0:20

It is, what time

0:23

where you are, five

0:25

black stack brewing? Your

0:27

friendly neighborhood

0:30

murk to gleaming I'm John

0:32

by Blackstack of friendly

0:35

neighborhood Daily with me. John

0:37

Bono so it's

0:39

daily with me of the

0:41

outlet. It is, It is

0:44

what time where

0:46

you are are? .m. a.m. .m.

0:48

a.m. .m. Koolingata Beach. in Australia.

0:51

and 2 p.m. .m. in

0:54

Minneapolis, Yeah, in the lovely

0:56

North East Minneapolis. What is the

0:58

is the temperature there

1:00

today? today? I don't I

1:02

don't leave i don't leave

1:04

the house is. It's it is

1:06

it's always Yeah, air and gleam and

1:08

live. No, 68. It is 14 degrees here,

1:10

is let is 14 degrees

1:13

here but let me tell

1:15

you something john it's

1:17

sunny so don't Back to

1:19

that into you. That sounds good. Yeah. We

1:21

had to get together I

1:23

had to get together because there's so much new,

1:25

no, no, not much news. much news. now,

1:27

we was thinking how long the joke

1:30

about I picked the picked the

1:32

right to be pop it around like

1:34

an idiot idiot the globe. No

1:36

question about that. Well, about

1:38

have worked last it would That's last

1:40

off thing too. That's the amazing

1:43

We're really at like really at

1:45

months. months. I I would say. of nothing

1:47

because the previous trade

1:49

deadline they also did previous

1:52

trade deadline, they also did

1:54

nothing. I You're right. to get

1:56

the years right here because get the

1:58

years right here because it's a friend yeah

2:00

yeah mid 2023 yeah it's also

2:02

it's also it's also my birthday

2:04

yes so everyone knows I don't

2:06

know why people need to know

2:08

that I barely need to know

2:10

congratulations yeah so we really you

2:12

don't look very odd's look very

2:15

young for 50 it's amazing I'm

2:17

really impressed I don't feel good

2:19

for 50 John even though I'm

2:21

42 I feel I feel I

2:23

feel bad for 70 I imagine

2:25

but anyway that's a story for

2:27

another day It's really been like

2:29

obviously this off-season the twins have

2:31

done like almost literally nothing We're

2:33

going to talk about the few

2:35

scraps of Interest that we have

2:37

that we can talk about here.

2:39

It's mostly people leaving the twins

2:41

is actually the most interesting parts

2:43

Which we'll get to in a

2:45

moment, but Last off-season they did

2:47

nothing. I mean that was sort

2:49

of the talking point when the

2:51

payroll cuts were kind of Halted

2:54

all momentum and changed their strategy

2:56

from a front office standpoint and

2:58

all that But also they did

3:00

nothing at this past trade deadline

3:02

They acquired what Trevor Richards basically

3:04

right but then I was just

3:06

trying to think like once last

3:08

time we had action if you

3:10

go back to the 2023 trade

3:12

deadline Who I can't remember the

3:14

right-handed picture? I'm blanking on his

3:16

name that they acquired right for

3:18

Jorge Lopez. That's right. Sorry. Sorry

3:20

Dylan made a real impression. Actually,

3:22

I had a good year for

3:24

the, uh, maybe something I want

3:26

to say, but that was really

3:28

the only move they made at

3:30

that deadline. And we've ceased being,

3:32

I don't know, surprised or confused

3:35

by the, but a lack of

3:37

action. It kind of gets us

3:39

back into like the terror Ryan

3:41

era, but even this is dead

3:43

even for the terror Ryan era.

3:45

At least make trades a lot.

3:47

Actually, Tehran, I would say, made

3:49

a lot of trades, you know,

3:51

relative to payroll and all that

3:53

stuff. He often would try to.

3:55

for prospects, which the twins don't

3:57

really necessarily do, trade veterans for

3:59

prospects. But they're, yeah, I mean,

4:01

Terrine, it's not the Terrine didn't

4:03

make free agent signings. I mean,

4:05

I'm not saying they made like

4:07

a ton of free agent signings.

4:09

They made, you know, a fair

4:11

number, I would say, a few

4:13

every off season. They were just

4:16

such low wattage, low upside often,

4:18

especially early on in the 10

4:20

year. This time. I mean, they've

4:22

literally done nothing this off-season, almost.

4:24

The two past trade deadlines, they've

4:26

essentially just acquired a random middle

4:28

reliever, by the way, both of

4:30

whom were cut before the end

4:32

of the season. And then going

4:34

back to last off-season, they shed

4:36

money last off-season. They have to

4:38

trade Palanco just to sign Santana.

4:40

They haven't shed any money this

4:42

off-season yet. We still kind of

4:44

expect that. But... They're not adding

4:46

anything and the two very low

4:48

wattage moves that we're going to

4:50

discuss here. They made a trade

4:52

and a minor league signing. We'll

4:55

get to in a moment. First

4:57

of all, those are, I mean,

4:59

I think the trade is worth

5:01

talking about even if they were

5:03

relatively busy. It's sort of an

5:05

intriguing little swap. But that trade.

5:07

For kind of a quad a

5:09

first baseman catcher DH type in

5:11

Mickey Gasper again We'll get to

5:13

him in a more in a

5:15

second and then the signing they

5:17

made yesterday Which is not even

5:19

really worth talking about under normal.

5:21

We would not normally talk about

5:23

a minor league signing Yeah, I

5:25

mean we might say oh they

5:27

picked up this guy. I don't

5:29

remember us spending a lot of

5:31

time on Willie Castro. We heard

5:33

they ended up signing as well

5:36

We should have yeah, we probably

5:38

said of you're right you're right

5:40

But Mike Ford who people might

5:42

recognize people might recognize he spent

5:44

I don't know, five or six

5:46

years in the major is bouncing

5:48

around, but the fact that he's

5:50

also a first baseman and their

5:52

lost Carlos Santana officially to the

5:54

Guardians, which we'll talk about more

5:56

in a second too, it makes

5:58

me think... I do

6:00

think they're going to make some

6:02

trades because I think they got

6:04

to shed some money. But beyond

6:06

that, this whole, you know, we've

6:08

talked about like lower cost free

6:10

agent first base options or trade

6:13

options at first. But the more

6:15

this goes, I mean, most of

6:17

the even lower cost semi appealing

6:19

first base, you know, Josh Bell

6:21

types, right. Well, he signed too

6:23

for six million like Santana's off

6:25

the board, Goldshman's off the board.

6:27

You know, Peter Alonzo's not coming

6:29

here. Even the minor moves the

6:31

fact that both of the kind

6:33

of semi-interesting minor moves they've made

6:35

have been for first baseman for

6:37

kind of AAA or quad a

6:39

first baseman make me think Oh,

6:41

oh, that's that it might just

6:43

be kind of a hodgepodge at

6:45

first base like give Jose Miranda

6:47

some competition or maybe give Miranda

6:49

slash Edward Julian some competition and

6:52

that's Mickey Jasper and, you know,

6:54

Mike Ford instead of I don't

6:56

know, Justin Turner or something like

6:58

that. So, well, last spring, when

7:00

we talked about, when the right-sized

7:02

comments came out of ownership, right,

7:04

on CCO, we talked a little

7:06

bit about, we said even then,

7:08

listen, we think this is bad

7:10

news for this off-season, because this

7:12

off-season we at least had hope.

7:14

But next off-season, it looks like,

7:16

like, we're kind of hoping. Well,

7:18

maybe they are going to find

7:20

another 5, 10 million if they

7:22

get the TV contract worked out

7:24

and all this other stuff. Maybe

7:26

10, maybe 10, 15 million, you

7:29

know, something like that. But last

7:31

year, what we saw was kind

7:33

of how this works, which was

7:35

even to make a low wattage

7:37

signing, Santana didn't end up being

7:39

a low wattage signing, but he

7:41

was a low wattage signing at

7:43

the time. He was a 5

7:45

million. 5.2 million is, yeah. Even

7:47

to do that. We haven't seen

7:49

this ownership group faced with the

7:51

sort of payroll constraints that Terry

7:53

Ryan seemingly leaned into, right? Even

7:55

to get the Carlos Santana deal

7:57

done, he had to trade the

7:59

way Jorge Polanco first. Right. Right.

8:01

Like that's what freed up the

8:03

money. He wasn't spending that money

8:05

until he didn't, he wasn't spending

8:08

the $5 million until he freed

8:10

up the, what, $6 million by

8:12

moving Polanco and minus Clafini's salary.

8:14

Right. And as I am watching,

8:16

you know, guys that I thought,

8:18

even for a, you know, somewhat

8:20

kneecapped. Payroll situation get taken off

8:22

the board Josh Bell being a

8:24

great example Or I mean Turner

8:26

for that man. I don't know

8:28

what Turner's gonna sign for but

8:30

It seems like they're not really

8:32

in play until somebody takes on

8:34

one of the Contracts that we

8:36

already are looking to move are

8:38

this we think they are willing.

8:40

They are looking to move right

8:42

now and without somebody doing that

8:45

Yeah, you're not you're not actually

8:47

players at all. You're just You're

8:49

making trades and getting minorly guys.

8:51

You're getting, you know, literally minimum,

8:53

as a smaller contract room as

8:55

you can get. Yeah, I mean,

8:57

non-guarantied minimum salary or triple salary.

8:59

Right. It's weird too because I

9:01

still think they're going to, I

9:03

would like if they didn't have

9:05

to trade any salary. I mean,

9:07

they're at 140, roughly right now.

9:09

Right. But my understanding this whole

9:11

time has been that they got

9:13

to get to 130. I mean,

9:15

I had twins people tell me

9:17

that in person to my face

9:19

last, you know, what, three months

9:21

ago or something like that. But

9:24

the problem is, like, like you

9:26

pointed out, you go, well, okay,

9:28

well, maybe they'll trade Vasquez and

9:30

they'll go sign Josh Bell or

9:32

Justin Turner, that was off the

9:34

board. But just like as an

9:36

example, and you can do that.

9:38

And I mean if we're being

9:40

honest, it's not like these moves

9:42

have to be made in chronological

9:44

order. Exactly. Which this team has

9:46

seemed in the past to be

9:48

open to. Like they've been patient

9:50

on things free. agents and a

9:52

lot of things like that. But

9:54

yeah, I mean, it's, there's no

9:56

mid-off season like salary check-in. Now,

9:58

unless you hand out signing bonuses

10:01

that need to be paid at

10:03

certain points, you're not paying these

10:05

guys till the season starts. So

10:07

like they could carry $160 million

10:09

payroll until February, as long as

10:11

they were confident that they were

10:13

going to be able to shed,

10:15

you know, the 20 million or

10:17

whatever, Vasquez, Paddock, fill in the

10:19

blank, whatever it. But the problem

10:21

is that I think we're seeing

10:23

we're seeing now. is, well, it

10:25

could be one or two things.

10:27

One, they're having some difficulty getting

10:29

traction on salary dumping trades, you

10:31

know, which we speculated about for

10:33

months now, especially with Vasquez, like

10:35

how much value does it even

10:37

have? How much do you have

10:40

to eat? Who's going to take

10:42

10 million on that? We'll see.

10:44

But beyond that, the second problem

10:46

might be... Even if somehow you

10:48

luck into and I would consider

10:50

it very positive development for the

10:52

twins, if they could shed the

10:54

entirety of Vasquez's contract, that's 10

10:56

million. That just gets him to

10:58

1.30. Then there's no room to

11:00

do anything. So I think that's

11:02

maybe what we're seeing. And you

11:04

know, we do this every off

11:06

season with them, where it's like,

11:08

oh my God, they haven't done

11:10

anything. Why don't they do anything?

