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jmlease1

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Everything posted by jmlease1

  1. jmlease1
    seriously. that's easily the worst part of the development process this year: how many top pitchers are injured/not pitching. Makes it harder to feel any confidence in immediate help coming through from some of these guys for the MLB squad if they're not pitching after a 2020 where they didn't pitch in competitive games (and in some cases didn't pitch at all). They're not wrong when they say the best ability is availability.
  2. jmlease1
    I love seeing the Astros lose. Bunch of cheatin' bastards.
  3. jmlease1
    I'm for dealing some of these guys if it nets us Trevor Story, whom we sign to a nice extension. But I still have hope that we come to an agreement on Buxton. Dealing Donaldson is mostly about opening up 3B for Miranda while shedding his contract for me. Kepler, ah Max Kepler. I like him a lot. But 2019 is looking like a Brady Anderson anomaly year to me, and I do think Larnach & Kirilloff are going to be able to provide the lefty pop in the corners, so if Buxton doesn't go I think you can explore moving Kepler. But I'm not sure how interested the twins are in that one and might like him as the 4th OF?
  4. jmlease1
    Good to see celestino & rortvedt having success at the plate in AAA. we knew both of them probably weren't ready and only came up because of the plethora of injuries, so it's good to see them playing well at the level they really should have been at most of the year. Hopefully it continues and they can settle in with a good approach at the plate that will be productive in their next stint in MLB. Both have enough defensive upside that they'll be good assets if they can hit even a little, Miranda's amazing. His breakout might be the best argument for eating some of Josh Donaldson's salary in a deal in the off-season. Good 2 hit night for Martin, who I like a lot. Looking forward to watching him settle in at AA and get on base basically all day. I suspect they'll do any tinkering with his swing in the off-season (make sure he gets healthy from the hand injury), but I'm not opposed to seeing him control the zone and hit a bajillion singles in his first season in professional baseball at AA. I think rankings that are dropping him fast because they haven't seen power production in half a season of pro baseball are making a mistake and I'm happy to have the Twins reap the benefits.
  5. jmlease1
    Barnes started out well and it fell off quickly. Once he started missing his spots and needed to locate in the heart of the zone to get a strike...he was in trouble. But might as well keep running him out there so we can see if he's a AAAA player or a back-end option. He's left-handed, he throws a change-up, he's got a pulse...careers have been made on less.
  6. jmlease1
    Look, if Toronto is able to extend Berrios in the offseason at market rate (or less), then we'll know that either the FO botched this or was never serious about keeping Berrios. But I suspect that Toronto will be no more likely to extend Berrios than the Twins, absent a substantial overpay. Now...what constitutes an "overpay" for Berrios? YMMV. I think the market rate on him as a free agent is AAV of $25-28M with a term length of at least 5 years. (Wheeler is the floor; while Wheeler had been better than Berrios at the time of his FA, Berrios is younger and healthier, and the best ability is availability. but he's not going to get Cole money unless he wins the Cy next year) How many people want to give Jose Berrios 5 years and $150M? That might have gotten it done, but tell me it doesn't make your palms sweat.
  7. jmlease1
    They're buying low if you agree with FanGraphs downgrade on Martin, I guess? the Twins FO doesn't seem too concerned about his power production this year (he may have adjusted his swing to compensate for a hand injury) and they're right that it's a lot easier to add power to a guy with high bat skills and great control of the strike zone than it is to add average and contact to a player with big power. Small tweaks in elevating his swing, pulling the ball more, using his legs better, adding muscle, etc are all thing that could add additional pop to his bat. I heard on Gleeman & the Geek the comp of "Shannon Stewart with more walks" right now. That would be a pretty nice player, as Shannon Stewart was a borderline all-star a couple of times and a quality starter for the better part of a decade. add in more walks and you have a player who is a multiple all-star and a building block for your team. I really didn't expect the twins to get a player of this quality and a high-upside pitcher for Berrios, which was part of my resistance to trading him (the other part is I would have preferred to sign him long-term...but I'm increasingly of the belief that absent a substantial overpay the Twins had no shot of extending him. I think the same is true for Toronto: I believe Berrios is serious about wanting to be a free agent and see what happens.) Martin is really good as a player. They'll find a position for him defensively; this isn't a case of needing to stash him somewhere where he won't do any damage.
