Do you still view Dozier as "untouchable" ?

[Scheherezade]

If the Angels want to give us Mike Trout straight up for Dozier, I'd take that deal.

[beckmt]

I don't think the odds are that good

This is with the 2nd or 3rd best farm system in the majors and 5 prospects in the top 50 of some lists. Twins best chance is to get most of these 5 and some of the rest up here to start 2016, you don't want to start losing key pieces just when you are ready to compete. Money for Free Agents can be spent at this time to fill the holes that don't work out.

[drjim]

I think that the odds of trading Dozier are near 0%, but one possible trade that jumped out to me after thinking about it was the Cardinals.

 

They could offer Taveras and Wong, Twins would have to add something else, perhaps Suzuki?

 

The only way Dozier gets moved is if a 2b comes back - and the Twins previously drafted Wong.

[tobi0040]

Fair enough, I can read stats too.

 

You answered my May response, I also believe he would be up if he hadn't gotten hurt.

 

Meyer is more complicated in my mind. He could come up and be successful, but there are concerns about his third pitch and his fastball command. This season isn't going anywhere, I think it makes sense to develop these two things in a lower stress environment. If he can improve these two things he is an ace.

 

The key is preference if you want to development them in AAA or at the majors. I disagree the majors is better because he would get exposed, fall back more his two plus pitches, and not develop as well as he should. I assume you would disagree.

 

I think he would have some success right now in the majors, and also some setbacks. I also think if the Twins were contenders he would be up in the bullpen right now. But they aren't so they have the luxury of patience.

 

I side with Mr. Brooks. He is dominating AAA now and the Twins are going to move him up this year at some point. Between now and then, he will not have learned anything further at AAA. So for my money, let's get some experience up here and see how his stuff fares with the big club. Then you can work on and think about adjustments all off-season. The longer we wait, the more of the adjustment period will get pushed to next year.

[bronald3030]

Dozier fields well, but an average less than .240 does not make you untouchable. If someone offers a building block for the future trade him.

[nicksaviking]

I side with Mr. Brooks. He is dominating AAA now and the Twins are going to move him up this year at some point. Between now and then, he will not have learned anything further at AAA. So for my money, let's get some experience up here and see how his stuff fares with the big club. Then you can work on and think about adjustments all off-season. The longer we wait, the more of the adjustment period will get pushed to next year.

 

I'm with Drjim in the fact that we have no idea if these guys are "ready."

 

That being said, I don't believe they need to be completely "ready" to be called up. It seems that the Twins require their pitchers to have a lot more polish prior to their call up than they do the batters. Unless the players are mentally fragile, or the sunshine and rainbows atmosphere in Target Field is conducive to stunted development at the first sign of adversity, I don't know what the hesitation is to let a pitcher take his lumps at the MLB level. It would seem to be a pretty good learning experience unless the pitcher happens to be the kind of guy to cry in the corner of the shower and ask for his mommy after getting rocked.

[Beezer07]

Dozier fields well, but an average less than .240 does not make you untouchable. If someone offers a building block for the future trade him.

 

Isn't Dozier a building block for the future?

[diehardtwinsfan]

This is with the 2nd or 3rd best farm system in the majors and 5 prospects in the top 50 of some lists. Twins best chance is to get most of these 5 and some of the rest up here to start 2016, you don't want to start losing key pieces just when you are ready to compete. Money for Free Agents can be spent at this time to fill the holes that don't work out.

Most of the top 5 should be up by then baring injury. Stewart would be the only exception to that rule, but in principle, I'd have to disagree. I don't think you want them taking up roster spots while they struggle because they were promoted too rapidly.

[diehardtwinsfan]

Isn't Dozier a building block for the future?

 

I'd argue that he is.

[laloesch]

Atlanta actually is using a pretty solid prospect now - La Stella. The Nats and Orioles could use a second baseman. If the Twin were able to pry Gioltio or Bundy back, I'd be ok with moving Dozier but not for a potential #3 pitcher.

