chpettit19

I didn't at all suggest Petty wasn't doing well or can't be very good, so I'm not sure what isn't fair. And his breaking ball was considered to show real promise coming out of high school (you can find the phrase "flashes plus" and 55 grades all over the place for it coming out of high school). So I'm not sure where this "questionable secondary pitches" narrative is coming from. Sure, there's the typical question of developing a changeup type pitch for any power high school arm as none of them need a changeup to dominate hs hitters when they can throw 100, but that's the same concern as 99% of high school power arms. I'm not trying to justify the Gray trade by suggesting Petty hasn't been good or won't be good. I'd do the trade today knowing what kind of season both of them have had. Or are we supposed to expect the Twins to only trade non-prospects for above average major league talent? Both teams can "win" this trade. Most of the time trades are made with the idea that both teams will "win" them in the end because the teams have different goals. The Twins needed to upgrade their rotation for 2022 and 2023. The Reds were selling and looking to build for the future. This trade accomplished both of those goals. 1 prospect for an above average major league starter is a smart trade. Even if that prospect turns into the next Max Scherzer. So, no, I will not look back at this as a very bad trade no matter what Petty becomes. You can look back at it however you want, though. And I haven't seen Petty make any top 100 lists yet. Fangraphs still has him at a 40+ FV and 14th ranked in the Reds system. MLB.com has him 9th in their system. Don't have a baseball america account so can't confirm, but looks like they might have him 7th in the system. Keith Law only updated his top 60 midseason, but he wasn't in the top 60 or honorable mentions (Emmanuel Rodriguez did jump up to number 53 so that's exciting), and he wasn't in his preseason top 100 list. The Athletic also did an article about the Reds system after the trade deadline and he wasn't in the top 10 system prospects for 2023 after they took out the graduations from this year. So I guess there's still some industry hesitation on him.

For sure. My bigger concern would be someone like SWR who's not to 100 innings yet this year after he was wildly mismanaged last year with his trip to the Olympics where he didn't throw a single pitch. He's 21 in AAA doing well, but will barely crack 100 innings on the year. That is not ideal for him as you'd like him to be at 150+ next year when he hopefully gets the call to Minneapolis. Prielipp is another one who I'd like to see get a ton of innings next year, but my guess is that this FO will have him on a relatively strict inning count coming off his lost 2022 season. The other guys the Twins have been calling up lately aren't guys with much of a chance to be true frontline guys. Overall, though, I just push back on people who blindly throw out minor league inning counts to try to prove the Twins are developing nothing but 5 inning starters. The Twins very well may be only developing 5 inning starters, but that's because they may just not be developing anyone good enough to really front a rotation and throw 200+ innings like they were doing with Berrios, not because they're totally unwilling to let anyone go deeper. The Twins need to start finding, and collecting, true top pitching prospects. Better than SWR/Balazovic/etc. Prielipp may be one. Maybe Raya? But otherwise most of their young arms aren't equipped to be what the team really needs at the front of the rotation, unfortunately. But if they could fill the 2-5 spots and most of the pen with young guys maybe they'd finally spend on a #1 in free agency? Haha, not even I think that dream will ever come true! And now I'm sad ?

It's exciting, but also a little frustrating, to see the Twins turn Ober and Varland types into major league pitchers after being late round picks. Just need them to hit on some of these higher round picks and get some #1 pitchers out of things! Laweryson looks like he could at least snag a pen role in the bigs at some point, and even that would be a very nice development for him. I hope he continues to develop and we see him in Minneapolis next year sometime!

Oh, I'm with you. I'm not suggesting they sit back and assume these things happen. I'd resign Correa to a 7 year deal and then figure out what to do with the excess after that if/when Lewis and Lee establish themselves, and Miranda shows that this is who he is moving forward and the league doesn't figure him out. Was just having a little fun with that proposed hypothetical of those 4 reaching their peaks and manning the IF for the Twins for the next 7-10 years. Need a few happy thoughts during this injury riddled stretch of brutal Twins baseball.

