At the end of the 2011 season, Joe Benson had to be flying high. He just completed one of the best seasons of his professional career and he was rewarded by getting a call-up to make his major league debut. There was talk of him fighting for a more permanent role with the club in the future. It looked like the sky was the limit for young Mr. Benson. For how great the 2011 season ended, it was hard to imagine how far Benson fell during 2012 campaign. ...
There were a couple of preliminary top prospect lists for the Twins released over the last couple of days. On Sunday night, Seth Stohs from TwinsDaily.com released his primary list of the top 50 prospects for the Twins organization. It's a pretty extensive list and you should check it out after you have perused the list below. John Sickels from MinorLeagueBall.com released his preliminary top 20 list for the farm system for the Twins. Both of these men have a ton of knowledge about the system for ...
This Twin of the Future is also a Twin of the past. Joe Benson was drafted in the 2nd round of the 2006 draft. He has tools. He has power, speed, an arm (yeah yeah, he has two, a good arm, smart guy), and he is a good fielder. The one tool he doesn't seem to have is the hit tool. Regardless, he showed enough in the Minors to earn a September call-up in 2011. He and 2006 first round pick Chris Parmelee were given some time that month. They were two completely different prospects. Parmelee ...
At the beginning of the year, Seth Stohs from the Twins Daily crew asks some of the bloggers from across Twins Territory to put together their picks for a variety of categories across the minor leagues. It's a fun exercise to do at the beginning of the year and it's interesting to track the progress of players during the minor league seasons. There were some breakout candidates at almost every level in 2012 but there were some setbacks along the way as well. Here are my picks from the beginning of the year ...
At this time last year, the Twins called up a couple of young prospects from Double-A to make their major league debuts. Joe Benson was the more highly-touted name out of the two young players but Chris Parmelee came up and made a much stronger impression in the final month of the year. Benson would bat .239/.270/.352 in his 74 plate appearances in September while Parmelee was putting on an offensive show. By season's end, Parmelee was hitting .355/.443/.592 with ...
Updated 09-04-2012 at 07:30 AM by Cody Christie
For fans of the minor leagues, this time of year is pretty fun. The Elizabethton Twins will be starting their playoff run tonight. September call-ups can start happening on Friday. The minor league regular seasons come to an end on Labor Day and then more players get called up while those playoff runs start. As you know, Beloit will be in the Midwest League playoffs, and most likely, they will be the lone Twins full-season playoff team. Today, it is expected that ...
In my fourth annual Minnesota Twins Prospect Handbook, which became available in January, I posted my Top 30 Twins Prospect list as well as my annual rankings back five or six years. I enjoy looking at those lists for a couple of reasons. First, it is humbling. No one will likely ever produce a top 10 list that is 100% accurate. Second, it’s a fun reminder of some of the names from the past that didn’t stick around or make it. Third, it’s just fun to review to see what I have learned since then. ...
With New Britain likely headed toward the playoffs, we may not see some prospects early in September. Hermsen and Benson would be probables, but I am especially eager to see Hicks and Arcia. With his five hits on Wednesday, Hicks has moved to the top ten in league OPS, and most of the others on the list are 1B or DH. Most importantly, his left-handed productivity has caught up with his right-handed productivity this summer. Meanwhile, Arcia would be leading the league in both BA and OPS if he ...
After an offensive explosion on Monday night, the Twins made things a little bit more interesting on Tuesday when they didn't take their first lead in the game until the seventh inning. This comeback was spurred on by four two out hits with Ben Revere and Joe Mauer knocking in the runs to make the difference in the 6-4 final score. It seemed like a showcase game for Joe Mauer as he went 3-for-4 in the game including an RBI and one walk. He also made a tremendous diving catch on a bunt ...
The Twins had a rough weekend series with the A’s, so on Monday night they picked on another vowel, the O’s. The Twins scored seven runs in the first inning and kept on adding on their way to a 19-7 win over Baltimore. Scott Diamond wasn’t in finest form after a ten day break since his last start, but he did go six innings for the Win. Justin Morneau had four hits, extending his hit streak to 14 games. That is the same hit streak that Trevor Plouffe has as well after he had two hits. Ben Revere ...
Since the Twins took Aaron Hicks with their first round pick in the 2008 MLB Draft, there has been plenty of talk about the athletic outfielder fitting into the future plans of the Twins organization. Hicks was one of the highest draft picks the Twins had prior to drafting Byron Buxton in this year's draft and he seemed to have all of the tools to make him a very valuable player. It hasn't ...
The Twins lost 9-3 to the A’s on Saturday night. It was a bad games for the Twins right from the start. Cole De Vries gave up four runs in the first innings, the big blast was a three-run homer off the bat of Chris Carter. The A’s hit three more homers in the game. The Twins rang the bases really poorly. The offense did very little against the A’s Tommy Milone. Brian Dozier and Josh Willingham each had solo home runs, but it was far from enough. With that, here is a look at the Twins ...
Another slow day around baseball. The Twins activated RP Matt Capps and optioned Kyle Waldrop back to Rochester. The Wings currently have six pitchers on the disabled list, so getting another arm is probably pretty welcome. The Twins reached agreements with 23rd round pick P Travis Huber from Nebraska and 28th round pick P Carson Goldsmith. It was also announced that 6th rounder Andre Martinez (P) will not actually sign after it was reported he agreed ...
Francisco Liriano did a tremendous job on Friday night of building his trade value. The lefty gave up just one run in 6.2 innings against baseball’s best offense. Jared Burton got four outs quickly. The Twins got enough offense, as well as some help from the Rangers defense, to put up five runs. Joe Mauer drove in two runs, and Justin Morneau homered. The two teams play again on Saturday as Sam Deduno makes his first Twins start. With that, here is a look at the Twins minor league scores ...