Tiantwindup

I would not make a lot of changes and give up a lot the way of prospects…it’s too early to know what I would do, but three factors to consider: 1. The minor injuries to many starting pitchers has the upside of limiting innings so, for example, Gray and Ryan may be better positioned to go long in Sep/Oct. 2. Maeda can be an added bullpen piece (or possibly a starter) that gets added at the traditional trade deadline. 3. Twins have a roster/rule 5 crunch coming. Among miranda, steer, larnach, kiriloff, Arraez, Gordon, Celestino, etc they don’t have enough at bats to go around and they should be able to get some pitching help by sending a package that includes one or more of these as headliners and reducing the redundancy (depth) at these positions.

These trade ideas make me question the numbers assigned by MLB trade values. If I could trade Miranda for five Steers (exactly equal values) I would make that trade without hesitation and it seems to me that would be a very lop-sided trade. Am I missing something?

I chafe at the need to declare a winner on a trade. Certainly there are cases where trades are lop-sided (see Archer to the Pirates), and a ‘winner’ can be declared, but I believe it is better to think in terms of the trade being good or bad for a team. This approach means both teams can ‘win’ (good trade for both), or both lose. Case in appointment: the Pressly trade was good for Houston and for Minnesota; in the short-term the Astros got a very good reliever that contributed to several deep playoff runs. The Twins got two players that appear primed to make strong contributions for many years. Certainly let’s discuss and analyze trades as this review does, but declaring a ‘winner’ just isn’t necessary and can sometimes be counterproductive to a deeper discussion of the trade.

I, too, agree that the 14 and 18 are not too fast. Pitchers will adjust. I am curious as to what these times would be form earlier eras when games were shorter. For instance, what were the times in the ‘80s? Also, does this impact trade value any? For example, if Stashak and Duran were same age, pitch quality, years of control, etc., would Duran have higher trade value because he would need less adjustment to the pitch clock implementation or would FOs assume that pitchers will adjust without little problem?

Teams used to have pinch-runners and pinch-hitters who were basically used just for those respective purposes. The Twins hit a lot of solo home runs. So…The Twins should immediately promote Julien to the big league club and have him be the first designated pinch-walker in the history of mlb. Just send him up there right before one of those solo home runs is about to be hit…uncanny how the guy draws walks.

Assuming that Alcala eventually returns from injury to the same performance level we witnessed last year…the Pressly trade is looking pretty good right now.

Camargo…we have enough car names with Martin and Royce ?

Catcher questions: we entered the year concerned about catcher depth in the minors. Isola is hitting at AA and Camaro same at A. How are these two defensively?

We all lament the lost minor league season of 2020 and the impact on development, but this week’s summary makes me wonder if it may have been a benefit rather than a curse for pitcher development. We all know that Winder was a so-so prospect until 2020 and came out of that ‘lost’ year with increased velocity and is now looking great at the major league level. Headrick was also not a top prospect and is looking very good this year, as Seth details. Is that because 2020 was spent working on things on the practice field rather than pitching in games or in spite of it? Same could be asked of many more pitchers who were with the organization during the 2020 season and are having very good starts to the minor league season…

If they don’t sign you also lose the ability to apply value to later rounds.

I applaud and thank TD for zero tolerance policy.

There*

I’m not sure who I would pick as the top two both has outstanding months. I do agree with several who mentioned age should not be a factor. After all, when voting for the Cy Young winner, for example, age is not taken into consideration. To that point, to the powers that be at TD: are their guidelines for player of the month that explicitly mention the criteria used for the selection?

It’s possible the ‘October’ pitching reinforcement could be a guy named Maeda

Winder should stay because 1. He is logical next starter if someone in the rotation is injured, 2. He has pitched very well in relief. 3. And the most important reason is that if he heads to St. Paul he will be starting and burning innings and will thus be unavailable if needed in September (or October?). He will be on an innings count, after all. I think that for the same reason it is good that Balozovic is having innings limited at this point…

Thanks for the link, Ros. Seeing the entire offseason activities in one detailed piece gives me an appreciation for the number of significant changes the FO made over the year compared to my overall sense from experiencing the deals piecemeal as they occurred in real-time over the last few months. Obviously too early to draw any conclusions, but certainly the starting pitching approach looks brilliant at the moment. I still regret the loss of Rortvedt as I think he will be solid over his career…but the boldness of the front office is a clear change from the norm.

I have an idea! How ‘bout we try Miguel Sano there? ?

Great job of putting this signing in context. Getting ahead of things here, but if he has a typical Correa year, would Twins have a chance to keep him for year 2 (and potentially year 3) by upping his salary to, say, $40M?

Although I agree with waiting until the deadline rather than overpaying now, I do worry about the impact of the expanded playoffs. With more playoff spots available there will be more teams in the hunt at the deadline and fewer teams that are selling, so the price for a mid-year acquisition is likely to be significantly higher than in past years.

Considering the impact of the loss of games from the pandemic and the uncertainty of the valuations (unlike the stock market you do not get a daily assessment of what someone is willing to pay for the business), a 5% increase in the value of the business seems quite healthy. I cannot feel sorry for the investment returns of the owners.

I am very curious to see how the rule changes affect the perceived values of specific players when/if implemented in majors. For instance, Kepler is viewed as someone who is hurt significantly by the shift and is pretty fast. Do the shift and (slightly) shorter base paths increase his value? Does Jeffers lose value as his framing ability gets nullified by a robo ump? Does the FO trade for someone who fits potential new rules better, taking the risk that those rules are implemented?

Wow. This is quite the shock. Along with many others I have been disappointed with much of the post-lockout trades and wondering about the competency of the FO. This signing is creative and maintains budget and roster flexibility. Most comments are supportive (if not ecstatic) about this trade. Many of those that are not supportive are by posters that seem to have nothing but criticism for the FO. Really? If you find them wholly incompetent what benefit do you get from being a fan? Find some joy in the moment!

Longtime reader who finally registered. This article I just had to comment on. This is what makes TD special. Great human interest sorry about someone I never heard of!