biggentleben

One of the better ones out there. My brother is a salesman and could tell you all the stuff the company is doing around the world to grow their market share. In most countries around the world, if you ask a rural child to draw a tractor and then to "color it", they will choose green, and that's akin to Coke or McDonalds in world reach, even if a lot of people never see the brand in use.

Except that you had the rookie of the year, Chuck Knoblauch, Mike Pagliarulo, Scott Leius, a guy who finished with votes for MVP, Chili Davis, and basically an entire new setup crew - Mark Guthrie, Carl Willis, and Steve Bedrosian. The 1991 team was a big makeover from that 1990 team. Don't kid yourself.

Part of what can happen when you release the list this early, sadly, and especially when you go this deep.

Thing is that he asked not to be inducted if he wasn't by the time he passed. Many feel his nomination now is disrespectful to his wishes.

...and he didn't look out of place, either. That part impressed me quite a bit.

There were also a few that touched triple digits...

That guy is Graterol. Well, and Lewis. Lewis is considered by many a guy who could play in the majors in 2019, which is remarkable for a high school talent. The biggest questions I got from other teams' guys who saw him in GCL or Cedar Rapids was whether he stuck at short simply because the nuance of the pro game at the position may not have time to develop before his bat is ready for the majors.

Davis is fun to watch play the game. He's a guy who you can tell understands how lucky he is to be playing the game now after losing a season and having that chance possibly taken away from him (his injury to his shoulder was pretty gruesome). Hard not to cheer for a guy like that.

That once was true. That has significantly changed in the last decade or so, to the point where teams are intentionally developing guys in the bullpen and choosing not to develop them as starters. Certainly, the decision to move them to the bullpen is happening sooner now than it ever was before with guys who have the chance to be legit elite relievers. There's good reason to get behind certain guys, but there's also a lot of "feel" on relievers. A guy that Seth watches throw 3 pitches in the bullpen and top out at 92 from the left side could look like a LOOGY at best sort of guy, but I watch him and see something in his slider that makes me think he could have a shot at working against both sides - and either one of us could be right. Like Seth, I often discount guys in the bullpen a tick or two because they're in the bullpen, but you cannot deny a guy who has shown elite stuff and health up to the upper minors. That's when those guys start ranking in top 15-20 range, even as a reliever.

I was able to go out to 100 a few weeks ago without a lot of trouble. The biggest issue was who to leave off, especially among relievers, as the Twins do have a significant amount of guys who have a legit chance of a major league career of some variety in the bullpen, and that's of value for sure. Already hearing buzz from guys of the Twins having a top 10 system, and the more talk that there is about the system, the more people seem to really like the depth.

Yep, and he's been pitching fairly major spots along the way. His broken arm was the most brutal part of it. He came back from TJS and in an early-season game had a Dave Dravecky moment that simply made your stomach turn over - that's why they were granted longer rehab time for him in the minor leagues as well. He'll be a back end guy for them in 2018. Point being that the Braves picked him knowing he was headed to TJS and have held on through all this other stuff. Burdi very well could go.

Braves still have a Rule 5 guy who is arbitration eligible this year. He'll have to be on the team through May next year to finally fulfill his Rule 5 from 2014.

Not making excuses of course, but still....today's weather was absolutely nuts.

In all seriousness, the weather had a lot to do with that. The wind was ridiculous and unpredictable, which made throwing for both sides difficult. Rhoda had some nice throws also get dropped. I will say that I don't care if he's 6'10" or not, throw the damned flag for DPI on guys when they're draped on Wozniak. Both tight ends had multiple DPI calls blatantly missed today to the point where my wife and foster daughter hollered at the TV.

My wife and I got into "This Is Us" finally recently, watching the first season. Why can't network TV do this more often?

Here's the article....feel free to rant! https://puckettspond.com/2017/09/08/minnesota-twins-have-two-examples-of-baseball-scouting-dichotomy/

No, I wasn't ripping on your comment at all...just piggybacking on your thoughts that access can lead to better overall content. It was another thing that bugged me in the "rant" that was published by Souhan in his follow-up. Access comes in lots of forms, not just the clubhouse.

One of the things that Souhan hasn't yet figured out is that "access" doesn't have to come from the clubhouse anymore. Players are much more willing to talk with someone they know through social media or in the community and give their real opinion. I've got hundreds of opinions on players from front office people and scouts in the game right now that I cannot use a quote on, but they're more than willing to talk with someone who they know will use that information responsibly. Being in the locker room or clubhouse is not the only way to get access to the game and access to the information needed to accurately report on the game. It's just one way.

