If this is a fire Falvey thread, I'm all for it. Up until 2021 it's the next player drafted. Rooker is the clear favorite in 2017, but it wasn't going to happen here, his next place, or the place after that. So I'm dismissing that one whether that's fair or not. I would take Lee over Cross, Soto and Jenkins are both too early to tell since they were HS players. Jenkins is the next great hope around here. 

The Johnson boys should have been replaced long ago.  It is on Falvey that they still have a job. 

Noah Miller is not knocking on the door to MILB, more like a barely audible tap. Every mediocre batter is hoping he will become the full time SS for the Dodgers. League averages for everything would drop 

13 hours ago, Vanimal46 said:

If this is a fire Falvey thread

It isn't really, and I don't especially want to turn it into that.  But it isn't "not", either.  I'm just putting some qualitative (hardly quantitative) analytics out there for consideration.  Readers will draw their own conclusions, largely based on what assumptions they brought in with them.  😀  Firing someone is not the same as looking over the resume as a possible hire; I think the latter is more my motivation right now - looking for that "special sauce" someone has.  And the conclusion I'm drawing is that I don't see it.  (Which is why I wanted to discuss Jenkins even if it is premature - I believe virtually any FO would have picked him.)  But personnel decisions involve other considerations such as whether a perceived flaw (like this one) can be remedied; Falvey still has youth on his side, to a decreasing degree each year of course.

It's only a start.  If I feel like it's worth it, I should look at the next two or three rounds of the annual draft in the same manner, and see whether any additional trends develop.  A third phase would be then to examine all the lower rounds for whatever gold nuggets the draft team has found down there - I think that would require a different methodology than my "side by side" construction, since the vast majority of mid-to-late round picks never amount to anything anyway - that's a lot of noise and not much signal, too little wheat and so much chaff, to separate out.

I also don't know how to separate the "draft" from the "development" part.  So maybe the title of this post is in error from the outset, LOL.  Maybe it's the case that if the draft choices were swapped along the lines I speculate about, the other team would have taken our guy and developed him better, and our FO would have done less well with the alternative player once he was in the fold.  E.g. maybe Charlee Soto would be cruising along at AA and Thomas White would have been hit by that darn, mysterious, totally random injury bug.  Maybe Royce Lewis wouldn't have done whatever dumbass thing it was that he did when he tore up his knee the first time.  And so it goes.

Thanks for reading and commenting.

4 hours ago, old nurse said:

The Johnson boys should have been replaced long ago.  It is on Falvey that they still have a job. 

Noah Miller is not knocking on the door to MILB, more like a barely audible tap. Every mediocre batter is hoping he will become the full time SS for the Dodgers. League averages for everything would drop 

If they replace all the Johnson boys (and girls), the Twins will have to go on a hiring spree:

Senior Director, Strategy & Insights: Brandon Johnson

Manager, Consumer Membership & Service: Cory Johnson

Senior Director, Partnership Activation: Amelia Johnson

Senior Manager, Radio Partnerships & Administration: Amy Johnson

"My name is Yon Yonson, I live in Visconsin..."

(Oh, and there's also Sean and Deron, who I assume you have in mind.)

As for future HoFer Noah Miller, I laid out my reasoning in a "show your work" kind of style, and others can repeat the analysis and reach different conclusions if they wish.  I will say though that someone reaching AAA in their age-22 season needs to be treated seriously - unless you believe players stop getting better at their 22nd birthday.  People lose patience so quickly with high school draftees.  He's currently hitting his usual empty .235 for OKC, and that doesn't bode well for ever being a starter in the majors.  But in case I wasn't being clear, starting is not the only criterion I had in mind for draft success - getting anything beyond "a cup of coffee" out of a #36 overall pick is not to be taken for granted - there is the occasional Randy Johnson or Johnny Bench but also a lot of "who he?" types.  Miguel Rojas is 36 years old right now, and maybe by the time Father Time has his final say on Rojas, Miller will have learned a few new tricks at the plate and  the Dodgers will choose him as the heir at backup middle infielder (Rojas seems to be really good in that role, BTW).  Or, Miller could be a viable trade chip to some other team with that need.  But I'll say again, he does still need to improve.  Bottom line, "knocking on the door" is a much looser concept for me than it seems to be for you.  As I said in my other reply, this is a highly qualitative study, not quantitative.

In any case, thanks for reading and commenting.

47 minutes ago, ashbury said:

If they replace all the Johnson boys (and girls), the Twins will have to go on a hiring spree:

Senior Director, Strategy & Insights: Brandon Johnson

Manager, Consumer Membership & Service: Cory Johnson

Senior Director, Partnership Activation: Amelia Johnson

Senior Manager, Radio Partnerships & Administration: Amy Johnson

"My name is Yon Yonson, I live in Visconsin..."

(Oh, and there's also Sean and Deron, who I assume you have in mind.)

