Minnesota Twins

It was the end of the 2002 season. Jim Thome was finally a free agent after years of torturing the Twins. (And particularly, torturing Rick Reed. Good lord, did Big Jim take it to Reed. Thome hit more home runs (9) off of Reed than any other pitcher, even though he only had 27 at-bats against him. Think about that. He hit .333 JUST IN HOME RUNS against Rick Reed. Lordy.)

Anyway, Thome was a free agent. As a blogger who is asked these sort of things all the time, I must have received the question "Will the Twins sign Jim Thome?" roughly a dozen times per week. Never mind that the Twins had made absolutely zero intimations that they intended to pursue Jim Thome. Or that the Twins had a left-handed DH at the time named David Ortiz. Or that the Twins still had no hint of a stadium. Hell, they had just barely survived contraction. And yet EVERYONE wanted me to tell them the Twins might chase Jim Thome, the biggest free agent on the market.
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Aaron and John talk about the Twins' youth-led turnaround, Byron Buxton and the power arm-filled draft class, Trevor Plouffe's homer binge, Scott Diamond's ace impression, Chris Parmelee's return from Rochester, Ben Revere's long-term upside, Liam Hendriks' impending re-arrival, the wisdom of re-signing Ryan Doumit, Jason Marquis in pitcher heaven, Brian Dozier's struggles, and the exciting life on Aaron's balcony. Here are:

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On Thursday afternoon, R.A. Dickey tossed 7 1/3 innings of shutout ball for the Mets in a win over the first-place Nationals. The victory moved the knuckleballer's record to 9-1 on the year and lowered his ERA to 2.44. Holding opponents to a .225 average and sporting a dazzling 78-to-14 strikeout-to-walk ratio in 81 innings, Dickey has to be considered a Cy Young front-runner in the National League, and he might start the All-Star Game.

This is the best we've ever seen from the 37-year-old right-hander, but his effectiveness is nothing new. During his first two seasons with the Mets after joining up in 2010, he posted a 3.08 ERA over 383 innings. This after spending most of the first 14 years of his career struggling to stay in the majors. That included a stop in Minnesota – his last stop before turning into a steady rotation anchor for the Mets.
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Last year in Twins Territory, Denard Span was the hot topic as the trade deadline approached, much to Span’s dismay. This year, we’ve read that the Nationals are still interested in Span. They certainly should be, given their stopgap centerfield solution, Rick Ankiel, is hitting just .221.

But they likely aren’t going to be alone. Span plays a premier defensive position competently, but more importantly he gets on base as a leadoff hitter. One can bet a few of the below teams will at least be calling at the trade deadline this year.
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Per the Star Tribune's Joe Christensen, the Twins have announced that they will be sending Carl Pavano to the DL with a right anterior capsular strain in his throwing shoulder and Nick Blackburn will be activated from the DL.

Pavano's obvious velocity decline throughout the season and the effect his shoulder had on his repertoire was a fairly strong indication that the right-hander would eventually have a date with the DL. Meanwhile Blackburn's rehab assignment has not been great - he's made two starts, thrown six innings and has six hits, five of which have been doubles, as well as a 2-to-4 K-to-BB ratio.

A discussion on this has already been started. Please comment on it here.
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The last time the Twins owned the No. 2 pick in the MLB draft, they selected a college pitcher named Adam Johnson out of Cal State Fullerton. As most fans will recall, he cruised through the minors and made his major-league debut at the age of 21, but hit a wall and quickly fizzled out.

That's a scary memory as the Twins eye a handful of collegiate hurlers with this year's second pick, but fortunately the history of the draft slot has been much brighter since the Johnson bust.
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