  8. jmlease1
    Lot of unknowns here, and I wouldn't expect much information from the twins staff on this issue (there's really no winning for them: if they say "look we didn't tell him to throw meatballs down the heart of the plate and that's what killed him" then they're going to get whacked for bashing a player, and if they say "we wanted to tweak his slider and have him throw it a bit more and he didn't change how he threw it all" then it's a he said/he said where they're talking past each other, etc). Like most, I'd say it looks like there's some shared blame. I'd weight it slightly more on Shoemaker: a) he's a veteran, b) if he didn't like the sequencing/selection it's not like he couldn't shake it off, and c) the heat maps show the anecdotal impression of him grooving a sinker in the heart of the plate sure is born out on the stats. I also discount the AAA performance to some degree: if a veteran MLB starter can't dominate AAA hitters, then he's either injured or cooked...
  9. jmlease1
    I looked at the recap of the Saints game and there was no Jose miranda 2+ hits reported and I was so confused surprised...and then saw he got the day off. lol. He's delightfully increased the expectations rather significantly. Vallimont is clearly struggling with his control, and this is the big concern with him. Hopefully they can find a way to get him going, whether it's a mental or physical change that needs to happen. the talent and stuff are there, but until the control comes along, he's going to hang in the minors.
  10. jmlease1
    I'm happy for Drew Maggi that he's having a hot month and a good year overall for the Saints...but I have trouble naming a 32 year old career minor leaguer Hitter of the Month. I know it's not a prospect ranking or anything, but still.
  11. jmlease1
    The stuff is clearly there with him; now it's all about refinement and command. The move to put him in AA after a year where he didn't get to pitch was an aggressive one by Toronto and I'm sure it's a big part of why his numbers have suffered. Looking at his game logs is interesting; he started a game on June 15th, struck out the side and left the game. I would presume he tweaked something? He didn't miss a start, but he's definitely struggled after that short game with some real stinkers in there. Makes you wonder if he hasn't been able to get comfortable out there and should have gotten shut down for a couple of starts? All speculative, but he was very effective until then and the BB/9 was pretty manageable. Prior to these rough 4 starts, he was keeping the ball in the park quite well too. Not a finished product, but the way he hunts Ks is impressive and he looks like he has the kind of pitch mix and stuff to be a top of the rotation starter if he can command his pitches effectively and consistently. Ton of potential at age 20. Hope he has a good time at the Olympics with Joe Ryan and they both come back ready to roll!
  12. jmlease1
    We'll see where Strotman ends up at the close of the year. They've got some work to do with him, but Ryan was the better piece in that trade to my mind. Looking forward to him joining after the Olympics. Palacios is a great story. He's getting a bit old for AA but has done a nice job in rebuilding his confidence at the plate after 2 very rough years in the TB system. Is he really a prospect or organizational depth? Probably still a little unclear, but he should contend for a spot on the 40 man and might be a nice INF option to have in AAA next year. Would love to know more about his defense?
