VIDEO: Keith Law: Twins Pitching Prospects "Not Above The Median"

[Tom Froemming]

The Minnesota Twins rely on their prospects. Luckily, there's a lot of talent in the minor league system right now. Aaron Gleeman recently spoke with Keith Law, both of The Athletic, about the state of the system. There were several topics discussed, but I found Law's comments on Austin Martin, Royce Lewis and the pitching staff as a whole particularly interesting.

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[Doctor Gast]

Keith Law speaks his mind but I believe that mind is bias for AL East Division teams, especially Toronto and against lowly AL Central teams, especially Twins. It's interesting how high he's on Austin Martin (a Toronto by-product) and so low on Royce Lewis (home grown) which he knows very little about except that he doesn't like his swing (I know we haven't seen him for 2 years now because his injury and covid, which would effect his rating but not that much). Too many people put too much importance on his swing. The poor showing that Lewis has shown is based on the organization tinkering on his swing yet he had a MVP performance in the AFL, where they left him alone. Many MLB hitters have that high leg kick and have done quite well. Let him figure it out on his own.

I'm a little frustated with our pitching farm system. I'd hoped to see some one by now step up and perform well on the MLB level. I'm pleased that Dobnak has appeared from nowhere and have some success but we are still waiting on our higher rated prospects. Twins traded away home grown Berrios and Graterol which slims down our home grown MLB ready pitchers. I know that drafting pitchers has not been a high priority with the Twins so why are we surprised when others evaluate our pitching farm system so low?

[chpettit19]

32 minutes ago, Doctor Gast said:

Keith Law speaks his mind but I believe that mind is bias for AL East Division teams, especially Toronto and against lowly AL Central teams, especially Twins. It's interesting how high he's on Austin Martin (a Toronto by-product) and so low on Royce Lewis (home grown) which he knows very little about except that he doesn't like his swing (I know we haven't seen him for 2 years now because his injury and covid, which would effect his rating but not that much). Too many people put too much importance on his swing. The poor showing that Lewis has shown is based on the organization tinkering on his swing yet he had a MVP performance in the AFL, where they left him alone. Many MLB hitters have that high leg kick and have done quite well. Let him figure it out on his own.

I'm a little frustated with our pitching farm system. I'd hoped to see some one by now step up and perform well on the MLB level. I'm pleased that Dobnak has appeared from nowhere and have some success but we are still waiting on our higher rated prospects. Twins traded away home grown Berrios and Graterol which slims down our home grown MLB ready pitchers. I know that drafting pitchers has not been a high priority with the Twins so why are we surprised when others evaluate our pitching farm system so low?

Royce added that leg kick himself, that wasn't a Twins coaching move. Royce has openly stated that he added that on his own. Will be very interesting to see what he looks like when games finally get going again and see if he's toned that kick down.

I'd say Ober stepped up and performed well at the MLB level. But I'm also frustrated that we haven't really even seen any of the prospects make debuts beyond Ober and the newly acquired Ryan. I don't think it's fair to say drafting pitchers hasn't been a high priority with the Twins. I assume that take comes from them going with bats with their top 15 picks, but that doesn't equal it not being a high priority at all.

I think the responses Law gave in the piece Tom is featuring here should be tempered by his comments on the system in his ranking of all the systems:

"Farm systems change each year for two reasons: Teams add/let go of talent in the system, and the players in the system themselves improve or regress. The Twins’ system is the most likely of any team ranked in the bottom half to benefit from that second part because they have so many players who should be on the upswing and be more valuable in a year than they are now. They have a ton of players who need to get healthy and get on the field — highlighted by Royce Lewis — and a number of players who should see progress from working with the Twins’ player development department. But that doesn’t mean I could wishcast this into a top-half system just yet."

That reads to me like he thinks the Twins system has a bunch of guys that have the chance to be very good if they could just get on the field. 

[baul0010]

1 hour ago, Doctor Gast said:

Keith Law speaks his mind but I believe that mind is bias for AL East Division teams, especially Toronto and against lowly AL Central teams, especially Twins. It's interesting how high he's on Austin Martin (a Toronto by-product) and so low on Royce Lewis (home grown) which he knows very little about except that he doesn't like his swing (I know we haven't seen him for 2 years now because his injury and covid, which would effect his rating but not that much). 

 

If I remember correctly, I believe Law also worked for Toronto for a while.

[LastOnePicked]

Yeah, this was rough, but still important for Twins fans to hear. Our prospects are not as highly-touted as we'd like to think, and there are successful organizations whose MLB teams are winning and still running circles around our farm system as well. If we're not going to be a player in free agency, this has got to change.

