markos

Something to think about with regard to high school pitchers: How often does the consensus best high school arm going into the draft actually turn into the best pitcher? For some examples: 2007: Best HS arm (according to BA) was Rick Porcello, who was #2 pitcher overall after David Price. 4th best HS pitcher (9th best pitcher overall, and 6th pitcher taken) was Madison Bumgarner. 2010: Best HS arm was Jameson Taillon, who was considered neck-and-neck with Manny Machado for #2 prospect behind Bryce Harper. At pick #34 and #38 the Blue Jays draft Aaron Sanchez and Noah Syndergaard. 2011: Best HS arm was Dylan Bundy (and best overall pitcher according to BA) in loaded 2011 class. 5th best HS pitcher (12th best pitcher, 20th best overall, 7th pitcher taken overall) was Jose Fernandez. I'm not say that the Twins should avoid Greene at all costs. If it turns out that he is clearly the best player in a lackluster class, then by all means pick him. But if there is serious doubt about the best player, I think the better strategy is to take the position player 1-1 and load up on high-upside arms in the later picks.

Does anyone know how Greene stacks up against other top HS pitchers of the past few years? Guys like Giolito, Bundy, and Taillon.

There are a few. It is hard to go back and compare against different eras, but guys like Jake Westbrook, Doug Fister and Tanner Roark all found success with below-average minor league strikeout rates. Sonny Gray (in his limited minor league career) also struggled. So it definitely isn't a death sentence, especially since it sounds like his stuff is more or less still intact from high school. I've been very low on Stewart for a years now, but I have to admit that there were some encouraging signs this year. First and foremost, he stayed healthy and threw almost 150 innings. Considering that so much of the battle for HS pitchers is staying healthy, this is an encouraging sign. Second, he did show improvement when repeating A+. Third, he continued to limit homers and get ground balls in AA. I wasn't sure how much of that was a product of the suppressed offensive environment in the Florida State League, so it was nice to see that continue at AA. All in all, I think signs are now stronger that he will contribute at some level in the big leagues. His ceiling is still low - certainly lower than you would expect with a #4 pick.

Sure. But I was factoring in that even a below-average GM, given 20 roster spots and $90M, should be able to scrape together an additional 10 WAR. Look at this terrible Twins team. If Dozier, Sano, Buxton, Kepler, Gibson and Berrios had combined for 30 WAR, the remaining players on this team, the worst team in baseball, (Grossman, Rosario, Nunez, Escobar, Santana, etc...) would have been enough to be in wildcard contention.

The argument for emulating the Cubs is that they have acquired and developed a cost-controlled core (Bryant, Rizzo, Russell, Baez, Arrieta, Hendricks) that you can basically pencil in for 30 WAR and will cost less than $25M both this season and next. At essentially any payroll level, that core is enough to put a team into contention. The Cubs financial resources are an advantage, but right now it is basically just pushing them from a 90+ team to a 100+ team. Of course, it will play a bigger roll after 2017 as they have to keep this core together.

Hard to know right now if this is a good pick or not, but I'm cautiously optimistic. A lot will depend on who stays/goes in the org, and who he brings in from the outside. I feel like we will know more in another month.

There were two recent examples from last fall. David Stearns left the Astros at the end of September even though they were still in the middle of the playoff race. And Billy Eppler left the Yankees in the beginning of October just before their playoff game. In both cases, they left for clear promotions. Echoing what Brock said, I also believe that lateral moves are discouraged while a person is still under contract.

I don't mean to be too negative here, but isn't this 100% on the development staff? Someone should have made the determination that he needed to get this fixed when he was in the minors. This is another example where it seems that development and promotions are determined by minor league success and less by preparedness for the majors.

