Seth Stohs

One thing I'm curious for reader thoughts on... what do you think is a fair, reasonable timeline for "shaking off rust?" I asked the question in the article, and the obvious/correct answer is that there is no way to know for any one individual, but what do people think? Do we think he'll shake it off in spring training? It took Rosario months to shake off his rust from missing 50 games, and Sano missed a full season. What are you thinking/hoping/expecting?

260 is Vargas small... Last year at Twins Fest, Sano weighed in at about 260, and he was about the same this year, I believe. In spring training, he'll get to between 250 and 255 which is what he played at in 2013.

I really think people will enjoy this series. It's fun to look at in these smaller chunks. Killebrew is such a fascinating figure in Twins history. I wish I would have known more about him when he was still alive. I wish I would have had the chance to meet him.

He's the kind of guy that they will find a place for and others will be moved.

I don't know... you'll just have to check back tomorrow to find out!

Despite missing the entire 2014 season due to Tommy John surgery, Miguel Sano retains his status as the Twins #2 prospect. In fact, reviewing most of the national prospect rankings, he has remained a Top 20 overall prospect. That is what happens when you have the elite talent and power potential that Sano has. 2015 will be an interesting year for the slugger as he returns to action. How long will it take for him to shake off the rust? More important, how long will we have to wait before we see him in a Minnesota Twins uniform?Age: 21 (DOB: 5/11/93) 2014 Stats: Did Not Play ETA: late-2015 2014 Ranking: #2 What’s To Like When we talk about Miguel Sano, the natural lead topic has to be his power. Few throughout minor league baseball have the kind of power potential that Miguel Sano has. In the organization, Adam Brett Walker and Kennys Vargas come close. At 6-4 and 260 pounds, Sano presents an intimidating presence in the batter’s box. Fortunately, he has been able to back up that power potential with real, effective power. In 2012 in Beloit, he hit 28 homers. In 2013, he hit a combined 35 home runs at Ft. Myers and New Britain. Along with the homers, he added 28 doubles in 2012 and 30 in 2013. In his time in the rookie leagues, Sano was known to swing at a lot of sliders down and away. He has continued to improve his plate discipline each year, and with this power, that has translated into more walks. In Beloit, he walked in 14.5% of his plate appearances. In 2013, he walked 11.9% in Ft. Myers and then 13.0% of the time in New Britain. Miguel Sano is a supremely confident young man. He knows he has huge potential and talent, and he wants to be great. He doesn’t just want to be a major league ballplayer. He wants to win home run titles and set records, and he wants to win baseball games. He is fun-loving, and he will be a media and fan favorite, but he will also work hard to achieve these types of goals. It is my opinion that he will play even better as a major leaguer since he has worlds of talent and he has that drive to excellence. He has an ability to raise his game to the level of competition. That’s not to say there won't be struggles and adjustments, but I have little doubt that he will be able to make the adjustments to get through the struggles. What’s Left To Work On Despite the home run power and the walks, one concern with Sano is his strikeout rate. In the two rookie leagues, he struck out in over 26% of his plate appearances. In 2012 in Beloit, he struck out in 26% of his plate appearances. In the first half of the 2013 season in Ft. Myers, Sano struck out 25.1% of the time. After his promotion to Double-A, he struck out 29.3% of the time. Few players are successful with these kinds of strikeout rates, and yet, those who have been successful have generally been power hitters. However, I think that if Sano can, after a couple of seasons in the big leagues, reduce his strikeout rate to below 25%, he can be elite. There have always been those who question whether or not Sano can play adequate third base defense in the big leagues. The Tommy John surgery doesn’t change that in any way. Before surgery, Sano was able to throw across the diamond as hard as anyone, well into the 90s. If the velocity on his throws is reduced by even 5 mph, he’s still got plenty of arm for the throws. Will he be able to make the plays? Well, in 2012 at Beloit, he made 43 errors at third base, though most were in the first half. In 2013, between Ft. Myers and New Britain, he had 23 errors. Sano is a very good athlete for his size. He started out as a shortstop so he does have some pretty good instincts at the hot corner. He is able to play deep because of his arm. Often, his errors in 2013 were on more routine plays, and he made a lot of highlight reel plays. That said, the question of whether or not he can be an adequate third baseman remains very fair and this is an issue that will need to be monitored. What’s Next The Sano situation is certainly interesting. Trying to predict what he will do in 2015 is very difficult. Obviously, fewer position players have gone through Tommy John surgery. Shin-Soo Choo had the surgery in late September, 2007 and returned to the lineup the final day of May in 2008. Carl Crawford had the surgery in late August, 2012, and he returned to the lineup on Opening Day 2013. Shortstop Zack Cozart had the surgery in August, 2011 and returned Opening Day 2012. In reviewing Jon Roegele’s terrific and thorough Tommy John Surgery List, it appears that most position players who have had the surgery before August were able to return by opening day the next season. The question for the Twins, Sano and the fans has to be, How long will it take him to shake off the rust of not playing competitively for 14 to 15 months? I assume that he will return to Double-A to start the season since he last played at that level in 2013. That said, if the Twins were to decide that they would like him to spend the month of April in Ft. Myers to keep him a closer eye on him and put him in a place where he should experience quick success, I would have no problem with that. I think that, as fans, we need to be a little patient with this situation. It isn’t common. There is no Best Practice for handling this yet. When talking about a 21-year-old who is still believed to be a future cornerstone, doing the right thing is very important. That said, once he gets to Double-A and begins experiencing success, it will then just be a matter of time and opportunity. That could be as early as June, if there were an injury or as late as September. Unless things go very wrong, we should see Miguel Sano in 2015. TD Top Prospect #10: Nick Burdi TD Top Prospect #9: Trevor May TD Top Prospect #8: Eddie Rosario TD Top Prospect #7: Jorge Polanco TD Top Prospect #6: Nick Gordon TD Top Prospect #5: Alex Meyer TD Top Prospect #4: Kohl Stewart TD Top Prospect #3: Jose Berrios TD Top Prospect #2: Miguel Sano TD Top Prospect #1: (You’ll just have to check back tomorrow to find out!) Click here to view the article

