Open Thread: Twins offseason
Now that he has locked up the MVP, lets start discussing specifics of a possible Joe Mauer Contract extension, and any other offseason moves. This is the first time I’ve attempted anything like this so it probably won’t work. In the comments section, leave you suggestion for what the Twins should be offering Mauer and any other musings you have in regards to offseason moves.
Remaining needs to be filled
A second or thirdbaseman
One or two mid rotation starters
some bullpen help.
In the comments let me know if you agree, or disagree, or have specific players in mind to fill these and any other holes. We are approaching the winter meetings, so lets give Bill Smith some suggestions.
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Buster Olney has a good analysis of the Twins/Mauer situation:
http://insider.espn.go.com/espn/blog/index?entryID=4681683&name=olney_buster
its insider only, unfortunately.
I think Felipe Lopez should be our 2B target, Beltre should be our 3B target (assuming we can’t get Figgins on a 5/$50M deal), we should go hard after Sheets (and?/)or Harden, and we should also keep Pavano.
Bullpen-wise, I don’t think we should do anything in free agency. It’s always way too expensive, and it never works out. Better to fill those spots from within. And with Neshek & Boof coming back we’ll have some arms to go with all the young starters who won’t have a spot in the rotation due to Sheets/Harden/Pavano.
Lineup:
Rotation:
Bullpen:
Seems to me if we put that together, we ought to be the favorites in the Central.
Oh, and yes I do think we should fill both 2B and 3B, and I do think we need two starters (as long as they’re affordable).
I agree with Sirsean wholeheartedly. Unfortunately, the Twins will absolutely not do this.
My guess is they will resign Pavano and maybe trade or sign for a short term 3rd baseman.
Nicky will keep his job, based on 3 weeks against mostly AL Central crap. We won’t significantly help the SP rotation. Of course we will bat JJ Hardy (he with the low OB%)2nd, cause that’s what Tardy does.
I hope I am wrong. I would be shocked if they got Beltre. First of all he is a Boras client and there is interest out there. 2ndly, it will require a 3 year deal and Valencia is waiting in the wings. Lopez would be more likely an option, but he too will cost. I doubt they will do either, although Lopez would fit in nicely with his .380 ob% last year, in the two hole.
My guess is Crede to a one year deal, and nothing at 2nd.
Puke
Hard to believe Mauer will resign this offseason (if ever), so just do whatever it takes so that Nick Punto is not a starter. Resign Crede if you have to. Go after O. Hudson, or some other stopgap 2B (next year’s 2B crop may be better). Or give Casilla one last shot at a starting job. Hand Danny Valencia the 3B job if it comes to it. Hell, I don’t even mind if Gardy brings Punto in for D if we’re up. Just please, give me a reprieve from watching Punto strike out with a runner on 3rd and 1 out once a game. Or fail to lay down a bunt. Or ignore his 3rd base coach. Or swing for the fences, ever. Then I’ll be happy.
Those moves would all be much more reminiscent of the old-Twins way of thinking, but I’m hopeful that things will change for two reasons:
The Hardy trade, I thought, was an aggressive move that showed Mauer the front office will not be complacent.
You can choose to believe that Mauer’s not being totally truthful, if you want. But if he is being honest, then the single best way the Twins can re-sign him is to make aggressive moves to fill holes. My guess is that “more of the same,” which is what the front office is comfortable with, will drive Mauer away. And I think they know that.
I think the JJ hardy trade set the tone nicely for the offseason, but it also set the bar high. This can’t be the only move they make or they will be in trouble in the Mauer negotiations. They need to AT LEAST inquire about Figgins and/or Beltre, and one or two of the high upside pitchers sirsean mentioned a while back. Smith can’t just say “That Figgins is too expensive” He needs to go to the agent, get an estimate and see if its doable.
And I hope he communicates that to Mauer and his agent — if Mauer’s aware that they’re trying and that Figgins’ price tag is simply too high this offseason, he’ll at least know that the team is working to improve and build a winner around him.
(Secondly, they’ll need to imply that they expect revenues and thus the payroll to increase in the coming years, such that Mauer will know that even if he gets a big contract from the Twins, he won’t be surrounded by scrubs and rookies for the rest of his career. You know, a lot like he’s spent the early part of his career.)
Right. We can’t make Figgins (or any one player) sign here. we need to show we are not only actively pursuing just one but several so we fill at least one need with a high quality player. Instead of focus on just one, losing out, and then ending up with nothing.
How do you think Mauer interprets our outfield situation?