 

I would make that trade in a heartbeat. Heck i'd throw in another guy to make the deal sweeter for the Nats if they'd send Giolito our way. That kid is going to be a stud starting pitcher. We should have drafted him when we had the chance but not over Buxton.

[drjim]

I'm with Drjim in the fact that we have no idea if these guys are "ready."

 

That being said, I don't believe they need to be completely "ready" to be called up. It seems that the Twins require their pitchers to have a lot more polish prior to their call up than they do the batters. Unless the players are mentally fragile, or the sunshine and rainbows atmosphere in Target Field is conducive to stunted development at the first sign of adversity, I don't know what the hesitation is to let a pitcher take his lumps at the MLB level. It would seem to be a pretty good learning experience unless the pitcher happens to be the kind of guy to cry in the corner of the shower and ask for his mommy after getting rocked.

 

I think they try to get people close to their ceilings before calling up.

 

I stand by my analysis of Meyer. He would come up now and have some success, but his lack of a third pitch and less than perfect fastball command would be exploited by major leaguers. If he was to clean these two things up he would be an ace. I think it is reasonable, considering the current state of the team, to be patient and to have him work on them in a less stressful situation.

 

Barring injury flaring up again, May will be up soon.

[tobi0040]

I'd argue that he is.

 

A good fielding second baseman that is young and cheap, takes walks and can get close to 30-30. Definitely a building block.

 

It comes down to when we can compete. We have Dozier under control for like four more years and could probably sign him to a 5-6 year deal. We should be competing within 1-2 years. If we were the Phillies and we were awful, aging, with absolutely no farm system. Then Dozier might be a guy you trade to speed up the process. But not here. You can't have a team of 25 rookies and think you can compete.

[tobi0040]

I would make that trade in a heartbeat. Heck i'd throw in another guy to make the deal sweeter for the Nats if they'd send Giolito our way. That kid is going to be a stud starting pitcher. We should have drafted him when we had the chance but not over Buxton.

 

We did not have a chance to draft Giolito if you prefer Buxton. They were in the same draft, Giolito was a high school kid (first draft) and he went 14th.

[Rosterman]

Dozier is still a nice piece to keep. We can assume that the Twins may be modestly competitive in 2015, hopefully pushing towards .500, but they may stink again as they break in a rookie rotation and play with offensive holes that won't get tryouts until the season progresses. Like Plouffe, Dozier is a keeper that can still be re-marketed as next season progresses. You have no immediate quality replacement and he is still cheap enough to keep on your team, and cheap enough and under control that he is a good solid trade chip as long as he plays as well as he is playing now. But like Plouffe and Parmelee and Gibson, just to name a few, they aren't causing people to knock down your door. When your hottest trade chip is Suzucki, and he will be a free agent again so he will bring a 40-man roster guy about to be out of options or a High-A player blocked ina club's system, the Twins have no real stars that people will go overbarad to get. Okay, maybe Perkins or Mauer or Hughes. But that is it, for now. It shows the weakness of the team. If you flip to the other end of the spectrum and the Twins needd one or two pieces to get into the wild card, then they have a whole slew of players they could trade for a Price or a Trout, for example. But they currently need the promise of those players as well as the best place setters they can field until something proves themselves out of the minors.

[nicksaviking]

I think they try to get people close to their ceilings before calling up.

 

I agree that they do, I just don't agree that they should. 25-year-old rookie pitchers shouldn't be the norm when the guys are top 100 prospects. There's nothing wrong with a little stress for a young pitcher. He's going to have to deal with it at some point.

[Willihammer]

The Twins top pitching prospects don't line up that well with their top position prospects in terms of shooting for any kind of "window." The Kepler, Harrison, Buxton, and Polancos are all 20-21. Meyer and May are 25 already. Gibson is 26. Pitchers tend to peak earlier anyways. And if the position players go Dozier/Plouffe on us then we could be talking about little or no overlap at all.

