Merry Xmas and stuff

So I guess you know you're getting old when you start getting books for Christmas instead of video games.
I have a lot of reading to do.
Now on my to-do list are The Bad Guys Won by Jeff Pearlman and 3 Nights in August by Buzz Bissinger. Apparently three more books are on the way via UPS according to my wife, and while one of them is undoubtedly The Replacements: All Over But the Shouting - about the greatest American rock band of all time, I'm assuming the other two are probably going to be about baseball.

And in perhaps a further sign that I'm getting old, I'm actually looking forward to reading all of them. I recently finished The Cheaters Guide to Baseball by ussmariner blogger Derek Zumsteg, and it kind of reinvigorated my appetite for good baseball reading.

Reading about baseball (and other stuff) as a kid not only primed me for my present career as a sports writer, but it also probably kept me from either dropping out of or flunking out of high school.
High school was impossibly stupid, the most pointless thing that ever happened to me, but going to class gave me a time and a place to get a lot of reading done. I read four John Irving novels and a few baseball books in my junior year alone, and I didn't do any of it at home during my free time. That's what makes it harder to read as an adult. To do it, I'd actually have to give up some of my own free time. But I'm willing. I'll get started tomorrow.

I'm assuming if you take the time to read this blog, that means you're literate enough to have read a book cover to cover before, and enjoy baseball to some degree, so while I'm on the subject, here are some of the baseball books I've enjoyed best.

*I Love This Game - Kirby Puckett
Puck's autobiography is extremely light weight, and if you aren't a Twins fans or didn't follow his career somewhat closely, you might not have much reason to read it. But it's a fast-moving story that covers Kirby's entire life in pretty good detail. I particularly enjoyed the parts about Kirby's flirtation with leaving the Twins to sign with the Red Sox in the early 90's. He was candid about the situation and it gave a telling glimpse into how the Pohlad's operate.
The books strength is in how it lets Puckett's shiny disposition come to life. Puckett's ex-wife, Tonya, and others made efforts to portray Kirby's "lovable" side as a bogus alter-ego in the later stages of his life, and it's pretty clear that he did have a dark side. But anyone who reads this book will come away confident that he was a great ambassador of the game, a great teammate, and someone who truly did care a great deal about the fans.

*The Mick - Mickey Mantle
Great because Mick pulls no punches. If memory serves (I read it several years ago) he doesn't talk much about his womanizing, and the controversial liver transplant didn't take place until later, but he's otherwise pretty unflinching in his battles with excessive drinking and partying. His story of rising from the Oklahoma farm to the Yankees is inspiring, but the highlights are certainly his late night shenanigans with Billy Martin, many of which had me laughing out loud. The second funniest baseball book I ever read.

*I Ain't an Athlete, Lady - John Kruk
The funniest baseball book I ever read. Written well before Kruk became a terrible ESPN analyst, this book was the reason I knew Kruk was a terrible choice for an analyst the day he was hired. He's anti-intellectual. A Big Mac-and-beer type of guy who never took two seconds to analyze himself, much less the hows and whys of MLB.
It makes for a bad analyst but a terrifically entertaining storyteller. Kruk tells stories about living with a rowdy family, playing with rowdy teammates, and the humorous, aw-shucks demeanor that overshadowed what a great player he was throughout his career is ever-present , but the highlights are without a doubt the stories of the '93 Phillies team and his days playing for Larry Bowa. If you read this book, you'll never look at Bowa - currently a Yankee coach and formerly an ESPN analyst himself - the same way again.

*The Cheaters Guide to Baseball - Derek Zumsteg
Both funny and enlightening, the Mariner blogger does a terrific job of covering the history of cheating in baseball from the dirty play and gambling scandals of the 1800s to the steroid scandals of today. Spectacularly researched, yet it's more than a history, it also does a great job of pointing out (and celebrating) the fine line in baseball between what is considered cheating (steroids, corked bats) and what is considered gamesmanship (stealing signs, lying to umpires). The chapter on the ways a groundskeeper and his crew can affect a game is fascinating.

