Dman

I guess I just don't get that they felt they couldn't keep him on 26 man in a relief role until he found some mojo? This isn't a likely playoff team. It's a team in desperate need of a 5th starter.

I'm a huge Royce backer, but I'm still not sure he is ready. I agree with @tony&rodneythat he has seen far too many middle, middle fastballs. Must be paying the pitcher for those lol. Still some of the home runs have some off of tougher pitches. No question Royce is hitting the ball hard, but I still a fair bit of chase there still as well. Let's see how he finishes the week. Culpepper still on a heater with the bat. gonna be hard to keep him down at AAA.

We'll see. It is always a big jump so hard to know. He does throw strikes and can miss bats. Hopefully he's as good as I think he is.

If Lackey offers the better discount and the Sox feel fine about their shortstop position in the future I could easily see them pivot to Lackey. The question then becomes would the Rays skip on Cholowsky? He should be a fast mover. There is no guessing he will hit for power as he has proven he can do it. If there are "true" concerns about the swing translating would the Twins move off Cholowsky and go with Lombard? Lombard is supposed to have really good EV's can run like the wind and just has some potential hit tool challenges ahead. I have heard the Giants are extremely interested in Cholowsky would they try and buy him down to the 4th pick? This could get interesting if Lackey goes one and Emerson 2.

There are a lot of surprises in there. This might be a long post. I have been waiting for what feels like forever for Winokur to have a month like this. He has the four other tools just needs the hit tool to work out. I would love to see a promotion to AA as that level can take some time for most players to move past. Mendez might be my favorite bat. It's a great eye and contact, always contact with the ball. He is tough out for pitchers. A real pest. He just needs to find a bit more power. He is young for the level and there is time, but if the Twins are sellers at the deadline would love to get a look at him at the MLB level. I know some guys do not perform well in cold weather which make April a tough month for stats. Olivar couldn't hit a basketball in April. It was a ton of swing and miss as well as weak contact. I was shocked to see just how good his May numbers are. He has always been a solid bat, but not going to get much defensive value from him. If he keeps this up he looks close to ready even if not on the 40 man. Culpepper warmed up with the weather as well and has been the same player at pretty much every level. Not much more he can do other than give the Twins another month of this type of production and force their hand to move him up sooner rather than later. For as good as Culpepper has been Ross has been his equal. Granted Ross is older, but they almost seem like twins these days in that they both can play short and be plus there defensively and both have solid hit profiles with good power. Ross can also play in the outfield. He needs to show he can keep this level of production up the better part of this year to have a chance to get added to the 40 man. If he does it would be awesome to have a utility guy with his skill set that you could send up and down for the next three years. Fedko just needs to keep doing what he is doing and keep the pressure on. Biggest surprise is Sabato at number 1. I knew he was doing well because I kept seeing if Fedko was going to overtake him for OPS. Every time Fedko got a double or a HR Sabato did the same. I'm still not a huge Sabato fan, but I have to say he looks to be in great shape. He must be working hard on his body because he looks fit and moving about as well as I've seen. Still I think I'd rather have Fedko on the 40 man instead mainly because of defensive value and versatility. Would have to look closer at underlying numbers offensively to see if Sabato has better EV's, swing and miss or chase rates to see if I could choose him over Fedko. At any rate great month for Sabato I hope he keeps it up. Been watching Reyes, Duran and Carabello as all three have been off to hot starts. I don't know if Reyes can keep this up, but he did have an .800 OPS in the DSL last year and if he does about the same in his first year stateside I'd be happy with that. Carabello was the catcher we got in the Rule V trade and he seems to be off to repeating his numbers from last year as well. Small sample sizes on these guys, but it would be nice to find another fast moving high octane Rodriguez type bat at some point again.

Paredes has always been a solid arm, The main knock has been his fastball velocity and K rate. He never had an ERA much over 3.00 his entire minor league career. They kept him at levels far longer than they needed to and used him as a stopper out of the pen in several leagues. When starters went down they would use him as a starter. He's just been perhaps an unspectacular arm, but very reliable arm. Because of that and being an 18th round pick he has never received any top 30 love despite his really good performance since becoming pro. I feel like I have been high man on him for a while. Not sure that he will be a great player, but certainly more reliable than a lot of other arms I've seen. Call me crazy but I really think he could be a mid rotation arm in the Big leagues. I think he'll be an equal or better arm than SWR and he can come out of the pen as well. It makes me wonder if his recent performance was one reason they were willing to move on from SWR, They are the same age. About the same level ceiling and yet Paredes has three option years left and more versatility. Personally I still think they could have kept Sim so it feels like something else might be going on as well, but all things being equal Paredes should be a good replacement even if he never made a top 30.