Big picture, all three of them have a chance to be upper-half-of-the-rotation starters. Not sure if they can be true #1s, but all three can be guys that you'd feel pretty good about making starts in the playoffs. My personal ranking was: Berrios 3, Gordon 4, Stewart 5, and Meyer 6, but any ranking having those four in any order would be hard to argue against.

You may have to translate for me... does that show how many 3-ball counts there were, or pitches per at bat?

They all were good picks at the time. There's no possible way to know how draft picks will turn out. The Willie Banks pick was considered tremendous at the time. Loewen certainly has had an interesting career. I think last year he went back to pitching for the first time in several years.

Lightfoot, you know that I like Walker and am higher on him than most... but I have to admit that I can't get into this argument. The league championships don't matter much to me in prospect rankings. They're a team thing and he was one of 24 on the team. He was one of the starting 9. It's awesome that they win, but doesn't affect prospect status for me. That said, it was his 3-run-homer in the 9th of the Appy League championship game that sent it to extra innings and then Dalton Hicks' grand slam won it a couple innings later. FSL All Star Game MVP is a nice honor, but one game. A home run derby championship alone doesn't mean a lot. Chris Parmelee won that same championship several years ago. It speaks to his power, but the 25+ regular season homers mean more to me than a HR derby. Walker is a good prospect on his own based on power and potential. Intangibles to me are his personality, humility, work ethic, etc. Those matter to me.

Well said! I like homers too, but I'm probably just as big a fan of doubles, and if the guy is fast enough, some of them become triples.

We know that Arcia will be in LF and Hunter will be in RF, so it really comes down to who will be in CF, and that is subject to change throughout the season.

This is also correct. I think the odds of him pitching in the big leagues this year is pretty low. I hope I'm wrong and I know he's worked very hard to get there. He just might. At this point, I wouldn't put much past him. however, things would have to go really poorly in the starting rotation (certainly possible) and I also think it would need to happen before September. It makes no sense to call him up for September when he doesn't need to be added to the 40 man roster for another year. Same with Buxton. If they're up in July or August, great! If not, might as well wait until next May and protect the 40 man roster. That all said, I would LOVE to see him get to Target Field in 2015.

It was a crazy thing! I don't know how to explain it, and probably shouldn't (dont want to) overthink it as Bill James did. Ha! I remember as an 8-year-old when he was called up liking him, probably just because of his name. I remember as a 9-year-old, getting ready for school, and my mom coming into the room and telling me that Puckett had homered the night before. But to go from 4 to 31 is crazy. He did alter his approach. I think he also did a better job of laying off of certain pitches (outside slider, for example). He didn't like to walk at all, but he definitely had a better approach at the plate and better eye for what was a strike.

