bird

Trading vets is an important avenue for sustaining or improving a system. I believe that this low number speaks to Ryan's most glaring weakness, which was his "sell discipline". But to be fair, we had a lengthy period there where we lacked high-value tradeable vets as well. And other than perhaps Dozier, we still aren't blessed with a lot of current assets to trade for future assets (prospects).

Saying the Twins farm system is bare is factually inaccurate. If you read any of the pundits, they are fairly uniform in their descriptions. Not one of them describes the system as bare, or with any language that would hint at that. You're entitled to your opinion of course, but in my mind, you're making the same old tired blanket statements about bad scouting that are not supported by making genuine comparisons of the results of other teams confronted with similar opportunities and barriers. I'm sorry, but its a hollow argument. And it's just plain ridiculous to act as if they're in line to "blow" another draft. Contrary to your belief, the system is fine, the scouting talent is fine, and that's the reason Falvey hasn't made the wholesale changes so many rather simplistically argue is necessary. Come talk to me about how bad the scouting is when Sano gets MVP consideration, Buxton becomes an all-star. Kepler, Rosario, Dozier, Vargas, Mauer, Duffey, Rogers, Berrios...this group alone represents a good argument that calling the organization's scouting bad is farcical.

Sure, easy. Ryan was fired because of the W-L record. They told us that. No one ever mentioned anything about the farm system. The system is fine. It cycled down due to graduations and other factors ( a bad first round pick, which BTW everyone has, and a few key injuries). The great news is that its low point is to be a middle of the road system in the short term. No big deal. The 2017 draft and a good return for Dozier alone will change this conversation.

Diaz has a chance to make the lists. Others have a better shot. Burdi made it onto the tail end of a list or two, but never onto KLAW's or MLB.

In the few years there where the Twins were claiming as many as 6 or 7 spots, it was because of high-impact prospects, right? Some of those guys fell off. Meyer, Burdi, Thorpe, and Stewart come to mind. Some graduated: Buxton, Sano, Berrios, Polanco, and Kepler. They, along with a few payers who weren't good enough to make anyone's Top 100 now form the core of a team on the rise. Guys like Rosario and May fit in this category. Just because Gordon is the only player currently regarded as a Top 100 prospect is not enough to conclude something as dramatic as that the system is barren. Because it's far from barren. There are a good number of nice prospects that probably just missed the list, like Gonsalves and Diaz. The talent pool, especially in the upper minors, is pretty average right now, but it's not lamentable, and I'd wager a lot of cash that by next year the experts again regard it as an above-average system as opposed to an average one, with perhaps guys like Javier, Kiriloff, Romero, Wade, and a pick or two from this year's draft making the organization one of the more enviable ones in the game because both the parent and the affiliates have above average talent. The scouting personnel is capable in this organization.

Charles Brown's "I Stepped in Quicksand" deserves a place in every cultured person's music library. But it shouldn't be off-limits to TD'ers either.

I'm not concerned much about whether the Twins get pitching or position players in return for Dozier. For a number of reasons. One, I don't think Dozier fetches a MLB starter who vaults the team from pretender status into contenders. Two, if I'm GM, my sell discipline is not violated, and says I only trade from surplus, and I always get what I believe is an overpay, meaning I keep guys like Dozier when the offer is DeLeon. Because teams are not likely to overpay with anything other than prospects, I'm not counting on trading my way into instant contention. I have to be willing to make the occasional FA deal. Oh, and I'm NEVER depleting my farm system to make a run, ever. I want to avoid cycling in and out of the picture if possible. So, I'm trading Dozier, who is surplus, for prospects with a design on sustaining competitive excellence over time. I'm keeping Ervin, because I lack a current surplus and no one will overpay me anyway. He's worth more to me than to another team. How do I get from pretender to contender in 2018? Internal progress, taking my chances that the young guys come into their own, that guys like Chargois and Gonsalves come through, that guys like May and Thorpe recover, and one special FA move for a bona fide frontline starter. Can't count on trades or this year's draft.

Me too, but I think we have to acknowledge that there may be only two, possibly three consensus #1 pitching prospects available in a given draft. You obviously take Price and Strassberg . But if Dillon Tate is your best pitching option, the strategy of going for a position player makes all the sense in the world to me. The Twins took Gordon instead of Nola, Freeland, or Hoffman, and I think they'll be happy they did. If they had a disciplined draft strategy to take position players when the alternative is a pitcher with a #2-3 ceiling, perhaps we'd be enjoying Benintendi or Happ instead of asking if Jay is off the DL yet. However, I don't believe this "position player priority" strategy plays out past the first round of the draft. In fact, I'd probably resonate to a strategy that says you either find a high-ceiling HS pitcher and overpay when possible or take your chances on a fallen angel like Seth Romero or Clarke in the second round. And I agree that the draft this year dictates they take a pitcher with that first selection.

Concur.

