Potential

Twins fans have discussed potential since about 2012, when Minnesota drafted Byron Buxton 1st overall in the player draft. Twins fans have pinned their hopes almost entirely on potential for years, as Buxton, then Miguel Sano, and Jose Berrios emerged as top players. Their potential was on it’s way. Eddie Rosario and Max Kepler weren’t as highly regarded in the minors, but their debut and initial impression had people salivating over the team that could come.

Derek Falvey and Thad Levine, a couple of young hot shot administrators came into the fold to run the team, and they did. They fielded a moderately lucky team in their first team, but really started digging into the team and forming it into one of their own by 2018. Their potential as leaders was exciting, and seeing what they could do with the potential in their developing prospects had fans on the edges of their seats.

After the team seemed to coalesce in 2019, leading to a playoff appearance after a divisional win, the team made some of the biggest offseason moves the team has ever made. They signed Josh Donaldson to the biggest free agent deal in team history. After a great deal of pushing and shoving, they acquired Kenta Maeda in exchange for Brusdar Graterol. This looked like the best team at least since 1991, and the potential to be better.

Worse than pining after potential is the revelation that the potential many never be realized, through no fault of their own. And now, a week before the scheduled start of the season, we sit with a whole lot of potential that is unlikely to be realized, thanks to the expansive measures that the league, the country and the world at large have taken in response to the Coronavirus.

Now, we are all, as a nation, concerned with the potential of infection. The potential is relatively low on an individual basis, but the concern is for the greater good. In baseball terms, players only get a hit about 25% of the time they bat, and on their own, they aren’t threatening. Sometimes, though, they get strung together and that’s when trouble arises.

Congregating groups of even 10 is a threat to spread this virus, and a group of 25,000 is completely out of  the question. Even with the potential for hospitalization low, individually, there will simply not be enough hospital beds for those that get sick if we allow the virus to spread.

Suspending the baseball season is the right thing to do, even if the Twins are leaving a ton of potential on the table.

(Site note: I will be reviewing OOTP 21 later this week, and because I don’t want the roster to lead to nothing, I will be covering an OOTP season as though it were live on this site. I hope it can fill some of the void)