With 144 votes cast in the run-off for Prospect #18, Jeff Manship accumulated 74 votes (51%) with B. J. Hermsen receiving 70 votes (48%).  Jeff Manship is our 18th prospect with B. J. Hermsen Number 19.  Congratulations to both Jeff and B. J!

Holdovers from the last round for Prospect Number 20 are Tyler Robertson, Rob Delaney and Trevor Plouffe.  New additions who appear for the first time are Elizabethton pitcher Tom Stuifbergen and New Britain infielder Steven Singleton.  Returning from previous rounds are closer Billy Bullock, starter Michael McCardell and Dominican signee, Jorge Polanco.

As usual, your comments on players for future rounds will be appreciated.

Continue reading this post »

It is good to be back in Minnesota.  Left Denver yesterday morning at 4:45 am and drove non stop to the Twin Cities.  Not certain I want to do that again in the near future. 

With 184 votes cast for prospect 18, Jeff Manship is the leader with 58 votes (31%) with B. J. Hermsen in a near tie with 56 votes (30%).  Thus, there will be a runoff vote for Prospect 18 with the loser taking our 19th slot. 

With three players well under the 5% requirement, Brian Dinkelman, Luke Hughes and Matt Bashore, we will need five new prospects for the twentieth spot tomorrow.  Your comments will be appreciated.

With 98 votes cast for our seventeenth best prospect, Alex Burnett was a clear winner with 38 votes (38%).  Jeff Manship was second with 22 votes, while B. J. Hermsen was only a vote behind Manship in third place.  Congratulations to Alex Burnett who made remarkable progress in his first season as a short reliever.

Steven Tolleson, Wander Guillen and Michael McCardell didn't receive five per cent of the votes cast.  The four players added to the voting for Prospect #18 will include two players who have not appeared in this voting prior to this round, Matt Bashore and Brian Dinkelman.  Re-appearing in this round will be former first round pick Trevor Plouffe and lefty starter, Tyler Robertson.

I will be driving back to the Twins Cities tomorrow from Denver and will be unable to post the next round, thus, voting for prospect number 18 will remain open until 3pm, Tuesday, December 22nd.  

We are now reaching the part of this process where there could be many equally qualified candidates to add to each round.  Thus, your suggestions of who you would like to see added is more important than ever, Thanks! 

Continue reading this post »

With 103 votes cast for Prospect #16, Joe Benson led the way with 44 votes (42%).  Congratulations Joe!  Alex Burnett was a clear second choice with 23 votes (22%).

Jorge Polanco received only one vote while Tyler Robertson had three.  Michael McCardell and Steve Tolleson both received only four votes which fell short of the five percent cutoff.  Because we don't want to replace more than three players in each round, both McCardell and Tolleson will remain on the ballot for round 17.

Added to the group for the next round are two players who are on the 40-man roster, top reliever Rob Delaney and power hitting third baseman Luke Hughes.  We have had two sixteen year olds already selected, neither who has yet played their first inning of professional baseball.  The third player added to the next round is another sixteen year old.  However this young man, Wander Guillen, led the DSL Twins in hitting this past summer. 

As we begin to get into the middle rounds of this process, your suggestions as to which players should be considered for future rounds remains extremely helpful.  I am not certain of my schedule for tomorrow, thus, the cutoff may be somewhat later than 3pm CST. 

Continue reading this post »

Good morning from balmy Denver.  Hey, it has been over 50 degrees every day since our arrival on Wednesday.

The only Twins transaction this week was the announcement that they received relief pitcher Chris Province as compensation for Boof Bonser.  Most reports indicate that Province has a very good sinker, but needs to work on a second pitch to have a legitimate chance at a major league career.  Province, who is the all-time saves leader at Southeast Louisiana University, had a 2-4 record with 1 save, 2.60 ERA, 1.31 WHIP and 55K/32BB at AA Portland (Eastern League) last summer.  He allowed only three home runs in 79.2 innings.   

Province, who was on the same Mesa AFL team this fall as the Twins prospects, had a 0-2 record and 2 saves in 13.0 innings with a 3.46 ERA and 9K/5BB.

It was also reported that Philip Humber signed with the Kansas City Royals.  That means that Deolis Guerra is the lone remaining prospect from the Santana trade...not including John Rauch and J.J. Hardy who were obtained in trades for Kevin Mulvey and Carlos Gomez.     

