Vigilance

 I will readily admit to you that I don't know much about anything, but I will say that one thing that has made itself evident over the years, and has done so prominently especially in the last decade or so is that the extremely wealthy in the world are primarily focused on retaining their wealth. There are exceptions to this rule, of course, but generally speaking, if you are profoundly rich, it is because you have dedicated your life to accruing that money.

I'll let you determine your own morality, but if you have something you care deeply about, and are passionate about, weather it be money, or internet clout or whatever, you will be protective of it. So let's circle back to the super rich. 

Because of this world view that I have cynically developed over time, whenever billionaires are involved, I suspect there is an element of self preservation or financial exploitation involved. AI leaders are looking for AI regulations from the government right now. The overriding theory is that it is to have guardrails against rogue artificial intelligence. Industrial leaders have supported stricter immigration, despite an increasingly Hispanic workforce/ Major League Baseball wants a salary cap, but it also wants a salary floor. 

AI companies are making these calls for changes to the industry, even as we continue to hear more and more about the high cost of producing artificial intelligence, the less optimistic outlook on the industry, and the slow down in adoption of AI agents. With so many investors in these companies, so much attention and so many promises, I'm sure that these owners are looking for a scapegoat (regulators) while trying to continue to promote their project (look how powerful it is!)

The vilification of immigrants fuels racism at all levels, which effectively fractures the workforce. Foreign workers don't join unions, and payrolls are reduced without the negotiating power. More money to corporate bottom line. 

And baseball owners, too, see the writing on the wall. TV revenue is going to be distributed to all teams, and there will be no advantage for being in a big market. Rather than look like they are getting cheap, they will be able to point to a cap as the reasonon they no longer can afford big new contracts. They will also use the floor as a way to distribute payroll so it is paid by lowe income teams, through pass through trades or buy outs. 

Rich people care about money. They do not care about silly things like people's well being or baseball parity. Maybe I'm wrong on specifics, but be a little circumspect when people make an offer that seems too good to be true. 

In 2027, watching the Twins will come down to every individual player

 My long standing opinion, whether I have been able to fully grasp it or not, is that sports and baseball especially, should be fun. When I started on this writing journey 20 years ago (yikes) I thought that winning is the only way it could be fun. Winning certainly is fun, but scaling the picture down to an individual game and appreciating the gameplay, strategy and environment can be fun, and zooming out, you an appreciate development and the ecosystem of your organization. 

After last years dismantling of the bullpen, and the bad feelings that resulted, along with a butchered attempted sale of the team, it was hard to get too many people bought in on the concept of a fun baseball season. I was optimistic, if not for fun, than for winning. My recipe was to appreciate the development of young players, enjoy areas where the team exceeded expectations and don't put too much stock in the comment section at Twins Daily. 

For most of the season, the Twins were in the hunt, which was fun! They certainly exceeded expectations, and saw enormous development from Taj Bradley and Brooks Lee, continued contribution from Byron Buxton and Kody Clemens, and plenty of leg room at the ballpark for all 6'3" of me. 

It was enough for the Twins to make a move at the deadline to bolster their bullpen. Of course, injury and fatigue dragged down the second half of the season, but on the plus side, we finally got to tap into the vaunted top of the Twins prospect pool. Kaelen Culpepper, Walker Jenkins and Emmanuel Rodriguez are all here now (along with Ben Ross and Aaron Sabato, for good measure).

I worry that next year will be a struggle, even for me, to find the fun. I don't know much about labor negotiations, but I do know that the one we are barreling towards sounds like a real catastrophe in the making. I don't want to go on a salary cap/floor tangent right now, but I think any institution of such a system will have disastrous unforeseen consequences. I think not instituting a system will result in a lockout that costs a big chunk of the season. Already, independent of the Twins, we are looking at some bad vibes. 

At the very least, the team assembly will likely be rushed. It can't possibly be more convoluted than this past offseason, but even if Jeremy Zoll has the green light to add to the payroll, the make up of the roster doesn't lend itself to any specific big money endeavors. So the Twins might either continue with a diminished payroll, go after poor fits, or simply give the playing time to the young emerging players.

There is likely to be a lot of negative energy around baseball, and I don't know how the Twins are going to thread what is left of the offseason and make fans happy, or anticipatory. The glow is coming off of all the young recent debutants, because they will now be expected to contribute. Luke Keaschall had a strong season this year, but he is now lost in the field, which means he must be an excellent hitter. Royce Lewis has strung a couple bad seasons in a row together, and there is a legitimate wonder if he has a place on the team any longer. 

If the younger players don't contribute on their low salaries, then the team is cheap, as they alway are. The player development is insufficient. And frankly, we all saw Edouard Julien, Jose Miranda and Matt Wallner sputter away blazing starts. Fans will go into the season looking for reasons for skepticism. 

I think the correct route for the roster is to let it breathe. Very little should change, except where contracts are expiring, and young players should get their experience at the Major League level. Unfortunately, recent prospect flameouts and a longstanding unwillingness by ownership to spend money will make it easy for the fanbase to move quickly to scapegoating as the team has it's growing pains.

The Twins are a team on the rise, with a bumper crop of young prospects and allegedly, new life in the ownership box. Those should be good indicators of a fun year ahead. Unfortunately, the labor landscape will pollute the offseason, and the narrative surrounding the team doesn't seem to let people view the Twins as ascendent.

The nice thing about a young team is the knowledge that the players will be members of the organization for a while. Get to know the players. Kaelen Culpepper seems to have great energy. Lewis is relentlessly positive. Keaschall and Lee seem to have some quirks lurking below the surface. Walker Jenkins, thus far, seems to have the personality of a block of wood, and as someone with a similar personality, that is fun in it's own way too! 

If I start to lose sight of enjoying the team, I know I can focus on appreciating the players for who they are. Baseball is the cadence of summer, an ongoing story every year. Winning, losing, strategy, development, it's always the players that make it fun.

The Twins' long term legacy

 There are many positions in many different markets that have a heralded status. Quarterback of the Dallas Cowboys, point guard for the Lakers, center for the Pittsburgh Penguins, those kinds of things. Positions that have a stake because of the history of success for that team, and also because of the popularity and identity of the team within the market. 

The Twins have had a common thread that has remained nearly unbroken throughout my entire life, even as it has bucked trends across the sport of baseball, and has transcended regimes in the Twins organization. I don't believe it is something that has ever been intentional, but the fact that the Twins have featured so many successful African American outfielders is, at the very least, a statistical anomaly.

African American participation in youth baseball, right on up through the Major Leagues has been dropping for decades, and in the meantime, the League has drawn more international players, particularly from the Dominican Republic and Venezuela. The Twins have not followed along with either pattern.

Until Emmanuel Rodriguez arrived on the scene, the Twins' only non-American on the roster was Yoendrys Gomez, which hearkened back to the late 2000s, when a reported factor in Carlos Gomez's stalled development was a lack of Spanish speaking coaches in the organization. 

That's pretty on the nose, but it speaks to a larger point: it's hard to be on your own, and it is a lot easier if you are in a new situation with people you have similarities with, especially when they can serve as mentors. Miguel Sano's best season was when Nelson Cruz was around, Luis Arraez first joined a roster with countrymen Marwin Gonzalez and Ehire Adrianza. 

As a middle aged white guy, I have no idea what it would be like to grow up as a young black ball player, but I bet Byron Buxton does, and before him, Torii Hunter and Ben Revere and Aaron Hicks and all the way to Kirby Puckett and Shane Mack. Coaches can teach fundamentals and strategy, but having someone with a similar background can help you feel comfortable, like you belong and to figure out more important parts of life.

Through the draft, trades and free agency, the Twins have sustained this throughline that was able to include multiple iterations of the "Soul Patrol," and two different stadiums. I think this is pretty cool. I'm mostly here for the statistical anomaly, because I'm not gifted enough to expound on the societal impact and obvious advantages, though there certainly are those, especially in a place like Minnesota. 

I'm not sure that there was any intentionality for the betterment of the Twins, and I am fairly sure there isn't, but this history of black outfielders in the Twins organization has meant a long lasting incubator for talent development that has lasted through multiple generations of Twins general management. What a legacy. 

Is the Bears offense.... .good?

 In my ongoing "Following the Compass" efforts, in which I draw a random game off of a random team's schedule, and try to attend or watch it, I selected the San Diego Padres and the Chicago Bears this year. The Padres game was last month against the Mets, while the Bears game will come next month on Monday night against the Eagles. Since I had children, I've not made it to nearly as many games as the 1 or 2 a year I used to get to, but I still make a point of following teams and watching the games, however I'm able. 

Since I haven't been getting to games and streaming is a more prominent possibility, I am also becoming more invested in the teams. The Padres have been a fun watch all year, especially when my other primary option has been the Twins. If one week is to be judged, it looks like the really fun watch will be the Chicago Bears. 

