Mr. Brooks

I'm sure the Red Sox would love to make out that good. Realistically, the Sox are going to have to give a pretty good prospect or two along with Price.

That's true, but I don't see anyone asking for the Twins to match the Yankees spending.

Yeah, I don't understand how he can say they've been run poorly, while also saying the Stroman trade was incredibly light. Which is it?

I don't agree. If anything, I think Cleveland won the Kluber trade, Kluber looks cooked and is expensive. The rough Twins equivalent of the Stroman package is Duran and Thorpe. That seems pretty fair to me.

That's a little bit of a gray area. Spending on free agents isn't the same as discretionary spending for a household. These are investments. There are certainly people who invest more aggressively than others who earn a higher income.

Rendon wasn't complimenting his new city/team. The sources were saying that he DOESN'T like the LA lifestyle, and therefore wasn't interested in signing with the Dodgers. And yes, I realize that Anaheim is just a short drive from LA, I'm just the messenger, maybe Rendon didn't know that!

That's not close to enough to get Thor, IMO.

Probably not. But, the Twins likely won't come close to spending their entire budget, and I think they're better with Romo than they are without him, so overpaying him a million or two has zero impact, IMO.

$500k is the buyout if they decline the option

You have to account for the fact that Berrios 3.68 ERA came in one of the most prolific offensive seasons of all time. You also have to account for league. Here are their respective ERA+ (adjusted to league average for given season). Berrios: 124 Lincecum: 114 Garcia: 104 Vogelsong: 105 Lester: 110 Hudson: 97 Ventura: 103 Hendricks: 196 McCullers: 96 Eovaldi: 112 Corbin: 141 So, with a little context, Berrios last year was actually better than all but Hendricks and Corbin.

Jason Castro had a league average OPS. Not league average for a catcher, league average for all positions. Astudillo had an OPS 21 percent below league average. How is league average "way worse" than 21 percent below league average?

I took his point to be that the Twins could trade Rosario for pitching then sign one of those free agents.

Every player on the MLB roster is fairly open to criticism, be it the 1st or 26th.

The flip side to that would be, if those guys are viewed equal or better than Rosario, than why would the Marlins trade for Rosario rather than just sign one of those guys for less money?

Didn't watch their games. In what regard were they lucky?

How is this thrift store shopping? How much do you expect any team, not just the Twins, to spend on the backup catcher?

Of course, this also speaks to why everyone wants a signing from the top 2 tiers. Most of the other title contenders weren't going to be considering Pineda to start game 1, no matter how well he was pitching down the stretch.

It was one game, but it was the biggest game in most of our lifetimes. Penn State was a great win, but there was no pressure on the Gophers. The Wisconsin game was for a Conference championship game, against our biggest rival, at home. The pressure was high, and they responded by completely disappearing. To me, that says a lot about who they are as a team. You disagree, you think it's just one game and the loss doesn't signal anything aside from that they lost one game. That's fine, not everyone has to agree, but please have enough respect not to demand that people have to be a fan your way or not at all. I already said they have nothing to be embarrassed about, they had a good season, and had an awesome win against Penn State. I also said I don't think we've seen the best of the Fleck era yet. I'm somewhat sour because after the Penn State win I was fooled into thinking this team was special. They weren't. When it mattered, and the season came down to one game they didn't show up. I'm still hopeful though that Fleck can make some recruiting adjustments and build a great team soon.

Ok, but Fresno State is just one game. Scheduling a team like South Dakota is a joke, IMO.

We feel drastically different about the quality if this team. That's fine, but it's the root of our disagreement. They weren't competitive at home against Wisconsin. So I respectfully disagree that they can compete with anyone outside of the top 25. Based on the Wisconsin and Iowa games, I think they'll struggle to beat any ranked team.

Why did you put "2 or more wins against top 15" in quotations, since I certainly never said that? They beat one good team, one. I said nothing of the rankings of teams they played. They don't have to apologize for their schedule, and the Penn State win was a great win. But their schedule afforded them the opportunity to affirm that they were a great team (Iowa and Wisconsin) and they shrunk in the moment. If the argument is that they don't get to pick their schedule, all they can do is play it, then there is two things I'd say. 1) They do get to choose their nonconference schedule. There is no rule that says they have to schedule cream puffs. 2) They didn't beat the schedule that was given to them. They beat all the bad teams, then had an awesome win against Penn State, that they don't have to give back, but then ultimately came up short when the games mattered. I'm not saying they have to be embarrassed or anything. It was a good, but far from great season. Hopefully it will make them better in the future because of it. But, for this year, they aren't a great team, and I feel that new year's day bowls should be for great teams.

As disappointed as I am in this loss, I'm confident we haven't seen the peak of this team. Fleck needs to recruit some legit running backs though, and some reinforcements for the front 7 on defense. And have a long talk with whomever thinks it's a good idea to give Rodney Smith the bulk of the carries, I don't get that.

Oops, my bad for assuming that Google would know I want the current schedule, not 2017. You're right, it is a pretty weak schedule.

As for the weather being a bad matchup against Wisconsin: someone might want to tell PJ that they play in an outdoor stadium in Minnesota. If cold snowy weather is ever a disadvantage to the home team, that's 100% on recruiting.

I agree the Gophers are good. I just don't think they're great. A great team doesn't lose both Iowa and Wisconsin games. They at least split.I think new year's day games should be reserved for great teams. Clemson has 3 wins against top 25 teams, including one win against a top 10 team. I'm not sure what schedule you're looking at. EDIT: Incorrect info on Clemson schedule, oops.