Twitter Mailbag
On Saturday evening, I asked Twitter
followers to send me Twins Minor League questions. I said I would answer them
here today. Thankfully I got quite a few questions. I will answer them, but
please feel free to ask more questions in the chat room.
TwinsTakes_com – “@SethTweets
assuming #Twins are buyers & r
looking for middle relief, what prospects will teams be asking for?”
1.) Aaron Hicks, 2.) Kyle Gibson, 3.) Liam Hendriks,4.) Miguel Sano, 5.) Oswaldo Arcia, 6.) Joe Benson, 7.) Adrian Salcedo,
8.) Angel Morales, 9.) Rene Tosoni, 10.) Chris Parmelee,
Those are many of the top 10 prospects in the Twins system, and
although if you’re looking for a middle reliever, it would be crazy to deal
anyone like these mentioned. At that point, it becomes a big guess. Generally,
if a team isn’t willing to give up a top 10 type of prospect, it will take two
prospects to get a deal done, maybe someone in the 15-20 prospect range plus
someone in the 20s. It’s funny because if the right scout sees the right
prospect on the right day, it could be that guy.
I heard a story
this last week that a Nationals scout happened to be watching the Ft. Myers
Miracle last year in July and saw lefty Joe Testa
throw 97 mph and he was added to the Matt Capps/Wilson Ramos trade. It can be
as simple as that.
jbohrer – “@SethTweets
Who is the best flame throwing pitcher in Twins system?:
They have some
hard-throwing relief pitchers. Dakota Watts and Bruce Pugh both throw very hard
(95+). Matt Hauser throws about that hard. Travis Aune
and I talked to Ben Tootle in Beloit. He was clocked at 100 before being
drafted. He said that he came back this spring after rotator cuff surgery and
was in the low 80s, gradually got up to the high-80s and is now getting into
the low 90s. Hopefully he continues to progress and gets back into the upper
90s. Carlos Gutierrez touched 97 at times. Reports have Madison Boer at that
same velocity.
Now, all of those
guys are relief pitchers, which is no surprise. Most of the Twins starters (and
most pitchers in any organization) sit between 88 and 92. Liam Hendriks, Kyle Gibson, Adrian Salcedo
and a few others can touch 93 at times. Tom Stuifbergen
has touched 94 this year. Miguel Munoz made one start at the beginning of this
season and has been rehabbing an elbow injury ever since. He has made three or
four appearances in the GCL this month. He was a starter that could touch 95,
so hopefully he comes back ok.
DOx80 “What is your take on Derek McCallum? Tough
to see a homegrown talent having such a tough time. Injuries or is he a
bust?
It has definitely
been a struggle for the former Gopher. Really ever since being drafted in the 4th
round in 2009, he hasn’t hit much. He hit just .241 in Elizabethton in 2009.
2010 was a really tough year because he went to Beloit, and immediately he was
hurt and missed a bunch of time. Then he came back for a few weeks and just as
he started hitting, he got hurt again. On the year, he hit just .228/.323/.296.
This year, he returned to Beloit and got more playing time in the outfield, a
new position for him. He was hitting under .200 when he was promoted to Ft.
Myers. With the Miracle, he hit just .191/.295/.191 in 22 games of part-time
play before being sent back to Beloit. In 47 games with the Snappers this year,
he is now hitting .177/.241/.248. He has seven doubles in 141 at bats and just
hit his first home run since 2009 last week.
2010, in my mind,
was a struggle because of the injuries. 2011 has just been bad and certainly
makes this question appropriate. McCallum turned 23 years old in spring
training. I would say that he will head to spring training next year and if he
can’t make the Miracle roster as a contributing player, it will be difficult
for the organization to keep him much longer. Also, I don’t think that the word
“Bust” is really appropriate for anyone taken outside of the first 100 picks in
any draft. Most don’t make it to the big leagues… but most put up better
numbers than this.
auzzie_02 “@SethTweets
Minor League Question: Where do you see Joe Benson's future with the Twins in
the coming years?? Trade him or make room for him?”
The Twins have a
good situation with all of the outfield prospects. It’s really hard to know on
any of these guys until after this season. Consider that it is possible than Delmon Young, Michael Cuddyer and
Jason Kubel could all be gone. The only for-sure
starter in the 2012 Twins outfield is Denard Span. I
anticipate the Cuddyer will be back, and if Kubel is back, he will DH a
majority of the time. Ben Revere’s defense is incredible and he will play a lot
of games either as a starter or as a fourth outfielder. Rene Tosoni has shown that he can be a very productive player in
the big leagues.
