bean5302

Under 50 PA is absolutely nothing. 100 PA is barely anything. Under 200 PA isn't a decent sample. First off, Larnach isn't going to continue to hit like this. He won't continue to walk 30% of the time, and a lot of those walks will turn into Ks. He's a league average hitter if he's not protected from lefties and he's a DH in year 2 of arbitration. Like 99% of fans on this site were exacerbated he was tendered a contract last year. Larnach isn't part of the Twins' future. At his absolute peak, he's a 1.5 WAR 65% of the time player. Wallner could be. There has yet to be a season where Wallner's worst at the plate isn't as good as Larnach's best, even if Wallner isn't shielded from lefties like Larnach usually is. Emma and Roden were both basically below average hitters before getting ahold of Philadelphia's AAA pitching staff this past week. I realize they've had 5 good games now so it's time to start the immediate roster shuffle and all..

Rodriguez has really been on a tear over his last 5 games, but I'm not sure how projectable a 35% BB rate is. Honestly, the Twins are out of time with him. It'd be a good value to get Emma some regular plate appearances at the MLB level soon. While I'm not as down on Wallner as others, he sure hasn't hit well at all through his first 20 games. He's totally outmatched at the plate right now. It's like he's guessing at pitches rather than reading them. Outman should be DFA'd, Wallner's honestly earning a demotion for Emma to be called up to play RF. Can't imagine the Twins are going to show more than about 10 additional games of patience with him.

Why not sign Dylan Bundy out of retirement?

This is terrible news. I don't see Abel missing less than 4 starts, but at least the issue wasn't immediately off the mound and his velo didn't show a big drop at the end of his last start. The fact this is "elbow inflammation" looks really bad, though. Rojas was up to 50 pitches and pitched 3.1 innings in his last outing. Prielipp was up to 76 and pitched 5.0 innings in his last outing. I think there's a fair shot Zebby gets the call even though the Twins have had him working on his sinker. He threw 96 pitches last time out.

I'm not debating whether Morris belongs in the rotation or the bullpen. I challenged the assertion Morris was "cooked" because he threw 28 pitches already. Then, when the OP's position changed to Morris would be better as a rotation guy because his stuff doesn't move, I challenged that logic. I have never believed Morris was being groomed for a middle reliever mop up guy since I don't think teams ever invest effort into grooming that worthless roster position. I think he's been viewed as short term injury replacement depth or possibly a #5 rotation arm, but it's entirely possible he could be the 26th man on a roster as a middle innings mop up guy.

RNG Jesus giveth, RNG Jesus taketh away. Keaschall's xwOBA last year suggested he should have been about a league average hitter with xwOBA 39pts lower than actual. His expected performance last year also makes sense given his actual performance in AAA last year and AA the year prior. He's still inexperienced and the numbers will trend back up as he looks like he's now unlucky by 43pts of xwOBA. If we're talking about hard hit and barrel rates, Keaschall's right in line with the same percentages of MLB hitter as last year right now. 2025 2026 Keaschall is going to need to adapt. To become the kind of hitter people around here seem to think he can be, he'll need to make a lot of improvement at the plate, but it's very early yet this year. I don't consider a sample size under 200 to be very valuable.

So the argument isn't that Morris was cooked because he threw too many pitches, it's that Morris was cooked because his stuff doesn't work in small sample sizes? Furthermore, because he doesn't have any good breaking/offspeed stuff, he would do better in a longer outing starting games in the rotation where he'd be dramatically more exposed? I'm not following that logic at all.

Complete and utter waste of resources. SOP with Falzoll. There are other depth bullpen options at AAA. Choosing to gut the extremely thin depth in the rotation is asinine.

Fixed that for ya.

Morris is a starting pitcher who literally just moved to the 'pen a couple weeks ago. He threw 70 pitches in 3.0 innings on 4/12. He could have thrown 70+ pitches, no problem.

It's worth considering San Diego city has a land area of 375 sq/mi. $108k median household income. Minneapolis and Saint Paul combined are 110 sq/mi. Compare to Hennepin county with a land area of 607 sq/mi. $95k median household income. Expendible income in the Twin Cities is probably higher, but property values are higher in San Diego (dramatically so). That said, the stadium is only leased by the Twins, not owned. The Twin Cities has plenty of expendable income. Need a product worth spending on. The Wild, for example, sell out despite dramatically higher priced attendance. The Vikings sell out. The Wolves and United are well attended, too.

