The Minnesota Twins began a new era with the hiring of 37-year-old Rocco Baldelli.
The Minnesota Twins have hired former Tampa Bay Rays outfielder and Major League Field Coordinator to be their new manager. There was a press conference at 3pm today.
This is an exciting time for the Minnesota Twins and it should be exciting for the fans as well but, they might not view it that way because this organization kind of sits in unknown territory right now. They have a lot of questions to answer to get back to the postseason and be the perennial playoff contender and championship-caliber team they aspire to be.
Is this the New Era?
We thought the hiring of Chief Baseball Officer Derek Falvey and General Manager Thad Levine was the start of a new era of Minnesota Twins baseball and, in the end, it probably will be the official start but, it’s been a strange couple of seasons since they arrived here. We know they made changes to the front office and baseball operations staff and they changed a lot with the scouting and the minor-league staffs and, after this season, they have made a huge change on the strength & conditioning side of things so we know they are making changes but we have yet to see much evidence from them.
Their previous hires have been relatively unknown at the major league level and probably wouldn’t have been the same coaches hired by the previous regime in hitting coach James Rowson & pitching coach Garvin Alston. Bench coach Derek Shelton was hired last offseason and he had a lot of major league experience but, he was also at Tampa Bay, who are considered one of the more analytical teams in the league. That’s one of the reasons he received a second interview in the Twins search for a new manager.
Why Rocco?
Rocco Baldelli was most recently the Rays major-league field coordinator in the dugout so he was basically running, “the whole system on the field.”
When Baldelli had to retire from playing, Rays GM at the time, Andrew Friedman, asked if he would stay in the organization. Baldelli told him he didn’t want to coach, but he was intrigued with other areas of baseball such as scouting and analytics. He showed it by spending most of the next four years on the road, scouting draft-eligible players. He still remained in touch with Friedman and other executives on a daily basis while also participating in meetings about trade possibilities, and offering his views on the Rays’ players.
Paul Molitor was willing to be open about analytics but evidently, Derek Falvey & Thad Levine wanted a manager wasn’t just open to the analytics, they wanted someone who was well-versed in that side of the game because it is a huge part of evaluating players and performance in today’s game. That may have been Molly’s ultimate downfall.
Light the Rocket
Rocco Baldelli is from Woonsocket, Rhode Island. Because of his speed & because his hometown is Woonsocket, Rhode Island (he was a sprinter in high school and a good base-stealer), he was nicknamed the Woonsocket Rocket so….let’s light that Rocket and watch it soar!
The front office has decided Rocco Baldelli is the best person for the job of moving this team forward now and in the future. This change is the beginning of an offseason that could see a lot of changes to the Minnesota Twins roster.
Fans should be excited to see where they go from here. Will the major league staff change? Would it be better to have a lot of change to the staff or are some of those coaches still good for the current Twins? We know the Front Office will “partner” with Rocco on those decisions as we’re sure they will also want his input for the roster.
They’ll want his input on what to do with Miguel Sano, Byron Buxton and Max Kepler, players who have struggled with consistency at the major-league level. They’ll want his input on free agency and what they need to get their pitching to where it needs to go. Do they need to add more than one piece to the rotation? He will have more insight as to the kind of player 2B Logan Forsythe is and if he’s a player worth keeping or, at least, adding as their 2B for right now until some prospects get here.
One of the biggest things he can help with is the Bullpenning strategy because Tampa Bay used that strategy more than any other team. What are his thoughts on it? Does he believe it’s something that needs to be done? Is it a strategy that smaller market teams need to use? Or is it just a strategy to work the younger pitchers into the majors until they can start games instead of coming in after the first inning?
We’re excited to see what happens in the time between now and when Spring Training begins on February 13th, which is only 111 days away!
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That is why it’s….
