mluebker

A one-year contract isn't something the Twins are going to offer for a season likely to be truncated by the CBA negotiations/lockout. And who knows what the new deal is going to look like? If they really want him--and I think they should--they're going to have to offer him a multi-year contract and hope he likes it here well enough to take less money than some other team is likely to put on the table.

Less terrain to cover, less strain on an already fragile, aging body. Will he still get injured? Of course. But maybe not as often.

Asking questions is fine. But it’s WAY too soon to be talking about tweaking his swing to get more of this or less of that. Maybe let’s see how he does as an everyday MLB player before trying to “improve” him.

I hope he gets the surgery, comes back from it a little less fragile, and settles into one of the corner outfield slots. Maybe that can extend his career for a few more years and keep his bat in the lineup.

Sounds more like a man-crush than an analysis of Jenkins’ first weekend in the line-up, not that there’s anything wrong with that.

You’re right, as I note in a previous post, somewhere above. But those guys from the last few years are farther back in the pipeline, and a lot of the ones on the roster now, bouncing back and forth between Minneapolis and St. Paul, don’t really have defensive homes, and can have a real cost when they put on a glove. So I’m speaking from frustration, while yes, they are drafting smarter now. I just wish more of the well-rounded players were ready to go now.

To be fair, Mike Sixel is right, they’ve been doing a better job drafting more complete players over the past few years. The problem is that the guys clogging up the Twins current roster were drafted in that bats-first era. And that mindset still was around this past spring when they signed Josh Bell, ostensibly to play first base. As a DH, he’s been a real asset. As a first baseman, it becomes a math problem, trying to to figure out whether his bat gets the team more runs than his defense is costing them. Same thing for Luke Keaschall. No one disputes that he can hit, get on base, and steal bases. But when he’s in CF or at 2B, are those contributions on offense outweighed by his mental mistakes and his hands of stone? The guys that like to look at the statistics can tell us. I’m just one of those dinosaurs who still thinks you both need to hit and play solid defense to be on a major league roster.

"Larnach was drafted as a bat-first slugger with defensive limitations." Maybe they should stop wasting picks on guys who can't both hit and field.

Yes, yes, and yes.

I’m with you. Pick a plan and stick to it until they have measurable results.

He’s athletic, he’s smart. Put him in the same spot _somewhere_ every day, and have him work on that diligently over the winter, through spring training, and from opening day forward (assuming there’s not a lockout). He’s young. He still can learn. But stop bouncing him around from place to place and let him earn and own a position. Don’t just settle for the iron glove and mental mistakes, that seem to be much more noticeable when they come with uncertainty.

Clemens knew what the glove was for, which gave him a leg up on about half the roster. And Lewis’s high ceiling turned out to be not a heckuva lot higher than Clemens’s low one for a lot of the season. One of them had to go back to AAA to get his head back on straight this year, and it wasn’t Kody.

Totally agree on the psych factor, but still want to see Jenkins in the lineup sooner, rather than later.

A right fielder who can hit and maybe spend less time on the IL because he’d have less territory to cover sounds pretty good to me. A guy named Tony Oliva comes to mind.

Winter ball, where his errors don’t mean anything. Build up some confidence at second—the Twins already have plenty of outfielders.