Category Archives: Offseason

Twins Won’t Sign Cliff Lee… Will They?

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My posts are too long. I know. This one is even longer than usual. Sorry. -JC

It’s impossible. It would be lunacy. And say what you will about the Minnesota Twins front office, they aren’t prone to lunacy. Sure, they occasionally screw up and overpay a light-hitting utility infielder by a couple million dollars or so. But the Twins don’t out-lunatic the lunatics in New York when it comes to bidding for the services of 30+ year old starting pitchers.

But still…

I have to admit that I find the Cliff Lee storyline 100 times more fascinating than the laughable Derek Jeter drama we endured last week. While they both involve the Yankees and thus share the same prospect of the Evil Empire ending up looking foolish, that’s about all the two have in common. There are many more compelling reasons to become enthralled with the unfolding Lee scenarios. For starters, Cliff Lee is still really good at baseball.

Cliff Lee

To bring people up to date (though “up to date” in this unfolding drama is, to say the least, a very fluid moving target), Lee is by far the best free agent starting pitcher on the market this off-season. In fact, if you look at pitchers with contracts expiring next year, we’re probably not going to see anyone better at what he does hit the market then either. The term “ace” is thrown around pretty loosely these days, to the point that I’m not even sure what it means any more. But Lee pretty much is everything a team would want in an ace. He’s left-handed. He works deep in to games and saves your bullpen. He has excellent command of multiple pitches. He (generally) stays healthy. He rises to the occasion in the post-season. He beats the Yankees.

The bidding for Lee had the potential to be a story worth following even before the Winter Meetings started this week in Florida. The Yankees and the Texas Rangers were expected to do battle for the right to pay him over $100 million over the next five seasons. In the end, of course, everyone expected the Yankees to get their man. After all, they “need” Lee and they always get what they need when the only determining factor is money. (By the way, I find this concept of the Yankees “needing” Lee to be typical of the Yankees and their fans. What other franchise would have CC Sabathia at the top of their rotation and yet feel they NEED Cliff Lee? What they NEED is someone better than Javier Vasquez and AJ Burnett to add to their rotation… how hard could it be to find someone like that?)

But a funny thing happened on the way to this two-team Battle Royale for Lee’s services. Other teams showed up with money in hand, too. So many teams showed up with so much money, in fact, that the price for Lee seems to be rising by the hour. Almost immediately, it became clear that a five year contract wasn’t going to cut it. It would take six. Reportedly, that was more than the Rangers were willing to go. The Yankees supposedly are willing to do six years… but no more. But so, perhaps, might the Nationals, Angels, Red Sox, Cubs or Orioles. Then, Tuesday, reports started coming out that one team (or possibly even two teams) might go seven years for Lee!

Speculation started about who might raise insanity to levels past all prior boundaries (a.k.a. beyond Yankee-Insanity). Immediately, eyes looked toward Washington where, it seems, the ownership has allowed the team’s close proximity to Congress to instill a total lack of fiscal restraint on the Nationals franchise. The Nats have already made the most excessive (read: dumbest) signing this year by paying Jayson Werth $126 million over the next seven seasons. But the Nationals deny they’re willing to go seven years. As do the Angels. And the Orioles. And the Cubs. And every other team that’s been asked, “Are you the crazy one?”

Which leads us to one of two conclusions: 1) Someone is lying… either about there even being a seven year offer out there (never mind two of them) or about not being the team to have made such an offer; or 2) there’s a mystery team (or two) laying in the weeds who’s willing and able to commit over $20 million a year for the next seven years for Cliff Lee’s services. The entertainment value alone of watching all the big (and small) media types chasing down the answers through the pastel-colored halls of the Dolphin and Swan hotels would almost have been worth the price of airfare to fly down there!

Speculation as to who the “mystery team(s)” might be has run the gamut from the Cubs to the Tigers to the Astros to the Brewers (seriously… the Astros and Brewers?!).

There’s every possibility that the seven year offer is nothing more than a phantom, leaked by Lee’s representatives to drive up the price or by another team just to… you know… drive the Steinbrenners a little nuttier than they already are. In either case, the end result would at least be that the Evil Empire would feel compelled to jack up their offer and overpay even more than they would have if they were only bidding against themselves (see: Jeter, Derek and Rodriguez, Alex).

But what if there IS someone out there with a seven year offer for Lee?

What sort of team would be willing to take on that sort of risk and be able to stay under the radar? Let’s look at the criteria any such team would have to meet.

Need. You have to really, REALLY, need a top-of-the-rotation difference maker. You don’t do something this crazy if you already have one of the best in the business heading your rotation… unless you’re the Yankees.

Motivation. You need to be a contender (or at least see yourself as being a contender) or close enough to being one that adding Lee would sure make you look like one. Ideally, you’re a contender who believes you may be an “ace” away from a World Series.

Resources. You need to have money. This can be tricky for outsiders to figure out because teams don’t broadcast how much money they have so the best anyone can do is estimate. Estimates are loosely based on two criteria: 1) how much you spent on payroll last year (teams supposedly dedicate about half their total revenues to their Major League payrolls); and 2) your home attendance levels.

Stealthy Insanity. You need to have ownership and front office people willing (or at least motivated, for some reason) to do something a little crazy… or a lot crazy… AND be able to keep their craziness quiet.

When you apply those four criteria, the possibilities narrow in a hurry. (Again, I say, the Astros and Brewers? Really?!)

