2wins87

I'm guessing it's more the latter. His stuff has probably improved somewhat since low-A, but I did collect some statcast data for him from his starts there last year. He averaged 89.5 MPH with his fastball and topped out at 92.5. He didn't seem to rely on any one secondary, but had a changeup, slider, and curveball all with whiff rates around 35%. I'd say a whiff rate over 40% might be indicative of a plus secondary pitch. So maybe three average-ish secondaries that he mixes well.

Royce Lewis played in A ball in his draft year and was promoted to high-A in the middle of his second season. Kala'i Rosario started in A ball the year after his draft and has continued to move up every year. I'd be a little surprised if Jenkins and Winokur weren't at least on those respective timelines. For all the hand wringing on this forum about when guys are getting promoted, this developmental regime has not been shy about moving the top guys quickly when they perform. There are a few teams that are sometimes uber aggressive (Braves, Jays, Angels), but the Twins are certainly no slower than average for their top prospects.

Walker Jenkins Little data, but 1.021 OPS and just 5 Ks in 30 PA backs up his pre-draft status. Previous: 1 (nc)Brooks Lee Slow start in AAA, but still just an 18% K rate in 34 PA and 93.4 MPH average EV suggest transition is actually going just fine. Previous: 2 (nc)Emmanuel Rodriguez .929 OPS in Jun-Aug with a 25% K rate and 22% BB rate. So basically back to doing what he did in his big breakout. Outfield routes look a little adventurous at times, but hopefully athleticism will still lead to good defensive value. Previous: 3 (nc)David Festa Low workload leads to some questions about long term durability/health for lanky guy. Was very good in short stints since All-Star break though, with 22 Ks in just 13 innings. Curious about whether there is a larger strategy behind the low in-game workloads for Raya and Festa and whether it will lead to better or worse long-term durability. Previous: 6 (+1)Marco Raya Some good starts in AA before a few rough outings. Aggressive promotion will hopefully lead to long term development, but only a 20% K rate in AA so far. Previous: 5 (-1)Charlee Soto Likely won't pitch this year so ranking still based just on upside. Previous: 7 (nc)Austin Martin Still a high floor with just 15% K and .372 OBP on the year. Reportedly just trying to be himself, resulting in modest success but pretty weak contact on average with EV just 85.4 MPH in AAA. Should have solid defensive value as 2B/CF. Previous: 8 (nc)Kala'i Rosario Cooled off a bit lately, but on the year still looking like a big breakout. Previous: 10 (+1)Yunior Severino Showing good results with excellent power from both sides. Already put up a 109.6 MPH max EV in just 20 batted balls in AAA. Previous: 12 (+2)Yasser Mercedes Had a decent July with .723 OPS before being shut down early August (likely injury?). Still a down year so far, but not seeming overmatched with just 22% K rate, so plenty of upside too. Previous: 11 (nc)Luke Keaschall Showing good plate discipline and contact rates early with identical 16% K and BB rates. Also already 8 for 8 stealing bases. Not showing any power yet, but should have a solid floor. Previous: 13 (+1)Connor Prielipp Really unsure about what kind of pitcher he will be with huge health questions, Only 34 1/3 competitive IP in the last 4 years and now TJ will take him out through at least midseason next year. Previous: 9 (-4)Jordan Balazovic Hasn't found a good out pitch in the majors. Changeup was his 4th pitch in AAA and has gotten the best results in the majors, but likely due to lowest use. Still could have either starter or reliever stuff with refinement. Previous: 15 (+1)Tanner Schobel Has struggled after promotion to AA, but BB and K rates have remained solid. Previous: 16 (+1)Brent Headrick Has had some struggles in both AAA and majors lately. Might soon be time to see if stuff can play up in a lefty specialist reliever role with shorter stints. Previous 14 (-2)Cory Lewis Has been the best in high-A of Twins 2022 draftees with a 2.99 FIP. Previous: 18 (+1)Brandon Winokur Has shown both power and swing and miss, but still a good start for a HS guy with hit tool questions. Interestingly has played lots of SS. Previous: 19 (+1)Andrew Cossetti Solid 27% CS rate across A/A+. Well rounded bat (plate discipline, contact rates, and power). Previous: HM (+4)Simeon Woods Richardson Continues to struggle with command and getting hit hard in AAA. Still very young but will have to break out at some point to be a major leaguer. Previous: 17 (-3)Danny De Andrade Has not turned out to be super toolsy as he matures, but has been a solid hitter against older competition. Should be a solid defender in the infield, but might not have great range at SS. Previous: HM (+4) Honorable mentions (21-33): Matt Canterino, Noah Miller, Noah Cardenas, Jose Rodriguez, Zebby Matthews, Andrew Morris, Kody Funderburk, Jose Salas, Jorel Ortega, Jaylen Nowlin, C.J. Culpepper, Jair Camargo, Ricardo Olivar

