Winter meetings, Day 3

Joe Blanton finished 2012 with the Dodgers, for whom
he made 10 starts and pitched 57 innings.

The Twins lost out on one of their reputed free-agent targets Wednesday. As that target was Joe Blanton, that was winning by losing; Blanton hasn't had an ERA below 4.00 or topped 200 innings since 2007. His ERA the last three years were 4.71, 5.01 and 4.82.

He's not close to the Diamond Standard.

Brandon McCarthy missed
much of September after
suffering a fractured skull when
hit by a line drive. His recovery
is said to have gone well.

And Anaheim signed him for two years, $15 million.

Blanton does have a track record of making 30 starts a year, and his strikeout rates have improved with age, but on the whole I'm not impressed. He's a back of the rotation guy, and the Twins have plenty of cheaper options there. I'm glad the Twins missed out on him.

I might as well put this on the record: Of the free agent pitchers linked to the Twins, the three who interest me most are, in order, Brandon McCarthy, John Lannan and Shawn Marcum.

All three are flawed, of course; if they weren't flawed, they probably wouldn't be available. McCarthy and Marcum, both right-handed, are health risks; the left-handed Lannan has poor strikeout and walk numbers. But McCarthy and Marcum, if they can take the mound, pitch well, and Lannan is a true ground ball machine. I have no issue with slotting the two righties ahead of Diamond, and Lannon isn't far off Diamond.

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Coming this morning is the Rule V draft. The Twins have the fourth pick, and they have four open roster spaces still, so we can expect some activity from them.

I anticipate that they'll select a pitcher. If they instead pick an outfielder, that will suggest that a trade of either Justin Morneau or Ben Revere is in the works; whispers out of Nashville this week had the Twins gauging the market for both.