*Season of Dreams - Tom Kelly with Ted Robinson
Robinson was the Dick Bremer for the '91 Twins, and he does a terrific job of taking Tom Kelly's retelling of the season and putting it in proper context and actually building suspense in a non-fiction book. For anyone who remembers the '91 season as vividly as I do, it's an absolute must-read. From the 2-9 start to the 15-game winning streak to the playoff push, reading it again recently was like looking through a high school yearbook. Loved it.

*Throwin' Heat - Nolan Ryan
Reading this one you can actually hear Nolan's deep, twangy Texas drawl as he recounts an amazing career that spanned parts of four decades. Not just a bunch of stories from his career, but a look into his thought processes on the mound, and how tough it was for a conservative farm boy from Texas to deal with immense celebrity and be a family man at the same time.

*The 20th Century Baseball Chronicle - David Nemec
If there was a class on baseball history (I'm sure there is somewhere) this would be the textbook. Weighing in at five pounds and over 600 full-color pages, it's chock full of stories, photos, stats and figures from each year from 1900-1991.
I learned more about baseball history from this book than any other source ever.

*Hi Everybody - Herb Carneal
If you didn't spend a large number of your summer days and nights with Herb's smooth and steady voice keeping you company while working on the mower in the garage, or relaxing by the lake, or making a long drive, this book won't appeal to you. But if Herb was a big part of your life, and if you visit this blog regularly he probably was, you'll enjoy it. It's like spending a few hours in the cheap seats with your Grandpa.

*Summer of '49 - David Halberstam
So good I've read it three times.
Meticulously researched and beautifully written, one of the greatest American writers set out to create a historical account of one of baseball's greatest pennant races and he wound up writing a novel. Seriously, it's nearly impossible for a non-fiction book to be so totally engrossing.
You don't have to be old enough to remember that season, and you don't have to be a Red Sox or Yankees fan (much of the story focuses on those two). In fact, you wouldn't even have to be a baseball fan to enjoy this book.
I was born in 1980, and I feel like I know exactly what baseball, and America's relationship with it, was like in 1949.

To contend or not to contend?

I'm starting to think that if the Twins were to keep Johan Santana and Joe Nathan for the 2008 season, they might be able to contend for a playoff spot.
If they didn't trade Johan of course, that would mean they didn't acquire Jacoby Ellsbury or Melky Cabrera. So I'm guessing they'd sign Kenny Lofton to play CF.
So this would be the likely roster.

CF Kenny Lofton
2B Brendan Harris
C Joe Mauer
RF Michael Cuddyer
1B Justin Morneau
LF Delmon Young
DH Jason Kubel
3B Mike Lamb
SS Adam Everett

Bench
Mike Redmond
Craig Monroe
Nick Punto
Jason Pridie
(Alexi Casilla - if they only keep 11 pitchers)

Rotation
Johan Santana
Francisco Liriano
Scott Baker
Boof Bonser
Kevin Slowey

Bullpen
Matt Guerrier
Juan Rincon
Pat Neshek
Dennys Reyes
Jesse Crain
(Glen Perkins - if they keep 12 pitchers)
Joe Nathan

There are a lot of question marks, obviously, like Liriano's health, Boof's weight and conditioning, Rincon's ability to bounce back, Lamb and Harris playing every day in the IF; but if things go right like they did in 2006, this team would be good enough to contend (though if Detroit plays up to its talent we're probably talking wild card).

If they trade Santana they probably get either Phil Hughes or Jon Lester in return, and while both of those guys are ready to be quality big leaguers right now, they're not ready to be aces - yet. Baker would become the "veteran" of the staff.

