Thread: Goldstein Ranked the Twins' system 22nd

I think 22nd feels about right to me, and here's why...

I get the sense that a lot of Twins fans are increasingly optimistic about this farm system. In some respects, that's fair. One of the knocks on them has traditionally been that they don't develop any power hitters, and with Miguel Sano as a signature prospect, we have one best potential power bats in the minors. Any time you can point to one guy who is doing everything right, it makes you feel pretty good about the overall product.

But then again, look at the difference a year makes. Everyone said Aaron Hicks was a legit prospect, and he has done NOTHING in the minors so far. Kyle Gibson, who fell to us because of injury risks, is now...injured. Then there's guys like Parmalee and Benson who will be "over-ripe" by the time they stay in the majors, but I have high hopes for both of them.

Beyond a few key guys, however, it thins out extremely quickly. Most of the guys that supposedly make this a good farm system are guys like Sano and Oswaldo Arcia, who are so far away from the majors that you expect them to get better. And the biggest problem, for me at least, is the absolute dearth of pitching talent, particularly power arms. Where are they?

Granted, we have a big draft coming up with all of the compensatory picks we received. The Twins could go heavy on pitching and middle infielders, and I might feel better by the end of the season. But until then, I think it's a very unbalanced system with a few bright spots, but lacking in too many areas to fully restock the major league team from within.

Originally Posted by Fanatic Jack

Shanewahl,

Do you ever think for yourself or just let other people do it for you. Sano lives in a country (D.R.) where they don't record births in hospitals. This of course means he does not have a birth certificate to prove how old he is. Every scout has stated Sano is the biggest 18 year old propsect they have ever see. Sano could say he is 16 years old right now and nobody would be able to prove he is wrong. He had about $3 million reasons to lie about his age before the Twins signed him. Well in my world 2 t 2 still equals 4. See Livan Hernadez for more information.

In regards to the comment "Who cares." The Twins should care they shelled out big money thinking Sano was only 18 years old and still developing. Now if Sano was 22 he would not be as valuable a prospect because he is in Beloit and 4 years older.

Exactly, there is no evidence just speculation and over generalization based on a FEW instances of lying. I have found that relying on evidence is more helpful for "thinking for yourself" than speculation with shoddy facts (as gunnarthor points out).

I saw Sano as early as his first Spring Training with the Twins in 2010, when he was a couple of months short of his 17th birthday. He was a big kid then, for a baseball player. But anyone who would state it would be unlikely he was really not quite 17 years old has never spent any time around high school football teams. He had grown more by the time I saw him last spring, which indicated to me that he was likely, indeed still a "growing boy," rather than a full-grown 20-year-old.

But as Seth said, at this point, I'm not sure I see why it matters. Whether he's currently about to turn 19 or about to turn 22, he's still going to open at Beloit and if things stay on track, probably make his Twins debut in 2015-2016. At that time, he'll be only 22 years old. But what if he's really 25? No big deal... that's still not old for a rookie and either way, the Twins are going to have him under their control for the next several years. It will only be at that point... when he's up for his first "big" contract... that his true age may be a factor.

Let me put it this way... does anyone think the Cardinals would give a damn if it turned out Albert Pujols really did understate his age? Hell, no. The only team that might care about that is the Angels, who are already overpaying for his declining years, not the team originally signed with. Similarly, the Twins don't care at this point if Sano lied about his age or not... as long as nobody can prove he lied.

In fact, the Twins have NO incentive to question his age, at this point. First, if he's proven to have lied, it could cost him his visa and cause all sorts of legal issues that could very well threaten his entire career with the Twins. Also, I seem to recall that the Twins get a fifth year to decide to put him on the 40-man roster or risk losing him in the Rule 5 draft, by virtue of him being 18 or under when he was signed. If it turns out he was 19 or more, they'd have only four years. The extra year may not turn out to be a big deal if he's on track to the Big Leagues by 2015, but if he's not, that extra year might be nice to have.

