bean5302

Sano's not a kid anymore. He's been in the big show for 7 years now and I do believe he may be getting a sense that his career is teetering on the brink, but things are going to need to bounce his way and he's going to need to put in effort and dedication he's never remotely come close to showing in his MLB career. If Rooker figures out how to adjust, Sano could find himself under Rooker on the DH depth chart. He's blocked at 1st by Kirilloff. He's blocked at 3B by 70lbs, Donaldson, Arraez and Miranda. If Donaldson isn't traded, it's hard to imagine him not slotting over to DH in an attempt to keep him healthy. Arraez and Miranda would then pick up 3B.

Those weights are from about 10 years ago. He didn't put on much weight for quite a while, but his power has really come on this year. No idea if he gained muscle mass over 2020.

Simmons is going to have to take a MiLB deal at this point, and a guy like that doesn't provide an obvious plan at SS for 2022. Not sure why some people feel watching horrible veterans play instead of potentially excellent rookies makes for more entertaining games, but hey, whatever floats their boat.

Astudillo is a known quantity. He'll be 30 in two months so he's not some prospect who could find another gear. Honestly, I think Astudillo would potentially be able to keep a utility spot on an MLB team if he dropped 50-60lbs, but he's more likely to find a niche on a MiLB contract as an emergency catcher someplace.

In regard to Sano's consistency, his year to year performance has been: 2015 - Great 4.5 WAR full season pace 2016 - Awful 0.5 WAR full season pace 2017 - Good 3.0 WAR full season pace 2018 - Awful (1.0) WAR full season pace 2019 - Good 3.0 WAR full season pace 2020 - Awful 0.0 WAR full season pace 2021 - Bad 1.0 WAR full season pace. Hard to get much less consistent. Thing is, Sano only has one playable season in the last 4 years. He's also clearly in decline meaning there aren't probably any bounce back (good) years left and his defense was so bad at 1B this year, he's likely slated for the DH going forward. His exit velocity is the 2nd lowest of his career and even though his K rate is down, he's not getting on base anymore. Chris Carter was never as good as Sano, but never as bad, either. Chris Davis, in the 4 years prior to his huge contract was 7.1 WAR, 1.1 WAR, 4.9 WAR, 3.1 WAR producing more value than Sano's career best in 3 out of 4 seasons. Davis has (6.0) WAR over the past 4 seasons and still has 40% more lifetime WAR than Sano. I agree Sano isn't a huge problem for the Twins because they don't need to play him. Eating $12MM to release him before spring training next year wouldn't break the franchise, and if he continues to hit the ball well through the end of the season, keeping him on the roster for depth won't really do any major damage, either. My projection of Sano seems pretty reasonable.

Don't get me wrong, I'm cheering for the Twins and their players to perform. I'd just much rather not see Palacios put up a 3 win season as a starting shortstop with another team next year or have the Twins hang on to Donaldson until mid-season before Miranda puts up All Star numbers staring mid year when Donaldson goes down with a hammy.

Ober is definitely taking advantage of his situation and making a case for the back end of the rotation next year. Here's hoping he can keep it up and even moreso that he can remain healthy!

I present this article in defense of retreads. Please do read the article and replace the concept of tire with pitchers and laugh away. Maybe I'm strange, but I definitely did. https://www.bandag.com/en-us/resources/why-you-should-buy-retread-tires#:~:text=Retread tires%2C sometimes known as,North American truck tire market.

I'm probably most interested in Spencer Steer and Blayne Enlow here. Steer seems fairly comparable to Noah Miller in regard to not having a really standout talent like arm or speed. 90mph infield velocity probably gives him a borderline plus arm at shortstop. His top speed seems to play at SS/CF out of high school, but he wasn't getting a good jump at all. https://www.perfectgame.org/players/playerprofile.aspx?ID=355596 His RF/9 in the minors at SS shows promise, but like all Twins IF prospects, the high error rate shows up again. The Twins have him playing 3B in AA instead of shortstop because the team has no plan or direction and doesn't understand the value of training, repetition and practice at fielding positions. His K rate initially skyrocketed at AA, but over his last 10 games, it's settled back down. Honestly, I'm probably higher on him now that I was. If he wasn't in the Twins' system, he'd probably be a legit SS prospect right now. Enlow has the potential of being a starting pitcher whereas I don't think Sands really does. That's really what it comes down to in my opinion there. Enlow is going to have a lot of ground to make up next year and very little time to do it.