And if I’m Mauer, if the Twins sign a bottom-of-the-barrel free agent a la Ponson, ROrtiz, Sierra, Batista, Castro, etc, expecting him be any more than a backup plan and waste of money … I’m gone. No ifs, ands, or buts, and no question. The key is going after quality players, and going after enough of them that you actually get one or two.
Hmm. I don’t know how he might think about the OF. I suspect he likes both Span and Cuddyer, as players and people. He’s never said anything bad about Delmon, but I wouldn’t expect him to, really.
What do you mean by “what he thinks of the OF situation”? I think he is happy we traded for a player of Hardy’s caliber. I also think he might be nervous that our OF defense is going to take a step back, and he knows how scary this is due to most of our pitchers being fly ball pitchers.
Projecting thoughts/opinions onto Mauer probably isn’t what we should be doing, but I do kind of hope that he recognizes the fact that the pitching staff is flyball-heavy, despite Gardy’s insistence that they’re all groundball pitchers. If that’s the case, he can’t be thrilled about the OF defense’s chances this year, but I think there’s little question that having Hardy at SS 150 times is more valuable than bringing in Gomez as a late-inning defensive replacement 100 times over the course of the season.
Exactly.
For me anyway, the outfield is my primary concern.
Coco Crisp anyone? Can he still play CF?
Not well.
Dang.
Coco Crisp sucks. League average OBP, and it’s declining. Hasn’t been good in the field since 2007, and since then he’s suffered multiple serious injuries. Cannot throw — multiple anecdotes out of Kansas City early last season had scouts saying stuff like “I cannot believe a major league outfielder has an arm that bad … he makes Johnny Damon look like Clemente.”
Crisp wouldn’t solve any problems.
Anyway, I disagree that the OF is the big problem right now. Yeah, the OF defense is set to be pretty poor this year, but none of the players are eminently replaceable. Delmon needs to get better, but the Twins feel they can’t sell this low on him — and his trade value is probably such that they’s just have to non-tender him, which they surely don’t want to do. Span is definitely sticking around. Cuddyer is on contract for two years and well liked. I don’t see anything moving in the OF until 2011 at the earliest, possibly 2012.
Meanwhile, in the infield, we don’t have a 3B — unless you consider a Tolbert/Harris platoon as an adequate stopgap until we get to Valencia, a promising but untested prospect (who is not a sure thing and hasn’t exactly been lighting up the minors). And the 2B situation is little better — Punto/Casilla is nobody’s idea of a championship-caliber 2B option.
I’d say the infield is considerably less settled than the outfield, and half of it is more than replaceable; it’s must-replace.
His career CF UZR/150 is 5.8, Span’s is -13.8. Crisp used to be good, but he didn’t play much at all last year (50 games total) and the last time he played a significant number of games is UZR/150 was -15.4. I might get yelled at for using stats to measure defense, but that is the best I can come up with since I haven’t watched Crisp much in his career.
Granted I don’t have my finger on the pulse of the MLB like you guys, so I reached on Crisp. Let’s assume the Twins make two more moves. Starting pitcher and one spot in the field. Less is more, right?
Who is the bigger liability? Having Young in left field or Tolbert/Harris at third? If you upgrade one, who do you choose?
FWIW, I did look at FanGraphs on Crisp (free agent) before floating his name.
I would say we need to fix the infield problem. The most likely scenario is we are going to have one of Punto/Tolbert as a starting infielder. The infield market seems to be better than the outfield one, so I say we roll the dice with Young in left, sign a high quality free agent to play in the infield, and then do something with the rotation. Another problem with throwing a ton of money at an outfielder now is that several of our top prospects play the outfield (Revere, Hicks, Tonosi), so we don’t want to block them.
Sorry if you already looked at Crisp. Didn’t mean to get redundant on you with the stats.
Good point on Revere/Hicks/Tosoni. Organizationally, the Twins have a lot of OF depth. We wouldn’t want to lock up a declining veteran who would prevent us from using them.
Conversely, if we sign a young(ish) free agent 3B like Beltre or Figgins, it’d block Valencia. But Beltre and (especially) Figgins don’t figure to decline quickly (barring injury), and are just in their early 30s. Meanwhile, Valencia may well be at his trade value peak right now, unless he breaks out and does better in the majors than he’s done in the minors. Upgrading 3B and trading Valencia at some point in the next 18 months could be the best option.
All that said, I kind of expect Felipe Lopez to be the most sign-able of all these options, despite his delightfully high OBP. If it’s a choice between an astronomical Figgins contract, a lengthy and expensive Boras/Beltre contract, and an affordable Lopez … well, I think it’s obvious I’d favor Lopez.
The infield market is a lot better, I’ll give you that. You also raise a good point about blocking our prospects. Any ready to contribute at the MLB level yet?
