Channing1964

Nobody will believe I am saying this but here it goes.... I don't believe Falvey sits in his office and goes to Levine, "hey have you seen Kepler's current analytical peripheral numbers? maybe we should switch Byron to right and Max to center. Max looks like way more of a HISTORICALLY center fielder hitter than Byron. Get Baldelli on the phone.(the last part i am sure really happens) Power is not going to be much of a worry as long as Sano and Cruz are around. Baseball would be pretty boring is all teams center fielders were all same kind of players as everyone else's. Can Max improve? Sure. I am sure he knows that. I like our players...a lot. So now that we ran Risario out of town we are going to pick on Kepler because he hit like a traditional center fielder. You dont get to preach analytics and then when you want to put a player on blast bring up old school logic. Falvey is going to look fir the best Players and put the brst team on the field without any traditional, historical, loyal, or organizational tendencies. He is totally going to re-write the Twins history books so...forget what you thought about the great Twins center fielders. Tovar, Puckett, Hunter, Revere, Span and Buxton. If it makes them feel good about taking credit for the trade, you see Joey Gallo in center field next weekend.

Although I don't especially agree they are that much improved, they still, IMHO did improve. I am not a fan of Chicago or Cleveland. I am sick of hearing how a team with a new(ancient, cameo) manager, a lineup full of 1st and 2nd year starters, a poor defensive team, and a team with arguably three solid starters could possibly be that much better than the 2 time division champions. You know the guys who have basically the same core group still together? Cleveland is more of a threat than The White Sox. By the A.S. break we wont be talking about them.

I can totally see your point but .....without knowing the reverse splits I feel like our team is way too right handed... the Yankees are too.

a pitcher to replace Castillo will surely have to be included. Im not sure of their depth needs but it will cost someone like Rooker, Larnach or Kiriloff. If I recall their needs are middle infield depending on the Nick Senzel plans so I don't see that deal ever happening really. We can't trade Lewis now.... they'd never take Gordon, and I doubt Blankenthorn(is that right?) will be enough.

i could see us surviving without Kiriloff but they are gonna want much more....maybe Alcala? Castillo hasn't really proven he's an "Ace". Falvey will never expose that much of his pale behind to that much scrutiny.

I don't care who plays left field as long as its not Rosario. He has stunk it up so bad I hope he takes his 30 homers and 100 rbi's a year somewhere else. Oh wait....HE DID.

i respect all your bull**** analytics but in the playoffs as we have seen for 10 plus years...champions have championship hearts

here's the thing, unless Kiriloff becomes all World, all of a sudden, then teams with elite closers like maybe Chicago, or the Brewers, or whoever has an outstanding closer will shut down Cruz(yes i love him but...), Sano, Buxton, Simmons, and or Garver and Jeffers. This young man is part of getting to the next level. I know you want Thad Levine's job but some things are constants in major league baseball...we are on the right track but the learning curve, very unfortunately is determined by your heroes in the front iffice. not by us

as usual, i guess you are here to rebut anything 8 say

Whatever he wants to do to play 130 games will be okay with me.

Let's not forget how effective Polanco is. I could see him leading off with Donaldson or Cruz 2nd, followed by Kepler then the other right hander (probably Donaldson). Baldelli we know, likes to stagger the hitters so then I can see Garver, Kiriloff, Sano, Buxton,and Simmons(if he ever shows up). Being way too right handed will most likely come back to haunt us but that's the price the Falvines have to pay for crapping on Rosario and believing their spread sheets. I dont see Arraez even starting on this team unless you put him in left(major defensive dropoff) or at third base on Donaldson's days off. Rooker needs to go to St.Paul and i guess Cave has to play sometimes. This team is way too heavy with rh hitters. Someone like Bieber or Giolito will most likely dominate them. Bear in mind I do not have the reverse splits in front of me.

its nice to know that if and when Buxton gets hurt, we wont have to watch Rooker play rf anymore.

i was kidding

I would feel way better about it if Rocco, Falvey, or Levine could give us some concrete explanation as to the exact circumstances why he is nearly 3 weeks late. To merely say he should be here soon is not cutting it with me. I haven't seen him make that much of a difference on a winning team yet in his career. You would think he could at least communicate to the FO his exact expected arrival date. IMHO this is not a great start to Mr.Simmons Minnesota Twins tenure. I am positive his checks will cash, expecting him to show up for work on time still doesn't seem that unreasonable.