I absolutely agree that the Twins have been serial criminals in failing to bring in that one elite relief arm in the off-season. Unsurprisingly, it has resulted in a scramble for a band-aid every season, and that's because the relief prospects they thought they might be able to count on were unavailable due to injury stifling their progress or because of other hiccups in their progress. They can be blamed for failing to bring in that elite reliever. They've been very unlucky when it comes to injuries to practically every relief prospect being mentioned now as languishing unnecessarily in the minors. Burdi, Chargois, Melotakis, Reed, Jones, Jay, Bard, Baxendale, Wimmers, Rosario, Cedaroth, Booser, Jorge. I believe every one of these guys has missed significant development time due to injury, many missing an entire season or more, all missing months at a time. So, we can argue that a number of these guys appear to finally be ready, and that's good. But I will cut them a little slack for being a bit more patient than I am, and I reject the argument that there's been a misguided and deliberate pattern of moving these prospects along too slowly. Well, okay, maybe just a little too slowly...

Yeah, I think it's important to remember that last year when they pulled the plug on him up here, his head was spinning and his breaking ball was not so much. He probably suffered as much from his lack of poise as he did from his lack of polish. Let's hope he will settle in this time.

Good catch.

It's instructive to look back and review what the scouts thought back at the time. I took a quick look at the five drafts from 2007-11. Rough count: of the 23 pitchers drafted within the first 10 picks, 12 made it to MLB. My best guess is that 10 or even fewer of the 23 were truly regarded as #1 types. A couple that weren't became aces, Bumgarner, the 6th pitcher taken and 10th overall selection in 2007, and Matt Harvey in 2010, 4th pitcher, 7th overall. The other aces or possible aces: Price, Strassberg, Taillon, Bundy, Cole. The failed aces: Matusz, Hobgood, Hultzen, Bauer, maybe Pomeranz? This may be a lousy analysis and conclusion, but here goes: * When you have a shot at someone who is truly regarded as having a #1 ceiling, you take it.Your odds are roughly 50/50. *You might find two consensus aces in the first round of a given draft, three in a great year. SO keep your expectations real if you don't have a top 3 pick. Your chances of getting lucky and finding one with the 5th pick? Really really bad. * The kind of pitchers you'll end up with if you pick after the aces are gone? If you're lucky, you get Matt Leake, Mike Minor, and Drew Storen. Remember, that's IF you're lucky and avoid the injury guys, and that's IF you're picking in the upper third of the draft. If you're picking in the lowest third, you're lucky (or maybe good) if you get Wimmers and Gibson. I know this last statement will be met with disbelief, but consider this: of the 14 pitchers selected BEFORE Gibson, maybe four or five of them have been better than he's been, and every one of them went 10th overall or higher (Strassberg, Minor, Leake, and Storen). And of the 14 pitchers selected immediately AFTER Gibson was selected, exactly none of them have been better. Zero. * So yeah, it's a crapshoot. And the window is narrow. Funny thing, I've read the mock drafts, and I swear there are two dozen mock selections that sound like they're going to be ten times better than Leake, Storen, and Minor, but I suppose someone said that about Ross Detweiler, Brian Matusz, Zack Wheeler, Barret Loux, Archie Bradley...

Or too aware of the pain they might cause.

This is an untrue comparison.

Great birding there, Bark, and you can pick your own hallucinogens along the river banks. Great cuisine as well. I highly recommend the blackened silver back monkey.

This goes to the crux of my own question. Because I too remember when the consensus was the Twins somehow lacked the scouting and coaching acumen to develop middle infielders. Now, we can examine every level and find that middle infielders are an unquestionable strength of the system. What happened to change this? Did we actually replace untalented development people? My own theory is that the DR effort finally began to produce. Simultaneously, the IFA budget increased, the reputation in the DR improved to make the Twins an attractive choice, and maybe luck played a part, because it always does. But I reject the notion that they don't find talent (Kepler, Polanco, Thorpe), draft and sign talent (Sano, Buxton, Dozier), or develop talent (Rosario, Vargas, Rogers). I get that the history surrounding pitching leads almost everyone to the same foregone conclusion that it has to be scouting, and/or development issues. I see other variables as the bigger culprits, but I understand why others will never be convinced that these other variables could be bigger contributors, even when given indisputable evidence when talking about specific players. As for Buxton, I'll give him the credit. He's the one playing baseball.

We'll save this for another thread (retread rethread?). I have my top ten list of reasons that you've read before. There have already been many major changes over the years that have eliminated or at least reduced a majority of the past problems that made my list. We're simply waiting on the results, but still feeling a few of the repercussions. Scouting, development, and training issues have never made my top ten list of problems. Giving them the best resources, technology, and tools, yes, but not the talent level of the field people themselves. As for Buxton, I'd guess the most critical thing for him will be that his mental and emotional growth allows his extraordinary talent to emerge. I think we're blessed to be witnessing this as it happens. He's remarkable.

Yeah, the Hunter tutorial makes for a good story, and sure, maybe he had a pointer or two that resonated. But I'm now imagining a few people clinging to a narrative that converts Hunter into the next great whisperer.

Yeah, and Joe Maddon's a lousy manager. Because he's old too. Berrios has been lights out in AAA. To which of his peers do you attribute this success?

In really suuny sun, the head is really that El Purple, Bark. That's why birding is so dang cool, even without LSD.

Both are delicious served on a bed of hummingbird.

Haven't seen one in four years, which was the last time I was down in your neck of the desert, Chief. Saw my first in Madeira Canyon, saw many later in various places, most of them in and around Lake Patagonia. It's easy to mix Anna's Hummingbird up with Costa's Hummingbird. And Bob Costas is a possessive guy.

Wrong, Ash, but it IS Anna's Hummingbird.