The Red Sox, maybe. They’ve got solid starting pitching already, but they missed the playoffs last season and they could use Lee. They have no shortage of money, though they’re going to have to shell out megabucks to keep newly acquired Adrian Gonzales around more than a year. They’ve shown a willingness to do crazy stuff before (like post a bid of a gazillion dollars to Dice-K’s Japanese team a while back). They’re also motivated by Yankee-envy and could figure that even if they don’t get Lee, at least they’d have the satisfaction of knowing they made the Yankees pay more for him than they wanted to.

The Tigers, perhaps. They had over $50 million come off their payroll this year and they’re clearly intent on spending it. They have every fan’s dream: an owner who’s really just a fan with an obscene amount of money who just wants to win, no matter what it costs. In addition, despite the Detroit economy, fans are still attending their games.

But let’s quit beating around the bush. We all know where this post is heading.

What about the Twins?

Do they need a playoff-proven, Yankee killing, ace?

Are they a contender that’s perhaps one or two key pieces from a World Series?

Do they have money?

Of course, the question is, “How much money do they have?” Nobody knows. But here’s what we DO know. They posted a bid for Japanese pitcher Hisashi Iwakura and were rumored to have posted the second-highest bid. Oakland “won” with a $19 million bid. Let’s say the Twins bid $10 million (I suspect it was more). They would have had to be prepared to shell out a total of $15 million in 2011 for Iwakura (including posting bid and at least $5 million for his first year). In 2012, the Twins potentially have over $15 million in payroll coming off the books in just two outfielders (Cuddyer and Kubel) just as the next crop of young (cheap) outfielders should be arriving. The Twins also have every reason to expect that they’ll continue to sell out Target Field’s 40,000 seats, resulting in another 3,000,000 attendance figure next year. While their average ticket price is only about $35 (thus just over $100 million in ticket revenue), let me ask you… how much money do you suppose the average ticketholder spends at a game? Does $30-$50 over and above his/her ticket price seem unlikely? And we haven’t even talked about media rights or advertising. Is it really impossible to imagine that the Twins are pulling down $300 million in revenues?

But even if we all would agree the Twins have the need, the motivation and the resources to make a seven year play for Cliff Lee, do we have any reason to believe they’d actually do something so totally un-Twinslike? Of course not.

But still…

A year ago, Bill Smith traded for a new shortstop, signed Jim Thome and Orlando Hudson as free agents, and went out and obtained Brian Fuentes and Matt Capps during the season in order to give his team its best shot at a serious title run. All in addition to locking up Joe Mauer to about the richest non-Yankee contract in baseball. In previous seasons, losing cornerstones like Joe Nathan and Justin Morneau would have meant writing the year off and dumping contracts, not to mention trading Mauer away for whatever they could get for him or watching him sign with New York or Boston as a free agent.

This is all a long (too long, perhaps, but what do you really expect from one of my posts, by now?) way of saying that if I were a writer covering this story in Florida this week and I was trying to unearth the identity of the crazy “mystery team” who’s made a seven year offer to Cliff Lee, I’d at least ask Bill Smith if he’s the nutty GM who’s made that offer.

On the other hand, Smith’s also the GM who probably wouldn’t give a straight answer to a writer who asks what he had for breakfast, so you might not even bother asking about this.

So… do I REALLY believe the Twins might be making a seven year contract offer for Cliff Lee, just because they have the need, the motivation, and arguably the resources to do so? No, of course not. The Twins never do that kind of thing. Ever.

But still…

-JC

Is There a Magic Wand(y) Out There?

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I find myself in unfamiliar waters these days.

Despite what some may believe, I tend to be pretty supportive of the job the Twins’ front office does. I know the organization is a business and understand they aren’t going to spend more money than they take in. I know they aren’t going to go out and overpay for free agent talent the way the Yankees do. Unlike many Twins fans, I’m not one who constantly finds fault with the owner or the GM or the manager. I consider the lack of recent success in the playoffs to be a source of frustration, but not abject organizational failure.

Yet, I’ve been quite up front about my impatience with regard to the Twins seeming lack of progress toward making any sort of real improvement in the make up of the roster so far. And Day 1 of the Winter Meetings did nothing to make me feel better. Bill Smith indicated that the only non-pitching positions that are undecided already are SS and 2B. And while he didn’t come right out and say that JJ Hardy would be traded once Tsuyoshi Nishioka is signed, that is clearly where the signs are pointing.

I also understand that my Zack Greinke wish is not going to come true. In fact, given that the Royals would clearly demand from the Twins a premium of prospects over and above the premium of prospects that they’re going to demand from teams that AREN’T in their own division, I’m willing to admit it would probably be foolish for Smith to pay the Royals’ asking price.

So given that the Twins won’t be bidding on the lone remaining top of the rotation pitcher (Cliff Lee) and probably shouldn’t be bidding on the next best starting pitcher (Carl Pavano) because of his expectations regarding a three-year contract, what does constitute a reasonable expectation for a fan who strongly believes the Twins need another strong starting pitcher?

Let’s try this scenario on for size.

Near the bottom of a column he wrote on December 1, Jayson Stark mentioned that the Houston Astros were in the market for a reasonably priced, left-handed hitting outfielder. If the Twins re-sign Jim Thome, they will, coincidentally, have an arguably superfluous lefty-hitting outfielder floating around in the person of Jason Kubel.

