Twins Select Trevor Larnach in the First Round of the 2018 Draft

Who knows which outfielders will still be here long term by the time he gets here.  I am guessing 2021 at the eariest. Sano (if he is here long term) or Rooker will be 1B and DH.  Only if they retain all the outfielders will he have a problem with a spot (if he makes it).  

I might have rolled the dice with a pitcher, but that is much riskier and Twins have a number of pitchers knocking on the door now.

Looks big.  How tall is he?   Don't see any information anywhere on size and weight.

Aaron Judg-ish?

On the surface, or at least from my hackneyed perspective, Larnach looks like a rather underwhelming pick, one that doesn't move the needle either way for me. Lots of comparisons to Rooker, so I'm not sure what he offers that the Twins are looking for. Then again, as others have noted, the draft is indeed a crapshoot, so who really knows how these players will pan out over the next few years. All we can hope is that, as they did last year, the front office did their homework and targeted some players with true tools and potential.

Never heard of this kid before last night.  Doesn't mean much as I hadn't heard of 99% of the players who will be drafted.

But as I read about him this morning I began to wonder.  Could he turn into a player similar to Michael Cuddyer?  Good average with reasonable power.  Defensively, not that great, but he got better by putting in a lot of work over the years.  Should this be the case, it would turn out to be a great pick!

A warm welcome to Trevor and Ryan. I hope both are signed quickly, stay healthy and start their seasoning as they journey to hopeful MLB debuts in the future.  I don't closely follow high school or college baseball, so I'll stay away from armchair quarterbacking the FO.  They have likely put thousands of hours into scouting, analytics and evaluations.  All we have are reports from Mayo and Co., and they are basically the equivalent of clowns selling balloons at the carnival.

Evaluating picks outside of the top 4-5 guys in a baseball draft is so damn hard. This guys seems fine? Hit like crazy this year playing for a top program against good competition, so that's good. Sounds like they think he still has upside as a hitter based on their scouting?

I dunno. Would have liked him to show some better defensive skills, because odds aren't great that he's going to get stronger in that area, but if his hit tool is good enough, it should be a high floor pick.

If this was "best signable player available" at 20...I'm ok with it. so far this management team has earned a little slack on drafting after last year's apparently excellent choices.

Hate both picks. Dumped the comp pick and lost the 3rd rounder by signing Lynn. That means the earliest possible chance to draft a pitcher is the 4th round. Considering the Twins' pitching has been the laughingstock of the league for a decade, you'd think we would prioritize it. Meanwhile we add yet another corner outfielder to a team whose outfielders are all in their early to mid - twenties. Hugely disappointed. Meanwhile, the Royals drafted their 2021 rotation in one night.

I wanted a pitcher and there were several good ones there. I guess they feel they can find quality guys later on in the draft. I kind of hate the one dimensional power guys who can't run or play defense in the first round. Hope they make me eat my words

I kind of hate one dimensional players who can't hit in the first round. Athletes that can't hit can be found in any round. 

Can't say I've had any time this year to follow the draft- probably the first since 2010 that I've been tuned out. But I like what I see so far from Larnach. Hits for average, power, draws walks- all at a top tier college conference. Very pretty swing on video. And it sounds like he'll hold his own in the field.

Likely underslot too. Use that money to nab a number of top 200 draft prospects with our limited number of picks.

Who needs pitching, anyway.

TINSTAAPP

FWIW, fangraphs says Larnach's exit velo is ELITE, and he's improved his launch angle. Where do I sign up?

I just don't agree with this, so much......

That acronym exists for a reason. 

Going back and listening to some pre-draft coverage podcasts, I did run across where Keith Law and Eric Longenhagen say that Trevor Larnach could see a huge power explosion once a team alters his swing to add more launch angle.

Seeing the name Johnny Ard (from 1988) in the first paragraph brought back a lot of memories. I saw him pitch for Orlando when he was in the minors. Such high hopes for that kid, but yet another "hot" prospect who fizzled out and never made the big leagues. Just never can tell what will end up happening with these high school players, especially the pitchers.

He's crushing the ball in the CWS right now. 

He just won game 2 tonight for OSU with a 9th inning 2 run homer.