mikelink45

I hate to see some of the names we have been reading about dropping in ranking rather than going upward. Rortvedt's struggles is a disappointment. I was hoping to see him on a fast track, it is nice to see Thorpe back and hopefully he will jump up the rankings again. Baddoo and Miranda ratings puzzle me. Based on what they are showing in the stats you share I would say they should be at least down in the next ten on the list. They are listed on hope and I do not put much stock in that until I see real production. I hope to follow your career updates. Arreaz injury is the worst news on the list.

I believe that he will continue to improve in all facets because he has the attitude to accompany his skills. I see that at the Oriiz factor, the ability to concentrate and swing hard and not be phased by the external things that can impact a player. I think we have just witnessed the birth of a star.

I am ready for Garver to see the majors and with the poor performance that Gibson just gave us I would like to see Sleger given a chance.

Melotakis is my shock guy on this list. I keep hearing that he is ready for MLB, but how can that be if he is this low on the list. I expect to see the list get more and more MLB ready as it goes up in number.

The Saints truly embody the fun and spirit of baseball and I appreciate all the fans who join in this great celebration of the game.

I am getting the feeling that the Park discussions are going the way of the second string QB. There is a reason that Park is not up. His record - both batting and health - is not screaming call up. Only his contract says that and like Hughes, the Twins need to learn to ignore contracts in their decisions. Park is nearing 31, he is not the future, and Palka has not cured his impatience yet - The TD minor league report this week covered that. Vargas and Grossman are the DHs and we are fine. What is not fine is a .219 utility player pinch hitting for either one.

I believe Mr Hughes is saving face and asking for a DL spot - so we should be so kind as to give it to him. Move on!

It is time to cut the losses with the old FO - Hughes is either switched with Duffey or sent away with handshakes and a wave good-bye. We do not need to repeat the Pelfrey scenario.

What am I missing. I keep reading these encouraging words about Hughes and then I look at the box scores and wonder if we have two Hughes on the team - the really nice comeback player who obviously has not thrown an inning yet and the Mr. Hyde Hughes that comes out and pitches batting practice to the other team. In 11 years Hughes has had two ERA under 4 and we paid big because of one of them. 5 times he has had an ERA over 5. What am I missing? Other than his contract. This reminds me of that wily old vet - Pelfrey.

For those who think Buxton should be the phenom and not Berrios, I think this baseball prospectus article about Aaron Hicks - yes we gave up on him - puts things in persective - http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=31873 Berrios had his ups and downs like Buxton and now has it together. I believe he is an example for Buxton.

When a pitcher finds success in a role then I advocate leaving them where they succeed. Going back and forth in a "May" scenario is only harmful to the pitcher. Both he and Rogers seem suited for what they are doing and I do not hear much from the team about putting them into a rotational spot.

He is almost 27. If he is going to have a career it is now. Play him and let him sink or swim. Then we will know if we should be looking at one of the minor league bats to replace him. He has a 304 OBP and a 746 OPS - over 4 years. Put him in and stay with him for a few weeks - we have done that with Buxton and Dozier this year despite neither of them shining with a bat. Park is about to turn 31 in less than a month, he is not the answer.

Very nice story. It would be great to see him move up quickly, but most important I hope the arm strength builds so he can do it safely.

Okay you minor league experts - tell me about Slegers. Is he real? Can he be MLB? I just love the idea of a tiny Berrios followed by a giant Sleger to really give different looks to opposing lineups, but that is my fantasy and I wonder how real his stuff is. I read these reports and he sure sounds good.

I am just glad Berrios is up. I would have liked it earlier, but I consider the Twins six weeks to be their real spring training and I am glad we came out with a winning record. They moved on Gibson and I am pleased they did and maybe he will find some magic with the AAA coaches. I wanted more from Mejia and hopefully he will be up and good soon. I do not see Duffey being that good again - even though his debut was spectacular and the May anguish has gone on for three years. Right now I see Santana, Berrios, Santiago and then I would like to see the same team that pushed out Tonkin and Gibson start down the list and move Hughes to the BP - in fact for those who like Duffey I would trade their spots. But then lets move on the BP and get some more stud arms out there. I listened to the Molitor interview last night and he basically said that Pressly is the only guy with an arm that can get a K and turn the other team. Why? We have Burdi and Melotakis and others in the minors with live arms. Molitor basically told the audience that we need some relief pitchers that can blow the other team away. So what are we waiting for. We have made step one and two - lets keep the shuffle going until we end up with what we really want to have going forward.

Hughes to the bullpen. His progress has been mediocre at best. We have three pitchers in the rotation and until someone else in the minors looks like they can come through it will have to be Mejia and Gibson filling our the rotation. Who is the next young pitcher? I read the minor league reports and the ones that were rated high in our prospect lists do not seem to be performing at a level to interest the MLB team.