Yeah, I would say that is pretty good.

"Like Bradley Cooper on Betty White." HA!!!

At some point in time, he certainly should/could be.

We appreciate your opinion. The purpose of these reports is not to say that it is perfect and the way others should think. As I've mentioned other times, we consolidated several of our prospect rankings and had some discussion and came up with our rankings. We want to provide information and encourage discussion about each of these players. Readers can then know more and feel good about making their own top 10 lists. Hopefully when our Top 20 list is complete, and people have access to other rankings, many people will develop their own rankings. If you bought a copy of the Twins Prospect Handbook 2015, you can see my ranking as well as Jeremy's and Cody's. There are several national sites and publications that have done their Top Twins prospect lists. It'll be fun to look at them all together and see what we think.

I do too. Lots of them!

Both have good track records of success and are still in their early-30s. They should be fine... they could both possibly be traded in July too.

yes, they believe he has top-of-the-rotation stuff. But there are a lot of reasons to be patient. First, he's never pitched full time the way some guys (like Berrios) have. He's spent a lot of time playing football, so it may take him some time to put it all together. More important, his last two seasons have ended with shoulder soreness. They will and should protect him. When you have the mix of pitches he has, the athleticism, the strength, the size, you have to like the potential. Obviously we'll see how it goes. I mean, if he puts up Berrios-like numbers in the first half of the Florida State League season next year, they aren't going to hold him back at all. They would move him up too if they believe that he is healthy and ready (beyond the numbers).

