Brock Beauchamp

Excellent piece from Gleeman today, talking about how Martin is returning to his roots and no longer trying to elevate the ball with intentionality. I don't like the undercurrent of what is being said here, that the Twins were trying to homogenize Martin and it simply failed. I'm not furious about it or anything but I think a team that had Luis Arraez on it for years should know better than to do this to a capable spray hitter. There are different ways to become a capable baseball player and that's okay. https://theathletic.com/4233049/2023/02/22/twins-prospect-austin-martin-2/

Who is this @Ted Wiedmann person and why wasn't he writing for this site a long time ago? 😃😃😃😃😃😃😃 Outstanding work!

With better revenue sharing and a salary floor, it shouldn't be a huge issue if the team wants to keep those players. And it drastically alters how teams approach free agency, lengths of contracts, and a bunch of other things that currently favor the likes of the Yankees and Dodgers.

If we're just throwing out wild ideas how to make baseball way better, here's another one: 1. Change how arbitration works and update it to use the same metrics teams use internally to evaluate players (on a surface level, WAR). 2. Players are guaranteed a $1m salary and arbitration begins in player year two. By player year five, they're making 100% of what a free agent makes (25%, 50%, 75%, 100%). Change that dynamic and it completely flips super-sized $300m guaranteed contracts on their heads. Players no longer need to push so hard at maximizing free agency in CBA negotiations because good players are hitting free agency with $100m earnings. WHICH IS HOW IT SHOULD WORK

Yeah, frankly, I think you were wrong. What baseball needs is someone who simply doesn't care about the informal "rules" that owners have colluded over in the past. Someone who blows right past salary thresholds and exposes the BS the owners have been pulling for years (ie. using salary thresholds as soft caps but not doing anything to actually fix the much larger problem of low-revenue and low-spending teams). Remember that MLB owners did not want to allow Steve Cohen to buy a franchise and this is exactly why they didn't want him in baseball. Which means we should all be supporting the hell out of Steve Cohen for being a madman. If the owners don't want something, fans should probably feel the opposite.

I'm going to post some stuff here as John sends it over so we have a place for you caretakers to follow our reporting.

Because the caps that have been offered benefit only the owners. Again, the players want to make money. If you guarantee them money, they'll accept all sorts of things they've shut down in the past. This can't be looked through the lens of "players hate salary caps" simply because they've rejected caps in the past. Look at the actual offers and what they would have done to player salaries. That's why players rejected previous caps.

The biggest reason the PA and owners have had such a vitriolic relationship is because the players keep losing ground in comparison to other sports. Lock salary caps/floors as a percentage of revenue as they do in other sports and I suspect the PA comes around. The PA simply wants to make money so offer them guaranteed money.

A salary cap absolutely requires PA buy-in because it involves player salary. How the owners distribute their own funds may not be within the PA’s purview, though. Ultimately, I think the MLBPA would agree to a cap if it came with a *real* floor. Not the $90m or whatever owners were trying to float a year ago but something like $140-150m. You have to capture 33-50% of teams with the new floor or I think the MLBPA tells owners to piss off.

I don't think owners need to clear revenue sharing with the MLBPA, I think they can make that change unilaterally. Someone please correct me if I'm wrong about that.

Oooh, this is exciting. After years of sitting on their hands while the game crumbled, MLB has been actively pursuing improvements to the game and I have to give them credit for making (mostly) right decisions. First, they ended the lockout in a relatively timely fashion. I could have gone with less drama but teams played 162, which I was doubtful would happen. I'm a big fan of most of the new rules changes, particularly the pitch clock. A couple of months ago, they hired a former RSN executive to evaluate blackouts and how to end them. When Diamond showed signs of going belly-up, Manfred said MLB is open to acquiring the rights. All of this is good. It's long overdue, but it's good. And now there's this bombshell. As always, subscribe to The Athletic, they're great. But for those who don't, I'll pick out a couple of nuggets. https://theathletic.com/4226341/2023/02/19/mlb-economic-reform-committee-mets-bally/ Okay, so this scared me a bit. The problem isn't that Steve Cohen spends so much, which has traditionally been how MLB approached this issue. They want to reel in the top spenders but do nothing for the bottom revenue teams, nor punish teams that simply refuse to spend. Not great. But... For the first time in a long time, I'm truly excited about the future of baseball instead of bracing myself against just suffering through the sport's refusal to address its long-standing problems.

Because it's a universal number. Teams exert pressure on one another over arb payments. If the Brewers give Burnes $11m, that raises the precedent for all future pitchers in arb. Baseball arbitration is a bass-ackwards system that was actually put in place before free agency. It badly needs an overhaul.

Twins Daily is a partner with FOCO products and earns products for any affiliate purchases you make, 100% of which is returned to our users in gift form. Any support you provide is support of the Twins Daily community itself! To celebrate the return of baseball, FOCO is releasing a Spring Training Bobblehead Collection that features commemorative team bobbleheads, mascots, and some of the game’s best players from the Grapefruit and Cactus Spring training leagues. The commemorative player bobbleheads in the collection feature spring training league logos across the body and head. They all stand atop a plate themed base with various thematic elements from the league that they play in. The player and mascot bobbleheads are also on a base with various thematic elements from the league they play in and their names are displayed in front. The commemorative generic players will retail for $75, the mascots for $70, and the athletes for $80. All of the bobbleheads in the collection are limited to 144 units and stand at 8" tall. These unique bobbles will only be available for a limited time so check them out! FOCO Spring Training Bobblehead Collection

If he wants to try to hit 103mph with his left arm, have at it. Otherwise, nope.

John will be down there for close to a month, I believe, but won't be covering the team the entire time. Nick, Seth, and Parker will also rotate in and out over the next six-ish weeks.

In general, optimally I want to see zero left-handed bats in the lineup against a lefty starter unless they're Mauer-level. And with Taylor and Farmer on the same roster, I'll be very disappointed to see Farmer on the bench and Gallo/Kepler in the outfield against a lefty.

There aren't many left-handed starters but the Twins will still face a lefty starter ~40 times in 2023. Do we really want Kepler and Gallo starting those games? I sure don't, give me Kyle Farmer every time.

Who should start in the OF against left-handed pitching, though?

The team wasn’t overrated, they just didn’t have any good healthy players left by the time they reached the postseason.

There are no winners here but Olive Garden is far and away the least offensive option listed.

Javy Baez at every position because good lord that would be entertaining.

Sadly, I know some of our writers' favorite spots were completely leveled by the hurricane. So this spring is going to be a learning experience for everyone!

About six months ago, my wife had the idea "let's go to Applebees and only order appetizers!" Neither one of us had been in an Applebees in over a decade. It was a terrible experience. Terrible. If you find yourself looking across the strip mall longingly at an Olive Garden, you know you've made some truly bad decisions with your life.

We’ll have one up during or after spring training. The hurricane changed so much about the area we didn’t feel it was useful to write up until we got down there and had first-hand experience.