Setting the Odds for Minnesota Twins Prospects to Be Protected from the Rule 5 Draft

Unfortunately I don’t think any of this matters for the next few seasons. Sure you want to protect your assets, but until this team spends the way they could/should our roster is going almost nowhere.  

Adams is the toughest call, I think. (Raya is a no-brainer, and I think you have to protect Olivar and Rosario or lose them) Of the rest the only one that you'd lose is Adams. He's close enough to MLB that you could pretty easily stash him as a long reliever in MLB for most teams, and a bad one that's short on talent would definitely grab him IMHO. 

So what do the Twins really think of his potential to pitch effectively in MLB for them? He's pretty far down the pecking order for starting pitching prospects, but it's unclear if he could switch to the 'pen and be impactful or not. I think that's the tough selection.

Maybe you could sneak Olivar through this year; it's tough to keep position players on a roster for a full season who aren't realistically in a position to play and Olivar isn't. (there are questions about him at catcher, and while he profiles well as a hitter, he ain't ready to go to MLB) But losing him would be a huge loss. I'm risk adverse; we'll see if the Twins are on this.

The only player clear-cut to protect is Raya. Olivar has a lot of potential but his catching development is behind, which a good catcher-developing team could pick him up as an OFer while personally developing him as a catcher. His hitting has just arrived at AA so hitting hasn't been proven yet at the high MiLB level. Olivar has the potential to be a very good catcher which we desperately need. On the one hand, I'd like to keep him but on the other hand, if the Twins can't develop him, it'd be best for him if he went someplace where they can.

Prospects :::

the front office likes to keep prospects , never trading them away and always losing them for nothing if they don't make the MLB  team ...

1 . yes they have some room on the 40 man roster for the better players  , our fringe players they need to make trades for younger players that dont need to be protected and they wouldn't have this problem every year  ...

2 . They have to learn to evaluate our  talent that is not going to be part of the future and package them in a trade  for a player that's somewhat established  in MLB and can play on the 26 man roster  ...

falvey is using the word creative more freely lately   , it's time for him to act on his words  ...

keep  the good ones like Raya  ...

I think Raya and Rosario for sure. Raya- is one of our top arms and Rodriguez has power that can be game changing, especially since he's right handed. I think the decision on Olivar depends on whether or not they think he can be a major league catcher. If so, he needs protection because we are seriously going to need some decent catching depth behind Jeffers. If he's only going to be an outfielder, we have plenty of those already. Maybe try to dangle him in a trade with someone else. As for the rest of the list, I think we're pretty safe not protecting any others.

I will go with just Raya. The Rule 5 draft is overhyped every year. Almost nobody gets picked and out of the players who get picked its mostly relief pitchers who are kept.

Almost every team has their own marginal prospects like Rosario and Olivar. Additionally, many teams have someone who is out of options that they want to keep on the MLB roster. With the expanded playoffs almost everyone is trying to contend. There is no room on an MLB roster for a position player who can't play when you only have a 3-man bench. The Twins made their position player moves in September when they added Helman and Keirsey.

Looking around the league the focus is on Boston, who has a full 40-man roster. They signed Michael Fulmer to a 2-year minor league contract last season while he rehabbed from ligament replacement surgery and now they don't even have room to add him to the roster. I wouldn't be surprised to see Boston make a couple trades today.

50 minutes ago, Cory Engelhardt said:

Wouldn’t be shocked if one or two of them get traded before the deadline tomorrow. Trades for players like this can happen today and tomorrow, right?

I'd expect some 2-for-1 or 3-for-1 type deal have been discussed in order to open up more protection slots. Hopefully the 40 man looks a little different soon (maybe trading Vasquez with an arm and a middle IF for Teel for instance). Boston has some money to spend and they're one team that could absorb Vasquez.

I wasn't familiar before with MacLeod. I like what I saw in the short clip. His delivery might be part of what makes him an effective strikeout pitcher, and we all know about the shortage of lefties in the system. But I wondered if he enjoys similar results out of the stretch. He'd be my "maybe" addition to the protection list. Talented Holland is a tough call with the leg and his age. Good trade candidate to me. Cardenas is a reminder of how thin we are at catching prospects in the system. Guess we need to keep him - he can field the position, but he is Jerry Zimmerman with the bat. I'm good with the rest of the proposed list. It'll be fun to see the departures and additions.