I was going to leave this alone, but no, really, I like seeing people pour an hour into a thoughtful write up explaining how the Twins could have traded for pitcher X and signed pitcher Y along with making various other moves and signings only to have you exclaim "Impossible! No pitcher will sign with Minnesota! Impossible! The Twins are a small market team and can't afford a budget greater than the old school 90s Taco Bell value menu $0.59, $0.79, $0.99! Impossible! No teams will trade for Minnesota prospects! Impossible! No team in baseball saw player Z's break out!" It's a waste of time to try and debate you.

Nice start from Griffin Jax again. Makes 4 in a row, even if the innings are a little short. I'm sure he's over the moon about tonights performance and the win. Even if the scouting reports and MLB bats catch up to him, you can't take games like tonight away from him. Some moves made in the minor league system today. I hope the front office's intentions start to emerge soon. I just can't see the value in seeing Simmons and Astudillo starting...

Great to see the rebound from Balazovic. I'm excited to get Simon Wood-Richardson in on the action and see Joe Ryan. Lots of moves should open the door for some fringe guys I hope! Also, found an 8/2 article from the Pioneer Press I hadn't seen before. Talks about Lewis being joined by Chase Petty and other guys (like Noah Miller). https://www.twincities.com/2021/08/02/rehabbing-twins-prospect-royce-lewis-determined-to-return-and-ball-out-like-people-have-never-seen-before/ Lewis has been running in the pool already, but he expects to begin jogging on land next week. Near the end of the month, he’ll travel to Minnesota to visit team physician Christopher Camp, where he hopes to get the go-ahead to progress his hitting and lateral movement. He plans to stay in Fort Myers through October and then report to spring training a month early in early-to-mid January to help him get some more at-bats under his belt.

Palacios' historical bat is pretty rough and he was legit awful for 2 years in Tampa. He does look really good this year, but he's also just turned 25 and he's in AA. If you project his bat into AAA and then MLB, there's a very real possibility his K% would jump quite a bit and his walk rate would plummet. Nick Gordon put up a 9.2% walk rate and 23.2% K rate in AA at age 22. I guess I'm just not sold that his new found power and plate discipline are a straight up product of talent rather than maturity. His defense has also slipped quite a bit in range factor this year, even accounting for the rock hands he showcased to start the season. It's tough to figure out what's going on for a casual fan like me who is relegated to stats as the scouting reports on Palacios have long since dried up. The lack of scouting on Palacios and his sudden emergence with what appears like a bat with some potential is intriguing and it's why I think the Twins need to find a spot for him at the MLB club as of 2 weeks ago. I haven't heard about Palacios bulking up, but it's one of the things a lot of scouts and fans wanted to see for a long time. It would explain a lot of the changes if he had packed on muscle, but I still believe he'll probably be heavily exposed at the plate against MLB pitching.

Where's that dead horse???? I just found my spare baseball bat!

Based on what I've read, would you consider Noah Miller to fall into a category of J.J. Hardy (with less arm since Hardy was throwing 91 off the mound in high school)? Hardy was never accused of having elite speed, but seemed to position himself well and he moved laterally really well, making tough plays look easy.

People don't give Escobar enough credit for his fielding at shortstop in my opinion as the metrics suggest Escobar was certainly solid, even arguably above average at the position. His career MLB numbers are .979 (avg .975) and 4.16 RF/9 (4.10 avg). Escobar also owns a career +2.4 UZR/150 at shortstop at the MLB level. Taking a deeper dive into Palacios' numbers, which look pretty rough this year, they may have been driven by unexpectedly high error rates. Palacios hasn't committed an error in 21 games now and only 3 in the past 44 games so a fielding percentage more like .981 and his RF/9 would probably jump to somewhere around 3.80, but traditionally, his RF/9 has been much higher. Escobar was billed as a slick fielding, glove first kind of shortstop whereas Palacios is considered a bit borderline at the position.

Keeping Pineda on the roster and pitching is totally defensible. The Twins already have 3 rookies in the rotation and 2 of the 3 are long shots to stick. They honestly don't have any MLB caliber starting pitcher candidates who aren't in the rotation right now. When Ryan is ready after his return from Tokyo, I expect he'll get a look. Thorpe will probably get a look if his velocity is there, Dobnak will probably be available at the end of the month. There aren't any legit options waiting for their shot right now.

I was using this for reference. Average throw speed 85mph+. Reference to an above average arm at 91mph in the minors. Noah Miller has an average arm for a shortstop based on the reference I was using. Not mediocre in general. It's not apparent he has a cannon for a shortstop like Sano has or even as good as Gordon's arm which was in the 90s from the mound. http://www.hsbaseballweb.com/pro-scouting/scouting_arms.htm#:~:text=Scouts grade arms visually%3B in,around 85 mph and higher.