As for future HoFer Noah Miller, I laid out my reasoning in a "show your work" kind of style, and others can repeat the analysis and reach different conclusions if they wish.  I will say though that someone reaching AAA in their age-22 season needs to be treated seriously - unless you believe players stop getting better at their 22nd birthday.  People lose patience so quickly with high school draftees.  He's currently hitting his usual empty .235 for OKC, and that doesn't bode well for ever being a starter in the majors.  But in case I wasn't being clear, starting is not the only criterion I had in mind for draft success - getting anything beyond "a cup of coffee" out of a #36 overall pick is not to be taken for granted - there is the occasional Randy Johnson or Johnny Bench but also a lot of "who he?" types.  Miguel Rojas is 36 years old right now, and maybe by the time Father Time has his final say on Rojas, Miller will have learned a few new tricks at the plate and  the Dodgers will choose him as the heir at backup middle infielder (Rojas seems to be really good in that role, BTW).  Or, Miller could be a viable trade chip to some other team with that need.  But I'll say again, he does still need to improve.  Bottom line, "knocking on the door" is a much looser concept for me than it seems to be for you.  As I said in my other reply, this is a highly qualitative study, not quantitative.

In any case, thanks for reading and commenting.

Well, ask yourself, does any of these jobs look like they. Are producing anything. 

12 minutes ago, old nurse said:

Well, ask yourself, does any of these jobs look like they. Are producing anything. 

"Senior Director, Strategy & Insights" for sure sounds like it requires a PhD in Thinkology.

Not picking Jackson Merrill was a big mistake in hindsight.  He’s already kind of what we hope Walker Jenkins can be.  I’m just at the point that I want to be done with the Pohlad’s, Falvey and Rocco with his entire staff.  I’m all in on moving on and seeing we’re a new regime can take us.  It can’t happen soon enough.  

On 9/5/2025 at 7:23 PM, Vanimal46 said:

If this is a fire Falvey thread, I'm all for it.

Count me in. 

On 9/6/2025 at 8:57 AM, ashbury said:

Firing someone is not the same as looking over the resume as a possible hire; I think the latter is more my motivation right now - looking for that "special sauce" someone has. 

That’s generous. Whatever special sauce Falvey may have had, I think it got left out on the counter overnight, when it should have been in the fridge. 

When the Twins fired Billy Gardner and replaced him with Orioles pitching coach Ray Miller, the idea was, "Bring in the pitching genius and our pitching will get better." It didn't work. When they brought in Falvey from Cleveland it was the same impulse. Didn't work; Cleveland has continued to produce good pitchers and the Twins not. Hiring successful people from other organizations seems completely rational, but it often fails.

5 hours ago, Mahoning said:

Hiring successful people from other organizations seems completely rational, but it often fails.

I don't know how to conduct a careful study, but I suspect that hiring the unsuccessful people from other organizations usually works out even less well.  😀

And then there's hiring from within, AKA promoting.  That can lead to stagnancy, a county-club atmosphere, and other bad things.  Except when it works out well, and then forget all that naysaying.

I'm sure there's no single formula for success.  When hiring for any interesting job, it's difficult to know what the person will do until they've been doing it awhile.  If the job is interesting enough, the candidate won't actually know for certain either.

12 hours ago, ashbury said:

I don't know how to conduct a careful study, but I suspect that hiring the unsuccessful people from other organizations usually works out even less well.  😀

And then there's hiring from within, AKA promoting.  That can lead to stagnancy, a county-club atmosphere, and other bad things.  Except when it works out well, and then forget all that naysaying.

I'm sure there's no single formula for success.  When hiring for any interesting job, it's difficult to know what the person will do until they've been doing it awhile.  If the job is interesting enough, the candidate won't actually know for certain either.

So, if I'm following correctly, the most successful strategy would be to hire more successful candidates rather than less successful ones regardless of where they come from.  Seems over simplified but if it works.  Perhaps you (or I) should write a book about this.....

Crystal balls are 20 / 20

Brass balls are about 20 pounds.

4 hours ago, dxpavelka said:

So, if I'm following correctly, the most successful strategy would be to hire more successful candidates rather than less successful ones regardless of where they come from.  Seems over simplified but if it works.  Perhaps you (or I) should write a book about this.....

I feel as if we may have been slightly beaten to market, with your idea.  Here's one for the analytics fans.

The Twins have done well in the draft overall.  The real way to grade drafts is to see if we are consistently adding 2-3 players to the team per season that stick in the majors.  We have several pitchers that were drafted lower that are really good.  Varland, Jax, Ober.... those were great draft picks.  

I mean the Twins drafted that pitcher with the #2 pick that never panned out 20 years ago.  We drafted Gorden 4th overall and he was ok but not that good. not all first round picks make it.  I think Jenkins will be really good.  I think Larnarch and Lee have been the most disappointing so far.  but both are still producing and hopefully getting better.  

On 9/9/2025 at 1:09 PM, Mahoning said:

When the Twins fired Billy Gardner and replaced him with Orioles pitching coach Ray Miller, the idea was, "Bring in the pitching genius and our pitching will get better." It didn't work. When they brought in Falvey from Cleveland it was the same impulse. Didn't work; Cleveland has continued to produce good pitchers and the Twins not. Hiring successful people from other organizations seems completely rational, but it often fails.

Falvey just got to pad his resume. How much did he really have to do with Clevelands success?