Sielk

Or waiting for the trainer.

Joe Ryan is fun to watch. TB probably couldn't find a way to get all of their prospects on the 40-man roster and was willing to overpay. But what a return for Cruz. And I gotta say, I am positively surprised by his slider and changeup. The scouting reports made it sound like these were not really MLB quality but he has thrown some very nasty looking ones.

Agree, it's great to see. He was certainly put in an unfair situation when they called him up way too early. But apparently he took it as a learning experience and is now hitting better than he ever did before. I still hope they can extend Buxton. But if they indeed accomplish that I wonder if Kepler could be on the trading block instead. In fact I could see Celestino fill the Kepler role on this team as an okay hitting outfielder that backs up Buxton in center and plays the corner otherwise (if they keep Buck and trade Kepler, that is). Maybe not right away but in the long term.

At this point I would like to just give Winder a shot as part of the rotation. The Twins probably won't do it, they rarely seem to be aggressive with promotions unless an injury at the major league level forces them to be. But he has been a consistent performer, has a deep arsenal, control over it and throws 95-97 mph from what I have heard. I feel like he has the least amount of question marks of all the top SP prospects we have in the high minors and I wouldn't be surprised if he performs relatively well right away. Ober should be a lock and the Twins are too thin at SP to not have Ryan in the rotation as well. Even if he struggles, would you rather have a Happ/Shoemaker type starting over him? Regarding Dobnak, I would prefer to have him as a 6th starter at least on opening day. Injuries will come soon enough and I like him better as depth than someone you pencil in.

Yes, very encouraging. After the last outing that was my main concern, but if he can keep up 92-93 mph through an entire start, I am totally fine with that.

Nice to see Buxton get back on track. I really hope they get that extension done. I also have no problem giving him huge incentives on basis of games played. When Buck is healthy, he is a superstar. Also, hitting looks too easy for Jorge Polanco. Swing... double. Swing... home run. Swing... oh yeah, he adds another double. Fun game so far!

I don't blame him at all for taking that opportunity. I definitely would have done it as well, in his place. I was just commenting how disappointing it is that he essentially missed 1 1/2 month of the season and still didn't get to pitch even a single inning in relief in the Olympics, let alone a start. Maybe the experience alone was still worth it to him but I would have been a little bit frustrated if I had gone to Tokyo only to sit in the dugout. And maybe you're right and the effect on his development will be minimal, considering he is still rather young for AA. I guess I am just a bit annoyed that one of our few top SP prospects that didn't get injured still missed a lot of time this season and wasn't even rewarded for it in the form of an Olympic appearance.

He didn't get to pitch during the Olympics and had to ramp up again to a starter's workload. It's really annoying. Essentially, I don't mind prospects going to the Olympics. But to have him go to Tokyo and thus miss a month of valuable development time only to have him sit on the bench and then miss another month of valuable development time because he has to ramp up again? That's so stupid...

I agree, the last thing I would want the Twins to do is signing another bunch of stop-gaps that only block young pitchers. Especially because this FO has so far shown a lot of reluctance to simply release/trade veterans that are clearly not part of the solution. There always seems to be a fear that the vets might still be needed and thus the Shoemakers and Caves of the world are kept far too long. One exception: If the Twins find a legitimate frontline starter in FA that would actually be willing to sign a reasonable long-term contract here, they should absolutely do it. If there is one thing we have learned from past years, it's that signing a top SP is far easier said than done. It would be too bad if the Twins didn't sign a starter right now, only to find out next year that none of the top starters in that class wants to come here.

It's not just the Twins, apparently it's a Minnesota sports thing. The Wild just drafted a player named Carson Lambos in the first round.

Sounds like an interesting class. Just from reading the scouting reports I am a bit more excited about Mercedes and Herrera. But who knows, maybe Bryan Acuna becomes as good as his brother. You never know with these 16-year-old prospects. I would imagine there are quite a few 16-year-old pitchers in this class who will turn out to be really good. The problem is projecting who that will be. I mean, even drafting HS pitchers is incredibly risky and these guys are two years younger. All teams will no doubt sign pitchers as well. But at this age pitching prospects are probably just too raw to rank them as high as position players who are somewhat easier to project.

I didn't watch his start too closely but I think he was at 88 mph the first inning or so and a bit higher after that. Mostly around 90, with 91 occasionally mixed in. But still, that's rather low to be a viable Major League starter, especially since his offspeed pitches aren't spectacular either, as far as I know. I don't think it would hurt to give him one last look but what kind of a future has he here? The fact that he is out of options drastically limits his value as a bullpen arm next year. And do they really want plan with him in the rotation when, at least to me, his upside doesn't seem that much higher than Barnes' or Jax's? Anyway, I really hope to see Joe Ryan for some starts this year, even if he doesn't get the one on Wednesday.

I would argue that protecting Enlow is pretty much a no-brainer. During the season you can stash him on the IL and they'll be able to maneuver around his roster spot in the offseason. There are just a whole bunch of fringe players that I would cut before risk losing a talented young starter like Enlow.

Personally, I would put Cavaco at 11 and Winder in the top ten. I'm still high on Cavaco but for me, he just needs to show a little bit more actual production to rank him that high. And that's not a knock on him, it's just because the other prospects are so good, too. Speaking of the top ten, I find it really hard rank them. If you told me about literally any of those guys that he will have the best career of them all, I would have no trouble believing you.