I don't think he needs 5 pitches but I strongly disagree with going to just 2. His worst stretch was in May when he basically was just going with two pitches. He didn't give up hard contact on the sweeper but opposing teams seemed to be able to sit on it, spoiling a lot of good ones while spitting on the "chase" pitches. He just wasn't able to put hitters away. After mixing in his cutter he had a good stretch. I'm not sure why he totally abandoned the cutter. I guess he probably thought it was too hittable, though it just seems like there were a couple lucky hits off of it. The changeup, similarly, has been effective when he's used it but with worse than expected luck. I'm not sure he needs to be messing around with a two-seamer. He could probably use refinement on his tertiary pitches, but I do think there is a point of diminishing returns with the sweeper.

Isola has a 13% CS rate in his minor league career, including throwing out just 1 of 39 base-stealers in AA last year. He's actually at 24% this year in fewer innings, so maybe like Cossetti he was able to make some improvements on his arm in the offseason. My general impression is that (like Chris Williams) he'd only be an emergency catcher in the majors though.

Good to see Festa stretched out again too. We were wondering why he wasn't getting stretched out sooner after the Futures Game, but it was a little lost how good he was in the shorter stints. Between July 14 and August 6 when he was pitching 2 or 3 inning stints he struck out 22 in just 13 innings. Hopefully he will be an MLB starter, but it is a good sign that his stuff could really play up as a reliever as a fall back. Martin has been really good so far in August. He's always had a pretty solid floor, even when the numbers weren't good, with his high contact rate and good BB+HBP rate. Whatever adjustments he was trying to make last year weren't producing any more power, so going back to what feels natural didn't really have any downside. His exit velocities in AAA have been quite low though. His average EV is just 85 MPH. There's still not a lot of upside showing yet, but if he can keep getting on base he'll still have value as a major leaguer. Jay Harry is now working on over 50 professional PAs without a single strikeout. He's been an extreme version of the slap-hitter profile, making even Martin look like a slugger by comparison. Harry has yet to hit a ball over 100 MPH, his 90th percentile EV is under 95 MPH, and has averaged just 83 MPH. I doubt that there is too much hope that he'll add any significant power, but I'm interested to see how far his extreme profile can take him.

I remember going seeing Strawberry at a Saints game that year as a kid. I wasn't super aware of him other than the fact that he had been a good mlb player and was clearly better than everyone else in the league. I think he was just trying to rehabilitate his career at that point, but maybe he had a suspension keeping him from playing in the majors at the beginning of the year? That was a couple years after Kevin Millar played with the Saints and a year before J.D. Drew played with them at Boras's suggestion after not signing in the MLB draft. Those mid to late 90's Saints teams were a lot of fun, certainly rivaling the Twins of that era for entertainment value.

Gallo is more or less the same vs lefties and righties, not just this year but over his whole career. I wouldn't mind having the young LHH at least get some experience against lefty pitchers until it's proven they can't hit them though.

