tony&rodney

Keith Law has his first mock pick up today. He has White Sox taking Emerson, Rays taking Cholowsky, and Twins taking Lackey. Sounds like it is a four player list for top of the draft.

All three are injured. Culpepper is playing through an injury as the Saints DH.

Yah, I'm hoping against hope. Right? Banda will give way in a few weeks to .... anyone.

We see once again why Wallner is suited to be a DH only.

Ruiz looked susceptible to pitch at the top of the zone. Announcers discussed Sim having trouble with splitter this season. What gets thrown? A splitter in Ruiz's favorite spot. Oh well. Clean it up Banda.

Trading either is a good idea, but only if the return is worthwhile. The Twins do not need any more DH guys, bench players, or soft-tossing pitchers. Ryan has another year before he is a free agent and Jeffers is worth a QO if he maintains his year, despite the extremely high cost. The Twins books are pretty clean. I do agree both should be traded but want decent prospects/players coming back.

Man, mental mistakes this inning = really bad. Martin overruns 3rd base and could have run home as soon as that throw left the cutoff hand because it was a really long throw. Nunez should have turned and run that ball in before throwing but Martin panicked and took his eye off the ball. Keaschall throws home when there is zero chance for a play. Runner moves up and scores on sac fly. The mental mistakes are what this team needs to eliminate

I don't mind the TV announcers, but find myself turning off the sound. They on and on for an inning about Royce Lewis getting back to being a star. I always want every Twin to do well because I'm a Twins fan. I hoped for Julien to do well just like I hope for Lewis. The conversation of Lewis as a star and critical piece of the team was overblown hype though. Does any one want Lewis to do poorly? Has he ever been considered amongst the top ten third basemen? I don't remember an inning long tribute/advertisement for Julien. Let Royce earn his position back. We know Tristan Gray isn't going to receive a long run. Lewis will be back in the lineup this weekend. Hopefully he discovered something watching a couple of games.

What stands out? Young has physical talent: strong arm, power, fast, quick - can't teach that. Now, Young needs to learn the difficult skills that come from experience.

Exactly.

Ok. Trial by fire. Seems like he could not be as flat as Garcia. The Twins are looking for answers. I can't blame them for trying out arms. Wish Gomez the best.

Until the Twins front office makes the changes that result in the team having solid gloves at all or at least most positions this will remain a Catch-22. The pitchers job is to create weak contact and if they try to strike everyone out, they will fail. The extra effort often reduces command which results in ... bang. There is only one Paul Skenes. Morris needs to work on increasing ground balls even though the infield is porous because next year or soon thereafter there will be defenders ready to turn those balls in outs and double plays. I like Morris quite a bit but he needs experience.

While I agree with this and will add that pitch sequencing is what specifically Morris was working on when pitching for St. Paul, I do think it is important that Morris execute all of his pitches. I wanted a high fastball in off the plate on pitch one. Even though we both disagreed with the call, putting the pitch in a tough location is most important.

Morris is due for some better luck. The last 3 years I have watched him suffer the fate of many broken bat hits and poor defense behind him. Morris needs to 1) pick up his teammates lack of defensive skill and 2) get better luck. It is too early to know what type of career Morris has, but he could fit in the pen or as a rotation piece. Inexperienced pitchers need to adjust to MLB hitters and get firm command of multiple pitches. Morris is a work in progress. Clayton Kershaw gave up more hits and had less strike outs than innings pitched with an ERA over four in his first season. We know Morris is nowhere near that talent level but it takes time to learn. Patience.

Never hurts to see what a pitcher can do with another opportunity if the guy has decent stuff. This guys does have stuff. Let's see what he does for St. Paul.

The obvious obstacle to trading Joe Ryan (or Jeffers, etc.) is the return in talent. We have no idea what was or is being offered for any Twins by another team. It is one thing to trade a relief pitcher for a top 100 prospect (former at least) or a gain top perceived talent that needs a change in venue. It is another thing to trade a TOR starting pitcher with control. What is the return? A top 100 guy could be similar to Abel, Morris, Rojas, Prielipp, Culpepper, Rodriguez. Do the Twins need more players to compete with those guys for playing time? How does that improve the team? I'm wondering if the Twins can acquire a top 10-20 prospect with a package of Joe Ryan plus a couple of prospects that add value like CJ Culpepper and Charlee Soto? I would want a top guy. Last winter I made a tongue in cheek suggestion for a trade that everyone knew had zero chance of being discussed much less being done. I said that I was willing to trade Ryan, Matthews, Lewis, Lee, Wallner, and Rodriguez for Konnor Griffin and Jared Jones. Of course that was ridiculous but top talent plays long term. That is the idea at least. The rumors last July of Franklin Arias and others (names like one of Tolle, Early, Mayer, Abreu) were interesting but we don't know is any of these guys were discussed or offered. Further, perhaps the Twins weren't listening or pushing at all. As Major League Ready suggested above, a fantastic offer passed up would have been shortsighted. In conclusion, there is simply no reason to trade Joe Ryan for future bench players or relievers. I'm in on a gamble trade that chases a top prospect, but believe the Twins already have enough prospects in their system that profile as backend top 100 or top 200 players. Further, a long term contract for Joe Ryan doesn't seem necessary or actually even possible. I have a ton of confidence in Ryan to deliver excellent starts. Does another team have that same belief and is willing to trade their top prospect? Until then, I'll just enjoy watching Ryan.

