bird

7-1 in the minors yesterday. The Twins (affiliates) sure know how to win.

I believe the market will increasingly favor buyers as we move along here. We have surpluses in the farm system. The system is just fine. Be a buyer, Derek.

Let's turn the question around. What kind of pitcher needs to be on the table? I believe the Twins need a bona fide #2 starter who has stretches of pitching like an ace and hardly ever has stretches of pitching like a mid-rotation guy or worse. Any pitcher who doesn't meet this standard just isn't going to catapult this team to the next level. Do you agree or disagree with this premise? Do Quintana, Gray, or Straily fit this description? I personally don't care one way or another about retaining Gordon per se when his absence doesn't create a void. I'm more interested in the prize, and whether the prize came at a fair price.

You're making a huge assumption that some GM out there would know as much as we do here on TD.

You sure?

Your last sentence is simply not a true depiction of things. I'd restate the first sentence to say we lack the ability to adequately fix the rotation from within to make a serious run in 2017.

Yeah, but what do YOU care what you'll say next year?

I think part of the answer to the question about who to get excited about is to not fret all that much about which prospects are quick to the majors and watch instead which prospects, at any level, build their value. We need this new FO to be more willing to trade surplus minor league assets. I think drjim is probably right in surmising that we don't have a front line starter on the cusp, Romero being the long shot for such a description. We probably have to hope Falvine are willing and able to acquire a 1-2 starter to anchor the rotation from the outside, either through trading some of these increasingly valuable minor league assets along with a MLB asset like Dozier, or through a FA signing. We have a lot of guys who project to possibly be nice mid to back end starters in the next year or so: Mejia, May, Gonsalves, Jorge, Thorpe, Romero.

Another really good day in the system. I think we should be encouraged by what's going on, despite the lack of star power. For me, I think the warm fuzzies some times hide behind the clouds because so many of the names in the box scores ( the older non-prospects) dull my senses. But then I consider that the All-Star rosters at each full-season level were adequately represented, and there has to be at least some optimism to take from two sets of numbers: 1. Team pitching (ERA and WHIP) at three of four full season leagues. Rochester is tops of 14 teams (3.29/1.23), Chattanooga 2 of 10 (3.02/1.22), Cedar Rapids 3 of 16 (3.36/1.18). Even Ft. Myers isn't terrible (3.46/1.30, 7/12). I conclude from this that there's some pitching talent, and that it's being properly developed. These have been major concerns of ours. 2. Winning teams. Rochester's winning percentage is .552, Chattanooga .640, Fort Myers .530, Cedar Rapids .552. ETown is 9-3 so far, GCL 12-5, and DSL 24-5. I conclude from this that the overall talent level in the system might be better than average and better than we have thought, and that the coaching is not too shabby. These have also been major concerns of ours. Not everything is rosy, but these are indications that things have been headed in the right direction and we have more good things on the horizon.

He might be better than Tyner. It's safe to say Trout has the edge.

In his defense, that was a "run on contact" play. To his credit, he stretched his hit into a double in impressive style.

There are over 30 species of parakeets and parrots that have made it out of the pet stores and into the wild in the southern states. They roost communally at night. Sometimes noisily.

The last Vermillion Flycatcher I saw was probably a 20 minute drive from Chief's house.

nydes, PM me. knucklehead...

Van, PM me. idiot...

A Vermillion Flycatcher, yes.

Great Tits. Look it up.

I couldn't agree with you more regarding the slight of the Olive-sided Flycatcher. I mean, who WOULDN'T love singing a team song that starts with a low pep pep pep with variations from soft rapid ptw ptw ptw to harder pew pew to single note pep with a final verse a sharp, penetrating whistle of whip WEEDEEER. The last verse basically sounds a lot like "quick, three beers!" Right?

No one can conclude with certainty which factors contributed most to Berrios's success in 2017, but something leads me to believe his excellence in the minors did more for him than his 2016 failings with the big club in terms of his current success. My questions regarding Romero, Gonsalves, and Jorge are: 1. If brought up, can they both produce acceptably (under enormous pressure) and continue to optimally develop at the same or maybe at an accelerated pace? 2. If not, would moving them to AAA enhance their development and/or speed it up, or are they better off where they are until they reach certain standards regarding their sub-optimal skills? These guys aren't ink on a spreadsheet that can so easily be moved around free of other consequences. Maybe having them settled in, under living arrangements that are in place, with teammates and coaches that are familiar, on a hugely successful team, playing against AA talent that might arguably be higher-ceiling talent than what's at AAA but rawer...makes more sense than bumping them up to Rochester, NY, I don't know.

What worked for him last year? Berrios came up in 2016 and was dreadful for the most part, wasn't he? He wasn't ready then, and he wasn't ready to begin 2017. He came up when he was ready in 2017. Well, maybe a month or so AFTER he was ready, but... I think we'd be absolutely thrilled if any of Jorge, Gonsalves, or Romero demonstrated the level of sheer talent, will, and polish we're seeing from Berrios. Remember, guys like Keith Law were at one time describing Berrios's ceiling as a 3-4 with a higher likelihood of becoming a bullpen arm. Berrios is a much better pitcher today than he was a year ago. It paid to be patient and let him develop.

