Nashvilletwin

ES is a prospect and potentially a very strong one. Mahle is now basically a one year rental. No consternation per se. But ES has upheld his end of the deal SO FAR while Mahle has not. Thus, TO DATE, the trade has been bad from our point of view. But, as I said, let’s see what the future holds - a lot of outcomes still possible.

At the moment, Mahle has done nothing for us when he was suppose to be a key cog in last years playoff run - which was a huge part of the rationale for doing the deal. We shall see what the future holds…

Sorry, but the Twins injury situation is already so bad it’s close to being like the woman who backed into the airplane propellor. Its getting much more clear that the FO has known for a while that Buxton, Polanco, and Kiriloff would need to be eased in at best - thus, Gallo, Taylor and Solano.

I so have the under on 30 starts and/or 150 innings. Hope I’m wrong.

Given the first rationale for the deal was for Mahle to lead the way to a division title and at least one playoff victory last season, the trade has been a disaster for the Twins to this point. If Mahle is healthy this year, the trade may end up working out for us and possibly both teams. But that’s a big if.

Very bad news. Hope he’s back soon, because Gordon is a) a good young player still with plenty of upside and b) one of the players I tune in to watch. Oh well, more Gallo, Kepler and Turner for a while -zzzzzzzzz.

I’m not quite there yet. The pieces certainly are there for a solid open window over the next half decade - as you eloquently pointed out partly by luck (getting Correa and Lee were both incredibly lucky and both could be the true anchors of this team during that window) and partly by competence. But this front office and coaching staff have yet to deliver one playoff game victory. They have not, for the most part, been able to develop the talent they’ve been given or acquired to the most of that talent’s abilities. The key to a good, long open window for our small/mid-market Twins will always be to capitalize on the young talent when still cheap while augmenting the team with select, more expensive FAs. We will see what our day-to-day operational leadership can do with the outstanding young talent now on the cusp, My advice to The Nephew is to demand accountability of his FO and coaching staff for the commitment of talent, capital, infrastructure, and opportunities our solid ownership provides them.

Lots of keys to the season, but this certainly has to be one. Sure, the starting pitching is better, the bullpen has promise, and the offense, well, let’s just say, overall isn’t too exciting but maybe a few players break out/return to top prior form. Yet all of that won’t really matter if we continue to play with the poor fundamentals that have become the hallmark of Rocco’s teams. The roster looks better in many respects, but not so strong as to be able to overcome playing dumb baseball - we just aren’t that good.

With all the errors, this game is pretty much how Rocco and staff treat ST and it rolls into the regular season. Very little accountability throughout the lineup. The adage has truth: you play how you practice. This is just how last spring felt: we dropped it and threw it around all spring training and then that pretty much set the tone for real games.

Quick predictions come Opening Day: Megill and Hoffman go to in AAA (unless Hoffman opts out). Moran and Santana (despite the walks) make the club. We see Henriquez next year (hate to say it, and dearly hope I’m wrong, but this is our Twins and fearing the worst just gives us a chance to be pleasantly surprised if it doesn’t happen).

Barring injury (loud knock on wood), 2024 is virtually a no lose proposition as a Twins fan. We win, great - winning is always fun, We lose, we get to see Lee, Lewis, Julien, and Martin (plus others, including pitchers) sooner rather than later. That’s a lot of fun too. I guess the only downside case is if we kind of contend, the FO gets delusional about our chances, and we end of flailing while not seeing much of the youngsters.

Agreed. Btw, Gordon and Farmer are going to start a whole lotta games this season.

I hope I’m still around to see Julien (like several others) when the FO finally let’s him play for the varsity team. Who knows when that will happen. In the meantime I will try to stay awake with all the one year rentals comprising our roster.

Agree, when Correa, Lewis and Lee all eventually start at SS, 2B and 3B (in some mix), Miranda should get pushed to 1B as his primary position. Julien and Kiriloff would round out the backup infielder roles and DH with Kiriloff maybe playing some OF too.

Who cares if we deplete the pipeline each year searching for pitching if we can continue to sign guys like Gallo, Taylor, Solano and Farmer? Even though that comment was written in sarcasm font, there is some truth to it - trading position player prospects for immediate or future pitching and signing/acquiring cheaper (relative to veteran pitchers) major league track record position players very much seems like an important plank of this FO’s current strategy. Lots of good points on this thread - with the reality, like most things, somewhere in the middle: ideally, we’d like to have a more consistent/dependable pipeline of pitching talent with an occasional clear top end starter come out of the system, while continuing to augment the staff as needed with trades. We might be a little long on one side of that ideal at the moment, but might have a chance to balance it out over the next several years.