I don’t anticipate
Joe Benson being traded. I expect that he will head to Rochester next season as
a 24 year old. Last year he had the 27 home runs. This year he has eight, but
he remains a doubles-machine. He has also cut down somewhat on his strikeout
rate. Benson is already a plus-plus defender at all three outfield positions
with a plus-plus arm with plus-plus speed. That’s not a guy I would trade, but
that’s a guy that I want to be in the everyday lineup starting in 2013.
texaszeller “@SethTweets
with Sano's difficulty in the field where does he end up projecting at the MLB
level and when will we see him in MN?”
18 errors in 32
games certainly isn’t good, is it? He is playing a lot
of shortstop and a lot of 3B. His errors have been a combination of fielding
and throwing errors. But even when the Twins signed him in October of 2009, the
assumption was that he would become too big to play SS. He’s already 6-3 and
having seen him this spring, the 195 pounds he is listed at is quite low.
Personally, I would keep him working at shortstop as long as they can. And 3B
is certainly an option as well. Baseball America projected him to be the Twins
1B in five years. He could be a right fielder because he does have a strong
arm.
Summary – I have no
idea whatsoever what position he will play when he gets to the big leagues. I
would also say that I wouldn’t count out shortstop as a possibility quite yet.
There have been a lot of big league shortstops who have had just as many of
more errors in the lowest levels of the minor leagues. I would guess that
someone like Jorge Polanco or Danny Santana would be
starting at shortstop ahead of Sano. However, he has a huge bat. With the
E-Twins, he is hitting .283/.338/.583 with ten doubles, five triples and six
home runs. 21 extra base hits in 127 at bats is pretty
impressive. He is striking out about once in every four plate appearances. He
is where he needs to be right now.
So, to answer the
second part of the question, when will we see him in MN? I would project that
he will spend 2012 in Beloit for a full season. In a best-case scenario, he
could start 2012 in Ft. Myers and spend the second half in New Britain at age
20. That is the age in which the Twins then traded AJ Pierzynski
so that Joe Mauer could get a big league job. That is
an incredibly fast track and I don’t think that we would see Sano in the big
leagues in 2013, at least not at the start of the season. However, I think he
could be up as a 21 year old in 2014.
ltw0303 “@mlbtraderumors
@SethTweets
If Bill Smith trades Arcia Sano or Hicks for Uehera he needs to be relieved of his duties.”
I
don’t know if this was a question or not, but if it is a True/False statement,
my answer would be Absolutely Yes. I like Koji Uehera
and think he would do a great job in the 7th and 8th
innings for the Twins. However, trading top prospects for relief pitchers is
absolutely crazy. That said, what happened last year? So, I wouldn’t completely
put it out of the realm of possibility. However, I think those three are pretty
untouchable. At least for me they would be (unless we’re talking about getting
Clayton Kershaw).
ERolfPleiss “@SethTweets
September call ups are barely 6 weeks away, who are you most excited to see
make their debut?”
I hadn’t yet thought
about September call-ups, so let’s think for a moment about who the Twins will
call up in September. 1.) Rene Rivera, 2.) Luke Hughes, 3.) Matt Tolbert, 4.)
Rene Tosoni, 5.) Scott Diamond (maybe), 6.) Jim Hoey, 7.) Chuck James
(assuming he is sent down soon).
I guess I wanted to
write that up because my assumption was that there won’t be any September
debuts. There is an outside chance that Kyle Gibson and/or Liam Hendriks are promoted to essentially watch, but the Twins
don’t typically do that. If the Twins chose one of those two pitchers to give a
September call-up to, my guess would be Hendriks
because he has to be added to the 40 man roster anyway after this season
whereas Gibson does not yet need to be added.
ltw0303 “@SethTweets
Keith Law said recently Kyle Gibsons upside is a #3
starter. Has Liam Hendricks now jumped ahead of Kyle in upside?”
I think this is a
tough question, in part because in recent years, I’ve really cooled on the
whole #2, #3, #4 pitcher thing. There are definite
#1s, but after that it’s so much about profile than about other things. Because
Gibson is a ground ball pitcher instead of a strikeout guy, immediately he can’t
profile as a #1? So to me, a #3 big league pitcher is
pretty good and I would not take that as a negative in any way in the least.
Again, Roy Halladay and Cliff Lee don’t profile as #1
pitchers because they don’t throw hard or get a lot of
strikeouts, and yet they have become great.
I have heard mixed
reports on Gibson. The general consensus is that the Rochester infield defense
is awful. That doesn’t bode well for a guy who gets a ton of ground balls. So,
there have been a lot of seeing-eye singles in Gibson’s starts. However, I have
also heard that recently, there have been a lot of really hard hit base hits
too. So, it’s naïve to completely go with the “bad infield” angle. He has work
to do, and he is the first to admit it. He works hard, so I think any concern
is probably premature.
