bean5302

No, Kirilloff has been a very poor defender at 1B. The hope was he'd play up there, but he hasn't so far. Not sure why Kirilloff is no longer considered a potential outfielder, but Falvey made a specific quote on that subject. In regard to Miranda, he had a long enough stretch in MiLB for the Twins to expose him to the Rule 5 draft before the 2021 MiLB season so there wasn't a lot of expectations around him at that point. It also means there's much more skepticism attached to great performances. Then, Miranda absolutely torched MiLB pitching at AA/AAA in 2021 without the Twins calling him up. He had a nice, but not great 2022 campaign at the plate, but his defense was just as rough as advertised leading to pretty low WAR totals. Miranda certainly had a lot of surplus value at the end of the year, but apparently, he hurt his shoulder that offseason and he was pretty terrible all of 2023. Cue the skepticism on 2021-2022. Also, there's reason to doubt Miranda's upside at the plate as his max & average exit velocities in 2022 were average, he doesn't take walks, and his swing doesn't tend to produce a lot of fly balls with launch angles that lead to home runs. He probably looked like a 18-23 HR a year full season guy. Average power, low walk rate, lots of pop ups. It's not a great projectable profile, and he was no longer considered a top prospect prior to 2021. That said, there's no real reason to suspect Miranda is a platoon candidate since he put up a wRC+ 110 vs. RHP in 2022, and hit them well in 2021, too. If they're sent down at all, both Kirilloff and Miranda are out of options after this year so it's definitely a make or break season for both of them.

Sure. We could watch Walker Jenkins put up a .100/.110/.100 batting line while generating -5.0 WAR. After all, he was pretty good in 56 plate appearances at Low A last year. He's ready!

Graterol throws a 100mph sinker, but sinkers don't generally generate a lot of strike outs. They generate slow rolling double play grounders and pop ups. Most people around here consider Duran elite so let's compare the two. Graterol vs. Duran 2022 = 3.26 vs. 1.86 ERA, 2.95 vs. 2.52 FIP, 3.12 vs. 2.11 xFIP, 0.99 vs. 0.98 WHIP 2023 = 1.20 vs. 2.45 ERA, 3.03 vs. 3.21 FIP, 3.53 vs. 2.75 xFIP, 0.97 vs. 1.14 WHIP Combined = 2.08 vs. 2.15 ERA, 3.00 vs. 2.85 FIP, 3.36 vs. 2.42 xFIP, 0.97 vs. 1.05 WHIP Graterol looks awfully similar to Duran in terms of results so if Duran is elite, it's awfully hard to argue Graterol isn't. Obviously, Graterol strikes out and walks fewer guys, but he makes up for it because when Graterol gives up a fly ball, it's often a pop-ups while Duran's fly balls allowed almost always leave the infield. In any case, I don't know as the Twins won or lost the trade. Maeda was a big part of why the Twins made the playoffs in 2020 and in 2023 as he was outstanding down the stretch for that matter.

Alex Kirilloff didn't hit LHP in the minors particularly well, either so thinking Kirilloff can make a big step forward into a position where he's not a platoon only guy is optimistic. Take his numbers at AA in 2019. vs. RHP .816 OPS vs. LHP .634 OPS Miranda probably isn't a candidate for platooning. Miranda had a wRC+ of 110 vs. right handed pitching in 2022 and an OPS of .908 against them in AAA in 2021. Miranda had no real significant splits vs. LHP or RHP in 2023, either. Honestly, Miranda's MLB numbers in 2022 vs. RHP were basically just as good as Kirilloff's career numbers vs. RHP.

