Token Draft Blog

Here’s a look at the Twins’ first day choices

1. Kyle Gibson, RHP, Missouri
1s. Matt Bashore, LHP. Indiana
2. Billy Bullock, RHP, Florida
3. Ben Tootle, RHP, Jacksonville State

The plan going in? “We need velocity,”—Twins Scouting Director Deron Johnson before the draft. Yeah, that leaves out the middle infielders and power hitters. But in the end, the one thing the Twins’ farm system was really missing was guys who could dial up velocity and blow the ball by hitters.

So, with the first pick, the Twins of course took Kyle Gibson, a 6’6” pitcher from Missouri with a, um, 90 mile an hour fastball. Gibson fell to the Twins at 22 because of a stress fracture in his arm. He was a top ten talent in the draft, though in a deeper draft 22 sounds more realistic for him. Gibson does the one thing the Twins expect in a pitcher though—he throws strikes and only walked 19 in 106+ innings this year. He also struck out 131, mostly with a decent slider that’s tough on righties and not so tough on lefties. The book is split on his change, with some people liking it and some people thinking it needs work. Providing the injury proves to be nothing, Gibson should be a decent bet to fill in the back of the rotation, and his stuff and command is very similar to Scott Baker and Kevin Slowey when they were draft picks. The problem is the Twins really needed a pitcher who could slot above Slowey and Baker in the rotation come 2012 or so. The upside to Gibson is that he’s a rail thin 6’6”, and as he fills out hopefully the consistent 88-91 will turn into a consistent 92-93. If that happens look out, though people have been waiting on Gibson to add velocity since his freshman year at Missouri and it hasn’t happened yet.

With the supplemental pick, the Twins grabbed Indiana University LHP Matt Bashore. His velocity sits 90-91 mph with good movement and the occasional 95 mile pitch thrown in for fun. He does so with a fairly smooth delivery. The nits on Bashore are that his control can come and go and his secondary offerings are inconsistent, meaning he probably won’t move quickly. His stuff is a little reminiscent of former Twin Eric Milton, though it will take improvements to reach an All-Star Game like Milton did. But if things don’t work out, lefties with Bashore’s velocity always get a shot in the bullpen.

In the second and third rounds, that’s where the velocity portion kicked in. Both Tootle and Bullock can dial up high-90s heat and were mentioned as first round possibilities, though they tend to do better as relievers than as starters. Bullock has a little more heat, but Tootle’s curveball may be the best secondary pitch of the four pitchers who joined the organization today and is a little more likely to be a starter than Bullock. Control isn’t either of their things though, and Bullock has been homer prone this spring at Florida.

It’s not the kind of draft where you can say without a doubt what is going to happen. But those kind of drafts are hard to achieve when you’re picking 22nd overall. Some of these pieces will succeed. Telling which ones they are right now though, well, that’s a little difficult.

Be sure to check out our BYTO forums for more discussion and information.

Posted by jewscott on 06/10 at 12:21 AM
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Easy Answers

It’s the beginning of the new month—a time when blogs like to go back through the events of the past month and talk about the negatives. A lot has been said about the Twins wasting the best month of Joe Mauer and Justin Morneau’s careers by posting a 14-16 record. Patrick Reusse had a piece about how the road portion of the schedule starts now, though I can’t imagine that’s going to be a lot tougher than facing the Yankees, Red Sox and Devil Rays in quick succession. More than anything, we’ve reached the point in time where the Backseat GMs, of which I am a card-carrying member, are crying out for improvements.

I’ve never been shy about speaking my mind for roster changes. This year? It’s a little different.

Jim Souhan had an idea that Anthony Swarzak should replace Francisco Liriano in the rotation should the lefty’s struggles continue. Which works in the fact that Liriano has been really bad of late. It also takes out of the equation what Liriano may do in July and down the road and that Swarzak is a pitcher who sits 91-92 with middling control and no out pitches, a puzzle that’s not exactly the New York Times Crosswords in terms of difficulty for major league hitters to figure out

Further down the road in Strib-land, Howard Sinker wrote in a recent blog that if he were Gardenhire he would “call Brendan Harris into his office and say, ‘Brendan, you’re my starting shortstop.’” In theory again, it works. So far this year, Nick Punto has done the impossible in dethroning Houston Jimenez from his title of “Worst Performance by a Twins Starting Shortstop in a Potential Playoff Year.” At the same time, Brendan Harris is such a butcher with the leather at shortstop, so much so that Jason Bartlett was named Tampa Bay’s MVP last year because he wasn’t Harris defensively.

I won’t even get into the 900-pound gorilla debate over which 23-year-old outfielder Twins fan prefer. Which brings me to the point at hand: the real problem with playing Backseat GM in 2009 is that there really are no black and white issues. In past years, decisions to toss Tony Batista, Rondell White, Juan Castro, Ramon Ortiz, Livan Hernandez and so forth to the curb were no-brainers. Further to the point, there isn’t a Jason Bartlett or a Francisco Liriano posting lights out numbers that help make the decision even easier.

Being into the Twins lately has kind of been a Democrat vs. Republican issue. This year, the issues have been more purple than blue versus red. Whatever you’re making a case for, unless it’s something crazy like calling up Aaron Hicks to solve the outfield problem, you may well be right. But you may well be wrong, too. Liriano could right himself to 2008 standards or continue to fall apart. Swarzak may well have enough to keep fooling people, or he may get shelled in consecutive starts. All we really know right now is two things:

A) This is a pretty good, but far from great, Twins team, and;

B) There are no easy solutions to fixing what’s wrong.

Be sure to check out our BYTO forums for more discussion and information.

Posted by jewscott on 06/02 at 02:47 PM
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