It's extremely important not to get too hung up on early season results, given how much maturation, development or injury can affect a team moving forward, but seeing Chicago nearly put up 60 points during their opening game of the season is jarring. Even when the Bears have been good in the past, it was on the back of their defense, and a couple of great running backs. Defenses and strong ground games don't often amount to high point totals. 

The Bears have been trying for as long as anyone has been around to find the mix that would help them develop a passing game and score some points. They've drafted or traded for quarterbacks that just never seemed to work out, for decades. These are just the regular starters, the guys who were supposed to start for the Bears, since Jim McMahon won the Super Bowl with the team:
Mike Tomczak
Jim Harbaugh
Erik Kramer
Cade MCNown
Jim Miller
Rex Grossman
Kyle Orton
Jay Cutler
Mitch Trubisky
Justin Fields
and now, finally, Caleb Williams.

Jim Harbaugh was tough, and Rex Grossman led the team to the Super Bowl. Jay Cutler was the longest tenured of the group, but none of them have done what Williams has done: Started every game in two consecutive seasons. In fact, 2024 saw Williams start all 17 games, the first QB to start every game for the Bears since Cutler in 2009. Since that 86 team, it was Harbaugh in 91, Kramer in 95, Grossman in 06 and Cutler. That is the list of season long quarterbacks for the Chicago Bears for the last 40 years. 

Having consistency at quarterback is a product of having a decent offensive line and a real game plan. The Bears hired Ben Johnson to be their coach before last season, and he has installed a new scheme, that for once, is working. Keeping Williams protected is the most important tenet. Letting him work is the next.

For one week, at least, the offense has clicked in 2026. They will play the Vikings in Week 2 to get a little bit more of a test on offense. It's been half a century in the making. 

Now, about that defense. 

This season has gone better than expected.

 It's incredible to be writing about this anniversary, 25 years later. It seems both so distant, something that has always been there, like something I learned in history, but it seems as though it was only yesterday. We are far removed enough that the features and remembrances are all covering how we collectively tried to move on, and a retrospective look back that reminds us that indeed, our lives have been irretrievably altered. I'm going to talk about baseball now, the current Twins team, with the memory of Mike Piazza hitting a home run in the first game back in New York, and the notion that while baseball can be unimportant, it's ability to entertain, distract and delight can be the vital cog in continuing on with our lives. It's important because it's fun. Before I move on today, go ahead and read Cody Christie at Twins Daily, and his retelling of an incredible walk off home run. 

It feels to me that all of the negative nellies around the Twins fan and journalistic base are finally getting their way. The Twins are stumbling into the end of the year, and the same outlets that have been forecasting doom and gloom for the team since the deadline last year are now lamenting another collapse, and are exasperated, ostensibly, at the continued late season struggles the Twins have had lately. 

The Twins will finish below .500, but were competitive for longer than most anticipated this year, and will finish with a better record than many had anticipated when the season started. Until very recently, I would say it has been a fun year. What made it compelling to me was the future cogs of the team that have stepped into important roles.

Taj Bradley has exceeded expectations, and looks to be a rotation fixture, while in the bullpen, Andrew Morris has taken an important role in the bullpen. Before he got hurt, Mick Abel looked capable, and Zebby Matthews has recently seemed to step up. All of those guys are young pitchers that are going to be a part of the future pitching staff for a couple of years. Kendry Rojas acquitted himself well in a long relief role.

On offense, Kody Clemens has had a career year, and will be under team control through his peak. Brooks Lee had question marks at short, then shifted to third base and has also settled into a role as one of the top power hitters in the lineup. He's only 25 , and he could certainly be a 30 home run a year hitter in due time. After very slow starts, Luke Keaschall has become one of the better pure hitters on the team. While Royce Lewis may not ever reach the apex of the potential we saw in 2023, he has shown a willingness to adapt and go where the team asks him with a smile on his face. He's not making that much money, and if you accept what is rather than what could have been, Royce can be a valuable member of the organization.

And the Twins are able to use the tail of the season to evaluate some of the upper echelon of their minor league system. Connor Prielipp has already made the leap early in the year, but Kaelen Culpepper has been electric since joining the team. Heck, even just today, Emmanuel Rodriguez came up and pulled a Kaelen, hitting a homer in his debut, too. Walker Jenkins has struggled, but Alen Roden is waiting in the wings. Roden's biggest flaw, as I can see it, is that his name isn't Walker Jenkins. He will be helpful next year as well.

The team, when you look at how they are constituted, is clearly on the come up. It's a fundamentally different team than it was last year, and especially two years. They already turned over the roster and bottomed out, but are already turning it back around. They are better this year than many thought they would be, and continue to trend ahead. 

There are only a couple of weeks left on the season, but given the long term arc of the team, I would say they are ahead of schedule. Most of the credit comes from the players on the field and the Major League coaching staff, given the tumult behind the scenes. Not many Twins writers in the region will give you this perspective, but things are looking up in Twins Territory.

The 2023 draft, and turning it into 2026 success.

 It's entirely possible that the Indianapolis Colts are going to be stumbling into a decent season this year. Generalized impatience in the NFL is a big part of the reason. Specifically, that impatience, and the effect it has on the Minnesota Vikings are direct reasons why the Colts may be poised for their first divisional win in over a decade. 

There are two areas that the Colts are hoping to turn pressure every team feels into diamonds for themselves. That is to say, there are two elements of the Colts that will be better, thanks to one singular pressure that is felt by teams across the NFL. Find a quarterback, and find him now. 

Back in 2024, the Vikings were moving on from Kirk Cousins, who had sustained a season ending injury and was at the end of his contract. Without a reasonable heir to the position, the Vikings went to the draft looking for a quarterback. The Vikings were not the only team looking for a quarterback, and ultimately, they were the 5th team to select a quarterback at pick number 10. 

The Colts, meanwhile, had Anthony Richardson, who they still thought was the quarterback of the future, and the 15th pick in the draft. They selected Laiatu Latu, their new defensive end, who is now starting on a continually strengthening defense. Latu was the first defensive player drafted in 2023, despite the pick coming halfway through the round. 

Another element of this rush for quarterbacks was the abandonment of previously regarded prospects. The Vikings saw it that year as well. They selected JJ McCarthy with that 10th pick, only to see him fall to injury in the preseason. Journeyman Sam Darnold, who had flamed out in New York and Carolina went to a team with a good system and coach, and some experience under his belt, and left the Vikings back to the playoffs. Darnold's image rehabilitated, left Minnesota to go to Seattle the following offseason, and won the Super Bowl with the Seahawks.

During that 2024 season, the Vikings also picked up Daniel Jones, the castoff from the other New York team to learn in the Vikings system. Minnesota wanted a low cost quarterback to build around for a while, so were committed to McCarthy. The Colts had seen Richardson struggle through injury filled years, and opted to bring in a quarterback with a little bit of experience. Jones came to Indy, and excelled, much like, though not as great a degree as Darnold in Minnesota. 

If you think the pressure to find a quarterback is intense in Minnesota, Darnold and Jones both washed out of New York, where the public glare even harsher. Also, part of the impatience means teams are looking to move on if your guy hasn't clicked during his rookie contract. There are some incredible athletes that are in fortunate situations and achieve immediate success, but then there are others that fall into a place like Giants Stadium and reach an immediate plateau.

What those guys, and many quarterbacks need is the grace, time and resources to develop. Darnold eventually got that in San Francisco, and maybe Jones had that a bit in Minnesota. Again, the Vikings are trying it again with Kyler Murray this season. Indianapolis knew better to throw away the more capable inexpensive option than to circle back to Richardson. They also have Anthony Richardson to thank for feeling comfortable enough to draft for defense and take advantage of the board in 2023. 

But more accurately, they have a leaguewide patience deficit to thank for their position now. We'll see how good it is starting on Sunday. 

The Cap is a trap

 As the 2026 season enters it's final month, we can start to get a picture of what the 2027 lineup will look like. It's full of promise, and now, with young players getting experience playing meaningful baseball, it looks like the next window will open much sooner than we were expecting. 

To wit, the roster on opening day next year may look like this:

C - Victor Caratini
1b - Royce Lewis
2b - Kody Clemens
SS - Kaelen Culpepper
3b - Brooks Lee
OF - Walker Jenkins, Byron Buxton, and one of Trevor Larnach, Austin Martin, Luke Keaschall, Alan Roden or Emmanuel Rodriguez, with another as the DH. 

SP - Joe Ryan, Pablo Lopez, Taj Bradley, Zebby Matthews, Baily Ober

RP - Jeff Hoffman, Yoendrys Gomez, Andrew Morris, Cole Sands, Connor Prielipp, Kody Funderburk

I think that team, goes into the 2027 with substantially more optimism. Now here is a thought exercise for you.