11:12

And then eventually they do something,

11:14

although it didn't happen last off

11:17

season. because of the circumstances of

11:19

ownership slash and payroll and that

11:21

makes me wonder you know is

11:23

this not under normal circumstances I

11:25

do think that the fall V

11:27

led front office buys its time

11:29

We'll end up spending the money

11:31

they could spend, but the problem

11:33

is they don't have money to

11:35

spend. So like that might be

11:37

out the window now too. Kind

11:39

of the normal MO of the

11:41

team of like, yeah, it's January,

11:43

but we do this every January.

11:45

We say they haven't done anything.

11:47

What are they going to do?

11:49

But normally we're doing that because

11:51

we're saying, well, our understanding is

11:53

they got about 28 more million

11:56

to spend. How are they going

11:58

to spend it? They're running out

12:00

of ways to spend it. They're

12:02

running out of ways to spend

12:04

it. I mean, our understanding right

12:06

now is they have negative 10

12:08

million or, you know, roughly. So,

12:10

and they, I don't know. And

12:12

it's probably, it probably makes sense

12:14

to wait, listen, you're not talking

12:16

about high impact guys here. You

12:18

know, Vasquez is a backup catcher

12:20

or, you know, moving a pitcher

12:22

or something like, these are not

12:24

names that would be generally moved

12:26

early in the off-season. saying well

12:28

we can still go and get

12:30

you know so and so via

12:33

trade and just cover our base

12:35

there right so it might just

12:37

very well be that all those

12:39

moves are still going to happen

12:41

they're just going to happen late

12:43

in the in the season it's

12:45

just that again which is something

12:47

we've talked about over and over

12:49

and over again with this front

12:51

of us Reagent pool is going

12:53

to be empty at that point

12:55

if you're looking for an impact

12:57

bat to be able to just

12:59

throw some of that money that

13:01

you're saving after. And yeah, I

13:03

mean, it's not that coming up

13:05

with contingency plans here. Right. I

13:07

think this is what they're doing.

13:09

I mean, we saw it kind

13:12

of with the bullpen last year.

13:14

We've seen it at various times.

13:16

They like to set a floor

13:18

and taken, you know, unconnected from

13:20

everything, other circumstances, payroll. Just, you

13:22

know, making a trade for a

13:24

guy like Mickey Gasper or signing

13:26

a guy like Mike Ford, whatever

13:28

it is, I have absolutely no

13:30

problem with those moves. I think

13:32

those are both intriguing players who

13:34

under the right circumstances with an

13:36

opportunity could be averageish, you know,

13:38

platoon players or useful players. I

13:40

have no problem with that as

13:42

kind of your floor setting, you

13:44

know. right goal there which the

13:46

twins clearly value I mean they

13:49

do that year after year this

13:51

point office they like to put

13:53

in place whether it was having

13:55

a you know Tyler Austin at

13:57

DH and we're like well they're

13:59

gonna go with Tyler Austin at

14:01

no they're gonna put Tyler Austin

14:03

there and then they're gonna go

14:05

and try to get Nelson Cruz

14:07

we've seen it with the rotation

14:09

at times they like to make

14:11

sure that they won't be left

14:13

with nothing and then they try

14:15

to pursue to, you know, more

14:17

appealing options. I just, I don't

14:19

know if that's actually gonna happen.

14:21

The floor setting might be just

14:23

what we're, what we're left with

14:25

here. And then I also started

14:28

thinking like, I mean, this is

14:30

nothing new, but we hear from

14:32

so many Twins fans and it's

14:34

hard to push back against the,

14:36

you know, why should I care?

14:38

Like, what, I mean, waiting for

14:40

this thing to be sold. And

14:42

just bigger picture picture. What is

14:44

the effect of a team in

14:46

a major market that is already

14:48

trying to compete with Vikings, wild,

14:50

wolves, links, gophers, etc., etc. Sorry

14:52

for any teams I've left out

14:54

there. For eyeballs, and not only

14:56

are you behind several, maybe all

14:58

at this point, of those teams

15:00

on the field in the most

15:02

recent season, but... Like just what

15:05

is the effect of going 18

15:07

20 months? Right. Without doing any

15:09

move that anyone has any interest

15:11

in, where they're even trading away

15:13

guys. Like, you know what I

15:15

mean? I'm not saying those are

15:17

like positive things, but they're of

15:19

interest. There are things that people

15:21

want to read about. There are

15:23

things that people want to talk

15:25

about. There are things that people

15:27

go, oh, did you see the

15:29

thing, the twins have gone essentially

15:31

18 months since the... Off-season going

15:33

into 2023 basically. Yeah. Signing Korea.

15:35

Right. Since that, which is funny

15:37

to have the biggest moment you

15:39

can ever have basically. And then

15:41

imagine at that point, like I

15:44

just think, were you in Florida

15:46

for that press conference? Or that,

15:48

yeah, it was Boris. I don't

15:50

remember if you were there. I

15:52

don't think I was at that

15:54

one, no. I cannot imagine. So

15:56

I'm pulling me aside as I'm

15:58

sitting there watching Korea and Boris

16:00

and And someone saying to me,

16:02

um, 20 months. not going to

16:04

do a damn thing. I'd have

16:06

been like, what do you mean?

16:08

Like, what? And I just wonder,

16:10

like, what is the long term,

16:12

I mean, we're seeing what the

16:14

short term implication is, but like,

16:16

of just sort of checking yourself

16:18

out of the of the limelight,

16:21

like of the interest, like you're

16:23

just not even in the rotation

16:25

of fan interest. And look, I

16:27

think we still have interesting things

16:29

to talk about. That'll be up

16:31

to everyone if these last 20

16:33

minutes have been interesting or not,

16:35

but. Like I'm not saying welcome

16:37

back to the first eight years

16:39

of this podcast kids except even

16:41

less Yeah, we have a lot

16:43

of practice Yeah, exactly. It's just

16:45

a very strange And I don't

16:47

even mean it so much as

16:49

a criticism of the front office,

16:51

although certainly I do think at

16:53

both trade trade deadlines last off

16:55

season this off season I would

16:57

have attempted to be more active

17:00

than they've been, but who knows

17:02

how successful I would have been

17:04

with that, but I do think

17:06

there were some buttons they could

17:08

have pushed there and they haven't.

17:10

So maybe I'm criticizing them a

17:12

little bit, but I mean this

17:14

is clearly just an ownership thing

17:16

like we've been over a thousand

17:18

times. It's clear even at the

17:20

trade deadlines they had payroll limitations

17:22

that were absolutely impacting their ability

17:24

to make some moves. Right. I

17:26

mean I know they came out

17:28

with quotes afterward and at the

17:30

end of the season where Fall

17:32

View was like, oh we were

17:34

never told we couldn't add payroll

17:37

at the deadline. Well yeah, I

17:39

mean, okay. Like Becky didn't say

17:41

to me last night. like okay

17:43

yeah it's just kind of understood

17:45

actually I think she'd probably say

17:47

go for it but anyway that's

17:49

a separate but I don't know

17:51

it's just a very strange thing

17:53

to why and by the way

17:55

making moves are not only not

17:57

always a positive thing look at

17:59

my beloved timber wolves right yes

18:01

but it is just very strange

18:03

for a team to be like

18:05

yeah we'll just check out of

18:07

here for a solid year and

18:09

a year and a half covering

18:11

basically two seasons, we just won't

18:13

do anything, good, bad, indifferent, like

18:16

we're just going to do nothing.

18:18

The biggest move... they have made

18:20

since resigning Carlos Correa in the

18:22

spring of 2023 prior to the

18:24

2023 season is well I guess

18:26

the Palanco trade would probably be

18:28

the biggest thing which is the

18:30

shedding of a contract and then

18:32

the Santana signing right if we're

18:34

being honest practically right that's a

18:36

what a B level move and

18:38

a C level move maybe in

18:40

the grand scheme of baseball something

18:42

like that so I don't know

18:44

that we do have the two

18:46

biggest pieces and news really in

18:48

our world number one our friend

18:50

Paul Lambert yes lovely wife Kelly

18:53

have welcomed a baby meat sauce

18:55

Louis Lambert great name I love

18:57

like Louis Varman. The alliteration. So

18:59

I know he listens, although maybe

19:01

he's a little busier than he

19:03

used to be, so maybe he

19:05

won't be listening to us. He

19:07

might have some time on his

19:09

hands. That's true. Well you're doing

19:11

like that midnight feeding or whatever

19:13

it is. Yeah, that's right. Pop

19:15

this dumb discussion in your... So

19:17

congratulations to the Lambert. Yes. One

19:19

of the meat sauce is one

19:21

of both of our favorite people

19:23

of all time, but the entire

19:25

family is just a... A lot

19:27

of very nice good people. Sure.

19:29

So congratulations for the entire growing

19:32

Lambert clan. That's right. Yeah. I

19:34

mean it is a clan. It

19:36

really is. I've met half of

19:38

them maybe and it's it's a

19:40

lot. But they're all very nice.

19:42

My favorite is still Dob, his

19:44

brother. Sure, of course. Sure. But

19:46

because we have a similar they

19:48

are a Vikings Packers dual household

19:50

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, right which

19:52

is what my household is Which

19:54

has been interesting these last few

19:56

weeks, but As soon as the

19:58

baby was born my Packers fan

20:00

who lives with me Becky said

20:02

well, what are they what are

20:04

they doing about the fandom of

20:06

this kid? Like that's an immediate

20:09

thing decide. And so I've seen

20:11

now from Meetsos's post on Twitter

20:13

what they're doing. They're just sort

20:15

of evenly distributing purple stuff and

20:17

green stuff and maybe just letting

20:19

this kid decide. That's I think

20:21

what's happening is they're being inundated

20:23

with various gifts from both both

20:25

fan bases to try and try

20:27

and I would argue if the

20:29

kids born in Minnesota it's a

20:31

Vikings fan, but you know, whatever.

20:33

I would also just say You

20:35

got like at least six or

20:37

seven years till this kid cares

20:39

about football in any sort of

20:41

meaningful way, right? Like a six

20:43

or seven year old? Let, whoever's

20:45

good at that point. That's the

20:48

real competition. Yeah, that's right. NFL

20:50

is high stakes. It's a billion

20:52

dollar businesses and stuff. But the

20:54

real stakes is can we lure

20:56

meat sauce as baby boy to

20:58

Packers or Vikings. That's a, the

21:00

other big piece of news. by

21:02

the way I think that hold

21:04

it real quickly I think that

21:06

does tie into the twins discussion

21:08

which is you know that is

21:10

the we've talked a little bit

21:12

about the decision to cut payroll

21:14

and how they potentially have impacted

21:16

you know a generation of fans

21:18

that were at the point where

21:20

you are playing for hearts and

21:22

minds once you are at the

21:25

point where you are a edge

21:27

of a in a competitive window

21:29

at the edge of you know

21:31

championship caliber type team and that's

21:33

where they were a year and

21:35

a half ago and that's what

21:37

they have given up to sort

21:39

of futs around with this thing.

21:41

I'm sorry, what was the second

21:43

biggest piece of deuce? Doakon Park

21:45

frequent guest on this show and

21:47

also right up there with meat

21:49

sauce on the all-time favorite people

21:51

list at least as far as

21:53

I'm concerned I know you're not

21:55

you don't like dough as a

21:57

person I've said I know. No.

21:59

Jeopardy, you know it all. That's

22:01

right. Doe has announced his retirement

22:04

from the Twins beat. Yes. Transitioning

22:06

to a different job with MLB..com

22:08

behind the scenes working on the

22:10

a stack cast product as sort

22:12

of a developer and maybe writer

22:14

sometimes and all that stuff but

22:16

yeah I wouldn't say this is

22:18

he's twins beat is the correct

22:20

thing he retired from not necessarily

22:22

not baseball at all not necessarily

22:24

twins fandom so maybe not even

22:26

twins writing right I'll be surprised

22:28

if he writes about the twins.

