puckstopper1

Hey Emilio - when does the bus to Wichita leave??

Awesome to see that Pagan is already in mid-season form!

IMO Kirby Puckett would fall into that category.

If Gordon or Gallo see much time in CF, then the Twins have issues. Taylor was brought in to back-up Buxton and hopefully his appearances in CF will be somewhat limited as well.

I saw the box score and say that a Twins pitcher named "Stewart" got knocked around and I had a flashback to mega draft bust Kohl Stewart. Ruined months of therapy...

As long as it is not Cave or Garlick DHing, I'm fine with a rotation especially since there is not a prototypical DH on the roster.

Sabato is Sano 2.0 (2020-2022 version) at best. Unfortunately the path he is on will have leave him as a first round bust.

As I mentioned in Cody's injury article earlier this week, Buxton is the most critical member of this team that needs to stay healthy. As shown above, if he is able to accomplish that, he can be a top 5 WAR player given his offensive and defensive abilities. A healthy Buxton gives the Twins a real shop at the Central.

While the others are important to have healthy and contributing, to me is begins and ends with Buxton. What a healthy Buxton brings to this team in terms of offense and defense is enormous. He could be a top 5 WAR player IF he can stay healthy.

JM: Good takes. I appreciate them. My point about the small market is that it is one of the things that is working against Mauer. Should it be? Absolutely not. But given that he did play in a small market, he had less national exposure. When he did have that national exposure (in the playoffs) they Twins had little success. These facts plus that facts that the Twin Cities media was regularly savaging him will not help his cause. Don't get me wrong - Mauer was the total package in his prime (sans a bit of power maybe). But the items above certainly will play against him.

As a catcher he was phenomenal and would / should be strongly considered for the Hall if he had stayed there. But he did not. He also did not play long enough, and he played for a small market team AND did not have any post season success. Sorry - but his is not a Hall of Fame candidate IMO.

Mike - I feel there are certainly players on the Twins roster last season who could be doing more on the base paths including Kepler, Gordon, Correa, Cave etc. It is a combination of both not having the runners AND the coaching philosophy. The Twins rankings in MLB steals per game the past 3 seasons has been: 2020 - Tied for Last; 2021 - 25th; 2022 - Last The point is expecting Martin to be a significant base stealer on the MLB roster is not likely to happen while Rocco is the manager. Having speed can certainly help him defensively.

Which unfortunately is a moot point with the current Twins manager.

It was his right wrist so his catching-hand wrist. This is good from a catching/throwing perspective but worse from a hitting perspective.

Excellent analysis @Harrison Smith. Thanks for pulling this together. What are your expectations for Maeda given his long layoff due to injury?