In this hypothetical I think I go Lee-Lewis-Arraez-Miranda from left to right. Definitely Lee and Lewis on the left side, though. They have significantly better arms than the other 2 so they're the ones I want making the longer throws. It's fun to dream on what this team can be if those 4 hit their peaks. And you add in that OF trio at their peaks and the offense looks really nice, and cheap! There are some real things to hope on for the future of the Twins. Let's hope they are able to make smart moves to supplement the young guys while getting the young guys to perform to the best of their potentials!

Outs are bad. A productive out is better than a non-productive out. But both are bad. Teams no longer find it useful to freely give up an out to advance a base runner 1 base (especially from 1st to 2nd) when it doesn't actually increase your chance of scoring. You may not like it, but that's the new reality of the league and it's not going to ever get back to the point where offenses are willing to give up their most valuable asset for anything outside of an actual run scored. It was a recurring dream for 100 years that pitchers didn't throw splitters either. Do you want Duran or Maeda to quit throwing their splitters because nobody threw one for 100 years? We've gotten smarter and adjusted how we play the game because of it. Sacrifice bunts are bad baseball outside of a couple very specific situations. For 100 years it was also every team's dream to have a SS who could field, but not hit. Same with 2nd basemen. No 2B are expected to be legit bats and a SS better be able to hit and field. You can ponder whatever you want, but the provable fact is that bunting is bad strategy. I'm sorry if you don't like that change in the game, but it's one you're going to have to accept. (Now bunting for a hit against the shift is a different story, but with the shift ban next year it's probably a less useful tool)

I think he has a real shot at it. Should start the year at AA and then it's just a matter of strong performance and the right injury to a major leaguer or 16 like this year.

If any of the guys you just listed were still prospects come 2024 there'd be absolutely nothing to be excited about. Those are all college guys who need to be graduating next year if they're to be looked at as top 5 system prospects in any system. Steer is already in the bigs. If they aren't all getting major league time in 2023 the Twins did a great job trading them. So I strongly disagree that the top 5 for 2024 would look any better with those guys still around.

For what it's worth the Twins pull the ball 39.3% of the time vs 38% league average. Go to center 35.5% vs 37% league average. And go oppo 25.2% vs 25.1% league average. Arraez, Gordon, Miranda, Larnach, Kirilloff, and Celestino all have quite nicely dispersed spray charts. So I guess the Twins are able and willing to develop that particular skill in at least some of their prospects. And nobody bunts anymore. You're going to have to give up on that dream. There are very few situations where bunting makes sense.

Sure, there's a difference in the HS vs College guy situation. But the argument around here tends to be people trying to connect minor league inning numbers to the major league team pulling guys early and saying they're developing nothing but 5 inning pitchers and will never let guys go deep. I don't particularly like the 5 inning start situation for the Twins, or baseball in general, but there's way more variables to the minor league numbers than people around here tend to use. For example, Varland was top 15 in all of affiliated minor league baseball in innings pitched before he got his call up. The lack of depth in starts in the minors shouldn't automatically be connected to the major league team pulling guys early. Minor leaguers have never thrown competitive innings for this long of a season. It's more than building up in game arm strength and being able to go 7 innings a start, it's about being able to make starts from April through October. You can go around and look at the Kershaw, Verlander, Scherzer types minor league inning totals, and they weren't down there throwing 200 innings a season either. It's a false connection people try to make. Even though I understand the tendency to do it based on the current major league pitcher usage.