I would like to see Garver come up. We have had Ryan in enough games to diminish any hopes we might have. The Yankee years are long gone and Garver has worked hard to earn a chance. Garver is not young and more seasoning is not to the benefit of a catcher since we all know that most catchers regress in their 30s. I agree with mlhouse posting - the pitcher numbers are not showing that big Castro boost. The pitch framing is not a cureall when the pitches are so far off that the people in the bleachers can call balls and strikes. Let Garver sink or swim. We all hope Rotverdt(?) will the the eventual answer, but by then it would be nice to see who can split time or back him up.

Why Rucinski? He has pitched 8 years according to Baseball reference and is 29-31 with 4.49 era 1.4 whip, about 1:3 BB/K. Don't we have better? Based on these reports I would think that we did.

I cannot see or scout the players and if I did I would not be accurate, but my hope is that we have assembled the talent judges needed for one of the most important decisions in the draft that we (hopefully) will have over the next decade.

1/4 mark of season - some expectations - Sano will continue to hit very well, Buxton and Kepler start upswing and keep going, Dozier has to have his half season of spectacular homeruns (two years in a row), and Polanco and Rosario maintain what they have. Catchers better continue framing because they won't be hitting and Joe Mauer will have a week or two where everyone thinks he is back and he won't be. Vargas should be okay, but not spectacular and maybe we will see another DH and I do not mean Grossman. Santana has to regress some, but still is our best, Berrios will be good 3/4 of the time, Santiago will regress, Hughes better not regress because right now he is awful and, therefore, we have to hope that Gibson and Mejia push Hughes to the pen. In the bullpen it is beyond time for Melotakis and Burdi to be there - Haley and Belisle out. And we have to learn to quit waiting for Kinzler to fail - we have to hang with him. Pressly - raw tough, poor performance, not a fan. With all that I think the Twins will be above 500 at the end, not a lot, but a game or two.

Great insight - yes the transition is the problem and if we are addressing that I am pleased.

I know that the articles tried to get in to this, but it is a tough one to analyze. Tepesch jumped out at me because of this minor league report and his start for the Twins. The three leading Runs vs Er pitchers this year are Tepesch, Tonkin and Hughes in that order. And last year it was Gibson, Duffey and Tonkin.

I do not think we can overestimate the impact of a lousy central division on our record. I will be interested in getting their record in division versus other divisions by the end of the year. Right now we are 5 - 5 with games against Texas which was struggling at the time, Oakland (a very poor team), Boston and Colorado. So we are 9 - 5 in division. Nothing wrong with beating up the weak teams.

I was struck by the fact that Tepesch gave up a number of unearned runs in this outing and did the same in the MLB outing. The difficulty in ERA is that it misses many aspects of measurements for quality pitching. Pitchers who consistently give up lots of unearned runs are poor pitchers in my mind. Perhaps they create hard hit balls that lead to errors and even if not, they do not have the stamina to get that extra out. I find it even more frustrating for evaluating relief pitchers who can give up runs to the players on base when they come in and get no impact on their era. A relief pitcher should always have an ERA a run below starters. I know that Baseball reference has tried to assess pitchers differently, but they still fall short - http://www.baseball-reference.com/about/war_explained_pitch.shtml Another look at unearned runs and pitcher performance is found at http://baseballanalysts.com/archives/2006/02/a_look_at_unear.php The author says = "If my longheld belief is correct, groundball pitchers should give up more unearned runs than flyball pitchers." and "I would agree with David [Gassko} and recommend that we pay more attention to total runs than earned runs. Oh, you'll still find me giving an ERA here and there, but recognize that run average (RA) is an even better gauge of a pitcher's performance than earned run average. Secondly, as it relates to ERA, be aware that a pitcher with a high percentage of unearned runs is more likely to regress than a pitcher with a low percentage of unearned runs. Not surprisingly, pitchers in the top 20 table above have a higher DIPS ERA relative to actual ERA than those in the bottom 20." I have not heard stats quoted about fielding independent pitching, but found this article quite interesting - http://www.hardballtimes.com/batted-balls-and-dips/ And finally I like this blog and the idea of Runs Allowed more than ERA - http://danagonistes.blogspot.com/2004/08/unearned-runs-whose-fault.html

I found this quote - "Double-A: The entrance to the “upper minors,” the jump to Double-A tends to be the most difficult for prospects, and tells us the most about them. The Double-A level is where hitters and pitchers begin to have a plan. This is where pitchers can’t get by without a decent off-speed pitch and the hitters who can’t hit them are exposed. The competition is good, as evidenced by the fact that we see players jump from Double-A to the majors with relative frequency. Each organization has its own philosophy on doing so, but it does happen often because of the advanced level of competition. There aren’t as many players in Double-A with major league experience as there are in Triple-A, but one could argue that the pure talent level is actually higher because players are heading in an upward direction as opposed to the stagnation that tends to take place with some Triple-A players." http://www.hardballtimes.com/understanding-minor-league-levels/ I believe that the really good players do not have to spend time in AAA. Remember how Kelly talked about AA back in his years. This was his real proving ground and AAA was what filled out the roster. For me, the relief pitchers do not need AAA, they need to move to the majors. Unlike starters, they only need two pitches and if they have them we should use the live arms in MLB.