twinstalker

Rod Carew's first batting title wasn't in 1972.

I'd give Duran and EmRod for Aidan Miller, easily. Maybe get an arm back that will be a future reliever. Kill a lot of birds with that stone.

I understand this more than anybody, but there's very little sense trading him if you can't get anything. There's really nobody pushing for playing time by the time you've replaced those who can get you something. 🙃

You don't have to. He's hot, he'll soon be not. So he made it here. The difference with Winokur is there's a tiny bit of hope. If someone has more than a tiny hope, it's a false hope. But there's a tiny bit of hope, which is more than you can say for most (including, say, Billy Amick who probably fits your criterion). And it's noticeable that Winokur's hot. So probably worth a mention. I've also noticed Ohl and H. Castillo in my studies. All worthy of mention in this series.

There's nothing to see here. I'm glad he's had AA success in his fourth go-round.

Billy Amick's not shown anything at all. Don't understand this. Don't be fooled. High K rate, too old at level (A+) for prospect status, and unsustainable BABIP. I have no idea what people are looking at. He's not on my top 20.

Oh, he'll be on the roster soon enough. (Old camp song...) Goodbye, Treva, goodbye Castra, we will miss ya, in Minnesata. Target's not home To Danny Coloumbe Much less Duran, Justa Topa, Harry Bada.

LOL at premise. Pretty much the Catch-22 of sports.

My projection of Lee was a second division infielder with a someday pop-up season that might get him an all-star game. Not a guy to build around, but not a bad guy to keep around. Seems right on so far. Last year at this time, that's the description of what I considered the #2 prospect in the system after Jenkins. I thought Keaschall was trending way upward and EmRod was overrated.

Acuna and Soto were destroying low A at age 18. Acuna the Youngest is a very average prospect at best, but the genes and possible growth make him worth watching on the periphery. I'd expect him to struggle at age 19 at low A. It's a far cry from stardom. Also, when I voted for my top 20, there was no ability to put Serrano in there last week, but I did put someone in and said in the comments it was Serrano. I could find nothing to dislike.

NM

Walker JenkinsLuke KeaschallDasan Hill Really close with Soto.Charlee SotoConnor PrielippEmmanuel Rodriguez Strikes out way too much to be higher. He's got some upside but the chance to reach it is very low. Minor league high walk rate doesn't project to positive MLB outcomes.Payton Eeles Stud. The lh Freddie Patek!Andrew MorrisGabriel Gonzalez A mix of Kirby Puckett and Jose Miranda. Not sure how much of each.CJ Culpepper Likely needs TJS but pretending he's going to be fineKaelen CulpepperKhadim DiawDanny De AndradeCarson McCuskerBrandon WinokurKyle DeBargeCole PeschlCory LewisDameury PenaSantiago Castellanos This is actually Teilon Serrano, but you don't have him and a bunch of other listed to choose from.

Bunting (sacrificing) is almost always bad. But it's especially bad in the top half of an extra inning. If the reasoning's not laid in the article or comments, shame on everybody. This is the perfect example of hindsight. It's so clear when you know what the outcome of the alternative is.

Twins minor league CF has big day at level he was playing at two years ago. I'm afraid Mercedes isn't going to be much of anything. Somewhat disappointing.

Even at 25% his K rate is far too high to do anything in the majors, K rate is what you need to know, adjusted for age vs level. There's nothing there. 26 in his fourth year at AA, that 25% is more like a normal prospect's 33%. That could well be 40%+ in MLB with contact mostly partial and weak. And maybe a couple of homers at first that don't mean anything other than pitchers feeding him some meatballs until they learn.

Hey, when your future goes down, and the guy you get off the scrap heap hits really well for a month, you really can't ask for anything more.

Yeah, first can he hit at all, then we'll worry about whether he hits enough for MLB 1B. Fact is, in his 4th try at AA and only over 159 PAs this year at age 26, Sabato is still striking out 26.4% of the time. If you're thinking he has a chance, you're right in that it's the same chance as Lloyd Christmas. His BABIP is .395 at AA this season compared to closer to .280 for his AA career prior. His reward for all this is being on the Hot Sheet, not being a real prospect.

My top Twins prospects: 1 Jenkins 2 Keaschall 3 Hill 4 Soto 5 Prielipp 6 EmRod 7 or 8 Morris (can't recall if there's some else in there but don't think so)

A number of years ago I was ignoring him because of his high K rate, but then I started following him more closely and before he was in the majors I was convinced he was different than other players with high K rate. I became convinced as it became clear that he struck out simply because he was trying to hit homers. It was soon noticeable that he was adjusting when necessary to have quality ABs. That's when I knew this man was dangerous.

They were also extreme fly ball hitters, and I think you forgot Reggie Jackson in the 1971 all-star game. High fly balls could clear that stadium. Surprised Kingman didn't do it at some point. Funny, I couldn't tell you a thing about any of the all-star games after Torii robbed Bonds, but that 1971 game stood out for so many reasons. I think it might be the only AL win during a many, many year period (like 18-20 years?). Look it all up, I didn't do so.

Kaelen Culpepper should be in AA, so if he weren't hitting well, he'd be a failed pick. As is, he's a wait and see.

Twinstalker top ten prospects (another thread): 10. Danny De Andrade. Not playing short and striking out 25-26% of the time probably makes this way too high. It makes me sad about a guy I thought was the next Greg Gagne. I'm keeping him at 10 until Culpepper proves he can mash at the next level this year, where he should be at this stage.

Bones McCoy could fix it.

