The cancellation of the minor-league season has presented teams with a huge challenge. Player development is being compromised, and the deleterious effects extend beyond the grooming itself. Prospects need to be evaluated, as well. With no games being played down on the farm, an integral part of the process has been lost.

As circus ringmasters were known to say, “The show must go on.”

Ben Cherington runs the show in Pittsburgh, and he’s less bearish on the quandary than you might expect. Technology, paired with the player-pool activities taking place at the club’s Double-A facility, is a big reason why.

“I’m not going to say it’s the same as professional games, because it’s not,” the Pirates GM said on Thursday. “But through video and technology, and the need for our pitchers in Altoona to get actual game experience, we do have an opportunity to evaluate pitchers and hitters in a way that’s not too different than a game setting. We have professional pitchers facing professional hitters [and] we can measure that through high speed video, through Rapsodo and TrackMan. We can pretty much measure all of the things we would in a in a normal minor-league game… we just don’t have a box score at the end of the night.”

Matt Blood, Baltimore’s first-year farm director, sounded somewhat less enthusiastic when addressing the subject earlier in the week. Read the rest of this entry »

Below is another installment of my series discussing each team’s 60-man player pool with a focus on prospects. If you missed the first piece, you’re going to want to take a peek at its four-paragraph intro for some background, then hop back here once you’ve been briefed.

Updating the East

Because our world is a roil of chaos in which people often drop the ball when the stakes are high, there have been a few roster changes in the Eastern divisions, mostly related to COVID-19’s spread or the reasonable fear of it. My initial thoughts on the AL East are linked above, while the NL East is here.

Atlanta’s positive tests during intake included Freddie Freeman, Touki Toussaint, Pete Kozma, and Will Smith, while Felix Hernandez and Nick Markakis opted out. The combination of Markakis’ opt out and Freeman’s delay (Markakis cited a discussion with Freeman as part of his reason for opting out) makes it much more likely that Yonder Alonso breaks camp with the big league club because he plays first base and hits left-handed, the latter of which the Braves’ major league roster sorely lacks. The Markakis opt out also means one of the dominoes leading to a slightly premature Cristian Pache and/or Drew Waters debut has fallen.

The bullpen is thinner without Touki and Smith but still strong because of all the talented youngsters, while Felix’s opt out makes it more likely that one of young arms, most likely Kyle Wright or Bryse Wilson, ends up in the Opening Day rotation.

Meanwhile, Philadelphia’s COVID situation is already so dire that it seems likely they’ll qualify for the “extenuating circumstances” clause in Section 6 of Major League Baseball’s 2020 Operations manual:

In the event that a Club experiences a significant number of COVID-19 Related IL placements at the Alternate Training Site at any one time (i.e., three or more players), and the Club chooses to substitute those players from within the Club’s organization, MLB reserves the right to allow that Club to remove those substitute players from the Club Player Pool without requiring a release.

Read the rest of this entry »

Ryan O’Rourke experienced life in the big leagues. The recently-retired left-hander appeared in 54 games with the Minnesota Twins between the 2015 -2016 seasons, and in two with the New York Mets last year. But the bulk of his career was spent in the minors. A 13th-round pick by the Twins in 2010 out of Merrimack College, O’Rourke toiled down on the farm in each of his 10 professional campaigns.

He experienced a lot. The minor leagues are an adventure, and while often fun, they are by no means a bed of roses. The pay is bad, the travel and accommodations are arduous, and for the vast majority of players, crushed dreams are inevitable. Moreover, success and failure aren’t always dictated by talent alone.

———

David Laurila: How would you describe professional baseball at the minor-league level?

Ryan O’Rourke: “Now that I can look at it from a helicopter point of view, I’d say that it’s a crapshoot in the truest sense of that word. If you don’t end up with the right organization, and your development isn’t a priority, your path to the big leagues is so much more difficult than it already is.

“I was fortunate to be with the Twins, who were very good about taking care of people, but I’ve heard horror stories from other teams. If you’re a nobody — anyone outside the 10th round is probably a nobody — and don’t show promise right away… let’s just say that guys who get big money in rounds one through 10 are given countless opportunities over someone who may have deserved it more.

“That’s the sad nature of the minor leagues, which, from a business standpoint, I do understand. If you gave one guy $400,000 and another guy $4,000, it’s obvious who you’re keeping. And sometimes it’s a matter of a coach liking you or not. Sometimes you’re cut because you didn’t impress one guy.”

Laurila: How much jealousy and resentment is there of high-round guys? For instance, Byron Buxton is a talented player but he also got a $6 million signing bonus. Read the rest of this entry »

Matt Canterino was drafted out of Rice University a year ago this week. The now 22-year-old right-hander was selected in the second round by the Minnesota Twins, and soon thereafter signed his first professional contract. As is the case for every young player who gets to live that dream, it was an experience he won’t soon forget.