Oh yeah, the way they had Garver play 1/2 to 1/3 of his games in the minors at utility positions and didn't give him a legitimate shot until they failed to protect Stuart Turner from the rule 5 draft, Jason Castro got injured, and their ill-advised free agent signing, Bobby Wilson, played like crap. The front office didn't defend Garver, instead allowing Molitor and Glen Perkins, among other pitchers, to take a nasty public swipes at the future starting catcher in 2017-2018. By the way, Garver made the call to a catcher framing coach, Tanner Swanson, not the Twins front office, and Garver spent the time working to improve himself. So Falvey does get credit for hiring the coach Garver reached out to for training, but it was Garver who was trying to seek an avenue of improvement. If it weren't for Garver's initiative and hard work while being publicly humiliated and largely ignored by this front office, he certainly wouldn't be starting for the Twins. This front office did just about everything they could to miss Garver's talent.

I don't think using Dollars/WAR is a good metric for evaluating free agency signings without context. Recognizing the fit for the signing is, in my opinion, step 1 in regard to evaluating free agents. If the Twins had signed only Cruz across the entire period, their free agent record would be impeccable using the Dollars/WAR metric; however, the front office's performance would be universally regarded as horrendous. The Twins did not sign the players they needed to advance in the playoffs. The front office built a team which was designed to potentially win the AL Central, a division with 3 teams actively rebuilding and 1 small market team in the twilight of their competitive window who decided not to start the rebuild only because of how weak the division already was. Unfortunately, a team capable of winning the AL Central is not a team which necessarily would have won in other divisions or the playoffs. It's also worth noting the Twins won the AL Central in 2020 by the absolute slimmest of margins. 2 teams were only 1 game back, folks.

I think the issue in regard to utility players is whether or not the player can cover shortstop and center field. In terms of elite shortstop prospects I'd define as players who are likely to be starting MLB shortstops, the Twins have nothing. In order of rank of likelihood, I'd say Lewis a22 AA (med/low) - Pros: Range, arm. Negs: Bat, Glove, ACL recovery Miller a18 Rk (low) - Pros: Scouted Bat, Fluid, Range. Negs: Arm, Speed, No pro track record Martin a22 AA (very low) - Pros: Very Good Bat. Negs: Arm, Speed Gordon a25 AAA (remote) - Pros: Could fill out, Arm. Negs: Very poor glove, Range, Bat Palacios a25 AA (remote) - Pros: Could fill out, Speed, Arm. Negs: Glove, Range, Bat Javier a22 A+ (remote) - Pros: Speed, Range, Arm. Negs: Very weak bat. Cavaco a20 A- (remote) - Pros: Arm, Speed. Negs: Very poor glove, Very weak bat I ranked Lewis above Martin despite Martin being very likely to be an MLB starter because I don't think Martin's physical tools will play at SS. Lewis is much less likely to ever be an MLB starter with serious questions emerging about his bat, but Lewis has superior athleticism. Lewis has about a 1/2 season to prove himself and there is a lot he needs to prove. 2022 is a make or break season for him. Either his stock will soar back up the charts or expectations will plummet. I don't see a middle ground considering his age, missed time and last performance. Noah Miller has a mediocre, arm for a shortstop with maximum throwing speed at 89mph and his speed isn't outstanding, but scouting reports say he moves well laterally contributing to good range. He could stick at shortstop, but needs to be careful about adding weight in the pursuit of added strength so he can maintain the needed range for the position. I rated him low because, well, MLB shortstops do not grow on trees. Much better prospects than Miller have flamed out and until there's some pro track record to evaluate, he's not going to get a vote of high confidence.

Palacios is very unlikely to be an MLB caliber starting shortstop. Gordon is blocking him at AAA right now, but I'd be okay with the Twins calling Palacios up directly from AA to get a peek at him. Seth reminded me Palacios is a free agent at the end of the year if he's not on the 40 man roster.

I don't know as I've seen much of the clean house sentiment to be honest. Plenty of frustration and eroded confidence, though. I think the frustration is warranted. I think 2022 is probably the season in which fans will start calling for Falvey and Levine to be walked out the door if things go poorly.

They had 2 starting pitchers with regular season ERAs of 3.18 and 3.58 that year. They won all 3 WS games where those pitchers pitched. Also, sometimes crazy stuff happens. I don't think MLB owners/mangement should rely upon luck. The Twins are not remotely close to small market.

My bullish-ness on Baez has been tanking lately. I'm actually pretty concerned about Baez at this point. His K rate is getting extreme and he's offering at 47% of pitches outside the zone now this season with a brutally low 62% overall contact rate and whiff rate cruising past 20%... I mean... those numbers make Nick Gordon's look solid. There are a lot of other free agent shortstop options out there.