stringer bell

Shades of Jorge Alcalá (August ‘24).

It is great to see Buxton demonstrating his elite speed. SSS, but he still runs further down the line than anyone when sprinting to first, so he still seems to have a bit of a problem slowing the freight train down, but the speed is legit and compared to just about every other player on the roster, it is otherworldly. It wasn't classic Bailey Ober yesterday, but he got through four innings and only allowed a solo homer to score. Pretty gritty. I've seen a couple references to his velocity, but 91-92 on a cool day in early April looks about right for him. I continue to wonder what the Twins have in Topa. There is some funk to his delivery and if he can keep making hitters pound ground balls, he should be all right. In addition, he's only had one healthy season in the majors and he's 34 years old, so I think that will be a worry. It's hard to trust Alcalá or Varland. Alcalá can blow up out of nowhere and Louie er Louis allows a lot of hard hit balls, but as middle men all three guys (including Topa) look satisfactory. In one or two run games, it looks like Sands, Jax and Durán are the obvious choices.

The bullpen is looking pretty good. Alcalá seems to be either dominating or very concerning. He walked up to the brink today, but recovered to work a scoreless inning. The offense has looked mostly feeble, with a few big innings and they really need to put more pressure on the other team.

Nick Gordon acquired by the Royals. He could be back in the AL Central soon. https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2025/04/royals-acquire-nick-gordon.html

I've been pretty downbeat on Miranda in this thread. I'll say this now if he's in the right situation, he could thrive. Put him on an athletic team where all he has to do it hit and he might fit right in. I'm thinking Cardinals or Orioles. As far as a package goes, I think the Twins could possibly deal someone currently in the rotation with team control because the options at Triple A are pretty good.

Under the current rules, the Twins did the prudent thing. Dobnak made the Opening Day roster precisely because he was a minor asset who they wouldn't lose in a DFA. The Twins get to keep Dobnak in their system for future use and Dobnak continues to be well-paid as a 4A pitcher. Nobody loses. Randy Dobnak pitched on a big league stage and had an audition for 30 major league teams. Good for him. He accrued a few additional days of service time, also good for him. Since his minor league "home" is just a short commute, there was little uprooting in his life. This particular scenario is about as good as it gets for both the player and team. Other end of the roster transactions are not as benign. Players who get DFA'd three and four times and never make the major league roster is another story altogether IMHO. The move from one minor league team to another and get constantly uprooted and they don't make big league pay. Another scenario is guys who get called up to start a single game--three ex-Twins come to mind (Chi Chi Gonzalez, Tommy MIlone and Devin Smeltzer). These guys have been in the spot start business at some point in their careers, without the guaranteed contract that makes Dobnak pretty much untouchable. They start a game and are promptly DFA'd, maybe if they pitch well someone else will claim them. If not, they are unclaimed and go back to the minors. The better they pitch, the more likely someone claims them. The Twins have used a couple guys like that as well, but their names escape me right now. The other factors in all of this is pay and benefits. I think players on the 40-man roster have a higher base than other minor leaguers (not sure) and I think perhaps changes could be made wherein someone on the 40-man is guaranteed a certain number of days on the 40-man roster when claimed or selected or maybe granting some number of service time days if claimed or selected. This might slow the DFA merry-go-round a bit. Minimum big-league salary is a lot of money and a great reward for pursuing your dream. I think the business will always treat the fringe players less well than those who are or could be stars. Assigning higher minimum service time and major league pay for transactions makes sense to me to make the players a little less disposable. One of the worst things about today's MLB is position players pitching. If rules changes could be made to eliminate this practice, I'd be all in favor of them. Of course, it might tie in with end-of-roster transactions, but eliminating position player pitching would be a step forward IMHO.

Do you really believe that Rocco consults his laptop and signals in every pitch? I really don't. Pete and the pitcher might consult on what to throw, but the pitcher and catcher don't have time to look to the dugout for every pitch. There's plenty to debate about any big league manager and Baldelli isn't without flaws, but this managing from a laptop stuff is overblown.

I think the fact that Brown is throwing might have a part in the decision.

It looked the second homer was on a pretty good pitch. Not so much, the first one.

I’m as big a Pablo fan as you will find. I think he would tell you he wasn’t on top of his game. I thought his second outing was much better, efficient but still not dominant.

