drjim

I think Kill resigned himself under pressure from his family. The U would have kept him if he would have stayed. The dorm scandal is not the reason that Claeys was let go, it just happened to be a very convenient and well-timed scapegoat for the Administration.

It was pretty much expected. There was graduations, transfers, players who quit, and lost recruits. Either way, kind of bad to follow up the best season in decades with this gong show. But switching coaches at a program like Minnesota is going to result in at least 3 years of rebuilding. I hope I never have to hear Fleck speak again, but he does have a track record of success at smaller schools.

Correct. Took him two years to get his health right before he could coach again. It would be awesome if he could keep it going, but he couldn't keep his regimen as the Gopher coach.

I would say the one exception I would make would be a clearly ready college arm - Price and Strasburg were about as surefire as you can get, Verlander quite close too. Kershaw, like he is in many ways, is an exception to a rule. And even he was a #7 pick. What's interesting too, is that 5 college arms were selected before him that year and none stuck as a starter (though a couple became good relievers). The college bat taken ahead was Longoria.

His health.

No chance. He's a potential top of the rotation starter. 2017 was about staying healthy, 2018 is about building up innings, and 2019 is when he breaks in. (Barring additional injuries).

The whole Jay process was a fiasco on multiple levels. They will redeem the situation a little if he can stay healthy and turn into a good bullpen piece. But that is two big "ifs" that need to be cleared. Stewart's result comes with the risk of trying to go really big on a high school arm. (And more proof that taking a pitcher in the first 10 picks is almost always a bad decision).

Jay stings a lot more in my mind. The 2013 first round was really a terrible draft, even if they nailed that pick (with what was left after Bryant and Gray), it's not even clear they would have gotten a clear starting caliber player. A lot more talent in the 2015 draft, including two really good college bats taken in the 3 picks right after Jay.

It's a talent issue. They had no internal guys to pay, and they can only spend so much on overpaid mediocre free agents. (Frankly, they spent too much on bad free agents, and weren't smarter about who they targeted to flip and add young talent for the rebuild).

He remains a rule 5 if he doesn't hit 90 days in 2018. Thus the need for a 40 man spot next offseason and a 25 man spot for 2019 too. That's a long carry for a guy who has never been healthy.

"Promotions". They are no longer in charge of those aspects of talent acquisition and development. That's some accountability, no?

Agree on both of these. Thorpe was a lock of locks. He might be the best pitching prospect in the system. No one is rostering a 1b/dh that hasn't made it past low a. I'm a little intrigued by Stewart and Burdi, but Reed/Melo/Bard weren't a priority since they couldn't make the roster last season.

Come one, no one in the front office is going to go on record and criticize a player like this. But when multiple media people mention this through a variety of mediums, it is clearly something that is coming up in informal/off the record/background conversations. It's not something that they are continually hammering, and it something they are interested in keeping in house, but it is a concern of the front office, and it absolutely should be. I'm aware of the big, lame fight going on between bloggers and writers (at least some of them) over this issue, but this is one of the benefits of increased access for writers that are around the club and front office officials.

They sold at the trade deadline from a roster that had the talent (relative to the other Wild Card contenders) to go on and make the playoffs. That is an error in evaluation, even granting the many other comments that it was defensible and a logical process.

Concerns about Sano's diet have come from multiple sources, which I would think reflects a real concern for the organization. Seems an appropriate assumption to have as a fan.

Sure, and I understand this position. I really thought they should have aimed higher in the offseason for a better reliever and I thought they should have done a soft add at the deadline. If you do little and stay conservative it does become a self-fulfilling plan. Even if they wouldn't have made the playoffs at 85 wins, which is a not unreasonable position to have, I would argue there was benefit to have the young guys play meaningful games until the end of the year as they attempt to build on it going forward. There was no reason to buy hard, and I wasn't especially offended by the Garcia transactions, but the Kintzler trade seemed so pointless. I'm actually quite impressed they didn't go sideways after selling at the deadline. If they had kind of went in the tank, especially by blowing 3-4 late games out of the deadline, it would have been a missed opportunity. To me it wasn't just the results, I thought there was secondary gain to be had by having competitive games through the end of the season. And I don't think the modest gain of the Kintzler trade was enough to potentially sacrifice that. And I would have reinforced that potential gain with a modest buy.

It was a strange sequence of decisions. They hit a moment of truth and waffled and punted. Made Terry Ryan look committed and decisive!

They went too light in their offseason additions and were too cautious at the deadline. At the very least they could have held. It wasn't a travesty, but they were wrong evaluating their talent relative to the league at all points so far. I'm optimistic about a good offseason, but that is based more on hope and a general trusting of their process, not based on anything they have actually done with the roster.

I'm optimistic this offseason, but the front office really hasn't shown much other than the ability to continually underestimate and misjudge the talent on the roster relative to the rest of the league.

Boom

Not a sexy name but I wonder if Chase Headley could make some sense. Yanks would probably eat some money to dump him for basically nothing. Good Sano insurance, veteran bat.

That's a good point. I'm giving Gibson too much credit in this equation.

I'm much less keen to lock in the 5th rotation spot like that. Assuming they sign a 4 year guy, they'll have him, Berrios with 5 years of control, and Santana and Gibson on one year deals with an option (or year or arb left). Combine that with probably 7 relatively legit guys that could make a start this year (May/Mejia/Gonsalves/Slegers/Romero/Jorge/Littell) and I would prefer flexibility, not locked in deals. If they are in the hunt midseason, they'll be in a better place to make a trade than they are now to add a high end guy on a short deal. If they struggle or get smoked with injuries, better not to be locked in to multiple long term free agent deals.

A Lackey type strikes me as acceptable if he is the second starter added this offseason. The Twins need to add one legit starter on a multiyear deal, but a second starter on a one year deal fits well on the roster and salary structure.