Seth Stohs

Congratulations to the Ft. Myers Miracle. They have had a remarkable first half of the season and on Saturday they clinched their first playoff spot since 2009 with a win over Bradenton. Tyler Duffey made his Miracle debut. Tom Stuifbergen made his AA debut in game one of the Rock Cats double-header. With that, check out the details of what happened in the Twins' minor league system on Saturday:[PRBREAK][/PRBREAK] Rochester Red Wings 1, Toledo Mudhens 8 Box Score Pedro Hernandez was scheduled to start but his back flared up on him. Virgil Vasquez started in his place. The right-hander gave up five runs on six hits (3 home runs) and a walk in four innings. He struck out two. Luis Perdomo came on and gave up two runs (1 earned) on two hits and a walk in 1.2 innings. Blake Martin entered and retired the four batters he faced. Shairon Martis threw a scoreless eigth. Anthony Slama came on and gave up a run on two hits and a walk in his inning. The Red Wings managed just one run despite six hits and five walks. They had no extra base hits. On defense, the team committed three errors. Game 1 - New Britain Rock Cats 11, Bowie Baysox 8 Box Score Tom Stuifbergen was on the mound in game one for the Rock Cats, making his Eastern League debut. To say it didn’t start out well might be an understatement. He gave up seven runs on five hits and two walks… and that was with just one out in the first inning. He got the final two outs of that inning and got six of the next seven that he faced in his three inning debut. He was replaced by BJ Hermsen who gave up three hits but no runs in 1.2 innings. Edgar Ibarra gave up one hit in 1.1 innings; he struck out two. Dan Turpen gave up a run on two hits and a walk in his inning, though he struck out two. Matt Hauser came on and worked two scoreless innings. Kyle Knudson led the way. The Minnesota native went 3-5 with four RBI. Danny Ortiz went 2-4 with a walk and his 18th double. Josmil Pinto hit his 11th home run and drove in two. Game 2 - New Britain Rock Cats 4, Bowie Baysox 6 Box Score Ortiz continued to hit well in the 2nd game. He went 2-3 with his seventh home run and three RBI. Josmil Pinto (13), Reynaldo Rodriguez (17) and Danny Santana (11) each hit a double. Logan Darnell started and went 5.2 innings. He was charged with six runs (3 earned) on eight hits and a walk. He struck out five. Bobby Lanigan gave up an inherited run but got the final out. Ft. Myers Miracle 5, Bradenton Marauders 4 Box Score Congratulations to the Ft. Myers Miracle. They have clinched a playoff spot by virtue of capturing the first-half championship with a 5-4 win on Saturday. The Miracle will be in the playoffs for the first time since 2009. Tyler Duffey started, making his Florida State League debut. He threw five shutout innings before giving up two, two-run homers in the 6th inning. He went 5.2 innings and gave up those four runs (3 earned) on eight hits and a walk. He struck out two. Nelvin Fuentes went 1.1 innings and gave up one hit and one walk. Ryan O’Rourke got his first save. He struck out two in the final two innings. Matt Koch went 2-4 with his seventh double, third home run and two RBI. Kennys Vargas was 2-3 with a walk and his 19th double. Cedar Rapids Kernels 1, Kane County Cougars 15 Box Score It may be fair to say that this is a game that the Kernels would prefer forgetting. Byron Buxton went 3-5. Tyler Grimes was 3-4. The rest of the Kernels' roster managed two hits. Brett Lee started and went four innings. He gave up eight runs on 11 hits (3 homers) and two walks. Kaleb Merck came on for his MWL debut. He gave up four runs on four hits and a walk in two innings. Josue Montanez gave up a hit and a walk in a scoreless inning. Alex Muren gave up a hit in a scoreless inning. Catcher Jhonatan Arias came on for the ninth. He gave up three runs on one hit and three walks. The first place Kernels are now just 1.5 games ahead of Beloit in the Western Division. The top two teams advance to the playoffs. They have a three game lead over Quad Cities for that second spot with eight to play. Please feel free to comment or ask questions below.