I'm putting up a bit that I hope will answer some of what I've mentioned a number of times, but the weight number itself, on an ideal baseball body, isn't the exact issue, especially if doing the right kind of lifting and plyometric/flexibility/agility work to go along with it. I had a fun talk with someone about this piece, so I'll link it back here once I have it up...

Rosario has been definitely struggling. Hard to watch level of struggle, no less.

Seth, sometimes I wonder if you guys are either in my head or reading my Slack channel as I toss out story ideas to my crew! Great piece! It'd be even better to see a few more of those arms up, like a Jake Reed or Randy Rosario or Michael Tonkin to add length to the team, none of which would even require a 40-man move.

That's where the biggest issue that I had with the first article was. There are thousands of athletes we can research now who have played for decades in much more violent sports at higher weights than Sano. So is it just the weight number? If so, is that saying something about the ignorance of the Twins staff seeing only the scale and not anything else? Or has Sano slipped on his workout regime? He came to spring with plenty of words published about how hard he'd worked over the offseason to get his body into the type of physical shape that he'd need to in order to handle third base, multiple articles specifically mentioning his work in flexibility and plyometrics along with his strength training that was hoped to help his agility at the hot corner. What's changed with his in season program? The biggest issue I had was that when I started researching this online, I found all kinds of articles with plenty of quotes from Sano about his weight and his size and his need to be in top condition to handle playing third. If he's willing to be quotable on this topic, why on earth was he not part of this article?

I mentioned this in previous discussion, but in watching the rare video I could find when doing a massive Twitter and social media search since last September, Sano was absolutely a newbie to power lifting. Within the first year of power lifting, it is not surprising to have someone have physical reactions of 15-30 pound gains in a 3-6 month span due to their first experience doing the new lifting with a different stress, like going to school, moving to a new community, or, quite possibly in Sano's case, moving to in-season programming rather than off-season. Of course, I'm not assuming 100% of the weight is "good", but I took multiple games from spring and tried to get a screen shot of each spring training, a game in May, and a game in August. There wasn't notable difference in his waist. There was, however, notable difference in his chest and thighs.

So this is something that a potential writer is really interested in doing for Puckett's Pond - scouring the internet for a post multiple times per week that would highlight the best original Twins content around the internet. He's given me permission that if he is unable to pursue PP (he got a brand new job just after signing on to contribute, so he's figuring out what sort of time his job allows him before committing going forward, and I'll for sure respect that!), I could find a writer to pursue that idea, if even for one post per week. I think there are plenty in the same boat as you, who would love to have one post with a set of links to the best stuff out there to help focus your time if you do venture off TD!

Thanks a ton for the kind words, Tom! I've got a small group of writers that are eager to learn right now, but getting some writers will make that site really take off. I've put up 140 articles my first two months with PP, and with a growing family and starting a new full-time gig, even if it is a flexible schedule gig, that's not exactly the way to grow the site. That said, there is a top 100 prospects list planned for this winter, some very fun interviews set up for the offseason with Twins fans in national roles in baseball or sports, and once the season is over, I can get into some video scouting, which is always fun for me personally! I love catching articles here, and I really will say that I don't have great places to add, but what I have found is that outside of Twins Reddit, the Twins blogging community is incredibly open, helpful, and willing to help prop up a fellow writer putting out a good article. I will say that I've already had to have a discussion with my director with FanSided due to retweeting Twins Daily articles, Brandon's articles, and other pieces, and I was encouraged to stay "on brand". I took a screenshot of an article of PP that was retweeted by Twinkie Town, two TD writers, and LENIII to show him that I intended to participate in the Twins community the way that the Twins community participated in good content. I haven't had another issue since! While I'm not dismissing anyone else on the TD team, I truly hope the TD readers realize how blessed they are with the minor league and draft coverage they have on this site. Best part is that the guys are open with their info and love talking the prospects. That's not the way it is across blogs for many teams around the game, so it's a pretty special thing in the Twins community. BTW, I would never, ever deny anyone the opportunity to blog here, but anyone wanting a spot to write consistently can feel free to drop me a PM as I've always got spots, and I don't have plans on going anywhere anytime soon!!