 

edit: all that's to say that I think it makes sense to use Meyer/May earlier than later, even if they aren't 100% ready, so they can contribute while Dozier/Plouffe/Mauer can still be expected to produce at or near peak levels.

[bird]

The Twins top pitching prospects don't line up that well with their top position prospects in terms of shooting for any kind of "window." The Kepler, Harrison, Buxton, and Polancos are all 20-21. Meyer and May are 25 already. Gibson is 26. Pitchers tend to peak earlier anyways. And if the position players go Dozier/Plouffe on us then we could be talking about little or no overlap at all.

 

edit: all that's to say that I think it makes sense to use Meyer/May earlier than later, even if they aren't 100% ready, so they can contribute while Dozier/Plouffe/Mauer can still be expected to produce at or near peak levels.

 

Not so sure about the window issue. Of the 6 top 50, Meyer and Berrios are a year and two years away, and Buxton and Sano are a year or so away, and Stewart and Gordon will come along one after the other. If we're fortunate, some of today's new initiates will have taken their lumps and show improvement in year two (Gibson, Arcia, Santana, Pinto). From there, the pipeline looks poised to deliver a steady trickle (Tonkin, Burdi, May, Hicks, Rosario, Vargas, Polanco). Obviously, some of these guys will struggle or flop, but there's sufficient depth.

 

My suspicion is they retain Dozier because of intangibles perhaps as much as that they forecast his production to exceed that of Rosario or Polanco. The outward signs indicate he's charismatic and likable, and maybe provides much-needed clubhouse leadership.

[GCTF]

Dozier fields well, but an average less than .240 does not make you untouchable. If someone offers a building block for the future trade him.

 

Why would you only cite average? He's 7th in MLB in OPS for 2B. .750-.800 OPS second basemen aren't growing on trees and he's cost controlled for a few more years. Unless someone bowls you over with an offer, you don't move that for a "future building block".

[laloesch]

We did not have a chance to draft Giolito if you prefer Buxton. They were in the same draft, Giolito was a high school kid (first draft) and he went 14th.

 

 

That's right. I forgot that he went 14th. Even still..... if we dangled Dozier to them and added another youngster, maybe Hicks; I'd make that trade in a second.

[tobi0040]

Not so sure about the window issue. Of the 6 top 50, Meyer and Berrios are a year and two years away, and Buxton and Sano are a year or so away, and Stewart and Gordon will come along one after the other. If we're fortunate, some of today's new initiates will have taken their lumps and show improvement in year two (Gibson, Arcia, Santana, Pinto). From there, the pipeline looks poised to deliver a steady trickle (Tonkin, Burdi, May, Hicks, Rosario, Vargas, Polanco). Obviously, some of these guys will struggle or flop, but there's sufficient depth.

 

My suspicion is they retain Dozier because of intangibles perhaps as much as that they forecast his production to exceed that of Rosario or Polanco. The outward signs indicate he's charismatic and likable, and maybe provides much-needed clubhouse leadership.

 

I don't know that we can consider Rosario as a 2B anymore. I heard rumblings in the off-season that the Twins were very proud of his effort from moving to CF to 2B. But it wasn't going to work out. So far he has been in the OF 40 games versus 15 at 2B.

 

So it appears some merit exists...

 

Circling back to Dozier, even if Polanco and Rosario are 2B contenders, we have one in the hand at this point and a good one. We would have to be blown away.

 

http://www.baseball-reference.com/minors/player.cgi?id=rosari001edd

[tobi0040]

That's right. I forgot that he went 14th. Even still..... if we dangled Dozier to them and added another youngster, maybe Hicks; I'd make that trade in a second.

 

I did hear Peter Gammons during the 2014 MLB draft say that if you have had TJ, odds are you will need another TJ within six or seven years. If accurate, I would be hesitant. That puts Giolito with a second Tommy John in his 4th or 5th year in the big leagues and most pitchers don't come back from the second one.

