Carlos Silva and Luis Castillo sat in a quiet Twins clubhouse Monday night, discussing another frustrating loss and the state of this team as it sits at .500 (34-34) with 94 games remaining. “It’s getting late,” Silva said. “You know, we need to start playing better baseball because this is getting out of hand.”

“One thing we say is we don’t need anybody here,” he added, referring to recent trade speculation. “We have the perfect team to win a lot of games. The only thing we need to do is the little things.”

I think Silva is wrong, but you have to respect the opinion. The last thing management wants to hear is a player complaining that his team needs more talent. On one level, Silva is right. The Twins could add Chief Wigginton or Cash Flowell (our thanks to Baseball Blondie for the best Mike Lowell nickname), and it wouldn’t matter if they can’t get more production from Jason Bartlett and Jason Kubel.

From what we’re hearing, the Twins are not close to completing any trade. They feel teams are asking too much right now, in general, but remain hopeful that the prices will drop as the July 31 trade deadline nears. We’ll continue our trade target series with Kevin Mench, which is a name that surfaced this past weekend at the Metrodome. We know you’re anxious to dissect Garrett Atkins and Adam Dunn, but we have yet to hear anything involving the Twins on those fronts.

They could have Mench for a song. With Corey Hart taking over right field, Geoff Jenkins in left and Bill Hall in Center (and Tony Gwynn Jr. waiting in the wings), the Brewers have kept Mench on the bench for all but two games since June 5. Can you say expendable? He’s worth a closer look:

Name: Kevin Mench, Brewers OF

Basics: He’s 29 (turns 30 Jan. 7). R/R, 6-0, 215 lbs. Born in Wilmington, Del. He was drafted in the fourth round out of the University of Delaware in 1999.

Stats: Batting .273 with 2 homers and 17 RBI. A .275 on-base percentage and a .403 slugging percentage. He has hit two home runs in his past 256 at-bats.

Salary: $3.4 million. He’ll be arbitration eligible at season’s end and eligible for free agency after 2008.

Good Twin because: The rumor is he wants to come here. They need a righthanded stick in their lineup, but Mench is a corner outfielder who does nothing for their third-base equation. And here’s a larger point that actually applies to the Dunn question: Do the Twins really want to trade for a DH? Where does Joe Mauer play on the days he’s not catching? To me, Mench would be a decent addition to the Twins’ bench (notice, that rhymes), but the Brewers probably like having him there, too.

Available?: Yes, and other teams aren’t exactly beating down the Brewers’ door.

Probable cost: Perhaps a C-level prospect, and even for that, Milwaukee would have to eat a portion of Mench’s salary.

Potential Bat-Girl nickname (*You know, if she still ran the greatest blog ever): C’mon, this guy seems like an easy target. Anyone else seeing a poor man’s Kiefer Sutherland? Let’s call him Lieutenant Kendrick. (Other uggestions?)

Odds this trade happens: 25-to-1. You get the picture.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 19th, 2007 at 1:13 am and is filed under Trade Targets, Twins thoughts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.