Thrylos

Not only bunting. I just looked at his July numbers. He had a .335 OBP. And had 11 hits, 8 of which were singles, 2 doubles plus 5 walks. So 15 SB opportunities. Guess what? He tried to steal twice and was thrown out once. Pretty ridiculous with that speed. What would Rickey do? (and Buxton has Rickey speed and at least Rickey intellect.) Something is wrong here big time.

The thing here is that, unlike the Twins, lots of teams trade their prospects who get developed by other teams, which is the equalizing factor in this situation...

I get these points. But about half of the teams that drafted below the Twins from 2008-11, actually did better than the Twins. There was an interesting similar comment arguing that the teams that drafted higher in each draft (like the Nats early) are favorites. So I looked at the top 5 or so individual WAR contributions from each of the early drafts vs. overall draft pick and looked like that: 5 (or so) Highest WARs in draft by drafted position: 2008: 5 (31.6), 135 (18.3), 117 (17.5), 16 (15.2), 96 (14.2) 2009: 25 (44.4), 246 (27.4), 82 (21.9), 63 (18.3), 1 (18.3), 59 (18.0) 2010: 13 (29.4), 3 (22.3), 1 (21.5), 70 (19.2), 23 (12), 272 (11.5) 2011: 172 (13.1), 14 (13.1), 18 (10.3), 11 (9.6), 1 (9.4), 6, (9.1), Funny enough no number 1 pick has the highest draft. As far as the second point goes, this really is part of the drafting strategy and should weigh in the evaluation. The Twins chose to take preps who will take 5 years or so to develop vs. College players who are ready in 2-3. It was a choice and it hurt them. And it is fine to do that if you are willing to fill the gaps with free agents in between, which is not what the TR & Co Twins do Fun thing to speculate: Would the 2015 Twins that nearly missed a post-season berth be there if they chose Wacha over Buxton in 2012?

As the Minnesota Twins are evaluating their front office, I would like to take the opportunity to evaluate the performance of certain parts of their front office for which there might be appropriate objective evaluation criteria. Deron Johnson, the Twins scouting director since 2008, has been primarily responsible for the Rule 4 amateur draft. There is a feeling that the Twins do not draft and develop players well. But drafting and developing are two different things. It's hard to evaluate drafting departments without comparing them to the rest of the league. How has Johnson done against the league?----------- Here is the data: I looked at the overall WAR for each team for each draft for all players selected by that team in the first 10 rounds of that draft. Calculated the average WAR for each draft and the better teams are indicated with green. The teams are listed alphabetically and the Twins are bolded. Averages in yellow indicate small sample size, because simply not enough players made it to the bigs in the last few seasons to make any conclusions, but the ones who made it, count to the total team WAR numbers. Long story short: During the time that Johnson has been in charge of the Twins draft the Twins did better than only six other teams in the league: The Red Sox, Yankees, Phillies and the Rangers and Dodgers who all are willing to open their wallets and buy players drafted and developed by others and, surprisingly, the Rays, who are more than willing to sell everyone high to restock their system with players that other teams drafted to develop. The Twins do neither, so that it a pretty big problem. By this criteria, Deron Johnson has been performing way below average, and D students should go home... Few notes: This is pretty interesting data about where the Twins can look to stock their front office. Surprisingly, the Diamondbacks', Padres', Jays', White Sox', and Nationals' systems might be good sources of scouting talent to replace at least Deron and some of his scouts.If it were not for 2009 where Dozier and Gibson account for most of the Twins' WAR, the numbers would be really pathetic.If you look at teams like the White Sox that have had the fourth best draft WAR in the period and really nothing to show for it in the majors, you can make easy conclusions about problems with their development and management systems.Yes, there are up and downs in most teams, but with the Twins, other than 2009, it has been mostly downs, and the other teams have done something about it (replacing under-performing front office pieces.) Will the Twins do the same?Originally published at The Tenth Inning Stretch Click here to view the article

Got to add Baxendale to the list. Very similar situation with Rogers, but he is doing it in AAA instead of the majors. Would not be surprised if he is with the Twins before anyone mentioned here not named Chargois

Cheap? Third year of arbitration after a decent season will be close to $3M. For a middle reliever. No. He has to go. Melotakis is cheaper.

