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I don't necessarily buy into the Buxton is a higher prospect than Sano. A 35 HR guy with 110 plus RBI's and potentially very good 3rd base play is not easily replaced as the MVP on a team, any team. Buxton hitting .325 and 40-50 steals and scoring 100 runs is very good but does it rate him above my fantasy Sano? Now if Buxton can get up to consistently hitting 20 dingers then we've got a fight on our hands. In any case I'm excited as heck by both. Plus they seem to have very different personalities. Miguel Hunter and Byron Mauer.

Just wonder what Twins management knows (or thinks they know) about him that has kept them from calling him up. It just seems very, very peculiar.

Berrios, Stewart, Meyer. Emotional makeup is always the key and Berrios just seems to have that championship makeup in spades. Meyer, it seems to me, just has had too many chances without crossing the finish line. I hope he gets it together, but I just don't have that happy feeling about him.

Arica is my offensive player. Barrios is my pitcher. I expect him to arrive at spring training ready well ahead of everyone else. He will put up great numbers in ST and if he doesn't break camp with the team he will be the first call up early in the season. Will prove to be a very good #2 or #3 starter. At the close of the season he will still not be 6 feet tall and batters will still not hit him well.

Arcia. I believe he will finally discover an ability to stay in the moment each moment. If he can stay focused with no one on base and no critical situation, he could post some really amazing numbers.

Joe Mauer is an enigma. Supreme bat control, great eye who demonstrated power...1 year. He could have been the clubhouse leader of the team, but appears to this outsider, to have avoided that role with all his mind and soul. It was correctly pointed out that the likelihood of a minor leaguer making it to the bigs is slight. It is, in my opinion equally unlikely that our Mr. M will remain healthy enough to contribute for another two years either, let alone another four.

It's Miguel Sano, without question. I drove from Charlotte to Elizabeth to watch him play as a rookie and was not disappointed. He only had one hit in the game, but in BP put 4 in a row into orbit. When he was in the cage dang near every player on both teams stopped to watch him and absolutely every coach did. On one of his rockets two players on the visiting team high fived. I hope he learns just a little bit of patience, because he really has the strength and potential to be a steroid free Bobby Bonds like hitter. When he leaves the circle and goes into the box the you can see the attitude of the guy on the mound absolutely change. Doesn't happen with many players. Sano is the guy I'll plan trips home around the Twins schedule to see.

First, I have very little inside baseball knowledge, and played only to the minor league level. I'm a huge fan and here's my take. 1. Miguel Sano. All the power in the world and most importantly, he has "It". What is "it"? In Sano's case it's a fire in the belly. His performance when he was tossed out of the game before he crossed home plate said it all. He just going to do it and don't get in the way. 2. Byron Buxton. He doesn't show the same fire as Sano, but he works hard and just does whatever it takes. Plus, he's got more talent than, perhaps, any one else in earth. Maybe he should be 1a. 3. Jose Berrios. Like a combination Sano and Buxton. Does all the right things and has all the talent on earth, just doesn't look right, I say, bull sh*t. Sort of like saying that Marilyn Monroe would have too many curves to be a movie star in today's world. 4. Nick Burdi. He pitched at 3 levels last year and no one has even hit a foul ball off of him yet. Well...maybe a few. I betcha he'll be our set-up guy by June and our close within 18 months. Blazing speed and a tough mind set. 5. Eddie Rosario. He's on the 40 man now so he can smoke all the dope he wants and they cannot test him. He'll be mellow and back in the groove. What Willie Nelson is to C & W, what Robert Parish was to the NBA, Rosario can be to MLB. And I don't care...the man can stroke. 6. Chih-Wei Hu. Why do people make up stuff about prospects and ignore results of those who don't fit the mold. He just keeps doing it and until someone stops him, he's in my top 6. 7. Kohl Stewart. The kid was really good last year, his first year of baseball only. For GOSH sake, it was the first year that he wasn't a football player first and the results were astounding. He's big, he's fast and he's a great athlete. I look at him and see Don Drysdale. Sorry, kids, I'm older than you. 8. Nick Gordon. Too early to tell what the upside is, but this may be the gift of last hear's draft. Hitting after Buxton and before Sano, he could be solid for 10 or 15 years. 9. Stuart Turner. He may be our long-term missing piece. Someone who can squat down, make sense when talking to a left handed pitcher (not as easy as it might sound), throw to 2nd base and hit his way out of a paper bag. I really have hopes for this kid. 10. Max Kepler. I don't know why. Someone had to be included and we did well with a Dutchman Last century. Why not a German thus century?

What's the reason? He hasn't hit a lick so far this year. Just seems like a big risk here, but, like everyone else, I believe in this kid so good luck Buck!

Rosario is batting less than .240 and now hasn't played in at least 3 games. Is he injured or just being rested out of a slump? The 50 game suspension seems to have really affected his game. Hope the drug usage doesn't indicate a head case for this once golden prospect.

Hu continues his string of amazing performances. Promoted to low A ball and he IMPROVES on the 1.69 ERA he had at Elizabethton. Just just may be the least known unhitable pitcher in baseball. Is there a real scouting report on him somewhere? What is he throwing? What is he working on? 84 K's and 16 walks in 82.2 professional innings so I assume his control and velocity are pretty good. A few more starts like this and I'm guessing Barrios/Stewart kinds of speculation and comparisons. I also wonder about his background in Taiwan. I don't know anything about baseball there and wonder if he threw a lot of innings, was he in professional ball there and just how did the Twins learn about him?. He's thrown less than 50 innings so far this year and it will be interesting to see if he begins to tire.