Wandy Rodriguez

The Astros, in return, have a certain lefty starting pitcher who’s going to start getting a bit expensive very soon. Wandy Rodriguez lost his arbitration contest with the Astros last year and ended up pitching for $5 million and now he and his agent are trying to work out an extension that will buy out his last year of arbitration and first couple of years of free agency.

Shortly after Rodriguez overmatched the Twins in a 4-1 Astro win in June, the Twins reportedly tried, unsuccessfully, to trade for the lefty prior to the trade deadline at the end of July. They should try again.

I’ll be the first to admit that I know very little about the Astros. (I think they play in Houston, right?) But what I do know is that they are reportedly for sale and they’re trying to cut payroll while remaining at least competitive enough not to screw up their sale price.

I have no idea whether Houston would want Kubel. I have no idea whether they might be interested in a shortstop like JJ Hardy. Maybe, instead, it would take prospects or maybe the Twins would have to eat part of Kubel’s or Hardy’s 2011 salary. Smarter people than I would have to figure out exactly what a fair exchange would be.

I don’t even know if Rodriguez would be available, but given the current state of that franchise, it’s hard for me to believe he’s going to be an Astro beyond 2011, his final arbitration year. In any event, the purpose of writing this is simply to demonstrate that there ARE options out there, other than Lee, Pavano, Greinke, et al. The Twins need to improve their rotation and the time to do it is now, before other teams beat the Twins to the punch.

I’ve heard enough about middle-weight infielders and middle-inning relief pitchers. I don’t want to hear that we should just be satisfied to replace most of the talent being lost to free agency. If you’re standing in place, you’re falling behind and there are options out there that can, and would, actually improve the Twins roster now and in the future. The Twins have some highly compensated businesspeople who should be able to turn over a few rocks and find those options.

Either that or they should find another line of work.

-JC

Monday in the Off-season: Winter Mtgs & Twins Fest

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Ok, this isn’t what I had originally intended to post today and I thought to myself, “..the plans of mice and men..” at which point my brain wandered to thoughts about what if I was a mouse or a man… Yeah, it’s just been that kind of Monday.

At any rate, today is the beginning of the Winter Meetings. Given that there is a percentage of the Twins fandom that is unhappy with the lack of news from the Front Office, now would be a good time for there to be at least some good reportable rumors! Obviously, there is going to be some discussion of Nishioka and whether or not progress is being made on signing him and we have that little problem of filling all the holes due to free agency. I think the sheer amount of work that has to happen during this off-season is adding more pressure than normal to the expectations of news from Smith and friends. You’d think Twins fans would be used to the “not hearing anything over the winter” but Smith broke that mold last year when he was so much more active (to our benefit) than previous general managers had been. He set the bar high for himself.

ESPN radio’s Phil Mackey is down in Florida covering the Winter Meetings and wrote up a great report covering what needs to be done.  If you need a quick catch up, I would give it a read.  Seth also has a good write-up with more of the player detail over at Seth Speaks.

As far as what’s going on here at HOME vs sunny Florida, TwinsFest tickets go on sale today.

Here’s the general details:

Friday, Jan. 28 4 p.m. – 9:30 p.m.
Saturday, Jan. 29 9:00 a.m. – 6:00 p.m.
Sunday, Jan. 30 9:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m.
Ticket Prices

Adults: $9 in advance
($15 at the door)
Children:
(14 & under):		 $5 in advance
($8 at the door)

Tickets on sale Dec. 8
Advance pricing ends on Thursday, Jan. 27, 2011

Here’s a link for more information.  I don’t know if I’m going this year or not yet but I’m sure that turn out will be high.  And also, I honestly don’t remember exactly what ticket prices were in previous years but it seems like these are lower than I recall.  Can anyone verify my recollections or set me straight (if only for ticket prices)?

A Mid-Offseason Report Card

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It’s been a while since I was in school (though perhaps not as long ago as one might expect for someone of my advanced years). That said, I do recall something called “mid-term grades”. The cool thing about them was that they told you how you were doing in your coursework, but they didn’t really “count”. If you were doing well, you could afford to have a few beers and relax over the weekends, but if you were coming up short, the mid-term grades served as a wake-up call of sorts.

Sometimes, I think it would be nice if I could get the same sort of feedback once out in the real world. And if I think that would be of benefit to me, certainly an intelligent man like Bill Smith must feel the same way, right?

As hard as it may be to believe, we’re approaching the half-way point between the end of the Twins’ 2010 season and the date pitchers and catchers report for Spring Training, 2011.

So it’s in this spirit of helpfulness that I offer the Twins’ GM his mid-term grade: D+.

And that grade assumes Tsuyoshi Nishioka gets signed by the December 26 deadline. If Smith doesn’t bring that home, the grade drops to an F.

The good news is, just like in college, the mid-term grades don’t really count. There’s still time to bring that grade up and not screw up the GPA. But time is wasting.

Monday at the the Swan and Dolphin hotels at DisneyWorld, MLB’s movers and shakers get together for their annual Winter Meetings, which wind up Thursday with the Rule 5 draft. Over the past five years, there have been an average of just over 10 trades announced during each year’s Winter Meeting gathering. It might be a very good idea for one or two of those deals this week to involve the Twins.

Why? Well, let’s take a look at what we’ve seen so far this offseason.