And if Santana is traded than you have to trade Nathan next. He's in the last year of his contract, and when you consider the washed-up Eric Gagne just got a $10 million, 1-year deal, it's safe to say Joey will be way out of the Twins price range next off-season (and even if they could afford it I wouldn't do it. Smart teams don't pay $10-$15 million a year for a closer. They also don't pay $11 million a year for Carlos Silva, which the Mariners are about to do.)

I'm still about 90% sure the Twins are going to trade Johan. Although I've also said that I'd be willing to let him walk after this year for a World Series ring. Could they do it? It'd be a big longshot, and it'd be the risk of all risks to try.
What if they kept him, went 93-69 but still missed the playoffs? At that point you lost out on a chance to get Hughes or Ellsbury, lose Johan for nothing, and don't go to the postseason. That'd be tough to swallow.

There have been reports that Santana wants a 7-year contract, and that would be a risky thing for the Yankees or Red Sox, let alone the Twins. But a 5-year, $120 deal might not be as ridiculous as it sounds.

Think about it.

Right now it seems like suicide for the Twins to commit such a large chunk of their payroll to one player. But look at how quickly the market inflates each year. Last year, the whole world thought Royals GM Dayton Moore was insane for giving Gil Meche a 5-year, $55 million deal. Now it seems like a decent investment, and Silva - a lesser pitcher - is getting the same deal and no one bats an eye.

By 2010 the going rate for an ace could be $35 million a year. If they signed Santana now for $20-$25 million per, it'd probably be a bargain in a few years. While the Twins do work on a budget, they're not as "small market" as the front-office staff likes you to believe. The payroll will probably be over $100 million by 2009.

To be clear, I'm just sort of kicking some thoughts around. I still expect Santana to be traded. I just wonder what exactly the team will be looking to accomplish in 2008 if and when they do.

An actual infield

Last year the Twins infield consisted of Justin Morneau, Luis Castillo, Jason Bartlett and Nick Punto when the season began. All four were coming off excellent seasons.
But Punto predictably went back to hitting like a utility infielder, Bartlett saw his offensive production drop considerably, and Castillo's primary skills (hitting for a good average and getting on base at a decent clip) were minimized by the failures of the rest of the lineup, and he was traded as the Twins fell out of the race.
That left the Twins with some work to do this off-season.
They included Bartlett in a trade with Tampa Bay to acquire OF Delmon Young and the strong-hitting, average-fieldeing Brendan Harris, and this weekend signed the left side of the Houston Astros 2006 IF; SS Adam Everett (1 year, $2.8 million) and 3B Mike Lamb (2 years, $6.6 million with a team option for 2010).

When Everett signed, I wrote that while his fielding is regarded as being superb, he was a lesser total package than Bartlett. That may prove to be the case, but in looking at the big picture, his signing makes a little more sense and starts to look a little better.
Harris has limited range at 2B, and Lamb is regarded as a well-below average defender. He played a lot of 1B in Houston, and other teams looking to sign him apparently pictured him as a DH/1B.
But Everett, who some defensive studies have proclaimed to be the premier defensive player of the current era, can certainly lessen the effects of Harris and Lamb's shortcomings, especially Lamb's.
What the Twins have essentially done is give themselves an infield that consists of three above average hitters, who are good (Morneau), average (Harris) and poor (Lamb) defensively, and one guy who is a terrible hitter and a world class defender, and that guy is playing the most important position.

3B is at the moment one of the weakest positions in baseball. After A-Rod and Mike Lowell re-upped with the Yanks and Sox, Lamb was probably the best 3B available. Seriously.
Lamb has never had more than 381 ABs in a season, and he's been playing in an extreme hitter friendly ballpark, but his career line of .281/.339/.427 is obviously much, much better than Punto, or Luis Rodriguez, Tony Batista, etc. In the last two years in particular, Lamb, who is 32 and lefthanded, has been very good at the plate.
In '06 he hit .307/.361/.475, and last year he hit .289/.366/.453.
He'll struggle defensively and he might not quite reproduce those numbers in the AL, but even a .270/.330/.440 line would make him a huge, huge upgrade at 3B.
The other good news is the move means Craig Monroe will not be an everyday player. The Twins lineup is almost set, and it actually looks pretty good (nowhere near as good as Detroit's obviously, but possibly as good as the one that won 96 games in 2006).