If Holliday and Chourio have graduated by then, I think a 19 year old in AAA would almost have to be the #1 prospect in the game. Keith Law already rated him 25th in his post-draft list. I expect he will be rated around there by a few other outlets by year end. Lewis is really the only other comparable player drafted under the current FO, and he played in single A in his draft year but was slowed up a bit by tougher competition by the end of his first full year. Jenkins is supposed to be an even more advanced bat for a HS pick, and there will be a little less pressure on the glove as an outfielder. I do think that this front office would be willing to put him on the Holliday path if his performance dictates it. Realistically I think he gets some single A experience this year, hopefully moves to high A before the All-star break next year and then could have a shot at AA before the end of the year, but still wouldn't be disappointing if he ended in A+. I do hope he does well enough to at least start in AA in 2025. That would be a fine path that could still see him debut before his 21st birthday. Anyway, as excited as I am about a dozen at bats, there's a long way to go.

Hoberg called a "perfect game" in the playoffs last year. I believe he may still be the only umpire to have done so. We definitely should call out good umpiring when it happens.

FYI, you can see pitch level data for AAA and most A games via baseball savant's gamefeeds. Here is the pitcher breakdowns for the Saints' last game when Funderburk was the opener. The data is a little less detailed and sometimes less reliable than for major league games but you can get a pretty good idea of velocity and spin from just a couple appearances, and I like to track whiff rates on individual pitches across multiple appearances for guys that I'm interested in. Funderburk is a bit over 40% whiff on his slider, around 30% on his 4-seam, and 20% on his sinker. All of these are good but not spectacular whiff rates for those pitch types. Overall he's getting whiffs on more than 30% of his swings which does back up the K-rate, though Balazovic, for one example, had a slightly better whiff rate in AAA which hasn't quite translated to the majors. The Twins probably also have some additional ideas on his pitch shape, release point etc., but from my perspective I don't see any reason he wouldn't be at least decent in the majors. I think the front office has shown that they aren't looking for just one type of pitcher, so he doesn't have to be like Felix Bautista to get a shot. It does seem like they value veterans, probably to excess, so that seems to be the main issue for him. Trying to crack not just the mlb roster but the 40-man as well, when the front office seems intent on holding onto every veteran who they've made even a tiny investment on.

Yes he can touch 95 (he never sits there). I'm just pointing out that stylistically he might be as close to Keuchel as he is to Bautista. I think maybe Tayler Saucedo could be a pretty good comp.

I'm all for giving Funderburk a shot, but for the record he sits like 90-92, so velocity isn't exactly an argument in his favor (and he's definitely a different kind of pitcher than Bautista).

My take on Kepler pretty much all year is that he's still being more or less the same player he's always been. OPS+ within about 10 points above or below 100. Good defense in the corner outfield spot. There are a few peripherals that are a bit more out of line with his norms, but overall, this is pretty much where we should have expected him to end up all along. So he's on pace for another season around 2 WAR which is solid starter material. Definitely not the kind of player that gets DFAd, but also not something you can't move on from if you wanted to construct the roster differently. Also definitely worth a $10MM option if they want it, though I don't think that should preclude them from shipping the $10MM option to some other team in the offseason either. I think there would be takers, though with an excess value of like $5 or $6MM they wouldn't get back a whole lot. Polanco is complicated by the fact that he also has another team option for 2025. It makes it a little harder to give up on the bounceback when they could get 2 valuable years of control if it happens. I'm becoming increasingly skeptical that his health can hold up enough for him to be the productive guy he could be though. Makes it harder to figure out what to do, but I also wouldn't be surprised if there are other teams that would like him. The second option is entirely gravy for any team that wants the contract. It's a $10MM bet that he can be healthy and productive, and if he's not they don't have to worry about the $12MM in 2025.

