Jump to content
Twins Daily
  • Create Account

2wins87

Verified Member
 View Profile  See their activity

  • Posts

    1,650

  • Joined

  • Last visited

 Content Type 

Profiles

News

Minnesota Twins Videos

2026 Minnesota Twins Top Prospects Ranking

2022 Minnesota Twins Draft Picks

Minnesota Twins Free Agent & Trade Rumors, Notes, & Tidbits

Guides & Resources

2023 Minnesota Twins Draft Picks

The Minnesota Twins Players Project

2024 Minnesota Twins Draft Picks

2025 Minnesota Twins Draft Pick Tracker

Forums

Blogs

Events

Store

Downloads

Gallery

Everything posted by 2wins87

  1. 2wins87
    Pretty much every organization has a policy of pulling pitchers after they go more than 35 pitches in an inning, to protect their arms.
  2. 2wins87
    I doubt there's much of an effect on pitcher development, but they have mostly drafted catchers in the late rounds, and more of them have been bat-first guys who they've tried to develop into better defenders. Andrew Bechtold and Charles Mack are two examples of athletic guys that they did try to convert to catchers (they really tried a bit of everything with Bechtold). Bottom line, it's just a very difficult position to get to major league quality defense. Clearly harder than SS IMO, and not a lot of the guys catching in the minors will actually go on to be viable major league options. Cossetti was definitely a bat first guy. They've done a bunch of work behind the scenes including improving his arm strength to improve his ability to control the run game compared to where it was when they drafted him. But a catcher needs a lot of skills, so I'd agree that I'm not sure if he'll get all the way to MLB caliber defense (let alone average MLB defense), though certainly they need to give him a shot to keep working at it. Of the catchers in the system, Camargo and Cardenas are the only two that I feel really confident could be MLB caliber defenders. Certainly there are other guys that might be able to improve enough to get there, but most of the catchers in the Twins system, and really most other systems, are questionable on the defensive side.
  3. 2wins87
    Seems like a rental would make the most sense this year. In theory they already have a full rotation for next year (of course in practice it might not work out that way), and right or wrong, money is tight this year and will be again next year. Getting a playoff caliber starter and moving Paddack to the pen down the stretch would bolster both the rotation and pen while keeping Paddack's innings in control. Doing so while keeping the current and near-future core in tact would be ideal. Gleeman and Sarris's list of "front-line" starters in the Athletic was: Crochet, Kikuchi, Flaherty, Scherzer, Verlander, Snell, Severino, Eovaldi, and Montas. The reasonable rentals (based on salary, talent, and performance) seem to be Kikuchi, Flaherty, and Eovaldi (though his option for 2025 might vest unless the acquiring team does some shady inning manipulation). So anyway, I think Kikuchi would make sense. He's not exactly a slam dunk, but I think it'd probably be worth betting on him to have a strong finish, in which case he could be an important playoff piece.
  4. 2wins87
    #1: Miguel Sano's 495 footer in Fenway a couple years ago. #2: Morneau walkoff against the white Sox in the Metrodome. Sitting above the baggy, bounced off my friends hands, felt like it was still rising when it got to us. I'll never forget those two
  5. 2wins87
    Pretty much all of the above. I think the best broadcasts are often when there are two color guys, sometimes you get some good back and forth between a former hitter and pitcher or just interesting baseball conversations. I don't think that will become the norm for $$ reasons. I always liked Perk and he's grown on me more lately. Smalley is the most old school but he generally has very few "get off my lawn" takes so I enjoy him. I can see how Plouffe or Hawk's personality would not be for everyone, but I have found them both to be generally entertaining. There is honestly nothing about Span being on the broadcast that I remember. I'm not even sure if I listened to the broadcast on games he did, though I think I must have at least a little bit. Probably needs to be on a few more times before we can really judge.
  6. 2wins87
    I would like to see some HS pick at either 21 or 33. It seems like there are more potential guys that would make sense at 33 than 21 so I could see something like this happening. I have been tracking most of the mocks I can find for a couple months now. I like to look at the last month or so before the draft in aggregate as a prediction of which guys could be available where. I don't think any single mock is very predictive but I do think we can get rough probabilities of whether a guy will be available at a given pick from aggregating enough of the high quality ones. Benge only makes it to at least #21 in around 25% right now, but he is probably the guy that is most consistently in the 15-20ish range so that 25% feels maybe a little low. I do think there will be a little more chaos than I've seen in mocks so far. There are a few guys like Benge, Cam Smith, Honeycutt, and Seaver King that are pretty consistently in the top 20 but often in the 15-20 range. They make sense there based on expert rankings, but I do think there is a lot of potential this year for a few wildcards to sneak into the top 20 and then a couple of those guys are available when the Twins pick. Then the question will be whether the Twins jump at them or if they perhaps have someone else very high on their board. Hard to get too attached to any specific guy when they are picking at 21. I'll just be along for the ride. Should be fun.
