Minor League Report (3/31): Yoyner Fajardo Calls Game

[Matt Braun]

Really, it should be called "the St. Paul report." At least until next Friday. 

Image courtesy of Grayson Wolfe, Twins Daily

 

TRANSACTIONS
There were no moves.
 

Saints Sentinel
St. Paul 5, Columbus 4
Box Score
Brent Headrick: 3 ⅔ IP, 5 H, 2 ER, 0 BB, 8 K
HR: None
Multi-hit games: Anthony Prato (2-for-3, 2 R, 2 BB)

Brent Headrick, the slender lefty, made his 2024 debut on Sunday. He faced trouble immediately. He allowed three hits in the opening frame but escaped without an earned run thanks to two fortunate outcomes: a double play split between the knocks and a ground-rule double called despite neither outfielder raising his arms in surrender. The decision removed a score. 

Now blessed with a fresh slate, Headrick dominated; eight of his 11 outs came via whiffs. He topped out at 93.8 and earned 12 swings-and-misses. His lone error was a two-run shot in the third.

A critical part of Headrick's success? His breaking ball. "In the cold weather, the off-speed is important," he told our resident reporter, Theo Tollefson. "So seeing the slider [that the] was able to be in the zone and out of the zone where it needed to be was a positive." 

Perhaps fueled by Headrick’s tremendous effort, the rest of St. Paul’s pitchers on the day—an assortment of relievers mirroring the group needed by the parent club—combined to punch out 14 with two walks. 

One of those pitchers was a familiar name: Diego Castillo. The one-time dominant Ray inked a minor-league deal with the Twins on Saturday, and he reached the mound on Sunday. St. Paul’s equipment manager wastes no time. Castillo pitched a scoreless frame, topping out at 94.7 MPH. 

This four-paragraph ode to the Saints’ pitching staff offers thin protection for an ultimate truth: St. Paul’s bats were sluggish. They took four walks but failed to score outside of when DaShawn Keirsey Jr. flipped an RBI single into left in the 3rd inning. 

Until the 9th, that is. The seemingly magic frame that flips narratives and breathes life struck once again when the Saints—once presumed dead—rose to score the game-tying run. Anthony Prato singled. A wild pitch moved him to 2nd. A groundout sent him to 3rd. A sacrifice fly beckoned him home. The hero's journey in manufactured form. 

The game officially transitioned to Manfredball. The teams exchanged implied runs in the 10th before moving to the 11th. Columbus scored one more run. The Saints scored more.

With the bases loaded and an 0-for-4 weighing on his conscience, Yoyner Fajardo swung at a lethargic cutter and smacked the pitch up the middle. José Tena dove to stop the ball. He didn’t. The adventure ended with Prato galloping around 3rd as Columbus’ centerfielder Lorenzo Cedrola never even bothered with a courtesy throw home.

"He's a guy who's always going to give you a competitive at-bat," said Saints hitting coach Shawn Schlechter, "and we knew that even with the left-on-left matchup, he was a guy who could create some action by putting a ball in play. In those situations, we trust that he's going to grind out at-bats, and he's going to see pitches to move it forward."  

Columbus shortstop Juan Brito homered and drove in three in a 3-for-5 effort. He is Cleveland’s 7th-ranked prospect according to MLB pipeline. 

TWINS DAILY PLAYERS OF THE DAY

Twins Daily Minor League Pitcher of the Day – Brent Headrick
Twins Daily Minor League Hitter of the Day – Anthony Prato

PROSPECT SUMMARY

Here’s a look at how the Twins Daily Top 20 Twins Prospects performed:

#16 - Yunior Severino (St. Paul) - 0-5. 3 K

TUESDAY’S PROBABLE STARTERS

St. Paul @ Nashville (6:35 PM) - RHP Simeon Woods Richardson

 

 

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[nicksaviking]

Ha, great win? Sounds like a messy game but so many fun players to follow on the Saints this year!

[FlyingFinn]

Amazing how much better some of the bullpen guys have started out vs. how they looked in spring training.

[Dman]

Severino's K rate this spring and to start the season is alarming.  Hoping he gets it going pretty soon again.

Man Headrick with 8k's in 3.2 innings.  He's got the stuff, but he needs to stop the bleeding with the HR's.  

Spring is generally tougher on the hitters, but St. Paul has a good bunch of bats.  As the weather warms the Bats will heat up.

[sampleSizeOfOne]

8 hours ago, Matt Braun said:

St. Paul 5, Columbus 4

 

8 hours ago, Matt Braun said:

Columbus scored one more run. The Saints didn’t.

Wait... what?

 

Something doesn't fit.

 

Sigh.

[sampleSizeOfOne]

Phew.