Let's say the next CBA gets agreed to, and there is not only a salary cap but the salary floor so many fans think will fix baseball. If the floor is at $150m as has been commonly bandied about, the Twins, with the above roster, would be well short of that number. So how are you getting there?

The first option is raises all around, with extensions for the arbitration eligible players. The second is to dramatically overpay to fill out the bullpen and the bench. The third option involves hijinks, not dissimilar to what you see in the other sport that famously has a salary floor, the NHL. 

Major League Baseball has had a free market for decades, and most teams still won't be worrying about the cap. Rebuilding teams like the Twins will be worried about hitting the floor. I can see a couple ways of doing this without paying for mediocre players to block elite young prospects.

The first is the salary dump. Let's say the Dodgers really want to keep Teoscar Hernandez, but know that he isn't worth the salary he is making any longer, especially as they try to get under the cap. The Reds have no use for him, but agree to take Hernandez and his salary, and a prospect, then immediately release him. He signs back with the Dodgers for the league minimum.

Hearkening back to the Dodgers, since they seem to have a creative front office and are really the reason this conversation has started in the first place, let's look at the other solution I can foresee. This is a favorite in the NHL, the pass through trade. In this scenario, two top payroll teams are trying to fit a deal with one another, and it isn't working. Let's say the Dodgers are looking to add one of the high priced and disappointing Mets this offseason. To work this one out, the Mets send, let's say Marcus Semien, to Los Angeles. The Mets and Dodgers both want to get under the cap, so they enlist your Minnesota Twins to pay Semien's salary. The Mets and Twins get prospects, the Dodgers get the star infielder. 

A salary cap and salary floor isn't going to redistribute players, but rather salaries. If you look at the media landscape right now, and hear talk about where it is headed, it sounds like all baseball teams will be on a common media plan, and the fiscal advantage of local TV contracts will be gone. The Dodgers and Yankees will only have an advantage if their owners' aggression, and no longer one of market size.

A salary cap will give the big market teams a scapegoat as they pare their payroll, something they are going to need to do in the near future anyway. A salary floor will simply shift the burden to smaller teams, and have them foot the bill for the big market salaries. 

Payroll manipulation isn't going to work how you think it will, and it won't work how you want it to. It will primarily benefit the wealthiest owners, and won't really affect on the field competitiveness. The lengthy rookie and arbitration contracts already take players deep into their prime, and large contracts go to old players as they hit the back end of their best years. The Dodgers have won the last two World Series, but the longest active playoff streak is only 12 years, and it belongs to the other team in Los Angeles, the Angels. There is no parity problem as it relates to market size. It has to do with front office ability and ownership will. (see: Tampa Bay Rays, San Diego Padres) 

Tie up some loopholes in contract rules, absolutely, but also focus on the development of your internal talent and don't encourage a plan that benefits not only billionaire owners, but the wealthiest ones that are already winning. 

Cooking with Ryan: Spreadsheet Salads

 I'm going to be a bit vulnerable here for a minute. About a year ago, I was diagnosed as diabetic, which stinks, but you can't really fight genetics. Mine is well controlled, but will be an ongoing struggle to continue to control. The best way to maintain a healthy blood sugar is through diet and exercise. 

I've dramatically limited my sugar intake, and I am more thoughtful about exercise in terms of timing and the type I do, and I've done well. I'm eating a lot of salad. 

But bagged salads, or salads from restaurants or working off a recipe can get repetitive or expensive. As you may know, I like a little chaos in my life, so I started randomly pulling ingredients to make a salad, using a random number generator. Don't worry, it actually tastes fine most of the time. It's like a salad bar.

So, since I am eating all these salads anyway, and because there are actually a few different things like this for other types of food or beverage, I decided to turn my Spreadsheet Salads into something shared online.

So yeah, come find me on Instagram and Youtube @Spreadsheetsalads. I promise I'll get better at video production.

Turn on your cruise control

 I want to take a moment to address something that has become a growing scourge. It regularly impacts not only my professional life, but it is a hazard on the open roadways. Ladies and gentlemen, when you are able, turn on your cruise control.

As a part of my job, I regularly need to drive long distances. There is nothing more frustrating than seeing the same car over and over. I pass them, they pass me, I pass them, and on and on for miles. Just turn on your cruise control.

On long distance journeys, it helps both the flow of traffic, and your general comfort. Having your foot constantly hovering over the pedals to try to maintain your speed, or to brake or speed up to try to maintain some sort of equilibrium is much more physically and mentally taxing than a simple trek through the prairies needs to be. Turn on the cruise control.

Maintaining a constant speed, and I don't care if it is fast or slow, gives you a bit of predictability. Faster vehicles know that they should stay in the left lane, and slower vehicles know that they need to stay out of your way. If you have, say, slowed down a bit, and a car you passed 30 seconds ago is passing you again, your inclination would be to speed up again. The car passing you is now hung out to dry in the left lane, you are now probably speeding, and the steady rhythm of traffic flow are disrupted. Having a reliable rate, moving to left lanes when passing and otherwise driving in the right lane on more rural or lower traffic highways makes things predictable, and therefore safer.

And also, it's better for gas mileage, and won't annoy all the other drivers who ARE using cruise control. You get to manage your speed, and you don't have to focus on the speedometer, but rather the road in front of you and respond to the various hazards as they come up. The actual, real hazards like weather, deer, or other drivers that can't maintain their speed.

Turn on your cruise control.

Bring back '87: Just get in.

I noted before the deadline that if you don't think the Twins can win with this bullpen, they should take a look at the 1987 Twins. Famously, the 87 Twins were World Champions, and not so famously, had a terrible bullpen.

I got two responses from random Threads users (the only people on Threads are completely random) that tried to gently push back. One said that this Twins team has no Puckett or Hrbek - simply not as good an offensive team. Fair enough. But on the other hand, even though the 87 Twins scored more runs a game than this Twins team does, they were also the 9th highest scoring team in the American League that year. The Twins this year are the highest scoring team in the AL.

Another user said "who will be this team's Jeff Reardon? referring to the closer for that World Series team. Well, if we are talking about ERA, then Yoendrys Gomez is obviously out, because his ERA is half of Reardon's. In fact, Kody Funderburk and Andrew Morris also have better ERAs than Reardon. If you want to talk about WAR, Morris and Gomez are higher already that Reardon for the whole season. Funderburk is a perfect match. So I guess Kody Funderburk is this team's Jeff Reardon? 

That was before the deadline, and we live in a different era. The Twins of 1987 may have looked to bolster their bullpen if that was how things were done back then. The 2026 Twins had a better pen than the 87 version, and then at the deadline, the Twins made the bullpen better. I'm certainly not saying the Twins this year are better than the '87 Twins, but the bullpen sure is.

Those Twins had Frank Viola and Bert Blyleven. Frank Viola in particular was twice as good as the next best player for the Twins, and one of the best in baseball that year. This year, the Twins are the best offense in the league. so they have a clear strength as well (and extrapolated over 162 games, the overall WAR for the offense is very similar to those 87 Twins). The teams aren't THAT different.

The 1987 Twins were a surprise that took advantage of a weak division, and got hot at the right time. Just having the chance to play in the postseason is valuable. Nobody will turn the 87 rings back in because the regular season was mediocre, or they held on to Blyleven a bit too long. 

The first game after the deadline, Joe Ryan was sent home with a potential injury, and I saw a Twins fan lament that the Twins didn't sell. I was initially frustrated by the optics of acquiring Jeff Hoffman (formerly released from Spring Training by the Twins, acquired after he lost his spot as the closer to the guy the Twins just traded to the same team at the last deadline), but I'm never going to be upset about a team seeing an opportunity and going for it.

Postseason chances are precious, and despite how much we love them, prospects are not. A playoff spot means you are guaranteed to play in the playoffs (duh) and you can get there with your known assets. Prospects are not guarantees. Be good enough to get to the playoffs, just like the 87 Twins.

Deadline thoughts.

 Gaaaa! The trade deadline is here! The Twins have done the unthinkable at the beginning of the season, and have kicked things off by being buyers. In the past couple of weeks, they have now sent away four prospects, bringing in relievers Tommy Nance and A.J. Minter, as well as starter Dean Kremer. And at the beginning of the year, people were wondering why the Twins hadn't traded Joe Ryan yet! 

Before I gleefully get to the Twins pursuit of more arms, I do want to mention the elephant in the room. The Dodgers got Tarik Skubal off the Tigers a full 2 days before the deadline, and many across baseball have taken an attitude that this is once again a sure sign that the game needs a salary cap. First, stop doing the owners' work. The Dodgers are paying for players, but why should they be kept from spending their money, just because other teams don't want to? Furthermore, the teams with the highest payrolls are also the oldest players. A reckoning from Father Time is coming for Los Angeles soon enough.