  13. jmlease1
    I think the Twins did pretty well at the deadline. They did well in their trades of Berrios & Cruz, getting real value and quality players that are already playing and showing success at higher levels of the minors. They got rid of Happ, who had declined from being a solid pitcher in the first month or so of the season to a trash fire. The demerits are not moving Donaldson, Pineda, and Rogers (arguably Simmons too) but there are reasons for all of them, I think. We just don't know if there were good options for Donaldson that didn't require them eating far too much of the contract. He's still an excellent player when healthy and he's been pretty healthy this year so if they had to eat the rest of this year's salary (ok) and a big chunk of 2022 & 2023...then maybe not ok. Pineda is a guy they might be looking to keep to help anchor the rotation. Rogers was hurt and it probably tanked his value. Simmons is still a fine defender, but it didn't look like SS defense was an area of significant interest among contenders. I'd say they were slight winners by getting excellent value in the trades they made. It gets pulled back a little by not being able to make additional moves that seemed to make sense, but the net is still a positive for the Twins at the deadline. ESPN pegged them as losers...but most of that grade is influenced by the rotten season as a whole. That's fair, but looking at just the deadline moves, I'd say they "won" as much as you can when you're selling.
  14. jmlease1
    As noted by KLaw, the power drop this season can likely be attributed to a change in swing approach sparked by a hand injury. I'll worry about that if he keeps inside-outing his swing after getting fully healthy. (I've bashed FanGraphs a bit lately for downgrading Martin right now, but I think it's justified because they seem to be ignoring the injury to downgrade the player. In their write-up on Martin as part of the trade they again ignored the issue which I find baffling.) He's a really good player. Fits in a lot of different positions. Would love to see how he plays a short, since Lewis won't be ready in 2022 and Simmons might/won't be back and Polanco should stick at 2B rather that float him back to SS as anything other than an occasional fill-in. If Buxton gets dealt in the off-season (please no?) then CF sure seems like an option too. I'm enthusiastic about this guy and don't think he's far off at all.
  15. jmlease1
    I love the guy, but who does he bump in MLB? We need to give Rooker ABs to see if he's a real player, we're paying Donaldson a lot of money to play 3B, Polanco & Arraez are proven at 2B, and frankly we need to have Sano get ABs and hopefully perform well to stabilize his value as well. Better to have Miranda play every day at AAA and be ready to compete for a job in 2022 than come up and sit on the bench. He's crushing it and already jumped a level. He gets called up if there's a injury need, otherwise he simply goes wherever he can play every day. It's not like we need him to "save" the season.
  16. jmlease1
    Getting rid of the corpse of JA Happ makes me so happy I could plotz. It was a perfectly reasonable signing in the off-season that crapped out completely after 5 starts. The last 12 have been basically a nightmare and getting rid of him for anything is awesome. He's been absolutely destroyed too many times in the last 2 months for me to ever want to see him in a Twins uniform on the mound ever again. I will be checking out Cardinals box scores just to see if he has a Lance Lynn-like rebound...but I don't think he will.
  17. jmlease1
    They're dropping him based on his power drop in half a season. After five minutes of digging, I found out his power loss was due to a change in swing after a hand injury. I think that's a pretty stupid reason to change your ranking on a guy.
  18. jmlease1
    Fine, instead of nefarious I'll just call it stupid. What if Martin has a minor injury that he's playing through that they're not disclosing? The guy had plenty of power at Vanderbilt (against good competition); to suddenly drop him down now after half a season at AA (and going straight from college to AA ain't easy) based on second-hand reports is arrogant and dumb.
  19. jmlease1
    Sabato is waaaaaay too high. I'm sorry, he's been terrible at the plate in low A. His value is entirely in his bat and all he can do is draw walks right now. Just no.
  20. jmlease1
    Name names for who they talked to, or I'm calling BS. What if the people they talked to were from the Toronto FO looking to cover their asses on the deal by trying to cast some shade on the guy they just gave up? Halfway through the guy's first professional season and they're gonna re-do his ranking? I hope he hits a bunch of dingers immediately and they flip back again, that'd be pretty funny. We'll see how this turns out, but the value seems pretty good here in the deal. I'm sure plenty of people will find reasons to have the entire Twins front office dismissed.