22:30

Well, we've talked about what a

22:32

compelling product they are to write

22:34

about, but our hope is, Doe

22:36

has already gotten out of Dodge,

22:38

he's no longer even Minnesota resident

22:41

at this point. Our hope is

22:43

we're gonna have Doe on for

22:45

sort of his exit interview. Because

22:47

anybody on this beat knows, you

22:49

need an exit interview, not with

22:51

the twins, not with your employer.

22:53

But with gleaming the geek you

22:55

have to talk your way out

22:57

of this thing or we won't

22:59

let you leave I would actually

23:01

not I would prefer not to

23:03

let dough leave if I had

23:05

a choice I've been sitting next

23:07

to dough For about 500 hours

23:09

no exaggeration per season for what

23:11

five years now? I've got very

23:13

close to dough literally and figuratively

23:15

and it pains me for him

23:17

to leave because as I've talked

23:20

about before he's a much needed

23:22

buffer as I was with him

23:24

between me and Dan Hayes and

23:26

he's they announced that Matthew Leach

23:28

is going to be his replacement

23:30

he was formerly when I first

23:32

started blogging and also he was

23:34

the Cardinals beat writer for MLB.com

23:36

like from 011 to I don't

23:38

know 13 or something like that.

23:40

And then he stepped aside from

23:42

the beat and did a behind-the-scenes

23:44

role with MOB. I know he

23:46

was an editor for a while

23:48

and stuff like that. So he's

23:50

uh, he's dusting off the the

23:52

notepad as if we still use

23:54

notpads, but you know what I

23:57

mean. He dusting off the spreadsheet.

23:59

Well we'll see that's... Doe leaves

24:01

very big shoes. Yeah, I know.

24:03

Not literally, but on the spreadsheet

24:05

front. And I don't know enough

24:07

about Matthew Leach to say whether

24:09

he can fill those shoes. So

24:11

we'll see. But yeah, congratulations to

24:13

Doe because I know this is

24:15

something that he has been thinking

24:17

about for a while and has

24:19

been sort of weighing the pros

24:21

and cons with for a while.

24:23

And yeah, it's good for him.

24:25

Bad for us. If you'd like

24:27

to listen to that exit interview,

24:29

I would suggest you to sign

24:31

up for the patron. I can

24:33

tell you you only have to

24:36

pay a bucket episode when we

24:38

publish and we haven't published in

24:40

three or four weeks. Yeah, so

24:42

you will not you will not

24:44

lose your shirt this off-season on

24:46

the patron. It's easy. We absolutely

24:48

cover the breaking news. We do

24:50

lots of interviews with people like

24:52

the various beat writers. and including

24:54

a lot of mailbag episodes where

24:56

you can ask us questions or

24:58

ask some of the other beat

25:00

writers questions about the twins are

25:02

about ridiculous side items in their

25:04

lives. Do you think Matthew Leach

25:06

would have taken this job to

25:08

replace Doe if he knew he

25:10

would have to do an entry

25:13

interview? Right. With us. Or if

25:15

he knew you'd have to sit

25:17

next to me for like $500

25:19

every season. That's the real painful,

25:21

right? As you see, that's the

25:23

challenge. Before we get to actual

25:25

twins things, let's talk about, well,

25:27

first of all, Black Stack, which

25:29

is our presenting sponsor each week,

25:31

or each episode. That's what you've

25:33

missed most being overseas here now.

25:35

So I did have a good

25:37

hazy here in Kulin Gata. But

25:39

I am very excited that when

25:41

I get back, not only will

25:43

my fridge have a ton of

25:45

black stack beer in it, Black

25:47

stack is also going to be

25:49

the presenting beer sponsor for the

25:52

winter meltdown. Eric Lehman. So we

25:54

will be having some of their

25:56

particularly good pale ale, hazy I

25:58

think, pale ale, local 755, that's

26:00

one of their flagship products. It's

26:02

the one that I know just

26:04

about everybody who is into beer,

26:06

absolutely loves from them. also their

26:08

Slope Spilsner which is another one

26:10

that I love from a black

26:12

stack which a little more drinkable.

26:14

But I mean they have all

26:16

kinds of other great ones. The

26:18

other pull tab pale ale is

26:20

another big fan uncut jam strawberry

26:22

rhubarb sour and now you can

26:24

find them not just in their

26:26

fantastic tap room which we visited

26:29

just before we left and we'll

26:31

probably visit once we get back

26:33

but you can also find them

26:35

in your local liquor store because

26:37

They have a whole new distribution

26:39

and distributor relationship right now. And

26:41

as such, they are in places

26:43

everywhere. From Grammarie to Rochester, Winona

26:45

to Fargo, you can find black

26:47

stack in your liquor store, and

26:49

if you can't just ask for

26:51

them. But I think you're going

26:53

to be able to find them.

26:55

So take a look for it.

26:57

It's usually kind of like a

26:59

silver black can with a little

27:01

bit of an accent of color

27:03

on it, and look for that

27:05

black stack ruin. they do really

27:08

really well some places do advertising

27:10

well and such these guys don't

27:12

they just hire like two podcast

27:14

guys to do it they they

27:16

kind of miss that aspect up

27:18

but the but they do do

27:20

the beer well so give a

27:22

cut for a black stack brewing

27:24

so stop by black stack brewing

27:26

which is near 94 to 80

27:28

or even easier ask the ask

27:30

for them at your local liquor

27:32

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sure. That means we got Tier

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John. Tier 1. That is correct.

29:25

Okay, let's talk a little bit

29:27

about some actual twins things, such

29:29

as they are. How about some

29:31

guys who are probably going to

29:33

be investing some of their money

29:35

from other teams? Sure, good segue.

29:37

There you go. Yeah. Three exits,

29:40

which Kyle Farmer heard already exited,

29:42

which leaves, I think they had

29:44

six Major League Free Agents, which

29:46

leaves, Manny Margot is unsigned, Probably

29:48

like a month or more ago.

29:50

It was pretty quick early in

29:52

the off season and then now

29:54

since last we spoke there's been

29:56

three signings Max Kepler signed a

29:58

one-year 10 million dollar deal with

30:00

Christie's beloved Philadelphia Phillies so she

30:02

can continue to look at Max

30:04

Kepler. I know that was a

30:06

big hope for her that she

30:08

wouldn't have to stop looking at

30:10

Kepler not so much as the

30:12

player but just you know look

30:14

literally just looking at him. Carlos

30:17

Santana signed a one-year 12 million

30:19

dollar deal with the Cleveland Guardians

30:21

which he kind of goes back

30:23

there it's actually his third stint

30:25

with the Guardians and then did

30:27

that number surprise you? Yeah,

30:29

I mean we can talk more about

30:32

that but like Just put it this

30:34

way in terms of surprise last year.

30:36

He was 37 years old Right around

30:38

this time and he signed a five

30:41

million dollar deal five point two five

30:43

million dollar deal with the twins Now

30:45

he's 38 years old And signed a

30:48

12 and a half million dollar 12

30:50

million dollar deal. So he's you know

30:52

He's that two and a half times

30:55

the contract despite aging a year. I

30:57

guess it sort of speaks to Well,

30:59

it speaks to the type of season

31:02

he had. He wanted his first goal

31:04

glove and he hit 23 homers and

31:06

after a horrible start He was you

31:09

know legitimately an all-star caliber player for

31:11

the last like, you know, five and

31:13

a half months of the season or

31:16

whatever I think it probably speaks to

31:18

the fact that the twins got a

31:20

pretty good bargain with him last time

31:22

around Although he had been coming off

31:25

like three pretty mediocre years at that

31:27

point And then the last one Caleb

31:29

Thielbar has signed, I didn't actually see

31:32

the terms on this. I haven't either.

31:34

I'm assuming it's a couple million maybe

31:36

with one year deal major league contract

31:39

with the Chicago Cubs, which I mean,

31:41

I don't think the twins had any

31:43

real, I don't want to say interest,

31:46

but like made no real effort to

31:48

resign any of those three guys. The

31:50

Kepler one, not surprising, I mean, I

31:53

guess I would have been pretty surprised.

31:55

If they if we heard they had

31:57

tried to resign Kepler Santana They

32:00

love Santa Ana and he was a

32:02

great signing for them. He's one of

32:05

the only, like we've talked about at

32:07

the beginning, one of the only positive

32:09

moves they've made in the last year

32:11

and a half. I think they would

32:14

have loved him back, but like we

32:16

talked about at the beginning of the

32:18

show, it's not clear to me they

32:21

even have $5 million to throw around.

32:23

And when he's getting $12 million instead

32:25

of $5 million, I mean, there was

32:28

zero chance they were going to be

32:30

in a position. They were going to

32:32

be in position. as opposed to going

32:35

to Cleveland for a third stint where

32:37

he's played, you know, two-thirds of his

32:39

career now or whatever. Even if he

32:42

wanted to stay in Minnesota and even

32:44

if the twins were really motivated to

32:46

bring him back at age 38 because

32:49

of how good he was for them,

32:51

12 million, which is, I mean, there's

32:53

no way to, unfortunately, it's sad to

32:55

say this, but there's no way to

32:58

fit that money into their financial situation

33:00

when they're already 10, 12 million dollars

33:02

over their self-imposed payroll. I mean, I

33:05

think he's a Minnesota guy, he's a

33:07

lifelong twins fan, all that stuff. I

33:09

think certainly he would have been open

33:12

to returning to the twins. My assumption

33:14

is, they kind of thought, well, you

33:16

know, good time. And they could use

33:19

the left-handed picture, just so we're clear.

33:21

Right, but part of the reason they

33:23

could use the left-handed picture is I

33:26

think they lost faith in him. That's

33:28

right. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. And you

33:30

know, the Cubs, that's not a bad

33:33

spot to land for a one-year deal.

33:35

So good for him there. I think,

33:37

you know, the Kepler one, it's kind

33:39

of that officially of an error there.

33:42

I mean, he was the last of

33:44

the three signed in 2009. It was

33:46

Kepler, Polanco, and Sino in the same

33:49

international class. They were all 16 years

33:51

old. Kepler from Germany and then Palanco

33:53

and Sono from the Dominican Republic, they

33:56

all signed the combined totals for that

33:58

trio of international signings, which were actually

34:00

tech. I guess signed by the Bill

34:03

Smith regime, in between Terry Ryan regimes.

34:05

They spent, they combined, those three guys

34:07

spent 42 calendar years in the twins

34:10

organization. Think about that. They played, they

34:12

played, they combined 28 seasons for the

34:14

twins in the majors. That's counting like,

34:17

you know, brief call up for the

34:19

beginning of their careers. And that trio

34:21

combined for 2000. 598 games with the

34:23

Twins, in the Twins uniform, not counting

34:26

minor leagues, just major leagues. I mean,

34:28

that's incredible. And, you know, we can

34:30

sit here and I feel like we

34:33

had this conversation about Sino when he

34:35

left, two years ago, we had this

34:37

conversation about Palanco when he left last

34:40

off season, and we had this conversation

34:42

kind of in advance of Kepler, you

34:44

know, going back two, three months, or

34:47

even at the end of the season

34:49

when it became clear he was gonna

34:51

shut it down for the season because

34:54

he was injured. we knew he wasn't

34:56

going to be back so we kind

34:58

of tried to put his career in

35:01

perspective so we're not going to do

35:03

that necessarily now but that's incredible for

35:05

three guys he signed when they were

35:07

16 for a total of about four

35:10

million dollars less than four million dollars

35:12

in 2009 money you got 42 years

35:14

in the organization 28 seasons in the

35:17

uniform and like basically 26 hundred games

35:19

Two of them were all stars and

35:21

then they won who wasn't an all-star

35:24

Kepler played, you know lasted the longest

35:26

with the right with the team so

35:28

I don't know that You could point

35:31

to Well, it's weird because I think

35:33

Kepler When you sign a 16-year-old from

35:35

Germany Which by the way is not

35:38

a lot at this Sano got 3.2

35:40

million at the same time. So Although

35:42

that was that was a record amount

35:45

or not quite a record amount. It

35:47

was close to a record amount at

35:49

that time. Oh, the Sino, yeah, yeah,

35:51

I mean, it was a actually kept.