And also, the Dodgers keep taking these big swings on the trade market because their farm is so robust. They acquire and develop exceptional talent at all levels. You can talk about how good the Dodgers free agents and trade acquisitions are, but they did that with good prospects to trade away in the first place, and are augmented by guys like Andy Pages, Justin Wroblieski and Emmet Sheehan, all drafted and developed by the Dodgers, or Max Muncy, who was an A's washout before excelling in LA.

OK, the Twins. It's an unusual spot to be in this year. All of my typical hang-ups with the Twins at the deadline have gone away in the last couple of years. They are no longer timid under Jeremy Zoll, nor were they last year under Derek Falvey, and they aren't waiting to the last minute to make their moves. I feel a sense of calm that I typically don't feel at the deadline. There are positions of need, but the Twins have addressed them a bit already. I don't need to worry if they are going to act, or if a certain player is no longer available. 

I do think the Twins have a couple moves in them tomorrow. Zoll has already proven himself to be frisky, and has already presented himself as a willing partner in innumerable minor transactions all season. There is word of a last minute scuttling of a trade by the Astros ownership which would have involved Trevor Larnach going to Houston for reliever Bryan Abreu. The Twins are likely to add another right handed reliever, and have the high level prospect capital to absorb a loss to an outfielder like Larnach.

While the Twins have been the highest scoring offense in the American League all season, their pitching has been problematic throughout the year. For what seems like the 10th time in the past two weeks, the Twins were in a tight game right up to the end, thanks to some late scoring by the offense. They erased a 6 run lead from the Mariners before eventually dropping the game. The admirable willingness to rally, even in the face of a lot of early season (and honestly, mid season) negativity makes this team scarier for postseason opponents than I think many people give them credit for. A decent bullpen with this organization would be even more intimidating. 

I'm team "always go for it" if there is a reasonable postseason chance. They don't need to be after the Tarik Skubals of the world, but the Twins have shown they are going for it. Keep it going with a couple of more moves before the deadline passes. 

What is the point of a baseball team?

 

There is something of a furor in the Twins blogging community lately, reflecting on last year's trade deadline sell off. Alex Speier of the Boston Globe reported that the Red Sox offered Payton Tolle and Franklin Arias, two prospects that are very highly regarded, for Joe Ryan, and the deal didn't come through. In a stunning turn of events, this means that some Twins fans and writers are upset that the burning down of the team last year didn't go far enough.

They are saying this with a straight face as the Twins are currently contemplating adding to the roster that the Twins would be better off without their #1 starter. This is clearly a lack of faith in the current squad, and an inability to believe that, for once, the Twins catch fire in the playoffs. I know Minnesota is suffering from a very real curse, but on the other hand, every single other team in the AL Central has reached a World Series since 2005, which is to say all you need is a ticket to the playoffs, and weird things can happen. Even if that is a great trade for the Twins on paper, I'm not mad it wasn't executed.

I have a couple of thoughts on the whole situation, as it happened then, and why it isn't happening now. First, and I don't want to call into question Alex Speier, because that's not the impression I am trying to give, but it is possible that the report is not true. Teams and agents put rumors into the press all the time to get a narrative going. The Red Sox lackluster deadline last year earned some negative reactions from fans. Feeding information through the press as if to say "look how unreasonable the Twins were, we couldn't have done anything else!" It's possible, but I don't want to speculate further down this path, because some may misinterpret it as dishonest or underhanded, when I think it's just gamesmanship.

Thoughts two and three are closely related. The Twins were surprised themselves by the extent of the sell off. They were going to trade their rentals, like Harrison Bader, but they had set a high price for Jhoan Duran, and then the Phillies met it. As the sell off of rental pieces continued, Griffin Jax asked for a trade, then the Astros and Carlos Correa pushed for a trade, and finally, the only trade that truly came out of nowhere, Louis Varland was traded to Toronto. 

Importantly, Carlos Correa was the only salary dump, and just as importantly, the future rotation and position players were left intact, while the bullpen was a shambles. Initially, this wasn't meant to be as broad a fire sale as it was until Jax and Correa indicated their desires. The Twins had no intention of trading Ryan. Because of that, this leads me to my second point: The Twins hadn't internally priced Joe Ryan yet. Perhaps the Red Sox made just the offer that was proposed, and the Twins hadn't figured out what the appropriate sell point was, like they had for members of their bullpen.

:Let's also circle back to the Jhoan Duran trade for a second. This is a bit like comparing apples and oranges, because of their roles, but Duran netted two top prospects in Mick Abel and Eduardo Tait. Abel is currently on the IL, and has missed most of the season, while Tait has fallen in the Twins prospect rankings after a slow start in the organization. This is to say, there is no guarantee that prospects will hit. Relievers are wild cards, so trading them for prospects is always going to be more palatable than starters, who tend to be more of a commodity.

If you thought my last comparison was apples to oranges, hold on. Last fall, the Colts traded several draft picks and a receiver for Sauce Gardner, one of the best cornerbacks in football. After the trade, a former assistant with the Eagles was on a podcast, talking about how clear a win it was for the Colts despite the draft capital. He noted that trading picks for players was how the Eagles have received so much sustained success. Draft picks are lottery tickets, but getting a player that you already know about is a guarantee, and usually ends up being the "winning" side of a trade. In this analogy, the draft picks are minor league players. 

We can second guess and eventually look back on a Joe Ryan non-trade as a missed opportunity, but that depends on Tolle and Arias' career, not their current stature. A real missed opportunity is failing to embrace a playoff chance. The Twins have been competitive all year in an admittedly bad league, which means they don't need to make big swings to get there, and the team is reliant enough on young talent that they should be even better next year.

And they'll do it this year because they have Joe Ryan.

Last minute decisions, likely to lead to inactivity.

I've changed a lot of opinions over the years, but one I have remained consistent on is that if there a chance at the postseason, you have to go for it. The AL Central isn't that good, and frankly, the entire American League is pretty rough. The Dodgers have ruined out expectations of what postseason baseball can be like, but really, once you are in, anything can happen. The Twins should realize that especially, given the teams that one titles in Minnesota. Pedestrian in the regular season, hot at the right time. 

There are two weeks until the deadline, and the Twins are likely to wait right up until the final day to make a decision. They have been up and down all year, and one last up could encourage an aggressive shopping spree, while a drop off will turn into a true sell. 

Many eyes will be looking at the upcoming 4 game set with Cleveland, given the team's are duking it out for the AL Central, and a Wild Card spot. More favorable is a subsequent homestand with the A's and Royals, two teams that are already destined to sell at the deadline. If that gets sideways on the Twins, then the trajectory of the deadline is completely different. 

The Twins will need pitching. Starting pitching is becoming increasingly important, as an aspirational acquisition. The need is going to be even more apparent as it was announced that Mick Abel won't be returning this year. The Twins still have a little bit of depth, with Connor Prielipp ready to return fairly soon, but if Andrew Morris and Mike Paredes are evidence, having some of their better starting prospects in the bullpen isn't a bad thing.

There has been speculation that the Twins might be looking to move on from Ryan Jeffers or Trevor Larnach. Both are having terrific seasons, and trading them would seem a setback for the team, but would also register as faith in the prospects that the team is loath to trade. Jeffers missed a good chunk of the season, and Victor Caratini and Alex Jackson were capable, while Walker Jenkins is poised to assume Larnach's roster spot. 

Finding a team that needs offense and has pitching to burn is the trick, though. I would say that there aren't going to be many teams that are both in contention and would be willing to give up a decent pitcher. In the end, that means the Twins would likely need to make a couple of different moves in order to move the assets they are willing to move and attain the assets they want. 

This is a complicated ask for a GM in his first trade deadline. I don't think that the stakes are high enough to nail this deadline for Jeremy Zoll to get too crazy in the next two weeks. Given the complexity of the needs and assets to spend, there isn't an easy or obvious path to follow. There will be good offers for Jeffers, especially from the Yankees, and I expect the popular catcher to move on. I don't know that it will be possible to make an impact addition. 

If things stay about the same, lurking in the race, with no discernable momentum, I think that is the deadline. Jeffers goes, and Tommy Nance, and perhaps another low impact reliever are the additions. Not much. Unless positive or negative momentum emerge. Then we will have a different conversation.

Meandering thoughts about streaming TV

Streaming has generally changed the way visual media can be presented to us. A lot has been said about the accessibility of it, and our ability to watch what we want, when we want. We binge shows instead of week to week or even all summer. The dissemination has changed, but it's also changed what is being made, and what we look for. 

