chpettit19

Well thank you. I appreciate the kind words and appreciate what you bring to these forums as well!

I'm with @Dman, the offense is in a good place with Celestino, Lewis, Kirilloff, Miranda, Arraez, Jeffers, Larnach, Gordon, Buxton, Polanco, Kepler all under 30 years old and under team control for 2 or, in most cases, more years at super cheap rates unless any of the real young guys blow up and get big arb numbers coming their way. That's 10 guys who've shown they have big league abilities in same way, shape or form. That's a really great place to be when building a team as their cheap deals mean the FO should be able to splurge in FA to fill specific holes with top quality talent knowing they have a base of competitive position players in place already. Health is a concern with a few guys and that's where the minor league system needs to kick out solid players here and there, but you're not in dire need of the system producing superstars in the next couple years because of those 10 guys being so cheap. Having someone like Brooks Lee bust out this year and next to possibly become a star would just put them in that much better of a position. The pitching is the concern still. Next year you have Mahle, Gray, Ryan, and Maeda as a pretty decent 4 pieces of a rotation, and, again, with them having extra money due to the young position players they could go out and spend a bunch on a guy to front those 4 in the rotation. Don't know that I'd bet on them doing that, but it's financially feasible at least. The pen is always difficult to assess as they're such volatile pitchers, but Duran and Lopez hopefully can form a really, really good 1-2 punch at the back end for 2 more years with Duran being around for 3 more on top of that even. Hopefully Alcala comes back and is a really nice middle inning guy and Jax can continue to be solid in that role. If you can have those 4 fill those roles for the next 2 years on arb or pre-arb deals you're again in good shape to splurge on the other 4 spots in the pen. They're in a good spot to supplement their holes going into 2023 due to the cheapness of the majority of the roster, but they still need to figure out some #1-3 pitchers from the system. Ryan could be a 2/3, but looks like he's probably best served as your 3/4 guy. The other top arms in the system have really taken steps back this year which is a real bummer. Maybe Prielipp comes in looking like his old self and cruises through the system in 2 years and can front the rotation, but the more likely situation is they're going to have to finally pay for some pitching. If they can keep churning out position players in the Miranda, Kirilloff, Larnach, Lewis talent range they can afford to pay for pitching, but I think we'd all prefer they start producing some top end pitching of their own. Or at least fill the pen with young shutdown arms (I'd move Canterino to a pen role now and see what he can do in the minors to be ready for 2023 as a pen weapon in Minneapolis).

It was definitely a fun time, but today is not a productive workday for me. Boss can't actually expect me to work EVERY weekday, right?

The scoreboard at Target Field called the bomb an 89 MPH splitter if that makes you feel any better...

I definitely had a friend or 2 turn down the chance to go to the game because it was a Thursday, which is a bummer. And I'm quite jealous of your work situation right now. My cube isn't as comfortable as I'd like it to be for days like this. And multiple meetings this afternoon means I can't even take a "long lunch" and not come back. Adulting is hard sometimes.

I'm not a big country music fan, but I stuck around for the concert and it was a cool addition to the game. Wish they'd do that kind of stuff on Friday or Saturday so work wasn't so tough today, though. I suppose I could also have chosen to indulge in one or two fewer Trulys, but then I'd have to partly blame myself for how I'm feeling this morning and that'd make me feel bad about myself so I'll just blame it all on Pagan and Duffey.

Agreed.

I'll start by saying I think they need to DFA Pagan, but to be fair to him for last night he did follow up Correa's error with another groundout that Miranda threw low and Arraez couldn't pick. Back to back errors that lead to a run can't be put on the pitcher.

Other than Arraez, there's no hitter in the Twins lineup I'd rather have up when the team needs a big hit right now than Miranda. Kid looks to be figuring it out and setting himself up for a very nice career.

We have 2 office areas in our building and 1 is empty but there's been serious talk about making me sit over there by myself so I quit discussing the Twins, and baseball in general. Feels like workplace discrimination to me.

Oh, you don't have to worry about me sharing my opinions. I'll continue sharing them. Even the bad ones. Cuz what else should I be doing with my time? Actually working at work? Seems like a ridiculous idea!

Actually, the OP asked "How would you rank the names listed above? Does a different prospect make your top-5 list?" And my original comment responsed to the first question. Then another poster and I had a conversation that included more detail. It was quite cordial and productive. You then asked me a question so I answered it. That's generally how conversations on forums go. I apologize if I put too much thought into my answer to your question and will refrain from doing so in the future.

