ShouldaCouldaWoulda

Seriously, has there been any official talk from the FO or Molitor on what is the immediate plan with Meyer and their explanation for not using him? This seems extremely weird in their handling of of their call-ups. I wasn't too happy about Keppler sitting on the bench and getting his first start vs a lefty...seemed like the worst plan to me. But, Meyer's situation just seems like they are TRYING to screw him up again. Of course, he will only get one shot up here too I bet. So, if they sit him forever and he then is rusty and jittery on his first opportunity...maybe give the guy the benefit of the doubt and take some ownership in how he was handled? I thought for sure they would send Berrios back down after last nights small sample that included bad weather and a delayed start.

The value of a good bullpen is directly correlated with how good the rest of the team is (rotation, lineup, defense.) That Yankee bullpen is awesome, but he team still isn't winning because the staff has been bad. Good bullpen can't be 1st priority. It can be second after bats or rotation, but putting it first is nonsensical. A team needs to be decent to good for the bullpen to really really important, otherwise, teams should be looking to fix their rotations and lineups first.

I just see no reason to mess with what Meyer was doing as a starter. You either bring him up to start or leave him in AAA to start and see if he can keep it up. The only way they should be moving him to the bullpen is if he starts to struggle as a starter again....BUT, you don't mess with a good thing when starters are hard to find.

Probably like the idea of grooming for late-innings pressure innings by keeping him in the closer role in AA too.

Expletive yeah!

Not true. He pitched a game in Rochester last year.

IMO, who cares about that. He will be damaged goods due to injuries or on the decline at that point. Bring electric arms up as soon as they're ready, as they are a fragile commodity that do not simply have improvements over year after year. Good young pitchers decline all the time while they are still young.

See Jorge had another dominant start. My question is what the heck is it about the FSL? Seriously, there is like no offense anywhere. Sure, I am very excited by the good numbers from our starting staff, but it seems every starter we pitches against us has an era in the 1's or low 2's. I don't get it. It seems like an era of 3.00 in that league would be like a 5.00 era in other leagues. I am serious. I can't even take the numbers serious for the pitchers. So yes, I am glad our Fort Myers pitchers are doing great, but I will withhold any value to it until they prove they can pitch this way in AA.

I think in an ideal situation would be for Meyer to continue to pitch very well as SP, and replace the weakest link in the MLB rotation sometime after his super-2 date, then Duffey to replace the next weakest link in the mlb rotation or BP, then for Berrios to come up after super-2 lapses and pitch mostly out of bp to limit innings, but to stretch back out and start the last month of the season. This would all be due to factoring in age, clocks, history, need, injuries/protection, and future upside to our club. I am sure it will go nothing like this though, and of course this all would be based off Meyer pithing the way he currently is, with Berrios and Duffey pitching how they did last year. Odds are one or two fall off or get hurt. That is just the reality of pitching these days.

If it's a spot in the pen that opens up I think Meyer takes it. If a spot in the rotation opens up I think it is between Duffey and Meyer, depending at what point it is in the season. I think the Twins will be hesitant to have Meyer pitch in the rotation at the the big leagues due to wanting him to have sustained rotation success at AAA for both confidence and refinement. With continued success a month or two in, I think the nod then goes to Meyer due to more upside. I think the Twins would love to keep Berrios down as long as they can.

Meyer has another great outing today. 7 innings and 7 k's, 2 bb's, 5 hits, and 2 er, 98 pitches. WHIP is stil under 1 and era pretty much right at 1. Getting a lot of ground all outs too. He has to be the next man up at this point I would think? I wonder if this success has the FO wanting to continue in the rotation or if the plan is to move him back to the bp when they call him up? There is bound to be a SP go down with an injury at some point soon, but Fien can't stick around too much longer either. Who gets the first, second, and third call between Meyer, Duffey, and Berrios...IF...they all continue to show good to moderate success if a spot opens up? I will say Twins go Duffey, Meyer, Berrios for some gut feeling.

Yeah, repeating was the right choice. He did not have a good year there compared to his peers in the league. He also needs to build confidence. This seems like one of those cases the Twins are doing the right thing by being conservative with a pitcher.