[laloesch]

I think they try to get people close to their ceilings before calling up.

 

I stand by my analysis of Meyer. He would come up now and have some success, but his lack of a third pitch and less than perfect fastball command would be exploited by major leaguers. If he was to clean these two things up he would be an ace. I think it is reasonable, considering the current state of the team, to be patient and to have him work on them in a less stressful situation.

 

Barring injury flaring up again, May will be up soon.

 

I hope your right. May has nothing left to prove in AAA. The FO is just being stubborn right now with Pino and Johnson. Both these guys won't be major league starters long term with this franchise. There's a remote possibility that Johnson could stick around for a little while, but I doubt it. I would like to see the Twins give May some experience this season and hopefully hit the ground running next year.

[JB_Iowa]

I did hear Peter Gammons during the 2014 MLB draft say that if you have had TJ, odds are you will need another TJ within six or seven years. If accurate, I would be hesitant. That puts Giolito with a second Tommy John in his 4th or 5th year in the big leagues and most pitchers don't come back from the second one.

 

But it does depend on the player and how they are used. Brian Duensing had TJ in 2003-2004 and here we are 10 years later.

 

But I would think the likelihood of recurrence would be greater with starters than relievers.

[Brock Beauchamp]

Isn't Dozier a building block for the future?

 

Yes. He's an above average MLB player in his prime seasons with no replacement ready to fill his role.

 

Trading Dozier seems very foolish to me unless the offer floors you (ie. a top 25 prospect). He's the type of player you don't necessarily build around but one that provides good numbers in a complementary role, a role too often undervalued by fans and the backbone of a winning team. Trading him now sets back the team and its timeline.

 

Besides, if Dozier keeps hitting, his value one year from now will be virtually identical to what it is today because he'll have a longer track record of consistent performance, despite having one less year of team control.

[Mr. Brooks]

Fair enough, I can read stats too.

 

You answered my May response, I also believe he would be up if he hadn't gotten hurt.

 

Meyer is more complicated in my mind. He could come up and be successful, but there are concerns about his third pitch and his fastball command. This season isn't going anywhere, I think it makes sense to develop these two things in a lower stress environment. If he can improve these two things he is an ace.

 

The key is preference if you want to development them in AAA or at the majors. I disagree the majors is better because he would get exposed, fall back more his two plus pitches, and not develop as well as he should. I assume you would disagree.

 

I think he would have some success right now in the majors, and also some setbacks. I also think if the Twins were contenders he would be up in the bullpen right now. But they aren't so they have the luxury of patience.

 

 

It seems their are people who say, "no, you don't go after the massive FA's, because winners are built from within."

And then, people who say, "we are not winning so their is no rush to get them up here."

 

I'm not accusing you of being one who says both these things, but to me I don't see how you ever get them up here if that is the case.

If you need your prospects to come up and produce to turn this thing around, but you don't want to call up your prospects until you are in a pennant race, then how will they ever get called up?

 

To me he is "ready" now. Does he still have some things to work on? Of course. But, he's going on 25 years old. At some point you just have to get him up here and hope that he can learn the rest at this level.

I would assume that there must be some age that is your "cutoff" (maybe not though)? How old would he have to get before you think he should just go ahead and come up with what he has, rather than wait for him to be perfect?

If that age exists, then perhaps we agree on the premise but just disagree on that age. To me, as far as elite prospects go, he's already an "old dog".

[LC34]

I say keep him unless a huge Walker type trade happens as well. Looking at what the Twins have had and let go before the prime, Id rather take a chance and keep a guy and not have him stay consistant than to lose them and watch them become an all star for another team

 

Examples: Ortiz, Gomez, Hardy, etc. Granted some of them we knew were and would be good, some of them needed time with another coach, and some just came out of no where but I hate the past two all star games have had an abundance of former Twins. Lets open the pocketbook and maybe overpay a couple guys to keep them, then to trade away and hope to land an all star rookie only to go through the same dance 3-4 years later when they are ready to be paid.