In the end, it's true that the Twins likely would not have spent $3 million on Sano if he wasn't just 16 at the time because an older player would be less likely to grow more, get stronger, and develop his game than a 16 year old would be expected to. That risk is essentially gone, because Sano has done all of those things. He's grown, gotten stronger and while he may never be a gold glove defender, all reports are that he has developed in several aspects of his game. In other words, there's been no indication that he has begun to "peak" the way he might have if he had been significantly understating his age.

Sano is the real deal. He'll be the next superstar in a Twins uniform. Anyone ripping on him right now is simply not interested in anything but taking cheap shots at Sano or the Twins organization or both.

Ok, I guess I can see why it doesn't matter so much. I certainly don't want to continue the conversation along those lines to feed the stupid speculation anyway. And clearly his growth points to being a growing young man as opposed to 20+. If he's in the majors at 22, that will be exciting. Maybe even a September call-up in 2014.

I also think that I did a pretty good job discussing prospect list movement between 2011 and 2012 in my last blog. Conclusion is that lefty starters, righty relievers (power arms), catchers, and 3rd basemen are needed first and foremost in the system, and the 2011 draft may have addressed some of that already (but the playing time sample from many of them is non-existent or very limited). Hudson Boyd as a closer down the road around 2015 is not out of the question. I do think the Twins need to find a way to sign a top-25 starter to be their number 1, and the minor league system can produce the rest of the rotation.

The Twins should be ranked lower than 22. Their top pitching prospect (Liam) only has #4 starter upside, how pathetic is that!!! The twins will never win a playoff game until they develop some high upside starters. You can sign veteran free agents for league minimum salary who are better than Liaam at his peak so why bother drafting these soft tossing BUMS?

Hendriks has #2 upside and is most likely a #3. Gibson, Wimmers, and Salcedo all could be 1/2 starters.

Originally Posted by shanewahl

Hendriks has #2 upside and is most likely a #3. Gibson, Wimmers, and Salcedo all could be 1/2 starters.

I think you're a little optimistic there... I think more realistically Hendricks has #3 starter upside but is more of a #4 on a contending team. Gibson is a 2/3, Wimmers is a 3/4, Salcedo is a 4/5 Nick Blackburn type unless he can figure out how to strike a few more people out.

Sacledo can become a 1 or 2 We have not seen enough of him to make a judgement of how good he could actually be.

Originally Posted by jtrinaldi

Sacledo can become a 1 or 2 We have not seen enough of him to make a judgement of how good he could actually be.

I don't have it in front of me but Baseball America classifies number one starters as possessing three or more dominant pitches, plus durability and plus makeup or something along those lines. Salcedo seems to have the makings of the plus durability and makeup from every report I've read. At this point he doesn't have even a single dominant pitch, the fastball velocity and command haven't come around as hoped, the change up is pretty average and his breaking ball is far from reliable much less dominant. He's young enough to improve quite a bit but it seems pretty unlikely he'd be able to vault himself into number one or number two status.

I think that Hendriks compares very similarly to Scott Baker. His velocity is the same. He has a better curveball. They have similar changeups. The difference is tha Baker is very stoic, which some really like and appreciate and others get quite frustrated with. Hendriks is known for being very competitive. So, if Baker is the comp, I think it's very fair to say that Hendriks' upside is a #2... more likely a #3. I'll take that any day. that's worth a lot of money.

I like Hendriks a lot. He seems to possess good traits of a lot of our pitchers - Slowey-like walk rate, better ground ball rate than Blackburn, seems more durable than Baker with slightly better k-rates. Obviously, I have no idea how he'll adjust to the majors but I think he's an underrated prospect.

It's been a little while since I've chatted w/ KG about it, but he did tell me he liked the Twins OF prospects as much as anyone's. This was maybe 6 months ago.

Originally Posted by jtrinaldi

Sacledo can become a 1 or 2 We have not seen enough of him to make a judgement of how good he could actually be.

He needs to find out how to get a strike out if that's the case.

Originally Posted by jtrinaldi

Sacledo can become a 1 or 2 We have not seen enough of him to make a judgement of how good he could actually be.

I really disagree with this. He might be able to be a 2, and that's at the apex of his potential, he's probably a 3. True 1's are rare and I don't think he has that kind of talent. Keep in mind that there are a lot of 3's that are #1 starters on their teams though. It's just a difference in philosophy I guess.