35:54

was the most ever, I believe, for

35:56

a European player. It was definitely the

35:58

most ever for a German player, but

36:01

that's not really a whole lot. There's

36:03

no way to look at that and

36:05

say, we signed a 16 year old

36:08

German kid. His parents are both in

36:10

Berlin Ballet. He was super raw. He

36:12

was basically just an athlete at that

36:15

time. And he ended up playing, literally

36:17

half his life, 15 years in the

36:19

organization. He played, you know, 10 seasons,

36:22

when the majors, all this stuff. Like,

36:24

there's no way to look at that

36:26

and not view that as an incredible

36:29

outcome for that signing. I mean, you

36:31

signed a 16-year-old and you got 16

36:33

years out of him, basically. But within

36:35

that, I think, and this is true

36:38

to some extent was to know, that

36:40

I think with Kepler, he had such

36:42

a weird, I don't know, like, lack

36:45

of progression, like he basically, as a

36:47

rookie, when he was like 23, I

36:49

think, I want to say he was

36:52

a rookie, he was kind of like

36:54

an average or slightly above average all

36:56

around corner outfielder, like he was a

36:59

little below average offensively for a corner

37:01

outfielder, but a good defensive player, you

37:03

add it together, it's, you know, average

37:06

everyday player. Well, when a guy does

37:08

that as a rookie, you know, 22,

37:10

23, you go, oh wow, well if

37:13

he can do that, you know, you

37:15

know, right away, And that never really

37:17

happened. Like obviously in 2019, he had

37:19

a breakout year, second half of 2023,

37:22

he was phenomenal. But for the most

37:24

part, he was kind of the same

37:26

player at, you know, 30 as he

37:29

was at 23. And it's kind of

37:31

the- When you had the Babbitt Ts

37:33

as well, like every offseason, you'd take

37:36

a look at, boy, he sure didn't

37:38

seem to get very lucky on hits.

37:40

And then it takes you of, you

37:43

know, three, four, I mean, it took

37:45

us- I mean, it took us- half

37:47

a dozen years it seems for us

37:50

to recognize no he's just never gonna

37:52

get lucky it hits he's not the

37:54

kind of guy who you know hits

37:57

the ball particularly or he manages to

37:59

check every box such that you're kind

38:01

of hurting yourself on balls in play.

38:03

So, yeah. Yeah, well, and then they

38:06

put the shift regulations in, which I

38:08

remember that was what, two, three years

38:10

ago, and everyone was like, oh, this

38:13

is gonna really benefit Kepler. And I'm

38:15

like, well, yeah, I mean, it will.

38:17

He's one of the most shifted players

38:20

and he's got a very rigid. way

38:22

of hitting that kind of produces the

38:24

same type of balls in play over

38:27

and over and over again so it's

38:29

pretty easy to defend and so yeah

38:31

that will help him that you know

38:34

you can't shift directly into the spots

38:36

he's gonna hit the ball but I

38:38

mean we saw his batting average go

38:41

up a little bit like but you

38:43

know he wasn't it didn't it didn't

38:45

make him more than an averageish overall

38:47

player but it seems similar to me

38:50

He wasn't as good as Jose Barrios,

38:52

but it seems similar to me to

38:54

Jose Barrios in that Jose Barrios was

38:57

terrible as a rookie, but then as

38:59

in his in his first full season

39:01

in his second year He was basically

39:04

like a number two number three starter

39:06

and we thought oh man this guy's

39:08

like 23 First full year. He's kind

39:11

of you know borderline top of the

39:13

rotation type of guy 180 innings three

39:15

something me are a Imagine when he's

39:18

going to be in two or three

39:20

years. Well, it turned out what he

39:22

was going to be in two or

39:25

three years was basically the same, the

39:27

same player, good player, better than Kepler

39:29

probably, but I mean, there's nothing wrong

39:31

with being an average player. It just

39:34

was a very weird. I think Kepler's

39:36

twins career was so much more stagnation

39:38

than development or improvement. And I think

39:41

that became frustrating to try to figure

39:43

out. And I know the twins were

39:45

somewhat frustrated by that over the years.

39:48

They played him every day even though

39:50

he was the worst hitter in twins

39:52

history against lefties He was a good

39:55

right fielder, but it became clear to

39:57

the twins that he Was not really

39:59

fond of filling in center feet which

40:02

they needed obviously because Buxton's hurt every

40:04

year and after the first three or

40:06

four years of doing that and doing

40:08

it reasonably well filling in he made

40:11

it pretty clear like I despised playing

40:13

center field so they stopped doing that

40:15

he just was he became a very

40:17

rigid player not a bad player but

40:20

just like the things he did well

40:22

never really grew and the things he

40:24

either did poorly or had no interest

40:26

in doing seem to increase over the

40:29

years and also there's there's also the

40:31

thing about he was hurt a lot

40:33

too you're right yeah well that's a

40:35

good point that's another good point that

40:38

was a frustrating aspect I'll give you

40:40

one more which is just in terms

40:42

of like fan perception he always seemed

40:44

to have almost one foot out the

40:46

door now that isn't on him that

40:49

is but I can't think of another

40:51

twins player that was ever rumored to

40:53

be on the trading block as much

40:55

as Max Kepler who was never actually

40:58

traded Right, I mean we started talking

41:00

about them potentially moving Max Kepler in

41:02

2019. I remember the off season after

41:04

that remarkable 2019 off season and we're

41:07

like, okay, what do they do? They

41:09

just got swept out of the playoffs

41:11

again. You know, by and what are

41:13

they going to do to kind of

41:16

take that next step? And I think,

41:18

you know, the thought process was sort

41:20

of. This was before we thought they

41:22

would spend any money like on a

41:24

career or something. But a lot of

41:27

it was like, well, they're going to

41:29

have to move some somebody from this

41:31

young core of good players and it

41:33

sure seems like Kepler is the fit

41:36

for that. And then you had what?

41:38

Is it last year or two years

41:40

ago where I guess it was where

41:42

it was just assumed I was two

41:45

years ago it was just assumed he

41:47

was off the team like they they

41:49

already had filled up they'd sign Joey

41:51

Gallo they'd they'd they'd filled every corner

41:54

outfield spot they could fill and we

41:56

were convinced that Max Kepler was not

41:58

going to be on this team by

42:00

opening day and somehow he made it

42:02

through the opening day well that one

42:05

I with all that that that one

42:07

ends up trading a rise which traded

42:09

which changed the left-hand hitting component but

42:11

I agree with all that I mean

42:14

I'm I'm as guilty as anyone or

42:16

more guilty than most for writing you

42:18

know trade speculation or they should trade

42:20

Kepler I always tell the joke of

42:23

like three off seasons ago I walk

42:25

into the twin suite at the winter

42:27

meetings and a high-ranking twins official instead

42:29

of saying hello Welcome to whatever he

42:32

said boy you really want us to

42:34

trade Kepler, huh? Like all the things

42:36

you said I just thought it was

42:38

logical I think what happened though and

42:40

this kind of goes back to the

42:43

stagnation not improvement and you know not

42:45

growing from being an average player I

42:47

think what happened eventually was by the

42:49

time the twins like 2021ish and on

42:52

the last couple of season certainly by

42:54

the time it was clear to the

42:56

twins like you know he's winding down

42:58

here we're probably not going to try

43:01

to resign him he's no longer like

43:03

one of our best players but he's

43:05

solid by the time it made sense

43:07

from for them not just from a

43:10

financial standpoint but like okay we have

43:12

larnick we have walner we're ready to

43:14

move on or whatever we have Kirilloff

43:16

now those guys weren't always as good

43:18

I mean there's something to be said

43:21

for being average every year but by

43:23

the time it it it made like

43:25

more straightforward sense for them to actually

43:27

trade him I think his value across

43:30

the league was pretty minimal. Like, I

43:32

can tell you two off seasons ago

43:34

and certainly this past off season, I

43:36

don't even really think they tried to

43:39

trade him because it was almost, it

43:41

wasn't quite a Vasquez situation where they'd

43:43

have to eat the money, but he

43:45

was on a contract for 10 million

43:48

and it was like, well, was Max

43:50

Kepler much more than a 10 million

43:52

dollar player? Funny enough. That's precisely what

43:54

he signed for as a free agent.

43:56

Now, it was coming off a poor

43:59

season, but it wasn't that much worse

44:01

than previous seasons that he's had with

44:03

the twins. So I think part of

44:05

it was, it's almost like he got

44:08

freezer burn with the rest of the

44:10

league. from being on the market. You

44:12

do it the same way you kind

44:14

of had freezer burn here, you know.

44:17

Yeah, I think, I mean, I think

44:19

it just became more and more difficult,

44:21

whether you're a Twins fan, whether you're

44:23

the Twins themselves, whether you're another team

44:26

that may have had interest in him.

44:28

Because I can tell you, they had

44:30

trade talks with him at trade deadlines,

44:32

going back two or three years, at

44:34

in off seasons, I know for sure

44:37

of negotiations of negotiations, of negotiations, but

44:39

at no point were they ever going

44:41

to be able to get a ton

44:43

for him in my in my subjective

44:46

view and I think we joked back

44:48

then that the twins were maybe overrating

44:50

him and that's subjective too but I

44:52

think what happened was the last couple

44:55

years it became tougher for teams to

44:57

kind of talk themselves into Kepler still

44:59

having upside for all the reasons that

45:01

we just discussed because it was like

45:04

well how how how how the twins

45:06

haven't ever been able to tap into

45:08

this upside and so then eventually he

45:10

becomes a free agent he becomes a

45:12

free agent And I'm not saying join

45:15

in a contending team in Philadelphia is

45:17

a bad thing or anything, but he

45:19

got a one-year $10 million deal. I

45:21

mean, that's certainly a whole hell of

45:24

a lot less in both years and

45:26

salary than we would have expected three

45:28

years ago trying to project what his

45:30

eventual agency. And so I think the

45:33

fact that he basically got the same

45:35

money that he finished with the twins,

45:37

which was $10 million this past season,

45:39

on a one-year deal, even though he's

45:42

only... I think he's 31 or something

45:44

like that. I think speaks to that.

45:46

It's like, well, being an average has

45:48

value and I'm sure the Philly C

45:50

one or two things that they think

45:53

they can try to tweak or tap

45:55

into and we'll see if they're more

45:57

successful than the twins, that it wouldn't

45:59

shock me if they were. But I

46:02

just think the notion of him as

46:04

having like considerable upside beyond just being

46:06

a good solid everyday player is probably,

46:08

you know, two or three years freezer

46:11

burned, like you said. It is interesting,

46:13

so I was reading our filly's writer

46:15

Matt Gelb who does a really nice

46:17

job. I was kind of giving him

46:20

the, filling him in on Kepler. a

46:22

little bit. And then I read what

46:24

he wrote after talking to Dave Dombrowski

46:26

about the signing. They're going to play

46:28

him in left field, at least as

46:31

things stand now, because they have Nick

46:33

Castiano in right field, although they're reportedly

46:35

trying to trade him. But they're going

46:37

to play Kepler in left field, which

46:40

he has literally never played in the

46:42

majors. And the last time he started

46:44

a game somewhere other than right field

46:46

was 2021. Preferences kind of go out

46:49

the window when you're trying to find

46:51

a one year deal for the most

46:53

money I think. And then the other

46:55

thing of note is that it sounds

46:58

like the Phillies are going to play

47:00

them every day. And I, by the

47:02

end, the twins kind of cease doing

47:04

that. But for the majority of Kepler's

47:06

career, 90% of it I would say

47:09

with the twins, he played every day.

