Twins Minor League Report (6/27): Dobnak Deals in Saints Loss, Kernels and Mussels Crush

Zebby actually walked a batter?! I guess he is mortal after all. 

Why waste anymore time? It's long past due to dump Farmer, especially after last night when he was the only twin not to get on base. Get Lee up here and let him run with the second base job. Keaschal can take his place in St Paul. Both Wallner and Severino are smashing this month and look like legit HR champions. I know Severino doesn't really have a position on the twins right now, but it'd be nice to see if his power plays in the bigs. I also think he's probably our best trade bait.

Yunior is on a real heater right now. But he need to sustain his production for more than just June. It doesn't have to be at this level, but right now his season is one great month: he had a terrible start to the season and even in May he was just ok. But this is what we hoped for from him.

Keaschall continues to do well. I like that he's taking his walks, and I think a little more power will come along, but it's great to see him making good contact, getting on base and staying within himself. He's having an excellent season and it's hard to believe this is his first full professional season.

1 hour ago, jmlease1 said:

Yunior is on a real heater right now. But he need to sustain his production for more than just June. It doesn't have to be at this level, but right now his season is one great month: he had a terrible start to the season and even in May he was just ok. But this is what we hoped for from him.

He has an .851 OPS on the season now.  29% K rate is still high but better than last year.  He's having a good season, full stop.

He still has defensive limitations and the K rate is still something to worry about translating to the majors, but I don't think the timing of his production really matters all that much. 

He's a good AAA hitter at the very least.  Not sure how he gets a shot in the majors with the Twins any time soon and his trade value is never going to be super high with his limitations, but still just a solid hitting prospect.

1 hour ago, bean5302 said:

Severino feels like a AAAA hitter to me. His wRC+ 120 overall performance in AAA is good, but not elite. I'm not sure why the Twins felt the need to add him to the 40 man last year. Sure, he had a bunch of home runs in a short stint with St. Paul, but his bat was only league average and he's far removed from being the 2B prospect he was years ago. Maybe the Twins can capitalize on this hot streak to get a small return for him this year? 

 

Because they would have lost him in the Rule 5 Draft for nothing if they didn't add him to the 40-man? Someone would have taken a flier on him, it's not like Sabato who was still down in AA. Maybe he makes it maybe he doesn't, but if you're a bad team why wouldn't you take a shot at him and see if you might find a hitter?

We'll see how he finishes the year. If he keeps hammering the ball and has reasonable K rates then he has a chance to compete for a spot or be more than a throw-in for a trade.

4 hours ago, stringer bell said:

 Also, Lee has played just a handful of games at second base and asking him to be a full-time second sacker with such little experience could easily go sideways. 

The idea that Lee can take over second base and Willi Castro can play elsewhere makes sense to a point,

Lee is not a good fielder at SS or 3rd where he has played all but a whopping 2 games in his Minors career.

Twins already have bat first/only players at 3rd and are not going to put Lee at 2nd which would make the Twins infield have gaping holes except at 1st and SS.

2 minutes ago, chpettit19 said:

The Twins put Lewis at 3B after a whopping 13 games played there in the minors. Put him in CF after 2 minor league games (and 5 fall league games) there.

The Twins put Luis Arraez at 1B in the majors despite having played only 1 game there his entire minor league career (and that was in rookie ball as a 17 year old). Put him in LF after 10 minor league games there (6 of which were in rookie ball as an 18 year old). 

The Twins put Nick Gordon in CF with 0 games played there in the minors.

The Twins put Jorge Polanco at 3B with about 15 games played there in the minors. 

The Mariners put Tim Beckham in LF for 12 games with 0 games played there in the minors. 3 years later the Twins put him back out there with no more games played in the OF between those stints. 

You keep saying the Twins "are not going to put Lee at 2nd" because he hasn't played there in the minors much. I think it's pretty clear the Twins aren't on the same page as you on not playing guys at spots in the majors they don't have a lot of experience with in the minors.

And they all were lousy afer being put there.

The reason Polanco played a career total of 20 games at 3rd and when they put Arraez at 3rd,  he literally threw a game away.

If it were not for his bat, Lewis would not be at 3rd , he is well below average there, and with his weak arm there is no where else he could play.

Twins are in contention, they cannot afford games lost by closing their eyes and praying a player will not stink up the field or lose a game for them playing where he has never played before.

This is not injury replacement emergency, at least not yet.  They are not going to play stupid what-if games to do so would be asinine.