Now to the Hendriks part of the question. I have heard reports from
Ft. Myers, New Britain, Rochester and other places saying that they are more
impressed with Hendriks in terms of stuff and in
terms of deception and fire. When I did my top ten recently, I put Hendriks at #4 and Gibson at #2, but I really strongly
considered Hendriks at #2 behind Aaron Hicks. Since
that time, I’ve done a lot of discussion with sources from all around the
system, and if I had done that a month earlier, I may have gone with Hendriks.
However, the big
picture is this: I can see a Twins rotation early in 2012 including Scott Baker,
Carl Pavano, Kyle Gibson, Liam Hendriks,
and either Nick Blackburn or Brian Duensing. Both
should be very solid big league starters, and if people want to call them #2s,
or #3s, I’m fine with that.
rviet82 “@SethTweets
where is Shooter Hunt at? I know he was struggling and haven't seen him in the
box score lately.”
He was put on the
Disabled List and shut down by the Twins again. In 30.1 innings this year with the
Miracle, he gave up 30 hits, walked 51 and struck out 31. His last outing was
June 24th when he went 0.2 innings and gave up five runs on one hit
and seven walks. In his last ten outings, he had 34 walks in 10.2 innings. It
was time. He is going to turn 25 in August. It’s hard to envision a situation
in which he is able to turn it around at this point. It’s really unfortunate because
his stuff was incredible coming out of Tulane. Very good
fastball. Unbelievable curveball. And, he has
always been stand up. He is a good guy who has participated in my football
picks in the past.
Bryz_OffTheMark “@SethTweets
Kyle Gibson probably won't be called up this season (no room in rotation, it
appears) but could Gutierrez be up this season?”
Gutierrez had a terrific spring training in terms of runs allowed,
although he did struggle to throw strikes some. He pitched well for Rochester
and in May there was a lot of question about whether he should be called up. On
June 29, he entered a game against Pawtucket and gave up two runs on a hit and
three walks without recording an out. That is the last time he has pitched. He
was put on the Disabled List. I have been told that he “has a sore arm” which
doesn’t sound so bad. In the next sentence, I was told that he “could be out
for awhile.” So, hopefully he will pitch again in 2011, but I can’t imagine
that he will be called up to the Twins unless he comes back quick and
dominates.
@brandonwarne52
“@SethTweets If you were
to put together a starting lineup of the best prospects at each position, what
would it look like?”
I like this question, how about this (and obviously be sure to use the Comments section to discuss or make any
suggestions):
·
Catcher – Danny Rams
·
First Base – Chris Parmelee
·
Second Base – Yangervis Solarte
·
Third Base – Miguel Sano
·
Shortstop – Brian Dozier
·
Left Field – Joe Benson
·
Center Field – Aaron Hicks
·
Right Field – Oswaldo Arcia
·
Starting Five – Kyle Gibson, Liam Hendriks,
Adrian Salcedo, David Bromberg, Tom Stuifbergen
·
Relievers – Carlos Gutierrez, Manuel Soliman, Bobby Lanigan, Dakota
Watts, Bruce Pugh
kreedstrom “@SethTweets.
Does @KWaldrop85 deserve a shot to be
up in MN this year? And who are the september
call ups likely going to be?”
For
the second straight year, he had a very strong showing in big league training
camp. Unfortunately, unlike 2010 when he was tremendous in Rochester, 2011 has
been a struggle. Not long ago, he had an ERA well north of five. However, if
you look at what he has done in his last ten outings, I think the argument
could be made for him to get a call up at some point, maybe in September. In
his last ten games, he is 1-0 with a 0.60 ERA. In 15 innings, he has given up
just one run on eight hits. He has walked three and struck out 12. Always a
groundball pitcher, he has an absolutely amazing 27/1 ground ball to fly ball
ratio. Basically, he is pitching as well as he has ever pitched right now!
Nipps26 “@SethTweets
whatever happened to Slama being one of our hot
prospect relief pitchers?”
It’s hard to
understand why Slama has never really been considered
much of a prospect by the Twins. Stats people and anyone who has paid attention
to Slama’s minor league career sees that he has been
incredible ever since signing with the Twins before the 2007 season after the
Twins drafted him in the 39th round in 2006. In five minor league seasons,
he has 387 strikeouts in 286 innings (12.2 per nine innings). Even in AAA, he
has 135 strikeouts in 118 innings (10.3 per nine innings). Yes, his career walk
rate is 3.8 per nine innings, and in AAA it has been 4.3 per nine. However, in
seven big league innings, he has seven walks and eight strikeouts. When he was
up earlier for the Twins, he got two games, and he was wild in those games,
even though he didn’t give up any runs.