In the last two weeks, we have considered four of the Twins fifth starter candidates, Mike Pelfrey, Alex Meyer, Tim Stauffer, and Tommy Milone. Today, we will take a look at one more candidate. Trevor May ended the 2014 season in the Twins rotation. His debut didn’t go as he’d hoped, but there are reasons for hope that he can be a solid big league starter for a long time.The Background The Twins acquired Trevor May, along with Vance Worley, in December of 2012 from the Phillies in exchange for outfielder Ben Revere. May had been Philadelphia’s fourth-round draft pick in 2008 out of Kelso High School in Washington. Following a 2011 season as a 21-year-old in the Florida State League, May was named the Phillies top prospect. He had gone 10-8 with a 3.63 ERA, but his 208 strikeouts in 151.1 innings had a lot of people excited. That’s a solid 12.4 strikeouts per nine innings. He was rated a top fifty prospect by most national publications. He struggled the following season in Double-A Reading. He went 10-13 with a 4.87 ERA and a 1.45 WHIP in 149.2 innings. He still struck out 9.1 per nine innings, but he walked 4.7 per nine. After acquiring May, the Twins sent him back to the Eastern League to pitch for New Britain. His numbers improved slightly. He posted a 4.51 ERA and a 1.43 WHIP in 151.2 innings. He struck out 9.4 per nine and reduced his walk rate to 4.0 per nine. May made the jump to Triple-A last year, and he really stepped up his performance. In Rochester, he went 8-6 with a 2.85 ERA and a 1.16 WHIP. In 98.0 innings, he struck out 94 and again reduced his walk rate, down to 3.6 per nine. In a five inning performance in mid-June, May hurt his calf and missed a month. He had been named to the Futures Game roster but had to miss that. It’s impossible to know now, but if healthy, he likely would have been called up to the Twins before that game. Instead, he rehabbed and shook off some rust in Rochester starting in mid-July. On August 7th, he received the news he had been waiting for: he was heading to the big leagues. Two days later, he made his major league debut in Oakland. We all recall that his debut did not go as he (or anyone) would have hoped. The A’s were patient against him, and May was charged with four runs on three hits and SEVEN walks over just two innings. His next couple of starts didn’t go well either. In fact, through three games, he worked just nine innings and walked 13 and struck out just three. At that point, May worked very hard with then-pitching coach Rick Anderson. At Twins Fest, May gave credit where credit was due, “When Andy (Rick Anderson) was here, we made some big mechanical adjustments.” Over his final seven Twins starts, he was able to make some adjustments. In 36.2 innings, he walked nine and struck out 41. He still gave up too many hits, but he found that when he threw strikes, he had enough stuff to get strikeouts as he had in the minor leagues. His overall numbers (3-6, 7.88 ERA, 1.77 WHIP in 45.2 innings) aren’t good. May said, “It took me a couple of starts to realize what was going on. It took me a couple of starts to fix it.” In his final start, he put together a quality start (6 IP, 3 ER) against the Tigers. “Going out and competing against (Max) Scherzer. That’s what you grow up playing baseball thinking about, pitching in big situations. They were trying to clinch. Me against a guy who won the Cy Young the year before. That’s what you want. That was exciting. That’s how I thought about it. I had a lot of fun.” His overall numbers (3-6, 7.88 ERA, 1.77 WHIP in 45.2 innings) were not awe-inspiring, but the lessons learned from those struggles could prove valuable over time. What is he? Trevor May stands at 6-5 and weighs about 240 pounds. He has a strong, sturdy frame and solid mechanics that have allowed him to be quite durable in his career. May has a four-pitch mix and is willing to use each of those pitches any time. Like most pitchers, he throws his fastball most frequently. With the Twins, his fastball averaged 91.9 mph, though if you watched his last few games, we saw quite a few pitches between 93 and 95 mph. He has a good changeup as well, and that averaged 83.4 mph. He threw a curveball in the mid-70s and a slider in the low-80s. Control has been an issue for him early in his career, but he has improved his walk rate each of the last two seasons. As noted above, he has shown the ability to get strikeouts. Most believe that May will not be a top of the rotation starter. He profiles more as a mid-rotation type who should be able to eat a lot of innings over time. Of course, the other option, as it is for Alex Meyer as well, is for May to pitch out of the bullpen. Scouting reports going back several years seemed to always point out that there was a decent chance that he could be a very good reliever. Obviously, with any talented pitcher who has the ability to miss bats, it makes the most sense to try him out as a starter and keep him in that role until he shows that he can’t. That said, he turned 25 in September and with four rotation spots being accounted for, it’s possible that the bullpen could be in his near future. If he was told he made the team as a bullpen guy, he would welcome the opportunity. “I’d have no problem with that. I threw (out of the bullpen) in the Fall League and really enjoyed it. I loved coming out of the ‘pen. I thought it was a good role that I could do. If anything, it’ll add a couple of ticks on my fastball consistently. I know that I throw hard enough to be an end of the game guy. With my routine, I could handle it. I would relish the opportunity.” If you were looking for how May feels heading into spring training, May said at Twins Fest, “I feel better than I’ve ever felt. I’m in the best shape I’ve ever been in. Physically, I’m definitely in the best shape of my life.” Regarding his standing in the organization as it relates to the available fifth starter job, he said, “I think my progress was enough to keep me in the conversation, but baseball is a business. Some guys are on contracts. Some guys just signed new ones that are going for the spot too. If you throw just as good as them, and their stats are identical, they’re going to get the job. That’s just the way it is. That’s just how it is. I know that. But my job doesn’t change regardless. My job is to be in the best shape possible and compete for the spot. That’s the job I want. That’s the job that I think I can fill and be a part of a winning team. I’m just going to be ready to go.” Last week, Twins Daily named Trevor May the Twins #9 Prospect, one spot up from his pre-2014 ranking. May Percentage Trevor May has an option remaining, so the is nothing that is requiring that he be on the opening day roster. We saw in his final two months that there are things that he can work on, and getting an opportunity to work on those things in Triple-A may make a lot of sense. Of course, when it comes down to it, he will eventually need to make those adjustments in the big leagues against the best hitters. With that, my estimation for the odds of Trevor May winning the Twins fifth starter competition is at 34%. To summarize this 5th starter candidate series, here were my five projections: Tommy Milone (35%), Trevor May (34%), Mike Pelfrey (20%), Alex Meyer (10%) and Tim Stauffer (1%). Logan Darnell, who made four starts for the Twins last year, should also be given a chance to win the job and a spot on the roster. Non-roster invites like Tyler Duffey, Taylor Rogers and JO Berrios are certainly candidates to make starts for the Twins at some point during the season, but it is very, very unlikely that they will make the opening day roster. Previous 5th starter candidate stories: Mike Pelfrey Alex Meyer Tim Stauffer Tommy Milone Click here to view the article

Potential. Upside. Projection. Projection as a shortstop. Power potential.