McCullers is viewed as being on a higher talent level than anyone of our prospects being mentioned. The other Astros mentioned have given Houston about 25 starts in total during 2017 with an ERA above 5, so I don't think we want to follow this path with our guys, right? Have them come up in 2017 with spotty results only to come back up in 2018 with only slightly better results? My theory is that the FO thinks about the pitching situation so differently than we do as fans. I doubt they ever think about or have discussed any statistic that defines the Twins as having "the worst pitching in baseball" or whatever the numbers say today. I think they strictly regard each pitcher and assess that player's current path. Their patience with the MLB pitchers, in my view, stems from this approach. My theory is that Falvine stays very much focused on the developmental progress of each prospect. I really wonder if, from a tactical standpoint, they ever have a discussion about ushering in a youth movement. As a hypothetical, I can envision a thought process that compares the benefits to the team of having Gonsalves come up and get eaten alive by the best hitters in baseball in 10 starts in 2017 versus straightening out Mejia, or Gibson, or Santiago and living with the best those guys can give you, until your assessment is that Gonsalves (or whomever) has a better than even chance to hold his own up here. I think a lot of times we get wishful about these prospects and lose sight of how big the jump is, especially for prospects with more "marginal" talent. I also think the fans' argument of "we don't know if we don't give them a shot" ignores the level of understanding the development people generally have about the stage of development of each of these pitchers. Jorge was thrust into the spotlight. They probably had an inkling that he could focus and hold his poise, maybe get away with some things for a start or two. But even we as fans can see that Jorge might get shelled next time out. He's not quite ready.

I agree with your first sentence and would restate the other one: ALL deadline decisions should take advantage of the opportunity of the moment as long as the decision doesn't compromise the immediate future (and I would argue this is 2018). I would add this crazy on-pace number: 10. All eight teams in the system, from MLB down to the DSL, have winning records. I wonder if another team in baseball can say this.

The Twins could conceivably trade for $3.9M of penalized teams' pool money. I'm not sure why it wouldn't be in both teams' interests to swing a deal. Presumably, a cheating team could trade a couple mil in pool money in exchange for a prospect that might theoretically be valued at, say, a million in bonus money if they were in this year's draft and still have enough left over to sign a half-dozen low-level prospects they like. The compliant team would give up a prospect today but gain enough to maybe sign two of the better prospects in this year's deep pool. I wonder if this strategy is being executed by any organization.

Since all teams essentially draft a like number of pitchers, we're getting a good idea on how many fail by looking at the few who succeed. Keep in mind every team has their Wheelers and Tonkins who make it but don't "succeed" as defined by at least 1.0 WAR. We've had a billion threads here on this topic. Comparisons are hard to do. For example, if we add the Royals to the comparison (5 years, 2007-11), they have 6 hits compared to Cleveland with 2 and the Twins 1. But here's the rub: Do the same comparison a year from now, removing the 2007 results and adding 2012. The Royals lose Holland and Duffy and maybe add Strahm, but probably not. And now their list id Montgomery, Hardy, Crowe, and Louis Coleman, and I don't think any of them are even with the Royals, let alone building uo a bunch of WAR. Cleveland will still have just the two Codys on their list. I think one of them is in AAA? The Twins lose nothing from 2007 and add Berrios, Duffey, Rogers, and maybe Chargois. Now however, if you add up the score by adding up cumulative WAR, Cleveland may be the "best" on the basis of 23rd round choice Cody Allen (8.2+ WAR) alone. I take away a few things from an exercise like this: 1. You have to be careful about time periods being examined, because a year or two can change everything, and because the jury may still be out. (You wouldn't trade Berrios and his 0.2 WAR for a single player on either Cleveland's or KC's list of hits.) 2. Adding up cumulative WAR is a pretty useless exercise in a comparison like this. 3. Looking at just the draft tells us something, but not everything. Two of the three subjects of this thread, Romero and Jorge, were not draft choices. 4. Draft order really matters. Two players on the three teams' lists were top 10 selections: the Royal's Duffy and Crowe, and both have produced, maybe not to expectations of fans. No top 10 pitcher selection was made and then failed. SSS caveat of course. 5. As hard as comparisons are to make , at least they tell you something, whereas reciting a list of prospects who have failed tells us virtually nothing whatsoever.

Just to give readers one comparison covering this 2007-2011 period. I chose Cleveland, a team in our division, Falvey's former stomping ground, our stiffest competition at the moment, and a team I'm guessing most TD'ers suspect have a whole lot better track record than the one being "analyzed" above. Over this 5-year period, the Twins sadly can "boast" of one pitcher who was drafted, signed and eventually produced a single WAR for the team so far. That guy is the enigmatic one, Kyle Gibson (4.4 WAR). He and Wimmers are the two 1st rounders during the period. Lots of "meh" here, with Tonkin, Wimmers, O'Rourke, Dean, Darnell, Achter, Wheeler. So yeah, it's ugly. We can't count guys on the above list like Thielbar (2.0), Mijares (4.2) Swarzak as an earlier draft (2.9), as Cleveland probably has some of those guys too. Hendriks essentially has zero WAR. Cleveland? Two guys during that 2007-2011 5-year period have come through with better than a 1.0 WAR. Cody Allen (8.2) is almost all of it. Cleveland drafted him in the 16th round in 2010, failed to sign him, and then drafted him again in the 23rd round in 2011. The other success story for them is Cody Anderson (1.8). So, once again, it's easy to draw up a list and lament about how sad the list is. But when we do more comparisons, we gain perspective. I think the positive thing is that technology advancements have greatly improved the ability of evaluators to make good calls on talent, for all teams, and the poor results for both these teams aren't really much of an indictment of anyone we know in my opinion.