Driveline did some biomechanics study on different pitches and the stress placed on the pitcher's arm. Overall, there were no pitches more stressful on the arm than the fastball. Basically, velocity was the main stressor in pitching. If curveballs were thrown as fast as fastballs, they'd be the most stressful pitch, but they're not so I'm not sure it's relevant. It's also worth considering how the increased velocity was modeled to determine whether or not it was even accurate. In young pitchers, the slider was most likely to generate pain. https://www.drivelinebaseball.com/2017/02/fastballs-offspeed-pitches-comparative-relative-elbow-stress/ In regard to how hard pitchers are throwing now vs. how hard they used to throw, I'm not sure how reliable older data was. Starters Avg Fastball 2002 - Max 94.5mph, 10th Best 92.3mph, Median 88.8mph, 10th Worst 84.9mph (85 Qualified) 2005 - Max 95.6mph, 10th Best 92.7mph, Median 89.5mph, 10th Worst 86.4mph (93 Qualified) 2010 - Max 96.1mph, 10th Best 93.5mph, Median 91.3mph, 10th Worst 88.2mph (92 Qualified) 2015 - Max 96.4mph, 10th Best 94.6mph, Median 91.9mph, 10th Worst 89.4mph (78 Qualified) 2019 - Max 97.7mph, 10th Best 94.9mph, Median 92.9mph, 10th Worst 90.5mph (61 Qualified) 2023 - Max 97.8mph, 10th Best 95.6mph, Median 94.4mph, 10th Worst 92.4mph (44 Qualified) I think there's a pretty clear trend. There wasn't a huge increase in average pitcher velocity through 2010, it was just a drop off on the lowest velocity guys. We start to see a trend of hyper focusing on velocity by 2015 with a significant jump in median and max velocities afterwards with a rapidly declining count of pitchers who are able to qualify. Max velocity for the top pitchers seems to have spiked out at this point, but there's still a hyper focus on pushing all pitcher velocity northward, and there's a plummeting number of them who will qualify as a result. While this method probably produces the best results in a playoff rotation, getting to the playoffs is maybe a different story. Unfortunately, all the way down into high school, pitchers know scouts want to see velocity, velocity, velocity. The number of pitchers who have developed 4 or 5 potential pitch offerings has declined while the number of 2-3 pitcher flamethrowers has seemingly increased. Even if there is more value in drafting and developing pitchers with somewhat lower velocities, but better stuff who could potentially be as good as mid-rotation, those pitchers may not exist in significant numbers.

I think it's pretty commonly held that Dobnak isn't on the roster and has no good path to making it back onto the roster. The Twins have to pay him his MLB salary regardless of whether or not he's on the team, and in terms of absolute emergency depth, he's not an awful option. If Dobnak hadn't been extended, I don't think anybody would argue he wouldn't have been DFA'd and released a while back. Last year was his first relatively healthy year in a long time. Dobnak seems like a nice guy with a good story, clinging to his last opportunity to make it back into the big show. I'm rooting for him, but he's going to have to build on his 2019 AAA performance from so long ago, and have a couple Twins starters fall to the injury bug this year to get another shot. Gotta be a bittersweet situation for him.

Center field is shallower than it was last year with Michael A. Taylor on the roster, and I think it's the shallowest position on the team. In a full season, you might expect: Buxton 5.0-6.0 WAR *Taylor 2.0-3.0 WAR Margot 1.5-2.0 WAR Castro 1.0-2.5 WAR Martin 0.0-2.5 WAR Rodriguez (1.0)-3.0 WAR Keirsey (2.0)-1.0 WAR There is no player in the organization not named Royce Lewis that could legitimately be expected to have a 2.0 WAR floor of starting caliber position player if placed in center field like Taylor did. I don't think anybody is enamored with the idea of shifting Lewis back to CF again. Margot - has a below average bat and declining speed. The Twins know what they've got here. Barely adequate backup center fielder if Buxton goes down. Castro - was signed to a MiLB contract last year after being non-tendered at $1.7MM by the Tigers. He had a great season with the Twins, but to be non-tendered despite a chump change projection and then signed to a MiLB contract tells you a lot about expectations for a player with a long track record. Martin - is a question mark for sure. He might be more rangey than Margot, and he might have a better bat. Or he might be AAAA caliber. Rodriguez - could be fun to watch if the Twins just rolled the dice on him. Or he could be totally exposed like he was in Spring Training. Pretty clear he's not ready, but maybe he could make the adjustments after a few weeks of struggles and turn into a stud enough to flip that WAR back positive? Not a gamble I'd like to take right now, haha. Keirsey - He's got enough speed to cover CF, but little power and a weak hit tool. I'd expect he'd be this year's Andrew Stevenson, but not quite as fast, probably. I'd view the 26 year old, non-roster player as emergency depth.