His subsequent introduction to pro ball centered more on education than on innings. Canterino took the mound just seven times, tossing 25 stellar frames — 31 strikeouts and eight hits allowed — between the rookie-level Gulf Coast League and the Low-A Midwest League. Most notably, he became acquainted with technology that showed him not only how his arsenal plays, but how his four-pitch mix can be optimized.

Canterino — No. 13 on our Twins Top Prospects list — discussed his draft experience, and his first-year education, over the phone from his home in Texas.

———

David Laurila: What was draft day like for you?

Matt Canterino: “It was more exciting than anything. I had a decent idea of where I’d be going — obviously nothing was set in stone — so to see that all come together once things got rolling into where I was projected to go… it was pretty surreal. It was also a dream come true. I feel like I’m still living a dream.”

Laurila: Did you go where you expected?

Canterino: “Yes. My agent gave me a range, and I pretty much fell right in the middle of it. Those were the expectations I went in with, and once that range started coming around, I realized there might be kind of a crunch time. But it happened really quick for me. There wasn’t much banter. It was a couple of teams, then one team, and all of a sudden I was drafted.”

Laurila: When did you start tuning in to the draft coverage? Read the rest of this entry »

If we didn’t know it was real, Joe Mauer’s career with the Minnesota Twins might strike us as being more like a fairy tale than an actual story. That is, until August 19, 2013. That was when Mets first baseman Ike Davis hit a foul tip that hit Mauer square in his helmet.

The moribund Twins, coming off a 69-93 season, had the first overall draft pick in 2001 for the second time in franchise history. The first time the Twins had the No. 1 pick, they drafted Tim Belcher, who didn’t sign when the team wouldn’t pay the going rate for a top selection. Minnesota also failed to sign their second round pick, Bill Swift; none of the players they actually did sign ever played a game in the majors. Read the rest of this entry »

Trevor Larnach projects as an impact bat at the big league level. Ranked second on our Minnesota Twins Top Prospect list, and 55th on our 2020 Top 100 Prospects list, the 23-year-old Oregon State University product has, in the words of our own Eric Longenhagen, “titanic raw power… and a refined approach.” Moreover, he makes consistent hard contact. Last season, 51.9% of Larnach’s batted balls were hit 95 mph or higher.

Larnach worked to further fine-tune his left-handed stroke over the offseason, and he continues to do so during the current pandemic-necessitated hiatus. He has a specific objective in mind. Larnach slashed .309/.384/.458 last year between High-A Fort Myers and Double-A Pensacola — heady enough numbers to merit an invitation to big-league camp — but an inefficiency has stuck in his craw. The extent to which he can conquer it remains unknown, but given that he draws much of his inspiration from the preparedness of Navy Seals, there’s a pretty good chance that he will.

———

David Laurila: To start, how are you preparing while the season is on hold?

Trevor Larnach: “I’m hitting every day. I’m working with the hitting guy I’ve been with for quite a few years now, Tyler Graham. He recently went from Oregon State’s baseball staff over to the [Texas] Rangers’ staff, where he’s working with their Triple-A team. We’re basically taking what I learned from spring training into kind of an offseason format. I’m pretty much doing everything I did in the offseason, but incorporating a couple of things into my routine that got exposed in big-league camp.“

Laurila: What got exposed?

Larnach: “In big league spring training you’re facing big leaguers and upper level minor league guys. Of course, early on they’re still trying to work out the kinks — just as the hitters are — but putting that aside, I was experiencing big league level pitching: the stuff, the speed, the consistency. It kind of shapes your frame of mind to where you need to be to put yourself in the best position to succeed.

“A big positive for me was getting to talk to Nelson Cruz, Torii Hunter, Justin Morneau, Josh Donaldson, Marwin Gonzalez, and all these different guys. I was picking different things that each one had to say, and incorporating them into my game. Spring training is a perfect time to test things out. I was putting what I worked on in the offseason to test, while at the same time taking in things I took from those guys.”

Laurila: How does the pitching you were facing tie into that? Read the rest of this entry »

I’m not privy as to whether the Cincinnati Reds assign a grade to character in their draft reports. I also don’t know how much the San Diego Padres weigh that attribute when pondering possible acquisitions. I do know that Taylor Trammell projects as more than a quality big-league outfielder. He projects as a role model.

Trammell became a Padre last summer. Part of the trade-deadline deal that sent Trevor Bauer to the Queen City, he’d been selected 35th overall by the Reds in the 2016 draft out of Kennesaw, Georgia’s Mount Paran Christian School. Blessed with plus raw tools, Trammell is slotted No. 69 on our 2020 Top 100 Prospects list.

