nytwinsfan

Good stuff. They should let these guys work through these issues.

Kohl catching fire makes me so happy. Almost enough to make forget about the major league club. Almost. Hope they promote LaMonte Wade to Fort Myers soon. That guy can really play.

If they are going to demote Park, they should demote Plouffe, Dozier and Suzuki as well, all of whom have significantly lower OPS than Park. I'm only half serious obviously, but Dozier and Plouffe have been striking out at almost the same rate as Buxton, Park and Sano. This isn't a "rookie" problem. It is a team wide hitting problem, with the exception of Mauer, Escobar and Nunez. To blame it "on the young players" isn't fair.

Yeah, the combo of 7 Ks in 6 innings and a 94-96 heater is really really nice to see from Stewart. Outstanding.

Don't forget that Ryan Pressly looked very sharp. Had good movement and hit his spots.

Great analysis. Really appreciate it.

I strongly disagree with you. I think the Twins Daily coverage of spring training is excellent. Likely they do not focus on stats during spring training because . . . spring training stats mean jack. Plus there are at least a dozen websites where you can go get stats up the wazoo if you really want to obsess over 27 PAs. Twins Daily is primarily for news and analysis, and new and analysis of spring training stats isn't really very helpful for anything, other than passing the days until opening day. I do think the coverage of Murphy has been a little light, but there are a lot of important pieces to this years Twins team, and Murphy (as back-up catcher) probably isn't the most important, even if he is new. I'm sure Twins Daily will have plenty of coverage of how he is adjusting to the Twins, both statistically and otherwise. As for Kepler, where have you been? TD is borderline obsessed with him. There are lots of quotes from Terry Ryan about him in a number of articles I've read here recently. Literally this article from today goes on an on about him: The fact that it doesn't mention or try to draw conclusions from his meaningless spring training stats is a virtue, not a flaw. Instead it rightly focuses on Kepler's mentality and recent changes in his approach, Ryan's thoughts on Kepler and the organization and Kepler's own plans for him this year. To sum up, I guess I think saying that the Twins Daily spring training coverage sucks just because they haven't focused on the spring training stats of one or two (relatively unimportant in the short term) players you are particularly interested in kind of sucks.

Does anyone know if Duffey was getting shellacked on his changeup or on his fastball/curveball. That seems like the $ million question. If the former, no big deal. If the latter, then Nolasco might have a shot at the 5th spot after all

Does anyone know if Duffey was getting shellacked on his changeup or on his fastball/curveball. That seems like the $ million question. If the former, no big deal. If the latter, then Nolasco might have a shot at the 5th spot after all

Gonna be Duffey.

I guess it is more pleasant to have your cynicism proven wrong than to have your optimism shattered. I admit when I watch him against MLB pitching, he seems to be guessing on a lot of pitches, and missing badly. Contrast that with Sano, who came up and immediately seemed to have a perfect sense of the strike zone and ability to recognize pitches. All of that being said, I don't think we realize how rare it is for someone like Sano to come up and do that right away. It is by far the exception, not the rule. Most really good hitters, especially when they are 21, take at least a year or two or longer to really blossom at the major league level.

I really don't think they will go with Nolasco over Duffey. As Rob Antony noted, Duffey is experimenting with his changeup, and the Twins know that. They are not judging him just on his performance during spring training. As long as they think Duffey's fastballs and curveball are where they were last year, he'll be the 4th starter.

Thanks Thrylos. The report on Jay was especially interesting.

Great post. I'd hope that Molitor gives Park a break against the toughest righties, at least for the first month or two. Those are ideal times to play Arcia. I do think Park needs to play against righties at least some of the time if he wants to get acclimated to MLB RHP, so against the weaker ones at first I'd still hit him. Arcia can also still get into the lineup on days when Rosario or Sano has a day off, and even when Buxton has a day off and Rosario swings over to CF.

His approach on that double looked pretty good. He stayed back on at least two borderline pitches, got to 3-1, and then drove the fastball to the left-field wall.

Note, it was a double, not a single. But that only makes your point stronger.

Well then that was a pretty good pickup then. Nice.

Interesting. He's also a couple of years older than Turner though, including when he was at the same level, no?

I agree with the part about Kepler needing more seasoning, but not with calling Kepler a "tweener," or at least not the connotations of calling him a tweener (i.e., that he can't be a good corner outfielder unless he develops significantly more power). Even if his power develops only a little more, he's a tweener only in the same way Alex Gordon is a tweener. I'm not saying Kepler is going to be as good as Gordon, just that he seems like a similar profile player. Kepler can hit only 15 HR a year if, like Gordon, he has a high OBP, hits some 3B (Kepler would probably hit more) and a lot of 2B, has very good D, and steals a few bases. With that skill set he can still be an above average player, and depending on how good the D, how many 3B and 2B, and how high the OBP, even a really good player. HR are great, but they really aren't necessary if the value is provided elsewhere. Gordon averaged fewer than 18 HR the last 5 years but has been worth 27 WAR in that period. If Kepler is worth even half that WAR the next five years, he'll have been a valuable addition. I think that's quite possible even without developing much more power.

Good article, but one small nit to pick. If he is clobbering Triple-A pitching in July, why would they trade him? At that point, the return would have to be ridiculous, and I mean ridiculous. Seriously, in that scenario, if you are going to trade someone, trade Rosario, or trade Plouffe and move Sano to 3rd. Right?

This.

Nope, he's a above average to maybe plus defender in the corner, but not in CF. A plus defender in CF is a very pretty rare player. Some people even claim Kepler's likely to be only average in the corner once he puts on a little more muscle and bulk.

Fantastic reporting Bob! Really appreciate you writing this up. Sano in the OF is really going to be scary. That's all I can say.

Darn, I don't see anything to argue with here.

I'm guessing because Rosario is a starter, and Landa a reliever. Big difference in upside there.