The Twins have gone about their business quietly this week at the annual general managers meetings, in Dana Point, Calif.

On Tuesday, Commissioner Bud Selig preached to the GMs about the dangers of handing out big salaries in this economy. But Scott Boras held court and reminded reporters that MLB does operate its in own world, with built-in stadium naming rights, multi-billion dollar TV contracts, etc.

Yes, teams might suffer at the gate in a bad economy. Suite revenue and corporate sponsorship might slip, but the bottom line is these teams still have big bucks, and the premium free agents (Mark Teixeira, C.C. Sabathia, etc.) are going to get paid again. There’s a theory that the non-stars on the free agent market will get squeezed. Time will tell, I guess.

MLB holds a seminar at the GM meetings with recommendations for how each team should handle arbitration dealings with their players. There are discussions about rules, scheduling and umpires. But the big news usually involves potential player moves.

The free agent market won’t open until Nov. 14, but the GM meetings are fertile ground for trades. That’s where the Twins dealt A.J. Pierzynski to San Francisco in 2003 for some guys named Nathan, Bonser and Liriano.

Last year, the Mets let the Twins know they’d be willing to include Carlos Gomez, Deolis Guerra, Kevin Mulvey and Philip Humber in a package for Johan Santana. The Twins said they’d get back to them, depending on how their contract dealings with Santana went.

The Twins and Rays continued working on a deal that eventually sent Matt Garza and Jason Bartlett to Tampa Bay for Delmon Young, Brendan Harris and Jason Pridie.

This year, there has been very little buzz coming from the Twins. But GM Bill Smith, assistant GM Rob Antony, VP player personnel Mike Radcliff, senior advisor Terry Ryan and pro scouting coordinator Vern Followell are all there, ready to work on potential trades. We’re keeping our ears to the ground and will keep you posted if we hear anything of substance.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 5th, 2008 at 11:09 am and is filed under Twins thoughts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.