The coaching staff: Bruno and Butch

Tom Burnansky is
out as lead hitting
instructor.

On Monday, the Derek Falvey-Thad Levine duo indicated that they would decide the fate of the major league coaching staff within 72 hours. Turned out to be more like 24.

Two got the ax: hitting coach Tom Brunansky and first base coach-outfield/baserunning instructor Butch Davis.

Everybody else, including pitching coach Neil Allen, remains.

As is typical (and decent) in such moves, the decision makers are bland and non-specific about the reasons for the ousters. Which won't stop me from naming two reasons: Byron Buxton and Miguel Sano. Excuse the doggerel:

If the Twins get
where they want to go, 
the big reasons will be
Buck and Sano

Too many K's,
too many E's
too many pitches
fanning the breeze

Taking the fall
for Buck and Sano
a pair of coaches
Butch and Bruno

Brunansky had his success stories as a hitting coach. Brian Dozier, certainly. Kurt Suzuki hit better overall for the Twins than I would have expected. Robbie Grossman was surprisingly good at the plate,

But Sano regressed last year, and Buxton struggled overall, and they are, absolutely and without question, priorities 1 and 1A. Keith Law of ESPN said repeatedly in chats last summer that Buxton needed either a new organization or a new coaching staff. Buxton had a strong September, but there was a lot of tinkering going on during his repeated demotions and promotions.

If Chad Allen, who has been the hitting coach at Triple A Rochester the past couple years, gets Brunansky's position, his work with Buxton at that level will probably be a factor. No matter who is the hitting coach, better production from both Buxton and Sano is essential. They have to be better players in the future than they were in 2016.

As for Davis: The Twins outfield defense this year was awful, The Sano Experiment was a failure. As good as Grossman was at the plate, he essentially gave up the runs he created in the field. Even the center field-capable contingent -- Buxton, Max Kepler, Eddie Rosario and Danny Santana -- were prone to errors and misplays.

Blaming the instructors for the pupils' failures may be a bit unfair, but it's pretty common. Now Buxton and Sano will hear new voices.

Happy Buxton Day

Byron Buxton in spring training.
He wore 70 in Fort Myers this spring,
but he'll wear 25 now.

No sooner posted than said. A few hours after I noted the surge in anticipation of the arrival of Byron Buxton, the Twins announced his callup.

I am curious about how the Twins will make room for him. They had a spot on the 40 man roster availed after designating Tim Stauffer for assignment, so that's taken care of. Somebody currently on the 25-man roster has to make room.

Possibilities:

• Aaron Hicks, who missed Sunday's game with a suddenly sore elbow, might go on the disabled list. That, obviously, might hinge on what's wrong with his hinge.
• The Twins have an eight-man bullpen, as they have for weeks, and occasionally make noises about getting back down to seven relievers. The most likely targets for demotion/DFA there are Aaron Thompson and Brian Duensing, but they are the two lefties in the bullpen. Neither is faring well, but I doubt that Paul Molitor wants to go to one LOOGY.
• Shane Robinson, who has been an effective reserve outfielder, might be seen as superfluous with Buxton, Hicks and Eddie Rosario all on the roster. (They are all at least CF capable.)

I'll say this: There's no good reason to see Eduardo Escobar in left field now.

And an outfield with Buxton in center with Hicks and Rosario on the flanks -- I'd opt for Hicks in right and Rosario in left, but I won't argue it too strongly -- would really be a boon to the pitchers.

The team of the future

I sure didn't mind listening to the Twins-Gophers radio broadcast Wednesday night. I was even happy to hear Dan Gladden, although the charm will soon wear off, I'm sure.

The game itself didn't mean much other than as a lineup to dream on. Byron Buxton in center, Miguel Sano at third, Eddie Rosario in left field, J.O. Berrios on the mound.

I expect that those four will open the season at Double A Chattanooga. I wouldn't mind -- at all -- if any of them opened the season with Minnesota. That's not the way Terry Ryan prefers to operate, however.

Still, I have to believe that Buxton could hit a least .250 with top-shelf defense and 50-plus steals if the Twins just put him in center and let him go. And we should know by now that they aren't going to get anything close to that from Aaron Hicks, Jordan Schaefer or Shane Robinson. The Twins aren't going to burn a half-year or year of service time to develop him at the highest level, however. I know that.

