The free-agent season opens at midnight and — news flash — the Twins aren’t gonna get CC Sabathia or Mark Teixeria. And there are a lot of players on the market whom, if put together in various 25-man combinations, could guarantee a 95-loss season.

It’s pretty clear that the Twins need to figure out a way to increase their right-handed power, improve the left side of the infield and (after yesterday’s news about Pat Neshek) find a couple of arms to compete in the bullpen mix. The Twins are in a strange place, for them, with our bullpen trust level as low as it is — and I’m not going to be the one to say that Crain and Guerrier are going to bounce back to their former selves. At least there should be enough veteran and sleeper talent on the market for the Twins to set up a healthy competition for a couple of right-handed relief spots at spring training.

The big question for me is bringing in someone who can hit the ball — hard and out of the park. I think we can get beyond the “that person has to field his position well” thing because of the Twins’ willingness to use Brian Buscher at third base and Brendan Harris at any position that requires a glove. So if a new guy comes in with a suspect defensive reputation, I’m willing to adopt a “so be it” approach.

I also suspect the Twins are going to have to give something to get something. In other words, don’t expect the answers to come from the free-agent market.

Casey Blake would have made a better half-season addition for the playoff drive in 2008 than he’ll make as a three-season investment at third base. He’s that old and I’m not sold that he’s that much of an upgrade over the Buscher/Harris thing. Orlando Cabrera doesn’t get much love from the Twins beyond the field staff (You can read that as the front office checking him out and not liking the reports) so don’t expect him to be the Opening Day shortstop in 2009.

I’m expecting the Twins to make a strong run at J.J. Hardy, the Milwaukee shortstop-who-could-probably-play-third-base-depending-on-what-other-moves-are-made. Hardy has hit 50 home runs over the last two seasons and would either give the Twins a different profile at shortstop (power hitting/OK defense) or another corner infielder with power. Keep in mind that the Twins have the option of moving Alexi Casilla to shortstop and opening second base to competition. The likely departure of Sabathia from Milwaukee contributes to the idea of a trade involving one of the Twins starters. (Would they ask for Slowey and accept Blackburn or Perkins?)

The bullpen could be a trickier issue. There are already reports that the Rockies are taking on Huston Street in the Matt Holliday deal with the idea of turning around and sending him elsewhere. Would the Rockies and Twins explore a deal that centered on Street and Cuddyer or Delmon? Otherwise, bringing in guys to compete with Guerrier/Crain/Bonser/Breslow is pretty much of an educated guessing game. For each Breslow who comes in and provides unexpected help — and I’m not convinced that he’s a long-term answer — there are several Carmen Cali-types who get their big chance and make the least of it.

Unfortunately, as seemed to be a trendy discovery in 2008, when you turn starting pitching into a six-inning game on a daily basis, you need a whole bunch of relievers in which you have faith. The Twins obviously didn’t have that last year and — while we’re paying attention to the bullpen for 2009 — I hope that one of the things being written on the whiteboard at organizational meetings is the need to raise the bar on the young starting pitchers, in terms of them handling more of their own stuff.

I hope that another thing being written is, “Can someone fix Matt Guerrier?” I don’t want to have to use the word “Rinconian” next season to describe his career path

The most interesting part of the off-season is that most of what happens doesn’t come with a build-up. The Santana thing last year was an exception because the entire winter was spent in opera about his departure. But the “for whom” cascaded rapidly from the original speculation (”You think the Twins can get Cano and Melky Cabrera?”) to which package of youth was the better deal. The Delmon deal pretty much came out of the blue, as did the free-agent signings — however ham-gloved, weak-armed and bat-impaired they turned out tobe. Better luck this year, Bill Smith.

So I’m pretty much going to wait for something unanticipated to happen. And I’m also going to start wondering — because it’s never too early to fret about this stuff — whether Scott Boras will still be Carlos Gomez’ agent when he approaches free agency in a few years.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 12th, 2008 at 1:15 pm and is filed under Thoughts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.