The shift was not banned. It's frustrating to see misleading statements in print so often. The shift was limited. FWIW, no player had a bigger discrepancy between xBA and real batting average than Max Kepler, and teams employed shifts against Kepler more frequently than any other hitter in MLB prior to last year as I recall. The shifting absolutely hurt Kepler's production at the plate, arguably more than any other player in MLB. Teams didn't stop shifting against Kepler last year, either. Fangraphs recorded plate appearances as 32 (No shift) 280 (Shift). Teams still shifted against Kepler literally 90% of the time. The 10% they didn't were almost certainly times when there were runners on base. Kepler talked about a strategy of just trying to hit the ball over the infield (in the air) to try and bypass the shift altogether. It helps, but Kepler's production will likely always be hindered at least somewhat by the shift. I'm not sure what to expect from Kepler going forward given the fact Kepler put up career high barrel rates, average exit velocity and hard hit rates last year. Clearly other MLB teams aren't sold on Kepler's turn around or he wouldn't be on the team at this point as somebody would have offered Falvey a return which couldn't be ignored this past offseason. Here's hoping Kepler tears it up this year. There's still even more ceiling in his game at the plate than what he's shown, but if he goes back to bouncing batted balls off the ground again, it's just going to be another quality regular starting position player season for him. 2 WAR floor 2.5-3.0 WAR good year, 4 WAR ceiling.

5 WAR. As far as I'm concerned, that's a success for Byron Buxton playing almost exclusively in CF. If Buxton is DH'ing, he comes with a pretty low ceiling since he can't get on base. My expectations for Buxton is 70-90 games almost all in CF generating about 4 WAR. Anything over that is icing on the cake. Anything less than that is a huge disappointment.

Me too, but once the Twins signed Margot, Martin was a long shot as it clearly pushed Martin/Castro into an infield only scenario.

If you live in Minnesota and you want to stream Twins games through Amazon... Step 1) Cable TV premium subscription (which includes Bally Sports North). This is required for anybody who lives in Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota, Iowa or part of Wisconsin. Step 2) Ballys Sports North subscription. Step 3) MLB.TV subscription Step 4) Amazon Prime subscription Now you can stream Twins games on Amazon, though if you have a sub to MLB.TV, you don't need Prime. You can use the MLB.TV app, which you also don't need to stream because you could just use the Bally Sports North app, but Twins games are blacked out unless the account is tied to a local cable company where you've got a package carrying Ballys. So yes. The blackout policies and subscription policies requiring people to have a premium cable TV package (which includes Ballys Sports North), blocks out a lot of potential fans.

Kris Bryant & Charlie Blackmon made up over $50MM of their budget last year. Their fans are really outstanding. Consistently great attendance despite poor results so there's a lot of payroll room in the budget.

Ryan's fastball has always been excellent because of his release and it's movement, but the reason the Twins were able to get him for Nelson Cruz was because the rest of Ryan's pitches were borderline offerings at the MLB level. While he's tinkered with adding new pitches, and changing his usage of the pitches he has, none of his offspeed or breaking stuff has been successful at the MLB level for long. For Ryan to take a step forward, he really needs a 2nd plus offering. It doesn't sound like they're super excited about the sinker. The biggest issues with sinkers is even elite versions don't often generate strike outs, and they have a propensity to land in the seats if the pitcher misses their spot. Hopefully, he can find a pitch mix that allows him to add that second legitimate weapon to his arsenal.

Sprain = lesser tear. Tear = greater tear. No matter which way you look at it, Prielipp had some sort of tear in his reconstructed UCL large enough that it wasn't healing sufficiently on its own and it required major surgery to address.