Going back 20-40 years ago, you get some great shows, cultural touchstones, like Friends or Cheers that got a decade on the air. There are procedurals that were highly regarded, and some remain on the air. Part of the reason that these shows had such great lasting power is because of the writing and acting. Particularly the sitcoms I mentioned, some were popular because of the serialized continuity of the shows, but that wasn't quite it. The shows offered familiar settings and characters. They were more lived in.

Now with streaming, less is about the setting or the characters, and they are often more story driven. Sure, characters and setting matter, but the show is unlikely to click with viewers if there isn't a broad story arc. The story is generally done after a few seasons of good writing, and the pressure doesn't come from networks to keep a ratings darling churning. Viewers aren't trying to get back to a familiar place next season, with old TV friends, but rather, they are moving on to the next story. 

This has changed the expectations for movies as well. Where once they were the home of good story telling, they are now the home of higher production values. Superhero movies belong in theaters, on big screens with huge special effects. Deeper explorations of character, or introspective plots are told in a ten hour limited run series. The stories are more effectively told than when you only get 90 minutes. Who wants to leave the house anyway?

I'm nostalgic for an era where I could work on something with a familiar character, or repetitive plot on in the background. I wonder if, for many people, Reels has replaced syndicated TV? Now that I have kids, going to the theater feels like fun again, but I'm not sure it is because I really wanted to see Gabby's Dollhouse on the big screen. 

No doubt, the quality of streaming shows steadily improves, and more worthwhile stories are being told. It's a greater investment in attention, is not appointment viewing. 

Inevitable collapse

 Growing up a Twins fan, the rest of what would become the AL Central have always been rivals. Two teams have always stood out, Cleveland and the Chicago White Sox. The Tigers came over from the East when the divisions broke into three, but weren't good for a while when that happened. The Royals were never any good, and didn't incur a wrath in me. 

Cleveland was regularly the team at the top of the division, and seemed like the most direct competition for the Twins for the first decade or so, but then, when I happened to be living in northwest Indiana, surrounded by a bunch of Sox fans, Chicago won the World Series. Insufferable.

With that background in mind, I would like to think that this post doesn't stem from jealousy, but it sure might. What I want to know is why collapse is assumed for the Twins, but not the White Sox? Make no mistake, each team has the record they have deserved. The White Sox have been a better team than the Twins this year. The Twins, though, aren't where they are at because of some good fortune.

I'm not talking about the perception of the Twins or White Sox, I am talking about their actual position. The White Sox, if the season ended today, would be the AL Central champions, and the Twins are only a couple of games out of the final Wild Card spot, and 4.5 games behind Chicago. 

Despite there being only a 4.5 game difference in the standings, the narrative around the teams is markedly different. There was a recent piece on The Athletic or ESPN that reevaluated preseason predictions. Now, a quarter of the writers thought the White Sox were a playoff team. Nobody thought the Twins were going to be a playoff team. This was written around Memorial Day, I recall, because at the time, the Twins were in playoff position. 

The Sox are a young team, younger than the Twins. Minnesota had a playoff team in 2023, before ownership decided not to invest in the team. More importantly, the young talent in the organization failed to launch, and the starting pitching couldn't sustain the same level of success and health over the next two seasons. Collapses resulted. Are Twins collapses just assumed now?

The greatest bugaboo in those two seasons was a reliance on young players that couldn't come through. Edouard Julien is in Colorado, Matt Wallner is in St. Paul. Brooks Lee is hitting. Austin Martin gives good at bats. Royce Lewis tinkered and came back stronger. Kody Clemens is now in year two of what seems like a peak. Luke Keaschall is settling in after a slow start. The Twins are also more willing to lean on veterans on hot streaks, like Ryan Kreidler and Tristan Gray. They have a new manager whispering different things to the players. 

Like I said, the White Sox have been better this year, but they also don't have many players with a sustained track record of success either. Miguel Vargas, Colson Montgomery and of course Muneteka Murukami are in their break out seasons. Why are they assumed to be less likely to fall off in the second half?

The Twins have a better rotation than the White Sox, even with injuries. The White Sox have a better closer with Seranthony Dominguez, and Grant Taylor has been a developmental success, but the rest of their bullpen is just as cobbled together as the Twins'. All in, I would prefer the Twins' arms to those of the White Sox. 

To my eye, there isn't a significant talent gap between the Twins and White Sox, and I think a big reason why the Sox better than expected start is embraced while the Twins' is not is because of the perception I mentioned earlier. The White Sox have spent recent years in the baseball wilderness. Any success is going to be embraced. The Twins problems seem self inflicted, torching good will after finally winning in the playoffs and completely botching an ownership transition this year.

Importantly, they didn't spend much, but they did spend on players that are connecting, in Murakami and Dominguez. The Twins spent a little, but Victor Caratini and Josh Bell haven't been as sensational. The White Sox are trending up. Somehow, the Pohlad family is so unlikable that Jerry Reinsdorf looks great in comparison. 

Bullpens are easy

 There has only been one player in the history of baseball to be named Yoendrys. He currently plays for the Minnesota Twins, and is having a very good start to his career in the organization. 

The Twins unrelenting pursuit of bullpen arms has lead them to, among other players, Yoendrys Gomez. Unlike the rest of the curious cast of characters the Twins have added, Gomez has settled in, and if things continue at the pace they are currently at, the Twins audio-visual department may need to come up with a bitchin' entrance for him when he comes into close games.

After doling out saves using a closer by very large committee strategy, Gomez has emerged as the top option for Derek Shelton with the game on the line. Since joining the Twins, Gomez has had 21 strikeouts in 17 2/3 innings, with a sub 2.00 ERA. His K rate has gone up, his walk rate has gone down, and importantly, he hasn't allowed a home run. Since joining the team, he's been worth about half a win, if you worship at the church of Fangraphs.

Given his career to this point, you are welcome to question his results. He's been inconsistent. ranging from mediocre to poor, pitching in New York, LA, Chicago and with the Rays. He was also slotted as a starter when with the White Sox last year, and Fangraphs' projections still have him on the path, as a back of the rotation starter over the next few years, and improving in that role every year. I'm not sure Gomez is going to start again, but I do think he is still getting better. He's only 26.

Gomez's velocity is up this season, and even since joining the Twins. That probably plays a role in his success. Additionally, he has made tangible changes to his pitch mix. As is often the case with pitchers joining the Twins, Gomez is throwing more sliders, up about 10%, and is abandoning his cut fastball. It's probably worth noting that his best year to day, his second with the Yankees, saw a similar pitch usage. 

Am I saying that Gomez is a future star? No, probably not. But I do think there is something there, and the Twins have found a way to tap into it. The constant stir of bullpen arms has started calcify into some sort of order. Gomez, Anthony Banda and Andrew Morris have developed into somewhat reliable arms out there. 

Now, about the rest of the bullpen.

A much calmer deadline

 The trade rumors surrounding a couple of Ryans (Joe and Jeffers) are swirling as the trade deadline approaches, now less than two months away. Of course, less in the conversation is that despite coming out of a 5 game losing streak, the Twins won their first two games back at home and are only a couple of games out in the Wild Card chase. Persistent negativity locally and nationally have signaled that nobody thinks this will last. Whatever the case, it seems as though the trade deadline will, at the very least, be confusing. 

With that in mind, if the deadline were tomorrow, I can see the Twins being in a mix and match mode, where they aren't buying, nor are they selling. With Jeremy Zoll now in charge, and a different Pohlad pretending to care now, they aren't going to give away players with the playoffs so nearly in reach. What a terrible message! But what does playing the middle look like for these Twins?

The best thing to do would be to make "baseball" moves. That sounds incredibly oversimplified, but I can't think of a better term. All season, the weakest part of the team has been their bullpen. Bullpens don't generally cost that much to patch up, unless you are dealing elite arms like Jhoan Duran, Griffin Jax or Louis Varland. The Twins don't necessarily need an elite arm.

Which is great, because if their goal is to trade from the middle, they aren't going to be offering elite players, either. Ryan Jeffers is in a contract year, and the Twins intentionally brought Victor Caratini in for two years, with Eduardo Tait waiting in the wings. Other positions are a bit muddier, but the goal will be to open up spots for the top of the system to step in and win some games.

The top prospects now are all offensive players, and aside from starting pitching, the Twins have received momentum from their offense. It's not one player, though, but rather a group of players who often don't have a position or really much of a track record. Tristan Gray and Ryan Kreidler are almost certainly peaking right now, and it is hard to cast that aside, though neither would get much on the market either. Orlando Arcia has had a top pedigree in the past, and may generate some return. 

The top prospects right now are outfield prospects. Trevor Larnach is beginning to look like a potential upgrade for a different contender, but Walker Jenkins and Emmanuel Rodriguez are hurt, so making an outfield move with a goal of bringing one of those prospects up is on hold. More likely is bringing up Kyler Fedko now after finally putting James Outman to pasture. But that isn't a trade.