Unless/until deals are reached to bring some of these guys back in to the Twins fold, the Twins have lost their most reliable starting pitcher, Carl Pavano, their most prolific power hitter, Jim Thome, and four solid (or better) relief pitchers in Jesse Crain, Matt Guerrier, Jon Rauch and Brian Fuentes.. The Twins have done absolutely nothing about replacing the departing talent, much less making any improvements in those positions.

Nishioka is, so far, the only meaningful addition this offseason (and he isn’t even officially on board yet). And you’ll have to excuse me if I’m not as convinced as others seem to be that he represents a certain improvement over Hudson, Hardy or whoever’s roster spot he ends up taking.

Of course, Justin Morneau should be back and healthy by Opening Day and that represents a significant upgrade over Michael Cuddyer at 1B. But the Twins have done nothing to improve their lack of speed in their outfield, they haven’t replaced Pavano’s innings in the top half of the rotation and there looks to be a significant drop off in bullpen talent between the back end arms, Joe Nathan and Matt Capps, and the rest of the pen arms.

The Tigers have added Victor Martinez and Joaquin Benoit, the White Sox have added Adam Dunn to the heart of their line up, the Red Sox have acquired Adrian Gonzalez and are still kicking the tires on Jayson Werth [UPDATE: Werth has signed with the Nationals], the Yankees are going to add Cliff Lee and both the Angels and Rangers are in the hunt for Carl Crawford. Meanwhile, the Twins have done little but try to strengthen the Rochester Red Wings roster.

And excuse me if I don’t believe the chatter about potentially trading JJ Hardy for middle relief pitching would constitute any sort of improvement whatsoever. There are 70 or so middle relievers on the free agent market, including the four pretty good arms that wore Twins uniforms last season. Trading Hardy for talent you could easily bring on board through free agency would be a total waste of a valuable asset.

You don’t improve your chances of success in this league by trying to simply maintain the status quo while everyone else is focused on improving. Yes, the Twins won 94 games in 2010, but those who think they don’t have to improve the roster just to have a shot at being competitive in their division next season are kidding themselves.

Smith and his front office team have shown very little progress during the first half of the “semester” and that’s what they’re mid-term grade reflects. But there’s still time to salvage a passing grade. The second half of the offseason starts this week at Mickey Mouse’s Magic Kingdom.

It’s time to get to work, Mr. Smith.

– JC

Twins: Foreign/Domestic, New/Old, Friend/Foe

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Just a few things that have come up around TwinsWorld lately that we haven’t gotten around to commenting about yet.

International Flavor:

Hope this is "our" Javier Pimentel. If not... oh well, worth a try, right?

In the past week, the Twins have submitted the high bid for the rights to negotiate with Japanese infielder Tsuyoshi Nishioka and signed the supposed #10 prospect in the baseball-rich Dominican Republic, 17-year-old infielder Javier Pimentel. This continues the trend, started a couple of years ago, of the Twins flexing their international muscles more than a bit. They’ve had a strong presence in Australia for some time, but they’ve now made a name for themselves in the European, Latin American and Japanese markets, as well.

You have to give the Twins front office credit for not waiting for the increased revenues from Target Field before starting to bolster their international scouting organizations. Rather than waiting until the ballpark opened to start the long process of establishing a presence, learning how things worked, and getting to know the markets, they started doing all of that pretty much as soon as they had a deal in place to build the ballpark. As a result, now that the money is available, they’re already a recognized “brand” in those markets and it appears we’re seeing the fruits of those labors starting to be realized.

Red Dog gets a gig:

The Big Lug

Our old friend Mike “Naked Batting Practice” Redmond has been announced as the new manager of the Blue Jays Midwest League affiliate, the Lansing Lugnuts. It will be interesting to hear whether his BP style (if you can call being naked a “style”) is passed along to his players. Red Dog will be hanging out with Lansing mascot “The Big Lug”, who is certainly no TC Bear (but then, who is?). In any event, I’m already looking forward to seeing Red when the Lugnuts travel to Cedar Rapids to face the Kernels in 2011. Good luck NBP!

Keeping an Eye on the Competition:

It’s starting to look like it may be difficult to recognize some of the Twins’ AL Central competitors in 2011. The Tigers have been the media’s big “winner” in the free agent market so far, having added Victor Martinez and Joaquin Benoit to their ranks. It doesn’t look like they’ll have familiar faces Jeremy Bonderman, Nate Robertson and Maglio Ordonez  around any more (though word is that they could still re-sign Mags). Detroit had something like $50 million in contracts come off their books after this season, so they’re still looking to add more. I have to say, though, that I think they’re overpaying for what they’re buying. I understand they probably had to overpay to get the guys they wanted, but in a year or two, I think they’ll be saddled with contracts they wish they didn’t have.

The bitchiest Bitch Sox?

The White Sox could very easily have neither Paul Konerko nor our old friend AJ Pierzynski in uniform next season. GM Kenny Williams always pulls some sort of surprise signing out of his butt so I’m sure they’ll make a splash yet. But they apparently don’t have a lot of salary room and his deals seem to almost always blow up in the Sox’ face, so it’s hard to worry too much about them getting a lot better. Admit it though… it won’t be nearly as much fun hating the Bitch Sox if their chief bitch, AJ, isn’t around, will it? On the other hand, if he gets no other offers and has to return to Chicago on some sort of minimum wage deal, that might be kinda humorous. As for Paulie, I hope he finds a nice place to play ball… preferably in the National League. I don’t want to see him back in Target Field unless it’s in the World Series… or he’s wearing a Twins uniform (or both). [UPDATE: Appears I may have spoken too soon. The Sox have signed Adam Dunn to a 4-year, $56 million deal and still are interested in bringing Konerko back. If they manage to sign both, there’s no doubt they’ll be improved. Twins should hope they stop at Dunn and let him play 1B]

Media experts keep talking about how the Royals have all these great young players coming up through their system and that now is the time for them to trade Zack Greinke. I’m on record already as wanting the Twins in on that action if the Royals are serious about letting him go, but after reading that his “partial no-trade” clause expires at mid-season (meaning after that date, the Royals are not limited with regard to who they can trade him to), I don’t really expect KC to get serious about letting him go until the trade deadline. And as for the Royals actually getting competitive… I’ve heard it all before, so pardon me if I’m skeptical until I see evidence on the field above the AA level.

