Jack Griffin

I would love taking a flyer on Lamet, but I'd wager he's claimed before he gets to the Twins

I don't think the comment in the OP saying "There isn't much there" with this farm system is fair, for one big reason. When 4 out of your top 10 from the year before graduates from prospect status (Duran, Ryan, Miranda, Winder) of course your system "looks" worse.

Topic: "What to do with Sano" First Reply: "Well if Rocco could put his spreadsheets down, and have pitchers go more than 1 inning, we wouldn't have to worry about this!"

Twins did not have the prospect capital Seattle had to complete that deal, They gave up multiple top 100 prospects+. They gave up a lot for him, It definitely was not being "out maneuvered"

Arraez currently leads all Twins players with 88 games played. I'm not sure where you're getting your info from.

The sooner they trade him, the more control the acquiring team has, the more value he has

An OF of Mike Trout and Byron Buxton would be an all-time "talented but can't stay healthy" duo

OPS has been used since around the 70s. Also how do you quantify who is a better fielder between 2 players that play different positions? They both have similar OAA at the very least (Average to below average) So not sure where you're getting that info

I still maintain there is a good chance Correa opts in for another year. Next year's SS class is LOADED with talent

Well, which one is it guys? What do most scouts say? lol

The almighty, unmeasurable attribute known as "potential" lol

ooo that's a good idea. I know Griffin Jax is the first one that comes to mind. I was pretty low on Kepler after his first month or so too, but that's definitely something I'm gonna like in to.

I don't even wanna think about the name Kohl Stewart after his time with the big league ball club. lol

Haha I remember thinking it was so odd when he was drafted. The fact he has turned into a decent contributor is even funnier

The Twins pitching staff right now is not good, that absolutely goes without saying. When trying to figure out how it got to that point, that depends on who you ask. Most people play the "hindsight is 20/20" card a lot without knowing, i.e. "we shouldn't have traded xyz for abc because y turned out good or a turned out bad..." It happens all the time throughout sports. Lets play that game and check out what COULD HAVE been if the Twins were currently in a vacuum and didn't make certain moves or kept certain players. Rotation: Jose Berrios Lance Lynn Sonny Gray Michael Pineda Kyle Gibson If only we could have this rotation with the current offense the Twins have. Reversing the Berrios trade is a pretty easy one, with the return still in the minors so we are unsure how good they will both be. Although he as struggled thus far this season, if I was a betting man (which I am) I'd wager he'll figure it out soon enough. Keeping Lance Lynn is one I'm slightly unsure on, based off his 2022 results so far (Although basically everyone on that team is struggling). I, like many, want to forget his time with the Twins, plus the return on him was basically nothing, but he's been very solid since. Sonny Gray is an easy decision, he's been solid this year, same for Pineda. The name Kyle Gibson alone may turn some Twins fans heads, but he's been quietly solid for the Phillies and Rangers. Bullpen (No particular order): Brusdar Graterol Ryan Pressly Taylor Rogers Zack Littell Jhoan Duran Caleb Thielbar Trevor May Josh Winder Wow, imaging this pen compared to the nightmare we currently have is so disappointing. The bullpen is a much more interesting one to think about compared to the rotation. I choose Graterol over Maeda because I figured we needed the pen help more than the starters. Pressly was an easy one, although that removed Alcala from the potential bullpen which is unfortunate. Rogers is another easy one, Paddack and Pagan have clearly not worked out so far. Zack Littell might be a confusing one to some Twins fans, but he just had his best year with the Giants. He's really the main one I wish the Twins held on to, they could really use him this year. Duran is a no-brainer, that really requires no explanation. After that point you can really plug in a ton of different players, I just chose a few decent ones. Did I forget any big ones? Do you disagree with any of them? let's discuss.

I agree. I believe most prospects are extremely overrated when it comes to actual value

I'd wager that Sands and Smeltzer won't be a factor in the 2023 rotation, at least to start the season. Sands has been bad the whole season and Smeltzer has really fallen off a cliff in recent starts

It was the Visa, combined with poor results due to bad control. Made it an easy cut

So in your mind, the same front office that signed Carlos Correa to a contract did so with the assumption they wouldn't be contending? The Twins made this from a point of being a contender, bolstering a weak rotation and losing little value, in their eyes, bullpen wise. They didn't have the idea of "we are reducing the bullpen" they got rid of a reliever and replaced him with another. Now that Pagan has struggled you can view it a different way, but nothing else they've done has scream "we aren't contending". They just traded away their last 1st round pick for immediate MLB help, that's not something rebuilding teams do.