I'm with you on Keuchel overall, and I get what you're saying about weak contact in xBA, but if getting groundballs is such a big part of his game, we have to be realistic that he'll give up some hits on them, oftentimes on weak contact. It might seem weird that a ball hit at 60 MPH could have a 30% chance of going for a hit, but that's the reality of pitching for that kind of contact. At any rate, his overall results on balls in play were actually in very close agreement with his xBA and xWOBA yesterday, even if the hits and outs didn't individually matchup with the contact quality. His 90% left-on-base rate was the lucky part. He did actually exceed my expectations in terms of getting groundballs and weak contact. I thought there would be a few more rockets than there actually were. But at the same time zero strikeouts is a pretty ominous sign. He might get "unlucky" in some future start by giving up a bunch of runs on dribblers and choppers. But if he's not missing bats that's going to happen to him and it's not exactly bad luck, it's just what happens to a pitcher like him. I don't think yesterday's start changed any opinions on the believers or doubters of Keuchel. The results were there but the process was a tightrope walk.

I normally trust savant but it looks similar to what the broadcast had and I believe my eyes that the broadcast was off by a couple inches the entire at bat. I noticed it several pitches before. Definitely looked like a tech glitch, might have affected both.

Pitch tracking on the broadcast looked about two or three inches off to the right. Looked like a strike if you could just ignore everything the broadcast was overlaying. (And the one before it looked like a strike too)

I like the pitching matchups a lot less if Keuchel gets slotted into one of the games as I think it was indicated he would be. We also get the Diamondbacks 3 most reliable starters so it could have been a lot better. The D-backs do seem to be in a rut since the All-star break, but against mostly pretty good teams. Their last two series were also against the Mariners and Giants, two of the better pitching staffs in the majors, so the last week of offensive struggles are a little exaggerated. Still, they can't be any more excited about facing the Twins pitching. The Twins have been quite a bit better at home so I'm still hoping for 2 of 3. There does always seem to be at least one clunker in each series for this team though.

Fangraphs says one more option year and he's mostly been in AAA this year, so I think he'll just be stashed in AAA.

Also, Ryan is a pre-arb player with all 3 options left who has been struggling for several weeks. It's very possible that the reason the injury only came out now is because after his latest blow-up in STL he was approached about getting sent down to AAA to try to get sorted out. At that point it becomes much more in his financial interest to come clean and make his MLB salary on the IL rather than be sent down, where he might have ended up going on the IL anyway. I'm not sure I would have thought about sending Ryan down quite yet, particularly since I share your skepticism on Keuchel. But it's very possible that the FO does believe in Keuchel and were already willing to give him a shot at the expense of their youngest starter who was going through a rough patch.

I feel like using the IL as a way to rotate out starters is a recipe for half a dozen grievances from the MLBPA. I guess Ryan agreed that he is at least going through some kind of discomfort, but there is usually no incentive for any player to agree to an IL stint if they aren't injured, and I think at some point if it was obvious enough even the commissioner's office would tell them to knock it off.

I have to agree that I really can't see him turning a corner this year. Given his overall track record, it seems hard to believe that he can't at least rebound a somewhat in the coming years, but I haven't seen any signs yet this year. The defense is good enough that I don't think we should be mashing the sell button like Jim Cramer already, but it's certainly been worrying.

Silently shaking his head slightly and walking back to the plate after Phil Cuzzi rules his double a foul ball.

Hustling out of the box thinking double all the way. He picked up another single so far too. It's pretty common for HS picks to stay in the FCL after the draft. If Jenkins is good enough I could see him getting a taste of low-A though.

Cossetti - 14.9% BB, 16.9% K Winkel - 13.6% BB, 23.1% K Camargo - 7.8% BB, 34.9% K For the record, Cossetti also has a .925 OPS overall in A+, which is significantly different from OPSing around .800. There is more than just OPS to being a well rounded prospect who can carry success to the highest level. I do like Camargo too, but his long track record of being an aggressive hitter who whiffs a lot is going to limit his ceiling. He seems likely to be Gallo-esque in the majors but without the walk rate to help him get on base. If the defense is good enough, which I think it could be, you can still live with that for a backup catcher. Cossetti's bat has been about as well rounded as you can get. Good plate discipline and contact rates, with very strong quality of contact in A-ball too. The defense is another question, but the reports are that he's worked hard and made huge strides so he should at least stick. It's fair to wait a little to see how well the numbers hold up against tougher competition, but to me Cossetti still has a huge edge in performance so far.