Article: Minnesota Twins Should Promote Little-Known Antoan Richardson

[SoCalTwinsfan]

Over at Yahoo! Sports, I published an article that looked at a player that has been under the radar:

 

Richardson is listed at 5-foot-8 and 165 pounds. He has no power and hasn't hit for all that good of an average. And yet, Richardson has a career on-base percentage over .400 in over 800 minor league games.

 

Read the whole article on Minnesota Twins Should Promote Little-Known Antoan Richardson.

 

I'm really interested in what the Twins Daily Community thinks. Is he too old? Is there something in his numbers that shows he probably won't succeed in the majors?

[Pitz]

It's unlikely that a guy his size with very little pop is going to be able to maintain a high OBP in the big leagues without hitting for a high average. Major League pitchers aren't going to give him free passes when there is little chance he's going to be able to do better than a single anyway.

That's not to say that the Twins shouldn't consider giving him a shot, just that I don't expect much from him at the big league level.

[Oldgoat_MN]

Gordon Beckham of the Chicago White Sox has a career OBP of .415 in AAA ball. I thought that when he got to MLB he was going to be an unusually difficult out.

 

His career OBP in MLB is .325. MLB is tougher than AAA.

 

I would have no trouble if they brought Richardson up and sent Hicks down to refine his approach at the plate. I do not, however, think we can expect a windfall of a leadoff hitter in such an event.

[Seth Stohs]

Richardson is Ben Revere, just 3-4 years older. He's had some big league time, primarily as a pinch runner. I don't think the OBP is maintainable in the big leagues. The reason I would call him (or Clete Thomas) up is that it would be best for Aaron Hicks, not because I think that Richardson would be any/much better than Hicks now.

 

But gotta like these stories. He's been in the big leagues. He's been in independent leagues. He's done very well with the Red Wings too.

[Tibs]

I say he deserves a chance with how poorly some other players on the Twins have been performing.

[nicksaviking]

Call him up now, Eddie Gaedel had a career OBP of 1.000. Got to love that tiny strikezone.

[Shane Wahl]

It's worth calling him up so Hicks can get 100 pa in AAA finally.

[stringer bell]

I agree with those saying the Twins should call him up. Besides being a temporary replacement for Hicks in CF, he is a leadoff guy and with Hicks being put at the bottom of the order there has been no one really to fill that void. I suspect Richardson would be Revere with a bit less contact, although he has really shown himself to be very selective this year. If he could maintain a high walk rate, he could have value as a speedy OBP guy.

[diehardtwinsfan]

Problem with calling him up is that someone gets DFAd... I'm not against sending Hicks back down for more seasoning, but with no obvious replacement on the roster, the Twins have boxed themselves in here.

[greengoblinrulz]

Clete Thomas does nothing for anyone & followers know his AAA numbers are a fraud.

Antoans AAA numbers in 2 wks mirror his longtime AA numbers & isn't a longterm solution but is more deserving of the shot

[SoCalTwinsfan]

A .325 OBP would be a huge boost to the Twins' offense since their leadoff hitters have a .240 OBP.

[Otto von Ballpark]

I feel like the Twins are still "committed" in some way to Mastroianni, which is probably silly at this point because he was a fairly marginal guy to begin with (although cheap with potential to be average), and with his injury and surgery, I would not be surprised if he does not return at 100% this season (or maybe ever). Yet the Twins have thus far refused to put another CF on the ML roster, and actually dropped the only other one besides Hicks (Benson) on the 40-man.

 

I'm not saying we should release Mastro, but we probably shouldn't count on him for anything at this point. So holding on to other CFs, maybe even getting one some MLB playing time in a backup role, might be a good thing.

[Otto von Ballpark]

(Also, SoCal, don't know if you'll get in trouble, but I recall that the site admins here didn't want the "Article:" prefix on any thread titles for articles published outside Twins Daily. I myself saw this title in the forum sidebar, and immediately looked up and down the front page for the original article to no avail -- probably one of the situations they are trying to avoid.)

[Mike Sixel]

Call him up, send Hicks down. Now.

 

DFA Hermsen, or Carroll (or trade Carroll). DFA Pelfrey and call up Gibson, that kills two birds with one stone......

 

lots of DFA opportunities....

[fairweather]

I don't think Hicks will ever be able to hit big league pitching from the left side with any consistency and no amount of time in AAA will change that. SOMEONE NEED TO TELL HIM HE'S A RHB!

[John Bonnes]

Boy - 1700+ plate appearances at AA and a .400 OBP and 250K/311BB ratio. That's interesting, not matter how he does it.

[SoCalTwinsfan]

Boy - 1700+ plate appearances at AA and a .400 OBP and 250K/311BB ratio. That's interesting, not matter how he does it.

Yeah, that took me by surprise when I looked up his stats to get more info on him and see if he might be an option for the Twins.

[bear333]

Gordon Beckham of the Chicago White Sox has a career OBP of .415 in AAA ball. I thought that when he got to MLB he was going to be an unusually difficult out.

 

His career OBP in MLB is .325. MLB is tougher than AAA.

 

I would have no trouble if they brought Richardson up and sent Hicks down to refine his approach at the plate. I do not, however, think we can expect a windfall of a leadoff hitter in such an event.

Sending Hicks down is a bad idea. Repeat, bad idea. Really people. The Twins are not hitting well and we only have ONE center fielder, that's right, HICKS. Who is getting better. What did he do last night? Stole a home run, hit a home run and hit a double on a night that Mauer and Morneau did nothing at the plate. And you want to bring up who? Ridiculous.