Seth Stohs

Things were pretty tough in the Twins farm system on Wednesday night. However, on Thursday, there were plenty of highlights for each of the four Twins affiliates. There were several great pitching performances. There were a lot of really strong hitting performances with multiple multi-hit games and some big home runs. One team ended one long streak, and another hopes to have started another long streak. A couple of bullpen arms continued their early-season dominance. One pitcher threw six one-hit innings. Another pitcher had a no-hitter through four innings. [PRBREAK][/PRBREAK] Drew Leachman was removed from the Cedar Rapids Disabled List and returned to their lineup. Matt Tomshaw was put on the 7-Day DL for the Kernels. Josue Montanez was sent back to Extended Spring Training. Oh, and it has been verified that J. O. Berrios has been added to the Kernels roster. The Twins had an off day and flew to Chicago to start a weekend series. There is a lot of information today, plenty for those Adopt-A-Prospect forums! Rochester Red Wings 5, Scranton/Wilkes-Barre 4 Box Score It has been a rough and disappointing start to the season for the Rochester Red Wings. Coming into the game, the team was 2-11 and had lost seven straight games. The offense had also not scored a run in 20 innings. The Red Wings got things going in the first inning and were able to hang on for the win. In the first inning, Eric Farris led off with a single. Chris Herrmann scored him on an opposite field double. Clete Thomas singled in Herrmann. Then Chris Colabello launched a towering, two-run blast, his fifth homer of the season. It gave the Red Wings a 4-0 lead before there was an out recorded. In the third inning, Chris Herrmann scored on a fielder’s choice by Colabello for the final run of the game for the Wings. Of course, the offense pretty much stopped after the first four batters. They had just two more hits the rest of the game. Herrmann was 2-3 with a walk and a double. Even Bigley, in his first game back with the Red Wings, went 1-2 with a walk. Virgil Vasquez started and went the first five innings. He gave up two runs (1 earned) on six hits. He walked two and struck out three. Daniel Turpen gave up three hits over the next 1.2 innings while striking out two. Tyler Robertson came on with runners on and two outs in the 7th. He notched a big strikeout. Luis Perdomo got his first save of the year. He went the final two innings, giving up two solo home runs, but got the final out of the Red Wings third win. New Britain Rock Cats 17, Portland Sea Dogs 1 Box Score The goal of any baseball team in any baseball game is to get some runs to support good pitching. Well, in this game, the offense was a bit extreme, and that’s a good thing, but it shouldn’t hide some pretty solid pitching too. 17 runs. 21 hits. 7 walks. The Rock Cats offense came to play. Antoan Richardson went 4-6 with a walk, his second double and his seventh stolen base. James Beresford went 3-3 with three walks and his, you guessed it, third stolen base. Curt Smith went 3-5 with his third double and first home run. Josmil Pinto went 3-6. Reynaldo Rodriguez walked and hit his fourth and fifth doubles. Danny Ortiz went 2-6 with his sixth double. Jhon Goncalves went 2-6 with his first double. All nine Rock Cats batters had at least one hit. Alex Meyer was a little wild but very effective. The lanky righty went the first six innings without giving up a run. He yielded up one hit, walked four and struck out five. Edgar Ibarra came on and worked the 7th and 8th innings. He gave up one run on two hits and two walks. Bobby Lanigan pitched a 1, 2, 3 ninth inning. Ft. Myers Miracle 11, St. Lucie Mets 8 Box Score After starting the season with 12 straight wins, the Miracle finally took their first loss of the 2013 season on Wednesday night. On Thursday, they traveled across the state to play the St. Lucie Mets looking to start a new streak. Thanks to their bats and tremendous bullpen work, the Miracle improved to 13-1 on the season. Things started out well for the Miracle. In the top of the first, AJ Pettersen led off with a double. He came around to score on Miguel Sano’s fifth home run of the year. Pettersen led the offense with three hits. He was 3-5 with his third double and his second stolen base. Sano was 2-4 with a walk and three RBI. Kyle Knudson went 2-5 with his second double. Down 7-6 in the 7th, Kennys Vargas knocked a two-run double to give the Miracle the lead and they didn’t look back. Vargas was 2-4 and the double was his fourth. Lance Ray went 2-3 with two walks and his third double. Madison Boer started and gave up seven runs on six hits and four walks in 2.1 innings. He struck out two. Nelvin Fuentes came on and gave up a run on two hits and a walk in 2.2 innings. He struck out three. Then in the fifth inning the dominant bullpen came in. Ryan O’Rourke has been the guy to come on in close games, often to see the Miracle take the lead. Reflecting this, O’Rourke's record improved to 4-0. He pitched two innings and struck out one. Zack Jones came on and recorded his fifth save by working the final two innings. He walked one and struck out three. Early in the season O’Rourke has pitched nine innings and given up no runs on two hits and a walk while striking out seven. Jones has thrown eight shutout innings. He has allowed one hit, walked two and struck out ten. Cedar Rapids Kernels 4, Peoria Chiefs 13 Box Score Things started out so well for the Kernels on this night, but it didn’t take long for things to completely turn around. The Kernels took a 1-0 lead in the first inning on an Adam Walker RBI single. In the second, a Tyler Grimes triple was followed by JD Williams’ first home run of the year. Taylor Rogers started and through four innings he had given up no hits. However, things went sour in the fifth inning. Rogers gave up eight earned runs on seven hits and two walks in 4.1 innings. Manuel Soliman was called on and was hit for five runs (2 earned) on four hits and two walks. Chris Mazza came on and gave up two runs and struck out two in 2.1 scoreless innings. Byron Buxton went 2-4 with a walk and his fifth stolen base. Niko Goodrum went 2-4 with a walk and his fourth double. Dalton Hicks and Adam Walker were each 2-5 with an RBI. Please feel free to comment or ask questions below.