On Saturday, MLB held its third day of the draft. It covered rounds 11 through 40 and lasted over six hours to complete. However, at the end of the day, the Minnesota Twins had made 40 picks this year. Day 3 was filled with a pitching-led theme again. The Twins drafted a bunch of power arms, looking to accumulate pitchers with velocity that they can work with on command and control. They took a couple of high-potential pitchers in Florida prep Taylor Blatch and Logan Shore [PRBREAK][/PRBREAK]although both are likely to go to college instead of signing. The Twins also accumulated plenty of talent to help fill their GCL and Elizabethton rosters. Below, you will find each of the Twins draft picks, and on many of them, Twins Daily's draft expert Jeremy Nygaard added some brief comments. It's taken two days to get through ten rounds of the MLB Draft. On Saturday, a conference call of 30 teams, each making 30 picks, will complete the 2013 draft. It'll be rapid fire throughout the day. As soon as one team makes a selection, the next will get about 5 seconds to make their pick. It's actually quite something to listen to. As Twins picks are made, we will continue to update the Twins selections below. Please comment throughout the day with your thoughts. The Twins have made ten picks through the first ten rounds. They have chosen six pitchers (4 college, 2 high school), three catchers (2 college, 1 high school) and a college third baseman. What will they do with their final 30 picks? Well, we can be assured that they will continue to find more pitching, but will they be able to find any hidden gems in the late rounds? Of course, only time will tell. Day 3 40th Round (1190) - Kelly Starnes - OF - Los Medanos College (CA) 39th Round (1160) - Seth Wagner - LHP - Mifflin County HS (PA) 38th Round (1130) - Javier Salas - RHP - U of Miami 37th Round (1100) - Julien Service - OF - Northeast Texas CC 36th Round (1070) - Joe Greenfield - RHP - Eastern Illinois U 35th Round (1040) - Nick Lemoncelli - LHP - Lower Columbia College (WA) 34th Round (1010) - Ivory Thomas - CF - Cal St. Dominguez Hills 33rd Round (980) - Stephen Stensley - OF - University HS (Louisiana) 32nd Round (950) - Carlos Avila - SS - Cal St. Dominguez Hills 31st Round (920) - AJ Bogucki - RHP - Boyertown HS (PA) 30th Round (890) - Tanner Vavra - 2B - Valporaiso (3B Coach Joe's son) 29th Round (860) - Logan Shore - RHP - Coon Rapids HS (MN) 28th Round (830) - Chris Erwin - LHP - Grayson HS (GA) 27th Round (800) - Tyler Blatch - RHP - Jensen Beach HS (FL) Blatch, who doesn't even check in at six feet, is going to tough to sign with his 95 mph fastball and two solid off-speed offerings. 26th Round (770) - Ryan Halstead - P - Indiana 25th Round (740) - Chad Christianson - OF - Nebraska Christianson started at SS for two years before moving to the outfield for his last two years. Showed more strength as a junior than he did as a senior. 24th Round (710) - Brandon Easton - LHP - Lakeland CC Easton is also a high-K pitcher (78 in 59.2 IP) and big (6-6). Easton was the OCCAC Pitcher of the Year. (Easton is in MLB's database as a 1B, but he's a pitcher.) 23rd Round (680) - Zach Hayden - RHP - South Carolina - Aiken Hayden struck out 41 in 21 innings for the Pacers this year. He also walked 23. 22nd Round (650) - Alex Swim - C - Elon University Swim is a senior who stole 15-of-18 bases and started all 64 games. 21st Round (620) - Tyler Stirewalt - RHP - Fresno State Stirewalt is a project. He walked-on the Fresno State football team for three years before switching over to baseball in 2012. Obviously athletic, Stirewalt can hit 94. 20th Round (590) - Jason Kanzler - CF - Buffalo Fifth-year senior, batting .330 with some power (12 HRs) and speed (21 SBs). 19th Round (560) - Jared Wilson - RHP - UC Santa Barbara A fifth-year senior with big arm strength and a lack of control. Good fastball and curve, but any success will depend on figuring out how to make it goes where he wants it to. 18th Round (530) - Ryan Walker - SS - Texas-Arlington Walker will be a solid shortstop for the E-town Twins, batted .304 in 58 games for the Mavericks. 17th Round (500) - Tanner Mendonca - RHP - Sacremento State Good body with a fastball up to 94 and a decent breaking ball. 16th Round (470) - Brandon Bixler - LHP - Florida Gulf Coast Bixler offers two pretty significant pieces: first, his ability to miss bats - a good fastball with two solid secondary pitches (curveball and change-up). Secondly, he doesn't always throw it in - or near - the strike zone. Bixler is also about 5-10, 160. 15th Round (440) - Derrick Penilla - LHP - Mt San Antonio College Not a lot of info out there on Penilla, a lefty. Started for MSAC and averaged over a strikeout per inning. 14th Round (410) - Zack Granite - CF - Seton Hall Three-year starter and leadoff centerfielder for the Pirates. Granite is small, but gets on base and has good speed. 13th Round (380) - Brandon Peterson - PHP - Wichita State Stop me if you've heard this: A college reliever who should get a shot to start in pro ball. Features a low-90s fastball and a slider. Was successful as Wichita State's closer with a ceiling as a set-up man if the starter thing doesn't work. 12th Round (350) - Ethan Mildren - RHP - Pittsburgh A tall, groundball pitcher who throws four pitches, including a low-90s fastball. 11th Round (320) – Nelson Molina - SS - Puerto Rico HS 6-3, 170, skinny and weak but very projectable. A scout's dream that could stick at shortstop with soft hands, quick release, but lacks the cannon arm. Day 2 10th Round (290) - C.K. Irby - RHP - Samford University 9th Round (260) - Mitchell Garver - C - U of New Mexico 8th Round (230) - Dustin DeMuth - 3B - U of Indiana 7th Round (200) - Brian Gilbert - RHP - Seton Hall University 6th Round (170) - Brian Navarretto - C - Florida (High School) 5th Round (140) - Aaron Slegers - RHP - U of Indiana 4th Round (110) - Stephen Gonsalves - LHP - California (High School) 3rd Round (78) - Stuart Turner - C - U. of Mississippi Day 1 2nd Round (43) - Ryan Eades - RHP - LSU (College) 1st Round (4) - Kohl Stewart - RHP - Texas (High School)

