Twins Minor League Report (5/22): Matt Wallner Homers Twice in First Rehab Game with Saints

[Seth Stohs]

4 hours ago, bean5302 said:

For whatever reason cannot be comprehended, the Twins are desperate to retain Winkel and Camargo rather than releasing them or pushing them lower in the system. Cardenas and Olivar have both controlled the run game well, with Cardenas being well above average.

Olivar is the only prospect among them due to age, but Cardenas has some history of hitting well (was bad last year.).

Why would they release Camargo or Winkel? Camargo has hit and hit for power including at AAA the last two years. Winkel is clearly the top defensive catcher in the organization. They are where they need to be. Cartaya should probably move down to Wichita when he comes off the Development List. 

[Seth Stohs]

4 hours ago, madtowntwin said:

Activate Wallner and what reciprocal action to the Twins present roster will there be?? 

I was thinking this same thing, but they shouldn't rush him back from a hamstring issue. 

Also, yes, it would be McCusker heading back down. And, since the Royals are throwing two lefties against the Twins this weekend, I'd keep McCusker around and keep things slow with Wallner. 

Where it will get interesting is when the second of Wallner and Buxton come back. Who will the second player dropped be? Option Keirsey? DFA Bride?

[bean5302]

1 hour ago, Seth Stohs said:

Why would they release Camargo or Winkel? Camargo has hit and hit for power including at AAA the last two years. Winkel is clearly the top defensive catcher in the organization. They are where they need to be. Cartaya should probably move down to Wichita when he comes off the Development List. 

Space for potentially better players?

Camargo is not a prospect. .212/.258/.319 wRC+ 49 in AAA this year and .212/.290/.403 wRC+ 72 last year. He's just taking plate appearances from other players who might have the ability to be backups at the MLB level. Love what he's doing catching base runners this year, but he's not going to play at the MLB level.

Winkel may well be the best defensive catcher in the system, but again, he's not going to play at the MLB level. He started out hot in just a handful of plate appearances this year, but quickly regressed back to his 37% K to 0% BB ratio at the plate.

Having both Winkel and Camargo at AAA just blocks other guys who might be serviceable as emergency depth or even as a backup. Things are just going to get worse when Cartaya needs a spot in AA if that happens. Unless these guys are Austin Hedges behind the dish, bluntly, they're just MiLB roster filler. They're not going to help the Twins, and if they're not going to help the Twins, why are they at AAA blocking other guys who look like they maybe have a shot?



 

[jorgenswest]

14 hours ago, Seth Stohs said:

In the past, the Twins have used it when they have six or seven starters on a roster, they would alternate placing pitchers. The pitcher continues to work, and throw bullpens and go about their routines, just in a controlled environment in the bullpen.

As it relates to Prielipp, he has been working three or four innings each of his starts. He's been limited to 40 pitches and then 50 pitches as the season has moved from month one to month two. If there was an injury, he would be put on the injured list. If I had a guess, I would guess that Prielipp, along with a couple of pitching coaches and coordinators and members of the front office, met during spring training to discuss how the season might play out. They get on the same page about pitch counts and ups and downs. They likely agree that after X number of starts, we're going to put you the Development List for a week.

Makes sense, they have been very intentional about his routine. He was on starting every 7 days and then moved to 6. Six days from his most recent start in AA lands on an off day. 

[DJL44]

1 hour ago, Seth Stohs said:

Option Keirsey?

Yes. That's the obvious move. Even in limited playing time he has a -0.8 WAR. They can't hide his deficiencies well enough to keep him on the roster.

[jorgenswest]

1 hour ago, Seth Stohs said:

Why would they release Camargo or Winkel? Camargo has hit and hit for power including at AAA the last two years. Winkel is clearly the top defensive catcher in the organization. They are where they need to be. Cartaya should probably move down to Wichita when he comes off the Development List. 

Camargo also is throwing out runners at a 41% clip. There is one catcher that has been arguably better than Camargo at throwing out runners. Hayden Sanger has thrown out 43% of runners in AAA as well as 3 of 5 while he was in the majors. Campusano in the PCL has thrown out 35% of runners.

