KLaw's in-season minor league rankings

[Shane Wahl]

Note: a possibility is trading Morneau with one of the names above (ex. Walker) either this year or next (Morneau accepting qualifying offer or some other 1-2 year deal) to make taking Morneau more palatable for whatever team is interested.

[jsimssd72]

Here is the rest:

 

Minnesota Twins | Preseason rank: 2

 

The Twins have benefited from big jumps by several of their top prospects, balancing out the promotions of their No. 3, 4, and 5 prospects to the majors this year. http://a.espncdn.com/i/teamlogos/mlb/med/trans/min.gifByron Buxton has fully justified my ranking of him as the top prospect in last year's draft, tearing up the low Class A Midwest League at Cedar Rapids before earning a promotion a week ago to high-A Fort Myers. His combination of electric speed and plate discipline has prompted some unfair comparisons to Mike Trout -- at Buxton's age, Trout was about to start the season in Double-A, and reached the majors before he turned 20 -- but Buxton clearly has superstar potential and is one of the top two prospects in the game.

 

Buxton passed Miguel Sano as Minnesota's top prospect, but Sano also has had a huge year -- he was recently promoted to Double-A New Britain -- and could reach the majors by early 2014, giving the Twins the kind of middle-of-the-order power bat they've lacked for several years. Max Kepler is finally healthy again and off to a solid start in Cedar Rapids; Eddie Rosario crushed high-A and joined Sano in Double-A in June.

 

Alex Meyer, acquired in the Denard Span trade, had a strong two months before hitting the DL with a shoulder issue; he's about to start his rehab, but before the injury he was missing bats and getting ground balls and continuing to show that he can succeed in a rotation. And the Twins added the top prep arm in this year's draft in right-hander Kohl Stewart, a Texas A&M football commit who has a plus fastball and slider with a raw delivery; he will benefit from work in a pro development system.

 

With no major prospect taking a serious step back -- Meyer's 2013 might be the worst, because of the injury -- the Twins are in even better shape today than they were in February.

[bird]

The best thing about this is that if even half of the guys in the top two tiers become above average players and 1/5 of the guys in tier 3-6 become respectable big leaguers we have a damn good crop of homegrown talent.

 

What makes me happy is a comparison of many of the names from 2009 who were thought to be among our Top 10 or 20. Salcedo, Hermsen, Bashore, Morales, Tosoni, Benson, Hughes, Valencia, Slama, Gutierrez, Bullock, Benson, Bromberg, and Guerra all made at least one person's Top Ten list. Of course, others who made a Top 10 list from 2009 include Plouffe, Ramos, Gibson, Revere, Parmelee, Hicks, Sano, and Kepler. No one ranked Arcia or Dozier higher than #25 back then, and a lot of guys who became serviceable players were not ranked at all, like Duensing, Casilla, and Mijares.

 

I'm not sure what this tells us, except that when the current guys are in a top-ranked farm system and the 2009 guys were not, we probably have a damn good reason to be excited.

[drjim]

Note: a possibility is trading Morneau with one of the names above (ex. Walker) either this year or next (Morneau accepting qualifying offer or some other 1-2 year deal) to make taking Morneau more palatable for whatever team is interested.

 

At what point does the board stop making this point? Trades in mlb do not work like this for a variety of reasons.

 

Let's be happy with the depth and give it the appropriate time to shake out.

[Ozziedavisfan]

Assuming Buxton, Hicks, and Arcia all pan out, what happens if Kepler (and Walker, maybe, with various others as well) work out too? We have such a glut of outfielders. We're almost certainly trading a couple of them away long before they hit free agency. That to me seems a likely source of one of our future starting pitchers. We finally have some promising starters in the pipe, but reality says not all will live up to the hype (same could be said for the outfielders, of course), hopefully we can find a good one in a trade down the line.

A good problem to have. And if that happens the trade possiblities are endless.

[cmb0252]

At what point does the board stop making this point? Trades in mlb do not work like this for a variety of reasons.

 

Let's be happy with the depth and give it the appropriate time to shake out.

 

Agreed.