47:11

He played against righties and lefties. Despite

47:13

the fact that he very rarely was

47:15

consistently good against lefties. And in fact.

47:18

Only Jock Jones and Nick Pinto, or

47:20

worse, you know, among guys who have

47:22

at least like, you know, 500 career

47:24

at bats against lefties with the twins,

47:27

have a lower OPS than Kepler. The

47:29

excuse that I always assumed was, well,

47:31

they didn't often have the ability to

47:33

play all righties against lefties. So if

47:36

you're gonna stick one lefty, leave one

47:38

lefty in the lineup, make it your

47:40

good defensive player, which was Kepler. But.

47:42

I mean the Phillies I don't know

47:44

I feel like kind of you're you're

47:47

not playing into his strengths by doing

47:49

that especially age 30 and I mean

47:51

the notion of like oh maybe he'll

47:53

get better against lamb and he's not

47:56

gonna get better against lefties but I

47:58

mean they had Marsh playing in left

48:00

field most of last year at least

48:02

seemed he made the most consistent starts

48:05

of there and he's also a left-handed

48:07

hitter yeah I don't really know what

48:09

they're what their right-handed option is out

48:11

there, to be honest. And then the

48:14

other signing, which we talk... about was

48:16

Santana. So what I thought was interesting,

48:18

and this goes back to the payroll

48:20

discussion that we had, Ken Rosenthal had

48:22

a good article about Santana, kind of

48:25

behind the scenes of how he ended

48:27

up back in Cleveland for a third

48:29

stint, and Rosenthal listed eight teams that

48:31

pursued Santana. I forget what his wording

48:34

was, but basically these were the teams

48:36

that were... going after him might even

48:38

been these are the teams that made

48:40

him some kind of offer and it's

48:43

telling that the twins were not one

48:45

of those eight teams listed which not

48:47

surprising because again once his once it

48:49

became clear he was going to get

48:52

a lot more than five million it's

48:54

just it's not doable for the I

48:56

mean it's like it's like you're like

48:58

wasting each of this time at that

49:00

point either you're despite how well he

49:03

played last year do you have Would

49:05

the twins have more confidence in him

49:07

at this time this year than they

49:09

had in at him with him this

49:12

time last year? Yeah, I mean, I

49:14

think it's debatable. I don't I you

49:16

can say well, I mean, look what

49:18

the year he put up and plus

49:21

he's better defensively than we thought he

49:23

was. They might have already known kind

49:25

of about the defensive part. They sure

49:27

sounded like they knew about that defensive

49:30

aspect of his game when we met

49:32

with them very first day in spring

49:34

training and Rocco was already talking about.

49:36

Santana is being playing first base on

49:38

a regular basis, but you know, I

49:41

don't know that I have more confidence

49:43

in him than I did last year.

49:45

I'm not sure they should be paying

49:47

much more than five or six million

49:50

dollars for Santana. I agree. I mean,

49:52

this goes back to we had many

49:54

of these discussions surrounding Nelson Cruz, who

49:56

was a much better player at this

49:59

age than then Carlos Santana, but the

50:01

thing we kept coming back to was,

50:03

you know, at some point, everyone ceases

50:05

being great. And the fact that you're

50:08

still great at 37 or 38 or

50:10

39, that's incredible. And I mean, all

50:12

credit to you, Nelson Cruz. worked as

50:14

an ass off physically I saw some

50:16

of it and I know Carlos Santana

50:19

same way it's not a coincidence that

50:21

those are two of the rare guys

50:23

who have are playing close to their

50:25

best at you know nearing 40 but

50:28

we saw it with Nelson Cruz I

50:30

mean when it ends it ends in

50:32

a hurry and that's just how aging

50:34

works in baseball and so yeah to

50:37

your point like if the twins in

50:39

life by the way God am I

50:41

learning that oh my god from from

50:43

39 to 42 I aged 300 years

50:46

physically and probably like 800 years mentally

50:48

like oh my god anyway yes so

50:50

I mean I can I could sympathize

50:52

I guess with this topic but to

50:54

your point even like given what the

50:57

ones actual payroll situation is which they're

50:59

over by 10 million they'd have to

51:01

trade just to be neutral from a

51:03

payroll standpoint. It was probably a moot

51:06

point, but if you said to me,

51:08

you know, their payrolls, 150, expected to

51:10

be instead of 1, so they have,

51:12

you know, 10 million to spend right

51:15

now, and then you said to me,

51:17

do you want them to basically spend

51:19

that 10 million or 12 million, as

51:21

it turned out, on a 38-year-old, Carlos

51:24

Santana? I

51:26

probably would say no, just because what

51:28

are the odds that he's going to

51:30

be as good at 38 as he

51:33

was at 37? I mean, he wasn't

51:35

even that good at 34, 35, 36.

51:37

He was better at 37 than he

51:39

had been at any point in the

51:42

previous three years. I'll give credit to

51:44

the twins, like you kind of said,

51:46

would the twins have more, I forget

51:48

what you wording, but like more confidence

51:51

in him being worth that at 38

51:53

than he was at 37. I give

51:55

the twins all kinds of credit for.

51:57

seeing a 37-year-old guy who to me

52:00

at least appeared to be on the

52:02

decline. for several years, a formerly really

52:04

great player, all-star caliber players certainly, you

52:06

know, and a nemesis for them. But

52:09

I didn't see anything in Santana, I

52:11

mean, go back and listen to what

52:13

we said when they signed him. I

52:16

was like, I hope they only used

52:18

him in a platoon role. He was

52:20

so much better defensively than I ever

52:22

expected, but to your point, Baldelli was

52:25

talking about him winning gold gloves the

52:27

first day of spring training. And so

52:29

I don't think he shocked the twins,

52:31

and that's a credit to them. But

52:34

that doesn't necessarily mean they would have

52:36

expected the same type of season at

52:38

38. Right. Well, I mean, and just

52:40

to put a fine point on it,

52:43

you know, he's 38 right now. He

52:45

turns 39 on April 8th. So really,

52:47

they squeezed that out of him in

52:49

what his, was his already his 38

52:52

year old season. And now Cleveland's betting

52:54

on him in his 39 year old

52:56

season. Now, that's not much different than

52:58

what you said. You said 37 to

53:01

38 on it, but it kind of

53:03

is. Actually, you know, sometime between like

53:05

37 and 41, things are not going

53:07

to go well and you get one

53:10

of those years and it works out.

53:12

You, you're playing with the house's money.

53:14

I would just, that might be when

53:16

you want to walk away from the

53:19

table. Yeah, I mean, you know, so.

53:21

I agree. I think one of the

53:23

people often hear us talk about like

53:25

ages in baseball and what we tend

53:28

to use is not someone's age. Like

53:30

their literal age on a given day,

53:32

but their seasonal age and so you'd

53:34

say like his age 38 season or

53:37

his age 39 season because the reason

53:39

that we do that is If you're

53:41

comparing like across eras and you want

53:44

to go Well, how many guys were

53:46

above average hitters at Carlos Santana's age?

53:48

Well, you can't look up like his

53:50

literal age, you know 38 years 157

53:53

days like that doesn't really help you

53:55

what you want to do is you

53:57

know how many guys in their age

53:59

39 season were above average haters and

54:02

you would group him in with that

54:04

and the way that works is i

54:06

believe it's july first Whatever age you

54:08

are on July 1st is that's your

54:11

age for the season. And so, yeah,

54:13

I mean, you're right. If you look

54:15

at like the entire history of baseball,

54:17

hitters in their age 37 season, you

54:20

probably lose, you know, how many were

54:22

above average, whatever the number is, let's

54:24

say there were 50 of them, who

54:26

were above average. You probably lose at

54:29

least a third and maybe a half

54:31

of them going from age 37 to

54:33

38. And then the same thing is

54:35

probably true. or maybe even more so

54:38

going from 38 to 39, you're just,

54:40

you're, you know, the hill you're trying

54:42

to climb is steeper and steeper every

54:44

time. So I don't have any problem

54:47

with not giving Santana $12 million or

54:49

more, it sounds like it would have

54:51

taken more to convince him of that.

54:53

And we should also note to clear

54:56

room for him, both that first base,

54:58

but from a payroll standpoint, the Guardians

55:00

traded Josh Naylor. Who has been you

55:02

know their cleanup hitter left-handed slugger first

55:05

baseman DH for the past three or

55:07

four years? In my head, he's just

55:09

destroyed the twins although I looked up

55:12

the actual numbers And he's been sort

55:14

of mediocre against the twins, but in

55:16

my head It's possible. I'm just remembering

55:18

a couple of homers off Emilio Pagan

55:21

or whatever but in my head Josh

55:23

Naylor has just been an absolute terror

55:25

on the twins, but they ended up

55:27

trading him to the diamondbacks because he

55:30

was expected to make around 12 million

55:32

in arbitration. So they basically traded him,

55:34

replaced him with Santana for the exact

55:36

same money, picked up a pitching prospect

55:39

and a supplemental draft pick in the

55:41

process, which isn't bad, although I probably,

55:43

going back to the age discussion, I

55:45

probably would bet on Josh Naylor out

55:48

hitting Carlos Santana in 2025, although defensively,

55:50

Naylor is pretty bad defensively. basically got

55:52

the same. I think you got 12.5

55:54

million from the Yankees. Josh Bell who

55:57

we mentioned earlier got six million I

55:59

believe from the Washington Nationals the first

56:01

base market is basically gone I mean

56:03

it's free agent wise I mean it's

56:06

it's it's it's just in Turner maybe

56:08

the after came you're getting into like

56:10

the Donovan Solano's and the Mark Canhas

56:12

and and those type of guys who

56:15

to me are more like role player

56:17

you know two million dollar type of

56:19

guys when that's not just first baseman

56:21

it's basically bats basically bats Right, I

56:24

mean, there's just, yeah, I mean, you

56:26

know, you can, you can take a

56:28

look at corner outfield, there's a lot

56:30

of areas and say, you know, well,

56:33

twins could move some stuff around here.

56:35

They've got openings, maybe in DH, maybe

56:37

at first base, maybe in the corner

56:40

outfit, like, they can, they can shift

56:42

some chairs around and see, you know,

56:44

make room forever, it doesn't really matter

56:46

what the position is. There's just not

56:49

a lot left on the free agent

56:51

market market unless you're, you're, you know,

56:53

you know, going crazy, so. I mean,

56:55

this has been one of the faster

56:58

moving overall free agent classes, I guess,

57:00

in the last five years. I think

57:02

relief pitching hasn't really had a run

57:04

yet. There's a lot of pretty good

57:07

relievers left. But starting, I mean, I

57:09

think, the athletic ranked, I was part

57:11

of the ranking, they ranked 40, the

57:13

top 40 free agents, I think like

57:16

24 of them have signed already. including

57:18

I think 10 of the top 15,

57:20

like you said, most of the, you

57:22

know, corner outfield, first base bats have

57:25

either already signed or, you know, they're

57:27

Peter Lanzo and it's irrelevant to the

57:29

situation, obviously. Which explains, which, yeah, which

57:31

explains the next two moves we're about

57:34

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we just talked just talked about, to

1:01:32

give a short shrift to

1:01:34

to but... Fieldbar, talk about him at

1:01:36

the end maybe, but at the twins

1:01:38

lost a left -handed lost a left in

1:01:40

Max Kepler and fielder in Max in a

1:01:42

Santana. first baseman in They

1:01:45

have They have left hand

1:01:47

hitting right field obviously. I mean,

1:01:49

they have. they have Matt Walner, I

1:01:51

would I would expect to be the opening day

1:01:53

right fielder. They they have Trevor Larnick who expect to

1:01:55

be the opening the left fielder, they could

1:01:57

swap that, I They could know, we'll see. don't know.