Finally, there’s the Indians. I haven’t really heard or read anything of interest about Cleveland except that they’re the only team I’ve read about (other than possibly the Twins, of course) having an interest in signing Nick Punto. I guess if there’s one franchise around who could use a Tiny Superhero, it’s the Indians. By the way,we’re hearing that one of the things Nishioka is known for over in Japan is… wait for it… yes… sliding head first in to first base. Sigh.

New Road Jersey:

In case you missed it, the lone change to the Twins’ uniform options in 2011 will be a new alternate road jersey. It’s a navy blue jersey with the same “script Minnesota” across the chest that the grey road jersey has.

The Twins dropped the very popular navy “block MINNESOTA” road jersey from their options a couple of years ago and, since then, the only alternate road jersey has been the same “script Twins” jersey that’s also worn at home.

Twins new "alternate" road jersey for 2011

As others have pointed out, the Twins tended to wear their navy jersey most of the time, at home and on the road, through the middle third or so of the season. The home whites and road greys seemed to be worn regularly early and later in the season and some people wondered if it had to do with superstitions among the players.

While I’m certainly not going to reject that possibility, because ballplayers are notoriously superstitious, I think there’s actually a more likely reason. The navy jerseys are made of much lighter weight material and during the dog days of June, July and August, the players (especially the starting pitchers, who have traditionally chosen the jersey they want to wear for their starts) opt for the coolest jersey among their choices. Conversely, they were more likely to wear the heavier (and warmer) white or grey jerseys during the cooler spring/fall parts of the season.

While the new road jersey will hopefully give them a second light-weight option, the real question that you would think someone would get around to asking is, “Why can’t they make a second set of white/grey jerseys out of the cooler material?”

Anyway… maybe we should keep track, here at Knuckleballs, of how many times each jersey is worn by the Twins next season. It seems like one of those interesting, if not at all important, pieces of information that would fit in nicely around here.

– JC

Giving Starting Pitchers Their Due

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This week, we have another one of those topics that bloggers across the Twins blogging community were invited to discuss at (roughly) the same time. This time, it’s “What is the most important position in baseball?”

Last night (or was it REALLY early this morning?) CapitalBabs posted her opinion and, while I agree that she makes some excellent points in support of her position… well… she’s wrong. The starting pitcher is, by far, the most important position on any baseball team (once you get past T-ball level, anyway).

It might sound like I leapt to this conclusion without even considering other possibilities. I did.

Yet, in my defense, after I made that leap, I did go back and consider other positions. The catcher, admittedly, is pretty important. Ask any team who doesn’t have a good one. Centerfielder is pretty important, too, especially if your team has a couple of cement statues playing the corner OF positions (we do know all about that, don’t we?).  Closer? If you really think that, you need to go read this Joe Posnanski piece (in fact, go read it anyway).

I also gave some thought as to what constitutes a “position”. Maybe we should look at position in the batting order. Is the leadoff hitter, perhaps, the most important “position” on the team? Maybe it’s the most important position in the first inning of a game, but after that, it’s arguably just another spot in the batting order. Yes, it’s important all game long, in that the leadoff hitter needs to get on base in front of the power sticks coming up behind him. But in that sense, it’s no different than the #9 or #2 hitters (and, some might say, with the Twins, the #3 hitter as well).

But, you may argue, starting pitchers only start every fifth game! Not true. There’s a starting pitcher EVERY game… and the question was not, “Who is a baseball team’s most important player?”.

Starting with the first pitch of every ballgame, the starting pitcher’s performance gives his team it’s best… or worst… chance of winning that game. I’m quite certain there are some of those fancy, new-fangled, advanced statistics that will back me up on this opinion, but I’m not going to bother looking for them. Why? Because I’m also certain there are some of those fancy, new-fangled, advanced statistics that will contradict my opinion. (That’s just kind of the nature of those fancy, new-fangled, advanced statistics, isn’t it?)

So how do I know the starting pitcher is the most important position? Easy… I played the game. In fact, at one time or another in my ballplaying career (ok, I never got paid, so it wasn’t really a career… but you know what I mean), I played every position on the field. Mostly, I pitched and played first base. I played a lot at other infield positions, too. I played quite a bit of outfield, when I was younger and coaches figured out I could catch line drives and fly balls, including some centerfield (until coaches realized my lack of speed made me one of those cement statues referred to earlier).

So with all of that experience behind me, how do I know starting pitcher is the most important position? Because I can honestly say, that in no game where I played first base or shortstop or outfield or catcher or even came in as a relief pitcher, did I feel after the game that I cost my team the game with my defense. On the other hand, I can’t begin to count how many times I felt that way after a poor start on the mound… almost always with good reason.