Josh Bell and Kody Clemens are interesting cases, however. Both now have a track record, though Bell isn't hitting like the Twins would hope. Clemens is proving to be a version of Willi Castro. Moving Clemens might lead to the Twins finding space for Royce Lewis (who is not a prospect anymore) to collect at bats at first and DH, given how well he has hit at St. Paul, and the fact that Brooks Lee has taken over at third.

Regardless of what happens through July 31st, I don't think Ryan or Jeffers are going to be with the team next year for financial reasons. Maximum value may come through a deal this summer, especially if the expected backslide comes. Otherwise I think we can feel good about a quieter deadline. There is plenty of organizational talent, and contention isn't far off, so another purge is unnecessary.

In another world, with the team only a few games from a playoff spot and an obvious bullpen sized hole, this would be a team looking to add players. As we saw last year, players get dealt from 'pens all the time. I am an advocate of never throwing away an opportunity if it is there, and right now, there is opportunity. 

But this isn't a great team, and these aren't good owners. Look for the Twins to do as little as is reasonably possible this deadline.  

Trying to make sense of the roster, and failing

I have been traveling extensively for work this week, so I came back to cell phone reception with the tail end of a string of messages. "Roster bloodbath." In addition to Ryan Jeffers going on the IL with a broken bone in his wrist, the Twins designated Justin Topa for assignment and optioned Royce Lewis to AAA. Those are some big moves, if for no other reason than name recognition.

The Twins have remained as relatively competent as at any other point in the season. Slightly below .500, but not really getting their doors blown off in any game. Now, though, the Cleveland Guardians have started winning in bunches, and put some space between themselves and the rest of the division. Without the pressure of contention, perhaps, Jeremy Zoll has decided he could make some more daring moves and shake up the roster. 

It shouldn't be daring to option a couple of players that are batting in the mid .160s like Lewis and before him Matt Wallner, or give up on a reliever who has, thus far, provided no relief. They were some of the names that didn't get moved at last year's deadline, however, and should have been part of this season's core. Excepting Topa, they could have been a part of an extended future as well. It's an open question now as to any of their future with the team, including Jeffers, a free agent after the season.

But the Twins clearly aren't giving up the ghost on 2026. If they were, perhaps they would take a look at one of the prospects who appears close to making the MLB roster. Instead, Travis Adams was brought back to the bullpen, and veteran short stop Orlando Arcia were brought in. Yes, he is Oswaldo's brother, and he has been very good thus far in St. Paul.

Tristan Gray was moved to the paternity list, and Gabriel Gonzalez was brought to the big leagues in his stead, but that is likely a temporary call up. Ultimately, maybe we are just reading too much into these moves: Walker Jenkins, Emmanuel Rodriguez and Kaelen Culpepper are dinged up. Perhaps leaning into prospects isn't about contention yet, but rather has more to do with the Twins not having healthy enough prospects? Otherwise, why would they start the clock on Kendry Rojas and Gonzalez, who are further down the prospect list? 

I think the team has been pleasantly surprised by how quickly Connor Prielipp has come out of the gate for the Twins. Prielipp, along with Taj Bradley and Mick Abel have been three compelling sources for hope in the Twins' season. He was called up before Zebby Matthews this spring, but he was also pitching better than anyone else there. 

I'm talking myself in circles here, trying to divine some sort of scheme to how the Twins have called players up, how they have responded to injuries, how it seems they are scaling for the future. I think it comes down to this: They are trying to put the best players on the field. Given the payroll limitations, the bench isn't deep, but it is there. In some cases, the best depth moves have been Ryan Kreidler and Arcia. In others, there were higher rated prospects who had shown they were nearly ready to make the jump.

Gonzalez and Rojas were the best options to make brief stints in the majors because they still have options, and they were doing all right in St. Paul. The good news is, the front office isn't afraid to cut their losses this season and give a younger player a chance, rather than continuing to lean on veterans, even if they aren't performing. So long as the younger player can prove they are ready. If not, a veteran option could be chosen.

The Twins will probably call up Jenkins, Rodriguez and Culpepper this season. Not because they have to, but because they can. If they are good enough, Jeremy Zoll won't hesitate to put them on the Major League roster. 

The league that needs to keep growing

A couple of things that the WNBA has going for it: players coming
into the league now have some cache/ Not only is the college game more popular, but players that come through college generally have a handful of college seasons. Women's basketball fans know incoming players to the W before they even enter the draft.

The other thing about the league is that there are only 14 teams now. This allows teams to pair some of the greatest players in college together consistently. There isn't much room for players to develop further after they turn pro. There is certainly opportunity overseas, but that isn't the same as reaching fame and fortune where your friends and family are.

Take the case of Hannah Stuelke. Iowa has had a steady stream of WNBA players lately: Caitlin Clark, of course, but before her Megan Gustafson, Clark's teammate Kate Martin, and Lucy Olson. Stuelke has been a steady contributor throughout much of that time as a forward who scrapped for rebounds and was gifted at finding lanes on offense. She never was much of an outside shooter, and she doesn't have the dimensions of a typical WNBA forward with her skills, and went undrafted. 

Stuelke is a well known player from a big program. She isn't one of the elite forwards in all of basketball, but she was one of the best while she was playing in college. The WNBA now has enough prospective talent that good or marketable players are left out. 

The league is expanding regularly now. Portland and Toronto brought the league to 15, and by 2030, there will be 18 franchises. If the current trajectory holds, that won't be nearly enough. More girls are playing and the talent is emerging, and will be able to fill even more rosters. How many Hannah Stuelkes will there be then?

The blessing of lowered expectations

 Being a Minnesota sports fan is a constant struggle. Being a Twins fan may be the hardest of all, but then, is it tough having low expectations and meeting them, or having high expectations and getting a punch in the gut? 

Low expectations might actually be saving Minnesota Twins fans' collective health, frankly. A lot of people have prognosticated a bad Twins season because of one of the worst bullpens ever seen. The pen has been protected because of good starting pitching thus far, but make no mistake: It's bad. 

Aside from that, the Twins are in contention. The AL Central is miserable, and it isn't getting any better. The Twins are 7-3 against their division, and 6-1 against Cleveland and Detroit. They have also been scoring runs: the 9th most in baseball. The starters have the 8th best WAR in the game. The Twins, again, aside from the bullpen, have been good.

And they keep getting hurt.

Of those good pitchers, Two are now on the shelf - Mick Abel and Taj Bradley are hurt. Simeon Woods-Richardson has fallen on hard times recently, and Joe Ryan has had some injury scares. Can you imagine how much those things would bother us if we looked at their offense and rotation instead of the bullpen and our preseason expectations?

I am only half kidding when I say that our pessimism is helping us out. We aren't necessarily disappointed in the sub-500 record, because we didn't expect anything better. Some people are thinking that this might even be the apex of their season. Having two above average units and still remaining out of the postseason will sting a little less if we didn't think they would be there anyways.

In my opinion, that is easier to cope with than what happened to the Wild. 

The unrealized promise of potential

 Money is a nice thing for a baseball club to have. Spend it to patch up weaknesses and to retain your strengths. It's not the only thing, though. In fact, I would argue that there isn't a team out there that was built only through spending. It made good teams better, but it hardly made bad teams good. 

In the wake of the Twins tear down after finally winning in the playoffs, there was a lot of handwringing about the payroll, and tying that directly the inability of the Twins to win in the years since. It certainly torpedoed fan morale, attendance, and maybe even the possibility of a sale, but from a leadership perspective, things likely wouldn't have seemed so dire.

The 2023 team was buoyed by, yes, a strong rotation (and arguably, the rotation is nearly as good now, and certainly younger and cheaper), but also youngsters Ryan Jeffers, Edouard Julien, Royce Lewis and Matt Wallner all appeared in the team's top WAR producers. With only Sonny Gray departing the rotation, Byron Buxton returning healthy, and a bumper crop of young major league talent, it seemed that the Twins were well positioned to be successful.

Of the four youngsters I mentioned, only Jeffers has continued on that upward trajectory. Julien was traded away for pennies on the dollar, and now the always optimistic Twins Daily has recently penned articles about how Lewis and Wallner may be nearing the end of the line as Twins. Injury has hampered both, to be sure, and certainly over exposure. Whatever the cause or whomever should bear blame, not having the expected anchors to the lineup able to anchor said lineup is a primary cause for the disappointing trajectory of the team.

At some point, even the richest teams in baseball need some of their growth to come from within. Playing in the AL Central, there is a longer runway, so we see players figure it out longer, but imagine where the Yankees would be if Aaron Judge hadn't come into his own, or the Dodgers beginning their current dynasty without Clayton Kershaw. Money helps, but having prospects that click is crucial. 

