First of all, after worrying about my knee, all I had was a little patella tendinitis. That’s what happens when you hurt your knee and watch it swell up for the first time. All I need is rest.

The Twins today placed catcher Chris Heintz on release waivers. The 40-man roster is due Tuesday and this was a move intended to free up some space.

Heintz hit .250 in 24 games with the Twins and .275 in 48 games with the Rochester Red Wings. He threw out one of 14 basestealers.

With Heintz and Matthew LeCroy gone, Jose Morales will move in as the catcher-in-waiting if someone is injured on the major league level. Drew Butera, Kory Feiner and Jeff Christy are among other catching prospects who could play at either AA or AAA next season.

The catcher to watch is Wilson Ramos. He hit .291-8-42 at Beloit, but scouts feel he will be a .300 hitter. And he’s a good catcher with a big arm.

That’s all I have for now. I may have a free agent story in the paper tomorrow, but it hinges on getting a certain phone call.

 UPDATE: Here’s a link to the Star-Telegram story about Hunter asking for seven years. This reeks of someone knowing he’s going to get five-year offers but is asking for seven so teams will come in with six. Is there no limits to this man?

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Before I get to some Twins notes I want to clear up this Craig Monroe, reduced salary thing.

The Twins believed that they could cut his salary by 40 percent, which I reported in today’s editions. Twins GM Bill Smith, when I called him, was still checking the rules to make sure that was true. I took what Smith and assistant GM Rob Antony told me as the final word because they sounded pretty sure of themselves.

Well, the league office informed the Twins today that the max cut is 20 percent. I apologize for the mix up. The signals I got from the club were that the max cut was 40 percent but I should have included the fact that the Twins were still checking the rule book.

I hope I didn’t throw you off. And I apologize to Smith and Antony for having the league office breathe down their backs. There seems to be a rule interpretation snafu every offseason.

On to some notes…..

The Phoenix Desert Dogs of the Arizona Fall League have qualified for the championship game, and it appears that Twins prospect Nick Blackburn will get the ball in Saturday’s title game. Blackburn is 4-0 with a 1.64 ERA in six starts. Over 22 innings, Blackburn has walked two and struck out 20. He was asked to work on changing speeds more, which he’s tried to do.

I hope Blackburn got his sideburns cut off while out there. I swear, he looks like Joe Mauer from a distance. It just so happens that Blackburn dressed next to Mauer after being called up in September. I’d come into the clubhouse and think, `Hey, there’s Joe. Gotta grab him…cripes, it’s Blackburn!”

Anthony Swarzak (1-1, 2,05), Ryan Mullins (1-0, 2.84) and Eduardo Morlan (12.2 scoreless innings in relief) have done fairly well in Fall League play. Matt Macri, Trevor Plouffe and Chris Butera have been decent based on their numbers.

The Twins are trying to lock up some minor league free agents. Jason Miller, Alejandro Machado and Tommy Watkins are back. They club wants Trent Oeltjen, Brian Bass and Felix Molina.

Ken Harvey, Josh Rabe and Dave Gassner will not be brought back.

Brian Buscher played 12 games in winter ball before leaving to take care of some unexpected family business. 

 

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Sorry I haven’t checked in for awhile. Joe C. held things down very well last week at the GM meetings.

Thanks for the encouragement concerning my sore knee. I ended up having an MRI last week, which revealed no structural damage but there is some fluid in there. I’m still walking with a limp. This is all new territory for me. All I can say is that it stinks to get old.

The Twins traded for Craig Monroe yesterday, but they will non-tender him if he doesn’t agree to a contract for less than the $4.775 million he received last season. “We’re working on that,” GM Bill Smith said.

My intuition tells me that the Twins wouldn’t have made this deal if they didn’t think they could sign Monroe. If he signs, then the Twins will send the Cubs someone from the bottom tier of their prospect ranks. And I mean bottom. It may be the clubhouse attendant.

Talked to Torii Hunter for a while yesterday. He wishes the Twins would make him another offer, but the Twins never received a counter offer after they faxed over their three-year, $45 million offer late in the season.

I don’t know who’s at fault here. Free agents are going to play the field at this time of year anyway. I still get the vibe that Hunter wants to stay, but it’s going to be hard for him to accept a three-year deal when lesser players like Juan Pierre and Gary Matthews got five-year deals last offseason

I expect things to really heat up at the end of the month, right before the winter meetings begin Dec. 3 in Nashville. I asked Torii if he planned on showing up to meet with teams. “I don’t want to go to Nashville, but if I have to I will,” he said.

Will other teams wait that long? I heard this afternoon that White Sox GM Kenny Williams wants to get his center field situation figured out by Thanksgiving. He’s got 13 players making $99 million next season, so he’ll have to move some salary in order to sign Hunter.

Check back over the next few days. I want to get into why I think Hunter is worth five years.

 

In what could be one of their final awards as members of the Twins, outfielder Torii Hunter and lefthander Johan Santana were named winners of Rawlings Gold Glove Awards today.

It’s Hunter’s seventh Gold Glove. Only Jim Kaat (11) has won more as a Twin. Hunter made just two errors in 394 total chances this season.

The Twins have long campaigned for one of their pitchers to win a Gold Glove. Brad Radke was annually beaten out by Mike Mussina. But Santana, an excellent athlete, broke through this year. He didn’t make an error this season and has made just three over the past three seasons.

It’s the 37th and 38th time a Twin has won a Gold Glove.

Now the question is where will Hunter and Santana be when they are given the award. Hunter appears to be leaving via free agency and the baseball world is waiting to see if the Twins will shop Santana in a trade.

Check here on Wednesday for a story about me and one of Hunter’s gloves. I’ve been dying to tell it and this is as good of a time as any.

Joe C. was supposed to post this, but he’s busy working the hotel lobby at the GM meetings in Orlando. He should have some good stuff later today, so keep checking his blog for updates.

Got a tip over the weekend that the Twins have spoken with Boston about outfielder Coco Crisp.

Don’t know how serious things are at this point, but the indications I’m getting are that the Red Sox mavens are at least doing due diligence on the Twins farm system.

This is one is worth keeping an eye on as the GM meetings take place this week in Orlando. The Twins still would like to sign Torii Hunter back, but GM Bill Smith has stated on more than one occasion that he has a Plan B. Covelli Crisp could be on that list of alternatives.

As I mentioned here recently, the Red Sox have an emerging stud in Jacoby Ellsbury. Crisp is due $4.75M in 2008 and $5.75M in 2009, plus there’s an option for $8M in 2010. He’s not on Torii Hunter’s level, but Crisp would be a moderately priced replacement. The Twins could take the savings and apply it to other areas of need.

 A couple of things I’ve caught in the wind (not from little birdies):

Mike Lowell could be available as a free agent. As well as he played for The Nation this season he’ll be 34 next season, and Boston may be reluctant to sign him to a multi-year deal at that age. The problem is that he’s probably worth around $8 million a year.

There are also some indications that the Twins and Devil Rays have been chatting about something. I don’t have a lot of information on this one, but the only player I could see them moving would be Rocco Baldelli. I know they need pitching, but I’ve got to believe they want to keep Carl Crawford and let Delmon Young and B.J. Upton develop.

Joe C. is at the GM meetings this week and will track any developments in a way that only the Star Tribune can!

Thanks for all the suggestions on how to treat my sore knee. It bothered me a lot over the weekend, but the swelling has gone down and it’s starting to look and feel like a knee again. The problem is that there’s some clicking going on in there, so I’m going to have it checked out ASAP.