-JC

In addition to CapitalBabs’ post below, you can find other bloggers’ views regarding the “Most Important Position in Baseball” by clicking these links:

Andrew at Twins Target (I believe he’s responsible for hatching this idea… if you don’t like it, blame him!)

k-bro’s baseball blog (k-bro seems to agree with me… perhaps she should rethink her opinion.)

The Common Man and Bill at The Platoon Advantage (two writers who share a blog but don’t agree… hard to imagine, isn’t it?)

Jesse at Twinkie Town 

Andrew at Off the Mark

Cody at North Dakota Twins Fan

There may be more, but this is what I’ve seen so far!

Baseball’s most important position: How do you score a 10?

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Recently, there was a bit of a twitter challenge relayed to some of us baseball bloggers.  I put forward this answer to the question, “what is baseball’s most important position?”

No, don’t laugh.  In attempting to decide what the most important position for a baseball team I have decided to go with that guy over there – what? You can’t see him?  HIM.  His nickname is Intangible… yeah, I know, not quite as impressive as Mr. Incredible or The Natural but nicknames are silly things.

Still a little confused?  Well, what is it that takes nine guys on a field, nine pretty darn talented athletes, from all over the country/world and makes them play a game together?  No, Mr. Funny Guy, the answer I’m looking for is NOT the guy with the checkbook. (although that helps).  And, No, even though I could put together a pretty good argument, it’s not the Manager either.  In fact, even a good manager will tell you that his first priority for managing his team falls square on the shoulders of Intangible.  He is the glue, the bond, the very definition of team.  His name is Team Unity.

Don’t scoff.  When he’s present, he can take a group of mediocre major leaguers and bring home a win.  When he’s not on the payroll because all the cash is going to 9 prima donnas more concerned with their stats during AB’s or the hot actress they’re banging who’s sitting behind home plate, the result could mean that 9 extremely talented players go down swinging.

Team Unity is what makes that brilliant timing work because of a near telepathic connection between a SS and 2B for that PERFECTLY organized DP.  Aren’t they pretty??  Thank Intangible.  Have you seen a 1B range a little further than his usual to field some out-of-control grounder and glove toss a ball from his belly in the general direction of his usual haunt finding a slightly winded pitcher tagging the base a step ahead of a runner? Yeah, you should probably score that a 10 – 3 – 1.

You can make the claim that Professionalism or Routine or even PRACTICE are legitimate stand-ins when Team Unity isn’t present.  You know what?  You’d be right but in a way, you would have just admitted to yourself that the ultimate goal, the REAL player you WANT, is Team Unity.  Those other guys are the minor league call-up that you hope will actually progress to Team Unity given enough starts.  Team Unity is the guy that pulls all his teammates together on the dugout steps to watch a veteran slugger with hope in their eyes.  Team Unity is the goofy guy who teaches the rookies 12-step silly handshakes for in the dugout after a good at bat.  Team Unity is the one that calls EVERYONE to the mound to greet the relief pitcher coming in after your starter has thrown his last.  Team Unity organizes off-field activities that share interests, passions and causes that are important to everyone.  Team Unity  pulls 50 years of players together to celebrate a tradition of excellence on the field.  He’s a pretty damn good guy when it comes right down to it.

So for all those claiming that the real core of the team is the pitcher or the catcher or the shortstop or whoever – if you’re pressed, even you will admit that without the unification of that core player and the other 8 on the field, you’d have a failure.  You really have to have that 10th position factor into your lineup or even the efforts of a truly talented individual could be wasted.

Other Contributors to the Most Important Position Project:

The CommonMan and Bill

Andrew Kneeland (the one who thought this all up)

Kbro Baseball Blog

And JC and I don’t agree of course so he’s got his own opinion following.

Shortstop: JJ Hardy vs Tsuyoshi Nishioka

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UPDATED UPDATED UPDATE: The Twitter reports are flying now… Joe Christensen, Ken Rosenthal and Parker Hageman (among others) are keeping up with the news, but the long and short of the situation at 11:00 am CT Friday appears to be that the Twins HAVE won the bidding (for about $5 million) for the rights to negotiate with Nishioka and that the contract could come in at $2-3 million per year on a multi-year contract. If those numbers turn out to be relatively accurate, that’s not an unreasonable financial risk to take, in my opinion. – JC

Early this week, we should find out whether the Twins have posted a successful bid for the rights to negotiate with Japanese 2010 batting champion Tsuyoshi Nishioka, the Chiba Lotte Marines’ shortstop. This is kind of exciting for Twins fans. Our team has never had the money to consider signing significant MLB free agents, much less throw several million dollars at a Japanese team for the rights to pay several million dollars more to the actual player. The Twins are apparently swimming in revenue! So, you ask, why not go get this young Japanese hero?

I’m glad you asked.

Nishioka

We’ve been reading that Gardy and the Twins front office want to add speed to the Twins’ offense. It turns out that it’s kind of hard to hit baseballs out of Target Field. Those hard hit baseballs find lots of room in the gaps for doubles and triples, however. So the braintrust has decided they should add players that hit balls in the gaps and then have the speed to get around the bases quicker. I can’t really argue with this. It’s logical.

Of course, by my logic, they should probably look to upgrade that speed in their own outfield positions so they not only get better results on the bases, but also reduce the chances of opponents’ batted balls finding those wide gaps between the not-so-speedy outfielders the Twins send out to the corner OF positions.