Law is probably right, though - teams will figure out Ryan's fastball, and it won't take long. They hit him pretty hard already.

Sad that we went from a #8 ranked system a year ago, then traded Cruz and Berrios for prospects, and now we have a #18 ranked system. All while the players who graduated from prospect status didn't exactly set the league on fire. And, of course, the prospects we gave away showed a lot more promise. Yuck. Tough road ahead for our club.

[Doctor Gast]

59 minutes ago, chpettit19 said:

Royce added that leg kick himself, that wasn't a Twins coaching move. Royce has openly stated that he added that on his own. Will be very interesting to see what he looks like when games finally get going again and see if he's toned that kick down.

I'd say Ober stepped up and performed well at the MLB level. But I'm also frustrated that we haven't really even seen any of the prospects make debuts beyond Ober and the newly acquired Ryan. I don't think it's fair to say drafting pitchers hasn't been a high priority with the Twins. I assume that take comes from them going with bats with their top 15 picks, but that doesn't equal it not being a high priority at all.

I think the responses Law gave in the piece Tom is featuring here should be tempered by his comments on the system in his ranking of all the systems:

"Farm systems change each year for two reasons: Teams add/let go of talent in the system, and the players in the system themselves improve or regress. The Twins’ system is the most likely of any team ranked in the bottom half to benefit from that second part because they have so many players who should be on the upswing and be more valuable in a year than they are now. They have a ton of players who need to get healthy and get on the field — highlighted by Royce Lewis — and a number of players who should see progress from working with the Twins’ player development department. But that doesn’t mean I could wishcast this into a top-half system just yet."

That reads to me like he thinks the Twins system has a bunch of guys that have the chance to be very good if they could just get on the field. 

I know Lewis developed that high leg kick on his own but most everyone wants him to ditch it. 

[Dman]

I generally like what Law has to say and I think he generally knows what's, what when it comes to prospects but when it comes to pitchers I don't trust him and analysts in general that much.

Since he is going to nitpick I am going to nitpick some.  I don't have Keith's old prospect lists but in 2018 MLB.com had Tristen McKenzie rated as their Guardians number 2 prospect, Bieber at 8 and Civale at 10.  Bieber was rated as maybe a number 4 pitcher in a rotation, Civale they felt was a bullpen arm.  McKenzie was supposed to be a number 2 or 3 starter.  No one had Bieber in their top 100 not Fangraphs, not mlb.com and most likely not Keith Law and yet he is the one who won the Cy Yong award in 2020.  He is the dominant pitcher of those 3.  Even Civale who was tenth best in the system has done better at least to this point than the highly rated McKenzie. What does this mean? Analysts have a really hard time identifying what impact pitchers will have once they reach the majors.

This is just one extreme example and we have to remember what prospect lists are.  They are not ultimate projection systems, they are based on the potential seen in players and projected out to their highest perceived potential.  Just because they are ranked higher doesn't mean they will reach all the potential ascribed to them.  Just because guys are ranked lower or not at all doesn't mean they cannot become impact players at the MLB level looking at you Luis Arraez who pretty much all analyst's left in the dust.

Keith Law never liked Berrios until very late and IMO doesn't have the greatest pulse on pitching prospects.  So I guess I take what he says with a grain of salt.  Cleveland's Bieber who had good control and was ranked at number 8 turned out OK. Maybe a guy like Josh Winder with good control can do something similar?  When it comes to pitching prospects I am not one to trust an industry prediction because they are just plain wrong too often IMO.

[chpettit19]

17 minutes ago, Doctor Gast said:

I know Lewis developed that high leg kick on his own but most everyone wants him to ditch it. 

I think it's pretty well accepted that he needs to tone it down from what it was in 2019 if he wants a realistic chance of hitting ML pitching. I just read your comment as the Twins having been the ones that encouraged the leg kick. From the sounds of it they were kind of just letting him feel his way through 2019 and learn the lesson of needing to tone the leg kick down on his own. It was probably still too big in the AFL, but there's some solid side by side videos out there of him having been more in control during the AFL. Will be fun to see what it looks like coming out of his rehab. He's had a bunch of time to get it locked in during cage work and such as he gets rolling again over the last few months so I'm excited to see him again when MLB and MLBPA get their s*** figured out.

[4twinsJA]

I think Law has some recency bias since Twins have not developed an ace (?Berrios) in a long time. Only time will give us the answers. This is a huge year for Twins pitching prospects.