David Festa has thrown 103.2 innings in his first year. Travis Adams is at 100.2. Povich had thrown 78.2 before he was traded which was a 103 inning pace. Pierson Ohl only has 91.2 so I guess he's trailing everyone by a lot. I assume the exclamation point on Petty's innings is just excitement that he's doing what a number of other Twins 2021 pitcher draft picks are doing. And Festa has a 2.43 ERA, 1.09 WHIP, and 108/34 K/BB ratio as a 13th round pick. Petty being younger does give him an edge, but turning Petty into 2 years of Gray and still developing a pitcher with those kinds of numbers is a pretty big win for the FO I'd think. Steer would've been a nice fill in for Polanco going down, but Mahle being in the rotation would've been nicer. That injury makes that deal less appealing for sure. Strand will be interesting to follow. He's likely a DH in the majors so he's going to have to maintain those numbers as he moves up to have value. But I'll take Miranda and Lee over those 2. Steer is older than Miranda, and Strand is older than Lee. If the Twins are willing to let Lee advance quickly, if he earns it, I'd much rather have Miranda, Lee, and Mahle over Steer and Strand in an already crowded infield.

Very well said!

At this point I'd call this season a success if the Twins win a playoff game and break "the streak." And I actually think it'd be a really important win. Even if they lose the other 2 games in the wild card round. Taking that pressure off the 2023 team would be huge. They all tend to say the right things and act like "the streak" doesn't bother them cuz they weren't here for all of it, but they're human, and there is absolutely added pressure to not be on a team that extends the streak, even if you weren't on the team that started it. And I do think that a relatively healthy Twins team could take a game in the wild card round. If the injured team can get them there.

A large part of it is that the minors are more for building up season long stamina. Especially at the lower levels. Those kids have never thrown this many innings over this long of a season before so they're more concerned about having their arms be able to throw at the top of their game into September and October. So the minors are typically used more about building up season long inning counts to get the body better prepared for the shorter recovery time of the offseason between seasons before having to go another 8-9 months of pitching every 6 days.

Yikes.

Is that a different setup for Martin? He looked to have his hands up earlier than usual. Does anyone who watches the minor league games know if he's gotten rid of the hands low, bat straight up part of his setup or am I just seeing the tale end of his setup in that clip where his hands go up?

You're playing some semantics now, and trying to bounce around a bit. You started off with the stance of "To be honest I don't know how this team will every develop a top end starter with the limits they put on the minor league pitchers." because the Twins limit Varland "to 5 ish innings (not testing them with the TTO)" which were things easily disproven as I showed that almost every "top end starter" has limits put on them while they're in the minors, and that Varland isn't being limited because of TTO, but instead because of innings limits while trying to get him to throw deep into a season. You have a problem with him being 25, and that's fair. Most elite major league pitchers got to the bigs well before they were 25, but they were also drafted out of big schools or high in the first round and expected to move quickly. Varland wasn't and that's why we're talking about "manufacturing" a top prospect instead of simply drafting a guy in the first round and having him become what everyone thought/hoped he'd become. There is no reason to believe he will only be a "4-5 inning starter." The Twins let Ryan and Gray both go deep into games early in the season before they went on the IL, and, in Ryan's case, stopped being effective. They let Berrios throw 200 innings a year, and be on pace for it again before being traded. And, again, Varland isn't being limited to shorter starts this year because of a fear of the 3rd time seeing the order, but because he's thrown more innings this year than he ever has in his entire life and they are working on building season long arm strength. As far as what "top pitching prospect" means you can define it however you want. You can compare him to guys who actually became elite MLB pitchers, but that's not fair to him, or any other prospect. Or you can compare his numbers to the numbers of guys who were ranked high on prospect rankings and then it's a whole different argument. There are a ton of high picks who are highly ranked prospects that don't even make the bigs and have terrible minor league numbers. The Twins have a whole bunch of them over the last decade. Tyler Jay was a "top pitching prospect" at one point. Is Varland a better prospect than Jay in AA? I don't think it's even close. Tyler Jay didn't even make it to AAA let alone succeed there. So who's the "top pitching prospect" out of those 2? The guy who's name was on "the lists" or the guy actually succeeding? I mean if you're simply trying to say you don't think Varland is going to be Jacob deGrom then fine. You win. He's likely never going to be Jacob deGrom. But to suggest he's not a legit prospect with very impressive minor league numbers that hold up to all the "big name prospects" is simply ignoring the facts.