Instead, apparently Gardy and Bill have decided that the upgrade in speed should be made at a position where the team already has one of the best defensive players in the league… shortstop. And since there are absolutely zero speedy shortstops available domestically, they’ve turned their eyes to the Land of the Rising Sun.

On the surface, it makes some sense, I suppose.

Nishioka did win the batting title in 2010 with a .346/.423/.482 split, good for an OPS of .905, and hit 11 home runs. He also stole 22 bases, while playing in all 144 of Chiba Lotte’s regular season games. He’s said to possess a strong arm and above average range at shortstop. He could also play second base if the coaches decide Alexi Casilla is the better shortstop. He’s also only 26 years old, so he could be a member of the Twins’ core group for several years to come. What’s not to like?

Plenty, actually.

Hardy

Let’s start with those stolen bases. He’s averaged about 25 stolen bases a year over the past five years and actually led his league with 41 six years ago. But he’s also been caught stealing about 1/3 of the time. That’s actually a bit above the average throw-out rate for MLB catchers. So you have to ask, do the stolen base totals indicate you’d be upgrading your speed or will he just be running the team out of rallies on a regular basis? In other words… if JJ Hardy attempted 30 steals every year, would he be successful much less than Nishioka would?

Of course, one knock on Hardy is that he’s been injury prone. If he and his bum wrist can’t take the field, what good is he? Let’s go get the guy who plays every day. OK… but that guy may not be Nishioka. While he did play the entire 2010 season, he missed anywhere between 14 and 29 games of each of his other five full seasons with the Marines, with injuries to his hamstring, knee, neck and… wait for it… yes, his wrist.

Don’t get me wrong… Nishioka may turn out to be the next Ichiro and if he does, it would be fun to see him in a Twins uniform. And maybe JJ Hardy will never regain the offensive talent he showed in 2007 and 2008. But finding out if either of those turns out to be the case will come with a cost.

Under the agreement between MLB and Nippon Baseball, once Chiba Lotte posted Nishioka, MLB teams had four days to submit a sealed bid to the Marines for the rights to enter a 30-day negotiating period with the player and his agent. It’s hard to predict what the winning bid might be, but given the lack of top tier middle infield options on the free agent market this off-season, it’s hard to imagine the winning bid being less than $10 million and I won’t be surprised if it’s closer to $15-20 million. [UPDATE: Boy did I miss on that assumption! The actual winning bid was reportedly around or just over a quite affordable $5 million.] That money only gets paid if the winning team eventually signs the player to a contract, however. Any team shelling out that kind of money for negotiating rights is going to want to lock the player up for several years.

If the Twins offer Hardy arbitration, they’ll probably end up negotiating a one-year deal for something between $6-7 million (though the possibility of signing him to a two-year deal for slightly less per year certainly exists). Compare that to the posting fee and multi-year commitment they’d have to make to acquire Nishioka, which would conservatively have to reach $25-30 million over 3-4 years. You have to ask yourself if you realistically should expect enough of an upgrade at the shortstop position to warrant that additional investment. Consider that the money you’re sending to Japan for the posting fee alone could otherwise be spent on bringing Carl Pavano back for 2011. [UPDATE: In addition to the actual $5 million-ish winning bid, early reports also indicate the possibility that salary demands may be somewhat lower than I projected here… if it’s closer to $3 million/year, this becomes a much more reasonably priced “risk” in my opinion. But would it be reasonable enough to ALSO keep Hardy? Stay tuned.]

And it’s not like the Twins stand to profit by selling broadcast rights in Japan… MLB controls all international rights and divides all revenues (broadcast, merchandise, etc.) evenly among the teams. The Twins might get some additional advertising dollars from Japanese companies, but that’s about it.

In addition, while I’m not really a big “team chemistry” guy (I think it’s overrated as a success factor), I do have to wonder how well Nishioka would fit in with the Twins. In 2007, he announced that henceforth he would be listed on the Chiba Lotte roster simply as “Tsuyoshi”. Kind of like “Cher” or “Madonna”. Or that other diva, “Ichiro”.

Nishioka and fiance Tokuzawa

On the other hand… the guy has dated models and even a professional golfer and he’s apparently engaged to model/actress Naoko Tokuzawa, so he’s got that going for him. She’d certainly constitute one of those “Target Field enhancements” the Twins have been talking about if she attends his games. And get this… both Noshioka and Tokuzawa have blogs! (You might want to brush up on your Japanese before you add them to your daily list of “must reads”, though.)

This guy clearly is not short on self-esteem. However, until this past year, it doesn’t look to me like he had the performance to match his ego. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that he chose this year to request that his team post him to MLB. Nor do I think it’s a coincidence that Chiba Lotte agreed to post him this year. They’re selling high and hoping to cash in if one MLB team will overpay for a young player who’s had one good year in an inferior baseball league.

I don’t think that team should be the Twins.

– JC

UPDATE 12/18: Click here to read our post welcoming Tsuyoshi Nishioka to the Twins, now that he’s officially signed with the Twins. – JC

The Curious Case of Derek Jeter

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Let me start this by saying I like Derek Jeter… at least as much as a person can “like” any New York Yankee. Maybe “like” is too strong a word. I appreciate the kind of ballplayer Derek Jeter has been during his career. Has he been overhyped as a result of being a Yankee? Sure. But he’s done his job well, stayed out of jail, and just generally has appeared to do things “the right way” throughout his career. If he had come up through the Twins system and played his career with our team, I’d probably sign a petition to erect a statue or something.