Correct. And that is part of the problem with the Twins. They are looking to help themselves in 5+ years vs the next couple. And it would have not been that much of a problem if they were going after top free agents. Who is better off after the 2012 draft? The Twins or the Mariners?

I thought about that. On the other hand removing those drafts will penalize the teams that drafted players and got help from them already in the majors. The Twins were close last season. Imagine where they would have been if they drafted Alex Wood instead of Melotakis in the second round of 2012 (and I am not even going into Wacha over Buxton,) or Jake Lamb before the Dbacks got him on the 6th round, Kendall Graveman in 2013 before the Jays got him in the 8th round, or one of Nola or Comforto instead of Gordon in 2014. They didn't. They made the choice to draft players who can help them in 4+ years, while they had a horrible team, instead of players who can help them in 1-2 years to turn this thing around quickly. And they should be penalized.

The problem with that approach is that it will be a subjective opinion. Numbers are objective

Actually what is wrong is the assumption that the best players in the draft are the earliest picks. Data: 5 (or so) Highest WARs in draft by drafted position: 2008: 5 (31.6), 135 (18.3), 117 (17.5), 16 (15.2), 96 (14.2) 2009: 25 (44.4), 246 (27.4), 82 (21.9), 63 (18.3), 1 (18.3), 59 (18.0) 2010: 13 (29.4), 3 (22.3), 1 (21.5), 70 (19.2), 23 (12), 272 (11.5) 2011: 172 (13.1), 14 (13.1), 18 (10.3), 11 (9.6), 1 (9.4), 6, (9.1), As a mater of fact, the first picks rarely were among the top 5 players in that draft, and 24 teams, including the Twins, passed on the best player drafted in that time period.

I started looking at all rounds but quickly after the 10th round I got into players who were drafted by one team in that draft and did not sign, drafted by another team and signed with that. I wanted to give credit to the team that did draft and sign the player. Most of the players who are selected in the top 10 rounds (with some exceptions, like Gaussman) sign with their teams. Just a way to minimize manual work looking at whether each player has singed. If I had a database, I could actually do a better job. Very few players who were signed after the 10th round give value, but, you are correct, there are some and teams should get credit for it. I started looking at draft positions (and about half of the teams below the Twins did better than them,) but it gets really complicated when teams were awarded draft picks for type A and type B FAs and, like the Twins in 2008, had 3 first round picks (and they took Hicks, Gutierrez, and Hunt).

better than the Twins if not for their 2009 draft

Originally published at The Tenth Inning Stretch ----------- As the Minnesota Twins are evaluating their front office, I would like to take the opportunity to objectively evaluate the performance of certain parts of their front office for which there might be appropriate objective evaluation criteria. Deron Johnson, the Twins scouting director since 2008, who came into the organization when the dearly departed Terry Ryan became the General Manager in 1994, as a regional scout, has been primarily responsible for the Rule 4 amateur draft. There is a feeling that the Twins do not draft and develop players well. But drafting and developing are two different things, and need to see how each of them might be performing against the rest of the league. How has Johnson done against the league, in the draft? Here is the data: I looked at the overall WAR for each team for each draft for all players selected by that team in the first 10 rounds of that draft. Calculated the average WAR for each draft and the teams better are indicated with green. The teams are listed alphabetically and the Twins are bolded. Averages in yellow indicate small sample size, because simply not enough players made it to the bigs in the last few seasons to make any conclusions, but the ones who made it, count to the total team WAR numbers, since Deron Johnson was responsible for the Twins draft. Long story short: During the time that Johnson has been in charge of the Twins draft the Twins did better than only 6 other teams in the league: The Red Sox, Yankees, Phillies and the Rangers who all are willing to open their wallets and buy players drafted and developed by others and, surprisingly, the Rays, who are more than willing to sell everyone high to restock their system with players that other teams drafted to develop. The Twins do neither, so that it a pretty big problem. And yes Deron Johnson has been performing way below average, and D students should go home... Few notes: This is pretty interesting data about where the Twins can look to stock their front office. Surprisingly, the Diamondbacks', Padres', Jays', White Sox', and Nationals' systems might be good sources of scouting talent to replace at least Deron and some of his scouts. If it were not for 2009 where Dozier and Gibson account for most of the Twins' WAR, the numbers would be really pathetic. If you look at teams like the White Sox, that have had the fourth best draft WAR in the period and really nothing to show about it in the majors, you can make easy conclusions about problems with their development and management systems Yes, there are up and downs in most teams, but with the Twins other than 2009, it has been mostly downs, and the other teams, have done something about it (replacing under-performing Front Office pieces.) Will the Twins have the guts to do the same?