Don’t block our OF or 3B prospects…so, can we go big at 2B?
Is Figgins at the point in his career where we can’t move him from third to second? I know he has kind of played all over the place, but seems to have been locked in at third recently. Any chance we can sign him to play second?
Tosoni is in AAA, but I don’t think anyone expects him to be ready in 2010. And it’d probably be wise to give him as much seasoning as possible. Hicks and Revere are still in the low minors, but are approaching the point where the Twins like to rush talented players through the system. (“Rush” probably too strong a word. Just recall the way Liriano/Garza/Slowey blew through the system once they got to high-A.)
My point re: Valencia was that blocking him shouldn’t be considered a big deal.
About Figgins, he used to be used as a super-utility guy, but everyone kind of agrees right now that his glove probably can’t play at 2B and his bat probably can’t play in LF, so he’s essentially a 3B.
And if we can only get one infielder, it might be better to get a 3B; considering that Gardy expects Punto to play, he’s much better suited to be a 2B (where his bat isn’t a huge liability) than a 3B (where his bat is a giant liability).
You know, why not Figgins at 2B? He’s not exactly a power hitter.
The word is that he no longer has the range for 2B. And given that he hasn’t played more the 9 games at second since 2005, I think it’s a safe bet that the Angels don’t consider him a viable 2B any more.
Over his entire career, he doesn’t have enough time at 2B to be statistically significant, but it’s worth looking at a couple numbers:
Yeah … I really don’t think it’s worth signing Figgins to try to play 2B, especially given how much money it’d cost to get him. He’s a 3B now.
Yeah, I knew you’d throw that out there…still, have you seen his SB numbers? Makes Punto look like a turtle.
No doubt, Figgins is a better player than Punto.
He’s both faster and a better baserunner, which is a pretty good recipe for doing better on the bases.
Works for me. Stick him at second.
The line-up of Span-Figgins-Mauer-Morneau-Cuddyer-Kubel-Hardy-Young-{Punto,Harris,Tolbert,Valencia @ 3B} as mentioned in Sizing up the infield market really looks like a lot of fun. I guess I’d be willing to roll the FunBobby dice on that outfield if we had this batting order.
Given that line-up, play Figgins wherever he wants…let’s sign the dude.
I stand by my statement that Figgins won’t be a 2B at any point in his next contract. Regardless, if the Twins can afford him and he’s willing to come to Minnesota, Smith should absolutely pull the trigger and bring him in. I’ve heard rumblings that the “big contract” people are expecting for Figgins is actually in the 5/$50M rage; if that’s true, it’s not nearly what I expected — and not nearly what he’s worth. If that contract will get him, the Twins simply need to give it to him.
(And since Figgins is considerably more valuable than Beltre, Beltre should be even cheaper. Given the way the market looks like it’s shaping up, I might consider it essentially unforgivable if the Twins don’t get either one of them.)
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Amid the all-too-common turmoil in Latin America, a peaceful and popular transfer of power in a U.S. ally deserves notice. So it went on Sunday when Juan Manuel Santos won a run-off presidential election in Colombia with 69% of the vote.
Now, that’s a landslide.
Mr. Santos is the former defense minister to Colombian President álvaro Uribe and he actively campaigned as the heir to Mr. Uribe’s “democratic security” policy. Colombians have now resoundingly ratified that policy, which over eight years has restored order to much of the countryside by scoring major victories against the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC).
Mr. Uribe moved against the guerrillas by strengthening the military while offering both rebels and their nemesis, the paramilitaries, a chance to demobilize. Among his many achievements is the drop in murders of labor union members. Because of the special protections given to labor, it is now statistically safer to belong to a union than to be a member of the general population.
Mr. Santos, a 58-year old technocrat who takes power in August, has never held elected office. But his 2006-2009 stint at defense and his commitment to continue making national security a priority made him an attractive candidate for a nation still threatened by terrorism. On Sunday 13 police and soldiers were killed by guerrillas trying to disrupt the vote. Mr. Santos has also challenged neighboring countries that provide a haven to the FARC.
This triumph also ought to echo in Washington, where Democrats in Congress and the White House continue to deny a vote on the U.S.-Colombia free trade agreement. One liberal Democratic excuse has been concerns about Mr. Uribe’s security policies, but Colombia’s people have now spoken.
Like Mr. Uribe, Mr. Santos wants the free trade deal to force his country to face the discipline of global competition and turn Colombia into the next Chile or Taiwan. Such progress would further reduce the FARC’s appeal, and it is certainly in the U.S. national interest. This one shouldn’t even be controversial.
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