I'm not so sure he makes it to Minnesota at number 3. hard to believe Chicago would move off of Cholowsky since he is likely a fast mover with a good power stroke at a premium position, but we've seen teams strike deals and catchers like Lackey don't come around often. While Tampa does value younger players more than most teams I could still see them trying to upgrade their catcher position for the future and it's a nice bonus to have a catcher who can hit on your team. So hard to say if he is even there at three., It seems like on pretty much all mock drafts there is a solid three developing and it's Cholowsky, Emerson and Lackey. I'd be happy with any one of them, but I think if I had to choose it would be Lackey as it's just so hard to find a good catcher. Still if they did miss out on Lackey there is a decent chance they could grab a catcher in the second round as well. We'll see what happens, but the Twins should be in good shape at number 3 no matter what.

Paredes has always been a solid arm, The main knock has been his fastball velocity and K rate. He never had an ERA much over 3.00 his entire minor league career. They kept him at levels far longer than they needed to and used him as a stopper out of the pen in several leagues. When starters went down they would use him as a starter. He's just been perhaps an unspectacular arm, but very reliable arm. Because of that and being an 18th round pick he has never received any top 30 love despite his really good performance since becoming pro. I feel like I have been high man on him for a while. Not sure that he will be a great player, but certainly more reliable than a lot of other arms I've seen. Call me crazy but I really think he could be a mid rotation arm in the Big leagues. I think he'll be an equal or better arm than SWR and he can come out of the pen as well. It makes me wonder if his recent performance was one reason they were willing to move on from SWR, They are the same age. About the same level ceiling and yet Paredes has three option years left and more versatility. Personally I still think they could have kept Sim so it feels like something else might be going on as well, but all things being equal Paredes should be a good replacement even if he never made a top 30.

Not buying Shelton's response. Twins must feel the younger arms are going to eclipse SWR and they are making this move early rather than later which very unTwins like. Still did they try and work the phones and come up with a trade? Seems like Colorado or the Angels would be willing to give something for a 25 year old starter who was pretty solid just last year. Do they really think he is going to clear waivers just because of his ERA? There were ways to make room if needed IMO. I just don't think they feel Sim's upside is better than other options they have coming up. Seems like they have lost confidence and are in win now mode and don't want to carry him while he figures things out.

Yeah this is my take as well. Once he comes back if it is the same old, same old, guess what's coming instead of seeing the ball well Royce I think I'd look for a team that has a similar type player and make a trade. Sometimes it takes a change in scenery or two to get on the right track and sometimes they never do get on track. I have a hard time giving up on him after he came out so hot that first year. Since his first big slump he has been trending down ever since. He should not have angered the baseball gods with the never slumping quote.

My bad I missed that. Thanks!

For whatever reason I still have a lot of faith in Lewis. When he is on he can flick his wrists and hit a HR. Still tons of talent there. He was just brutal to watch at the MLB level this year though. He was wildly swinging at anything. Just crazy how good he has been at AAA from the jump. Doesn't make sense to me at all. I get the quality of pitching at AAA isn't close to MLB pitching, but usually once a guy is in a funk they stay in it for a while like Wallner. I had him likely at AAA until close to the deadline. One more week of this and they might as well bring him back. Not ready to bring him back after one hot week, but if this is his new normal he might be back much, much sooner than I expected.

Hernandez must have some serious wheels to get seven stolen bases in one game. Hope he keeps hitting well. We could use more players with speed. Reitz looking good in small sample. I think if he can throw strikes he should be OK. Going to be interesting to see if someone his size can make it.

I agree with your analysis there. How about the Yankee's system? Maybe Dax Kilby and Lagrange who could be a Duran type closer if he can't make it as a starter or if you like Rodriguez better then take him. All three are lower end top 100 prospects so 2 of those and fill in with some FCL arms or who ever the Twins like further down the list? That might be a bit light but maybe workable. Unless of course the Yankees are in the bidding for Skubal. Then it probably falls apart.

Alright I'll stop hijacking.

You may be right. Maybe their marketing and inability to get lucrative TV contracts is on them. Or Maybe Minnesotan's just don't watch a lot of baseball or aren't willing to pay for it. I honestly don't know the answer. All I do know is they are included in the bottom ten teams for revenue generation and the more revenue you make the more you can spend on players and still make money. For now since they are one of the bottom ten teams means they have less to spend. Which makes it very challenging to compete for a world series title.

Well it wouldn't be just the Twins that are incompetent it would be the entire bottom 10.

I'd say St Louis is Mid market but not comparable to the small market teams that get revenue sharing. St Louis obviously pulls in more money than the bottom ten or they would be looped in with them. Sure the Twins can spend more but they also don't make as much money as St. Louis either. So if the premise is only large market teams as the bar then you are correct to add St Louis but I still think there is a difference between mid and small as well and the Twins are in the small category due to revenue sharing. St Louis has been as high as top 10 in revenue and generally around 15 on average these days though it looks like this year they are lower than normal. I'd consider big market to be those teams spending 230 to 300M per year. St Louis isn't in that category. Still if we are comparing this to what the Twins can reasonably do then I don't think it's fair to include St Louis as they are a tier above in revenue creation. So it isn't an apples to apples comparison IMO.