Continue reading this post »

In the previous round, Carlos Gutierrez led Adrian Salcedo by only three votes.  This tight finish caused another runoff in which 124 votes were cast.  As of our 3pm cutoff, Carlos Gutierrez had 62 votes as did Adrian Salcedo.  Thus, they will finish in our first tie, for fourteenth place.  Congratulations to both Carlos and Adrian!

We now move on to voting for the Sixteenth best prospect in the Twins system.  By virtue of only receiving three votes combined in the last round, Danny Rams and Billy Bullock will be dropped from this round.  The four players added for voting are:  Tyler Robertson, Steven Tolleson, Michael McCardell and Jorge Polanco, who is another sixteen year from the Dominican Republic who was signed this past summer.

Your suggestions for players to be added to future rounds continue to be needed. 

Continue reading this post »

With 123 votes cast, Carlos Gutierrez led Adrian Salcedo 34-31.  With only a three vote difference, we will have another run off with the winner designated as our 14th Top Prospect and the loser Number 15.

The two players added to this round, Danny Rams and Billy Bullock had only three votes total.  I am tentatively planning on replacing them in the next round with Tyler Robertson and Steven Tolleson.  Robertson had been a very high prospect two years ago before an arm injury cost him the end of his 2008 season.  He returned with a solid performance last season.  Tolleson has been one of the organization's better middle infield prospects and was added to the 40-man roster a year ago. 

We will need four new prospects in the next round.  Please let me know if a lot of you disagree with Robertson and Tolleson.  Also, who is someone else that you passionately want added in the next or future rounds.

In the runoff for Prospect Number 12, Anthony Slama held a lead throughout the voting with 51 votes (58%).  Max Kepler-Rozycki picked up 36 (41%) of the 87 votes cast.  Congratulations to Anthony and Max!

We now move on to the fourteenth round.  All of the other six players in the twelfth round had over 5% of the vote and will be included in this round.  A few names have been mentioned frequently in the last several rounds, including Tyler Robertson and hard throwing short reliever Billy Bullock.  A few of you also mentioned that the last round was nearly all pitchers.  If I add the two mentioned above, this round would include seven pitchers.  Therefore, we will be adding Billy Bullock and a catcher who has been mentioned several times recently, Danny Rams. 

Three players that I would like to hear some feedback on for future rounds are all thought of highly by the Twins as they are on their 40-man roster.  Do many of you think it is time to take another look at Trevor Plouffe or Estarlin De Los Santos?  Steven Tolleson is also on the 40-man roster and hasn't been included in any round as of yet.  Your thoughts on adding Tolleson please?  Please comment on these three as well as others you believe should be soon added.

The Top thirteen prospects in Twinkie Town voting are:  1) Miguel Jean; 2) Aaron Hicks; 3) Wilson Ramos; 4) Kyle Gibson; 5) Ben Revere; 6) Danny Valencia; 7) Angel Morales; 8) David Bromberg; 9) Rene Tosoni; 10) Deolis Guerra; 11) Chris Parmelee; 12) Anthony Slama; and 13) Max Kepler-Rozycki.  

Greetings Twins fans from central Nebraska.  What a round we had today!  With a total of 318 votes cast for Prospect #12, Anthony Slama held a slim 9 vote lead (57-48) over Max Kepler-Rozycki.  That falls within the 3% margin, thus we will have a runoff to determine the twelfh and thirteenth prospects in this year's poll.

I'm not certain when I will be arriving in Denver, thus, tomorrow's cutoff may again be a bit later in the evening.  With everyone in today's voting getting over 5%, they all will be included in the voting for Prospect #14 tomorrow.  Please continue to let us know who you prefer for the two open slots in the next round.

In our second run-off of the season, Deolis Guerra beat Chris Parmelee for the Tenth position in this year's poll.  Guerra had 75 votes (55%) of the 135 votes cast.  Parmelee had 60 votes (45%) to finish in the eleventh position of the 2010 Top 50.  Congratulations to Deolis and Chris!

In the voting for Prospect #10, all of the players scored more than five percent of the total votes cast and will be included in round twelve.  We will bring back two players who had appeared in previous rounds for round 12, Anthony Slama and Max Kepler-Rozycki.

Please continue with your suggestions for future rounds in the comments section.  In another note, I will be travelling tomorrow afternoon.  I expect I won't be arriving until 8-9pm, thus, today's poll will stay open until that time.  The next poll will be posted later tomorrow evening.  Thanks!  

Continue reading this post »