It's just something to dream on. And wait on, for a while.

Byron Buxton on the young talent the #MNTwins have: "We all can't wait to play side-by-side in the bigs one day. That day is coming."
— Tyler Mason (@FSNtylermason) March 5, 2015

Yeah. I just wish it was here.

The Twins by position: Center field

Jordan Schafer hit .285 for the Twins
in the last two months of 2014.

If we ignore Danny Santana, who enters spring training a presumed shortstop, the Twins will open camp with three center fielders with multiple seasons of major league experience: Aaron Hicks, Shane Robinson and Jordan Schafer.

Hicks is 25 and a .201 career hitter in 538 plate appearances spread over two years.

Robinson, a non-roster invitee signed after the Cardinals let him go, is 30 and a .231 career hitter (five seasons, less that 500 plate appearances)

Schafer is 28 and a .229 hitter (five years and nearly 1,400 plate appearances).

You can draw up various platoon possibilities out of these three. Schafer is left-handed, Robinson right-handed, Hicks a switch hitter. You might still envision Hicks as a regular, although that notion is increasingly dubious. No matter how you deploy this group, you get inadequacy. These are, at best, bench guys,

The best center field talent in camp (and this is true even if we count Santana as a center fielder) are two prospects coming off disappointing 2014s and ticketed for Double A: Byron Buxton, who had repeated injuries, and Eddie Rosario, who served a 50-game drug suspension.

Despite his 2014 stall, I still believe that if the Twins simply handed the center field job to Buxton this spring and let him play all year, his floor is something like .260 with 10 homers, 30 steals and Gold Glove caliber defense (assuming, of course, that he stayed intact). Rosario would probably put up a better batting average but with fewer steals and lesser defense.

You know to a dead certainty that the three "major leaguers" aren't going to come near those numbers. Not a dead certainty, but close to it, is that the Twins front office won't let Buxton sniff the majors until the second half of the year at the earliest, and Rosario isn't going to be fast tracked either.

The Twins have reasons to slow play Buxton and Rosario. They would do better to look for reasons to play the kids, not to look for reasons to keep them in the minors. Let the kids play.

Eye on 2014: Center field

Aaron Hicks had some moments of athletic
brilliance in 2013, but the year as a whole was
a disaster for the rookie.

There will be two kinds of center fielders in the Twins spring training camp.

One kind is Bryon Buxton. The other kind are the placeholders, the ones whose longer term purpose is as bench guys or as a marginal corner outfielder.

The placeholder candidates for center field are Alex Presley, Aaron Hicks and, although he's not now on the 40-man roster, Darin Mastroianni.

A recent SB Nation piece — a real hype-feeder — suggests that Buxton could, right now, hit .260 in the majors, steal 30 bases and play Gold-Glove level defense. I am quite certain of the latter and regard the other two assertions as genuinely possible. And if those three projections are accurate, Buxton would be the best center fielder for 2014 the Twins have.

Even if true, that doesn't mean he should get the job. The problem, of course, is service time. Bring Buxton up now, and the service time clock starts ticking while he's still developing. Another year of seasoning and growth means that the Twins will get more bang for their buck when he arrives. Patience is not an easy sell, but it's still the wiser course.

Realistically, the spring battle is between Presley and Hicks. Hicks has the higher ceiling, but the mystery is: After last season's debacle, it's difficult to see what he can do in spring training to win the job.

Remember, Hicks had a sensational spring last year. Then the season started, and he. Didn't. Hit. And his game didn't get any better when the Twins sent him to Triple A. Even if he has a sensational spring this year, why would we buy into it?

Hicks has the higher ceiling, Presley the higher floor. My guess is that Presley will get the center field job to open the season. He'll hit leadoff, provide an empty batting average and mediocre defense and be easily shoved aside when the time comes for Buxton. Hicks should go to Triple A and earn his next shot.

Presley's role on a good team, at most, would be as a fourth or fifth outfielder, a bench guy. Mastroianni has the same ceiling, but at this point has to demonstrate that last season's ankle injuries haven't robbed him of his speed. Hicks could be, should be, a regular center fielder somewhere someday, but it won't be in Minnesota. He'll have to hit better than he has to be a center fielder, and a whole lot better to be a corner outfielder.

