2020 Minnesota Twins Prospect Handbook Available NOW!

With the completion and availability of the 2020 Twins Prospect Handbook, I have now written and self-published a dozen Twins Prospect Handbooks. I think back to the first one, which I think I wrote up and published within about two or three weeks, and laugh. Since then, I truly believe that the handbooks have continued to get better and much more detailed, and that’s thanks to a lot of people.

As much as I know that I enjoy researching and learning about the players, it is a ton of work. But I enjoy having the conversations with a variety of people inside and outside of the organization. I enjoy watching video. I enjoy reading other opinions. I enjoy going to Ft. Myers each spring and spending time watching minor league practice and games. I also enjoy getting down to Cedar Rapids for some games.

However, ultimately, I also truly believe in that paragraph that I wrote in that 2008 prospect handbook and have included in every single Twins Prospect Handbook since then, including this year’s.

It’s about the players. They deserve the recognition. They work hard. Sometimes that means a big league career, and sometimes it means peaking in A-ball.

Tom Froemming wrote an article for this year’s Prospect Handbook about why it’s important to get to know more than just a team’s Top or Top 20, or even Top 40, prospects. A quick glimpse back at the Twins 2019 season reminds us that Luis Arraez asn’t a Top 10 Twins prospect just 12 months ago. Cody Stashak was recognized for his transition to the bullpen in 2018, he he didn’t rank as a Top 50 prospect. Randy Dobnak wasn’t a Top 50 prospect. Geez, how many Twins Top 100 prospect rankings would he have made one year ago.

Which prospects will surprise and advance in 2020? Which top prospects will?

The Twins system is currently really strong. There are four to six Twins prospects that are Top 100 guys nationally. There are a few others that are probably close to that level. And there is a ton of depth of players that have the ability to, if opportunity arises, be big league players. That makes the writing and researching and all the time well worth it!

So, here is a quick look at what you will find if you order a copy of the 2020 Minnesota Twins Prospect Handbook (which will again be available in paperback and as a PDF).

THE COVER

Finn Pearson, who has volunteered to do a lot of really good graphic work for Twins Daily the last couple of years, did a very nice job on the cover again this year. (He did last year’s too.) We talked about it and decided that baby blue was the way to go after the Twins announced they were bringing back those ‘80s uniforms in 2020. And, well, Pensacola sure had a lot of high-quality pitching prospects in 2019, didn’t they? Here are three of them; Jhoan Duran, Jordan Balazovic and Brusdar Graterol.

THE AUTHORS

Seth Stohs - As mentioned above, this is my 12th annual Twins Prospect Handbook. Hard to believe. I wrote the Twins Daily Minor League Award winner articles, and a few other articles.

Tom Froemming - This is Tom’s third Prospect Handbook. He wrote an article about how Twins fans need to look beyond the top 20 Twins prospects. We saw in 2019 that several players who did not come into the season as top prospects or even potential call-ups not only got called up, but contributed to the AL Central championship run.

CONTRIBUTING WRITERS

RT Rybak - The former mayor of Minneapolis contributed a great poem for the Twins Daily Offseason Handbook, and he was kind enough to also contribute a fantastic poem to the 2020 Minnesota Twins Prospect Handbook too. It’s titled, “All who Wander Javier,” and I know you’ll really enjoy it. .

Steve Buhr - Steve wrote a fantastic article discussing the controversy going on between MLB and Minor League Baseball. He tries to see both sides of the story, and tries to answer what it might all mean.

Ted Schwerzler - As he has done in recent years, Ted contributed an article in which he predicts which Twins prospects will make their debuts with the Twins in 2020 and when.

Nash Walker - He has been contributing articles at Twins Daily recently, and he wrote an article on Jhoan Duran for the handbook.

THE PROFILES

We like to call the prospect profiles the meat and potatoes of the Prospect Handbook. There are about 170 profiles of Twins minor leaguers in the book.

For those that have purchased Prospect Handbooks in the past, you have an idea of what the profiles look like and the information in each. For those of you who have not purchased previous Prospect Handbooks, well, you can buy previous Prospect Handbooks here. Ha! However, we wanted to include a profile here just to give you an idea of what you are getting.

Here is a quick snip of a player profile. The header information includes height, weight, how they were acquired and their 2019 statistics. The 2019 Recaps were written by Tom Froemming and they, well, recap the player’s 2019 season. I (Seth) wrote up the Background and the Scouting Report sections. The Background covers their amateur days and previous seasons. The Scouting Report provides, well, a scouting report on the player. We also included a Forecast for ‘20 in which we try to give a good idea of where each player could spend the 2020 season.

We have pictures of a lot of the players in the bios. I wish we had all, but we definitely want to thank all the photographers that were willing to let us use their photos. We used a lot of my photos, but I also want to thank Steve Buhr for his great photos from Cedar Rapids, Ft. Myers and the GCL Twins. The Elizabethton Twins photos came from Nicholas Badders or Kassi Butcher.

So there you have it. The 2020 Minnesota Twins Prospect Handbook is coming very soon. Keep checking back to Twins Daily and we will let you know when it is available and how you can order it.

It’s something that Tom and I are really proud of. It just keeps getting bigger and better, and we hope that you will enjoy it too!