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bird

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Everything posted by bird

  1. bird
    I'm not terribly concerned about that one instance of inflexibility. Frankly, I'm practically hoping for a 4-pitcher shuttle from Rochester to the rotation, and hope it would be a one-way ticket most of the time. This team is caught in a bad spot IMO. While they won't compete on a sustained basis until they upgrade the ceilings of their top three starters, they don't have prospects who appear ready to reach their better ceilings for a couple of years. In the meantime Falvey has a delicate dance ahead of him. I'm hoping he has the option to accept a big overpay for Santana at the deadline because it's offered and because Berrios, May, and one or two others now in the minors (Romero or Jay?) are shining. If the relief staff isn't on a shuttle system, we're in trouble. We absolutely have to get at least two real gems out of that group that includes Shaggy, Burdi, Melo, Reed, etc.
  2. bird
    You're absolutely spot on. I see little immediate hope myself. The hope will be for the most part in Chattanooga's rotation, in the quick insertion of Berrios into the rotation, in a fast and steady progression at the MLB level by May and Berrios, and in the readiness of Mejia, Duffey, and/or Gonsalves to step in and acceptably fill the role of back-end starter. I think anyone investing a great deal of hope in the resurgence of Hughes or even positive regression (let alone improvement) from Gibson is risking disappointment. Santiago? Blah.
  3. bird
    To be fair, though, we have to acknowledge that the talent level has been underwhelming since the pool was shrunk. We're not seeing the Darren O'Days and Hector Rodons with regularity, and this type would represent our highest hopes. The last two Rule 5 pitchers to stick for a season were named Joe Biagini and Matt Bowman. So maybe Justin Haley is as good as it gets these days?
  4. bird
    Almost impossibly unlucky, this organization.
  5. bird
    The risks of taking a HS kid are well-known. I don't see how the Brien Taylor example is any more instructive than a hundred other examples since his selection. None of these kids makes it on talent alone, and no one goes 1-1 if there are any serious questions about their talent. The really talented kids who fail do so because of factors that are extremely difficult or even impossible to predict. That's why it's so important for teams to thoroughly study the prospect's background, and even then, every organization is going to draft kids that get distracted by their own demons and never made it despite their prodigious talent. So, any hesitation in taking Greene over one of the college pitchers will come down first to an assessment of talent, then the risk factor related to age will be appropriately considered as always, but I'd suggest that if it is a close call, they'll take the prospect who displays those intangibles that get categorized as "makeup".
  6. bird
    Two questions: 1. What specific actions do you believe Smith took regarding Romero, other than to pull into his parking spot a good portion of the time during which Romero and his handlers were courted? 2. If someone other than Smith pulled into the parking spot with the interim GM title, and like Smith, was completely oblivious as to who this Fernando kid was, would Romero have signed elsewhere as a result? I'm sorry, but you're arguing about things that never ever took place and that have zero relevance regarding the success or failings of the IFA efforts. Any difference in success from the times Ryan pulled into the parking spot and when Smith did is pure happenstance, period. And that includes any notion of how much a GM influenced ownership to write a big check. Even Sano's check had much much more to do with Guerrero's influence and a collective understanding of the opportunity and much less to do with anything Billy Smith did. Talking about the Smith era versus the Ryan era is a bunch of nonsense, frankly. Let's give both men credit for their actual accomplishments in building and leading the IFA efforts and stop trying to give them credit for these individual prospects they had so little to do with. Who do you think had the most to do with Thorpe? Or Kepler? Try Howard Norsetter perhaps, but scratch both Ryan and Smith off the list.
  7. bird
    Again, Billy Smith never followed any of these guys. He had zero influence on this. He has never once had an independent opinion about any of them. He didn't develop a relationship with any of these prospects' handlers. And in fact, the area scout who DID develop that relationship had much much more to do with the signing of the first contract, including the amount behind the dollar sign, than Billy Smith ever had. We could have substituted any FO type as a substitute player in this IFA process and gotten the exact same results. Billy Smith WAS a replacement player himself. But, I know, we want to believe differently. Billy Smith should get credit for his role in persuading his owner to increase the IFA budget a dozen years ago. He had much more than replacement value in that regard. It's in that context that I agree with you that Romero is yet another international prospect that is a product (in part) of Billy Smith's aggressive international efforts.
  8. bird
    You're probably going to remain convinced that the system is weak despite the many opinions that run contrary to yours from people who study this stuff. But every system, the strong ones and the weak ones, have a prospect or two among their very highest-ranked that is raw like Kiriloff, who is described as having advanced skills for a HS prospect. Griffey was a consensus 1-1 selection. Kiriloff doesn't fit into this category. And yet, he advanced quickly to E-Town.