2022 rule 5 draft had 2 position players taken, Noda and Sabol. Noda had a good first year, sophomore slump last year. Sabol played at a replacement level for the Giants, pretty much got moved out of the catcher position,  2023 saw 2 position players taken. Nunez who is a defensive, speed no hit utility player was kept, de Los santos was returned. 2021 had 51 total players taken, and I didn’t see a name that stood out LeBlanc got his year in Miami and was released after the following year in the minors, Young was drafted by Washington and was not claimed back when sent to the minors, Maciel was returned, Ronnie Dawson was kept and releases at the end of the year, Nogowski was released. Kirwer was returned That is the first 6 selected position players  Of the 10 position players I looked up, 1 good season out of multiple. I think by and large the FO do a decent job of knowing what position players will make an impact and which ones don’t in protecting position players. If Olivar is near ready, then they protect him as he actually has hit in the minors. If he is not protected i think the chance that he is a viable starting catcher goes way down 

34 minutes ago, mikelink45 said:

It is not a group of outstanding prospects except Raya.  Rule 5 is a good thing for fringe players.  If they don't fit our profile they might fit elsewhere.  Rooker, Gil, Steer are good examples of quality players that did not fit our roster but did well elsewhere.  

When I look at a list like this and I think it reflects on the quality of our minor leagues.  Because we called up so many this year this list is less interesting than some of the past few years.  

Rule v has been a good thing for fringe pitchers 

Will be interesting couple days and your article gives us something worthwhile to think about for the next 30 hours or so.

My one thought looking at this list is that it doesn't have the high level talent we often see.  I guess some of that is due to the fact that a lot of the best prospects were added over the past year.

Perhaps the most meaningful move, or non-move, the Twins could make in the next two days is keeping Canterino on the 40-man.  That would tell us they believe he is likely to be available in 2025.  Considering he is potentially better than any of the above prospects, that could be HUGE!

1 hour ago, Seth Stohs said:

Here are my ratings and percentages for addition to the 40-man roster: 

1.) RHP Marco Raya 100% 
2.) C Ricardo Olivar 80%
3.) C Patrick Winkel 75%
4.) OF Kala'i Rosario 55%
 5.) LHP Jovani Moran 50%
 6.) LHP Christian MacLeod 45%
 7.) LHP Jaylen Nowlin 25%
 8.) RHP Travis Adams 10%

If you add up these odds it puts the over/under at adding 4.5 players to the roster. I will take the under on that. They're not going to fill the roster with Double-A players when they have so many needs at the MLB level.

With the exception of Raya, divide all those numbers by two (or more).

5 minutes ago, DJL44 said:

I will go with just Raya. The Rule 5 draft is overhyped every year. Almost nobody gets picked and out of the players who get picked its mostly relief pitchers who are kept.

Almost every team has their own marginal prospects like Rosario and Olivar. Additionally, many teams have someone who is out of options that they want to keep on the MLB roster. With the expanded playoffs almost everyone is trying to contend. There is no room on an MLB roster for a position player who can't play when you only have a 3-man bench. The Twins made their position player moves in September when they added Helman and Keirsey.

Looking around the league the focus is on Boston, who has a full 40-man roster. They signed Michael Fulmer to a 2-year minor league contract last season while he rehabbed from ligament replacement surgery and now they don't even have room to add him to the roster. I wouldn't be surprised to see Boston make a couple trades today.

100% agree here.  All the talk about Keirsey not being given a chance, yet he was left off the 40-man last year and no one took him.

The only ones I can see truly at risk and needing to be added are Raya, probably Olivar and Moran.  Defensive, no-hit 4A catchers are relatively easy to find.  Any position player below AAA will not be kept on a team's MLB roster all season.  Pitchers can be hidden, but anyone that was truly an asset last year would already be protected.

If the Twins only had 2 open spots, there would be no discussion here.  The fact they have so many opens up this discussion.

Ok, please reward me with a thumbs-down for my earlier post. I wasn't aware that Boston's 40 man was full!

And I do agree with another poster commenting on the relative dearth of talent on this year's protection list. I just hope that many other teams cut more talented players than we do.

4 minutes ago, IndianaTwin said:

With only four bench spots for position players

It's really just 3 spots. Every team carries two catchers and the second catcher is expected to play 40% of the games. Nobody has room to carry a position player they don't want to play.

1 hour ago, IndianaTwin said:

Best I can tell, in 2023, only two position players were selected. Old Nurse summarizes other drafts above. With only four bench spots for position players (five on occasion, if a team goes with a seven-man bullpen for a while), I think it's really difficult for a team to lock a fringe player into one of those spots for the entire year. 

 

Nunez was taken and kept. He was a know defensive specialist and pinch running speedster. The other one was returned.