1:01:59

We'll see. Emmanuel Rodriguez, who's their second

1:02:01

best prospect and probably one of the

1:02:03

dozen or so best hitting prospects in

1:02:06

all of the minors, ended the season

1:02:08

at AAA and is himself a left

1:02:10

handed hitting, I wouldn't say corner outfield

1:02:13

there, he's the center fielder right now,

1:02:15

but probably long term a good right

1:02:17

fielder defensively, maybe a center fielder, so

1:02:20

I mean they have Kepler replacements which

1:02:22

played a part in why I said

1:02:24

earlier that I never expected them, it

1:02:27

became clear that they weren't gonna make

1:02:29

an effort to resign Kepler to resign

1:02:31

Kepler. Santana leaves a more legitimate hole

1:02:34

in the lineup at first base and

1:02:36

You know, I think in ideal circumstance,

1:02:38

even if you thought that 12 million

1:02:41

for him was too too big of

1:02:43

a bet to make on a 38

1:02:45

39 year old, you know, there were

1:02:48

guys like Goldschmidt, there were guys like

1:02:50

Josh Bell, there's still a guy like

1:02:52

Justin Turner There are

1:02:55

some other you know, there's some trade

1:02:57

options certainly we could go through some

1:02:59

of those names if we wanted to

1:03:01

I Wonder more and more and again,

1:03:04

this is the result of Nothing happening

1:03:06

so that I start to try to

1:03:08

read between lines and and connect dots

1:03:10

that may or not be there But

1:03:13

the fact that the few low wattage

1:03:15

moves they have made have been for

1:03:17

basically triple a first baseman Makes me

1:03:19

think maybe they're setting up a situation

1:03:22

You know, whether they would have loved

1:03:24

Santana back, whether they would have loved

1:03:26

Goldschmann or Bao or whoever, because of

1:03:28

the limitations with payroll, they're setting up

1:03:31

perhaps a situation where it's Miranda, I

1:03:33

would say is by default at the

1:03:35

top of the first base step chart

1:03:37

right now. Maybe Julian is in the

1:03:40

mix there too. You add McGasper and

1:03:42

Mike Ford, who we'll talk about here

1:03:44

in one second, that gives you kind

1:03:46

of four guys to... cycle through there,

1:03:49

there's you know, maybe the possibility of

1:03:51

some other minor league guys stepping in

1:03:53

there, but I wonder if it's a

1:03:55

situation where because they basically have no

1:03:58

spending room they just say look this

1:04:00

can be Miranda right but we don't

1:04:02

want to hand we don't we don't

1:04:04

want to just hand him that job

1:04:07

for a number of reasons I think

1:04:09

defensively he needs to show he can

1:04:11

do more consistently be at least solid

1:04:13

over there he's never going to be

1:04:16

Santana I think he has to show

1:04:18

that he's healthy that he can you

1:04:20

know Can they count on him making

1:04:23

it through a full season productive? He's

1:04:25

yet to do that in three tries

1:04:27

in the majors. Yeah. Same thing to

1:04:29

some extent with with Julian too. I

1:04:32

mean, honestly, those two at first base

1:04:34

are real natural platoon. It's a lefty

1:04:36

and a righty. Whoever's not starting on

1:04:38

a given day can be a bench

1:04:41

bat for you and they both would

1:04:43

have value in that role. You know,

1:04:45

Julian can also play some second base

1:04:47

or DH. Miranda can also play some

1:04:50

third base and DH. So. That's not

1:04:52

the end of the world to have

1:04:54

that as your first base Answer, you

1:04:56

know, it's cheap. They're young right they

1:04:59

have upside There are twins teams there

1:05:01

are twins teams within the last decade

1:05:03

where we would have taken a look

1:05:05

at that as our opening day first

1:05:08

base platoon and gone All right, I'm

1:05:10

kind of excited about this like we've

1:05:12

got, you know, potentially productive sides product

1:05:14

productivity from both sides of the plate.

1:05:17

Both players have a fair amount of

1:05:19

upside. We've seen, you know, instins from

1:05:21

both of them what they can do.

1:05:23

And, you know, let's let's roll like

1:05:26

I could be excited about that. It's

1:05:28

just that, you know, those teams were

1:05:30

also not necessarily competitive and, you know,

1:05:32

looking to compete for an a essential

1:05:35

division crown either. So. Yeah, and I

1:05:37

think. Because

1:05:39

of how poorly the season ended for

1:05:42

twins, but for Julian and for Miranda,

1:05:44

and Miranda's health history and all that

1:05:46

stuff, and also the fact that I

1:05:49

would expect both of them to be

1:05:51

pretty rough defensively. You know, they've been

1:05:53

working on it all off-season, I'm sure,

1:05:56

and they're going to work on it

1:05:58

in spring. but you know I'm not

1:06:00

I'm not trying to compare them to

1:06:03

the reigning goal glove winner anybody's gonna

1:06:05

look bad compared to how great Santa

1:06:07

Ana was at first base for the

1:06:10

twins last year he was I said

1:06:12

the second best and maybe the best

1:06:14

twins first baseman in the 20 years

1:06:16

I've been covering them behind Doug McCavich

1:06:19

and he you know was phenomenal but

1:06:21

I think there's a real chance that

1:06:23

they're like both are well below average

1:06:26

defensively which puts a lot more pressure

1:06:28

on their bat and it's also a

1:06:30

spot where If you're not, at least

1:06:33

averageish production, offensively, and you're not getting

1:06:35

a good glove defensively, that's a spot

1:06:37

where, because the rest of the league

1:06:40

is so productive year in and year

1:06:42

out at first base and DH too,

1:06:44

it's a similar story, because that's where

1:06:47

all the big bats go. That's where

1:06:49

the guys who can hit go. You

1:06:51

can really fall behind pretty quickly, you

1:06:54

know, relative to the rest of the

1:06:56

league. And so that would be my

1:06:58

worry, I'm assuming that's probably their worry

1:07:01

too, but yeah, I mean, they might

1:07:03

get forced into basically throwing Miranda at

1:07:05

first base and seeing if it sticks

1:07:07

because of the payroll situation, but that

1:07:10

doesn't mean it's necessarily a bad thing

1:07:12

or a bad idea or a bad

1:07:14

process to get there. Like, I do

1:07:17

think first base, if he's gonna be

1:07:19

a long-term piece for the twins, you

1:07:21

know, more than the next year or

1:07:24

two. It's much more likely to be

1:07:26

at first base or DH than it

1:07:28

is at third base. I mean, he

1:07:31

did an okay job at third base

1:07:33

last year coming back from injury, but

1:07:35

he's not going to be a long-term

1:07:38

third basement. So if you believe in

1:07:40

Miranda's bat, sticking him at first base

1:07:42

or DH is not the end of

1:07:45

the world. The real thing though is,

1:07:47

well, what if he's hurt again? What

1:07:49

if he, you know? He doesn't have

1:07:52

great power really for a first baseman.

1:07:54

And then there are all kinds of

1:07:56

those questions and much more even with

1:07:58

Eddie Julian. So you wanna have some

1:08:01

alternatives, which I think they're setting up

1:08:03

here. But I just wonder if those

1:08:05

alternatives are going to be more competition

1:08:08

for those guys as opposed to Like

1:08:10

are they gonna right now? It's Miranda's

1:08:12

job to lose. I guess is how

1:08:15

I would put it. Yeah. I think

1:08:17

that's what we're good with putting it

1:08:19

We have seen or heard any indication

1:08:22

that they are even seriously planning on

1:08:24

moving Julie. We're talking to Julian like

1:08:26

he's already you know kind of a

1:08:29

first baseman but we haven't really seen

1:08:31

them do that with Julian at all

1:08:33

and I don't believe we've heard them

1:08:36

even really talk about having him at

1:08:38

first base and so you know and

1:08:40

both of the players that we're going

1:08:43

to be talking about here one is

1:08:45

left-handed one switch hitter that mostly it

1:08:47

looks like he's been hidden versus he's

1:08:50

hit a lot better as a left-handed

1:08:52

hitter I'm not really sure is Julian

1:08:54

really Do we really know if Julian

1:08:56

is being considered like are we going

1:08:59

to show up at spring training there

1:09:01

and be like no? Julian's not playing

1:09:03

first base He's going to be concentrating

1:09:06

on second base Right, I mean, I

1:09:08

think at the end of last season

1:09:10

they were working on first base Right,

1:09:13

I mean, I think at the end

1:09:15

of last season they were working them

1:09:17

on at first base a lot Okay,

1:09:20

that's like pregame stuff in that I

1:09:22

do think there was a I didn't

1:09:24

go to the winter meeting so I

1:09:27

can say for And I mean, this

1:09:29

is one of those things where you

1:09:31

can sort of figure out that something

1:09:34

is true based on what you know

1:09:36

won't be true? Right, no, no, I,

1:09:38

which is, I don't think, it makes

1:09:41

sense. Yeah, for sure, I got it,

1:09:43

right. I don't think they're gonna hand

1:09:45

them the second base job. So, I

1:09:47

mean, that could change, who knows? We'll,

1:09:50

we'll see what happens in the spring

1:09:52

training. Let's talk about the two guys

1:09:54

that you just mentioned. McGasper who they

1:09:57

acquired. Well, so first of all, going

1:09:59

back... three weeks was the

1:10:01

rule five draft and we were

1:10:03

kind of coy more coy than

1:10:05

I'd like to be but it

1:10:07

was kind of a odd situation

1:10:09

because I didn't really want to

1:10:11

hurt the twins or anything before

1:10:13

the rule five draft but we

1:10:16

had heard I mean I talked

1:10:18

to multiple people from multiple teams

1:10:20

that were kind of poking around

1:10:22

or sniffing around Giovanni Moran who's

1:10:24

coming back from Tommy John surgery

1:10:26

as a potential rule of five

1:10:28

pick because the twins dropped him

1:10:30

from the 40-man roster so you

1:10:32

know prior to Tommy John he

1:10:34

certainly looked like an MLB caliber

1:10:36

middle reliever with some upside great

1:10:38

change-up bad control that sort of

1:10:40

thing so not surprising that some

1:10:42

teams were like hey what's a

1:10:44

Giovanni Moran status he did not

1:10:46

get picked in the rule 5

1:10:48

draft and once he went unpicked

1:10:50

there was nothing like pushing them

1:10:52

to trade him because once you

1:10:54

Once, if you're not on the

1:10:56

40-man roster, which he wasn't, they

1:10:58

dropped him two years ago when

1:11:00

he got hurt. He was just

1:11:02

on a standard minor league, two-year

1:11:04

minor league contract because he had

1:11:06

the surgery. But just like a

1:11:08

regular minor league contract, which means

1:11:10

they can send him to AAA,

1:11:12

they can keep him in the

1:11:14

minors for the entire season and

1:11:16

just rehab him. If at any

1:11:18

point he looked healthy and promising,

1:11:21

they could just re-add him to

1:11:23

the 40-man roster and call him.