  21. jmlease1
    Not great for Sabato to leave game one. Hope it's nothing serious; he needs ABs and this has not been a great year for him. (I think he's rated too high on the prospect list, personally. He takes a lot of walks, but isn't making much contact when he swings and isn't doing damage when he actually makes contact. Basically he's showing one skill as a hitter right now and that's not enough. He looks like a guy who was clearly harmed by losing a year of MiLB development.) Javier is having a decent bounceback year but he still needs to work on some things at the plate. Still a ton of Ks and not enough BBs, but considering he moved up a level after not playing last season this is pretty good progress. Let's hope he finishes the season strong and continues to progress.
  22. jmlease1
    Bit revisionist history, yes? Baddoo was coming off a significant injury and the missing pandemic minor league year and in his last organized play year hadn't actually done anything of note (slash line of .214/.290/.393) and hadn't taken a single AB above A-ball. The decision was never "protect Cave or Baddoo"; Cave was someone who had 2 years of success at the MLB level for the Twins (and a poor pandemic year) and was well-suited to be a 4th OF...and broke his back this season. How can you let Baddoo go? Because you're betting that no team is going to be willing to keep a completely unproven player on the roster for a full season when he missed 1 1/2 seasons of development. It's the same kind of bet that they made on Miranda, and it went well. But the choice at the time was keep Baddoo or keep one of Celestino/Rortvedt, both of whom were more likely bets to be taken in the Rule 5. (backup catchers who can field and call a game can be stashed on a roster even if they can't hit, and proven defenders in CF are easier to hang onto as well because both can still add value even if they're not ready to hit at MLB) I'm happy with Gordon's development so far and pleased to see him get the chance with the Twins. He's never going to hit for power, but he's got a good feel for the strike zone and if he can get on base at a good clip, give speed and positional flexibility off the bench, then he'll be a nice utility option.
  23. jmlease1
    I think the Twins FO is screwed. If they make a deal for Berrios, they're going to get buried for "giving up on 2022" and will likely get pilloried by the fan base for not getting enough, because there won't be a proven MLB player in the batch. If they don't make a deal for Berrios, they're going to get buried by the fanbase for not getting something for him while getting destroyed for not locking him up to a long-term deal (with the usual cascade of "the Pohlads are cheap" cries). Because this season has gone so poorly with expectations being fairly high, you have a lot of loud voices who no longer have any faith or trust in them, and I really am starting to think there's nothing that will satisfy, absent a trade screw-job so monumental it'll make Larry Anderson for Jeff Bagwell look even. It's interesting how fast things can turn here.
  24. jmlease1
    Please cut JA Happ. It's time. We have enough healthy starters right now and there's just no excuse any longer for running out a terrible pitcher that gives your team no chance to win. He had a fine career, but he's cooked at this point. Happ can't get anyone out and is getting drilled by anyone who happens to be right-handed. He can't really get lefties out either, they're just not crushing the ball against him. He's had 7 starts where he's given up runs equal to or greater than innings pitched. He's only had 7 starts all year with a Game Score over 50...and you start out with 50 points in Game Score. 4 of those 7 were in his first 5 starts. A solid start every 3-4 starts isn't acceptable. The signing was reasonable at the time and it looked good at the start of the season, but this is why you have a 1 year deal: so if it goes bad (and this has gone hideously bad) you can cut bait and move on. What do you gain by running him out there to get his brains beaten in for another 10 starts? Let's see what we have with Strotman, Barnes, Jax, etc. Happ got destroyed by Detroit, a bad team going nowhere, twice in 10 days. He has zero value. Time to cut bait, please.
  25. jmlease1
    Robles started out the season great, then settled in as a decent bullpen option. He's been flammable in July, which happens to coincide with the period where the team is trash and has had very few bullpen options so he's getting run out there maybe a bit more than he should. (does it make sense for him to appear in 44% of the Twins games?) But the acquisition was fine. Don't let recency bias and the groupthink that "the FO is trash and can't do anything right" overrule reality: Robles shouldn't be going out on back-to-back nights right now; it isn't going well. Hope Garver is ok.
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