Pablo gave up four runs in 5 innings. The runs were ruled unearned because of his own error. He only finished five innings and threw a lot of pitches. For a #1 starter that isn’t a good outing. I believe he allowed eight hit as well.

The first twelve games last year the Twins were 4-8 and nobody was hitting. So far, pretty much the same thing. I'm sure they'll regress to the mean, but Miranda has clearly reinforced where his deficiencies lie. I'd like to see a more athletic and powerful team and Miranda really isn't either of those things.

Two views above. Put me more with the OP. Miranda has moments, but there's a lot of inconsistency. Add in that he is a slow runner with limited power and not a gifted defender and you have a guy that has to really hit well and we haven't seen enough of that. His career hasn't justified middle-of-the-order placement and he needs to be a middle-of-the-order hitter to overcome his deficiencies.

Depends on who you want to compare HB to. He's one HR short of Manuel Margot's production for the entire season (more than 350 PAs) and he's already got 8 RBI (in 6 games). I still don't expect great offense from him, but he looks like a definite step up from Margot.

Every pitcher in McCaughan's position is happy to get the major league service time and eventually he'll get a chance to audition for 30 big league teams for a more permanent role. Dobnak's position is slightly different because of his contract. He will accept DFA after DFA and remain in the Twins organization unless another club wants to take on his contract.

It might be Miranda. He's not swung the bat well, but Rocco doesn't bury his players.

Niko Goodrum signed a minor league deal with the Mets. https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2025/04/mets-sign-jon-singleton-niko-goodrum-to-minor-league-deals.html

All the teams in the Central have only played six games. It is way early to make final judgments. That said, there's plenty to be concerned about. The Twins played a middle-of-the-road team and a bad team in six games and only won two, and they were beaten pretty soundly in all four losses. The starting pitching had three bad starts, one meh, one pretty good and one better than good start. That isn't enough good pitching. The bullpen let one game get away and allowed opponents to add on a couple times, so not very good. The hitting has been abysmal, but the worst offenders are guys with records of being good hitters. Finally, the defense doesn't look any better in the infield. On the plus side, newcomers Bader and France have been outstanding and satisfactory respectively. Byron Buxton has started six straight games in center field and the Twins haven't dug a hole despite a cold start.

The Twins finished their first road trip of the year with a flourish, winning twice in cold wet Chicago and coming home with a 2-4 record, meaning all five AL Central teams are tied at 2-4. They face Houston in their Home Opener tomorrow with a forecast of 43 degrees and mostly cloudy skies. We all know that Baldelli doesn't stick with one lineup and that for two years he has strictly alternated his catchers. Given that information, I have tried to figure out what tomorrow's starting lineup will be. Here is what I have come up with: First of all, since it's the Home Opener, I doubt that any player will be given a rest day, including Byron Buxton, who has started all six games so far this year. Secondly, it's early, but Harrison Bader is swinging the bat as well or better than any player on the team, so I think he gets a start at a corner outfield spot. Thirdly, Edouard Julien has a couple hits and survived playing second base without any real issues. He is swinging the bat better than Jose Miranda and Mickey Gasper. I think he gets the nod at second base, with Willi Castro at third and Miranda riding the pine. So here is my best estimate of a starting lineup: Wallner RF, Correa SS, Buxton CF, Larnach DH, Jeffers C, Castro 3B, France 1B, Julien 2B, Bader LF, and Joe Ryan pitching. Does anyone else have different ideas? Go Twins!

It’s not a sure thing the Twins will win with two innings to go, especially in weird elements. The Twins put together a five-run inning with two outs yesterday just by putting the ball in play and getting a couple of free passes.

Five in the books. The mighty AL Central moves closer to having a five-way tie for first (through last).

Do they suspend games at this point, or could they wash out the whole thing. Correa could still be hitless.

Like they did for Buxton? Now BB is talking about playing his entire career with the Twins. “Purposely manipulate” means one thing to a player and agent and another to the team. I’ll put it this way—if Durán is bad enough to be removed from the closer role, the team would certainly consider demotion as a reset and the service time component would absolutely figure in.

I think it is fine to rest either against lefties unless and until they show they can hit lefty relievers. I’m glad both got the chance to hit against LH relievers today.

Not optimum with the Opener tomorrow in Minnesota. This team is still licking their wounds from four straight losses to start the season. I don't know why they'd want to play the White Sox today as opposed to later in the season.