  7. 2wins87
    Well, taking out their best players might neutralize that 😬 Obviously not intentional but not a good look either
  8. 2wins87
    Hunter Brown's previous 5 outing he gave up just a single run total and pitched at least 6 innings (31 total) Very nice showing by the Twins offense. Still feel like a couple more would be good for comfort.
  9. 2wins87
    That's actually not true. Expected stats like xWOBA and xBA work as well for Arraez as anyone else. His actual BA and WOBA have generally been pretty close to expected throughout his career. The reason he hits for average is that his launch angle is basically ideal: https://www.mlb.com/news/how-luis-arraez-is-an-elite-hitter-without-elite-exit-velocity Having a low K rate also gets baked in.
  10. 2wins87
    Willi needs a day off
  11. 2wins87
    There were some puzzling blocking calls when they first implemented that rule. One very questionable with Gary Sanchez that I remember. They seem to have gotten better though and I agree that one was not blocking.
  12. 2wins87
    Damn Miranda! Incredible. Didn't like running on Alvarez there but it worked out
  13. 2wins87
    He seemed so close to putting it together at times, maybe a stint in Korea will help him make it back to the majors sometime in the future. Didn't seem like he had much of a chance to make an impact with the Twins this year, but his underlying numbers were actually quite good in AAA this year. 30% K and 3.2 FIP, but only a 58% LOB, which seems to have sunk him overall. I''m not sure what to make of someone with a 5.6 ERA but peripherals like that. I do think there is a decent amount of bad luck, but also he needed to perform better with men on base, particularly if he was going to be trusted as a reliever, so I don't think we can say he "should" have had a 3.2 ERA in this case either.
  14. 2wins87
    This would be a good mix of players in the top 100. I am starting to like the idea of going for a HS bat at 21 rather than dipping into the second or third tier of college bats, when there will probably still be some good ones to choose from with their next few picks. I've seen Gillen getting linked to the Twins in some mocks now. I think pick 33 or 60 would be a good time to take a shot at a HS arm. I like the idea of DeBarge at 69 too. There are very few likely SS in the draft, it seems like he could be a really good value pick with a decent shot of sticking at short. Since Falvey and Levine took over, they've only drafted and signed one HS catcher, which was LaRon Smith in the 25th round of 2018. I don't think it's a demographic that they are very keen on, but like Flewelling, Smith was also from Canada so maybe that's something
  15. 2wins87
    Realistically, probably corner outfield. They'll keep giving him reps at C but he seems to still have a ways to go defensively.
  16. 2wins87
    The whole series was really full of dinks, dunks, and dumb luck going Seattle's way. Certainly some miscues and mental mistakes on the Twins side too. Yesterday's game was well played and the Twins still had to overcome a very unfair zone (over +1 runs in Seattle's favor according to ump scorecards). I think the scorecard for today's game might end up almost as bad. They must be feeling good to be getting out of Seattle, and with a series win too! The offense was pretty solid against a very good pitching staff. The Twins definitely looked the better team, as long as they can keep the mistakes to a more normal level.
  17. 2wins87
    Yeah, they have a lot of interesting bats who are catching, but I'm a lot more skeptical on the defensive side for most of them, Cardenas and Camargo being the main exceptions. Baez, as an example, has thrown out 4 of 75 base stealers in his time in the low minors. Even with modest improvements that's such a low starting point that I don't have a ton of confidence that he'll get to the point that it wouldn't be a problem in the majors. I think the early success with Jeffers made it seem easier than it actually is. Partly, much of Jeffers' early improvements were on the framing side, which was low-hanging fruit at the time but the threshold for average is much higher now. Tanner Swanson was also poached by the Yankees, though I think they have a lot of good coaches so I don't actually think that is a huge impact. I also think Jeffers might just be an exceptionally coachable guy, which seems hard to scout, but he's managed to make a lot of improvements on different aspects of his defense over the years. I'm sure every prospect works hard for the most part, but being able to translate drills, etc into actual physical skills is itself a skill that varies quite a bit among athletes. I get the strategy of looking for bats and improving the defense. But I also think it's a good idea to look for a higher defensive starting baseline at times, in part because guys that already have a lot of good skills at a position like catcher have generally proven to have a strong ability to turn coaching into skills.
  18. 2wins87