CF Jacoby Ellsbury/Melky Cabrera (still assuming Johan's gonna go)
2B Brendan Harris
C Joe Mauer
RF Michael Cuddyer
1B Justin Morneau
LF Delmon Young
DH Jason Kubel
3B Mike Lamb
SS Adam Everett

The 1 thru 8 spots will all be above league average, and several of them could be considerably better than that.

One thing seems kind of weird, though. Neither Everett or Young, or Monroe, are particularly young, so they would seem to be added with the goal of competing in 2008. If the Twins trade Santana, they won't have the pitching to compete. If they kept him, and Francisco Liriano actually came back strong, they suddenly might be good enough to have a shot at the playoffs in '08.
I just wonder what exactly the goal is. They won't be bad next year, even if they do trade Johan (and by the way, the trade of Dan Haren to the Diamondbacks significantly helps the Twins leverage, and the Yanks have confirmed they're still in the hunt).
But if they move Johan with an eye to the future, will Everett and Lamb be a part of it?

Either way, it's very encouraging that Bill Smith is giving his manager quality parts with which to build a lineup, rather than taking ill-advised fliers on washed up veterans, or asking too much of overmatched players.

Twins sign Everett....Mitchell report

The Twins have signed SS Adam Everett, who became expendable from the Houston Astros one day after they landed Miguel Tejada in a six-player trade.

Here's the lowdown on Everett. Defensively he is very, very good. And, unlike guys like Nick Punto and Juan Castro, his terrific defensive reputation is real - based on actual metrics such as zone rating and range factor - not just a made-up reputation built off a couple of highlight plays that showed up on Sportscenter. Jason Bartlett was a very good shortstop, Everett is better. In fact, many regard him as the absolute, No. 1 best defensive shortstop in baseball. That will be beneficial to a young pitching staff.

That's the good news. Here's the bad. He can't hit.
For his career, he's hit .248/.299/.357 in 2,145 at-bats. That's near identical to Punto's .245/.314/.321 career line. Everett has a little more power - he hit 11 homers in 2005 - but he won't draw near as many walks as Punto can.
'05 was Everett's best year, as he hit .248/.290/.364 with 11 homers, 54 RBI, 28 doubles and 21 steals. But in the last two years he's posted Punto-ish OPS+'s of 64 and 56.
In an injury-plagued '07 he hit .232/.281/.318. You thought Punto's '07 season was historically bad (it was) - he had a 52 OPS+, just 4 points lower than Everett's.
The gain in defense from replacing Bartlett with Everett is not enough to negate the loss in offense in my opinion. Factor in that Everett is two years older than Bartlett, and it's clear that Bartlett is the better total package, a factor that deals another blow to the earlier trade with Tampa that sent Bartlett to the Rays.
I do get the feeling that this could be another sign the Twins are strongly considering moving Michael Cuddyer back to 3B. While you can get away with having a good-field, no-hit shortstop such as Punto or Everett in the lineup, you can't do it with another banjo-hitter at 3rd, and there aren't a lot of options out there for a starting 3B. If the Twins do move Cuddy back to the hot corner, the Twins lineup probably looks like this.

CF Ellsbury/Crisp/Melky
2B Brendan Harris
C Joe Mauer
3B Michael Cuddyer
1B Justin Morneau
RF Delmon Young
LF Jason Kubel
DH Craig Monroe
SS Adam Everett

That certainly looks better than last year's lineup, but the obvious problem is that moving Cuddyer into the infield means Craig Monroe becomes an everyday player, unless another bat is brought in (and considering they're paying Monroe $3.82 million, that's highly unlikely). Monroe is a decent risk as a 4th OF, platoon guy (if overly expensive), but with him playing every day, you've got back to back guys at the bottom of the order who will almost certainly fail to provide a .300 on-base percentage.

