Twins trade deadline day. Calm down.

The first ever July 31st or bust trade deadline was weird. Teams you wouldn't think would be buyers were. Teams you assumed would be the big buyers in some cases did nothing at all. Most of the players who had been talked about the most as trade targets stayed put.

The Twins did not make that big splashy move for either a starter or a closer. But they did make 2 bullpen trades in the last few days. They got Sergio Romo from Miami and today Sam Dyson from the Giants. Both definite upgrades over the Trevor Mays and Tyler Duffeys. Suddenly the bullpen looks a whole lot more credible. We shouldn't have to see May in there trying to protect a tight lead in any more 8th innings.

But a lot of the fans have gone into meltdown mode. They are mad there was no big trade. They are mad that the Indians and Astros made bigger deals. I wanted a starter, but nobody made those trades. The Yankees needed a starter badly, and the Yankees always get whatever the hell they want, but even they couldn't bring in a Bumgarner or Syndergaard. Clearly the asking prices for these guys were way too high. And I'm not sure any of those presumably available guys are enough of a difference maker to make it that much more likely you can beat the Yankees or Astros. I'm certainly fine with not giving up top end prospects for a guy who might only be a minor upgrade over our 2-5 starters now.

I said weeks ago that I no longer felt that THIS team was the one you go all in on anyway. I don't think they can beat the Astros or Yankees in October under really any circumstances, unless the bats are just white hot, which is still their only realistic path to a world series. And if they are, they can take down good pitching. I don't think it will happen, but there was never a scenario where the Twins were going to be pitching-driven in the playoffs.

Fans also are freaking out that the Astros got Zack Greinke and the Indians got Yasiel Puig and Franmil Reyes. Now, Greinke wouldn't be relevant til the playoffs anyway, and these guys the Indians got are good but they're not Mantle and Maris. Cleveland weakened their.pitching staff in.exchange for a little extra power, but it seems strange to freak out about that when the Twins are racing towards a team homerun record.

I pretty much abandoned the world series dream a while ago. I'm still 50/50 at best on them winning the division. I just don't think the moves were really there to put the 2019 team over the top. And the future still should be pretty bright, so I wasn't into the idea of really blowing up the farm system either. And the 2 moves they made were low cost. I like what they did.

Comments

  1. MichelleJuly 31, 2019 at 7:01 PM

    And I haven’t been following Greinke in the NL but he definitely had some head issues when he played for the Royals. Which you don’t want in a pitcher. Thor would have been nice but not if it meant losing Bux.

    ReplyDelete

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