    Seems plausible, though I'm not sure it's really worked out as well as they might want to believe, if it is their strategy. Jeffers was a big hit for them. I'm not sure whether to call him a deep value pick or not. They took him way higher than expected, but were there other teams that would have popped him in the 2nd or 3rd round? They must have thought there might be. For their later picks, Isola, Winkel, and Baez cannot control the running game. I was excited about Cossetti's defensive improvements, but realistically he's still very iffy to be an MLB caliber catcher, though I want to believe he could still get there. Chris Williams seems kind of similar; he's still getting catching reps but never really gained enough of confidence in his defense to be a prospect. Cardenas is probably the only other catcher that this regime has drafted that I think could be realistically trusted to catch in the majors, and he's always been a pretty standard backup catcher profile from a mid round. On the plus side, they don't have to hit that often to make it a decent strategy. Just developing Jeffers is pretty good value. And I'm not sure you could really say they've been drastically different that the previous regime or many other orgs. Unlike the other up-the-middle positions, a catcher that can't hack it defensively typically doesn't have any defensive value elsewhere either, so I get not wanting to spend high picks on them. There typically aren't too many catchers drafted super high anyway, so it's hard to say if they are really shying away from them as a group, or their board just isn't lining up with their picks. The depth at the position this year does make it more interesting. There are a few guys projected somewhere in the round 3-5 range that seem potentially Jeffers-ish. Campos would be one, though more hit over power.
  19. 2wins87
    Hope we see Buxton and Jeffers instead of Margot and Vazquez in the 10th
  20. 2wins87
    My personal pref list of these guys would be Janek, Benge, Brecht, Caldwell, Gillen. Maybe it's just the lack of high end catching prospects in the system since Jeffers, but I really like Janek's profile. It seems like there's an industry consensus out to about pick 15ish, but then boards are kind of all over the place after that. The Twins will have 4 day 1 picks, so I'll be more interested in how they can use all 4 vs pinning my hopes for any one guy or type at #21.
  21. 2wins87
    No he's still 21, turns 22 in September. On the older end for a junior but still normal. He's 25th on the consensus board.
  22. 2wins87
    He has an .851 OPS on the season now. 29% K rate is still high but better than last year. He's having a good season, full stop. He still has defensive limitations and the K rate is still something to worry about translating to the majors, but I don't think the timing of his production really matters all that much. He's a good AAA hitter at the very least. Not sure how he gets a shot in the majors with the Twins any time soon and his trade value is never going to be super high with his limitations, but still just a solid hitting prospect.
  23. 2wins87
    I don't recall him ever being viewed as a fast guy and I think he has filled out a bit more since draft time so he may have slowed slightly too, not to mention the back issues. I remember seeing Alex Bregman as a comp somewhere around draft time, and he does seem to have grown into that comp physically. The only worry would be whether the lack of speed will hurt him defensively. I think his range is probably a bit below average but watching him play defense he certainly looks like he could hold down the SS position at the MLB level. I would guess that if he had to fill in for an extended period of time the defensive metrics would be good enough to be a regular MLB SS as long as the offense also mostly carried over from AAA.
  24. 2wins87
    I don't really care too much about specific rankings outside the top 10-ish from national rankers. I think it's worth reading their notes, but even very thoughtful and plugged in guys are probably going to end up with a lot of misses going that far down the list into all 30 organizations. I do like Dameury Pena and have him in my top 20 at this point. I also have Bohorquez, who they have at 17, in my top 25. In general they seem kind of absurdly high on a bunch of guys in the rookie levels though. Seems weird to me to have guys with proven track records like Rosario, Lewis, Severino, even Winokur outside the top 30. Certainly those guys have proven to have some holes as prospects but they've also proven to have plenty of abilities.
  25. 2wins87
    I think I saw that in one mock, those sorts of rumors actually pan out so infrequently though. The Twins seem to be a very tight-lipped org, so it could be coming from an agent but you have wonder what motives they could have for putting something like that out too. Could a team like Arizona or Baltimore with two picks in between 21 and 33 be heavily interested and the agent is trying to get them to put out a higher offer? It sounds like Sanford has one of the better defensive profiles among the HS hitters, so if the Twins have higher confidence in his offensive development I could see something like that making sense. There will probably be a few enticing HS arms available at 33 that could be worth making a run at with the extra money.
×
×
  • Create New...