But he’s a Yankee, after all, so I really can’t say I like him… too much. In fact, he’s the Yankees’ captain.

He also just happens to be a 36 year old free agent shortstop with declining defensive skills coming off by far the worst offensive year in his career. In fact, statistically with the bat, he had about the same kind of year JJ Hardy did (outside of the fact that Jeter actually, you know, played in most of his team’s games). Then again, Hardy is eight years younger than Jeter and covers a lot more ground at SS (again, when he’s actually on the field).

There’s a fair amount of discussion among Twins fans, bloggers, and the media (and apparently their manager and GM) concerning whether the Twins should non-tender (or even trade, according to the Baltimore Sun) Hardy. Offering him arbitration might result in a modest increase in his $5.1 million salary. But the Twins want to add more speed to their line up and, since they’re apparently set on having the slowest outfield in professional baseball, they have identified the shortstop position as the spot to target in their quest to upgrade their wheels. In

Tsuyoshi Nishioka

fact, they’re so intent on making that improvement that they’re reportedly shopping overseas, having posted a bid for the rights to negotiate with Japanese batting champion, Tsuyoshi Nishioka. There’s no doubt that replacing Hardy and Orlando Hudson with Nishioka and Alexi Casilla would improve the Twins footspeed. Whether it would improve anything else is certainly a fair topic for debate.

Meanwhile, over in the Bronx, they’re talking money with Jeter and his agent. Jeter pocketed $21 million in 2010, the final year of his contract. Now, apparently, the Yankees and Jeter are playing a little game of “chicken”. Jeter and his agent don’t think he should really have to take much, if any, of a pay cut and should get at least a four year extension… if not longer. The Yankees, on the other hand, say they’re willing to overpay for Jeter (after all, they overpay for everyone else), but only for three years and for something less than $20 million per year.

This is where I have to admit that, while I occasionally sound off about MLB being complicit in a system that allows the Yankees to be able to spend twice on payroll what most teams can afford, it’s not really quite as bad as that. It COULD be really bad, if it weren’t for the fact that the Yankees owners are morons who almost seem intent on overpaying for every player they want by focusing on what those players have done in the past, rather than what they’re likely to do in the future.

If the Yankees were smart, they’d tell Jeter, “We’ll pay you $35 million over the next three years. Even that’s overpaying, but you’ve been a good Yankee and we want to acknowledge that. Feel free to go shop around and if someone offers you more, give us a call and we’ll talk about upping our offer. But we aren’t going to negotiate against ourselves.” They’d probably get him for that price, too. Instead, he’s going to end up being paid close to $20 million a year until he’s a 40 year old shadow of himself. Hell, they may not have to erect a statue of Jeter. He’ll be his own statute.

As a matter of fact, if I owned the Twins (and had as much money as the Pohlads do), I’d be on the phone with Jeter’s agent, offering him $70 million for four years. Why? Because we all know there is no… friggin… way… that the Yankees can NOT bring Jeter back. Knowing that, why not run that price up to the point where the Yankees not only overpay, but grossly overpay for Jeter? In the worst case scenario, the Yankees balk and you end up with him on your roster. That’s not ideal, but at least you have a right handed DH, plus you’ve pissed off virtually every Yankee fan in the country. That’s gotta be worth something! If you really feel you have to recoup some of the cost, though, I suppose you could always dress him up in his old Yankee uniform and put him in a dunk tank out on Target Plaza on days he’s not in the line up. That ought to bring in a few bucks.

But that’s how teams with $100 million payrolls compete with the guys who spend $200 million… they make sure the rich team has to pay twice what their players are worth to anyone else. They make sure they commit $20+ million a year for six years to starting pitchers who have virtually no chance of being worth that money every season of the contract. That’s why I’m glad the Rangers and Nationals are talking about throwing some big offers at Cliff Lee. Why let the Yankees have him for anything close to what he’s actually going to be worth? Let him be their next AJ Burnett or Carl Pavano over the next several years. Meanwhile, opposing teams can just keep slapping ground balls in to left field past the $50 million worth of statues the Yankees will be trotting out to 3B and SS for the foreseeable future.

And as long as the Yankees have Jeter attached to their infield like a ball and chain, the Twins front office can go shopping overseas for a guy like Nishioka, without having to be concerned about the Yankees overpaying for the rights to negotiate a contract that would overpay him to play in New York.

God bless Derek Jeter! Take ‘em to the cleaners, Captain!

-JC

Holy Cannoli – Gardy Wins AL Manager of the Year!

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800+ Wins with the MN Twins

I know!!!!  Who would believe it?!?!  If you’re a Twins fan, you have gotten very, very, VERY used to our guy coming in as the runner up every single year that we can show that he really should be #1. 

Of course, there is a LOT of us that say this was NOT the best of his years to be considered but since this is a subjective art, you have to realize that the humans who do the voting can’t help but think a bit consecutively and realized that this was definitely an honor that couldn’t wait any longer.  Here’s the ballot results from the Baseball Writers of America site: 2010 Managers of the Year.

I honestly couldn’t be happier for him and I think it’s a well-deserved honor.

Keep your eyes on FSN because they will updating things during the day and expect to have an interview with Gardy available soon!  Here’s video provided by the Minnesota Twins twitter account with his ackowledgement of the award.

[update] also according to the Twins, there will be an interview aired at 5:00 pm on the MLB Network!