[stringer bell]

I have seen many of these guys in Spring Training and also was in Cedar Rapids before Buxton left. I agree that this is an exciting group of elite prospects. My concern is that too few are pitchers and there are too many question marks attached to the top prospect pitchers. It looks to me like the next prospect to have a major impact is Tonkin because if anybody in the bullpen is moved, he will probably be promoted. Another high minors guy who I think has both a good future and an important role is Josmil Pinto. I expect Doumit to be gone and hope that the Twins go with Pinto as Mauer's backup rather than a utility guy like Herrmann or a glove-only guy like Butera.

[stringer bell]

Alex Wimmers has missed almost three years of baseball. He suffered through Steve Blass syndrome and then had TJ surgery. For a college guy to have his development delayed that much is pretty close to a career killer.

[howieramone1406390264]

I have seen many of these guys in Spring Training and also was in Cedar Rapids before Buxton left. I agree that this is an exciting group of elite prospects. My concern is that too few are pitchers and there are too many question marks attached to the top prospect pitchers. It looks to me like the next prospect to have a major impact is Tonkin because if anybody in the bullpen is moved, he will probably be promoted. Another high minors guy who I think has both a good future and an important role is Josmil Pinto. I expect Doumit to be gone and hope that the Twins go with Pinto as Mauer's backup rather than a utility guy like Herrmann or a glove-only guy like Butera.

 

Completely agree, hence my hope we can get at least one starting pitching prospect for Perkins. Ryan's job of accumulating top starting pitching prospects has really just started. I like where we are on position players, but feel we need another 5-6 starting prospects.

[beckmt]

You can never have enough pitching. However given the strength of the outfield in the system, Twins may have enough to trade for a very good starter, or even buy one with all of the cheap players coming up the next few years. Twins should get another very good prospect next year as the draft is supposed to be deeper than this year.

[Thegrin]

Once Rosario makes it to the Twins, he'll be a fixture at 2b for many years.

Check out Amaurys Minier from the GCL Twins. He could be the Twins SS of the future.

Everybody forgets Liam Hendriks. Yes, he was not real good last year and he got hurt, but he is back and pitching well and may emerge from the pack by the end of this year.

[howieramone1406390264]

You can never have enough pitching. However given the strength of the outfield in the system, Twins may have enough to trade for a very good starter, or even buy one with all of the cheap players coming up the next few years. Twins should get another very good prospect next year as the draft is supposed to be deeper than this year.

I had the same thought. If we are lucky enough to develop 4 quality outfielders, do we deal one for a starting pitcher? Next year, I'm hoping to draft a SS with some pop. If not, another poster mentioned the Cardinals have had success with college starters with high floors and lower ceilings, because they make it to the show relatively quickly. With where we will probably be drafting the next 2 years that should be no problem.

[iastfan112]

Once Rosario makes it to the Twins, he'll be a fixture at 2b for many years.

Check out Amaurys Minier from the GCL Twins. He could be the Twins SS of the future.

Everybody forgets Liam Hendriks. Yes, he was not real good last year and he got hurt, but he is back and pitching well and may emerge from the pack by the end of this year.

 

Minier is a SS in the same way Sano was when he was signed, very little chance he sticks there.

[drjim]

Minier is a SS in the same way Sano was when he was signed, very little chance he sticks there.

 

I thought he was already playing 3B.

[Ncgo4]

When the year began I was thinking Sano and hoping Buxton would get there. Now with his adaptation to "A" and then "A" advanced without a hiccup or without even a three game hittless period, Buxton has amazingly separated himself. Not just from Sano, but from the world.

 

Sano, is also having a special year, but not on par with the Buxter. In many ways his production is superior (RBI & HR), and were they on the same teams having these years, Sano just might be MVP. However, the real issue is conversion to MLB super stardom. Here, Sano has more questions. Strikeouts, fielding & slumps all leave him w/more questions, IMHO.j

 

l actually believe Sano will ultimately prove the better player, but my guess (based on absolutely nothing) is that the cultural issues need to be resolved before we see the real potential here. It's easy to forget that this is a kid plucked from the moon and placed into another world.

[Oxtung]

I thought he was already playing 3B.

 

He is. Even played a game at 1B.