Minnesota Twins Trade Deadline Preview
By Jason Burke
Over the course of this trade deadline series, there have been numerous teams on the fence regarding whether they should be buyers or sellers at the deadline. Well, not the Minnesota Twins. After a rough start to the season the Twins just haven’t been able to put together a hot streak long enough to get them back in contention.
At 24-51, the Twins have the worst record in baseball and are currently seven games back of the Angels for the second-worst record in the AL, but just 1.5 games back of the second-worst record in baseball, trailing the Atlanta Braves.
The Twins long-time top prospect Byron Buxton has continued to struggle this season, batting .194 with a .233 OBP. He has improved a little bit since being called up at the end of May, batting .215 with his lone home run and seven of his nine RBI on the season coming in the last month.
Jose Berrios got a glimpse of the big leagues in his four starts, but struggled with the strike zone, earning a BB/9 rate of 7.2 over 15 innings.
Byung-ho Park leads the team in home runs with 12, and strikeouts with 78, even though Miguel Sano has struck out at a higher rate.
Those four players were expected to be a part of the revival in Minnesota this season, and with each of them having a hard time adjusting to the Major Leagues in the season’s first few months, the team finds themselves in the cellar.
As you can probably guess, with three of the aforementioned four players being bats in the lineup, their struggles have hurt the Twins offense overall, as the team ranks 24th in baseball in runs scored, just one run ahead of the Royals and A’s, and six ahead of the Rays in the AL.
On the pitching side, the Minnesota rotation ranks dead last in baseball in ERA with a 5.54, while Colorado is 29th at 5.23. The bullpen has performed better and is subsequently ranked higher, but not by much, with a 4.59 ERA, good for 27th.
One of the team’s biggest potential trade chips, closer Glen Perkins, is out for the season with a labrum injury, so even though the Twins are out of it, they don’t have a lot of big-name talent to ship off at the deadline.
The goal for this trade deadline should be to move players that don’t look like they have long-term futures with the club, freeing up spots on the roster for minor leaguers to showcase what they can do, or give some players an opportunity for a future with the club like they have with Robbie Grossman, giving the Twins a better idea of where they stand for future seasons while also trying to move some salary around to free the pocketbook up a little bit for upcoming free agents.
So without further ado, here is a look at some of the likely candidates to be on the move during the Twins fire sale, and some guesses as to where they could end up.
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