A scary trade deadline looms

 Despite what you may have heard about the Twins, they are still in a close race for the American League Central. They haven't been good, and are sitting just below .500 on the season. With the rotation they are trotting out, and some big money locked up in the lineup, the fact that they have a better than 50/50 shot at the post season meants that, without a doubt, at the end of the month, they will be one of the deadline buyers.

Yikes. 

If you look at the scale of trades the current organization has made, deadline sell offs would be #1 in their skill set (think of Joe Ryan and Jhoan Duran), while offseason deals would be number two. Deadline acquisitions have been a painful exercise of "be careful what you wish for". So often, Twins fans, myself included, have begged for the Twins to be active at the deadline, to supplement runs to the playoffs. It's impossible to understate how badly this has imploded.

This year, as I have noted, the problem is with the areas they need to supplement. Not only do we have a fairly tragic recent history with deadline deals, but the Twins are in a position to bolster a unit that might as well improve if they can get improved production from prospects that the Twins have been waiting along for some time.

The outfield is the greatest weakness right now for the Twins, but the players I think most fans would like to see on the roster from St. Paul are Trevor Larnach and Matt Wallner. Do you trust young players to revive a moribund offense? Do you want the team to expend the resources it would take to add a premium bat, knowing the recent history of the front office? Especially if that acquisition means less time for Larnach or Wallner or any other youngster trying to make their way into the league?

The front office has not been afraid to make moves to update the roster, and they have been conscious about areas that need to be addressed. What will they decide needs to be addressed, and what is the best way to do it? The track record tells us that the Twins will make moves that make a ton of sense, and patch holes in an efficient and thoughtful way. The same track record tells us that the move will almost immediately blow up in the Twins' face. 

There is no solution

It's another frustrating season for Twins fans. They started off well, and have proceeded to get worse as the season has dragged on. The summer warm up has not led to an offensive renaissance, and in fact have seen the offensive struggles balloon. Most of Twins Twitter is demanding some sort of change, lamenting the changes that were made in the last year or so and simply calling into question the organization.

The last couple of weeks in particular have been hard to watch. The offense has flailed, the bullpen is showing wear, and the rotation has simply been unable to keep the blistering pace they had early in the season. In past years, the solution out of the team hole was always apparent. Get more pitching.

Now the Twins have pitching, featuring one of the best rotations in baseball, even if they have been a bit over their own heads to this point. The problem is an offense that doesn't score enough to forgive the prodigious amount of strikeouts. The team often looks listless at the plate, and again are finding ways to fall on their face during important moments. 

The roster hasn't had the same injury issues that it did in recent years. The gravest underperformers are relatively healthy players that are not easily replaced. Meanwhile, people you might expect to be to blame are buoying the team. Willi Castro is the most productive Twin by WAR. Joey Gallo has a 110 OPS+, meaning that his productivity is 10% better than league average, despite a sub 200 average and so many strikeouts. 

Players with new contracts, Christian Vazquez and Carlos Correa are having bad starts to the year, though Correa has finally had a bit of life in his bat in patches. Players expected to be building blocks for the future, like Jose Miranda and Trevor Larnach haven't been good enough to maintain their spots on the roster, and certainly aren't at the level of what a team would hope for from a corner fielder. 

The offense needs a jump start. We can complain about the bullpen all we want, but a strong bullpen is a luxury that matters only to the very good teams. The Twins aren't very good. But what do you fix on this Twins team that hasn't already been addressed? Royce Lewis and Alex Kirilloff are getting regular playing time. You can't well take Correa out of the lineup. Really, the only player still getting regular reps that shouldn't be is Max Kepler. If he is dropped, Larnach probably gets the next shot, though Matt Wallner can't be kept at bay much longer.

Even then, the most important thing that needs to happen is that the guys on the roster start getting better results. Players perform to the capabilities we know and expect, and the Twins are suddenly running away with the division. This is the third year in a row that this hasn't been happening, though, and one has to wonder if there is a systemic problem.

The Twins under Rocco Baldelli were at their best when Derek Shelton was the bench coach, James Rowson was the hitting coach and Wes Johnson was the pitching coach. Johnson leaving in the middle of last season was immediately felt, but not having Shelton or Rowson has been a slower burn. The coaching staff now is largely unproven even after a couple of years on the job.

Like I said, though, losing Johnson mid season was only a negative last year, and changing the coaching staff mid stride on a baseball team isn't a great way to improve morale or results. If the Twins can't shake off these doldrums, much like the last two seasons, it will be time to remake Baldelli's bench, up to, and perhaps including Baldelli himself.

But that isn't something to be done now. Right now, there are no fixes, so expect fans to keep getting upset about hypotheticals and living in the past. 

At least these Twins are different

 The thing that plagued the Twins under Terry Ryan was an all encompassing reluctance to ever do anything. They would trust their roster, their development, and wouldn't make the big deadline buys or free agent acquisitions. It drove me nuts. 

The problem was an over-devotion to their prospects, most of whom were pitching prospects, and none of whom were as good as the Twins seemed to believe. Kevin Slowey was rumored to be a part of trade packages nearly every year in the late 00's, and ultimately left for a PTBNL in a forgettable move. For their part, the Twins, after adding Rick Reed and Shannon Stewart at the beginning of the millennium failed to make any significant deals while TR was in town.

Frankly, I would have preferred some deadline excitement, a sign that the Twins were trying to invest in a particular season, over the privilege of seeing Kevin Slowey's entire illustrious career first hand. Bill Smith and Rob Antony in his brief tenure were, at the very least, of average aggression in making moves and taking risks. 

As we in Minnesota are all surely aware right now, the Derek Falvey/Thad Levine tandem are much more aggressive in their roster construction than the Twins have ever seen in their experience. Sure, there has been a change from Carl Pohlad to his clearly more free spending descendants, but even know, Falvey and Levine aren't spending at the highest end of Major League Baseball. What I am saying is, the increase in trade activity is philosophical, and not financial.

The issue with Falvey and Levine right now is that we can lament the players that the Twins lost and suggest that the Twins are now on the wrong path, that standing pat is the right move. Luis Arraez is hitting .400. Spencer Steer and Casey Legumina are part of the Reds roster, and Yennier Cano might be an all star in Baltimore. 

You can gripe about that all you want, but the Twins also traded for Sonny Gray. You can complain about Luis Arraez, but the Twins added Pablo Lopez, a better player than Kevin Slowey ever was, AND added a top ten prospect. In my opinion, at least, it's better to be proactive and fix weaknesses. Title runs are not guaranteed, and teams should try to take advantage of the opportunities.

Of course, the success rate of the 2000s Twins and the 2020s Twins is nearly exactly the same. While the Twins are indeed different in operating style and aggression, they still maintain the very same losing streak in the postseason. It will at least be satisfying to know that this generation of the Twins' bureaucracy will not head closer to the offseason quietly. Unlike Terry Ryan, they will do SOMETHING.

It remains to be seen if it will be effective.