Exactly! Although it is very encouraging that Stewart seems to have improved quite a bit from his performances of the past two years, his stats are kind of what good prospects "should" be having in the FSL. League stats are not equal. Stewart ranks 14th amongst qualified pitchers in FIP thus far in the FSL, and almost all those pitchers are his age or within a year or two of him. So again, very encouraging sign so far, but he is kind of just doing what someone with his prospect status should do in that league. We must compare minor leaguers against their respective leagues only to get a true read on how they are performing. In the FSL Stewart is doing 'pretty' dang good and we should be happy, but it would be unwise to put too much stock into his number by themselves. Just being a realist, but am totally puling for him to keep this up and stay healthy. I have never been big on him as a prospect, but still think he could be a decent #4 or #5 MLB starter. That might sound like an insult, but many pitching prospects never even approach that, so still rooting for him.

This is just an odd team and was last year. Really tough to predict what they will do because they are so streaky. As a homer, you can look and down the lineup and staff and say, "I like that guy and he is good," but when you take each individual position and compare him to the rest of the division or league you see we are very average or below average at almost every position. We like Plouffe, but when you look at the rest of the league you find that there is not too teams that don't have better and younger 3B's than him. Good player, but would take 2/3's the leagues 3B over him. He will probably end up with similar stats as last year, but has been unlucky so far. Escobar is hitting well, but literally half of his BABIP drop for hits thus far and has not walked but a few times! Some regression coming there, but at least he is getting lucky and getting on base right now. Again, another position where we homers like this guy, but would certainly choose half the starting SS's from others teams over him. At least not below average here thought. Just not something to be very excited and proud of. Dozier we treat like he is some super star as homers, but again way overrated once you look at what else is out there. Yes, he is good, but not as good as we perceive him to be. Think he has another good year, but not as good, and then declines steadily. He has lived off of his pull power and 'just barely' line drive homers. Doesn't take much for the bat to slow down and those become outs. He is essentially terrible if not for the power. But, he is probably closer to the middle of the pack for 2B this year than the top, and was closer to just inside the top ten the way it was. Great player, but not as your top player. Mauer, is off to a hot start. Is striking out less, walking more, and making contact. Probably not going to keep up a .400 BABIP, but might be a good player this year. However, when you compare him to the rest of the leagues 1b, he would likely be near the bottom of starters by almost all standards. Like the start though and hope he can spark this team this year. Just not a plus at the position. Suzuki is just not that good at baseball. Not much power, doesn't get on base to well, and is not that great of a defensive catcher. He just has a nice personality, so there is that. Probably bottom 5 catcher in the league and will likely remain that. Our OF is young and is what I think most of us were hanging our hopes on. Well, so far that has been a disaster. There is youth and talent there, but also all 3 guys are and always have been extremely flawed too. I never thought Rosario was that great, nor did I think he could keep up his luck. He makes hard contact, but strikes out way too much, does not get on base, and his power is not even close to where it needs to be to make up for those flaws. His defense it nice, but as a hitter he is near the bottom when looking at other teams starters. Homers love him because he is young and flashy, but way too many flaws to be trusted or thought of as good. Buxton, is a stud in CF, but an AL pitcher at that plate. He has shown me nothing that says he will be make enough contact to be a good hitter. His defense makes him a good player, but still would say a the moment he is a bottom half CF with at least the chance of being one of the better ones. Just not right now. Sano is not and OF. Period. There is not much chance he will be as good as he was last year, but he could be close to that and still be a monster. The K's will likely always be there, but at least he can still get on base and the power is real. He might have stretches where he looks more like Chris Carter, but will also have stretches where he looks like Miggy. Our one true plus player. DH? Park is struggling, and many thought this could happen. Way to early to know what he really is and can be. But, right now he is negative player that hurts more than he helps the team. Our starting staff has performed better than in the past, but that is not really hard to do. Their ERA is top 1/3, but their metrics say more bottom 1/3 and have been getting lucky to this point. So, at least they are doing that, but nothing to be excited about. Our staff when compared to others is bad. Compare our #1 to others, our #2 to others, and so on and you almost always pick the other teams starter. So, we might like some of our guys, but in comparison they are not that great. At least we have a stud prospect that should help out at some point. This is not a good rotation, but it certainly is and will be much better than in the past. Our bullpen has underperformed their metrics and have gotten pretty unlucky so far. They are not this bad. But, they are not that great either. Perkins is probably a bottom half or third closer and falling. He is more like a decent setup guy. Jepson is not that bad, but he is no stud either. He is an average late innings guy, but more suited to be a really good 7th inning guy. May still is our best guy in the pen, but is not consistent enough yet. Even as a closer, he would probably be average at best when you compare him to the rest of the leagues guys though. He has the potential to be really really good, but has not been used very well at all to this point. Fien, is terrible and I have no idea why the FO thinks guys with low velocity and bad stuff can somehow just find a way to succeed. It doesn't work. The bullpen is not that good, but really isn't this bad either. I would say middle of the league BP. Not my biggest worry, but Perkins needs to get pulled fast if he continues to falter. I think we could be really good, if our minor league guys come up and help out. So, there you are. If you look at this team piece by piece and compare it to other teams guys you find that we really aren't a great team. Many people predicted us to be pretty bad based on these observations. Now, there was and is enough potential on this team to get streaky and find a way, but not likely. We need the young guys to live up to their potential and our veterans to not regress greatly for this team to be .500. The staff needs to keep it up and be infused by our minor league. This team is still an enigma and could end up getting on fire if everyone clicks, but it is just as likely, if not more, that this team finishes bottom 3 in the AL. Same goes for our staff and bullpen.

