilio Pagan and Cody Stashak. Internal Promotions Impact MLB Coaching Staff As a result of a series of internal personnel shifts announced by the team this past week, a new member has been added to the major-league coaching staff for 2023: Derek Shohon, who served as the hitting coach for Class-AA Wichita last year – overseeing the breakouts of prospects Matt Wallner and Edouard Julien, among others – will join the Twins as an assistant hitting coach alongside incumbents David Popkins and Rudy Hernandez. Some other moves of note: Drew MacPhail, son of former Twins GM Andy MacPhail, takes over as farm director. Alex Hassan, previously in that role, is now vice president of hitting development and procurement. Former run creation coordinator Frankie Padulo transitions into the assistant director of player development role formerly held by MacPhail. Brian Maloney was promoted to director of minor league and high performance operations, and Amanda Daley was promoted to director of player education. Roster and Payroll Projection: v1 Here's an overview of where the projected roster and payroll currently stand, under the assumption that Urshela and Garlick are tendered, and Pagan is not. (Far from guaranteed on any count.) The biggest existential priorities, as you can see, are finding a starting shortstop (and his backup), filling the catcher vacancy, and adding impact arms. They've got nearly $50 million to spend merely to get back to the 2022 payroll level, so needless to say there's a world of possibilities ahead. As a reminder, you can explore options at these key positions of need by downloading available chapters of the Offseason Handbook, and you can use our roster-building tool to forge your own Twins blueprint.