| 03 May 2011
BY MICHAEL L. WHITE
The Minnesota Twins are 9-18. .333 Winning Percentage. Bottom of the AL. Worse than the Astros.
Worst rotation in baseball. Worst offense in baseball. Ineffective bullpen. Forgettable defensive unit.
With all the signs pointing to failure, including the not-mentioned disabled list pile-ups, the time is now to show improvement. The division disparity is ten games, but five full months remain for redemption.
The questions remain: Is this roster capable of a climb? Does the farm have impact players capable of saving the season?
I have no real answer right now for the former. The latter, however, can be answered, “Yes and no.”
The Twins farm system has some depth, ranking in the upper half (#13) in Baseball America’s organizational rankings earlier this year. Young hitters Aaron Hicks and Miguel Saño bring a lot of promise for the future, but the impact potential the Twins need desperately right now is not there in the upper minors, ready for the picking.
We all know about Kyle Gibson, the Missouri arm who fell to the Twins in the 2009 thanks to injury concerns during the late portion of his junior year. He’s the best arm in the system and the number one prospect in BA’s team rankings.
Some see him (including BA) as a hurler with number one starter capability, but they note that staying healthy and creating more deception are important for his development. Bar none, he’s not ready. He induces groundouts well with his repertoire and Baseball Prospectus scouting guru Kevin Goldstein says he will always need to lean on his defense for help. As I noted earlier this week, the Twins defense is not an inspiring bunch, falling in the lower half of the AL. Gardenhire’s attempts to make Francisco Liriano lean on said defense has been a contributing factor to his horrific start to 2011.
As shown by recent callups, defensive help won’t be coming from the farm. Rene Tosoni has looked amateurish at times manning the outfield, and Matt Tolbert is no savant with the leather and laces (hard to call Tolbert a farmhand; he’s more of a shuttle-jockey between Rochester and Minneapolis). Ben Revere can certainly play CF well, but his lack of power leaves him useless in a corner with the exception of spot duty, and moving Span to a corner to accommodate Revere is not a gain unless you’re lined up against the Padres' inept offense for a few weeks.
The only hope for offensive help in the upper minors comes from OF Joe Benson, a 2nd-rounder from the 2006 draft. Benson has slowly moved up through the minors, developing the power scouts projected he had coming out of high school in Joliet, Illinios, slugging over .500 for the first time in 2010 in Hi-A Ft. Myers and continuing in his callup to AA New Britain. “He has center-field range to go with a right-arm,” says BA in their prospect appraisal. A rarity of defensive range, solid throwing arm, speed, and power, Benson is sure to be valuable to the Twins down the road.
A mammoth problem remains needing work: Strikeouts.
Despite an improvement all-around offensively in 2010, Benson struck out in over 26 percent of his 519 plate appearances, a glaring weakness to his game that would hamper his development should management bring him up in his age-23 season. Strikeouts were the cause of all-world prospect Cameron Maybin’s ills in Florida, and his lack of development in pitch recognition in the majors led to his ultimate dealing away to San Diego this offseason. If the Twins looked to him for help this year they’d be unlikely to see the type of production they expect and sorely need.
From a practical and business perspective, leaving guys like Benson, Gibson, Revere, etc. in the minors is about as big of a “No, duh!” moment as there can be in baseball. The prospects can’t help the big league club until the veterans are able to help themselves out by starting to look like even 70 percent of what we thought they were/are capable of producing. The defense won’t help Gibson like he needs it, Benson surely isn’t ready to take on big league arms yet, and Revere isn’t much help in the outfield when he can only assist in CF.
The Twins are best left leaving these guys in the minors to prove themselves repeatedly until no doubt is there how effective they’ll be and save burning up more time on their service clocks by letting them toil in the majors and add to Gardy’s headaches.
I’m not (necessarily) saying give up on the 2011 Minnesota Twins, but I am saying leave the current roster to save or strangle themselves. The sorry performances of April plague nearly the entire roster and it’s up to the guys getting paid to perform. Either way, by the end of 2011 the organization will know who is worthy of offers for 2012 and who needs to be non-tendered and sent packing.
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