Minnesota Twins Daily Clips Thursday, June 05, 2014
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Minnesota Twins Daily Clips Thursday, June 05, 2014 ➢ Twins’ guessing game continues right up to draft day. Star Tribune (Neal) pg. 1 ➢ I’m in the Joe Mauer debate by staying out of it. Star Tribune (Sinker) pg. 2 ➢ A little brute strength in Twins’ order goes a long way. Star Tribune (Reusse) pg. 3 ➢ Willingham’s bat is coming around. Star Tribune (Hartman) pg. 5 ➢ Twins’ New Britain farm team gets new stadium. Star Tribune (Miller) pg. 7 ➢ Postgame: Arcia says he followed ‘unwritten’ rules. Star Tribune (Miller) pg. 8 ➢ Santana is a worthwhile option in center field. Star Tribune (Reusse) pg. 8 ➢ Hicks and Gomez are comparable stories. Star Tribune (Rand) pg. 10 ➢ Twins 6, Brewers 4: Arcia’s bug night gets the best of Milwaukee. Pioneer Press (Murphy) pg. 11 ➢ Twins’ Pelfrey to have elbow checked out by Dr. James Andrews. Pioneer Press (Murphy) pg. 12 ➢ New stadium could lure Twins’ Class AA affiliate to Hartford, Conn. Pioneer Press (Murphy) pg. 12 ➢ Twins’ Fuld, out 25 games with concussion, slated for rehab assignment. Pioneer Press (Murphy) pg. 13 ➢ Only handful of first-round draft picks haven’t reached big leagues. Pioneer Press (Berardino) pg. 13 ➢ Arcia’s four RBIs fend off Aramis-fueled Crew. MLB.com (Bollinger) pg. 16 ➢ Fuld has successful BP, will need rehab stint. MLB.com (Bollinger and Smith) pg. 17 ➢ Dozier has high praise for rookie Santana. MLB.com (Bollinger and Smith) pg. 18 ➢ Nerve issue in elbow ongoing for Pelfrey. MLB.com (Bollinger and Smith) pg. 18 ➢ Gardenhire, Plouffe reflect on being drafted. MLB.com (Bollinger and Smith) pg. 19 ➢ Twins turn to Correia in finale against Brewers. MLB.com (Smith) pg. 19 ➢ Early challenge at third favors Gardenhire. MLB.com (Bollinger) pg. 21 ➢ Arcia shows off power, drives in 4 in Twins win against Brewers. Associated Press pg. 21 ➢ 5 thoughts on 3-run, slow trots, and showing emotion. 1500 ESPN (Wetmore) pg. 22 ➢ How do the Twins run the operation during the MLB Draft? 1500 ESPN (Wetmore) pg. 24 ➢ Surprise Turnaround. Sports on Earth (Megdal) pg. 25 Twins’ guessing game continues right up to draft day La Velle E. Neal III / Star Tribune – 6/5/14 Every class is unique in Major League Baseball’s first-year player draft because of its groupings of talent. Sometimes there’s a top tier of players before the talent level drops off. Other times, there’s a Stephen Strasburg, where there is one clear-cut prospect above all the others. Teams will try to identify how deep the top group is, then the next group, and so on. The goal is to figure out what players might be available in a group when it’s your turn to pick. The Twins believe there are three pitchers who should be in the top group of this year’s draft. As the first two rounds of the draft take place Thursday, they are trying to figure out who will be available when their turn comes with the No. 5 overall pick. “Every round has natural breaks,” said Mike Radcliff, Twins vice president of player personnel. “This year has a break of about three pitchers, then four to five guys who are pretty good. Then it drops down after that. It’s not a great draft, depthwise. It’s not a great draft from the top.” The top three pitchers are considered to be, in no particular order: lefthander Carlos Rodon from North Carolina State, lefthander Brady Aiken from Cathedral Catholic High School in San Diego and righthander Tyler Kolek from Shepherd (Texas) High. Kolek, whose fastball has been clocked at 100 miles per hour, could be the first righthanded prep pitcher ever taken with the No. 1 overall pick. Multiple baseball publications have predicted the Twins will take shortstop Nick Gordon from Olympia High in Orlando with their No. 5 pick. He is in a group that includes catcher-outfielder Alex Jackson from Rancho Bernardo High in Escondido, Calif; lefthander Sean Newcomb from the University of Hartford; lefthander Kyle Freeland from the University of Evansville and righthander Aaron Nola from LSU. Gordon is the son of former major league pitcher Tom Gordon and brother of Dodgers second baseman Dee Gordon. Tom Gordon, when reached Wednesday night, said that he’s spoken with every other team in the top 10 but has been unable to get a feel for where he son might be selected. But, understandably, he feels his son is special. ‘‘He can throw people out from left field,’’ said Gordon, who is with his son and other family members near Secaucus, N.J., where they will attend the draft. ‘‘He’s started to understand his abilities. He’s started to understand his power. What he has done in the last year, he has been phenomenal to watch.’’ The Twins reportedly have done extensive research on Gordon and like his makeup, believing he will become a good pro hitter. But it’s not that simple. Sometimes teams contact each other to see which way they are leaning, but the Twins aren’t sure what the four teams in front of them — the Astros, Marlins, White Sox and Cubs — will do. “There’s always late information on players and how they are doing,” Twins scouting director Deron Johnson said. “You have to take every game into consideration. The list is always moving. Things are being rearranged.” The Astros have the first pick, and most of Houston’s front-office members have been out to see Kolek pitch. But in 2012, the Astros selected shortstop Carlos Correa with the first pick and signed him to a financially-friendly deal, leaving Byron Buxton for the Twins at No. 2. Could the Astros have something up their sleeve again? So the Twins are spending the final moments before the draft preparing for different scenarios. They could take one of the big three pitchers if they fall to them. They also have done a lot of work on Nola, who doesn’t have powerful stuff but could move quickly through the minors. The Twins are looking at a group of seven to eight players they could take with the No. 5 pick. On Thursday, they will wait and see who falls to them at No. 5, then act accordingly. “You have to play out every potential scenario from [the Astros’ No. 1 pick],” Radcliff said. “They could take anybody. We don’t have a clue. Nobody does.” I’m in the Joe Mauer debate by staying out of it Howard Sinker / Star Tribune – 6/5/14 2 I have pretty much done my best to stay out of the Joe Mauer discussions, which is a polite term for much of what I’ve heard and read, because so much of it runs counter to what I value as a fan, a media member and a neighbor. A few weeks ago, I had some fun comparing Mauer’s production at the time to that of the legend Nick Punto and it set off people in all kinds of ways. Joe Mauer is having a mediocre year. You know it, he knows it, your co-worker who searches for truth by watching nothing but al- Jazeera and FOX News knows it. Whether it means that he’s started a career decline at age 31 or this is a big bump in his career, we’ll eventually find out. What do I think? I don’t know. What I do wonder about is how Mauer would be remembered if his career was pretty much done at age 32 in a manner similar to Tony Oliva, who went from one of the game’s best outfielders to just-another-starter (at DH, no less) for the final few years of his career because of the knee injuries that wrecked his game. Have Mauer’s injuries taken a gradual toll much less dramatic but just as problematic as what happened to Oliva? I don’t know. Or what would happen if Mauer’s career disappeared without warning, as it did with Kirby Puckett at age 35 because of glaucoma? Would Puckett’s legacy have been changed for some people if he’d been able to return from the fastball-to-the-face that he took in the last plate appearance of his career, but was never again capable of the play that made him a first-ballot Hall of Famer? I don’t know. Was the prevailing wisdom that Justin Morneau was done because his play ranged from mediocre to pretty good in the three years after his concussion? Yes, you and I both know the answer to that one. And as well as Morneau is playing right now, his statistics aren’t as good as in any of the seasons from 2006-10, when he was the league's MVP, an All-Star or both. I don’t know what’s ahead for Mauer. I do know that trying to find silver linings in this season is as ridiculous as using this season to say that he’ll never return to his previous form. I’ve heard a half-dozen theories of what Mauer should do, ranging from the insightful Dan Gladden to insight-impaired talk show participants who make me hit the radio button that takes me to old-school Hip Hop. It’s like that, and that’s the way it is. I’ve watched the comparisons of Mauer at age 31 to Puckett and Derek Jeter at age 31 – and I’m pretty sure those are intended to enrage the debaters more than to advance the discussion.