J2: Come Here, International Free Agents

Let's hope there's some awesome prospects next July since we'll have a huge bonus pool to spend! Maybe that will be the year we go all in!

Vargas is from Puerto Rico and so is not an international free agent.  The Twins international signing and development is suboptimal IMO

Oswaldo Arcia, Wilson Ramos, Yangervis Solarte, Deolis Guerra, Liam Hendriks.

More reasons to question an opinion that the Twins are slouches when it comes to international signing and development of foreign-born talent to the big leagues (Liriano, Morneau, even David Ortiz).

Oswaldo Arcia, Wilson Ramos, Yangervis Solarte, Deolis Guerra, Liam Hendriks.

 

More reasons to question an opinion that the Twins are slouches when it comes to international signing and development of foreign-born talent to the big leagues (Liriano, Morneau, even David Ortiz).

I said the Twins international signing and development is suboptimal and this is your defense.

Did the Twins successfully develop Arcia, Solarte, Guerra, Hendriks, or even Ortiz?

They didn't even sign Guerra, Liriano, or Ortiz.  Or Morneau (as in international free agent).

Between Liriano coming up and Arcia, the Twins turned

out Ramos, Mijares and Hendriks?

Look at the international free agents on the Twins teams that lost 90 games 2011-2014.

2011  Nishi (not a J2 signing), Mijares, and Hendriks

2012  Hendriks

2013  Pinto, Arcia, Hendriks

2014  Pino, Polanco, Arcia, Pinto

The Twins failure to sign and develop international free agents rates up their with failure to draft and develop front line pitching or above average position players

Okay, I can accept that perhaps their rate of success at signing and developing (and yes, they get some credit for successfully developing Liriano, Ramos, Guerra, Hendriks, Solarte, Pinto,, and even Ortiz) international prospects is in line with their success at drafting and developing above-average position players. If that's also suboptimal by your definition, fine.

Are you limiting your observations to 2014? Sano and Kepler and Rosario, and it's still suboptimal? Compared to...?

I've never been one to tout their expertise as superior to most other teams with either domestic or foreign prospects. But I strongly believe that the constantly stated opinion that they are somehow inferior, worse than average at it, is false, and unsupported by the evidence. This holds true in particular when one examines more recent history, say, the past decade, and when one rightfully factors in the main mitigating circumstances, such as draft position. What happened 14 years ago, when Jose Mijares was signed, hardly tells us a thing.

IFA signed and developed and still playing for the same team. Soler, Contereras and Conception are the only three IFAs signed and developed by the Cubs. Diaz and Oh for the Cardinals. None for the Moneyball A's,   Romero and  Colombe for the Rays. The league may be 24% foreign born players but that doesn't mean many stay with the same team. To say the Twins are bad at developing IFA is simply not founded.