Sipp and Bastardo were in the level of Matt Capps when Ryan (over)paid to re-sign him, so it is not like it has not been done in the Twins' organization. Two other things: a. Not going after a closer-type player knowing that Perkins lost 5 mph on both his slider and fastball, is not quite what a decent general manager does. b. Ryan got the following pitchers out of the garbage heap last off-season: Buddy Boshers Brandon Kintzler Fernando Abad David Martinez Dan Runzler Aaron Thompson and then during the season Sean Burnett Neil Ramirez Only the top 3 managed to make it to the majors, and they made it with a last place team. It would be "success", if there is demand for their services by a contending team and they will not go the way of Fien, Boyer, etc, which is usually the Twins' way in these matters... Also, competitors who do not want to go after the Chapmans and the Millers of the world, develop from inside and give their young relievers a chance. The fact that Kintzler is the Twins closer now instead of Chargois and Abad the LH setup guy instead of Melotakis, in a last place team, is inane. So the heap pile, even though it might once a while get them someone who may be serviceable, costs them much more in opportunity...

If Palka were a catcher, instead of a corner OF/1B, or the Twins had a couple MLB-ready options, I would totally agree with is; however he is not.

Yeah. I am not sure that it is a win for the Twins. And I think that Palka is great and should be on the Twins' roster by September. Herrmann is probably better than any catcher the Twins currently have above A ball. And, effectively the Twins did not trade Herrmann for Palka. You have to see the trade in the context of the off-season after a season that were close to contending. They traded: Herrmann for JR Murphy and Hicks for Palka Did that trade help them in 2016? Nope. So I don't think that it should be listed among Ryan's high points, esp. if you add the context that he got rid of Hicks who is hitting .301/.346/.508 for Detroit, mostly in AAA and a bit in AA...

Forgot: 2011 A+ .317 2011 AFL .405 2012 AFL .556 2012 Twins .077 and this one: 2013 AAA .292 was with Brunansky as his hitting coach.

Interestingly enough if you look at Herrmann's career BABIP with the Twins organization, up to and including 2012 and in AAA in 2014 (i.e. the seasons he did not have Brunansky as his hitting coach) is not out of line with the above .371 annual. Herrmann at some point was a top-10 Twins' prospect and had a great ability for hitting LDs in both fields.

I don't know about the Palka trade. I think that the Twins could use a catcher who is hitting .290/.350/.503 in the majors more than they can use an outfielder who is hitting .279/.354/.557 between AA/AAA. The fact that the Twins did not trust Herrmann or can get that out of him, is a totally different conversation, and definitely does not look good for Ryan (and Co)

"Albers could very easily fill a rotation spot with the Twins during August and September." If that happens, Antony should get the boot at the spot. Albers was part of the problem with the Twins and will never be in their future, so it is totally unreasonable to have him up, instead of Berrios, Meyer (if healthy,) Wheeler and Baxendale; and all of the healthy 3 mentioned have pitched better than Albers...

Please qualify this. My take is that they are pigeonhalling themselves as a Minnesota/Dakotas team as far as marketing goes.

Can't disagree with much, other than calling Goin a "stat guru". He is not Bill James you know

Can anyone explain to me, please, why Neil Ramirez is in the Twins roster today, over any of the relievers mentioned (or not mentioned) above? And please could the explanation reflect some opinion about the person who put him and the person who kept him on that roster? Thank you.

Indianapolis, Indiana. Do you realize how South that is? Ok. Let's see: South, Chicago, LA, New York. What's the next logical step? Minneapolis?