The next round, after Jeffers, Julien, Lewis and Wallner, namely Brooks Lee, Austin Martin and Luke Keaschall profile differently. Martin is as old as Lewis, but broke out later, while Lee and Keaschall are contact driven, and will be evaluated on their defense as much as their plate production. Lee is hitting now, but for how long? Keaschall is in a sophomore slump.

The Twins are going to hope that Walker Jenkins and Emmanuel Rodriguez, as well as anyone else that comes up at the same time as those two aren't beset by the growing pains the Twins have been done in by. The Pohlads abandoned the team, certainly, but it's all for naught if the young talent never clicks. 

Building a winner in Minneapolis

The Twins sit in a strange spot. Everyone can see the flaws with the team. Did you guys know that the bullpen is really, really bad? I've long stated that bullpen matters only if the rest of the team can get them into contention. That's the other strange thing: the Twins are only 3 games out, because the AL Central is back to being a contemptable warren of mismanaged underachievers. 

Minnesota's front office, in the face of it all, sees that they are pretty close, and rightfully know that winning will get fans to return to their seats. If winning is to continue, they need continued health in their rotation - which hasn't happened. Not only is their the potential for this season to continue to fall off without Pablo Lopez and maybe Joe Ryan at the front of the rotation, but if it were to flail with them, getting a prospect return via trade is a good way to return to the conversation quickly. 

Like it or not, the Twins are doing well this year BECAUSE of last year's trade off of their bullpen. Griffin Jax brought in Taj Bradley, Jhoan Duran brought Mick Abel. Before Ryan went down, I would argue that the 26 rotation is better than the 25 version.

So without prospects, potentially, to augment the farm system, it sounds like the Pohlads might be in a nightmare situation. They might have to spend their way out of these doldrums. They may have to pay, either to keep players in the system, or when free agency comes again, to get the team back to the top of the division in 2027. The fly in that ointment is this unfortunate survey: The Twins (along with Cincinnati) are playing in the least popular city among players in Major League Baseball. The Twins aren't in the bottom 5 for road game destination, with the ambience and facilities scoring well. Players specifically don't like Minneapolis.

Regardless of the reason - we all have theories - this likely means that, for premium players, the Twins will have to pay a "Minneapolis tax" for players to come to the Twins. All money being equal, the Twins are going to get players to come here, and then the front office looks foolish for paying too much. They will get less bang for their buck.

So how do you build a long term winner in Minnesota with those headwinds? You look for advantages only available if you are playing in Minnesota. It seems like the Twins are already leaning into that idea a bit. 

I imagine one of the things non-Minnesotans see when they see Minnesota is a cold, inhospitable climate. And it can be. Ignoring what the effects are on the player, it also affects the dynamics of the baseball. Essentially, cold, dry air is denser. Allow me to get meteorolgically nerdy on you for a second. According to the ideal gas law, pressure*volume is equal to the number of molecules*Temperature. Or, molecules per volume = density. The pressure is going to stay the same, so temperature going down means density needs to go up. Increased density will slow balls in flight down, which is why there are fewer cold weather dingers. It can also cause balls to break more easily.

So what does that mean on the position player side? Rather than power, which can get pricy, lean into a low strikeout rate, and if possible, a high walk rate. Those expensive homeruns turn into fly balls through the early and late months of the year. Getting on base is a skill for all seasons. 

The Twins have a couple of bright spots in the lineup this year. They are are also the players (with 80+ plate appearances) with the lowest K% among the top 5 in the league in BB%. The other three in that group, for what it's worth, are Nick Kurtz, Mike Trout and Brice Turang. Good company. High value may be attained by strengthening their lineup using a similar, high contact, high walk profile. Some guys that would fit that aren't going to break the bank include Seattle's JP Crawford, Detroit's Gleyber Torres and St. Louis' Ivan Herrera. More than the Twins might want to spend, traditionally, but certainly better cast for playing in the cold.

On the mound, the hard throwers are going to be valuable everywhere. Players with movement are going to benefit from time played in Minnesota. The Twins showed an awareness of this in their deadline strategy. Hard throwers Duran, Jax and Louis Varland were sent off to a great return. Justin Topa and Cole Sands, who don't throw as hard, relying a bit on craftiness were retained. Sands, for one, has one of the highest rates of horizontal motion on his slider in the game. A diminished velocity Bailey Ober has been effective recently. Meanwhile, Mick Abel has one of the higher spin rates in baseball.

The Twins should look primarily at spin and vertical and horizontal motion. A flyer on Washington reliever PJ Poulin could prove to be a good fit. Or Chase Shugart from the Phillies.

All of these conjunctures use current data one month in. And they project a profile, maybe not an individual player the Twins could look at this offseason (or in season, if the opportunity presents itself). Power will always come. We see that the Twins are able to get a cheap 1b every off season, and Byron Buxton has added the hits to his repertoire. Those homers just cost more on the open market. And don't forget defense. With fewer balls leaving the yard, running them down is important as well.

Games at the beginning and end of the season count just the same. The Twins can equip themselves for the environment they play in, an easier task than building it for the environment of everyone else. 

Matt Wallner has only played 6 MLB games in May in his CAREER

 In my last post about Luke Keaschall, I also spoke ill of Matt Wallner. If you like Matt Wallner, you will point to his electric summers. If you are wary of Wallner, you know about how he does in colder conditions. We are all right. You are only wrong if you say that Wallner is backsliding somehow this season.

Wallner is a career .180 hitter in April. His ISO is nearly 100 points below his career average, and he strikes out about 4% more as well. April Matt Wallner isn't "a little off". April Matt Wallner is bad. And that plays directly into his May.

Which Wallner, historically, does NOT play in. He has either been sent to AAA to work on things, or placed on the IL because of injury. One way or another, he spends May on the sidelines. He looks like a guy that really appreciates shaving time for the fishing opener. Junes haven't been great either, but everything looks good compared to April Matt Wallner.

If you are patient long enough, and the Twins are still in it, Wallner racks up the numbers in July. August is brilliant. Historically, he then has faded in September as well. His under the hood metrics suggest he is even worse than it appears. 

Wallner is less frustrating when you can clearly recognize the pattern he has fallen into. Now, the question is whether a player who can't play into early season momentum and character building, and fades during crunch time is someone worth building around.

Improve the lineup with this one weird trick (fans hate it)

Everyone has the player or player group that they are down on going into the season, and they will subsequently remain down on the player for the entirety of the remainder of their career. At least, that has been my experience in Minnesota, enjoying the opinions of Minnesota area fans. Thus, as the Twins continue to crater over the past week, in particular, 

The rotation continues to be the highlight, and the rest of the team hasn't been good enough to warrant worrying about the bullpen. That is because the team stopped scoring runs. I noted in my last post why the outfield prospects, like Emmanuel Rodriguez, aren't going to be called up yet (and actually, now James Outman has strung together some good appearances), and it is because of the efficacy of Trevor Larnach and Austin Martin. 

So where is the problem? There are two players in particular who have been bad all year, and haven't got any better in the last week or so. One of them is Matt Wallner. Speaking of those hobby horses people like the denigrate all the time, Wallner is certainly one of mine. That said, part of the Matt Wallner Experience is understanding that he will be borderline unplayable until about mid-June, in which he will really take off, completely unnoticed by me, and end up with decent stats by the end of the year, mostly accrued after the team is out of contention anyway. 

The point is, a bad Matt Wallner is April is just Matt Wallner in April. The difference this year is that with ABS, he hasn't been able to pin his strikeouts on the umpires. Maybe he is hurt, what with the grimacing at the plate? Wallner is pretty entrenched, and will be given time to work out his kinks, so we can enjoy a glorious 6 weeks in the middle of summer where Wallner is terrific.

So that leaves Luke Keaschall. Twins fans should be well informed about sophomore slumps by this point, and he has had one all season thus far. His WAR is lowest on the team, and looking under the hood, it's driven by a low wOBA and a similarly low xwOBA. He isn't hitting, he isn't hitting hard, and he has nobody to blame but himself.

Keaschall hasn't played a full year of Major League Baseball yet, and he has all three of his options remaining. In the interest of giving the team a jolt and also helping Keaschall with his ongoing development, the Twins should send their second baseman to St. Paul. Not forever, just until he sorts things out.

The Twins have a pretty good built in maneuver. They can call up Ryan Kreidler, have him take reps at short and move Brooks Lee to 2nd. The offensive jolt might be minimal, but the improvement to defense would be notable. If you want to get really weird, you could try Orlando Arcia, instead. 

The Twins are only 2 1/2 games out. They will continue to make win this season moves, while trying to preserve their player development. Right now, this seems like the right, if not popular, move. 

It's not time for Emmanuel Rodriguez yet.

