Twins Non-Tender Cron and Hildenberger, Tender Adrianza

With the Non-Tender deadline coming and going Monday night, the Twins have made decisions on some of their more fringe arbitration eligible players, and also painted a clearer picture of next year’s roster and the work yet to be done.

C.J. Cron’s status was much debated in the seemingly infinite baseball-less days since the Twins exited out of the playoffs like a bird flying into an airplane rotor, and now it seems the team plans to move on without the first baseman. Cron was projected to make $7.7MM in 2020, which seems perfectly reasonable to me, but the Twins brain-trust clearly felt different. Insert my arbitrary yelling at rich people here.

The hole Cron leaves behind is an interesting one, as there isn’t a super clear replacement on the roster, leaving the Twins an opportunity to sign a FA First Baseman, or pull an old switcheroo and drop Miguel Sano at 1st and sign a 3rd basemen like Josh Donaldson or even Anthony Rendon (hey, a girl can dream).

Reliever Trevor Hildenberger seemed like a long term bullpen solution as recent as 2017, but has stumbled about since. The 29 year old, a good age for humans who are cool, still might find his Big Show-legs, but it looks like he’ll have to do so in a different state.

Meanwhile, utility man and honorary Ed, Ehire Adrianza has earned himself a pay day of $1.6MM, which is .3MM lower than projected. Adrianza’s ability to play all over the field, and hit almost kinda well has made him a nifty little player for the last few years, and that will continue for at least one more year, as he’ll hit free agency next off-season.

Even with the Twins non-tendering Sam Dyson as fast as Sonic The Hedgehog as soon as the offseason started, several players still need to reach agreements on a 2020 salary, including, Eddie Rosario, Sano, and Jose Berrios. The exacts of those contracts remain to be seen, but shouldn’t do much to move the needle on the offseason plan.