Houston's got the glove, but he's going to need to hit to make it to the big show. He's not going anywhere with a K rate nearly 30% in high-A, but he's got time yet this year to put things together. Speaking of all glove SS prospects, what happened to Noah Miller this year? Looks like it's unlikely to stay (not a single barrel, lots of pop ups), but fun to see. .324/.437/.465 OPS .902 wRC+ 143 in his first 87 PA with the Dodgers AAA organization.

Yes, I reviewed defensive stats from the minors at SS over the past 3 years in the International league. The stats available aren't comprehensive. They're pretty rudimentary. Fielding percentage and RF/9. Kreidler graded out as good. Not exceptional. In 875 innings or so as a SS with Detroit AAA over the past 3 years, Kreidler manages about a .965 fielding percentage and 4.25 RF/9. The fielding percentage is not good, the RF/9 is good, but not great. Even professional scouts are terrible when it comes to the eye test when it comes to outfielder speed. Reviewing Kreidler's Baseball Savant page, it shows his sprint speed has dropped from barely 60 grade (28.2 ft/sec) in 2023 which is about the bare minimum for acceptable CF coverage down to 27.4 ft/sec last year. Continuing the trend suggests Kreidler is about league average when it comes to speed. He's not going to be a good CF. Outman can cover CF. Kreidler cannot. Neither should be on the roster.

If this was the case, I would hope the Twins please just trade him instead of ruining his career.

Just as easy to highlight this to buyers as it is to sellers. If the Ishbia's had purchased the Twins and dumped money into the payroll consistently to put a legitimate World Series competitor roster together, the buzz would have led to fans flooding into Target Field, and the Ishbia's could have ridden the 2 billion in value appreciation themselves. The Pohlad family has only half-heartedly committed to spending money to make money. Instead, quickly growing conservative as they settle for a "competitive" position. Unfortunately, they're completely out of touch with the market base and don't understand how to make a Twins game attractive to prospective attendees.

That's 4 starts in a row from Bradley of at least 5.0 innings and an ERA of less than 4.00. Probably would have been 5 in a row including his first game if not for the ridiculously quick hook from Shelton. That's not a common accomplishment. Pablo Lopez has managed more than 4 GS started in a row that way just once in his Twins career. Same for Joe Ryan and both ended at 5.

Where is the line drawn? Heckling has been a part of sports forever, but as our society continues its march towards the full criminalization of "being mean" where mean is subjective based on political alignment, I think it's fair to consider what is and is not subject of punative action vs. what is poor behavior vs. what is acceptable enough vs. what is good natured ribbing. Historically, people get tossed when they make the game day experience miserable for other fans directly. Generally, that's physical violence (including physical acts like throwing garbage/food/drinks) obnoxiously loud and continuous shouting or cursing. Heavy intoxication and violation of general ball park rules as well. When it comes to encouraging a person to commit a violent act or threatening a violent act, I believe that crosses into the punitive action area. Its reprehensible action which makes the game a hostile and uncomfortable environment for the vast majority of fans around them. I would also say, I could definitely imagine an angry fan from Boston yelling at Duran after a ground out while Boston was getting creamed as much or more than a Twins fan, but obviously being over the Twins dugout side makes that less likely. Also believable is a fan might have no knowledge of Duran's series, and they might just be a piece of work. Believe it or not, I'd wager 90% of people at the game have no clue. For Jarren Duran, he's right. He opened the door up into a dark place where he was exceptionally vulnerable, and people are going to attack his weakness. When trying to shine a light into an area where people have been ostracizised, there's going to be resistence. That's the way of life and human society. Taking a position of leadership and pushing progress means you're subjected to intense criticism. It's up to each person to decide who has an opinion worth valuing. Some idiot who literally paid money just to see you from a distance trying to take advantage of a vulnerability? The sooner Duran sees those people as pathetic, and unworthy of listening to, the easier it will be on him. Duran is also a professional athlete. Fans in the stands are going to look for anything they can to get into the head of a player, and not all fans are going to be decent people. If he can't get over it or he can't turn it into motivation to go 5-5 with 5 HR the next 5 at bats, he's in for a long road. There's no justification for the heckler, but Duran needs to expect there are a-holes out there so he doesn't get to flick off an entire fan section in the hopes the heckler is the only one who sees it.