A few brief observations from watching parts of games: The Saints are punishing the ball. Plenty of good plate appearances all through the lineup. Alex Jackson looks pretty good behind the plate and has hit the ball hard on a number of occasions recently. I was thinking that he may have been disappointed to not make the Minnesota Twins squad but has settled in comfortably with the Saints and must be pretty satisfied to have that sweet contract. Jackson can help a MLB team when the opportunity arises. Hendry Mendez looked really good. He hit a screamer for an out, another shot for a double, had two fantastic plate appearances for walks, and looked reasonably comfortable in the field, moving his feet athletically. He looked like he did not want to walk in his last time up. One of the most difficult skills to learn is to focus on every trip to the plate, not giving away those chances to hit. Mendez impressed me more than he did for Wichita, although I liked how he performed for the Wind Surge as well. Riley Quick has tools. Batters sat on his fastball and when Quick executed he still managed well with the heater. He needs more command with his pitches which is perfectly normal and to be expected. Quick is a big guy and he could be real tough in another year. Winokur was smooth at shortstop yesterday and looked good at the plate as well. The swing is always a challenge for him and he looks to be working on shortening up a bit. Yasser Mercedes is healthy and looking to be promoted. Cedar Rapids should be his home by early June. He has some skills and just needs a ton of game experiences and refinement.

Good question. I'm not sure. His stuff is focused on keeping batters off balance. There isn't any time he blows people away with velocity. Trevor Hoffmann used a change up as his primary pitch as does Devin Williams, but they both used a fastball on occasions. Ober is still mostly effective for 5 innings and often more. This is a key year for him personally as he approaches a greater income gain through arbitration. I wondered what other teams thought of Ober last winter in terms of his trade value. Perhaps the Twins have a greater value on Bailey than others though. I was miffed a bit with how Ober just ran out of gas last night.

Ober is confusing. He was rolling along and seemed to run out of energy. He looks like he could pitch all day, but he tires quickly at times.

Bailey Ober is a weird plate appearance for hitters. He looks like he could fire the ball past you and then throws all types of off speed stuff that never seems to be in the middle of the zone when he is going strong. Hitters are off balance much of the time and struggle to get a good swing away versus Ober's offerings. A young team meets the wait for it pitcher. Lazy fly balls and pop ups follow, hopefully.

Well, Fedko is a guy that is easy to like because he does a little bit of everything decently. The big mark against him is he swings and misses against better pitching (imo) and that makes it hard for him to be a distinct plus. I hope he gets a shot at some point this season. It is always difficult to predict injuries, trades, and dfa's.

Best player available is a no brainer.

The timing of the article is interesting. Lewis hit a timely sac fly last night and made a couple of decent plays in the field. Royce has been a darling of Twins fans. Despite the injuries, seldom do players get as long of a leash for playing time as Lewis has during the last three years. Tristan Gray, no HOF guy himself, must be a little jealous. Baseball is a game of overcoming failure and Lewis has fallen into such bad habits at the plate with his legs that he actually might be served best by a reset in Ft. Myers, followed by yet another trial run. Linus (in his comments on page one) writes, more or less, how I have viewed Lewis for a couple of years. I do and have thought that Brooks Lee is suited for third base. Culpepper won't likely arrive before some time in June if he keeps progressing and displays enough skill to satisfy the Minnesota front office that he is ready to hold down shortstop. Still a month before the Twins make a bunch of changes.

Curious if you have watched more than a few Saints games? I watch most of the Saints games.

A number of players need to go on the IL before Sabato even gets brought up in a conversation. The guy can hit a grooved pitch. I watched the Saints game last night and wondered what the Las Vegas pitchers were doing throwing it middle middle to Sabato. The last pitcher did not. Glad Sabato had a big game. He is still working on the dream. Also, Sabato cannot play first base, he is a DH. Tonight, Ober will provide quite the contrast from Taj Bradley. Meanwhile the Twins face a struggling pitcher after crushing a guy coming off consecutive 10 K outings. What will be the hitting strategy?