*The big names on the Mitchell report are obviously Roger Clemens, Andy Pettite, Miguel Tejada, Mo Vaughn, Kevin Brown, Brian Roberts and some others.
There were quite a few Twins on the list, notably Rondell White, Chuck Knoblauch, Chad Allen, Denny Neagle and Dan Naulty.
The only really smoking hot gun to come from the report, in my opinion, is the direct testimony of injection on Clemens and Pettite by a trainer. None of those Twins names surprise me, and I still am almost certain that Marty Cordova and Bobby Kielty, among others, used steroids.
I could probably write for two hours about the moral implications of steroids, who's at fault, what should be done and so forth, but in short, my general opinion is that the game is at fault. Players can't be blamed for trying to keep up. A lot of guys - Naulty is a good example - took steroids literally to survive in the game, to put food on the table. It isn't always a case of just trying to hit more homeruns. The game allowed an environment to come into existence in which players had to make the impossibly difficult choice of taking steroids to keep up, or find another job.
If I were a guy hitting .260 in Triple-A, I absolutely would've taken steroids to bump me up to a level where I could reach the big leagues. At the time, it wasn't a lot different than scuffing a ball or maybe even stealing signs.
Now that it's illegal they can punish, but any use that took place before testing is the fault of the game's administration, not the players.

So long Tyner

I'm in Tennessee, hitting on chicks with six teeth, but I still have internet, so I managed to stumble onto the news that the Twins signed Craig Monroe to a 1-year, $3.82 million deal, and non-tendered Jason Tyner, everyone's favorite singles hitter.

While I've spent an inordinate amount of time and space on this blog pointing out that Tyner isn't a particularly good major leaguer despite a nice looking batting average, I'm a little sad to see him go.
He had a knack for getting important hits, he played hard, could play CF fairly adequately, and yes, he did always contribute a good batting average. But I still agree with the decision to keep Monroe over Tyner. Monroe is coming off a terrible year, in which he hit .219, but in 2006 he hit 28 homers while batting .255/.301/.482.
This is a good case to point out how Tyner's batting average doesn't tell the whole story. Tyner hit .286 to Monroe's .219, and yet their OPS was almost identical. And this is comparing Monroe's worst year to Tyner's second-best.
Monroe is also probably a better OF than the noodle-armed Tyner.
The Twins are going to end up with either Jacoby Ellsbury, Coco Crisp or Melky Cabrera in CF, and that leaves Michael Cuddyer, Jason Kubel, Delmon Young and Monroe to fill the other spots. There are rumors that Cuddyer could be moved back to 3B if the Twins can't find a suitable replacement, and if that happens, you'll likely see Young in RF, Kubel/Monroe in LF, and Jason Pridie probably makes the team as a backup. The good news is that Tyner's 2 1/2 year stint with the Twins probably allowed him to solidify his bank account a little bit, and was almost surely productive enough to entice a team with lesser aspirations to give him a job. I wish him well.

What I like about the Twins decision to cut Tyner loose is that it is another piece of evidence that suggests Bill Smith actually does some homework, actually analyzes the numbers beyond Avg., HR and RBI. Lew Ford and Tyner were the kind of players that Ron Gardenhire would find a spot for no matter how terrible they were, and it's good to know that Smith isn't as stubbornly loyal to guys that suck. If the Twins had another option for a utility IF, I'm sure they would've jettisoned Nick Punto by now as well.

BooSox, and Tigers

You probably read all over the place Tuesday that the Twins were closing on a deal with the Red Sox, and that the Yankees were out of the running.
I spent much of the day trying not to throw up at the idea of the Twins giving the best team in baseball -the Red Sox - a pitcher they don't even need, Johan Santana, for Jon Lester, Jed Lowrie, Coco Crisp and Justin Masterson.
However as the night wore on the deal never happened, and it sounds like it isn't as close as it may have been reported. I can only hope that the Twins are still just trying to squeeze more out of the Yankees, because the Sox deal isn't that good.