[tony&rodney]

Pitchers develop at somewhat unpredictable rates. The Twins have a bundle of prospects getting near their auditions. I referenced Law's opinions in a post about the Twins potential rotation. The Twins have bodies but only Balazovic receives wide acclaim and he is seen as a mid rotation pitcher. Law is generally pretty positive towards the Twins prospects and we could hope to fill the bottom three starting position slots with a prospect (Winder), Ober, and Ryan if all goes perfectly. That leaves two openings, at least. Keith Law is a decent analyst. He actually goes to watch a ton of prospects play and has many discussions with a host of baseball fokls regarding players. He does his research and is hard working to put forth his positions. It is noteworthy to read that virtually every time he writes an article there are a few people who feel that Law has little respect or even knowledge about their team. This has been true for a few years. I'm not concerned about the opinions of Keith Law, but they are informative.

[DocBauer]

5 hours ago, Dman said:

I generally like what Law has to say and I think he generally knows what's, what when it comes to prospects but when it comes to pitchers I don't trust him and analysts in general that much.

Since he is going to nitpick I am going to nitpick some.  I don't have Keith's old prospect lists but in 2018 MLB.com had Tristen McKenzie rated as their Guardians number 2 prospect, Bieber at 8 and Civale at 10.  Bieber was rated as maybe a number 4 pitcher in a rotation, Civale they felt was a bullpen arm.  McKenzie was supposed to be a number 2 or 3 starter.  No one had Bieber in their top 100 not Fangraphs, not mlb.com and most likely not Keith Law and yet he is the one who won the Cy Yong award in 2020.  He is the dominant pitcher of those 3.  Even Civale who was tenth best in the system has done better at least to this point than the highly rated McKenzie. What does this mean? Analysts have a really hard time identifying what impact pitchers will have once they reach the majors.

This is just one extreme example and we have to remember what prospect lists are.  They are not ultimate projection systems, they are based on the potential seen in players and projected out to their highest perceived potential.  Just because they are ranked higher doesn't mean they will reach all the potential ascribed to them.  Just because guys are ranked lower or not at all doesn't mean they cannot become impact players at the MLB level looking at you Luis Arraez who pretty much all analyst's left in the dust.

Keith Law never liked Berrios until very late and IMO doesn't have the greatest pulse on pitching prospects.  So I guess I take what he says with a grain of salt.  Cleveland's Bieber who had good control and was ranked at number 8 turned out OK. Maybe a guy like Josh Winder with good control can do something similar?  When it comes to pitching prospects I am not one to trust an industry prediction because they are just plain wrong too often IMO.

I had to re-post this because a "like" can't display how much I want to "double like" or "love" this post. And it's NOT about Law, and I will comment further, but this post is just spot on with content/opinion. More to follow.

[Doctor Gast]

I just saw the ESPN top 100, and Miranda is the only one on the list (around 87). So it's a little discouraging about our future since that's what some fans want to build our hopes on and forget about our present core.

[DocBauer]

Keith Law, and just about any paid observer/scribe/former FO employee has forgotten more about baseball and prospect evaluation than I will ever know. Period.

And who am I? Just a fairly smart person of 56yo who has been watching baseball most of his life and eating up everything from Baseball Digest to the Sporting News and Baseball America, to just about every baseball website you can imagine since the internet became a real "thing" 20yrs ago. I've seen Gooden and King Felix be the best pitchers ever before burning out. I've seen Clemmons being a STUD from pretty much day one. I've seen Randy Johnson being the best prospect in baseball struggle, be OK, and then suddenly dominate. Ive seen Stieb and Key being OK prospects and pitchers turn in to ACES and dominate when they weren't expected to. Yada, Yada, etc, etc. I've also witnessed countless TOP pitching prospects who never made it. Going back in time a bit, the 90's A's had 4 young pitchers that were supposed to maintain their window, lead by Todd Van Poppel, the second coming of Nolan Ryan. None of that happened. Conversely, ugly as it is to remember, it was just shy of this time the Twins had a collection of pitching talent that was supposed to lead them to a WS. None of them contributed to '87 or '91.

Law would destroy me in a debate, as would others about prospects or the history of. But I could care less based on history..

What I DO KNOW is that projecting SP  is an almost hopeless exercise. History has proven that to be true.. But the more arms you have, the better your chances to find quality pitching. According to the OP, didn't Law put Balazovic in his top 100 before anyone else? Well, he was awesome and then was shut down to protect him. That's not abnormal for any team post 2020, or the injury factor. Strotman was ranked higher in the Ray's system than Ryan before TJ. Where is Law on this? SWR was a top 100-150 prospect almost since drafted. But young for AA and a mediocre season at best, how does he "stink" now? Ober put up video game numbers as a less than high selection but had injury concerns. Suddenly he finds a repeatable delivery that keeps him healthy, AND makes adjustments during his rookie season to get better. But coming in to 2021 he was what, a late 20 or early 30th ranked prospect?