  9. bird
    I'm with you on both points. Making questionable statistical comparisons is the common cold of TD. It's contagious as hell, and if we're here long enough, we're going to get the bug. But it's fun stuff. However, I'm very confident no one who's seen both Gordon and Vielma in action, and especially those who have coached them both, would draw a close comparison regarding their upside as MLB hitters. Thrylos wants us to believe that the Twins have perpetuated this "suburban legend" that Vielma is a bad hitter. I mean, why would they do that? No one from the Twins, at any level, has ever even hinted that this is the case, we can be sure of that. But I hope he's right that Vielma has offensive promise, all the statistical gibberish notwithstanding. And yet, it's nice to have Javier, Gordon, Polanco, and the new free agent from Milwaukee at various stages of readiness, all of whom are probably better bets than Vielma, as is a rebounding Escobar.
  10. bird
    I can think of a million things that happened last year for which Molitor could apologize. This isn't one of them.
  11. bird
    Did they go over slot technically but not in spirit? Who cares? And I don't care if you believe they should have blown through the allotment and signed more prospects. I don't care if you think they would've signed Javier for $5M had their allotment been $4.85M. Or that they should've shoved more money in his agent's briefcase and gone way over slot on "principal". All I know is they had enough conviction about this kid to take the huge risk of limiting themselves to just him. That speaks volumes, does it not? Regardless of what perception you've formed in your mind about the quality of the Twin's evaluators, you need only look as far as Sano or Kepler to see that they've bet fairly big before on a few rare occasions and they don't regret it. This kid is an exciting prospect to have in the system if for no other reason (so far) than the enormity of the bet and the things scouts are saying about his tools ( although, taking tobi's cue, if I had a nickel for every prospect described as a five-tool prospect...)
  12. bird
    I wonder if there's another prospect out there where the "problem" that needs to be "fixed" is any clearer and indisputable. On the surface that is. Everyone who follows him "knows" : that he 1) didn't concentrate solely on baseball until he began his professional career; 2) is working to harness command of his stuff; 3) throws some impressive stuff right now and has progressed at a very young age at an acceptable pace with at least decent results in all categories except BB/K stats. So, the polarity of opinion about his upside is really exclusively about the one thing. Some don't like him much because of what they "saw", while others don't like him much because they forecast that this will not change, and still others, fewer in number this season, believe he will eventually overcome the command issues and become a decent MLB starter. I'm tired of the reiteration of the problem and am looking for signs that point specifically to details about steps in his development process that are being taken to address this singular problem. If in fact it is as singular and clear-cut as people describe it.
  13. bird
    Can you repeat that?
  14. bird
    Knowing your thinking, Chief, if Buxton runs himself onto the DL, you have high conviction that Zack Granite and Tanner English are money in the bank.
  15. bird
    It will be interesting to see if what we're seeing is an effort to improve defensively simply from a roster construction point of view. Let's see what the game day lineup looks like I guess, but I'd view it as an over-correction from a roster construction standpoint if Stubbs makes the roster and has a role as a defensive replacement in the OF. Castro is unarguably a defensive improvement over Suzuki regardless of how we rate his defense beyond pitch framing. It was perhaps the single most glaring position player weakness and FA was the best avenue to fix it, so they overpaid slightly perhaps. He'll make a difference on game day, and we'll see about Adrianza in that regard I suppose. Falvey was painted into a corner. The paint was wet when he was issued his employee badge and won't completely set until next off-season. In the meantime, we have to expect to see him reach out of the corner to try to fix problems. Because of this, I'm actually impressed with the Adrianza move and find the Stubbs signing to be a function of having rather limited options. I hope they cut him and maybe pick up a better 4th OF option when spring training casualties hit the market.
  16. bird
    Apparently he and Bruno avoided each other.
  17. bird
    I'm most encouraged by Falvey's language when it comes to individual goals and honest two-way communication about how to "close the gap." Thinking hard, I can't honestly recall a single in-depth article or interview where either a Twins pitching prospect or a Twins baseball person discussed having a development plan or training regimen customized for a player as part of an organizational initiative. Maybe the beat writers don't explore these things. But I think it's safe to say we're going to see some positive changes on the development front. Good news, and terrific article, Parker. Thank you once again.
