Tomorrow is June and I started thinking about the July trade deadline which means what to do with Morneau? His batting average has returned to a respectable .294, but he lost his homerun power swing with only two for the year. It's his contract year and the prevailing sentiment at the beginning of the year was to let him go because Parmelee's natural position was 1st base and he was a power hitter. Then Parmelee went into a funk and has only recently started showing signs that he might be having more respectable plate appearances.

Morneau is making $14 million through this contract and may not be willing to accept a significant cut. So what does the Twins organization do, trade him now for a prospect or try to lock him in with a less amount of salary?

OK, maybe I was a little down after that Kevin Correia signing…sort of left a bad taste in my mouth. Really can’t recall anyone attempting a positive spin on the acquisition. Thing is, Terry Ryan continues to say that the Twins are not done and they need more starters.
Now the Twins have acquired Mike Pelfrey who might have a chance of contributing, depending how he comes back from the Tommy John surgery early last year (kind of the same situation that Scott Baker would have been). I noticed that both of these guys were on the list of pitchers the Twins organization were talking with during the winter meetings, so who's left?

One good news story-line is that talks broke down with Liriano; but John Lannon is going to the Phillies and Joe Blanton is going to the LA Angels, leaving the names the Twins have offers (or just conversations) out still in play…Joe Saunders, Shaun Marcum, Brett Myers, Jair Jerrjens, and Vinente Padilla. Sure hope to see a signing from a name in the front of the list rather than the end of the list.

Now that Zack Greinke has signed a $147 million deal with the LA Dodgers, does the log jam begin to unravel?

http://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2012/1...k-greinke.html

Maybe I’m way off, but are Sanchez, Jackson and Lohse the next dominoes to fall? If they are, does that take teams that seem to be in on all the talks with FA starters off the market? I keep reading LA Angles, Red Sox and Royals (obviously there are others), if they spend their Monopoly Money and leave the arena, are the Twins better positioned for Marcum, Saunders or Myers?

ESPN’s Jayson Stark reported that Jason Marquis will sign with San Diego.

https://twitter.com/JonHeymanCBS/sta...12984229900289

Now I can breathe a sign of relief.

I realize that Ryan relies on his generalize and cover-all-the bases type of response to all questions, like “there are a lot of starters we need to look at” or “we need to make sure we put the right people in the right place”, but I too would be interested in more specifics.

The biggest question I have is about multi-year contracts for a starting pitcher. Given the reluctance to for a three of four-year contract in the past, does anything change with the Morneau contract going off the books in 2014? Regardless of whether Morneau is traded during the off-season or during the season, there seems little reason to resign him for 2014, which leaves $14 million available that could be part of a SP multi-year deal.