In Lester, the Twins get a 24-year old lefty who has posted a 4.68 ERA in 144 innings over two years with the Sox. In 483 minor league innings he's posted a 3.33 ERA with 446 Ks, 429 hits and 203 walks. Those numbers are good. They are not great. This, to me, doesn't seem like the kind of guy you build a trade for a 29-year old two-time Cy Young award winner around.

Crisp isn't as bad as some are making him out to be. He's hit just .264 and .268 in two years with Boston, with only 14 total homers after two outstanding years in Cleveland. But he does steal a lot of bases and is a great with the glove. He's only 28. He could still rebound with a change of scenery. But he's kinda spendy, with two years left on a 3-year, $15.75 million deal.

Lowrie is being advertised as a SS, but he ain't one. He's a 2B. He's hit pretty well in the minors - he had a .509 SLG in half a season at Triple-A last year, but is he likely to improve on Brendan Harris' .286/.343/.434 numbers? No, so why bother.

Masterson is a 6-6 righty whose ERA last year was 4.33 in 27 starts split between A and AA.

Seriously, people, this is not enough.

Phil Hughes and Melky Cabrera straight up for Johan would be better if you ask me.
Hughes, it seems almost obviously, is considerably better than Lester, and Cabrera is already as good as Coco, and a lot younger and cheaper. What am I missing here? Why not take the Yankees deal? You're getting a young, cheap, ace and a CF who's above league average at the age of 23.

It's important to note that while Hank Steinbrenner has told the media the Yanks are done dealing with the Twins, Bill Smith and his staff say the Yankees have not told them they're out of it. My guess is the Yankees are still players in this thing.
And let's think about this critically for a minute.
The Sox don't need Santana. Really, they don't need him. They have Josh Beckett, Curt Schilling, Daisuke Matzusaka, Tim Wakefield and if they keep him, Lester, to make a pretty goddamn good 5-man ro'.
Why trade decent prospects to add $150 million in salary? Just to keep him from the Yankees?

And the Yankees, no matter what they say, have to make this deal if they're going to keep up with Boston and Detroit (more on them in a minute). The Bombers offense is amazing, but they haven't won a World Series since 2000 for a reason - they don't have a No. 1. They haven't had a No. 1.
Chien-Ming Wang is not an ace. Andy Petitte, Mike Mussina and Roger Clemens, at their ages, are not aces.
Just like Randy Johnson, Javier Vazquez, Carl Pavano, Kevin Brown, Al Leiter, Jon Leiber, Orlando Hernandez, Jose Contreras, David Wells and Jeff Weaver weren't when the Yankes brought them in after it was too late for them to make a difference.
With Santana, it's not too late. He's still an ace.

The Yanks' offense is good enough to get to the playoffs, but without Santana they don't have a prayer in a playoff series against Anaheim or Cleveland, let alone Boston or Detroit.

Here's what the Yanks have to decide. Can they let Boston, Detroit and Anaheim take over the AL for a couple years, be patient, and wait for Hughes, Ian Kennedy and Joba Chamberlain to develop?
Or do they have to play for a World Series ring every year, in which case they trade the farm for Johan and worry about the repercussions later?
If they were smart, they'd swallow hard and take the former option. But if the Twins are lucky, Hank will get antsy, realize his team can't win in 2008 without Johan, and push for the deal.

* If the Sox land Johan it would make them seem invincible. At least it would've, until the Tigers pulled off the trade of the century.
Miguel Cabrera and Dontrelle Willis for catcher Mike Rabelo, pitcher Andrew Miller, OF Cameron Maybin and three other minor leaguers.