From a scouting
standpoint, they have never been real high on Slama.
His fastball has only been between 88 and 92. His secondary pitches are good,
but not great. He is always known for his deceptive delivery, but scouts never
thought it would translate to the big leagues. So, as much as Slama has never been a big prospect, he has done absolutely
everything in the minor leagues that he can do.
With the Twins in
need of a right-handed bullpen arm, Slama would be
perfect (potentially) for the role. Unfortunately, he hasn’t pitches since July
1st with arm problems. Arm issues made him miss most of spring
training. He struggled in April because that was his spring training. He was
great in May and pitched some of the Twins. He was incredible in June, and now
injuries have cost him again. If healthy, I fully believe that Slama would have played a huge role in the Twins bullpen
this year.
TWINS NOTES
The Twins got five shutout innings from Scott
Baker in his return, and then the bullpen got the job done for the final four
as the Twins beat the Tigers and cut their lead to six. The Twins have a late
start today so that fans can watch the Hall of Fame speech of Bert Blyleven
this afternoon.
Minor
League Updates
Be sure to check
out Roger’s
Minor League Report at Twinkie Town later this morning.
Rochester Red Wings
Rochester beat Indianapolis 12-5. Brandon
Roberts went 4-6 with his fifth double. Rene Rivera was 4-5 with his fifth
double and his second and third home runs. Denard
Span was 2-4 with a stolen base before being replaced late by Dustin Martin who
hit his tenth home run. Jeff Bailey went 2-5 with his 17th double
and eighth home run. Eric Hacker started and gave up five runs on eight hits in
five innings, and got the win. He struck out five. Dusty Hughes came in and
struck out four in two scoreless innings. Jake Stevens struck out two in two
scoreless innings.
New
Britain Rock Cats
New Britain lost 7-2 to Altoona on Saturday.
Matt Schuld started and gave up five runs on nine
hits and four walks in just 2.2 innings. Andrew Albers went the next 4.1
innings and gave up one run on four hits and two walks while striking out five.
Brett Jacobson gave up one run on one hit in one inning. The Rock Cats managed
just three hits. Deibinson Romero hit his 16th
double, and Mark Dolenc hit his second home run.
Ft. Myers Miracle
The Miracle lost 8-6 to Clearwater. Oswaldo Arcia went 3-5 with his
fourth double. Josmil Pinto went 2-4 with his seventh
double and four RBI. Jamaal Hawkins was 2-3 with his sixth and seventh doubles.
James Beresford went 2-5. Pat Dean gave up six runs on nine hits and a walk in
four innings. Alex Wimmers came in and struck out the
side in the fifth inning. He returned for the sixth and gave up two runs on one
hit and four walks (and he struck out three more). Listening to Alex Margulies,
Wimmers was getting squeezed. Good to hear that he
wasn’t all over the place, but instead was just missing. Matt Tone threw a
scoreless inning despite a hit and two walks. Matt Hauser struck out three in
his inning.
Beloit Snappers
The Snappers lost 3-1 to Lansing. Snappers starter AJ Achter
returned to his college stomping grounds at Michigan State and pitched well. In
six innings, he gave up two runs on three hits and two walks. He struck out
seven. Blayne Weller struckout two in his inning.
Nelvin Fuentes gave up one run on two hits and a walk
in his inning. The Snappers had just three hits. Reggie Williams hit his first
home run, and Adam Bryant walked twice.
Elizabethton Twins
Elizabethton topped Princeton 3-1. Pedro
Guerra started and threw 6.1 scoreless innings. He gave up seven hits, walked
one and struck out six. Steven Gruver gave up one run on three hits in 1.1
innings. Madison Boer recorded his seventh save by striking out three batters
in the four outs he got. The E-Twins had six hits and five walks. Tyler Koelling went 1-3 with a walk and his second steal. Jairo Rodriguez went 2-4. Miguel Sano walked twice. Eddie
Rosario hit his fifth double.
GCL Twins
The GCL Twins beat the Red Sox 6-1. Hyun-yi Chen gave up one run on five hits and a walk in three
innings. He struck out three. Nathan Fawbush threw
two scoreless innings. Gonzalo Sanudo struck out four
in two scoreless innings. Marcus Limon gave up two hits in two scoreless frames.
Candido Pimentel went 2-5 with his third stolen base.
Michael Quesada went 2-4 with his fifth double. Jorge Polanco
was 2-4. Angel Morales went 1-3.
Any other questions on the
Twins minor leagues? E-mail
me, or leave
some Comments.