Not to mention it's been widely reported all agreements for Diamond Sports for this year were at least 85% of the previous season putting the Twins TV revenue somewhere between $45.9MM to $54.0MM this year. It's a pretty narrow value, and actual TV contract details are almost never reported publicly so some hint at some sort of conspiracy to not report it isn't reasonable. Also not reported in the article is the Padres were in violation of liquidity rules for MLB. Basically, they had been spending more than they could afford as an ownership group so they were given a directive by MLB to get their financials in order. The Angels are an absolute mess, and most fans and analysts believe the team should rebuild as they don't have a good playoff potential. Not sure those fan bases have a real cause for anger.

The Twins are almost certainly a playoff team, IMHO. Elite bullpen, strong lineup, high floor rotation. In order to make a deep playoff run, the Twins need a higher ceiling rotation. Their current options won't cut it beyond Lopez. That said, we're months away from the trade deadline, and something truly unexpected in terms of development could happen. With the organization once again in a position to "put a boot to the throat", they once again punted. Playoff Rotation FGDC WAR projections Astros - Valdez (3.7), Brown (2.3), Verlander (2.2), Javier (1.7) Yankees - Cole (3.5), Rodon (3.1), Stroman (2.0), Cortes (2.0) Rangers - Eovaldi (2.3), Gray (2.3), Scherzer (2.0), Dunning (1.8) Orioles - Burnes (3.8), Rodriguez (2.6), Kremer (1.8), Bradish (1.3) Mariners - Castillo (3.8), Kirby (3.7), Gilbert (3.0), Miller (1.6) Twins - Lopez (4.1), Ryan (2.8), Ober (2.1), Paddack (2.0) Jays - Gausman (4.4), Bassitt (2.9), Berrios (2.4), Kikuchi (1.9) Rays - Eflin (3.6), Civale (2.0), Baz (1.5), Bradley (1.4) The Twins are pretty middle of the pack in terms of projected top rotation right now, but it also depends on some guys I'm not particularly bullish on so I'm more bearish than the projections here. With Snell and Montgomery still out there, and Snell looking to consider short term offers, it just makes too much sense to me to lock in another front of the rotation option without diving into our top prospects yet again as the season progresses.

I really can't comprehend the hate for Wallner here. There's nothing in his profile from last year suggesting he won't be a great to elite bat moving forward. Almost the entire team sucked at the plate against the Astros in the playoffs. Basically, the entire team was overwhelmed by the atmosphere and they were collectively swinging at junk. Only Lewis & Correa actually forced the Astros pitchers to throw strikes at all if my recollection serves me well. Wallner wasn't some exception. Not sure why the sky isn't falling from the 5-10 PA other Twins players got?

Absolutely Brooks Lee has potential to be a great player, but rankings involve a lot of different assumptions. High floor vs. high ceiling, how close the player is to contributing, etc. There have been holes in Brooks Lee's game. That's absolutely expected. For him to be at the MLB level this year would still be quite fast to the big leagues. I'm going to bring Austin Martin back into this. He was ranked #2 overall for the 2020 draft by MLB, #1 overall by Keith Law, #1 overall by CBS, #3 overall by Fangraphs... you get the idea. After the draft and his first year of playing time, Martin was ranked #12 in all of MLB by Keith Law mid 2021, was consistently top 50 after 2021 (#22 by MLB) and still consistently top 100 (#52 by MLB) after 2022. Did Martin have the potential to be a superstar? For sure! Super elite hit tool. Athletic with plus speed, questionable arm for SS, but viewed as a potential CF fall back. The scouting reports were glowing and Martin destroyed AA level pitching right out of the gate with Toronto. In every way, shape or form, Austin Martin was viewed as good or better than Brooks Lee at the same age. Prospects are just that, and almost all of them have some holes in their games which need to be identified and worked through. Even an eventual MLB Hall of Fame, god level talent like Joe Mauer needed 3 years in the minors. That chart includes top level high schoolers who had 2 years of experience above Lee and it shows: 1.5% of players reached MLB through age 20 5.9% of players reached MLB through age 21 15.6% of players reached MLB through age 22 <--- realistically, Brooks Lee, since he was 22 until last month... 31.1% of players reached MLB by age 23 50.2% of players reached MLB by age 24 67.0% of players reached MLB by age 25