Tier 1 would be anyone with all star upside. I think those 2 are the only ones like that currently. After tier 1 I'd split up pitchers and hitters and there'd be tiers within those groupings. Example being likely relievers would have their own grouping and then it'd be tiered on back end, middle, mop up, non-major leaguer. Starters would be mid-rotation, back of rotation tiers. Hitters I'd break into position groups and it'd be tiered in those groups by major league regular, backup/utility guy, non-major leaguer. Something like that. I just don't think there's much value in saying "mid to back end of a rotation pitcher A should be ranked 6th in the system, but mid to back end of the rotation pitcher B should be 9th behind major league regular corner outfielder C and utility man D." Pitchers A and B are basically the same guy and you're just hoping 1 makes it so they should be grouped together while the 2 bats would fill different needs on the team so shouldn't really be compared to each other or the pitchers on a ranking list. People love to know what rank a prospect was in a team's system when they get traded. Receiving the 9th ranked prospect doesn't sound as good as receiving the 6th ranked prospect even though their spectrum of outcome possibilities are likely very, very similar. So to me what is important is what their spectrum looks like and not some arbitrary ranking they're given. I think grouping and tiers is more effective in representing spectrums and what a system really looks like instead of splitting hairs and comparing apples to oranges in an overall list.

Yeah, I don't know if it's the issue or not, but I know that was their plan so it's a possibility. Mostly just trying to hold out hope that the kid can turn a corner.

Took me 21 days, but I got my 1 for the month.

There's a pretty bold take. I don't know that I'd argue super hard against it. It sort of feels like a Buxton situation to me and the best thing Martin can do for himself is just tune everyone out and build his swing the way he wants. That's all assuming his fall from grace is largely driven by the Twins trying to turn him into a power hitter and the swing/approach changes are driving his inability to hit for average now. I feel like the talent is still there to be a right handed Arraez-lite with speed. If he can be a .300 hitter who steals some bags and plays really nice defense in left I'd be quite happy. But he sure looks lost right now. I also think they need to put him in left and just let him be. You traded for his bat, not his glove. There was nothing hurt in seeing if he could stick at SS, but that possibility has passed and it's time to let him settle into a spot and focus on his bat. Put him in left and let him focus on getting his bat right.

It's your list, my friend, you can put him wherever you want! I'd pretty staunchly argue Lee being ahead of him, but I wouldn't put up much of a fight about how anyone orders guys behind Lewis and Lee.

Winder was 25 when he debuted, for what it's worth. To me it's splitting hairs with a lot of this stuff when it comes to ranking lists (it's why I'm not a big fan of ranking lists). I prefer groupings/tiers. I'd have my grouping of "Untouchables" that either position players or pitchers can be in. Then I'd break down my pitchers and position players into different groups with many factors instead of listing everyone together in a list. The difference between a pitcher ranked 8th and 12th in a system is basically nothing most of the time. They're likely both middle to back end of the rotation type arms and it's just a question of which one can put it all together. So to me the Twins have 2 guys with All Star upside in the system (Lewis and Lee) and then it's just a jumble of guys with similar likely ceilings.

Then I guess it's a good thing Miranda is a long term 3B and not 1B. He's got 1 OAA at 3B compared to -2 at 1B. Glad he's targeted to play 3B.

FYI Lewis (59), Winder (69), Rodriguez (85), and Steer (100) made Baseball America's updated top 100.

I'm more of a tiers guy so I'd just say Lewis and Lee are tier 1 guys while the other 3 are tier 2 guys for varying reasons while each have legit paths to jumping into tier 1 (back into tier 1 in Martin's case).

Do they think anyone from the Povich, Prielipp, Hajjar, Balazovic, Canterino, Varland, Henriquez, et al group of prospects will be ready by 2024? Do they think SWR or Winder are significantly better than any of those guys? I'd say they better have at least 1 of those arms ready by 2024 whether they keep Winder and SWR or not, and I don't think SWR or Winder are any more likely than that grouping to be front of the rotation arms. Unless they have a reason to believe Castillo is any more likely to get injured than any other pitcher or his performance will drop off dramatically in the next year and a half I do that trade. Give me Castillo, Ryan, Gray for the rest of this year and add Maeda back next year all on below market deals and I can build a pretty competitive rotation.

It's the same discussion we go round and round on every game thread and recap. Some people like the strategy, some don't. Someone will inevitably complain that Rocco has no feel for the game and needs to use his gut. Others will point out stats that show the strategy is largely successful and others will complain that if they didn't baby guys so much they'd be better and able to last longer. Others will point out that there's far too many variables that go into these decisions to whittle it down to 1 variable and say it's always just a 3rd time through decision. Somebody is going to say their numbers are so high because they're facing the top of the order on the 3rd time through so it's skewed. I just wanted to get the gut comment out of the way before we dive into the rest of the back and forth.

But what does your gut say about it?