Assuming that Mauer is just going to stay as healthy as he was last year is also something that should obviously not be expected. I would speculate he could spend quite a bit of time on the DL the next few seasons, which could open up some auditions for some guys to prove themselves.

I was disappointed in the way the Twins have not optimized platoons in the past and last year. I think losing Hicks really takes away some great options for them. Ideally, I would have liked to see Rosario/Hicks create a platoon with the other serving as a late inning defensive replacement or bat late in games. Arcia could serve as the 5th OF'r, and platoon with Buxton/Sano/Park/Hicks to get plenty of at bats with our other OF's being able to slide around for him pretty easily. This would give the Twins time to let Kepler's clock to pass and make him prove last year wasn't an aberration. If this arrangement is working out great, you can afford to keep Kepler down longer, trade one of the pieces (like Hicks or Arcia), or get a bigger piece using Kepler (only if that OF was working out great.) I also think that Plouffe should be platooned more often, as he is not very good vs RHP, but there are less options there. The one option that would have and does make sense, is having Sano play some or a lot 3B and sitting Plouffe, and sliding in Arcia to the OF, or Kepler when he's ready. There are a lot of ways to platoon better, but not having Hicks has taken away a great option we could have used to optimize our lineup, defense, and bench. We still have options, but I highly doubt we will take advantage of them. Hopefully no one flounders enough vs same side pitchers for this to become an issue, but I see Rosario and Plouffe to continue to struggle, and maybe more.

Any word on the early velocity readings from any of these guys? Watched the game last night and noticed it was shown on the scoreboard, but it was not on TV. I know things can change, but sometimes early readings have a guy throwing much higher or lower than before, which can give us something to go off of. Part of the problem of assuming guys will be as good or bad as the year before, or yeas before is that they assume they can recapture once accomplished stats with diminished stuff and velocity. If Hughes is going to get back to how he pitched 2 years ago...it is never going to happen with his velocity from last year.

I have not read anywhere on the concerns of him vs right-handed hitters. He sported a 4.97 ERA and more worrisome a 1.82 WHIP vs them vs Right-handers in 12.2 innings of A+ ball. He held a decent K%, but that is not a promising stat for someone we are hoping to be a starter. Yes, it was only 12.2 innings, but they were not good ones by any means. Now, I am really really hoping that he was being forced to use a certain new pitch and was not allowed to use his best pitch or something, but I have not read anything on that.

