Minnesota Twins: Building a trade for Noah Syndergaard

The Minnesota Twins are on the search for an impact starting arm, is there a package they can put together for the Mets Noah Syndergaard?

The Minnesota Twins are looking to upgrade their roster really across every facet of the game and position groups. Out of all the position groups, the starting rotation feels like the most complete aspect of the roster right now as we look forward to 2019. Even though it feels complete, the starting rotation could still use an impact ace-type arm to slot in next to Jose Berrios.

With the rumor that the New York Mets may be exploring trades for one of their young and phenomenal pitchers, Noah Syndergaard, it seems like at least an opportunity for the Twins to try to use their strong minor league system to acquire an impact arm. Anytime a pitcher of Syndergaard’s caliber is made available there is almost always some sort of question mark attached.

For Syndergaard the big question almost any team will be looking at is his injury history. The Twins will have to do their homework and find out if they are acquiring the dominate Thor or the often injured pitcher of the past two seasons. In 2017 Sydergaard was limited to 30.1 innings and while still injured much more available in 2018 with 154.1 innings.

Even with injuries considered this presents an opportunity for the Twins and other teams to acquire a top end power arm when he is on the mound and healthy. Syndergaard throws a fastball and sinker in the upper 90s and is near the top of the league in swinging strike rate at 13.6% in 2018. The Twins will just have to figure out if they have the package to acquire Syndergaard and if they are willing to give that up for him.

Thankfully, Syndergaard does have three more seasons of team control and isn’t a pure rental. The Mets would likely be looking for in return some major league ready and controllable talent. The positions that need the most upgrading for the Mets are catcher, middle infield, and bullpen.

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It would be hard to help out the Mets with their catcher situation as the Twins could also really upgrade at the position. The Twins are also light on middle infielders in the majors, but do have Nick Gordon who could be set to step into the majors this season. This isn’t starting off too well as that is already two strikes on two positions of perceived need for the Mets.

The thing is with trades, it isn’t just the position that matters but the impact. This is the type of trade where the Twins can start to have conversations that could include Eddie Rosario or Max Kepler in a trade. Rosario has a track record of a good bat and Kepler has a ton of talent that a lot of clubs do believe in.

Then based on the Mets current pitching staff makeup and need for a bullpen arm I wonder if they would be intrigued in Fernando Romero. We saw some glimpses of what Romero can do as a starter in 2018 and more importantly for the Mets is he could easily slide into a major league bullpen role. With Rosario/Kepler and Romero making the base of a deal the Mets would likely ask for one more solid prospect in the deal but the Twins are running out of major league ready talent that they would likely be ready to trade away.

Depending on if the Twins have big plans to make some bullpen moves this offseason we can wonder if the Mets may even be interested in arms like that of Trevor Hildenberger or Taylor Rogers. Based on the state of the Twins bullpen it seems unlikely they would be part of any trade package. Maybe adding Nick Gordon to the package of Kepler/Rosario and Romero can get it done as that equals three major league ready players.

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What are your thoughts? Can a Rosario/Kepler and Romero centered deal get serious conversations going with the Mets? What kind of package would you be willing to put together for Syndergaard?

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