In case you don't follow the National League all that close, know that Cabrera is basically A-Rod, and Willis, before a poor 2007, was Santana.
Cabrera is 24, and has posted an OPS near 1.000 for three straight years. He just puts up giant, giant numbers. In Detroit's lineup he's likely to hit .340 with 50 doubles and 30 homers.

That's not to say this isn't a risky deal for Detroit.
Willis had a 5.17 ERA last year, one year after winning 22 games, and the NL is the weaker offensive league.
And they gave up a ton. Rabelo's a nice player, and Miller and Maybin are the team's prized prospects. The other three guys in the deal are also considered high quality prospects. The Tigers essentially gutted their minor-league system.
But why not? At some point you have to go for it, and I mean really go for it, and that's what they're doing. I say good for them. Mitch Albom of the freep said prospects are like money. You work hard to save money, but you have to remember what you're saving it for in the first place. To spend it eventually.

What this means to the Twins is that it's officially safe to use 2008 as a rebuilding year. I've picked the Twins to win the AL Central every year from 2002-2007, and while I've only been wrong twice, I don't think I'll be picking them again in '08.

Here's the Tigers lineup.
CF Curtis Granderson 2B Placido Polanco 3B Miguel Cabrera RF Magglio Ordonez DH Gary Sheffield 1B Carlos Guillen C Ivan Rodriguez LF Jacque Jones/Marcus Thames SS Edgar Renteria

Sean Casey, who would be the Twins No. 3 hitter, is apparently now a bench player.

Keep him?

As of midnight Monday, a few sources were reporting that trade discussions with the Yankees involving Johan Santana were hitting an impasse.
The Twins insisted that the Yanks include Ian Kennedy along with Phil Hughes and Melky Cabrera, a deal the Yankees would have to be retarded to make.
The Twins then said, OK, if you don't want to include Kennedy, then throw in P Alan Horne and OF Austin Jackson. That didn't make the Bombers any happier, and now they're apparently considering backing out of the deal.

There are justifiable concerns that Bill Smith could overplay this thing and get left with his dick in his hand, but he seems unconcerned by that possibility, willing to fall back on keeping Santana for 2008, which, in case you forget, he is under contract to the Twins for $13 million.

Santana angrily refuted reports that he's trying to push the Twins into a trade, and appears to be open to returning to them. He also reportedly would still be happy to listen to contract extension offers from the Twins. But of course, those offers are going to have to be in the $120-$150 million range for five or six years.
While I'm certainly glad to hear that Johan is maintaining a good rapport with the Twins organization, committing that much money for that many years to Santana, who could (and I stress could) be in decline already, would be a mistake.
So that means they can keep him, try to build the 2008 team around him and then let him walk (likely to the Yankees) for nothing but compensatory draft picks after the year.
Or, they can keep trying to trade him right up to the trading deadline. Santana's agent, Peter Greenberg, declined to say if Johan would exercise his no-trade clause during the season, but the uncertainty is there.

Theoretically, if the Twins were able to add a SS, CF and 3B, I might be OK with getting one more big year out of Johan and then saying goodbye. For a World Series ring, I'd trade losing him for nothing.
But is that a realistic possibility? Maybe, but not likely.

That's why I think they need to make the trade with the Yankees. Cabrera will be an above-average CF, maybe even a really good one. There's no guarantee that Hughes will be all he can be, but the odds are good that he'll be pretty special. And they'll both be cheap for awhile.

So the more I think about it, it seems as though I've convinced myself that the Twins have to trade Santana. I think I might actually be disappointed if they don't move him.
That's sad, because I like him. I just don't think he's going to post anymore seasons with a 2.50 ERA, and I love the idea of having Hughes to build the rotation around, with Cabrera in CF.

The Red Sox have said they're open to talking trade as long as the Twins want to, so my guess is the Yankees will stay in the hunt. The "deadline" proposed by Hank Steinbrenner apparently brought little more than laughter from most of the league.

