Terry Ryan's Big Plans

It sounds like there could be some excitement in Twinsville over the next few months, as the Twins make concerted efforts to sign no less than five significant players to long term contracts or extensions. In this Star Tribune piece, La Velle E. Neal III discusses the Twins basic strategy for the remainder of the off-season: try to sign the "Big Three" arbitration eligible players (Mauer, Morneau, and Cuddyer, if you haven't been paying attention), and then turn to trying to sign Joe Nathan and, yes, Johan Santana to contract extensions that will keep them in a Twins uniform for many years to come.

Will it happen? It's really impossible to tell. However, if you read the article you'll see that both Nathan and Santana express their desire to remain with the Twins (provided that the price is right). Ultimately, I think the Twins are going to be successful in these negotiations. Maybe I'm being overly optimistic, but I think that Terry Ryan is going to go for broke in these negotiations, and that Carl Pohlad is going to give Ryan the go ahead to increase payroll every year until the team gets into the new stadium. Further, I think Pohlad and Ryan both recognize the importance of keeping Johan Santana around - and if there is one player that you break the bank for, it's Santana.

One possible cause for concern is that the Twins haven't made any progress yet on the arbitration eligibles, and I'm sure that's not for lack of trying. There's still time before these players have hearings to get them under contract, but I was hoping that at least one player would have been signed by now. Maybe next week we'll get some good news about Mauer and Morneau being kept around for the next four or five years. Still, timing is not as important as just getting these deals (or a couple of them, anyway) done.