Twins have had too many pee-poor fielders recently and are not going to stick Lee where he does not belong no matter how much gents here want them to.

35 minutes ago, RpR said:

If it were not for his bat, Lewis would not be at 3rd , he is well below average there, and with his weak arm there is no where else he could play.

Is he? seems to be about average so far this season, but it's all a small sample size. Arm appears good enough for 3B, but of course if it is too weak for 3B then 2B would be an option. (Miranda is the one with the poor arm) Royce looks like he'll have good range at 3B and he's doing a good job learning the position on the fly.

Pretty much every professional talent evaluator out there thinks that Brooks Lee would be above average defensively at 2B or 3B, with several thinking he could be elite at 3B, so I'm confused why you think he's trash defensively. He's been able to hold his own at SS past people thinking he was going to get moved off it too.

Teams drop players in all the time at positions they didn't play much in the minors or previously, particularly when they're moving down the defensive spectrum. Polanco had no trouble handling 2B when they moved him off SS and was immediately a solid defender there. 

7 hours ago, jmlease1 said:

Yunior is on a real heater right now. But he need to sustain his production for more than just June. It doesn't have to be at this level, but right now his season is one great month: he had a terrible start to the season and even in May he was just ok. But this is what we hoped for from him.

Severino's first 39 games: 145/251/303 (555; wRC+ 42); BB%-12.0; K%-35.3

Severino's last 28 games: 424/540/727 (1.267; wRC+ 224); BB%-19.8; K%-20.6

I don't think anyone in the organization has been this hot for this long so far this year. Like any scorching hot streak, the BABiP is unsustainably high (as his BABiP was 'unsustainably' low to start the year.) But look at the BB/K numbers. Has he figured something out? If so, he's going to have value either on the roster, or in a trade.

2 hours ago, chpettit19 said:

Yet the Twins do it. Maybe start saying "I hope they don't" or "I wouldn't" instead of "the Twins won't." Because the Twins do. They put Sano in RF for goodness sake. The Dodgers put Mookie at SS this year despite only having played 13 games there in the minors over a decade ago. You wouldn't do these things, but major league teams do it. A lot. Including the Twins. The Nats put Trea Turner in CF after 6 minor league games there. It happens all the time. Whether you'd do it or not. The Twins would and have done this. The Padres made 20 year old Jackson Merrill their starting CFer this year despite having never played there in a game in his life.

They do it if they have to, no because they want to.

They put Blankenhorn at 2nd and Arraez at 3rd and lost a game because of it.

There is zero reason for them to put Lee at Second and probably have him show he should not have been put there.

Farmer is going nowhere but to Second Base; why he is having hitting trouble is a concern but he is still the best fiedling 2nd  Baseman on the team; his number show he was not a good SS, good at 3rd and very good at 2nd.

2 hours ago, jmlease1 said:

Is he? seems to be about average so far this season, but it's all a small sample size. Arm appears good enough for 3B, but of course if it is too weak for 3B then 2B would be an option. (Miranda is the one with the poor arm) Royce looks like he'll have good range at 3B and he's doing a good job learning the position on the fly.

Pretty much every professional talent evaluator out there thinks that Brooks Lee would be above average defensively at 2B or 3B, with several thinking he could be elite at 3B, so I'm confused why you think he's trash defensively. He's been able to hold his own at SS past people thinking he was going to get moved off it too.

Santana had to learn to play bounce catch with Lewis' throwing arm; his fielding percentae is .917 but his Minor League numbers show he was never a good fielder.

His bat and his attiude, will keep him in the game, proably for a long , long time.

Talent evaluators crystal balls mean little in the real world.

Lee's numbes show he is below average fielder like Lewis but the gamble is he can hit Major League pitchers as well as he did in the Minors;

Lee' career fielding numbers show him to be a lessor fielder than Juline who was never a good fielder in the minors; Juliens Pro fielding error numbers are pretty good but him making sure he does not screw-up may be one reason he is slower at turning plays.

As others have written here, many Minor League stars never shine in the Bigs.

1 minute ago, chpettit19 said:

And they played Andrelton Simmons at SS and lost a bunch of games because of it. Because he couldn't hit.

Yeah right, in your mind.

If that silliness is true then the Twins lost a lot of games because Correa was off kilter last year; because Jeffers has huge slumps; because Wallner is a strike out king only slightly behind Julien and oh yes a certain formerly loved Twins rookie made a very, very bad error at Frst in the Post Season which is one reason Santana is here etc., etc., etc..

 Good defensive keeps runners off bases; runners not on bases cannot score.