What about Marco Raya is high upside? Lots of guys throw his mph and have a pitch. If he's high upside, then everyone is pretty much high upside.

You'd be surprised. I played relatively (vs normal person) high level football and basketball. I sprained my ankles a lot, and people treated it as you say, bummer, accident. And then I got tired of constantly being out, so I started doing something about it to prevent it, even though my ankles were now a mess. I'm talking high school and small college, and I guess I never had the expectation back then that the team should be addressing this proactively with everyone, even me. It's really easy to prevent. I had so many "events" occur after I started my prevention, and none of the turns were bad because I protected. Then I got cocky in grad school playing IM hoops, didn't protect, bad sprain. Rest of life protected, never hurt again in hoops, but sprained twice running unprotected (hit a hole, hit an ice chunk). There are levels of protection, and there are ways to concentrate on protecting against high and low sprains. I was very interested in learning all this, of course. It shocks me to this day when an athlete sprains his ankle. I know my story is very anecdotal, but I think I was an extreme case to begin with, and that matters here. As for EmRod, for one, I spend an inordinate amount of time studying prospects and their eventualities. My background and graduate work is in stats, but I still need to get a life. EmRod has a chance, as I said. He's a good prospect compared to the Twins list of prospects, but there are a half dozen or so in the organization now I expect to have better careers, on average. This is all on average. And that may be shortchanging him if he figures things out 6-7 years down the road and has a fine career thereafter. I know I keep repeating it, but minor league K rate is pretty much the one statistic you need to look at, albeit it adjusting for a few other factors, including age vs level, power hitting (binary, think Wallner) and a few other things. The new statcast data are going to refine this, but K rate is the biggie of the common-now stats. So I predicted struggles for Julien and success with a lot of strikeouts for Wallner. Wallner's not done proving it, but Julien is. He'll have to be a 2nd phase guy if he's anything, and it's going to take a massive change, if it's possible. Also, a low walk rate in the minors isn't a good thing unless the hit tool is extraordinary (see Jacob Wilson), but a high walk rate (non-predictive) is almost always about passivity. It's incredibly easy to draw a walk in the minors compared to the majors, and that means walk rate can be more misleading than helpful. MLB pitchers have a field day with a passive hitter. Mind you, just like with Julien, pitchers don't figure a player out immediately, but when they do, the book is everywhere. I'd have to imagine the pitching learning curve is shorter now based on better minors data. I would expect EmRod to enter the majors on a minor league hot streak, and both that and the natural pitcher learning curve could contribute to immediate success, just like with Julien. Someone with power like EmRod (though not a power hitter, binary) could do very well before suddenly "what happened?" Another example is Keaschall. Last year I was giving EmRod more a benefit of the doubt than I am now, but I think my top five in order were Jenkins, Lee (because guaranteed MLBer) Keaschall, Zebby, and EmRod (mostly to avoid having to explain why he wasn't in my top five). But Keaschall had everything we look for in a prospect except maybe high high upside. And he showed it when called up, though he'll never be that good, obviously. He's got some power, doesn't K, speed, was about as young vs MiLB level as he could be given his draft status plus had those intangibles that turn into tangibles: SBs, extra bases, and such. As far as I know, I was the only one ranking Keaschall higher than EmRod, and to me it wasn't even close. Lee, btw, I criticized often, but his low K rate made me believe he'll be a major leaguer as long as he's young and healthy. Keaschall wasn't a sure-fire MLBer like Lee but was really close. I think I had Zebby ahead of Keaschall, if I did, because of impact if he reached his ceiling. I also like Payton Eeles a lot, but there are so many unknowns and a few key negatives that I think won't be a real problem with him, but his profile is so unique, I'm not betting the house on him. His upside is a fine 2B with the Keaschall intangibles...I'm not even sure he can be a utility player, though his arm strength might not be the problem I fear, and he will be just that. For the record on 6/6/25: 1. Jenkins (clear 1 due to a lot...he's quite good if healthy) 1b. Keaschall (too good to start with a "2") 3a. Dasan Hill (better than Soto but further away for now) 3b. Charlee Soto (can't seem to get info on injury, and that definitely puts him after Hill) 5. Connor Prielipp (could be higher, but I think he's a reliever) 6. EmRod (mostly due to age, speed, and fielding to go with his hitting stats vs K rate) 7. Payton Eeles (this is purely a "I know he'll play and be decent" spot) 8. Andrew Morris (15 months younger than Zebby, last year Zebby started at high A, less mph) <special place for CJ Culpepper, who likely needs TJS, but the Twins are Canterino-ing him> 9. Gabriel Gonzalez (not sure there's much upside, but he'll hit, 14% K rate this year, 12% AA) 10, Danny De Andrade (I could put McCusker here or around 15) After that's there's a bunch of guys like K. Culpepper, DeBarge, D. Pena, maybe Winokur, Olivar, maybe McCusker, et al. There's a whole lot of pitchers we don't quite know about that will fill up 11-25 at the end of the season. When we get to 30, we can start talking names like Raya, Schobel, No, Schobel hitting well at third time through AA doesn't impress me. Could be a thrown in to a deal, I suppose. I'm probably too rough on both, but they're not top prospect in any way at this point. Finally, Corey Lewis. Need to figure out what's wrong. Pretty sure he's much better than he's showing, not sure what's wrong. At this point I'd put him around 15-20 based on his prior success. Amick maybe sneaks in top 20 but is 20-25. You can't be as old as your competition and strike out at a 25% rate and show zero HR power. I won't say his decent stats are all BABIP driven, but there's a god chance that's what we're looking at.