I am so glad we will be able to see the shortcomings of Eddie Rosario at least 19 times this season....feel free to check back with me at the All Star break before you wear your arm out patting the Falvine's backs for their forward thinking roster moves...lol

Sounds about right with the Kiriloff question up in the air and Anderson will have to outpitch Smeltzer and Thorpe to win that bullpen spot. Injuries will have something to do with it for sure.

true that. Broxton was signed for depth. If he sees any time at the makor league level it means we are in big trouble. He has played his way back to the minors at least twice so far in his career. If Buxton gets hurt, Kepler is in center with some combo of Rooker, Arraez, Kiriloff, and Cave at the corner outfield spots

my point was, the money is STILL there according to Jim Pohlad. We can't worry about it now because its a done deal anyways. Maybe we should look at it like this...to my knowledge Simmons isn't even in camp yet. That 10.5 million isn't looking like such a great deal now does it?

PUT IT ON THE BOARD!! TWINS WIN AL CENTRAL IN 2021!

I don't drink the White Sox kool aide and I think our rotation and lineup is the absolute best in the AL Central. Quite possibly we may have a top 5 bullpen again as well.

I dont see why they didnt non tender Buxton, DFA Cave, and trade Kepler to the White Sox. With the smokin hot outfield we have in Larnach, Kiroff, Rooker, and Celestino we would march straight to the Championship for sure. Not to mention the 5 more million we could save the Pohlads. The team that Derek built is finally taking shape.

I absolutely expected the payroll to be much lower because of the pandemic. Just because someone doesn't agree with you doesn't mean they have their head buried in the sand. Every time i see Jim Pohlad on any media outlet he is harping about the fact that the revenue reduction from last year is not going to affect his business decisions with the Twins. He stresses he is not laying off any front office employees and he can afford to pay the minor league players their full salaries for 2020. I do not care what other teams are doing but i am proud that my team is setting that bar. Now you want to argue with me what the budget is. I am sure I dont know that information specifically and i would be quite surprised if you told me that Derek Falvey, Thad Levine, or Jim Pohlad shared that information with you. My point was simply this....what would have been so wrong to spend 10 more million on Rosario this year so that we had an established major league player in that position? If i recall the combined salaries of Gonzalez and Adrianza were about equal to Simmons. Cruz is making basically the same money. They absolutely saved another 10 million by signing Happ, and Shoemaker while subtracting Odorizzi's 18 million. Why in the world should we not think there is money enough to keep Rosario. After 2021 he could have been an unrestricted free agent anyway. Some people are so in love with this front office that they never take their rose colored glasses off long enough to see some of the flaws in their thought processes. I am not even saying they deserve to get fired. What I am saying is ..Is this the way we want our organization to treat loyal and productive employees. Do we want the MLBPA to have an overall bad opinion of our teams management? There is a right, just, and fair way to do everything. I just want my team to be looked on favorably by the rest of the league and its fans. Just because the rest of the league has its head buried in analytic spread sheets and cost cutting manuals doesnt mean the Twins have to stop doing the right thing and treating the players like human beings instead of cattle. There is most likely going to a be a work stoppage in 2022 and these little things wont be forgotten by the players. All of the junior assistant general managers will be out of work if there is a 9-12 month strike in 2022 wont they? It wont matter who your smart, affordable team controlled players are if there is no league to play the games in. If you think 2020 was bad wait until you crack the books for 2022.

Sparkman just may beat out Shoemaker

I dont know why anybody hates Boras. He does what any one of us would do if we could....Be the absolute best we can be at their job.

Again I am sure Mr. Pohlads opinion of the front office is mostly positive...I just think as Minnesotans, and fans of the team we have a right to scrutinize every decision they make. I am not calling for their dismissal, only objectively evaluating some of their moves. For example, I love Josh Donaldson as a player and as a man, but i would never have given him a 4 year deal at this stage of his career. I suppose we could argue about that too but IMHO that was stupid. So when you wanna take that big step and be the big men on campus you better hire some more p.r. people to cover your butts. This aint New York, Boston, LA, Or Chicago but believe me, plenty of us are watching. Closely.