Minor (league) stuff

Byron Buxton, the consensus top prospect in the minors.

The games resume today! The games resume today!

But before that:

Prospect rankings: A couple of notable prospect watchers delivered their revised mid-season top prospects lists Thursday.

Keith Law of ESPN put Bryon Buxton No.1 and Miguel Sano No. 4. Law also ranked new first-round pick Kohl Stewart No. 30, Alex Meyer 38 and Eddie Rosario 41. Law's midseason list goes to 50, so the Twins represent 10 percent of it.

Law, unlike Baseball America (whose midseason list I discussed here), included new draftees in this ranking. Stewart has barely pitched in pro ball (three games and eight innings in the GCL), so ranking him ahead of Meyer seems a bit aggressive, but we know he's talented.

John Sickels' list goes to 75, and, like Baseball America, doesn't include the 2013 draft class. He puts Buxton No. 1 and Sano No. 3 (mirroring BA's ranking to that extent at least). He has Meyer at 51 and Rosario at 56.

Tonkin back in minors: A week ago I speculated on ways the Twins could make room for relief prospect Michael Tonkin. They didn't bother; when Caleb Thielbar came off the bereavement list, Tonkin was returned to Rochester.

He'll be back. I understand the reluctance to (potentially) prematurely drop one of the current pitchers; I'm also quite certain that Tonkin is going to be a significant bullpen arm in the near future, and I suspect he'd be an immediate improvement over Josh Roenicke.