1:11:25

because he only has like a

1:11:27

year plus of Major League service

1:11:29

time. So there wasn't like a,

1:11:31

oh, if we're not gonna have

1:11:33

him in the majors, we might

1:11:35

as well just trade him rather

1:11:37

than lose him. They weren't gonna

1:11:39

lose him. I mean, he was

1:11:41

just in the organization as a

1:11:43

standard minor league player. And yet,

1:11:45

despite the fact that some teams

1:11:47

were sniffing around him, for Mickey

1:11:49

Gasper who. 29 year old switch

1:11:51

hitter kind of split time between

1:11:53

first base and catcher. in the

1:11:55

minors amusingly had a great I

1:11:57

mean he's been a very good

1:11:59

minor league hitter he's like he

1:12:01

was a 27th round draft pick

1:12:03

of the Yankees I want to

1:12:05

say you know seven years ago

1:12:07

or whatever it was at no

1:12:09

point has he been considered a

1:12:11

prospect but he he was so

1:12:13

consistently good especially in terms of

1:12:15

on-based percentage drawn walks hitting for

1:12:17

average in the minors that at

1:12:19

the end of last season after

1:12:21

he crushed AAA for a two

1:12:23

three months. The Red Sox called

1:12:26

him up and you know he

1:12:28

actually debuted I think at second

1:12:30

base. Now the Red Sox were

1:12:32

struggling at that point and banged

1:12:34

up at that point so you

1:12:36

know that doesn't necessarily tell you

1:12:38

everything but I remember at the

1:12:40

time I think he's a local

1:12:42

guy he's definitely an East Coast

1:12:44

guy I remember he was sort

1:12:46

of positioned as a Not quite

1:12:48

Dobnik asked but maybe like Caleb

1:12:50

Thielbar asked like oh, look at

1:12:52

this is a great story like

1:12:54

this guy is 29 He's sure

1:12:56

you know grinding away as a

1:12:58

27th round draft pick which they

1:13:00

don't even have 27 rounds anymore

1:13:02

He's been putting up big numbers

1:13:04

at double and triple A for

1:13:06

years now. What a nice thing

1:13:08

for him to you know get

1:13:10

two weeks in the majors at

1:13:12

age 29 But the Red Sox

1:13:14

did not drop him from the

1:13:16

40-man roster after that and then

1:13:18

ended up They actually needed a

1:13:20

roster spot for Walker Buehler So

1:13:22

instead of DFAing them they trade

1:13:24

him to the twins for Moran

1:13:26

to interesting trade I was a

1:13:28

little surprised Just you know after

1:13:31

sticking with them through the rehab

1:13:33

for a year that they would

1:13:35

just give up on Moran because

1:13:37

there was nothing, you know motivating

1:13:39

him to do it Right especially

1:13:41

because as we just talked about

1:13:43

a minute ago like it's not

1:13:45

like they have left-handed options really

1:13:47

for the bullpen so I know

1:13:49

I'd also heard from some people

1:13:51

there like oh well we do

1:13:53

have Johani Moran like in terms

1:13:55

of left-handed options like the don't

1:13:57

forget I what I basically heard

1:13:59

was like don't forget about Johani

1:14:01

Moran and then you can forget

1:14:03

about him last night I agree

1:14:05

it's certainly suggests just logically that

1:14:07

they weren't particularly optimistic about his

1:14:09

ability to get back to full

1:14:11

strength and it's not like he

1:14:13

was a guaranteed you know contributor

1:14:15

even at full strength I mean

1:14:17

he struggled so much to throw

1:14:19

strikes but I thought you know

1:14:21

you've gotten over the hump with

1:14:23

him where he missed the whole

1:14:25

year this was the year where

1:14:27

you try to get him back

1:14:29

on a mound and maybe a

1:14:31

second half contributor or something like

1:14:33

that so I was a little

1:14:36

surprised I don't really get the

1:14:38

logic of that it's also a

1:14:40

guy that is, you know, 29

1:14:42

year old AAA guy. I'm not

1:14:44

saying he's not a decent player

1:14:46

overall. He's been a really good

1:14:48

hitter at AAA. Certainly last year,

1:14:50

he was a great hitter at

1:14:52

AAA. He led all of AAA

1:14:54

in OPS last year, like both

1:14:56

AAA leagues. And look, I would

1:14:58

cite unseen. Take a look at

1:15:00

any guy who leads AAA. in

1:15:02

OPS, whether it's 19 or 50.

1:15:04

I feel like I've been pretty

1:15:06

consistent with that over 20 years

1:15:08

of doing this, like anybody who

1:15:10

stands out, if they're three feet

1:15:12

tall, if they weigh 800 pounds,

1:15:14

if they're 112 years old, if

1:15:16

the guy was the best at

1:15:18

AAA, I'm willing to look at

1:15:20

him, you know, and so I

1:15:22

get it from that standpoint, but

1:15:24

you know, I asked around about

1:15:26

Mickey Gas because my initial reaction

1:15:28

was that maybe he would be

1:15:30

part of the catcher. solution if

1:15:32

they were to trade Vasquez. Like

1:15:34

maybe he could be the backup

1:15:36

catcher because I initially, I didn't

1:15:38

know much about Mickey Gasper obviously,

1:15:41

so I looked at his, you

1:15:43

know, just track record at AAA

1:15:45

and he's basically been half catcher,

1:15:47

half first base. And so I

1:15:49

thought, okay, well, maybe he's a

1:15:51

good hitting, poor fielding catcher. If

1:15:53

they trade Vasquez, he could be,

1:15:55

you know, platoon made or backup

1:15:57

to Jeffers cheaply or something like

1:15:59

that. But asking around about him,

1:16:01

not a good defensive catcher, probably

1:16:03

not a viable defensive catcher. It's

1:16:05

subjective I guess a little if

1:16:07

you hit well enough you're viable

1:16:09

anything, but and so now I

1:16:11

kind of think he was probably

1:16:13

more of a First base consideration

1:16:15

like we're getting into now where

1:16:17

it's like all right you got

1:16:19

Miranda You got Julian you'd like

1:16:21

to have a veteran or two

1:16:23

now I would prefer that veteran

1:16:25

be like a Josh Bell or

1:16:27

a Justin Turner or at least

1:16:29

a Donovan Solano or a Mark

1:16:31

Canha, but those guys cost money

1:16:33

and apparently they don't have any

1:16:35

money so you get Michael Gasper

1:16:37

who's been an on-base machine in

1:16:39

the minors and is a switch

1:16:41

hitter and you know he can

1:16:43

play first base he's played a

1:16:46

little second base a little third

1:16:48

base and then a couple days

1:16:50

after a couple days ago I

1:16:52

guess it was yesterday we're recording

1:16:54

this what Friday I don't want

1:16:56

to confuse you since here in

1:16:58

another it has been confusing I'm

1:17:00

not going to go on another

1:17:02

planet basically but Mike Ford is

1:17:04

kind of a similar player I

1:17:06

mean he spent parts of six

1:17:08

years in the majors. He's played

1:17:10

250 games in the majors. Left-handed

1:17:12

hitter, actually two years ago had

1:17:14

a nice run with the Mariners

1:17:16

and the majors. But other than

1:17:18

that, only has a 93 OPS

1:17:20

plus in the majors, but a

1:17:22

good hitter at AAA. Just a

1:17:24

very good draws walks, hits for

1:17:26

power, low average type of guy

1:17:28

at AAA, okay at first base,

1:17:30

left-handed bat. To me, him and

1:17:32

Gaspar are pretty similar. Gasper maybe

1:17:34

has the edge in that he

1:17:36

can play. if needed, catcher, second

1:17:38

base, like in an emergency situation.

1:17:40

But I think more, they're both

1:17:42

really just first base DH. One's

1:17:44

a switch hitter, one's a left

1:17:46

hand hitter, they're good triplay players.

1:17:48

They'd probably love to have them

1:17:51

at St. Paul as sort of

1:17:53

backup plans. Right. St. Paul would

1:17:55

love to have them because they're

1:17:57

really good triplay players. I just

1:17:59

wonder like is this now. Is

1:18:01

this not to steal an NFL

1:18:03

term, but is this the first

1:18:05

base room? Is this how they

1:18:07

always say like this is the

1:18:09

wide receiver right? Like is this

1:18:11

what's gonna go day one of

1:18:13

spring training are we gonna be

1:18:15

talking? about this being Miranda's job

1:18:17

to go win. I will be

1:18:19

interested to see how things shakeout

1:18:21

at spring training with this group.

1:18:23

One thing I want to call

1:18:25

about for, because I've already seen

1:18:27

it referenced, he's got reverse splits

1:18:29

over his career in that he's

1:18:31

hit left handers with a higher

1:18:33

OPS than he has hit right

1:18:35

handers. In the majors, you're talking.

1:18:37

Yeah, in the majors, right. You

1:18:39

also take a, I will just

1:18:41

call this out, whenever you see

1:18:43

reverse splits, especially on a batter,

1:18:45

especially on a left-handed batter, make

1:18:47

sure that you take a look

1:18:49

at how many plate appearances they

1:18:51

have versus each side. I don't

1:18:53

know, I don't remember exactly the

1:18:56

breakdown, but something like five to

1:18:58

one. of his plate appearances are

1:19:00

versus right handers versus left handers.

1:19:02

And so the fact that he

1:19:04

has a high OPS versus left

1:19:06

handers, I think it might only

1:19:08

be like 120 plate appearances or

1:19:10

something like that. I don't know,

1:19:12

that might be too low, but

1:19:14

as I recall, it was something

1:19:16

like five to one. And when

1:19:18

you see that, what that means

1:19:20

is, that's an indication that they

1:19:22

are hiding him versus left-handed. pictures

1:19:24

who are any good whatsoever. And

1:19:26

that is an indication that don't

1:19:28

pay attention to the split as

1:19:30

to whether or not you think

1:19:32

he's going to be able to

1:19:34

hit left-handers. Yeah, I mean, I'll

1:19:36

take that a step further, which

1:19:38

it's interesting. And I think what

1:19:40

you're pointing out is definitely true.