Piggy-backing on diehardtwinsfan, I am definitely adjusting my priors based on the past few weeks of rumors. At the start of this process, I felt very strongly that: 1) There are only 30 jobs available, so almost by definition this position would be desirable. 2) I didn't expect that many candidates would turn the position down, and I didn't think anyone who wasn't currently a GM or POBO would decline to be interviewed. 3) I thought that the vote of confidence for Molitor in 2017 was essentially meaningless and at worse an extremely minor point. I am starting to seriously doubt all three. I am shocked - SHOCKED! - that both Cherrington and AA not just turned down the position but declined to even be interviewed. Individually they are kind of understandable - Cherrington more so - but I'm still very surprised. There has been a lot of rumors from various media sources that have really muddled the idea of what the position will actually be. Some have indicated that the new POBO would report to Dave St. Peter. Maybe the reason so many qualified candidates are declining the position early in the process is because the role being presented is very different than what the title would indicate. Similarly, the obsession with Molitor has made me wonder if the expectation is that the manager would have more voice in the player acquisition/development process than most organizations currently employ (and this would play into my own suspicions that Gardy had significant sway in decisions when Bill Smith was GM). In all, this is starting to feel a bit like the Angels GM position last year, where it was very clear to everyone that the new GM would be limited by a meddlesome owner and a powerful manager.

Really? That is a pretty big change. Across the league, the Director of Baseball Operations is a spot below GM. For example, Farhan Zaidi had that title with the A's when Billy Beane was GM. Also, see http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/mlb-big-league-stew/cubs-hire-25-old-director-baseball-operations-010712430--mlb.html

I don't think they will have to wait too long. David Stearns was hired by the Brewers on September 21st while the Astros were in the midst of a pennant race. The Angels hired Billy Eppler on October 4th, two days before their wildcard game.

I kind of disagree with this take. As you alluded in the original article, going into this season there were two big question marks with Jay: will his stuff hold up as a starter, and will his body hold up. From everything I've read (and please correct me if I'm wrong), the answer to the first question was 'yes'. His velocity was still above-average as a starter, and his breaking stuff was still above-average to plus. And he kept his stuff throughout starts despite regularly throwing 90+ pitches and facing 20+ batters. That was one pretty big hurdle that he needed to cross, and I think that he cleared it. But the question of durability is still pretty open. He was injured and shut down early. Well, that obviously isn't good. But pitchers get hurt all the time, so it is hard to know if this injury is strong evidence one way or the other about starting. It isn't a good sign, that's for sure. But it certainly isn't a death sentence on his starting career. So in his path on transitioning to a starter, I think, overall, that it is less doubtful than at the start of the season. More doubt with durability for sure, but the is a lot less doubt about his stuff. So I feel like Jay moved one full step forward (stuff held up!) and a half step back (sore shoulder). And that is a net positive.

3. The POBO decided that they needed time to evaluate Antony (and others), and the best way to do that is to leave them in place. 4. The POBO's top choice for GM is currently unavailable due to contract constraints, and they decided to temporarily hang on to Antony until said person is available.

Sano and Buxton are free agents after the 2021 season. Kepler after 2022. They have a couple years yet before they need to start worrying about their window closing and making panic moves.

I think they were many very, very clear mistakes. You can argue about some (the Greinke signing and the Miller trade, for example) But the AZ front office clearly did not know the rules in many cases. They offered trades that were illegal. They didn't know the rules of international signings. They lost decent players via inexplicable 25-/40-man roster moves. There are many other examples, both rumors and in the public, that do not need the benefit of hindsight. There is a basic level of competency that they did not demonstrate.

I think a better "cautionary tale" for the Twins isn't the Diamondbacks but rather the Padres. AJ Preller came in with a plan to putting a winning team on the field ASAP, gutted the farm system of almost all the old regime's prospects, and had most of those moves blow up in his face. They are now pretty terrible and basically rebuilding the farm system from scratch. It isn't hard to see a scenario with this Twins team where the new GM is hired, in part, due to the promise of a quick turn-around, and subsequently the farm system is used to acquire middling, older players to try to compete next year. In my view, that would be a mistake and the team should really be building for 2018+ for contention (though some smaller moves on the margins to improve the rotation/bullpen could certainly go a long way in 2017).

I suspect that they are gone, but I can see a decent argument that they deserve one more year due to the injuries they've had to deal with this season.

