Carlos Correa to the Twins - 3 Years, $105 Million

I do think it’s worth noting that Houston will finish this season with their payroll under the luxury tax by a significant amount. (Not enough to have covered Correa’s salary, but still a good amount.)

 

The Astros don't make decisions in a void. They chose not to spend $35MM on Correa in part because they had Pena. If there was no Pena in the system, the Astros might just have paid Correa that money to fill the hole for a year. So at the end of day, they took a risk that they didn't need Correa (or someone like him) because they had Pena. It remains to be seen if it works out. If they win the World Series, they'll be geniuses. If they don't, and Pena is an offensive or defensive hole and a part of why they lose, then it will look like a mistake.

 

Carlos Correa has had a very weird career so far.

First off its hard to believe that he isn't even 28 years old yet.

He has basically missed two full seasons of games so far in his career (not to mention the COVID year).

EVEN with that, he will be at 40 career WAR at the end of this season, so he is still on a Hall of Fame pace with all the games missed and injuries, and the inability to get the long contract he wants.

For reference the MLB average HOF shortstop has a career WAR of 4.9 per 162...... Correa's career WAR per 162? Almost 8....

He has been in the top 10 in WAR 4 times in 8 seasons, and that is despite the fact he has only played over 140 games twice in a season.

His 2017 season is underrated, he was on par for a 9-10 WAR season at 22 years old if not for injuries.

 

This is not entirely true.

Crane was willing to spend more money but the GM wanted to wait until the deadline. The problem is that the GM didn't get any of the players he felt he could get.

FWIW I am not really defending Crane, it is just how it played out.

 

Was Crane willing to spend $35M more prior to the season along with potential future years if Correa opted in? If Crane was, yes, I am wrong. Click should be fired if that was the case. I still don't think Pena playing well or not in the playoffs should be the reason to be up in arms. It would be the money not spent that should be the issue.

 

Is it that miscalculation by Click that has led to Crane not extending his contract yet? I'd be curious to know how much blame Crane puts on Click for the Astros not winning that World Series last year, and what his thoughts would be if we don't win one this year.

 

I think Carlos thought he was going to a contending team, not a rebuilding one or one locked into mediocrity.

 

I don’t know exactly how long out Crane would have gone with option years on Correa. They didn’t think he would agree to what he agreed to with Minnesota.

What I do know is that in the off season Crane gave Click permission to spend to the tax line. Click made the decision to wait until the deadline. At the deadline Click made the absolute necessary moves early, in part because Click had not been happy with Luhnow waiting too long and missing out on players early in his tenure.

On the day of the deadline Crane was lead to believe the Astros would bring on players in trade, possibly some beyond this season and it didn’t happen. Crane was miffed.

I see both sides of it. Crane wants to maximize and spend when he can and Click wanted flexibility… problem is Click couldn’t pull anything off. In fairness to Click no one did, but still annoyed Crane.

 

That's a somewhat incomplete picture of Minnesota's trajectory. Minnesota won the AL central in 2020. They went first to worst in 2021. I think positive regression plus the additional of a Correa-level player they were thinking playoffs/a more firm playoff contention.

Don't know their entire 2022 season, but I don't think they've been in a playoff slot (division winner or one of the WC's) for most if not all of the season. That's got to be disappointing. They're roughly at .500 ball but they were never really a contender.

 

In addition they have another MVP level talent in Buxton.

Added Urshela and Sanchez from the Yankmees and probably hoped "lightning in a bottle" or change of scenery could help elevate them back to all star level players.

 

Buxton was hurt yet again, which has hurt them. Sanchez is garbage, but Urshela's given them decent production. The biggest problem is they don't have much pitching.

 

Sounds like MANY teams- Angels, Rangers, Cardinals, off the top of my head

 

Preseason, the consensus Over/Under for win total for Minnesota was 81.5 with Correa on the team, 10 games behind the projected champion in the White Sox ( https://www.vegasinsider.com/mlb/odds/win-totals/ ). That's basically exactly the pace they are on. People were not picking them to make the playoffs or win their division.

 

I get what you're saying and you are correct that their performance is pretty much meeting the mean projection.

That being said, I'm assuming their FO and fanbase believed signing a guy like Correa would help them over-perform projections and maybe make the playoffs. From that standpoint, the Twins' overall non-contention all year has to be disappointing.

 

Fair - though I don't think it's been non-contention all year. If I remember right, the Twins led the division the first couple of months of the year and had a similar record to the Astros. And just a week or so ago, they were 1 game out with 7 games left against the division leader (unfortunately for them, they got swept by Cleveland). So they've been contending for the playoffs most of the year until this week.

 

Umm.... they had been leading their division for most of the year. They were only one game behind at the beginning of this month

 

Whatever the pre-season assessment for the team or expectations for Correa, I firmly believe the Twins players, staff, brass and fans expected more than missing the playoffs.
Whatever happens in the AL Central, regardless of who wins the division, I think certain doom awaits them in their first playoff series.

 

Gotcha, my mistake. I thought the Guardians had been leading the entire time. My bad.

 

The Indians are Guarding the top spot now

 

Not disagreeing but that's not what I replied to. Vince specifically said, "Correa is gearing up for October with an excellent September". And "he's switched into Superstar mode for the rest of the season".

Ok great but he won't be doing it in the playoffs this year.