Minnesota Twins 2021 Season

[Monster]

After getting blown out by the White Sox the previous game the Twins come back and get a nice win behind a pretty good performance by Jax and the pen and heroics of Astudillo.

Look out folks Sano's OBP is now .300!!!

[Monster]

Bailey Ober with a very good start the Pen finishes off a scoreless game Colome gets the save and Polonco almost had a 2 HR day. Did we step into some other universe?

[Camden [enjin:6601484]]

The Twins' front office made outstanding moves at the trade deadline, in my opinion, besides failing to find a taker for soon-to-be free agent Michael Pineda, but they will need to continue to shuffle the deck this off-season. I'd like to see them find a way to move Josh Donaldson, Miguel Sano, and Max Kepler to clear up some payroll as well as continue to restock the farm system. Those are their three highest paid players on the 2022 payroll taking up $37-million and I'm confident that the Twins either have natural replacements for them under contract or can adequately find one in free agency that aligns with this club better. What the past couple of seasons has proven to me is that Minnesota placed too much emphasis on power potential versus guys that get on-base and put the ball in play much more. And that doesn't even begin to address the issues with the rotation and the bullpen. Again, the answers there might already be in the system, but there are still moves that need to be made this winter.

[Monster]

The Twins' front office made outstanding moves at the trade deadline, in my opinion, besides failing to find a taker for soon-to-be free agent Michael Pineda, but they will need to continue to shuffle the deck this off-season. I'd like to see them find a way to move Josh Donaldson, Miguel Sano, and Max Kepler to clear up some payroll as well as continue to restock the farm system. Those are their three highest paid players on the 2022 payroll taking up $37-million and I'm confident that the Twins either have natural replacements for them under contract or can adequately find one in free agency that aligns with this club better. What the past couple of seasons has proven to me is that Minnesota placed too much emphasis on power potential versus guys that get on-base and put the ball in play much more. And that doesn't even begin to address the issues with the rotation and the bullpen. Again, the answers there might already be in the system, but there are still moves that need to be made this winter.

I have doubts the 37 million crew will do much in terms of restocking the farm system. Plus the Twins would probably have to pay a chunk of the salaries to even unload a couple of those guys. I am totally cool with any of those guys getting dealt but I'm not clamoring for it...or in Sano's case getting my hopes up. Teams could sign a CJ Cron type for a million and pray (probably not that earnestly) they can put up Sano type numbers...which isn't exactly that hard of a bar to achieve for a DH 1B guy.

The question to me for the Twins offseason is how much of a stomach are the Twins going to have for letting their season be decided by younger players. I don't think anyone things they are going to just go full rebuild. I think it's pretty obvious that they want Pineda to come back and he probably wants to be here since they didn't move him. Can they add some established players that can actually help to the young guys and players they already have?

As for trading guys...there are only so many prospects you can have. This year teams actually struggled to some extent with getting enough work for players with basically a level of the minor league system eliminated. Some younger players in the organization are getting a decent audition for 30+ more games to go and some more experienced players maybe showing they are guys that can be counted on in some respect. For some guys this time will also be valuable in helping them be ready to take a step forward at some point. Some of the guys (particularly pitchers) that were at AAA or were in between AAA and MLB level getting hurt not only hurt the Twins not having them available but it stalled their development.

[Jester1534]

I'm going to say Maeda is finally healthy.

Kenta Maeda has a 2.98 ERA and 54 strikeouts in 45 innings since July 1

I really do feel like the Twins can to semi rebuild on the fly.

I know cam was saying to Trade Donaldson the problem is his contract and if he actually does play and stay healthy he's been playing to his contract.

They need to get rid of Sano and figure out the Buxton situation and they need to call up Miranda see if it translates to the majors.

I don't see why Donaldson can't replace Cruz

2nd year Killroff> than Sano

Bag of balls> Simmons

Free agent pitcher to = Berrios

Spend all the money to fix the bullpen

[FNG]

I couldn't agree more on Maeda, Jester. I got to see him up close at the Angels game, and it was clear to me that his stride issue (he clearly couldn't extend fully at the start of the year) was fixed. He has been terrific recently and especially last night.

Fun to see the offensive explosion last night. I'm really enjoying this team right now. I don't know where I stand on Donaldson. He's always been one of my favorite players and I love his competitive fire, but he doesn't stay healthy and hasn't played up to his contract...I'm not opposed to moving him if the right deal came up, and turning 3b over to Miranda (can't wait to see him in September). I suspect it won't.

