Twins Minor League Report (8/22): Deadline Acquisitions Garrett Horn, Hendry Mendez Turn Heads

Morris and Raya both didn't throw many pitches their last start, and it looks like that was planned. Wonder if they are looking at bringing them up for a September bullpen arm?

So much for Fedko hitting HRs because he is extremely pull happy. Let the kid ride with the big club. And where is Rodriguez? Is he hurt again? 

K. Culpepper really scrabbling right now; wonder if he's getting a little worn down after playing more games in a season that he's ever done before? He's still had a fine season, but learning how to handle 120+ games in a season is something he might need to work on.

Mendez seems to be having a bit of a breakout season. Seems to have good bat to ball skills, and if the improvement in his power numbers is for real, we may have grabbed an underrated little gem in exchange for Bader. Be a nice piece of business if this is more who he is as a hitter. Would like to know more about his defense; quality in LF or not?

Rosario has quietly put together a pretty good season. He's on another hot streak in August, which is a nice recovery after a bit of a wobble in July. I'm always going to be concerned about his contact rates until he proves otherwise, but he takes his walks and causes damage when he swings. With all the LF OF bats we've assembled, his thump from the right could find a place at some point. I expect him in Saint Paul next season. Wonder how he rates with the Twins staff at this point?

Glad to see Morris pitching again. This season has been a bit of a mess for him: injuries and struggles, but I still like his talent. Hopefully he can finish strong and be an option.

Fedko is a good candidate for the team’s minor league offensive player of the year. I hope they give him a shot when the rosters expand. He deserves it, especially as a right handed hitter w some power and speed in an outfield that has plodding lefty hitters Larnach and Wallner, neither of whom provide ML defense. They already made a mistake on Rooker, so I hope they don’t make another one on Fedko without giving him a legit shot. 

1 hour ago, mikelink45 said:

I am ready for some more promotions - Outman doesn't do it for me.  Give a young batter a chance.  Same with Julien - I know he got two hits last night, but everyone hit against the Sox.  

I just went to the BR page to see the Twins batting stats.  Looking just at BA (I still like this stat) and out of 23 batters this year 6 are hitting under 200.  Mickey Gaspar is 117 and still on the team and playing?  And Julien is 198.

Six are hitting below Lewis 233 and four are on the current roster.  So of 23 batters for the year 13 are hitting 233 or lower!  Of the remaining 10 batters above 233 - 4 are gone in the big house cleaning.  I think we started on the wrong end of the list.

Out team BA is 238, 

If we look at OPS 10 are under 650 with Gaspar at 387 and 5 are on the current roster.  Martin escapes at 657.  And of course out of the other 12 four are traded.   Team OPS 705.

Of course we aren't winning and its time for some real experiments - give the young players a chance - I do not care about their time before arbitration - well before that they will be DFA'd, traded, or signed.

Or, how about pitching.  BR has 33 pitchers for the year which includes Bride - our team era is 4.27

11 pitchers have an era under 3 (this includes Willi Castro) - we have 2 left.  We have three more with eras in the 3's.  They are all on the team.  We have 13 (includes Clemens and Bride) with eras over five which includes Ober, Festa, Matthews, 

Then we have 10 with eras over 6 and six of them in double figures.  Yes Bride and Clemens are on this list and Cabrera is our active double digit era leader.  

 

 

I think they will give Outman the rest of the season to show something, whether he is producing or not. Otherwise, they would have to admit acquiring him was a mistake, on top of all the other mistakes this front office has made.

Ok can we call up Fedko now? The kids gonna have a 30-30 season with a great BA. Plus, he's a RH hitting OF. Outman has shown absolutely nothing at the plate. A 45 percent K rate is laughable. Send him down and give Fedko a big league audition for next year. Pitching wise, let's dump some of these waiver wire veterans who we know are not going to be on the team next year and see what we have in some of our own pitchers. With Lopez and SWR, plus Able and Bradley making starts soon, we could try guys like Ohl, Adams, Raya and Morris in the pen. We are going to need to rebuild our relief corps from scratch, why not get an idea of who fits where right now in a lost season where nothing is at stake?

9 minutes ago, Otaknam said:

I think they will give Outman the rest of the season to show something, whether he is producing or not. Otherwise, they would have to admit acquiring him was a mistake, on top of all the other mistakes this front office has made.

Outman has played 5 games for the Twins. They aren’t going to rotate in new players every 5 games. That would be an insane amount of roster churn.

Will be surprised if Abel gets the start for the Saints tonight.  TV showed him in the Twins dugout last night in Chicago with today's starter listed as TBD.

It's getting to the point that we expect Fedko to have games like last night.  Will be shocked when we see an 0-4 with a couple strikeouts.  Add me to those above who are curious about Mendez' defense and speed.

Have a great weekend, Tom, and thanks for the report. 

14 hours ago, Dman said:

Jimenez still doing his thing.  2 Walks, no K's and another hit to keep his OPS in the 1.000 range.  He also more walks than strikeouts at A ball.  Kid id on heater right now for a guy that was supposed to be a so, so bat.

This! And he’s pretty young for A ball, as well. The first deadline acquisition, and immediately went under the radar with the subsequent blow-up and higher-profile acquisitions. The BB/K ratio really is encouraging. Obviously, there’s been a major effort to upgrade the catching depth in the org. We’ll see how it goes.

In other minor league catcher news…happy birthday to Khadim Diaw who turns 22 today. I wonder what the relative projections are defensively for Diaw, Tait, and Jimenez?