A prima donna he’s not. When he reaches the big leagues, Trammell will do so with a genuine appreciation for what life has presented him. Moreover, he doesn’t just embrace the game of baseball. He embraces the people who come to see it played.

“I have thoughts on fans,” Trammell told me in Padres camp last month. “I love them. There are people who come to games and want to heckle, and they have the right to do that. Do I agree with it? No, but if you want to pay money to come yell at us, I mean, do whatever you want. Go to a boxing match. Go to a baseball game. Go to a basketball game. Any game. When there are a whole bunch of fans in the stands, whether they’re rooting for you or not rooting for you, it’s great for baseball. They want to see a game and we’re putting on a show for them.”

If you’re rolling your eyes with skepticism upon reading that, you shouldn’t be. By all accounts, that’s who Trammell is. Part of a working-class family — his father is a post office employee, his mother once balanced two jobs — he hasn’t forgotten where he came from. The values he grew up with remain the same. Read the rest of this entry »

The 2019 Minnesota Twins hit, roughly speaking, all of the home runs. That’s not precisely accurate of course, but it’s close enough for government work; they set an all-time record for home runs. Of the 12 Twins who came to the plate 300 times in 2019, 11 hit 10 or more bombs. Bomba Squad isn’t just a nickname; it’s an accurate description of a team filled to the brim with home run hitters.

This article is about that 12th Twin. Luis Arraez had 366 plate appearances last year. He hit just four home runs. That was the sixth-lowest home run total among players with 350 or more PA, and the names below him aren’t inspiring; Billy Hamilton, Tony Wolters, Yolmer Sánchez, Nicky Lopez, and Dee Gordon weren’t exactly offensive powerhouses.

All told, only 29 batters hit less than 10 home runs in 350 or more plate appearances. That reflects the democratization of home runs, but it also means that it’s difficult to contribute offensively without dingers. In fact, 27 of those 29 players had a wRC+ below 100. The only two exceptions? Nick Markakis, who squeaked over the finish line with nine bombs and a 102 wRC+ — and Arraez, who batted .334/.399/.439 on his way to a scintillating 125 wRC+.

It’s not weird, not even a little bit, that players who don’t hit home runs are generally bad at offense. There’s no single outcome as helpful to a team’s cause as a home run. If you had to predict a player’s offensive output and you could only have access to one outcome type, you’d pick home runs, right? Walks might be okay, and doubles might be as well, but singles? Triples? Heck, throw in BABIP and strikeouts if you want. Nothing comes close to home runs. Read the rest of this entry »

Ben Lindbergh and Sam Miller banter about Mike Trout’s career spring training stats, then preview the 2020 Minnesota Twins (9:01) with the The Athletic’s Aaron Gleeman, and the 2020 Pittsburgh Pirates (46:33) with The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette’s Jason Mackey, plus a conversation between Ben and Pirates pitcher Mitch Keller (1:19:30) about Keller’s historically unlucky debut MLB season.

Audio intro: Union Street Preservation Society, "Meet Me in Spring"
Audio interstitial: Sleater-Kinney, "Leave You Behind"
Audio outro: Ages and Ages, "Just My Luck"

Link to Max Marchi on spring training stats
Link to story on Takashi Miyoshi’s new role
Link to Matt Trueblood on not extending Theo Epstein
Link to Jason on the Pirates’ pitching plan
Link to Ben on the Archer trade
Link to Ben on Keller’s debut year
Link to the Banished To The Pen preview series
Link to order The MVP Machine

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Zack Littell was stellar out of the Minnesota Twins bullpen in 2019. In his first big-league season as a full-time reliever, the 24-year-old right-hander went an unblemished 6-0 with a 2.68 ERA in 29 outings covering 37 innings. His slider was a big reason for his success. Make that his pair of sliders.

“They’re two different pitches,” Littell told me late in the campaign. “When I got moved to the pen and got rid of the curveball — a pitch I’d had my whole career — they said, ‘We’re going to go predominantly slider-fastball, and mix in a few changeups.’ I kind of got used to that, throwing a lot of sliders.”

That would be an understatement. The North Carolina native threw the pitch… er, the two pitches, a full 49.6% of the time last year. He threw his four-seam fastball 48.6% of the time.

Littell, who we first wrote about in 2016 when he was a 19-year-old unranked prospect in the Seattle Mariners system, originally developed a slider in 2017 after being traded to the New York Yankees. At the time, “it was more lateral than downward,” and while the righty called it a slider, it was “pretty much a big cutter.” Read the rest of this entry »