Top prospects shut down

The World Series is barely complete and free agency has just opened, but it appears that the winter baseball seasons for Byron Buxton and Miguel Sano are already over.

Buxton aggravated his strained shoulder, which kept him out of the Arizona Fall League for about a week earlier in the month. With just a week left in the AFL anyway, the centerfielder -- the No. 1 prospect in all of baseball by general consensus -- is unlikely to play again.

Sano appeared in just two games in the Dominican winter league, then injured his elbow. He returned to the states, was examined by the Twins doctors and then by the renowned Dr. James Andrews. The docs agree: Rest and rehab, no surgery.

I sometimes think, when looking at my Twitter feed and seeing a daily update of Buxton's or Sano's lines, that we wind up paying too much attention to the trees in this forest simply because we can. I'm not inclined to worry about these injuries. There's a long time to go between now and spring training, and the idea seems to be that rest will cure the ailments.

They're young, and they've been through a long minor league season (which, it must be granted, is shorter than a major league season). It's probably time for them both to have a break anyway.

Arizona dreaming

Byron Buxton at the Futures Game.  The 19-year-old will
play in the Arizona Fall League this year.

Any news involving Byron Buxton gets my attention, and so the announcement Tuesday that he will be among the seven Twins farmhands playing for the Glendale Desert Dogs in the Arizona Fall League caught my attention.

The MLB.com piece on the league rosters leads with Buxton, the consensus top prospect in the game. It also deems the AFL to be at a level between Double A and Triple A.

If so, that means Buxton, currently ripping it up in high A ball, is again being challenged -- which figures. He should be on the fast track.

But if he's being challenged with this assignment, what about Max Kepler, who missed the first half of the season with injury and has been somewhat less than dominant in low A? He too is going to the AFL. He's a good prospect, and he has some time to make up, but this is much faster company than he's used to.

It's interesting, too, that Kepler is listed on the roster as an infielder. In his case, that means first base. It hardly precludes some outfield time, but it makes me suspect (especially since the Desert Dogs manager will be Jeff Smith, the manager of the Twins Double-A affiliate) that the Twins want Kepler to focus on first base. (It may also be that there remains some concern about his elbow.)

Trevor May has
averaged more than
a strikeout an inning
this year in Double A.

Also on the roster: Eddie Rosario. Latin players aren't often assigned to the AFL; they more often play winter ball in their homeland (as will be the case with Miguel Sano in the Dominican). Rosario starred last winter in the Puerto Rican winter league. But he was also playing mostly outfield, and the Twins have had him playing second base. It may be that this assignment is rooted in the master plan of Rosario at the keystone.

Then there's the pitchers. The AFL teams are formed out of five different organizations, and typically each team sends one starting pitcher. The Twins are sending two starters: Alex Meyer, who missed much of the summer with a shoulder strain, and Trevor May. Meyer has innings to make up, so sending him is no surprise; May, on the other hand, is on his way to a 150-inning season. They are two of the organization's more prominent pitching prospects, and they're at an advanced level. The Twins would dearly love to see one of them emerge for next year's rotation.

Buxton, Meyer, Rosario, May and Kepler were all generally rated among the organization's top 10 prospects coming into 2013.

The Twins are also sending a pair of relievers, Zach Jones and A.J. Achter, each of whom have had strong seasons. (Achter has split the 2013 season between Double A and Triple A; Jones has been in high A.) As relievers, neither is ever likely to be prominent on prospect lists, but they are legit major-league possibilities.

Whither Aaron Hicks?

Here's a tangent not taken in the composition of  this week's Monday print column, which was devoted to the happy thought that Bryon Buxton might reach the majors as early as the middle of next season -- the Mike Trout timeline, if you will -- the tangent being, what would that mean for Aaron Hicks?

Hicks, currently nursing a bad hamstring on the disabled list, has had an undeniably rough go of a rookie year. His batting average remains well south of the Mendoza Line, and the walks and power have not been strong enough to overcome that.  The Twins have been patient with him in part because of a lack of perceived options in center field, but if Buxton is on the Trout timeline, that lack will soon be filled.