There is a theory out there that the ball has changed, and the version used in the minors is different than the one in the majors. This has been a common explanation for the current home run spike. Keith Law (and maybe others?) have mentioned this as an possible explanation for why rookie pitchers across baseball are doing poorly this year. This is arguably the worst that rookie starters as a class have performed since 2009. http://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=all&stats=sta&lg=all&qual=0&type=8&season=2016&month=0&season1=2005&ind=2&team=0,ss&rost=0&age=0&filter=&players=0

This is a little off-topic, but is AA on your shortlist?

I am down on the Rays and Astros. Rays have seemed rudderless over the past few seasons (especially since Friedman and Maddon left) and have really struggled to develop their own draft picks. Interesting fact - the Rays have only won 9 more games than the Twins since 2013. I think the Astros have made a lot of questionable decisions over the past few seasons. They took Appel over Bryant, had the messy situation with Aiken, traded a lot for Carlos Gomez, traded a ton for Ken Giles, gave up arguably too early on several players like JD Martinez, Grossman, Villar, Carter, decided to go with 4 starters with sub-90s fastballs. They are currently an 85 win team with a substantial core (Altuve, Springer, Keuchel) that all pre-date the current regime.

I agree with wsnydes. This is the right move. Now they just need to pick the right person.

This is why any discussion about trading Dozier needs to define the goals for the trade. Looking specifically for a pitcher or pitchers that can help in 2017 is very different than targeting a window of contention that starts in 2019. For example, the Yankees can't really help with the former but could with the latter. Advocating for trading Dozier to improve pitching is easy. The hard part (or fun part, your mileage may vary) is determining (arguing over) what kind of pitching: how much? how good? how soon? how long? etc.

Not at the deadline but maybe this offseason (I'm a big believer in the inflated price at the deadline so I'd want more if they moved him a month ago). I think part of my opinion is that I really liked Holmes in the 2014 draft (I considered him a legitimate option at #5), so that probably clouds my judgement a little bit. But I think this package, in the abstract, is essentially what will be on the table for Dozier: one pitching prospect ~#50 overall plus one or two B/B- pieces.

I think the Dodgers are the only realistic option, and they did pay a fairly steep price (in pitching prospects) when they traded with the A's at the deadline. So I think they will be willing to trade. They have multiple infield holes to fill (Turner and Utley are both free agents), and I don't think they have any obvious internal option that is ready to step in right now. Dozier would be a good player to bridge the gap for them at either position even with Kendrick still under contract. And they have the pitching prospects that would make the trade attractive from the Twins perspective. The big question is if they are willing to part with one of De Leon or Alvarez. I'm skeptical - a high-payroll team like the Dodgers probably keeps their A prospects (potential stars) but trades their Bs (potential regulars) - but I could see a De Leon + something (maybe Barnes?) swap being worth it for the Twins. The Mets are probably out. I don't think they have the minor league pitching, and given the injuries to their starters this year they probably aren't going to give up a young guy like Matz for Dozier. The other teams with major 2B needs (Royals, Angels, White Sox) don't have the prospects or players to make it worthwhile, unless you think a guy like Fulmer from the White Sox would suffice. Maybe Fulmer and Alec Hansen? I don't see any other team in the win-now category that has a big need at 2B. And I don't know how much a team will be willing to pay for just an incremental upgrade. Teams like the Giants, Rangers and Blue Jays have solid young players. Are they going to be willing to pay top dollar to go from 2 WAR to 4 WAR at 2B when they could use the same resources to try to fix a more glaring hole?

I can see why you might think that, but the argument that this writer put forth was a little more nuanced. Basically, shortish pitchers like Berrios need to create a fair amount of momentum and burst from their lower half in order to (in his opinion) safely generate arm speed. If the top-half (arms, shoulders) are moving too slow, it ends up lagging behind the lower half. That lack of sync causes the release point to be behind and pitches to drift armside. I wish you could see the article. He added a couple of nice gifs that contrasted two pitches against different lefties. They may have been cherry-picked, but even to my untrained eye I could see a subtle difference between them. Basically, if you look at where Berrios's arm is when his left foot hits the ground, you can see that his arm is just a little bit behind on a arm-side miss than when he throws a good strike.