A year ago, did most fans/writers know who Winder and Varland were? 

A lot of things can change in ONE YEAR in regard to prospects.

A year ago, Miranda was a high draft prospect with a decent bat that could be very good. Now he's a top prospect in all of baseball.

Keith Law says the Twins pitching prospects are not above the medium? Despite the fact he's ranked Twins prospects high previously? Sucks, he could be right. But, come on, there's just too much stuff and too many good arms here. And history has shown you really don't know what the hell you have until they actually pitch.

Numbers and talent say we have a couple quality arms that will be part of our 2022-2023 and beyond. History states a couple will be very good, a couple solid, a couple will find a role in the BP. But nobody will surpass the medium? It may take time, but I call BS. At least a couple will match Berrios or better. Just too many arms and too much arm talent .

[TwinsDr2021]

8 hours ago, DocBauer said:

Keith Law, and just about any paid observer/scribe/former FO employee has forgotten more about baseball and prospect evaluation than I will ever know. Period.

I am not defending Law, way back when he was free on ESPN I read all of his stuff. I think it was in one chat where he said something a long the lines of younger pitchers are hard to project, so you take size, arm motion and stuff and project what they could be, thus why you see pitchers like Kohl Stewart so high on lists, but the older they get the closer they are to what they will be than would they could be. And besides SWR none of the Twins prospects are all that young. Shane Bieber was getting his feet wet with 20 games as a 23 year old, got better at 24, awesome at 25. 

I remember a debate about the NY Mets maybe assembling one of the best pitching staffs in history. Thor, Harvey, De Grom, Martz (and maybe wheeler, don't remember all of them) around 2014 and it was pointed out most them were already in their mid 20's and weren't likely to get much better than they already were and shouldn't be mentioned in conversation, because they hadn't really accomplished anything at that point, 7 years later to this point besides De Grom and Wheeler (in Philly) as a group they didn't get any better.

I don't really think the Twins need their top prospects to get better (except SWR) than they are they just need to continue what they have been doing in the minors in the big leagues. So we can hope one of them magically becomes amazing in the majors or  just be happy that 5 or 6 of them will be solid and maybe a bit better for a few years in the majors.

 

[Unwinder]

Even if he's right about everything, "sub-median" is still better than "dire," and is therefore an improvement for the Twins. (I don't think he's right, I think he's a bit too pessimistic while we here tend to be a bit too optimistic)

[DocBauer]

3 hours ago, TwinsDr2021 said:

I am not defending Law, way back when he was free on ESPN I read all of his stuff. I think it was in one chat where he said something a long the lines of younger pitchers are hard to project, so you take size, arm motion and stuff and project what they could be, thus why you see pitchers like Kohl Stewart so high on lists, but the older they get the closer they are to what they will be than would they could be. And besides SWR none of the Twins prospects are all that young. Shane Bieber was getting his feet wet with 20 games as a 23 year old, got better at 24, awesome at 25. 

I remember a debate about the NY Mets maybe assembling one of the best pitching staffs in history. Thor, Harvey, De Grom, Martz (and maybe wheeler, don't remember all of them) around 2014 and it was pointed out most them were already in their mid 20's and weren't likely to get much better than they already were and shouldn't be mentioned in conversation, because they hadn't really accomplished anything at that point, 7 years later to this point besides De Grom and Wheeler (in Philly) as a group they didn't get any better.

I don't really think the Twins need their top prospects to get better (except SWR) than they are they just need to continue what they have been doing in the minors in the big leagues. So we can hope one of them magically becomes amazing in the majors or  just be happy that 5 or 6 of them will be solid and maybe a bit better for a few years in the majors.

 

Great post. I think the age debate has some merit. It could also be debated/shown how many quality pitchers matured late and went on to great careers, as well as hiw many debuted early and flamed out. 

What I think we have to remember is all of these kids are a year younger "prospect wise" than their physical ages. 

[GeorgiaBaller]

The Twins going from a # 8 to a # 16 rated farm system has more to do with their top prospects not panning out to be on the field major leaguers.  You really saw 2 yrs worth of evaluation take place because of the Covid year not having minor league schedules---evaluation on these "great prospects" that don't pan out after a missed year and then a year when the major league club had every reason in the world to pull forward any bright spots.