 The Twins are approaching an eight of the way through the season, and have continued to flirt with .500. They have started to slide in the past week, losing painfully to the Reds and Mets, and dropping the series opener with the Rays. Their bullpen has shown weaknesses, but the skid has come as the starting pitching has scuffled, and the hitting has been less effective. 

The Twins, as I've said early and often, are still treating this team as a team that intends on contention. It seems like they should be putting their best players in the organization on the field, right? The folks that gave up on the the team before the season started are looking at the recent streak and have already started calling on dissembling the team and calling up prospects. 

In this regard, it seems like there should be common ground, right? Dispatch James Outman, call up Emmanuel Rodriguez. It seems so easy! Outman has been a little used bench player, playing in 20 games, mostly as a defensive replacement - he only has 24 plate appearances. Meanwhile, Rodriguez has an OPS of .887, smacking around AAA pitchers. There is no doubt that Rodriguez, right now, is a better player than Outman.

Of course, Outman hasn't got into a rhythm this year. There was a chance that he would pop in to spell Austin Martin or Trevor Larnach, two other guys that seemed to have narrowly made the roster this year. Well, Martin has been the Twins' best position player on the team so far, and easily so. Trevor Larnach has mostly platooned, and isn't known for his glove, but his WAR is #4 on the team among offensive players. 

When Martin is off, Larnach plays. Often, they play together. There is no spot for Outman to fit in the lineup, especially with Byron Buxton and Matt Wallner entrenched (and Ryan Jeffers or Josh Bell or Victor Caratini or whomever is occupying the DH role on a given night). But Outman is 28, and is not likely to emerge as the long term asset that Rodriguez could. It is paramount that Rodriguez plays every day. The Twins smartly don't want him waiting around on the bench.

If a change does come, expect it to come after an extended decline of the team, and trades being made. Or after an injury. There isn't as great a case to get Rodriguez to the majors right now as it appears on it's face. 

The Twins remain unabashedly confident.

 The Twins were on a high before they played the Reds. Since then, they were swept at home, suffered injuries, and have seen long suffering fans once again abandon hope. The moves the team made to address the areas of diminished depth, however, seem to indicate that the front office is still fully on board with making 2026 a success. 

It helps that, since Pablo Lopez went down, the injuries the team has seen haven't been the long term disasters that we all have become accustomed to. Royce Lewis is already back. Mick Abel's elbow, allegedly, isn't anything serious. Really, the longest term impact is probably Kody Funderburk, whose wife had a baby. He'll be dealing with that for a while.

The way these injuries have been addressed is interesting. In particular, the pitching depth tests have been strange, if this was a team simply looking to bide time until they are fully in contention again. There are plenty of spot fillers in St. Paul, players with longer MLB careers, and aren't reasonably presumed to be fixtures of the Twins' long term futures, like John Brebbia or the recently signed Luis Garcia. But that isn't the route the Twins took when Abel, Funderburk and Cody Laweryson went on the injured list. 

Even with the short stints expected on the IL, and with most of the world projecting the Twins to be in a rebuilding phase, the team still opted to start the clock on Connor Prielipp and Kendry Rojas, prospects in the organizational top ten. With Abel off the list, they are also two of the top 3 pitching prospects in the system. They also have had hot starts in St. Paul.

Maybe they will both be in the Majors for a longer stretch than just these couple of weeks, but with the information on hand, it looks like the Twins were trying to capture the momentum of a couple of guys pitching well to try to maintain some sort of forward momentum with the Major League roster, and they didn't take into account what that meant for service time. 

Calling up Prielipp and Rojas now, in mid-April, is a clear win now move. The prevailing narrative is that the Twins aren't a team that is going to contending team this year, but time and again, the team has shown that they aren't buying into it. 

A brief bit about luck and hitting in the clutch

 

This morning, we took the kids to the Mall of America, and they went on rides at Nickolodeon Universe, and I walked around, very happy not to do the rides. While walking the grounds, I walked over the site of the Met Stadium home plate, and said, "Aw, crap" and recalled the curse. Then the Twins blew their game against the Reds. Sorry, gang.

One factor that I regularly called out during obnoxiously slow starts was the "clutch" metric from Fangraphs. Essentially, it showed that the Twins were regularly and dramatically worse than their regular selves in late. close and run scoring opportunities. This year, the Twins have gotten off to a better start despite meager projections.

Naturally, I thought that perhaps this meant the Twins were finally seeing things fall their way. The "clutch" rating is thought to be luck driven, and should ultimately trend towards 0. The beginning of the 2026 season seemed like all those bad times were being corrected, with a better than normal performance in the clutch. You know, the Twins are getting results because they have been lucky. 

The Twins are in the middle of the pack. Their clutch score is a hair above 0. The highs we have been feeling in the first 1/10th of the season? That's just how normal fans live. I see why baseball is so popular.

So are the Twins actually good? Maybe. Probably better than promised. They have played a bit above .500, and I think that is plausible. If they had hit a bit better when it mattered in the past couple of years, perhaps this recent run of success wouldn't be so hard to believe. 

That same darkness remains.

 The Twins are 10-7 this year, much to the utter shock of the baseballing world, and perhaps most of all to Twins fans everywhere. I've spoken about my resistance to the overwhelming pessimism surrounding the Twins this season, but even this is a significantly better mark than I anticipated. It should serve as a reminder, however. 

A reminder that even though we have problems with certain specific actions or decisions the front office or management makes, or question a players fit with the team, the players aren't the problem. The manager isn't the problem. The front office isn't the problem.

It's always been the Pohlads. 

Derek Falvey was second guessed for his trade deadline results last year, and other trades he has made in the past. His signing of Josh Bell and retention of Trevor Larnach were questioned, because of the fit, and value vs. the money available. The Griffin Jax/Taj Bradley trade is paying immediate dividends. Mick Abel looks like the real thing. Josh Bell has been ethereal, and Trevor Larnach has produced, even against lefties. Austin Martin is breaking out, and on days he doesn't eat Canadian Subway, Simeon Woods-Richardson has been stable at the back end of the rotation. Those last two have been in the organization longer, but the first several instances were happenings early in the offseason.

Derek Shelton is getting plaudits, and people are still bad mouthing Rocco Baldelli, though managers barely matter. Even if Shelton was a deciding factor in the Twins' early season success, some is still owed to Rocco Baldelli, who brought him to the team in the first place, as bench coach. There is some philosophical overlap.

And of course, the players are always going to be out there grinding, for themselves and for one another. Their effort and attitude hasn't been the problem. The manager hasn't been a problem, and the front office isn't the cause of any strife the team has. The problem is the Pohlads.

Even after the team sold a portion, the problem remains the Pohlads. Always the Pohlads. 

Women's basketball on the cusp

NIL has left an indelible mark on college sports. Nevertheless, the NCAA football championship game featured Indiana winning over Miami, and the Final Four saw Illinois weasel their way in. None of those football schools are regarded (not anymore, in Miami's case) as college royalty. In Illinois' (and yes, Connecticut's) case, they got to the Final Four despite not being a number one seed. There is more money, yes, but there is a lot to go around.

In women's basketball, there is also a remarkable level of NIL and endorsement money in the women's game as well, and the game has benefitted because of it. Well known players like Caitlin Clark, Angel Reese and Paige Bueckers have been able to stay through a full college career because the income level is enough that they don't yet need the professional salary. Their brand names in their college towns were enough. 

There is a talent gap in women's basketball that doesn't exist in the men's game. I don't mean that  to diminish the game, but rather to state that the best teams are simply a lot better than even the next tier. This year’s Final Four consisted of four No. 1 seeds; last year saw three—plus Connecticut. The game is at a peak in attention, but for now, there isn’t much parity.

I officiate high school basketball, and I get to watch boys and girls, and even more than the college resurgence, that has made me a fan of the women's game. And women's basketball is a different game. The rules are the same, but the strategies are evolving. Former players are now coaching and recognizing more effective ways to utilize talent.

Unlike men's basketball, size isn't as important in players. Since players are smaller and don't have the same reach, there is more space on the court. Ball handlers and facilitators are essential. Clark is tall. Physically, she could profile as a forward. What separates her from her peers is her handling and outside shooting. No need to jam everyone into the lane.

The game is different for girls and women, thanks to co. aches adapting strategy to the game, which helped to bring the modern stars to the forefront. The game is better for it. The players are now put in a position to play the best version of their games. and now have seen that good women's basketball draws fans too.

Getting the game right was stage one, and probably not one that was recognized early enough. Now that the game strategy is so good and player development at younger levels is better equipped to find the right skills, NCAA Women's basketball is on the cusp of much more entertaining tournaments. More girls are playing, and more former players are coaching and developing talent.

It’s only a matter of time before No. 1 seeds are no longer automatic favorites—because more teams will have elite talent.