I think Hicks is/will be a better hitter than he's shown so far, that he'll eventually establish himself at an offensive level high enough to be a regular center fielder. I don't know that he's going to hit enough to justify being a regular corner outfielder.

It is at the least an interesting field of speculation, the makeup of the future Twins outfield. Oswaldo Arcia in one outfield corner, Buxton in center ... and maybe Hicks in the other corner. Arcia isn't much of a gloveman, but with Buxton and Hicks out there, Arcia wouldn't have to cover a lot of ground.

But for that to happen, Hicks is gonna have to hit. And I now think he has less time to do so than everybody thought a few weeks ago.

---

More on Buxton compared to Trout: the Cedar Rapids paper provides this stat matchup for the two outfielders through 64 games with the Kernels. (Trout, as noted in the print column linked to above, played 81 games with Cedar Rapids in 2011; Buxton has 64 and may not get to 65. The Midwest League all-star game is Tuesday, and speculation has had him moving on to Fort Myers after that.)

Best man hits second. It's coming. It's here.

During Monday's FSN telecast of the Cedar Rapids Kernels game -- aka the Byron Buxton Show -- the studio boys spent some time talking about batting order position in the context of Buxton, who has been used strictly in the leadoff slot this year. Is he a leadoff man in the future, or a No. 3 hitter?

Tom Kelly's response combined common sense (basically, we don't really know yet what form his talents are going to take) and the outdated ("You don't want to hit him second").

Well. I suppose TK can't really be expected to be keeping up with always-evolving managerial strategies, but I'm comfortable with making this assertion: In five years, it will be as much the norm for teams to slot their best hitter second as it is now for teams to reserve their best reliever for save situations. And it will make a lot more sense.

There's resistance to this change, but it's already taking place, with the Twins and elsewhere. (Jim Margalus of the South Side Sox blog did a nice job this week dissecting the Hawk Harrelson-Steve Stone ridicule of the Blue Jays for hitting Jose Bautista second.) Ron Gardenhire went away from hitting Joe Mauer second for a couple of series, then switched back, presumably because he discovered that, yep, he was losing games while Brian Dozier got more at-bats than Mauer.

I don't know today who will be the Twins' best hitter five years from now. It might be Buxton. It might be Miguel Sano. Possibly it will be Oswaldo Arcia; it might even be a 35-year-old Mauer, although that seems unlikely given expected decline with age and the sheer talent coming up.

But I guarantee you: The expectation by then will be that the best hitter hits second.

A game in Cedar Rapids, Part I: Bryon Buxton

How fast is Bryon Buxton? He was out of the camera
frame before the bat landed in his first at-bat Monday.
(Photos by Linda Vanderwerf)

Last week, in taking note of a dramatic game-ending grand slam by prized Twins prospect Byron Buxton, I said I'd better get a move on if I'm going to see him play for Cedar Rapids this year, because he might be promoted quickly to Fort Myers.

And so it was that I essentially burned two days off — Sunday and Monday — to see one minor league game. Monday afternoon, the Kane County Cougars (Cubs affiliate) at Cedar Rapids.

I have plenty of observations to make from that game, and I'll dole them out over the next few days, but today's post will be about Buxton, because he was the big reason for the trip.

Buxton homered in his second at-bat, a majestic fly ball that flew over everything in left field. That was his only hit in five trips to the plate. He struck out twice, reached on an error and was retired on a grounder to third.

Byron Buxton awaits a pitch.

And he made two magnificent catches in center field. In the first inning, Kane County's Gioskar Amaya drove a ball to deep center. Buxton made the catch with his back to the infield and hit the fence on his next step. The impact knocked him down, but he got up quickly.

In the ninth, Pin-Chieh Chen drove a liner to left-center. Buxton made a diving catch just before the ball found the grass.

(I was sitting right behind the Kernels dugout. Kernels coach Tommy Watkins had been moving left fielder J.D. Williams toward center on Chen, then had him move two steps back toward the foul line. After Buxton's catch, Watkins,who spent the game on the top step of the dugout, turned around  and said with a grin to somebody inside the dugout: I moved him back because he was crowding Buck.)

Tom Kelly has said that Buxton is the fastest player he's ever seen, and I saw some of that in play Monday. He hit a one-hopper in the first inning right at the third baseman, and the throw only got him by a step at first base.