Camargo also stands out when compared to the rest of the catchers on his team. Some teams have good numbers as a whole (30%) but the catchers have pretty similar rates. When Camargo isn’t catching runners the Saints throw out runners at a 10% clip. His ability to throw out runners appears to be a major league level skill. I am not sure how important it is when he doesn’t hit well but stolen bases has been a bigger part of the game the last few years. Seems like that skill alone is worthy of keeping around as the third catcher.

[DJL44]

55 minutes ago, jorgenswest said:

When Camargo isn’t catching runners the Saints throw out runners at a 10% clip.

2 hours ago, Seth Stohs said:

Winkel is clearly the top defensive catcher in the organization.

Those things can't both be true.

[High heat]

3 hours ago, Seth Stohs said:

I don't think Olivar is a plus-plus defensive catcher, but he's solid, and this year, he's throwing out more runners. I had to look to see what the actual breakdown of catching has been. 

Noah Cardenas - 16 starts
Andrew Cossetti - 14 starts
Ricardo Olivar - 13 starts 

I think it's fair to say that Noah Cardenas is the best of the three defensively. Olivar is solid defensively. Cossetti can hit for a lot of power. 

Total games played for these three: 

Noah Cardenas - 22 games
Andrew Cossetti - 22 games
Ricardo Olivar - 32 games. (13 games catching, 8 games in left field, 11 games as DH)

We know that this front office and player development believes in trying to keep their catchers fresh. It's a long season. Gotta keep their legs strong. Remember, they're working on defensive skills most days before the game (especially if they're not catching in the game), catching bullpens, working with pitchers and more. 

So Olivar is catching about 30%, and he's near the top of their lineup in 80% of their games. 

I hope Olivar is working on catching a ton on off days.  I’m not sure he is a major leaguer if he can’t catch.  
 

Im actually not sure any of these three are major leaguers.  
 

Scary considering both Jeffers and Vasquez will be gone by 2027 and could both be gone by next yr.  (Jeffers has one more season of arb and will likely be very expensive, with current owner ship still in place could see Jeffers traded)

I think Camargo is a major league back up  catcher right now.  Not sure if his bat will get good enough to be anything more.  
 

If Olivar could be solid defensively and continue to develop hitting you might have something by mid season 2026.

[Linus]

7 hours ago, DJL44 said:

Interesting that TwinsDaily is creating sister sites for other teams. I am not particularly interested in those, but I would be interested in an MLB aggregated site for the other teams in baseball that takes the best articles from each team and curates them. We lost a lot when Baseball Think Factory shut down.

This is a good idea. There are enough non team specific topics that a talented writer could get exposure across all of these related sites. 

[jorgenswest]

15 hours ago, DJL44 said:

Those things can't both be true.

Runners have been success in 24 of 28 stolen base attempts with Winkel catching in 81 innings. That is a high rate of attempts per 9 innings. Since he has 3 assists one of the caught stealings could be a pick off. Catching is much more than controlling the running game though and he may be very good at the other skills that make up the position.

[DJL44]

8 minutes ago, jorgenswest said:

Catching is much more than controlling the running game though and he may be very good at the other skills that make up the position.

If he can't control the running game, he'll never be a major league catcher. It doesn't matter how well he frames or blocks wild pitches. You can't turn every single or walk into a double.

[jorgenswest]

2 minutes ago, DJL44 said:

If he can't control the running game, he'll never be a major league catcher. It doesn't matter how well he frames or blocks wild pitches. You can't turn every single or walk into a double.

The only times I have seen Winkel catch is on MiLB.TV so I don’t want to make any definitive statement based on 81 innings. I respect @Seth Stohs knowledge of the organization and his thoughts about Winkel’s catching skill outweigh that one stat over what amounts to 9 games for me. It may be possible that both are true.

Camargo has a long track record of success throwing out runners. Enough for me to conclude he is one of the better catchers at throwing out runners in AAA.

 

[bean5302]

To be blunt. Who cares about the defense of Winkel or Camargo if they have a .100/.125/.125 OPS .250, 5% BB, 60% K line at the plate at the MLB level?

Fighting over which of the two players is a -3.5 WAR vs a -3.0 WAR player at the MLB level isn't a game I'm interested in playing.