I mean Varland has been fighting the odds since he walked on campus in St Paul. Not a whole lot of MLB players coming out of Concordia St Paul. And, again, I'm not predicting he becomes a front line starter. The fact that he made it to AAA is an absolute success story for him, first and foremost, and the Twins development teams secondly. The fact that he continues to perform well and looks like he has a real shot at making the majors is encouraging for all involved. Pointing out that he's behind the elite, 1st round (or 4th in Webb's case) picks in progression at his age isn't breaking news at all. That's why the article is about "manufacturing" a prospect. He's a late round pick from a small school that has no business being where he is already. I'd say that kind of shows that "the odds" don't necessarily apply to him.

I'm not suggesting he's going to be anything like them on a talent or performance level, I'm simply disproving your idea that you can't develop a top end starter if they don't throw more in the minors. It's an incorrect stance as proven by basically everyone at the top of the pitching leaderboards today.

Have you looked at McClanahan's minor league start data? Average batters faced: 21.65. Average start: 5.08 innings. Average pitches thrown: 82.9. In his season with the most innings thrown in the minors. Don't even look at Webb's 2018 minor league stats. Only made it into the 6th 3 times in 26 starts. Only cracked 80 pitches 7 times. Only faced at least 20 hitters 8 times. The connection you're trying to make simply isn't that easy to make.

Pablo Lopez (this year's leader in ML innings pitched) threw 145.1 innings in 2017. Highest he ever totaled in the minors. Varland should get awfully close to that total this year. And Pablo Lopez is a top end starter. Jacob deGrom maxed out at 147.2 innings in 2013. Max Scherzer topped out at 90.2 in 2007. Verlander 118.2. Kershaw 122. Gausman 123.2. Bieber at 173.1 is an outlier for you. Fried 118.2. Cease 124. Rodon 132.1. Alcantara 125.1. That's a pretty good list of "top end starters" that weren't exactly throwing a ton in the minors. I just think the connection you're trying to make isn't one that can be so easily made. According to Fangraph's minor league leader board, Louie Varland is 12th in all of affiliated minor league baseball in innings pitched this year. Again, this isn't about letting him go 3 times through the order, it's about building up arm strength to endure an entire major league season. The goals in the minors are different than those in the majors and it's not such a straight line connection between the strategies.

He's gone into the 6th in 13 of 23 starts this year. He had never thrown more than 103 innings in a season in his life. He's at 126.1 this year, and will make several more starts. They're limiting the length of his starts because they want him to be used to pitching the entire season while also not overusing his arm so much that he struggles to stay healthy next year. He didn't pitch in 2020. Threw 103 innings in 2021. And is going to get to the 150 range this year. Next year he'll likely not have any inning limit beyond how he performs and whether or not he's worthy of making it through the order a third time, etc. They aren't limiting him because of the third time through the order, they're limiting him because his arm has literally never done what they're asking it to do before.

I think their stated concern with Archer coming out of the pen is the amount of work that goes into getting him ready to pitch. He's the Buxton of the pitching staff. Getting his body ready to play is a whole ordeal and he's not suited to sit in the pen and then get warm when needed. I assume they have no plan to take him out of the rotation, but if they insist on him staying here I'd like to see someone who'll piggyback him after the 4th every start for the rest of the year. Just let him do his 4 innings and sit down. Let Sanchez or Winder or Ober take the game over in the 5th no matter what (he's never going to go 9 innings so I don't even care about having a perfect game through 4) and then let them go for as many as they can.

Kyle Garlick is not a homegrown player either. Weird that you'd give other organizations credit for developing Urshela while putting the blame on the Twins for Garlick who was developed by the Dodgers (clearly terrible at clutch hitting organization there).

He's got a great arm. But really bad reads and slow.