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While the depth and upside on the roster heading into the season positioned the Minnesota Twins as a fringe playoff contender, most fans came in with the understanding that this team remained a work in progress. The postseason was a nice dream, but above all, getting signs of positive progress from the core prospects was imperative.
Instead, things have played out brutally for most of the organization's key young players, many of whom look nowhere near ready to compete at the major-league level despite their demonstrable mastery of the minors. This serves to exacerbate the miserable results on the field, leaving Twins fans with painfully little to feel good about.
It was reasonable to expect further growing pains from Buxton as he continued to adapt to the MLB learning curve. But given his immense talent and his history of catching on quickly, few would have imagined that his play would plummet. From 2015 to 2016, Buxton's OPS dropped from 576 to 497 and his K-rate rose from 34 percent to an outrageous 49 percent.
Hitting in the majors is hard. But it is exceedingly rare to see a player of any age or experience level flounder to the extent that Buxton has. In total he has whiffed in 36.4 percent of his 187 MLB plate appearances; since the year 2000, only four non-pitchers have struck out at a higher rate in 150-plus plate appearances and none had a lower walk rate than Buxton's 4.3 percent.
As for Berrios, he had not been pitching well through three big-league starts, entering Monday's game with a 6.28 ERA and 989 opponents' OPS, but in Detroit he unraveled in a way that hasn't often been seen. The righty faced nine hitters and recorded only two outs, allowing a homer, a double, a single and four walks. According to Mike Berardino, Berrios became just the seventh starter in Twins history to allow seven earned runs while lasting less than one inning.
To be clear, there's no reason to lose hope for either player. Both are very young and neither has accrued a whole lot of experience at Triple-A. But their initial exposure to the majors has been just about as bad as it possibly could be. And this is made more difficult to stomach by the ugly results from nearly every other top prospect entering the fray.
Eddie Rosario became the latest victim on Thursday, when he received a long-deserved demotion to Triple-A following a terrible first six weeks. Like Danny Santana and Kennys Vargas before him, Rosario imploded following an impressive rookie showing, and showed little interest in adjusting his often out-of-control approach. John Ryan Murphy, acquired during the offseason as a hopeful heir at catcher, was shipped out earlier this month with an unspeakable 219 OPS. Alex Meyer has been a disaster in all four of his major-league appearances. Jorge Polanco has impressed in limited playing time but for some reason can't get on the field with any regularity. Miguel Sano has taken a sizable step backward after a great rookie year.
The 10-30 record is horrendous, no doubt. But the more deeply disturbing development of this 2016 season is just how far away this young core collectively looks from turning a corner. Terry Ryan put his full faith into these kids and what he's received is a bitter reality check.
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