[63/365] An en-Correa-ging Offseason

[cosmolinguist]

Before spring training started, I wrote a thing for a baseball blog and never heard back. Bummer!

But here it is anyway. (Annoyingly I didn't keep the first draft, which was 1800-odd words. Only then did I check the submission guidelines and see "500-1000 words," heh. So I cut it down and now I don't have the old version.)

I wrote this for a baseball audience and I don't expect anyone else to care, but if you do read it and have questions, please ask! I am always delighted to explain.

I'm from Minnesota, so this off-season I've been through all five million stages of Correa: optimism, pessimism, optimism, pessimism, disappointment, grief, confusion, bafflement, hilarity, exhaustion, disbelief, assuming the rumors are shitposting, finding out they're not and finally cackles of glee.

When Correa was going to sign with the Giants, the narrative was about the desperation after they missed out on Aaron Judge. Big free agents signed quickly this off-season, and San Francisco didn't want to be left out. [This blog] said it yourselves: "They would not be the snotty kid picked last in gym class."

Then Steve Cohen said "We needed one more thing. This puts us over the top." But was he really what they needed? Correa wouldn't even have been able to play his position for the Mets. Swooping in and swiping Correa up in such dramatic fashion felt like Cohen was just hoarding elite players. Of all the teams who weren't expected to sign a free-agent shortstop this year, surely the Mets were at the top of that list. Correa, a player that would be franchise-altering for many other teams was casual and almost an afterthought here: "we'll fit him in somewhere, he's one more thing."

The Giants needed something and Correa was something. The Mets needed one more thing and Correa was a thing.

To the Twins, he was the only thing.

This doesn't mean that Minnesota somehow recognized or appreciated him in some special way the other teams didn't. It just means: if the Twins didn't get him, they wouldn't get anybody. All due respect to Kyle Farmer, Joey Gallo and Christian Vázquez, but the offseason so far hadn't given Twins Territory much to be excited about. It just fit the familiar narrative: the Twins don't spend big money on big contracts -- especially long contracts, and that's what Correa wanted.

Correa only got to Minnesota in the first place thanks to unusual circumstances -- the lockout, firing his agent mid-offseason -- and his year there felt like a fluke, a future obscure trivia answer: "he played for the Twins one season?!" From the moment the Twins signed him in 2022, it was understood that he'd opt out at the end of the season and be off to the kind of big free-agent contract that an elite shortshop deserves.

Twins fans could dream, but those of us who've been around a while know better. The Twins had never signed a big free agent.

It was expected that the Twins would work hard on a deal and scrape together all their pennies and make...the second- or third-place offer compared to whatever Correa eventually took. What the Twins front office would be proud of or anxious about, a record-breaking offer for them, was going to fall far short. They know their place and it's not in the top tier.

It's still nowhere near the top tier of course. Having Correa is no guarantee of success -- after all, the Twins didn't make the playoffs with him in 2022 -- but the stability that both Correa has and that the team has to build around can't hurt.

But most of all, I just really hope that the narrative around the Twins can change now. It can certainly never be said again that they don't sign big free agents.

Comments

[radiantfracture]

This has great energy! I don't know anything about any sports and I still enjoyed the narrative.

[silveradept]

We can hope that it will help the Twins. I'd like the Central to be less of a joke division in baseball.