By Tom Schreier
You don’t want to ever press the button just on something for jolt consideration.
— Twins manager Paul Molitor, 6/13/15
Following a 20-win May, the Minnesota Twins were reeling and needed a boost. Paul Molitor has already worked his magic after a 1-6 start which included a 12-3 loss to the Kansas City Royals on Opening Day, and top prospect Byron Buxton was knocking on the major league door, hitting .283/.351/.489 with more triples (12) than doubles (7) at Double-A Chattanooga. The team had lost five straight, falling behind the Royals for the division lead and appeared to be in yet another tailspin. The team needed something to help turn things around.
It was time.
The team believed in itself following Molitor’s speech at the beginning of the season, they felt that they could be anybody on any given night. Mike Pelfrey and Kyle Gibson looked like ace pitchers, Trevor Plouffe was driving anything that came near the strike zone, and Torii Hunter had the team dancing the night away after every win.
But like the a smoke machine and lasers that covered up everyone but Hunter’s terrible dancing, the early season success of Pelfrey and Gibson, as well as Plouffe’s hot streak might have overshadowed other problems the Twins had even though the team was winning. Joe Mauer is hitting around .400 with runners in scoring position, but had otherwise pedestrian numbers at first base. Phil Hughes is off to a slow start after a career year last year. And Kurt Suzuki is hitting more like he did in Washington and Oakland after making the All Star team for the first time in his career last year.
It’s not as though all is lost with the Twins. In fact, it’s positive that Byron Buxton will join a decently complete team — or at least one with rising stars in place — rather than be asked to change the team’s fortunes all by himself. He, along with players like Miguel Sano, Jose Berrios and Alex Meyer (before he was sent to the bullpen), is a top prospect who is expected to not only halt the team’s recent losing streak, but help Minnesota snap out of a culture of losing that has come as a result of four straight 90-loss seasons.
Prospects always bring promise, but it can’t be overlooked that Brian Dozier, an eighth round selection in 2009, has turned himself into a solid defensive second baseman with power at the plate. Or that Plouffe, a first round pick in 2004, has made great strides defensively at third and is one of the best hitters in the league when he’s on. Or that Aaron HIcks has showed signs of turning it around, and that Eddie Rosario has played well since his call-up.
This isn’t a Hicks situation all over again where he joins an inept lineup, is expected to leadoff and play center right away, continues to get playing time in the majors despite his struggles, and ultimately take multiple steps backwards before beginning to make progress in the majors. This is more like Trevor May getting to start and shake off the nerves in meaningless games last year, then earn a rotation spot in Spring Training and enjoy success in his second season with the team. Buxton should be able to build confidence at this level because the pressure isn’t all on him to turn the Twins into a winner again.
Make no mistake, however, the Twins have used up one of their limited electrical charges. They still have the call-ups of Sano and Berrios to use in order to provide an influx of fans into the stands and shake up the clubhouse, but Sano appears to be a ways out and Berrios is a pitcher, so he won’t have an everyday impact on the crowds. Molitor made it clear that the team wasn’t making this move just to try and get the team out of its recent losing streak. “The last thing we want to do is force a kid into something he’s not ready for,” he said on Saturday. “We’ve done that a few times here, and guys have had to pay the consequences of either going back or growing pains and all those things.”
That line of thinking is correct, because obviously a poorly-handled call-up can backfire in ways that outweigh initial rush of having a top prospect join the major league team. Everyone kind of knew Hicks was getting the call after Minnesota traded Ben Revere and Denard Span in 2013, but when he struggled at the plate as a leadoff hitter and took poor routes in the field, fans immediately soured on him, and his development was hampered because he was overwhelmed in the big leagues.
Buxton was ready, or at least the team thinks so, and there’s no reason to hold back a player that went No. 2 overall three years ago. He and Sano were dubbed the Glimmer Twins by Sports Illustrated in 2013, and there’s no reason to hold back special talent. Eventually even the best players have to prove they can produce in the big leagues, and holding a player back only leads to speculation that something is wrong. Buxton was seriously injured in an on-field collision on August of 2014, of course, which delayed his arrival to the big leagues, but even though he’s only 21 years old, the expectation is that once-in-a-generation talents like him will make their debuts at an early age. Mike Trout and Bryce Harper debuted at 19; Mauer, like Buxton, reached the majors at 21.
The Twins like to build from within, and rightfully so. They are a mid-market team that traditionally has had a great farm system, they have plenty of talent at Double-A, and they can’t — or aren’t willing to — spend like the New York Yankees, Boston Red Sox or Los Angeles Dodgers. Last year they tried to boost a 29-31 club that was five games back in the AL Central by signing Kendrys Morales, with general manager Terry Ryan exclaiming, “Why not the Twins?” But the team fell out of contention shortly after the acquisition, and Morales ended up being dealt to Seattle towards the end of the season.
Looking back on it, Ryan says that he would do it again, but he’s upset the line took a life of its own. “I guess I better be careful about what I say,” he said recently when asked who the ‘Why not us?’ player would be this year. “I don’t know, it seemed like the appropriate approach. Everybody was questioning ‘How come he signed here?’ I said, ‘Why not us?’ Well, it stuck.”
Ryan should have no regrets, the Twins need some swagger again, and that should come from the top. Even after all the losing, Ryan trusts his men to draft the right players and develop them into stars. He doesn’t really like making a splash in free agency, and knows that the team doesn’t get the kind of revenue that the Yankees, Red Sox or Dodgers receive. And really, who can blame him after Ricky Nolasco’s tough start to his Twins career and Ervin Santana’s 80-game suspension for failing a performance-enhancing drug test?
The Twins should be built from within — like the St. Louis Cardinals, they are a mid-size market team with a rabid fan base — and therefore their “blockbuster acquisitions” should come from within the system. Class AA Chattanooga is filled to the brim with talent, and calling up a prospect is less costly (of course). And unlike Morales when he signed, the Twins can option their young players back to Triple-A for a fine-tuning like they have done with Kennys Vargas, Danny Santana and Oswaldo Arcia this year. It might not be as sexy to call up a player as it is to get one through trade or free agency, but it should work out better.
The Los Angeles Angels spent big money to get Josh Hamilton and Albert Pujols, and look how that worked out for them — they can’t make the playoffs even with Mike Trout on their team. The lesson there? It’s better to be the Cardinals than the Angels, as winning free agency goes only so far. The Twins have a long way to go in becoming the model franchise they once were, but having Buxton join a good team with a winning record is the first step in the right direction.
Tom Schreier writes for 105 The Ticket’s Cold Omaha. Tune into The Wake Up Call every Sunday at 8:00 am to hear the crew break down this week in Minnesota sports.