Very interested to see if Hu can continue the dominance he showed the last 2 outings. He has been limited to 6 innings each start with the Kernels. He only has 40 innings this year and I would like to know how many pitches is this per outing? Or are the just counting innings? Nice article, thanks.

Got to see most of the game last night. Very impressive outing by JO. Most impressive to me was how quickly he worked. Not a lot of walking around or fidgiting around, just catch it, get the sign and throw it back. i don't know about height or angle of attack but a real good hitting team couldn't touch him last night. Going to be fun to watch.

Sad Burh wrote: "I think you answered your own question right there at the end. Leading the league in everything EXCEPT merely 2nd in RBI." i'm not familiar enough with your writing to know if this was a serious comment. I assume it was I tongue in cheek and I like it. I have always assumed that promotions, particularly up from the lower levels are based as much on management's expectations for a player as his actual production. This is not a comment on the Twins, but baseball in general.

With the Twin's results this year, I assume that Gardy is on the "Bubble" right now or will be soon. I like him, but at some point results matter and Minnesota nice goes out the door. The question is who would replace him? Jake Mauer is the natural choice, but Dougie baseball has a lot more fire in his belly. Or does Ryan go outside the system?

Monkey paws, that was my first thought. On reflection, however, I cannot imagine that they left him in the game for all those innings if there was ANY doubt about the health of his wrist. No one and I mean NO ONE would want o be the manager that blew that decision.

Buxton is 11 for his last 22 in his last 5 games. This includes 2 HR's, 1 triple, 5 walks and at least 1 HBP. That's at least a .608 on base record. I guess his spring training is coming around. Another few games like this and how long do they wait to move him up?

These ratings are interesting in light of what happened yesterday. Buxton homered in the 9th yesterday to go 2-4. This follows a 3-5 night with a triple. His spring training is being done in live time during games, so not easy. Stewart started and went 5 shut out innings. 0 walks, 3 k's and a 9-2 ground out fly ball ratio. He got the win and finally had solid defensive help. Like Buxton's spring training in public, Stewart is having his no football, full summer of baseball learning experience in public. In the last 10 games he's got a 2.42 ERA with 1 very bad outing about 6 or 7 games ago. Without this his ERA is well below 2. I'm pretty excited about both of these two prospects. We need to watch Buxton closely. A week of solid hitting and he may very well move up. I assume this would be to AA and not AAA, but I'll defer to someone smarter. Twin's management night decide early that his spring training is over. I'll be surprised if Stewart goes anywhere, though. At 19 they must really watching his innings. He's at 81 innings so far after 20 innings all last year. If he can continue getting in 4-6 innings an outing and not get beaten up, will they pull the plug at some point or do they base this on his ability to maintain speed, etc?

Watched the futures game and the short film posted elsewhere on this forum. Berrios looked very short when next to other players. Clearly this is not a reliable way to judge height, but the appearance of being less than tall was unmistakeable. I've tended to have a kind of a dismissive attitude about questions raised about his height. A question...do we know factually what his actual height really is? I don't think 6 ft is an insurmountable problem, but 5' 9" or 5' 10" might be.

I'd be pretty surprised if these young men weren't aware of every thought, rule or nuance affecting their careers. Especially the Latino players who might naturally be a bit cautious given the language and cultural barriers they face.

In an earlier post someone said he is hitting around .400 with bases loaded and very well with runners in scoring position is key. It might mean that when he concentrates he can be very succesful. It may also mean that when he bats in a non-high reward situation he has a much more cavalier attitude. This should be something that is coachable.

A very big day for our top position and arguably our top pitching prospect. Buxton is back in the line up and it looks like he's lost nothing in the field. Will be interesting to see how long it takes him to get his batting eye back. Berrios got what was clearly the most earned promotion of the year. As the youngest pitcher (I believe) at high A he was tearing up the league. He will certainly be a child among men at AA so those of us who were clamoring for this promotion will see what he's got at the next level. Too young, too short and too good. Makes for a high interest promotion. Good luck to J O and hoping that Buck can stay off the ground.

Only had 2 AB's then replaced by Walker. Tell me it was scheduled...please!

Has anyone seen him? The questions are multiple and obvious. His BA has to be a concern. It shows (I guess) a huge lack of discipline. Most puzzling is his performance with the bases loaded. Does this demonstrate that it's a matter of concentration? Also, are his dingers bombs or line drives just over the fence? Clearly, though, the production numbers are amazing.

Clearly my tongue was planted deep in my cheek. The point is that the kinds of production we've seen from him and the maturity/character reports make him seem to have more than the usual prospect promotability. My main reason for believing a promotion should be at hand is that I am not sure what more there is to accomplish where he is. As to those ahead of him...who cares? If they are ahead of him let them demonstrate on the field that they belong there. Right now no one at the next level is. i can certainly feel for the consternation he must be causing the head office. I understand the questions raised by age, size, etc. But I'll bet it's not such a big problem that they wish it would go away.