Maybe the Twins will still get their way, and get somebody to overpay. But either way, I think they have to make the trade. And I hope the Yankees, Red Sox and whoever else, do not realize this.

Get it over with already (update)

*Santana's agent, Peter Greenberg, contacted the Strib Monday to refute the disappointing reports that Johan was forcing the Twins hand in a trade. According to Greenberg, Johan has not demanded that a trade be worked out with only Boston or New York (like it matters, they're the only two in the running, anyway), and that Santana has said nothing one way or the other about potentially waiving his no-trade clause during the season, which, as described below, would've been a rather dickish thing to do. Apparently Johan read the reports and got pissed off about it. So I guess he's not such a bad guy and all. I take back the elbow thing. Though I still hate the WBC.

I just want the Twins to get rid of Johan Santana at this point.
I'm not one to begrudge players getting as much money as they can, like some of the fogies out there who expect players to sign for 300% less than what they could get because it's more money than they make at their shitty job at Citibank.
Having said that, I'm kinda pissed at Johan. As the Twins try to make a deal, Cy-asshole delivered a blow to the Twins leverage by telling them Sunday he will not waive his no-trade clause during the season. Meaning, if the Twins don't trade him now, they won't be able to trade him later, and they'd lose him for nothing but the compensatory draft picks.
Asshole.
The Twins organization made Santana what he is today. Without the changeup that Triple-A pitching coach Bobby Cuellar taught him, and probably without the overly protective methods that Ron Gardenhire and Rick Anderson used to protect his arm, Santana is not in position to sign a $150 million contract right now.
Again, I have no problem with him telling the Twins, "Sorry, you can't afford me", but tying their hands just because you're anxious is fairly shitty.
Here's hoping that Santana blows out his elbow in the next World Baseball Classic.

*The deal is down to the Yanks and BoSox.
The Yankees are offering Phil Hughes, Melky Cabrera and a second-tier prospect, and Hank Steinbrenner has set a deadline of Monday.
The Sox are offering CF uber-prospect Jacoby Ellsbury and a bunch of secondary prospects.
I strongly prefer the Yankees offer, and I hope the Twins accept it today.
Cabrera, who turned 23 in August, already has over 1,000 at-bats in the big leagues, and has hit a respectable .275/.340/.388 in that time. Much like Delmon Young, those numbers are much more impressive when you consider how young he is.
Ellsbury is probably better (he hit .353 in 116 at-bats with the Sox down the stretch, and has a .313 career average in the minors), but he's not way better, and when you consider that the Yanks are throwing in Hughes while the Sox refuse to include either Jon Lester or Clay Buchholz (reportedly) I don't see how it's even close.
In fact, a large segment of Yankee fans are vehemently protesting the idea of the Bombers including Hughes in a deal (see keephughes.blogspot.com). While Santana costs $150 million, and could possibly be already on the decline, Hughes will be cheap for the foreseeable future, and has an excellent chance of being an All-Star caliber pitcher.
Hughes was 20 years old when the Yankees called him up last year, and in 13 starts he posted a decent 4.46 ERA, with an excellent WHIP of 1.28.
In 53 career minor league starts, the 6-5 righty has gone 25-8 with a 2.03 ERA and an 0.86 WHIP, with 311 K's and only 170 hits allowed in 275 innings. Those are truly amazing numbers.
In all honesty, if I were Bill Smith I'd trade Santana for Hughes and Cabrera alone, I wouldn't even need a 3rd piece to the deal.

The Yankees have made the playoffs every year since '95 or '96 or whatever, but as Roger Clemens and Andy Pettite have aged, their lack of a true No.1 has been glaring, so I can see why they'd make this deal. Santana is 29, and the Twins have done a good job of protecting his arm over the years. You'd think he's a safe bet for another five years at least.
But I still suspect his best days are behind him, and would love to land a talent like Hughes, as well as a promising CF like Cabrera, in exchange.