On your other suggestions:

1) I try to move Kepler rather than Sano. We have plenty of options in corner OFs, and I like what I have been seeing from Miguel the past couple weeks. Only 4 K's in 19 ABs the past week is an extraordinary turn of events. If he can lay off the bad breaking ball like he has currently, his enormous power can make him a significant force in the lineup. I would prefer to see someone like Rob Refsnyder (or as I prefer to call him...Kim Jung-Tae) in RF over Max. He was a great prospect coming out of college, and his at bats and contact have been consistently good this year.

2) I hold on to Simmons for one more year. He's a magician at SS, and we don't necessarily need offensive production out of that position.

[Monster]

I couldn't agree more on Maeda, Jester. I got to see him up close at the Angels game, and it was clear to me that his stride issue (he clearly couldn't extend fully at the start of the year) was fixed. He has been terrific recently and especially last night.

Fun to see the offensive explosion last night. I'm really enjoying this team right now. I don't know where I stand on Donaldson. He's always been one of my favorite players and I love his competitive fire, but he doesn't stay healthy and hasn't played up to his contract...I'm not opposed to moving him if the right deal came up, and turning 3b over to Miranda (can't wait to see him in September). I suspect it won't.

On your other suggestions:

1) I try to move Kepler rather than Sano. We have plenty of options in corner OFs, and I like what I have been seeing from Miguel the past couple weeks. Only 4 K's in 19 ABs the past week is an extraordinary turn of events. If he can lay off the bad breaking ball like he has currently, his enormous power can make him a significant force in the lineup. I would prefer to see someone like Rob Refsnyder (or as I prefer to call him...Kim Jung-Tae) in RF over Max. He was a great prospect coming out of college, and his at bats and contact have been consistently good this year.

2) I hold on to Simmons for one more year. He's a magician at SS, and we don't necessarily need offensive production out of that position.

It's great that Rooker is hitting again after a pretty rough stretch and he had a nice catch in the OF.

Personally my question is whether or not the Twins let Jake Cave go off the 40 man roster. What will he show the next chunk of games to prove he cab be a worth depth OF option? Meanwhile at this point Refsnyder...is this guy actually for real? I mean if he just plays replacement level baseball the rest of the way the Twins are gonna want to keep him around possibly replacing Cave as that extra OF.

The Twins have kept making various minor moves making waiver claims. It will be interesting if 1 more more of these pitchers can be a worthwhile addition past this year.

[Monster]

Another Twins win against a good team.

[Jester1534]

Another walk off for the boys tonight. I watched from the 7th on.

It's sad that Maeda ran for Donaldson cause he's faster.

Mitch Garver looks like himself again it's great to see.

Colome 8th straight outing being good.

Minya change up is filthy and he was off today but still got the job done.

Jeffers now the all time leader in home runs for rookie catcher in Twins history with 11

I don't know what the Twins should do with Polanco at the end of the year. It's almost like Dozier 2.0 with him.

Also per Gleeman Twitter

Great return to High-A action for #MNTwins pitching prospect Matt Canterino, who had been out since May with an elbow injury.

Three shutout, no-hit innings, striking out eight of the 10 batters he faced.

Canterino now has a 0.78 ERA and 45 strikeouts in 23 innings this season.

[FNG]

I was there last night on a perfect evening to watch this resurgent team. Quite sloppy (4 errors and some odd mental errors) but another close win. You can't say enough about Polanco this season...I wonder if anyone in baseball has more clutch hits than him the past two months.

-Griffin Jax had a nice night, but he looks quite hittable to me. Good kid, but not in any of my plans for a future starter.

-Miguel Sano does not look like the same guy we watched struggling the first half of the season. His at bats look much more like rookie Sano than early 2021 Sano. There's a genuine buzz in the stadium every time he gets in the box again.

-I've never seen a HR hit as hard as the one Zimmer hit off Jax. They said 446 feet, but we all thought 500+. It hit the batter's eye in center hard enough to dent it. He and his teammates were laughing as he rounded the bases...they couldn't believe it.

-Jose Ramirez is really a character...never stops talking on the dugout steps.

-Arraez is a hitting machine who will win a batting title before he is 30. Plus, he plays the game with more joy than anyone else on the team with the possible exception of Tottuga.

-Great to see Colome pitching so well. He and Rogers will be a great end of game combo next year.

-This team is fun to watch again, and Buxton will be back soon.