1:19:42

I mean, he's been used very,

1:19:44

I mean, he's a marginal major

1:19:46

leaguer. So when he's gotten opportunities,

1:19:48

it's been like, oh, can we

1:19:50

get two decent months out of

1:19:52

this guy as our option? He's

1:19:54

I would say probably never been

1:19:56

handed just handed a job for

1:19:58

a month or a season or

1:20:01

anything and I'll take that a

1:20:03

step further. You are pretty safe

1:20:05

if you just always assume that

1:20:07

a left handed hitter has normal

1:20:09

splits. The outliers there over the

1:20:11

last 20 years are basically each

1:20:13

row. That's it. Who's one of

1:20:15

the more uncommon unique. or whatever

1:20:17

you want to call it, players

1:20:19

in the history of baseball. Other

1:20:21

than that, if you give a

1:20:23

left-handed hitter 5,000 played appearances, his

1:20:25

splits will be just like all

1:20:27

the other left-handed hitters, basically. But

1:20:29

yeah, it's interesting because it shows,

1:20:31

I mean, certainly if Mike Ford

1:20:33

were to win a job with

1:20:35

the Twins, it would be a

1:20:37

pure platoon, left-handed bat, he faces

1:20:39

all the right-handed pitchers, either playing

1:20:41

first base or DH, kind of

1:20:43

platooning with Miranda, let's say. Something

1:20:45

like that. I mean gasper probably

1:20:47

the same thing because as you

1:20:49

talked about earlier He's a switch

1:20:51

hitter, and he's I'd certainly rather

1:20:53

have gasper at the plate against

1:20:55

the lefty than Ford But he's

1:20:57

been he's been much better as

1:20:59

a left-handed hitter right? Which kind

1:21:01

of makes sense because That sucks

1:21:03

for Eddie Julian. Yeah, I know

1:21:06

because it's clear who they have

1:21:08

a little bit more confidence Right,

1:21:10

but if they're we should say

1:21:12

correct. This is I was taught

1:21:14

by a really well driving you

1:21:16

never say right Correct anyway, but

1:21:18

if you're skeptical of Miranda the

1:21:20

easiest thing to do with him

1:21:22

is sort of work him in

1:21:24

as a platoon player, gradually give

1:21:26

him more playing time if he

1:21:28

deserves it. She'd want to pair

1:21:30

him with a left-handed hitter. Although

1:21:32

I will say Miranda has weird

1:21:34

splits too in his career, although

1:21:36

that's small-ish sample size too. So

1:21:38

yeah, that's Gaspar and Ford. I

1:21:40

mean, I would like to, two

1:21:42

weeks from now, we maybe are

1:21:44

laughing that we spent so much

1:21:46

time. that I wrote about these

1:21:48

guys that we talked about these

1:21:50

guys and then all they ended

1:21:52

up doing was they went and

1:21:54

traded for so and so or

1:21:56

they You know went and signed

1:21:58

Justin Turner or something but barring

1:22:00

that I do think that this

1:22:02

is sort of a Twin setting

1:22:04

the floor not putting themselves in

1:22:06

a position where they have to

1:22:08

rely on Miranda. I mean this

1:22:11

is a pretty low floor. I

1:22:13

agree. my projection standpoint, I saw

1:22:15

that Zips, which is Dan Zimborski's

1:22:17

fan graphs projection, has GASPR at

1:22:19

a 105 OPS plus. Okay. And

1:22:21

I believe Ford, like I said,

1:22:23

Ford has a 93 OPS plus

1:22:25

in the majors. I think his

1:22:27

projection was like a 96. So,

1:22:29

you know, slightly below average. Gasper

1:22:31

slightly above average, which by the

1:22:33

way is why Gasper would look

1:22:35

appealing if he could catch it

1:22:37

all So we'll see if that

1:22:39

even is a factor for the

1:22:41

twins, but You know you use

1:22:43

those guys only against left the

1:22:45

er against righties you shield them

1:22:47

completely against lefties. These maybe you

1:22:49

can talk yourself into getting a

1:22:51

100 or a 105 110 OPS

1:22:53

plus which is not that I

1:22:55

mean Santana only had a what

1:22:57

109 or something like that. Yeah,

1:22:59

right so you know minimum salary

1:23:01

no commitment that's not the end

1:23:03

of the world even especially if

1:23:05

it's like a placeholder if it's

1:23:07

like we just need this to

1:23:09

make sure Miranda's okay or to

1:23:11

give Julian a chance to well

1:23:13

I mean what you're asking of

1:23:16

these guys is hit righties you

1:23:18

know hit them and hit them

1:23:20

hard and hit them hard and

1:23:22

both of them are capable of

1:23:24

that so they both shown that

1:23:26

much that they can be capable

1:23:28

of and then you know really

1:23:30

the eggs are in the Miranda

1:23:32

basket like that's Ultimately, what you're,

1:23:34

the mystery of him as being

1:23:36

how can he be so good

1:23:38

and then, you know, fall off

1:23:40

a cliff the way he has,

1:23:42

you know, three of the last

1:23:44

three years where suddenly, you know,

1:23:46

he, when everything's fine-tuned, he is

1:23:48

just absolutely unstoppable. It looks like

1:23:50

he's playing, well, somebody who's in

1:23:52

South China, it looks like he's

1:23:54

playing cricket out there, like they

1:23:56

cannot get him out, right? And

1:23:58

now, and then suddenly it's like,

1:24:00

no, he's just lost now. He's

1:24:02

just lost and we've lost him

1:24:04

for a month. You know, so

1:24:06

I think ultimately that's gonna be

1:24:08

the solution. And when they can

1:24:10

and they wanna give him some

1:24:12

time. and they need to give

1:24:14

them a break. Let's get somebody

1:24:16

in there who can hit righties

1:24:18

really well. Yeah, I mean, I

1:24:21

think that makes sense. Do you

1:24:23

think you're gonna start a cricket

1:24:25

podcast? I did go to a

1:24:27

Melbourne Aces game. Yeah, I went

1:24:29

to the Melbourne Aces game. I

1:24:31

would describe the vibe there as

1:24:33

sort of a low A. Vibe

1:24:35

or maybe you know medium college

1:24:37

program vibe. But that's that's the

1:24:39

that's the baseball team, right? That's

1:24:41

the baseball team. Yes, yes. Yeah,

1:24:43

no, I didn't go to I

1:24:45

had a chance the biggest cricket

1:24:47

day of the year is the

1:24:49

day after Christmas Boxing Day here

1:24:51

in Australia where they have a

1:24:53

five-day match between Australia and one

1:24:55

of the other major countries that

1:24:57

has been into cricket and this

1:24:59

year. the biggest, maybe the biggest

1:25:01

match they will have in, you

1:25:03

know, over the next few years.

1:25:05

That one was sold out to

1:25:07

a crazy amount because not only

1:25:09

do all the Australians want to

1:25:11

go, all the Indians who are

1:25:13

living in Australia also want to

1:25:15

go to it. Over the five

1:25:17

day match, Australia won that. It

1:25:19

was very exciting. A big story

1:25:21

was. that their opener, Australia's opener,

1:25:23

was a 19 year old who'd

1:25:26

never played in a test match

1:25:28

before. Everybody was very nervous about

1:25:30

it, but very excited because he's

1:25:32

supposed to be very talented and

1:25:34

he ended up having an incredible

1:25:36

opener, by the way, is the

1:25:38

lead off batter. Okay, he ended

1:25:40

having an incredible run his first

1:25:42

time. They were hoping to get

1:25:44

like 19 runs out of him,

1:25:46

maybe, and he ended up with

1:25:48

60 plus. So, everyone was very

1:25:50

excited and that helped carry Australia

1:25:52

to a victory. Can he play

1:25:54

first base? I did not check

1:25:56

to see which way he batted,

1:25:58

whether or not he just left-handed,

1:26:00

I'd not check his split. I

1:26:02

have, listen, I come to Australia

1:26:04

now, this is like the third

1:26:06

time in 25 years. So about

1:26:08

every 12 years I come to

1:26:10

Australia and every time I have

1:26:12

to relearn how cricket is played

1:26:14

and I I Think I have

1:26:16

done as poor a job of

1:26:18

remembering it this time as I

1:26:20

ever have done But we do

1:26:22

like watch the highlights and stuff

1:26:24

and try to figure things out.

1:26:26

It's fun actually. It's a fun

1:26:28

game to play There was a

1:26:31

cricket documentary on Netflix like five

1:26:33

years ago. I think it was

1:26:35

like the Indian whatever like the

1:26:37

main league in indias it was

1:26:39

like a document like a season

1:26:41

it's the india premier league is

1:26:43

what it is okay yeah yeah

1:26:45

so i watched it it was

1:26:47

a great like i was fascinated

1:26:49

by the documentary and i watched

1:26:51

like ten hours of it probably

1:26:53

if you would have said to

1:26:55

me you know for ten thousand

1:26:57

dollars at the end of watching

1:26:59

that describe to me the basic

1:27:01

rules of cricket i'd been like

1:27:03

Sorry, can't do it. So, I'm

1:27:05

just wired for baseball. I would

1:27:07

say we've got about two-thirds of

1:27:09

them down and we translate them

1:27:11

all into, you know, baseball ease,

1:27:13

you know, like a wicket isn't

1:27:15

out. That's the thing, because there's

1:27:17

so many similarities to baseball, like

1:27:19

just stylistically obviously, but also just

1:27:21

like the fact that there's like

1:27:23

innings kind of and that sort

1:27:25

of thing, but it's just different

1:27:27

enough that that almost screws you

1:27:29

up. Well, because I keep trying

1:27:31

to think of it in baseball

1:27:33

terms and it's just not quite

1:27:36

like that. That is exactly correct.

1:27:38

Because, you know, if you make

1:27:40

an error in baseball, you know,

1:27:42

it's bad. But if you make

1:27:44

an error in cricket, oh my

1:27:46

God is it bad. Like, because

1:27:48

these guys score, you know, a

1:27:50

guy will score a hundred runs

1:27:52

in his at bat. And his

1:27:54

one at bat. Right so making

1:27:56

one one plate appearance I should

1:27:58

say right yeah so making an

1:28:00

out is like massive it's yeah

1:28:02

it's a huge thing right so

1:28:04

if you like you if you

1:28:06

are a out fielder that we

1:28:08

so watched two outfielders come together

1:28:10

and then let the ball fall

1:28:12

with the hubby wife did right

1:28:14

and the guy ended up. where

1:28:16

he's 75 more runs after that.

1:28:18

That's rough for the old. But

1:28:20

hey, doesn't caught it. And the

1:28:22

pitcher slash bowler is just like,

1:28:24

you know, he's just rubbing his

1:28:26

temples the whole time. So, did

1:28:28

you know, imagine that? It's like,

1:28:30

oh, Julian really mishandled that. Oh,

1:28:32

Joe Ryan gave up 70 runs.

1:28:34

to finish on here. So yeah,

1:28:36

cricket, I don't know, we could

1:28:38

do a cricket. But Belvarnaces was

1:28:41

fun and I have to mention,

1:28:43

Delmene Young featured in there, a

1:28:45

big picture of Delmene Young hugging

1:28:47

me because they won the championship

1:28:49

Delmene Young's year, one of Delmene

1:28:51

Young's year, one of Delmene Young's

1:28:53

couple of years here for the

1:28:55

Belbine, we're playing for the Belmeneases,

1:28:57

you know, the twins have a.

1:28:59

Well under the previous regime when

1:29:01

you and I started 20 years

1:29:03

ago doing this thing right the

1:29:05

twins were kind of at the

1:29:07

forefront of Australian scouting and They

1:29:09

signed Grant Balfour and there was

1:29:11

a guy Brad Thomas and Luke

1:29:13

Hughes and Glenn Williams and I'm

1:29:15

right some other ones. I'm missing

1:29:17

some too and Some of them

1:29:19

made the majors and some of

1:29:21

them Balfour was a ended up

1:29:23

being good reliever once he left

1:29:25

the twins Lewis Thorpe was the

1:29:27

more recent one that he kind

1:29:29

of washed out For on and

1:29:31

off field reasons I think but

1:29:33

yeah, it never really Paid off

1:29:35

for the twins. I would say

1:29:37

we just talked an hour ago

1:29:39

about how they signed a 16

1:29:41

year old kid from Germany for

1:29:43

800 grand right and got 15

1:29:46

years out of right in Max

1:29:48

Kepor. They signed you know a

1:29:50

couple dozen guys probably over the

1:29:52

course of a decade or so

1:29:54

from Australia and really got no,

1:29:56

Liam Hendricks is a great example,

1:29:58

but they ended up being good

1:30:00

players just not for the twins.

1:30:02

Yeah, the Melbourneases team and it

1:30:04

feels like some teams are still

1:30:06

kind of invested in the Like

1:30:08

for instance, the Melbourne Aces team

1:30:10

had four or five people that

1:30:12

are in the Phillies organization someplace

1:30:14

or have recently in the Phillies

1:30:16

organization someplace. There were a fair

1:30:18

number of Phillies uniforms in the

1:30:20

crowd. And that's what made us

1:30:22

look it up. And then we

1:30:24

looked it up and we found

1:30:26

out that the biggest organization we're

1:30:28

signing Phillies was Adelaide. And that

1:30:30

was because Adelaide. seemingly because Adelaide's

1:30:32

coach is also a coach in

1:30:34

the like low A Philly's organization

1:30:36

something like that and it did

1:30:38

make me wonder like I want

1:30:40

to talk to somebody in the

1:30:42

Triz organization about this at spring

1:30:44

training like have they ever explored

1:30:46

or how it works in having

1:30:48

you know A lot of Hispanic

1:30:51

players like to play in like

1:30:53

some of the winter leagues in

1:30:55

like the Dominican Republic or Puerto

1:30:57

Rico or something like that for

1:30:59

those championship things. You know Americans

1:31:01

slash English speaking folks do they

1:31:03

ever think about trying to send

1:31:05

them here for winter ball or

1:31:07

have they ever toyed with the

1:31:09

idea of getting you know several

1:31:11

organizations together there's like eight teams

1:31:13

in the in the Australian baseball

1:31:15

league here that you know some

1:31:17