[Craig Arko]

No, but at the very least he'd need to buy dinner. Maybe flowers and chocolate.

[DocBauer]

Just to share and echo many sentiments here in my own words and opinions.

 

No, absolutely no, Dozier is not a tradeable asset. Yes, if someone offers you a tremendous return you always listen. You have to. What that return would be is hard to say, and so I won't go in to pure speculation mode.

 

I am firm belief Dozier's BA will be climbing. In fact, if Santana and Mauer had stayed healthy, hitting around him, I'd be willing to bet we would have already seen a climb this season. He simply has too much of a hitting record, a nice swing, a good eye, and what seems to baseball sense not to expect improvement. But he has already fashioned himself, in only his second season, to being a highly productive player in the AL in regard to virtually every offensive statistic. And not just "for a second baseman".

 

I find it it rather un fathomable that some clamor for the promotion of young prospects, even if not seemingly "ready"...even read references to blowing up the roster with prospects...and yet wanting to trade a young cornerstone player who is young and under team control for several more seasons. Also, despite the tremendous potential of Rosario and Polanco, and the surprising and steady play of Escobar this year, as well as the seeming emergence of Santana, who replaces Dozier if you trade him? Rosario and Polanco simply aren't ready yet. So we trade a budding star who ranks amongst team and league leaders to do what now? Just add more young unproven as of yet talent?

 

While this thread is about Dozier, Meyer and May have also been brought in to the discussion. Always remember, the minors are for player development. When you hear comments about such things as "consistency", it doesn't mean waiting for a player to develop to a point where they are guaranteed ML ready to perform at a high level daily, or, every 5th day. It's about performing to a certain level of consistency, sometimes the little things that can be magnified at the ML level, so that they have the best chance to grow and succeed. May had achieved that level, I believe, and probably would be up already if not for his calf injury. And I believe he will be up soon. Meyer slipped, no denouncement of his talent or future, but he did slip. And now he's rebounded very well. Logical speculation would see him up after May, whether that be August or September. If there is an innings concern, I have no problem with him seeing relief innings to introduce him to ML ball to build toward next season.

[kab21]

this team lost 96 games with Dozier as the primary 2b. As good as he is, if you can improve to a greater extent in the future by trading him or another player, do it. Can you get significantly worse?

 

This isn't how baseball works. It's a team sport and you could have the best player in the world and still lose 96 games. To build a good team you need a core of really good players (such as Dozier) supported by players that don't suck (Plouffe) while avoiding players that completely suck (Fryer, Florimon, Kubel). If you trade every good player that you have away using your argument then you will never build that core. And you will certainly delay it by a couple of years. My target would be to start building that core now and hope to get the most out of Buxton's and Sano's pre FA years instead of being at the same place we are now for 2-3 of those years.

 

this doesn't mean that Dozier is untouchable but rather that the Twins would have to be blown away by an offer.

[Richie the Rally Goat]

This isn't how baseball works. It's a team sport and you could have the best player in the world and still lose 96 games. To build a good team you need a core of really good players (such as Dozier) supported by players that don't suck (Plouffe) while avoiding players that completely suck (Fryer, Florimon, Kubel). If you trade every good player that you have away using your argument then you will never build that core. And you will certainly delay it by a couple of years. My target would be to start building that core now and hope to get the most out of Buxton's and Sano's pre FA years instead of being at the same place we are now for 2-3 of those years.

 

this doesn't mean that Dozier is untouchable but rather that the Twins would have to be blown away by an offer.

I didn't say they should trade away every good player, just don't over value your best player. Every team needs more than one really good player. If you can turn 1 into 2 and not get significantly worse in the short term, make the trade. Depth is still a major concern, and post season success is further away than 2015 or 2016. Brian Dozier is the best 2B in the system by far, but how much of an impact does he really have? 3.8 WAR in 2013 is significant as an individual contribution, but 4 more losses or 4 more wins makes no impact in the quality of the team.