In 2012 infielder Jamey Carroll played in 138 games (second-most of his career) and racked up a career-high 537 plate appearances. He was the Opening Day shortstop but that was the position that he played the third-most. He played 66 games at second base, 44 games at third base and 37 games at shortstop. Through 13 games in 2013, Jamey Carroll has made just two starts and has a total of nine plate appearances. Why has his role been so diminished to start this season? I think there are a few potentially good reasons. [PRBREAK][/PRBREAK] Did Carroll’s skills diminish in 2012? At first glance, looking at just his .660 OPS in 2012, we see a drop from .718 and .706 in 2010 and 2011, respectively. However, his Isolated Discipline (OBP – BA) of .075 was better than 2012 (.069). For his career, his Isolated Discipline is .078. In other words, his approach at the plate was right on par with his career. His 2012 Isolated Power (SLG – BA) was .049. A year earlier, that number was .057 and for his career, it is .067. So, his “power” dropped slightly from not-very-much to even-less. The .022 drop in batting average accounted for .044 drop in OPS by itself. Considering that he got off to such a slow start (hitting .214 in April), he was himself the rest of the season. The summary of the previous paragraph is that it was clear that Carroll’s production drop in 2012 was more related to a couple of hits falling (or not falling) in over the course of the season rather than a fundamental flaw in his approach. The Twins have committed to giving every opportunity to 26-year-old Trevor Plouffe at third base, 26-year-old Pedro Florimon at shortstop and 25-year-old Brian Dozier at second base. The primary utility player at this stage of the season has been 24-year-old Eduardo Escobar. As much as the Twins say aloud that 2013 is about winning, it makes much sense for the rebuilding organization to play the younger guys as much as possible, ahead of the 39-year-old Jamey Carroll. One side aspect of this situation is that Carroll is a terrific person and happy to teach. He can be a strong influence on the younger players offensively and defensively. Carroll is as steady as it gets with the glove. His demeanor is exemplary on and off the field. He has kept himself in great playing shape throughout his career. And offensively, Carroll remains one of the more patient hitters on the roster. Is it possible that a large percentage of Carroll’s lack of playing time is money-related as well? He is making $3.75 million in 2013. It is the second year of his 2 year, $6.5 million contract. However, the contract comes with a $2 million club option for 2014 that the Twins could consider picking up. It becomes a player option if he reaches 401 plate appearances. That is a number he has reached in each of the past three seasons. However, in the previous seven full seasons before 2010, he reached that number just twice. Since he is a prototypical #2 hitter, if he were playing most days, he would average about 4.2 plate appearances per start. He would need about 96 starts to eclipse that mark. If he continues to get just nine plate appearances for every 13 games, he would end the season with fewer than 120 plate appearances. At some point during the season, an infielder may get hurt and need to miss 15 to 20 games. Would the Twins start Carroll or Escobar in that situation? My assumption today would be that most of those starts would go to Carroll. Escobar really profiles to be the next in a long line of solid, long-term utility infielders like Al Newman, Jeff Reboulet, Denny Hocking and Nick Punto. No one is feeling sorry for Jamey Carroll. The author of this article and most of those reading it would give just about anything to sit on the end of a Major League Baseball bench and still make $3.75 million for the year. Carroll has had about as good of a career as a guy can have who didn't debut in the big leagues until he was 28 years old. He has over 10 years of service time and has earned the respect of his peers around the game of baseball. I had the opportunity to briefly meet Carroll at Twins Fest and he is one of the nicest people I have ever met. He acknowledged that he has a goal to play in the big leagues as a 40 year old. He will turn 40 as spring training is starting next year. It may be as simple as the Twins are going to play those young guys and give them a lot of rope to start the season. That’s completely understandable on a rebuilding team with some terrific prospects on the way but which still has to determine which of these current young players warrant a spot on future Twins teams. It may be as simple as trying to get out from needing to pay Carroll $2 million in 2014, although that is a very fair rate for a quality utility infielder in baseball. It is also possible that, despite Carroll’s work ethic, his skills had diminished enough to notice in spring training and he simply is not considered the player that he was within the organization. Who knows? Maybe there is something else going on all together.