Catcher framing is the stat people seem to desperately want to be real despite the fact it's all over the place from year to year. The last time I looked it it, tall catchers tended to get high strike calls. Short catchers tended to get low strike calls. Changes to pitching staff seems to impact "framing skill" more than the catchers do.

How I read your response. Stats don't matter. The Twins front office is infallable and is a defensively minded operation. The Tigers must have coveted Kreidler's defense because they occasionally rostered Kreidler as short term depth while he had options. (It must be baffling how they DFA'd a player who has options making the league minimum. I guess the Tigers front office must have accidentally lost track of things...) The Larnach comparison is hyperbole. Your link doesn't work. https://www.mlb.com/tigers/video/tarik-skubal-in-play-out-s-to-tommy-edman-dcmfyg?q=Ryan Kreidler&cp=CMS_FIRST&qt=FREETEXT&p=0 Trevor Larnach, defensive wizard... https://www.mlb.com/tigers/video/cole-sands-in-play-out-s-to-nick-loftin?q=Trevor Larnach catch&cp=CMS_FIRST&qt=FREETEXT&p=3

You hear about Lewis' upside because his upside is MVP candidate. He's played through a lot of injuries, and he's still probably more injury prone when it comes to lower body stuff. Two complete ACL tears in back to back years led to a severe quad strain, led to hamstring issues. The kinds of injuries he sustained, and played through recovery, are completely devastating to the lower body. I'm not sure where you get the idea Lewis has less defensive flexibilty. You could tell Lewis to play any position, he might not prefer it, but you can make him stand there. Same with Kody Clemens. It doesn't mean Clemens is a good defender at those positions and it doesn't mean Lewis would be.

The Twins have tasked Conner Prielipp with learning a curveball. I think his results are going to be a little dicey for a while. I still think Matthews will get the nod before Prielipp as the Twins have clearly been working with Matthews on the sinker while abandoning the changeup. When you miss hang a sinker, it ends up in the seats, and that's exactly what's been happening for Matthews. We'll have to watch Rojas, too. I think Rojas could pass both of them on the depth chart if the Twins like what they see in terms of strike throwing, but the Twins worked changing Rojas' stuff up and around last year after they acquired him, too. AAA doesn't feel like the right place for prospects to learn how to pitch to me, but the Twins seem to like it that way.

Kriedler is a known entity. Can't hit, like at all. Is that why people think Kreidler is some sort of defensive wizard? Because he can't hit so he must be good at something? Savant shows declining speed from 60 grade in his rookie season to 50 grade now. Kreidler can't cover CF any more than Larnach can. Kreidler's arm is 50 grade. His speed is 50 grade. Like... sure, he's more athletic than Brooks Lee, but he's probably inferior to Austin Martin. Then again, he's been atrocious at the plate so he must be good defensively, right? It's not like Kreidler's defense at SS the past 3 years in AAA has been otherworldly or something. Schobel was a better SS in AAA last year than Kreidler was by a substantial margin. Kreidler is better than Brooks Lee defensively. He's much, much worse offensively. He does not have the speed to cover CF. If you like Manny Margot in CF, you'll love Kreidler.

Matthews is throwing harder in AAA right now than he was in MLB in 2024. He's clearly tinkering with his repertoire. Four seam fastballs generate strike outs. Sinkers generate ground balls, not strikeouts.

It was never about whether a pitcher can succeed at 88-89mph for their fastest pitch. It was about whether "Ober" could succeed, and whether it was a good idea to let him re-learn to pitch with reduced velocity at the MLB level. There's a "chance" Ober can be successful at 88-89mph despite his poor performance when that happened last year. The argument is basically moot at this point. There aren't any pitchers in AAA trying to force their way into the Twins' rotation right now.

I don't think Breslow has shown an appetite for the Twins' asking prices for talent. I don't think the Twins would part ways with him for anything the Red Sox would be comfortable offering. In addition, Brooks Lee's history doesn't suggest he has a bat which plays at SS, let alone 3B. He's had some nice games recently, but the batted ball data thinks his results have been unwarranted. Brooks Lee has not been an MLB caliber starting position player so far in his career. He's not a viable option for 3B in my opinion.