Formerly awkward retirement age actuary hit by bus (always a bus or car, amirite?) at right wing conspiracy convention is isekai'd into a new world as a demon lord. I think I'll pitch that to Amazon. They make a lot of bad choices in terms of shows. Maybe I'll get paid? LOL

I wouldn't think there was any expectation he'd be pitching before mid season at the earliest. He underwent UCL surgery in late July. Every surgery and person who undergoes the process is different, but a second UCL repair can be slower than the first. Maeda had an internal brace in September, 2021 and he wasn't ready for 2023. Ohtani had an internal brace in October, 2023, and while he's hitting, he hasn't even started a throwing program. He's all but completely ruled out for pitching this year. Paddack had his second UCL surgery in May, 2022 and he didn't start throwing off the mound for nearly 14 months afterward. Prielipp has been in Ft. Myers already according to the TD scouting report page, but I'd be surprised to see him progressing much into a throwing program until well after the season starts. I'm sure the Twins are going to be taking him along slowly like they did Royce Lewis last year because of the 2nd ligament tear in a short time. Maybe mid-season? The "internal brace" procedure sure seems to have been sold with an overly rosy view on recovery time recently so I think fans got 6 month time frames into their heads as reasonably possible when it doesn't seem to have truly accelerated the time frame much for pitchers. I'm with you, though. It'd be fun to hear some good news on him.

What makes you think Brooks Lee profiles as a superstar player? Also, the average college draft pick getting to the majors is 3-4 years. Fast is 2-3 years. Brooks Lee is starting his 3rd year and he was over 4 years younger than the average AAA player last year. Somebody posted this spreadsheet. Worth a look. a20-21 debuts are super elite players drafted out of high school. a22-24 debuts are very good players drafted from high school or college. a25 still produces some solid talent. a26+ are mostly roster filler.

I think it's widely accepted the Twins took Desclafani in the Polanco trade because the Mariners didn't want him and didn't want to absorb Polanco's entire price, and it was known at that time that Desclafani may not be ready for the start of the season because of the flexor tendon strain, even if he was optimistic. The Mariners acquired Desclafani as part of their trade with the Giants as San Francisco wanted to shed his contract, and the Mariners were not intending on adding the pitcher to the rotation, instead using him as a long reliever, but when the opportunity arose to shed a little of their cost for what would be a long reliever for them, they found a way to exchange some numbers with the Twins. A lot of fans wanted Varland to get the job in the rotation from the get-go, and moving Desclafani to the 'pen like the Mariners were intending is probably not the end of the world.

Right down the street from me. If I have time, to drop in should I wear like an evil costume befitting my reputation around here? LOL. I could create a poll. Is bean5302 a: A. Crotchety old man/woman. B. Demon lord. C. Angry right wing nut job. D. Awkward actuary E. Other

Some of the possible roster decision players for 26 man. Spring Training OPS, wRC+, BB%, K% Miranda RHB = 1.072, +198, 13.3%, 20.0% (1 option) Larnach LHB = 1.011, +167, 10.0%, 30.0%, (1 option) Martin RHB = .679, +93, 9.1%, 27.3% (3 options) Kirilloff LHB = .641, +66, 4.2%, 20.8% (1 option) Goodrum RHB = .421, +34, 22.2%, 27.8% (Non-Roster, 2 Options) Wallner LHB = .345, +7, 13.6%, 31.8% (2 options) Severino SHB = .054, -71, 0.0%, 53.8% (3 options) Not that Spring Training stats usually have a big impact on team decisions, but just for the sake of curiosity.

What part of his swing isn't under control in your opinion? Wallner stands close to the plate and the type of swing he has isn't going to be successful at generating hard contact on inside edge pitches so he's going to be vulnerable to those if the pitcher can hit their spots. I do think there's some work Wallner might be able to do on pitches down in the zone. He doesn't hit them as well, and he sees a lot of pitches down and away or in. He seems to have inside pitches pretty well handled, but down and away is his biggest K weakness. Up and away/outside edge is an area he can probably swing more and do more damage, but he gets a lot of his walks there already. Overall, Wallner's o-swing rate is already better than MLB average so I'm not sure I expect there's a lot of room for him to make big strides.