 

Looking at the box score, the score was right, the description misleading at best (feel free to remove these comments if the article gets edited to alleviate my confusion. Too lazy to suggest a better phrasing (maybe not? insert "just" or "only" (or even "merely" before "one more run"... that changes the implied didn't from didn't score (a run) to didn't score exactly 1 run...

 

Anyway, bed time. Nothing keeps one awake like picking nits...

[Bill Lumbergh]

I noticed the temperature at game time was 111 degrees per the box score.  Fans appeared to be overdressed.

[Matt Braun]

4 hours ago, sampleSizeOfOne said:

Phew.

 

Looking at the box score, the score was right, the description misleading at best (feel free to remove these comments if the article gets edited to alleviate my confusion. Too lazy to suggest a better phrasing (maybe not? insert "just" or "only" (or even "merely" before "one more run"... that changes the implied didn't from didn't score (a run) to didn't score exactly 1 run...

 

Anyway, bed time. Nothing keeps one awake like picking nits...

It wasn't misleading; it was true. St. Paul did not score just one run. Perhaps I believed describing it that way added a dramatic allure. 

[chaderic20]

4 hours ago, Matt Braun said:

It wasn't misleading; it was true. St. Paul did not score just one run. Perhaps I believed describing it that way added a dramatic allure. 

It's possible for things to be true, but still misleading. I agree that it was confusing and misleading writing. I understand what you were trying to do, but it didn't work.

[twinstalker]

How is Yunior Severino a top 20 prospect?  Did I miss something?

Oh, the list of names that could hit straight fat balls in AAA:

Randy Bass hit .321/.456/.560 in 1977

Bob Gorinski, Mark Funderburk, Boomer Wells (.941 ops in '82), Bernardo Brito, the law firm of Radmanovich and Rupp, Todd Sears, "Restovich and Ryan, LLC," Garrett Jones, Randy Ruiz, Brock Peterson.  And Yunior Severino, who struck out 56 of 153 appearances at St. Paul last year in his age 23 season after K-ing 30% of the time at AA in his, um, age 23 season.

They mostly all have in common a poor combination of defense, age, and strikeout rate vs league (or MLB) average.  Oh, and most played in big-time hitters parks except for the Rochester guys.

I have no doubt Severino will get a cup of coffee.  He is likely one of those guys who finally gets a shot due to injury, he doesn't show much other than the Ks, and the Twins "lose" him to another team as they attempt to have him clear waivers.

But that's who he is.  It's ordained.  He wouldn't be on a prospect list of mine if the list ended with the last player who might be positively impactful.  The Twins system after #4 is super bad, but there have to be more than twenty guys who could potentially someday help after those four, and he's not one of them.

I know the people doing this aren't lazy, but his placement at 16 is pretty lazy.  This is his age 24 season.  He would have to get his K rate under 25% at AAA and put up numbers consistent with last years AA for me to even consider him a prospect.  Honestly, it would probably have to be about 20% at AAA for me to have hope he could stay under 30% in MLB at his age.

On the other hand, the Twins system might be so bad that it's all darts after #15 or so.  Without looking, I'll be shocked if Gleeman or Law had him anywhere close to 16.  Ok, looked, and Gleeman had him 18 (boo!), and Law had him...not in his top 20 and not in his "others of note."  To me that makes sense.  But Gleeman's write-up on Severino pretty much provides no positive predictors for him.  Gleeman's stabbing, too, probably because he's a Twins fan.  I just don't remotely see it.

Take a look at Randy Bass' career if you want some fun.  He did make it to MLB but was horrible.  Then he went to Japan, and for his 5-6 years there, he averaged an ops over 1.000.  I might be wrong, but I sort of recall maybe even an MVP there.

I don't predict the MVP, but Severino heading to Japan makes a lot of sense.

 

[sampleSizeOfOne]

23 hours ago, Matt Braun said:

It wasn't misleading; it was true. St. Paul did not score just one run. Perhaps I believed describing it that way added a dramatic allure. 

It has since been edited so the point is moot,

 

The original phrasing is indeed more interesting to read structure-wise. And thank you for adopting my suggested fix in your rebuttal, It is surprisingly difficult to score 2 runs without scoring a run first, which the first version seemed to say did not happen.

Meh... maybe not misleading; I just misfollowed. Happens all the time, and twice on Sundays apparently.

[sampleSizeOfOne]

And i should add a big thanks for the write it up.

 

Nit picking is easier than writing, which involves lots of subtle decisions i'm glad i don't have to make.

[FlyingFinn]

19 hours ago, twinstalker said:

The Twins system after #4 is super bad,

No, it isn't. The professional ranking systems rank the 2024 Twins minor league prospect rankings anywhere from #9 to #17 or so. None rank the Twins as "super bad."