  18. bird
    Almost everyone on TD knew May wasn't going to get a fair shot last year by the time spring training rolled around. After Ryan failed to add sufficient BP help, it was painfully obvious that May represented one of the best options for addressing this area of weakness. Some of us begrudgingly saw it as the right move under the circumstances. And we know Duffey won't get a legitimate shot at the rotation THIS year and might be one of the more viable bullpen options. I'm guessing most of us believe May will in fact get a legitimate shot at a rotation spot this year. Why wouldn't we? The circumstances are different. ANd yet, wouldn't it surprise you to hear the GM say Duffey doesn't stand a chance at earning a spot? Why would a GM turn that card over with the fans?
  19. bird
    I'm not commenting about fans' patience at all. The question I have is, if you were the GM, hired at the same time as Falvey, what move(s) would you have made to improve the starting rotation in 2017? Other than giving Trevor May a legitimate shot at a spot, which the GM has done. And even if, as the GM, you had decided to ignore adding a lot of talent in 2017 and to abandon the goal of improving the record in 2017 through outside means besides Castro, what moves would you have tried to make this off-season to improve in 2018 and beyond, besides the one Falvey apparently worked hard to accomplish (Dozier) without success? We're talking in this thread about the prospects of an improved record in 2017, and how moves by Falvey this off-season could possible be made or maybe should have been made. And how internal improvements might impact the record in 2017. There's decent consensus that a FA BP arm or three would be kind of a no-brainer, and a consensus that to-date Falvey hasn't adequately addressed the BP. You'd agree that a majority believe a straight-up trade of Dozier for JDL would have been ill-advised?
  20. bird
    I guess I wouldn't necessarily take exception to this belief, especially if you limited it to starters. Fixing the problem is another matter. I don't have any clever ideas about that, and frankly, I haven't really been exposed to any on TD, especially this off-season. The thing I find least digestible is that, even if every single starter performed in accordance to the more optimistic expectations out there for them, the current staff would probably be pretty much "average". Again, I don't know how a GM fixes this problem entirely in one or two off-seasons.
  21. bird
    For dozens of reasons other than a belief that you've isolated the issue by declaring there to be a dearth of talent.
  22. bird
    I think it's fair to say this. They've also said they haven't set the roster yet. I'm hoping for a bullpen move. I keep reading statements that the Twins are the "worst team" in baseball. Talent-wise, I don't buy this. Apparently, neither do the Twins. There are realistic and advisable things a GM can do to improve talent in an effort to improve the record. There are ill-advised and/or unrealistic ideas presented on TD all the time, like trading Dozier for players that were not ever going to be packaged in a trade for him (unrealistic) or for DeLeon straight up (ill-advised). If Falvey does nothing to change the BP roster, I'll be critical of that non-move. I agree with Nick. A slightly better BP via addition would help, as will Castro. After that, I personally attributed a lot of the underperformance to Molitor's subpar managing, some very key performance disappointments, some caused by injury, others not so explainable, and some bad luck. I for one am happy that Falvey believes the talent is vastly better than last year's record.
  23. bird
    No, but the site was a backyard BBQ at Andy and Lark MacPhail's home. On lawn chairs. A lot of the discussion I participated in centered on their (Jim and Andy's) belief that this costly long-term investment, despite the fact that there may not be results for more than a decade, was essential to the team's future. Keep in mind what the nature of the DR marketplace has been historically. The pipeline back then was controlled by a very few influencers. It took more than throwing a scout down there with a notebook and a checkbook. Things were improving for the Twins every year, albeit slowly as relationships were established and the first academy came to be. I'd categorically disagree with a description that international efforts have been languishing. They're still making aggressive moves there, as evidenced by the new joint facility in the DR. Based on a number of things, it's relevant to consider the possibility that the Twins actually have their act together to a much greater extent than what might be the consensus thought on the subject. Maybe moreso than a majority of the teams in MLB. Ramon Ortiz's thing is essentially irrelevant to the Twin's evolving story in the DR. That was just a FA event.
  24. bird
    This is total nonsense. I can give you ten reasons the Twins have lost 90 games in those seasons, back each reason up with solid logic and facts, and none of them would have a thing to do with the Twins doing a "bad job" of drafting.
  25. bird
    That they got a late jump in the DR is very true. Andy MacPhail, Billy Smith, and Jim Pohlad were beating on Carl Pohlad for years to approve a huge budget increase that would allow them to build the necessary infrastructure (scouts, facilities, relationships). MacPhail once told me it would take ten years for this investment to bear fruit. If we examine things carefully, we can see that we're just starting to see results that compare favorably to other organizations if we exclude the one-off Moncada-type events and focus on the traditional pipeline. When it comes to the IFA situation, the new regime is stepping into a pretty good situation.
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