Twins' Mike Radcliff on Buxton, Sano, Stewart and more

[Parker Hageman]

Ok, so I cheated on Twins Daily. Baseball Prospectus asked me to do a guest post so I obliged. For it, I wrangled up an interview with the Twins' vice president of player personnel Mike Radcliff who had many interesting things to say about developing prospects from the beginning to the end of the pipeline.

 

There's more to the interview which I will post on Wednesday but, for now, give the BP article a read:

 

Baseball Prospectus | Baseball ProGUESTus: How the Twins Can Fulfill Their Potential

[gunnarthor]

Nice article, congrats!

[Monkeypaws]

Good stuff Parker - thanks.

[Smcginnity]

Great article and a fun read. Thanks for passing along. I'm super excited for Hicks, Arcia, Buxton, Sano, Rosario, Vargas and Kepler to be up with the team. This will be fun!

[nicksaviking]

Congrats Parker, a great publication to be associated with!

 

I'm curious about this quote from Radcliff: “For every player there is a productivity, analytical, sabermetric test that you would like to see,” Radcliff says. “But there’s the eyeball test, too.

 

I wonder what exactly the "analytical" and "sabermetric" tests are? Or was Radcliff just very aware of his audience?

[Parker Hageman]

I wonder what exactly the "analytical" and "sabermetric" tests are? Or was Radcliff just very aware of his audience?

 

I didn't include it in this piece but that was in reference to a progress sheet that they establish for every player. The Twins have defined things that they what a player to work on throughout the year and then they have an exit meeting with players at the end of the year to discuss where they are at and what they need to work on over the offseason. He didn't elaborate on specifically what was on the progress sheets but my take was that it was both statistically and observational based.

[howieramone1406390264]

Good job! I was happy the old eyeball test was mentioned prominently. Definitely not in vogue on todays upscale fan boards.

[IdahoPilgrim]

Nice writeup, and what I thought were some good comments from Radcliff. I particularly liked his comments on the value of facing Triple-A pitching before coming to the majors. You don't want to let top prospects languish there, obviously, but even a month or two of hitting against people who can pitch and not just throw (another nice distinction from Radcliff) would have to help get someone ready for what they will face in the show.

[cmb0252]

Maybe my favorite Twins article so far.

[nicksaviking]

Good job! I was happy the old eyeball test was mentioned prominently. Definitely not in vogue on todays upscale fan boards.

 

Obviously there are things you can't always see with stats but the problem with the eyeball test is you then need a test for the guy who's eyeballs are doing the evaluation. Who's eyeballs are we using to grade these guys and are they reliable eyeballs.

 

Numbers can tell you if Delmon Young needs to see more pitches per plate appearnce but the eyeball test to see if he is providing enough hustle down the 1st baseline is pretty subjective. I would think preconcieved notions have a tendancy to skew many eyeball tests.

[Brad Swanson]

This is outstanding, thanks for sharing! It's very cool to see Twins Daily represented at Baseball Prospectus!

[JB_Iowa]

Wow, great read. I really appreciated the way that you wove in the quotes with factual information. Thanks to you and to Mike Radcliff for giving us a great insight into the way the Twins minor league system works.

[Ncgo4]

Great article, but now how to keep the excitement in check. The comments about Buxton. "SuperMagicUnicornGood" from Jason Parks a top analyst is crazy. About Sano, he said, "The power s extreme and it made me question my religious beliefs."

 

These are not comments about pretty good prospects. These are comments about off the chart (once in a decade or more) potential. WHEW!

[J-Dog Dungan]

Wish that article by Parks that was alluded to in your article was open season; looked like a very interesting read to me.

[jokin]

As a teaser, Radcliff adds, “Who’s to say we won’t have Buxton in Double-A in a month and in big league spring training next year?”

 

This is the most encouraging thing in a very encouraging article. The least encouraging thing is the lack of top-flite pitchers and near-major-league-ready starting pitchers to contemplate. I hope Meyer comes back full-bore in August and gets the September call-up, but the Twins will probably, and justifiably, play it very cautiously with him.

 

Did Berrios come up in the conversation but end up on the "cutting-room floor"?

[Seth Stohs]

Did Berrios come up in the conversation but end up on the "cutting-room floor"?

 

Radcliff just loves Berrios. He's very high on him.

[Badsmerf]

I still think you steal my ideas subliminally. At least my ideas will be showing up in BP with cool videos with circles in them (still don't know how you do that).