It cost them money for THIS season. Pagan is due 2.3 Mil this year, I'd Imagine next year that's not gonna go up much in his last year of arb. Based on his results this season, lets say 3 mil will be the settling point. Paddack is due 2.25 Mil this year, due to the injuries I'd also imagine there wont be a huge raise in his 2023 number. Lets also just say 3 for him. Keeping Rogers past this season would more than likely cost the Twins more than both of them combined next season. Not signing him to an extension is where the "future" money comes from. The Twins had a weakness in the rotation. They viewed Paddack as an upgrade to it, and Pagan as similar enough in value to Rogers. Obviously, that didn't work the way as planned, that's where the "in theory" part of this trade comes from. Holding Paddack's injury against the Twins as if they knew he was gonna tear his UCL is not a fair critique.

Since roughly 2009 the Twins have had some well... rough seasons. When a team is bad, they become sellers at the deadline, and at least me personally, stop caring as much about the active games, and switch to focusing on prospects and the future. During those bad years I become pretty fixated on prospects, so lets go over some that I really thought were gonna be good. 1. RHP Dakota Chalmers Woof. I was so high on this guy when we acquired him from Oakland for Fernando Rodney in 2018. I blame Garvin Alston, the Twins pitching coach at the time, for talking up Dakota from his time coaching in the A's minor league system. I can't quite remember what he said but I'm almost certain he called him a "potential system changing arm" and I was hooked. Chalmers had a myriad of injuries as well as off the field mental health stuff that lead to him not pitching a whole lot before coming to the Twins, but once he did he had success. In 2019 he even pitched in the AA playoffs, and everyone seemed to be talking about his stuff, I was so intrigued. He was added to the 40 man roster in 2021 and I envisioned all his success, and it was followed by struggles and a pretty quick DFA. I was devastated. Since then he has been on a few different teams with little success, and is currently in the Dodgers system. 2. RHP Fernando Romero Most Twins fans will probably remember this one, and probably at some point felt the same I did. A top arm in the Twins system for years, what wasn't to like about him. A fastball that reached 100 mph (This was pre Graterol and Duran so the Twins just frankly never saw that) and a wipeout slider to boot. We all remember his electric 2018 rookie season, where he had immediate success. He did drop off slightly as the year went on but still, the sky was the limit. That was followed by a ton of control issues in 2019 and after the season, he was out of the MLB completely (Although he potentially had a chance to re establish himself in 2020, but it was stopped completely by Visa issues. Because well... there were some things going on in the world that made it tough to travel) He is currently pitching in Japan. 3. OF Adam Brett Walker This one was more me just being young and naïve more than anything. ABW was a 3 true outcome guy before it was cool. High power, high strikeout, and not a whole lot else. I really had no reason to be high on him besides the fact he had some really exciting homeruns. Wow could he hit the ball when he connected. He really was never much of a true prospect and never even got added to the 40 man in a Twins uniform. His last year with the Twins was in 2016, he bounced around the league until 2018. He then moved to indy ball, and actually some some success as recent as 2021, but it never materialized into a second MLB chance. He's currently playing in Japan. 4. OF Oswaldo Arcia Much like Romero, I feel like most fans will remember this name. Arcia was an international FA signed in 2008, who quickly worked his way up through the levels and had a TON of success at each level. He reached the majors in 2013 and had some initial success, but really couldn't put together any consistency year-to-year. from 2013-2016 he was basically on the Twins taxi squad going up and down multiple times a year. The Twins eventually gave up on waiting and traded him to the Rays, but that didn't last very long. Altogether he was on 4 total teams (TBR, SDP, MIA, MIN) in 2016 but really had no success with any of them. In 2017 he had somewhat of a renaissance in the DBacks system, but I don't think anything could've happened to get him up with the team. Arcia was pretty much the definition of a AAAA player. He is currently playing in an Independent league. 5. RHP Alex Wimmers I don't really have an explanation on this one. He was a first round pick I suppose so that always makes you hope they work out. Wimmers had a 22 game cup of coffee from 2016-2017 and had very mediocre results. in 2018 he struggled at AAA and was released. He had a short stint that year with Miami but registered no official playing time. He is currently not playing baseball anywhere. Some of these are more defensible than others, but I just wanted to talk about them. Thanks.

The best way to describe this trade is: In THEORY it works. Paddack, who's has multiple years of control left, pitches well and bolsters the tail end of the rotation that was weak before. Pagan regains his form and is just as good as Rogers would have been, but the Twins free up future money to sign other players. But obviously that didn't work out, Paddack is hurt and Pagan has.... well, been Pagan.

They have worth roughly the same since May.

They are paying for his last year of arbitration to get a more controllable return, that's your chief complaint?

Paid in free agency, not just his base salary for his last year of arb