That is my point...it is not a "thing"because of throwing out runners at 2B and 3B, which we are learning play very little of importance anyway......and could likely be made up for by the much smoother receiving of the pitch, allowing for a quicker throw. Old paradigms. Also, factoring into the lack of lefty catchers is that any lefty with a good arm is likely on the mound. Teams should be out looking for a good catcher that is a lefty, or some young kids should be looking to pioneer in this. Many things in baseball are not things, until they are. The past ten years has seen many shifts in team makeup and how the game is played compared to in the past.

KS is likely never going to be a good hitter for a season again. He might have something better than last year, but not likely anything that a fanbase should be excited about. My personal opinion and observations is that he just is not very good "overall" defensively. I think KS gets extra props and perceived bonus points for being a great guy and being tough. This gives him some sort of perceived positive of being a leader and handler of the staff. However, I really don't think those traits make him a good catcher or game caller. He is just liked is all. I "like" him too, just not offensively or defensively. Defensively, I really do not see him as a good catcher in any area. Everyone is aware of him being a really bad thrower and framer. The former being less important, and the later being much more important. However, the one area that I have noticed KS as a liability through watching games very intricately last season, is that makes odd pitch sequencing decisions and calls for terrible placement locations on the regular. I can't remember how many times huge rallies or big hits came from a pitch being exactly where or near he set up for it. I repeatedly would say to myself WTF is he calling for that pitch for right now and why would he ask for it in that location?! Of course, that is not ALL the time and of course guys would miss spots too. But, overall his calling left me scratching my head and often it had major consequences. *Sidenote: In all the catcher framing articles I have read over the past few years on Fangraphs and Baseball Prospectus I have noticed and watched several gif breakdowns in them. They never made this point, but I noticed that catchers that are the opposite handedness as the pitcher seem to receive and frame the ball much better than same-handed battery mates. Particularly, this seemed even more so the case with sliders and curveballs, which of course are most pitchers "outpitch." If you cannot get a hitter to swing and miss on that outpitch, at least there is a chance you might get a called strike on the edges, right. You would think these 2 strike breaking balls would factor in several strike 3 calls or non calls, which have the biggest implications in games. ***Aesthetically, a pitch being framed from a opposite handed battery mate is much much smoother. Especially so when the catcher is stabbing at and stopping a breaking ball to the outside of the pitchers glove side. In stopping those breaking pitches, the ball is coming toward and into his glove, and not away as it would for an opposite handed glove mate. This makes for a very smooth and easy catching of the ball, with very little movement. The catcher also does not need to reach across his body to extend his arm or turn his torso to stop breaking balls at the edge, nor does the ball pull his glove with momentum. All of that lack of extra movement and effort has to make the pitch "look" better to the ump than the same pitch that might have a same sided catcher extending his arm, or turning his torso, having the glove pulled by momentum or having to pull the ball back in order to frame it. Maybe this is why the Dodgers, White Sox, and Pirates are going so LH heavy this year. Anything out there on this? If you watch some of these videos in slow motion, it really is easy and drastic in the difference in movement by the catchers in receiving and framing by opposite handed catchers vs same handed catchers.

Wow, that Chattanooga group is very very "Twinsie" and uninspiring.

If healthy, their lineup is better than ours. Their top 4 SP's are better than ours. Their BP is improved, and ours is not great anyway. We do have a lot more average replacements though.

I guess all depends on how Sano does in the OF weighed in against Arcia or anyone else would do as the 3rd OF'er. Add on how Plouffe would do compared to that guy and Sano at 3B. Both offensively and defensively. I honestly think it might matter what handed pitcher we are facing even. Would it be the worst idea to play Sano at 3b and Arcia in the OF vs RHP's and Plouffe at 3B and Sano in the OF vs LHP's to some degree? Also think Rosario should get platooned some against LHP's. Just my thoughts.

http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/dee-gordons-biggest-improvement/ Lets hire this dude to work with our IF's, since Gordon and Santana seem like the same kind of guy.

I explained clearly that I simply did a quick dirty search for a reference from Fangraphs Steamer projections because it was the only one that I knew of that was out. They are not MY projections and it was just to point out that we are not very well off by the computers opinion. It is not like I agree with all of those projections...the good or the bad ones.