nicksaviking

Pelfrey just turned 31. He's definately a candidate for a four year extension from this club.

A statistically averse old school manager? I don't see a fit for him in this era of baseball. Unless the Twins fire Molitor that is.

That's my horse too. My second horse may be pulling a Houston: lowballing a prep player so he doesn't sign and getting the 7th pick in 2016 instead.

Hey layoff, it was only his first error of the year! Previously his defense was perfect!

Yeah, it's funny Biston doesn't have that one thing. When we was there, we were told to get a cannoli. Eh nothing special. If beer counts, The Sam Adams brewery gets a thumbs up from me. Lots of free samples.

Everyone. And since women are unable to play, it makes them insanely jealous. That's my working theory anyhow.

No, but that's percisely the type of behavior my wife is trying to curb. You get busted asking a stranger if he wants to play Ghostusters one time!

My wife doesn't allow me to lick strange women nor pee next to strange men.

I don't want to see a single Twin in DR Winter League next year. The front office should already be figuring out how to break it to the young guys.

Arcia is too young to platoon. If there are attitude or behavioral issues, a team imposed suspension or benching could be considered, though not if the issues are arrogance or over-confidence.

Agreed. Smith was largely known as a bean counter so it's doubtful he actually made any moves without thurough consultation. It would be interesting to find out who was involved in all those decisions. While Ryan had retired, he was still consulting with the team. For all we know, the good, the bad and the ugly may have all still been in part influenced even by Ryan himself.

Dalton Hicks and I have a Cinderella story to finish.

While this is on Santana, there doesn't seem to be any supporting evidence that any team other than the Twins were willing to give this guy more than a one year deal, and the Twins of course tried to sign him up for three+ years twice. I'd guess the other clubs were rightfully suspicious about his consistancy, age or his UCL, but for all we know, other clubs had doping suspicions, especially his former clubs who knew him much better. There's one thing that I've been thinking about today. I think it's pretty well understood that Ryan is well respected in the league, regardless if fans here think he should be replaced. I'd bet that normally GMs may warn other GMs they like about particular players, however, in this case Ryan probably would have been kept out of the loop. The Braves made a QO clearly to only get a draft pick as they made no further attempt to re-sign him, so John Hart wasn't going to be giving anyone a heads-up and Dayton Moore probably would feel compelled to keep his mouth shut so a division rival would be hurt by the consequences. And of course judging by how he handled himself with the Josh Hamilton situation, Jerry DiPoto has no friends and is a world class scumbag.

Well let's just hope if contracts become voidable, teams would handle themselves as classy as the Angels are now with the Josh Hamilton situation.

Well they already all claim they don't know how it got in their system so the excuses would be the same.

You're not really going to start insisting on reasonable doubt? Did another club benefit from Santana last year? The Braves are under budget and were needing pitching going into the off season. The probably made no effort to sign him because they knew.

Ryan can't be blamed for Santana taking steroids, but he can be blamed for signing a 32 year old pitcher with a torn UCL to a four year deal. It's not just armchair fans who were critical of the move, most pundits nationally couldn't figure out why a team on the verge of promoting its young talent would do that to the roster.

The Braves should not be benefitting from a draft pick when they were the team benefitting from Santana's cheating.

In the business world they call it inside information. In the underground gambling world they call it losing at Russian Roulette.

I don't like the idea that the local homer media types will now use this as an excuse for the Twins front office, ignoring every national publication that predicted a terrible 2015 for the Twins before the Santana incident. They're just not making wise decisions. The poor decision to sign an aging pitcher was bad, but now they are making bad auxiliary moves in reaction to it. I know plenty of front office supporters would even agree. I like the men in charge as actual human beings, but this can't continue. Why is this team so damn old after so many losing seasons? What will it take to get new people in charge who will sacrifice the now for the future?

While I think we are all hoping for this, that means there's a ton of players to clear off the 25-man. Unless we're talking a ton of significant injuries, it wouldn't seem to me the front office would be comfortable losing 11 players even if many of the posters here may. Sano alone would seem to make Plouffe, Hunter, Arcia, Mauer or Vargas have to move. We're not even talking about the cutable guys like Herrmann, Schaffer or Robinson. Then make room for ten more guys? I don't think the team is OK with this much in season turnover.

But I could care less if Plouffe and Dozier start losing velocity due to the natural decline that comes with a build up of innings and age.

Of equal concern to me: Who can get righties out?

Mauer will be fine if he goes ahead and makes a concerted effort in beating the Mauer shift, he always was a good enough hitter to do what he wanted with the ball anyway. However it was clear last year that he needed to adjust, and he didn't, so I'm not sure he's willing or able to adjust any longer.

For pitchers, I'm very on board for limited innings at the upper levels. Again, not sure what they can learn in the minors they can't at the majors.