SydneyTwinsFan

How about 63% - the amount of inherited runners that have scored so far. League average is about half that I think.

I don't know that it's that ridiculous. You could make an argument that Eddie Rosario's rookie year was more valuable than his last year (by WAR at least)

Kirilloff not in the Pensacola line up tonight....

Great discussion here. My own takes: Eliminate the DH. I'm a bit torn as I like the point of difference between leagues, but on balance I'd rather see proper batters hit than pitchers flailing away. 26 man roster. OK as long as pitchers are capped at 13. I thought about having a 27/28 man roster of which 24 are active for a given game. On the one hand it would provide flexibility if a position player is a bit dinged up but not needing a DL stint, or provides an active arm to replace the previous day's starter (who is effectively redundant), but I think it would probably just lead to an excess of relief pitchers being rostered and would eliminate or minimise the impact of burning through a whole relief corps in the first game of a series (I like that occasionally the starter is under pressure to go deep because the bullpen is gassed from a blowout the night before). Pitch clock. Seems like a no-brainer, although I do wonder how much time it would really shave off a game. Anti-tanking. Hard to enforce I think and if a single-season salary floor was imposed that would potentially just encourage mediocrity at the expense of a well thought out rebuilding strategy ie force a team to spend an extra $20m to win 72 rather than 66 games, while impacting their ability to spend that $20m to be more competitive the following year. (note - the Twins are an example of teams that DON'T seem to carry forward savings for the benefit of future years, but maybe not all teams act this way?). Maybe enforcing a salary floor (% of revenue?) over a rolling 3-year period would allow for some flexibility and rebuilding.

Interesting to see that Law rates the Twins farm system as #4 overall - "sneaky good" as he describes it.

I was thinking in relative terms compared to BP (33), BA (55) and MLB Pipeline (68)

Twins have no-one in the 51-100 section. Interesting that Balazovic (102) and Graterol (108) were included in the "just missed" group, with Balazovic ranked slightly higher. Law seems to think Graterol is destined for relief which is the most bearish I've seen anyone on him. "Scouts see no projection.." seems overly harsh based on his performance to date. http://www.espn.com/mlb/insider/story/_/id/25852941/keith-law-2019-top-prospects-nos-100-51 http://www.espn.com/mlb/insider/story/_/id/25833101/just-missed-top-100

I think it takes Lewis, Kepler and one of Romero / Gonsalves / Graterol for them to return your call.

1.) Where are you from? Born and grew up in the UK. Lived in Sydney, Australia for the past 19 years. Have family in the Twin Cities 2.) Age Range? 47 3.) What brought you to Twins Daily? BYTO 4.) Highest level of baseball/softball played? Never played, other than a few social/corporate softball games. Got taken to a game at the old Met in about 1980 when visiting family and loved it. 5.) Favorite Twins Player? Justin Morneau. It was also great having Jim Thome, even if only for a short while Favorite under appreciated Twin? Brad Radke. As an adopted Australian, Glenn Williams and his .400 batting average! Favorite current Twin? Jose Berrios 6.) Favorite non-Twins Daily site/authors? Joe Posnanski, Molineux Mix (fan site for my favorite UK soccer team), Scandinavian crime writers 7.) Favorite Twitter follows? Don't do Twitter 8.) Other interests outside of baseball? Soccer, reading, travel, good food, wine, beer, poker, golf, snorkeling, hanging out with my kids 9.) Favorite part of Twins Daily? Game threads, tolerance (usually!) for a wide range of posters' views, cameraderie generated amongst regular posters, daily game and minor league reports

Gibson should have been DHing all year

Clearly keeping Belisle for the save opportunity. Closer experience and all that.

To be fair to the Cleveland rookie, he's been scorching the minor leagues this year. 1.10 ERA and 61/3 K/BB in AA and AAA. Aggressive promotion by the Indians after just 5 AAA starts

Scott Barlow mowing down the Twins line up tonight. The same Scott Barlow who sports a 6.09 ERA in his AAA career...

If you're looking for a top 3, the April 2016 and April 2017 vintages of Byron Buxton would fill out the podium nicely

How come Kerrigan goes from Ft Myers to Rochester? Would have preferred to see Wade to Rochester and Kerrigan to Chattanooga

In other news, Gonsalves has 1-hit Pawtucket through 7 IP so far

After a nightmare start, Gibson was pretty solid for the last 4 months of the season: From 1 June - 21 GS; 121.1 IP; 4.23 ERA; 7.1 K/9; 2.9 BB/9 Over the same period: Santana - 22 GS; 134.1 IP; 4.15 ERA; 7.4 K/9; 2.2 BB/9 Berrios - 21 GS; 119.0 IP; 4.16 ERA; 8.5 K/9; 3.0 BB/9 Of course games played in April and May count just of much, and yes the sample size is a bit arbitrary. I don't know whether the last 4 months represents a "turning of the corner" or a sample size fluke, but to argue Gibson wasn't a contributor over a long period of the season is a bit unfair IMO.

Agree with this. Diaz posted a .770 OPS in low A, doesn't walk and has projectable rather than demonstrable power thus far. Personally I'd say there's a 1% chance he gets taken and sticks on a 25-man roster all year. The risk that Burdi gets taken and stashed on the DL is real I think (I would try it on a rebuilding team).

I agree that if you were building a team around either Dozier or Vargas, you go with Dozier every time based on track record, sustainability of success etc. In the context of a "power ranking" based on performance to date in the current season though, I'm not sure there is as much separation between them as Brandon's rankings suggest.

Kintzler feels a bit hard done by, in terms of the role he has been asked to do and the effectiveness with which he has done it. By WPA and ERA+ he belongs in the top 5, and even though his peripherals haven't been overpowering, that wasn't held against Santana. I don't have a strong view on the Vargas v Dozier debate above, but worth noting that in terms of wRC+ and WPA Vargas (116, 0.32) edges Dozier (111, -0.18) and the difference in fWAR (0.3 Vargas and 0.6 Dozier) is all positional (although also skewed in Vargas' favour by some unsustainable base running stats).

Mejia due to pitch today but it got rained out. Tepesch has a 75 pitch limit due to not having pitched in about 10 days. Not sure why they wouldn't bring Mejia back up to start tomorrow and send Tepesch (or Tonkin. Or Pressly) down on Wednesday to make room for Berrios.

Really? I'm not normally one for torches and pitchforks, but Tepesch getting the next start over Berrios would have me dialing 1-800-ANGRYMOB for sure

I think the structure put forward by Jeremy and nytwinsfan works but I would have thought it would need to be more like : 2018: $2 million 2019: $5 million (would be first arbitration year) 2020: $8 million 2021: $12 million 2022: $15 million (would be first free agent year) 2023: $18 million or $3 million buyout Total guaranteed: 6yrs/$45 million to get Sano to bite. He still gets to test free agency at age 30 and $40m+ is a lot of money to walk away from as a 23yo with a season-ending elbow surgery already on his cv.

Defensively the OF has been fine. At the plate Kepler has done well, Rosario's approach has been encouraging (if not yet translating into results) and you have to trust that Buxton will hit eventually. I have a bigger problem with this bizarre insistence on a 3-man bench, which gave Molitor no options today with Castro at the plate as the tying run in the 8th inning. Not having one of Vargas/Park/Palka as an option in that spot defies belief, whether in place of the redundant 8th bullpen arm or DanSan (or both).

Good job we have a big bench bat to PH for the catcher late in a close game. Um...