IBC

The Minnesota Twins and Tampa Bay Rays are close to a swap of two potential future stars.

The Twins would acquire outfielder Delmon Young in exchange for right-hander Matt Garza, sources told ESPN.com's Keith Law.

The potential swap was first reported by the Minneapolis Star Tribune, which reported the deal could involve as many as six players, with shortstop Jason Bartlett and reliever Juan Rincon going to Tampa Bay in the deal and shortstop Brendan Harris and outfield prospect Jason Pridie coming to Minnesota

Curious to everyones thoughts?

I think its a money deal for Rays to add someone like that to the rotation and not even hurting them in the lineup already with crawford-upton and Longoria coming up.
-Kazmir,Garza,Shields,Price, Davis\Mcgee

I may be wrong but I feel as though the twins got snubbed on this one espeically since santana will be gone and who knows if liriano will be healthy for a while.

It's probably a bit premature to judge how the Twins do on this trade until we see what Santana brings back. If we get a young starter and a position player from the Yankess (Hughes and Cano...although the Yanks have supposedly pulled Cano off the table), the deal makes a bit more sense.

The head-scratcher for me, as a Twins fan, is what to do with Delmon and Cuddyer? Do you move Delmon to CF and leave Cuddyer in RF? Do you move Cuddyer to 3B? Do you trade Cuddyer.

If Bill Smith does his job, the haul of talent he could get for Garza, Johan, and Joe Nathan could be ridiculous.

First of all, I totally commend both of these GM's on this trade. It takes a lot of balls to make a trade like this - young talent for young talent.

There's no question that, ultimately, both teams benefit here. It's just like the IBC, way too many teams are concerned with "winning" a deal - Jake just proved it with his post. This deal makes the Twins better.

They have boatloads of starting pitching - and they will get a two starters and a cf back when they trade Santana. Let's say they do the Yanks for Hughes, Kennedy, and Melky or Austin Jackson (not even both like many are thinking they will):

Their rotation would be Liriano, Hughes, Kennedy, and two of Bonser/Baker/Slowey/Perkins - and that's just off the top of my head.

Their lineup would be built around Melky (23), Mauer (24), Morneau (26), Young (22) - which is pretty sick. Not to mention the team gets two nice players in Harris and Pridie - not to mention they still have Cuddyer, Kubel, and Punto running around.

They lose the contracts of Hunter, Castillo, Santana and all of a sudden have a crap load of inexpensive incredibly talented players in the rotation, lineup, AND they still have Cali, Crain, Guerrier, Nathan, and Reyes in the pen (I cheated and looked up that one).

The Twins traded from an area of depth and got one of the best young players in baseball to add a desperately needed infusion into their lineup.

Now, take w/ a grain of salt, I'm assuming that this trade means Santana is going. If Santana doesn't go, then the Twins got swindled.

When I saw this trade at first, I thought that it would have been more likely in this league than in the MLB. And then I had my doubts on it (as I'm not the largest Young fan in the world), but at the moment, I like it, precisely for the reasons Z stated above. It gives the Twins a shitton of options in dealing Santana, as they don't have to make a position player the centerpiece of a deal--which makes the Yankee deal more likely (ugh).

Smith had better pull the trigger on a Santana deal though.

And Jake, I too am a bit flummoxed as to how the outfield situation will work out--it looks like three corner outfielders who deserve to be starting in Cuddyer, Kubel and Young, though I am not all that sure how well any of them can patrol center...

Z, I agree with you, I just thought the timing of the trade came at a weird time. Im suprised they didnt wait till after they decided what to do with santana.

Seriously? This was the ONLY time for the Twins to make this trade - the minute they move Santana, and try to trade for young players, the other teams have them TOTALLY leveraged out...

This shows their Hamilton College educated (PLUG ALERT!) new GM has a plan for the team - honestly, it wouldn't shock me if he had the outline of a Santana deal in place right now...

I think the Twins win the deal at face value, but yeah, we have to see their full offseason to judge it properly probably.

Twins acquired Rays acquired OF Delmon Young, INF Brendan Harris and OF Jason Pridie from the Rays for RHP Matt Garza, SS Jason Bartlett and RHP Eduardo Morlan.

Morlan, interesting

ah damnit i didnt want to see morlan go there.

Hmm. Substituting Morlan for Rincon lessens my esteem for the deal--though the Twins have quite a few guys who could step in and take over the niche that Moran held as kickass-reliever-of-the-future. I would have preferred seeing Rincon's salary shed.

Don't the Twins need a DH? I could assume one of Kubel/Young/Cuddyer fit that role, while they still plug a guy like Melky, Willits, etc. into CF.

Actually, now that I think about it, the Twins wouldn't know what to do with a guy who has a OBP close to .400 (Willits). Maybe that's an avenue they need to explore since he's obviously available now.

Re: Morlan
The guys a AA reliever. If any Twins fan sees losing Morlan as a dealbreaker... well, you might need a little perspective.

RedSox wrote:Re: Morlan
The guys a AA reliever. If any Twins fan sees losing Morlan as a dealbreaker... well, you might need a little perspective.

A AA reliever with an electric arm...in a deal like this, I don't mind losing him, but I'd have preferred it be Rincon.

RedSox wrote:Re: Morlan
The guys a AA reliever. If any Twins fan sees losing Morlan as a dealbreaker... well, you might need a little perspective.

Somebody doesn't like to look at the "big picture"