Buxton led off the fifth. He tried a bunt and fouled it off but ran it out as if to show us all how fast he is and how easily that speed comes. He followed with a soft grounder to short; the shortstop charged the ball and juggled it trying to make a rapid exchange from glove to throwing hand, and Buxton was safe. It was ruled an error, and I suppose that, had the shortstop made the play perfectly, he would have been out. I suppose. It certainly would have been a close play. I'm convinced: There is no such thing as a routine groundball out to the left side with Buxton.

Having reached first, he stole second base easily. He then came around on a pair of ground outs.

Bryon Buxton, top Appy League prospect

Byron Buxton takes batting practice in Target Field after
signing his Twins contract.

On Tuesday, Baseball America named Byron Buxton -- the outfielder the Twins took with the No. 2 overall pick in June's draft -- the top prospect in the Gulf Coast League.

On Wednesday, BA named Buxton the top prospect in the Appalachian League.

This two-fer was no surprise; rookie league stats are secondary to the lifestyle change these young players are experiencing. Buxton's athletic gifts didn't change, and as the consensus best talent in the 2012 draft pool, he was bound to be the best prospect in the Rookie leagues he played in.

Note that Bubba Starling of the Kansas City Royals organization was No. 3 on BA's list. Starling was the sixth overall pick in 2011, a draft class regarded as much deeper than the 2012 one. Starling perhaps went as "low" as sixth overall because he had signed to play quarterback at Nebraska, and he wound up being drafted by, and signing with, his hometown team in Kansas City. (Sounds a bit like Joe Mauer, right?) BA in 2011 regarded Starling as one of six legitimate possibilities for the No. 1 overall choice. 

There were Buxton-Starling comps leading up to the 2012 draft, and this ranking suggests that, while it's close, Buxton rates better. But, again, it's Rookie-level ball.

Unlike the GCL, the Twins had a second player in the Appy League top 20 -- another outfielder, Max Kepler. Kepler was repeating the Appy League, but he was still only 19, and he blossomed, showing signs of turning his athletic talent into skills.

A number of players who started out at the GCL and moved up to the Appy League, such as Twins pitcher J.O. Berrios (first pick in the supplemental round) and Houston shortstop Carlos Correa (first pick overall) didn't make BA's playing time requirements to be listed in the Appy League rankings. I suspect Berrios didn't qualify for either GCL or Appy, having worked a total of 30 innings split almot evenly between the two leagues. I can't see that this diminishes his status at all.

Draft day: Evening edition -- Buxton over Appel

Byron Buxton during a showcase game last summer.

I am acutely aware of the limitations of my knowledge of amateur prospects. I'm not a scout, so I have no first-hand observations of Bryon Buxton or Carlos Correa or Mark Appel to rely on. Unlike John Sickels or the crew at Baseball America, I don't talk to scouts or scouting directors, so I don't have second-hand information. I can offer nothing more than third-hand opinions.

That said: The Twins' choice of Buxton with the second overall pick Monday evening pleased me. The scouting consensus isn't always right, but he was/is widely regarded as the top talent in this draft field. (I have a suspicion that Correa may prove the better player, but that was out of the Twins' hands when Houston made Correa 1-1.)

That the Twins passed on Appel didn't disturb me at all (it apparently does Joe Christensen, who tweeted repeatedly in the wake of the pick that the Twins have zero top-of-the-rotation prospects). My reading of the information on Appel (and the other top collegiate pitchers) does not suggest that any of them are destined to be the next Justin Verlander.

That Appel fell to eighth suggests another issue: He is a Scott Boras client, and Boras has been known to hold inflated bonus expectations. Buxton was said by the Twins to have been at the top of their draft board since last summer, but Appel's chances of being their pick may have died the night Boras sat in Terry Ryan's suite last month.

The draft rules have changed sharply from the recent past, and the penalties for overpaying to sign propects are steep enough that it's hard to imagine anybody exceeding their alloted budget. And the penalty for not signing a pick is also painful.

Appel and Boras, I think, overplayed their hand leading up to the draft. The pitcher was taken by a team (Pittsburgh) whose TOTAL budget -- for 10 rounds -- is less than the money slotted for the first or second overall pick. Somebody is going to come out of those negotiations unhappy.