Following the Twins selection of RHP Kohl Stewart, he called in and talked with the media for a while. It was interesting to hear him talk about the draft. For so long, we have heard that he had this strong commitment to Texas A&M where he had a full scholarship to play both football and baseball. Listening to his responses tells me there is no question that, not only will he sign, but he could sign quickly. How did Stewart find out he was drafted? His parents had 75-100 friends and family at their home, a big rain storm came down and temporarily knocked out their satellite. He had to scramble and found that he had been drafted by the Twins on his cell phone.[PRBREAK][/PRBREAK] Below are some quotes from the 18-year-old prep from Texas: Regarding whether or not he’ll sign with the Twins: Honestly, the Twins picked me, and they expect me to sign. I’m not going to say for sure, but I am looking forward to joining the Twins organization. Why I think that Stewart could sign relatively quickly: I’ll definitely be in touch with Couch (Kevin) Sumlin in the next couple of days or whatever it ends up being. I don’t want to say anything, pull anybody any way, but I look forward to being a Twin. (Side Note – Texas A&A football coach Kevin Sumlin was a wide receivers coach and a quarterbacks coach at the University of Minnesota in the mid-90s.) His thoughts on the Twins organization and potentially being a part of it: I think that there is extreme loyalty within that organization. I think that they’re committed to winning. They’re looking for ways for the organization to reach the World Series. I’m committed to being part of that organization and work my way up, grind it out until my name is called. And hopefully, one day I hope I can help the Minnesota Twins become one of the winningest organizations in the league. Was he surprised to be drafted by the Twins? I definitely thought that the Twins were the best bet for me. A lot of the communication went through my advisers They obviously relayed that information to me. I definitely believe that this is where I was headed. I’m extremely excited about it, and surely blessed to have this opportunity to be a part of their organization and help them win. His thoughts on playing football and now potentially just playing baseball (also, the comment that makes me most excited about how good Stewart could be): I don’t ever bore. There’s always something for me to be working. Football has always taken rank over baseball, especially in high school with it being so demanding and such a big deal here in Texas. I look forward to being able to just sit down and work on baseball for once. I’ve never been able to do that. I really didn’t start pitching at the level I have been pitching at until high school and then football came again and took away from that. So I’m really looking forward to being able to really focus on one thing and focus on that for a long period of time. I can’t wait to see how the Twins can help me and see how much I can grow. What pitches he throws and what he’s working on (and the information that makes me possibly even more excited about how good Stewart could be)? (I) throw a fastball. This year I threw a slider, a curveball and a changeup. My fastball? There are days where you’re not going to have that pitch, but my fastball is a very comfortable pitch for me. I like to use both sides of the plate and work off my fastball. My slider is probably my second best pitch, with my curveball and changeup. I’m really comfortable throwing any pitch at any count. There are a lot of things I need to develop. I need to work on throwing my slider inside to righties. Sometimes I let it get away, throw it too hard and it will go away to righties. My slider is more effective right now, just because I started throwing my curveball just this year. My changeup has definitely come around. I’ve thrown that a lot more in the last year. And, I even have a little bit of a sinker just to give me something else to go hard in in righties. The sinker has kind of come to fruition, just in the last couple of weeks, just throwing bullpens and messing around with some things. I’m kind of always open to different things and working on different pitches. Always having those different kinds of things to always fall back upon if something else isn’t working. It was exciting to hear from a young man who is clearly very excited to be drafted high by the Twins, and a guy who has confidence, stuff and charisma. He’s got plenty of developing to do, but he has the potential to be the 2013 pick that has the biggest impact.