I agree with most of what you said there, but would remind you of the flaw in there. Lee, Keashcal and Lewis were all top 100 prospects. Culpepper, Jenkins and Rodriguez are too. If you trade Ryan for prospects there is no certainty said prospects work out any better than the ones you are ready to throw away right now. So if you are trading Ryan for top 100 prospects it might not work out. Of course you could hit on the right guy and make things work, but the odds of replacing Ryan's production even in the future is minimal. I'm not saying it's not worth doing, as I do lean toward trading him as well. Just that we have a lot of of past and present top 100 guys as is and it might take some time before we know who is going to work out and who isn't. I'm not convinced that adding even more of them helps in the short term at least. Thus my thought of adding guys further away from needing to be added to the 40 man. Bradley, Abel and Rojas look like pretty good trades right now, but have a ways to go to prove it. Gallagher, Mendez and Jimenez could be something as well, but non of them are top 100 prospects so will have to wait and see. We'll see what the Twins do come the deadline.

I wouldn't consider ST Louis a small market. They are not in the revenue sharing portion of Teams. They've had a top 15 payroll in recent years. They wouldn't qualify in my mind. KC put together the last really good small market team in quite a while before Teams like the Dodgers, Phillies, Mets and Yankee's have tried to buy their way there. Odds are pretty stacked against small market teams IMO.

Yeah the 2027 work stoppage does make you think twice about what to do with Ryan. On the one hand it seems like they could move on from him with Pablo, Ober, Bradley, Abel, Matthews, Prielipp and Rojas in the wings performing at the MLB level. With SWR and a few others in long relief roles that could possibly be 5th starters in a pinch. If you trade Ryan for another close to ready arm plus extra the Twins would have plenty of quality arms to throw out there in a five man rotation with Quick, Soto and Hill hopefully working their way to AA this year they would also have some backup arms not too far away. Still replacing a bit of a unicorn arm who when dialed in, is ace quality is no easy task. And if you decide to get the most value you can for him at the deadline what is it that you would be looking for without worsening the log jams that are already there? In the infield we already have Lee, Keacshal and Lewis with Culpepper nearly ready, with first round pick Houston not too far away and Ben Ross who has been looking really good lately not to mention they :Like Kriedler a bunch, but maybe Ross takes that role? So who is moving out to make room for some new guy added by trade? In the outfield We have a lot of prospects waiting for their turn in Roden, Rodriguez, Gonzalez and our number one prospect Jenkins. Not to mention we still have Buxton, Larnach, Martin, and Wallner. With other guys like Fedko and Mendez that could fill in. Unless they are getting rid of guys there's no room in the outfield right now. So what would you trade Ryan for that you need more than Ryan at the deadline? It would have to be a young (HS) top 25 prospect most likely. Someone or someone's to come up with the next wave. Still they could just hang onto Ryan and go for a comp pick after the 2027 season as well and get their high school guy then. I'm just not sure what they can get that would be worth losing Ryan. I'd guess more young pitching, but it's incredibly hard to develop that into a Joe Ryan type pitcher. Still he is an asset and the Twins will have to decide how they feel about competing this year and in 2027 to decide if they value the prospect haul they could get versus what could happen this year and in 2027. We'll see what they decide to do.

Yeah Gore was my pick in that draft. A potential ace lefty for a pitching starved Twins at the time. I was OK with the Lewis pick with the spending going to Enlow. I never liked the Helium Leach pick as there were a ton of better options there IMO. I wasn't as high on Greene as some. I always felt TJ was in his future and didn't see the arm holding up for him. I did think Wright was the safe arm pick in that draft and that did not work out either. Like many McKay seemed like a decent bet to bust. I thought his bat Miiight save him, but I was wrong there too. It's amazing that there is an over 50% fail rate in the first round including comp picks. Granted most were later in the first round. Players still have time up that fWar, but still it looks like a pretty bad draft in general.

I would agree he didn't affect the play in the end. The rule was put in place to protect players from getting spiked or knee's taken out on the throw from second when players knew they had no chance to be safe. I think it is a good rule in that regard. Lee knew he was out and had no chance to be safe at second yet he slide aggressively into second. So much so that he did go past second base and into the knee's of the thrower. While the contact was minimal I think they want to discourage that type of uncontrolled play into second to protect players vulnerable after the throw. I don't think making the rule apply only if the player is injured is the "right" message. I'm old school and used to the aggressive slides, but I get that protecting players on a throw from a guy who has no chance to be safe at second makes some sense to keep players from getting injured for no good reason.

I hope this is a new and improved Adams, but if we are into small samples his ERA was 9.00 at AAA in a 7 inning sample. Granted maybe working on stuff there, but even last year he gave up 39 hits in 33 innings with an ERA of 7. I like Adams and maybe he turns a corner using his fastball less, but his previous history doesn't give me a ton of confidence..

I didn't have Adams on my bingo card to go in and save the day in the 9th as he generally gives up hard contact. Feels like Shelton is either a genius or getting some amazing good fortune with his pen management, I love that they got it done today. Was hoping for them to go at least 5 and 5 on this road trip and they are two wins away from that. Will be interesting to see this White Sox team and what they can do.