Twins Minor League Report (8/20): Royce Continues To Roll

I know it's just one game but hopefully this will cool the "The Twins are incompetent because they won't bring up Gonsalves" talk. Gonsalves has a bright future but he's only got a few starts at AAA. His year is next year; the Gees, Melvilles and Sledgers can muddle through this year somehow.

Incorrect.

A "winning" culture starts with Major League team's owner, GM, manager and solid veterans. Fundamentally sound baseball and game preparation is what gives a team belief.

Was a "winning culture" present during the extra-inning Orioles' playoff loss to Toronto last year? Perhaps their farmhands feel more optimistic of being called-up with Showalter, though.

Yeah, I wouldn't call them incompetent over it; I don't think Gonsalves is any great savior either.  But to be fair, he only has "a few starts at AAA" because of other front office decisions.   Not sure if he needed 28 starts at AA.  Promote him after 8 starts at AA this year, and he'd have 10 under his belt at AAA already.  Not that we'd necessarily count on him this last month, but he could have been an option.

I don't think 10 starts instead of 3 really changes the equation that much. Either way he was going to potentially be able to be effective for a couple of starts but likely not in a position to be put permanently in the rotation.

They weren't keeping him in AA for giggles.

Don't you think that most everyone who is in the "promote Gonsalves to MLB" camp now has also been in the "promote Gonsalves to AAA" camp for the last several months too?  At least anyone who is reading this, in the minor league forum section.

 

It's fair to disagree with both, but responding to the former with "he only has a few starts at AAA" doesn't seem like it really addresses the argument.

I won't speak for the previous poster, but I don't think 3 vs. 10 AAA starts is much of a difference.

I also personally thought an argument could be made that he had more things to work on at AA and he might not have been quite ready for AAA at the point people were calling for it. Remains to be seen. As a counter, I have heard chatter from some of the executives that they are looking hard at Gonsalves, so maybe they aren't especially worried about limited AAA starts. I thought it was a virtual lock he would be starting in Chicago today instead of AAA yesterday, but maybe they didn't want to give up the 40 man spot yet and risk an option (if it wasn't worth it to bring him up again in September).

Yeah, I wouldn't call them incompetent over it; I don't think Gonsalves is any great savior either.  But to be fair, he only has "a few starts at AAA" because of other front office decisions.   Not sure if he needed 28 starts at AA.  Promote him after 8 starts at AA this year, and he'd have 10 under his belt at AAA already.  Not that we'd necessarily count on him this last month, but he could have been an option.

I've been hoping he'd make it to AAA the past month or two but not because he'd be available for the Twins this year. I wanted him to get enough time in AAA that it wouldn't be a barrier to him making the 2018 rotation out of spring training.

That said, I trust that minor league promotion is not just about numbers. The Twins likely saw things he needed to work on that were best done at the AA level. Or there was a coach at AA who was clicking with Gonsalves and they wanted to plumb that relationship a little bit more. If he'd stayed til the end of the year, I'd get the angst over how long he was at AA but a few months is within the range where I say "The professionals know more than me".

I do wish they'd be more forthcoming with that stuff in general. It can't be a competitive disadvantage to say "We want to see how he does with pickoff moves before we move him up" or "We want him to work on his circle change with _______." It would stop the angst considerably.

 

It's quite possible they were keeping him in AA for non-critical reasons because they didn't expect to be in contention at this late point in the season.  The same thing that drove their selling at the deadline, last offseason's bullpen plans, etc.  Could have been non-critical refinements, waiting until they could provide Chattanooga with strong reinforcements (i.e. Littell and Thorpe?), sorting through AAA SP options, etc.

 

And while 10 starts vs 3 might not make a huge difference to you, I was responding to a poster who suggested that 3 was too few. And I think if you project a guy as a possible contributor, you should aim for more than 3 by the time you may need him to step in.  Especially for non-elite guys.  Duffey stepped into the rotation after ~12 AAA starts in 2015.  I would guess there would have been more hesitation about making that move if he had only 3 AAA starts at the time (after a solid debut, Duffey's next 3 AAA starts were a little shaky).  Berrios was an option that August too, and he finished 2015 with 12 AAA starts.  I suspect he would have been considered even less with only 3 AAA starts, although ultimately his innings limit and non-40-man status (and maybe Duffey's success) prevailed in that decision anyway.  Hard to tell how a guy is going to respond in just 3 starts.

This is interesting. Looking ahead, Gonsalves looks to get 4-6 more starts in AAA, depending on rotation structuring and playoffs. So that would put him in the 7-9 range for AAA starts. More would obviously be better but if he pitches well (and maybe gets an MLB start down the stretch?) he'd likely be in the mix for 2018. It'll be interesting to see if he still starts in AAA due to service time considerations.

I'd be willing to bet a lot of money that they keep him in AAA. It makes too much sense to keep him down until whenever that magic date is in order to gain another year of control. 

I wouldn't be surprised if they put Gonsalves on the same plan as Berrios. ~6-10 AAA starts and bring him up in May/June.  

I don't even think it would have much, if anything, about service time. He's rightly not going to be plan a entering spring training, but should be positioned to be one for the first couple of pitchers available for a call up.

As a fan of small sample sizes, I am really digging Lewis's .400 batting average at Cedar Rapids. Although he has dropped .400 points in the last week....

First Cedar Rapids bomb today. Still 0 bbs in 9 games tho (with 7 ks).

I think the issue is that there's simply more to lose with Gonsalves. My guess is that they want to be sure he's ready, which we can't really know from the stat line alone. If they rush him and he fails, then there's probably some serious doubt about how effective he can ultimately be. <snip>

Not to hijack this thread, but as a comparison look at how the White Sox have handled Fullmer (whom we pummeled last night). I am all for promotions, but the WS seem to have promoted Fullmer aggressively, with somewhat disastrous results. I know we can point to people who were disasters despite earning the promotion (e.g. Berrios), and still managed to overcome their horrible debuts. At some point, though, you have to wonder if the degree of failure will take a toll on a prospect (even one drafted 1:8).