Mini Profile of Twins 11th round MLB Draft pick: LHP Taylor Rogers

The Twins with their 11th round pick (#340 overall) in the 2012 MLB Draft select LHP Taylor Rogers from U Kentucky.

Here is his MLB.com scouting video, here his profile and here his statistics












Here are videos:











You can find mini-profiles for all Twins' picks of the 2012 MLB Draft here

Mini Profile of Twins 10th round MLB Draft pick: RHP Douglas (DJ) Baxendale

The Twins with their 10th round pick (#310 overall) in the 2012 MLB Draft select RHP Douglas (DJ) Baxendale from University of Arkansas, Fayettesville.  He is a starting pitcher.

Here is his MLB.com scouting report, here are his stats, here is his official profile and here is an interview video.  Here is an additional video





Here are videos:






You can find mini-profiles for all Twins' picks of the 2012 MLB Draft here .

Mini Profile of Twins 9th round MLB Draft pick: LJ Mazzilli 2B

The Twins with their 9th round pick (#280 overall) in the 2012 MLB Draft select 2B Lee J Mazzilli, son of Lee Mazzilli, from University of Connecticut.  Mazzilli was considered the best position player prospect in the whole Big East Conference.

Here is his UConn profile,  here is an article from Hartford Courant and here is an article from the UConn newspaper.  Here are his stats.







Here are videos:
















You can find mini-profiles for all Twins' picks of the 2012 MLB Draft here

Mini Profile of Twins 8th round MLB Draft pick: RHP Christian Powell

The Twins with their 8th round pick (#250 overall) in the 2012 MLB Draft select  Christian Powell RHP from College of Charleston.  Good mid 90s Fastball, his breaking ball and changeup are works in progress.  6'5" frame.  He is a starting pitcher

Here is an article on him, here is his University profile and here are his statistics.




Here are videos:

Mini Profile of Twins 7th round MLB Draft pick: Jorge Fernandez C

The Twins with their 7th round pick (#220 overall) in the 2012 MLB Draft select  Jorge Fernandez C from Colegio Hector Urdaneta High School in Puerto Rico.  Tall (6'3") and skinny (165 lbs) for a catcher.  Also plays CF.  Committed to Alabama State.

Here is his perfect game profile (with 4 videos)  Another profile is here


You can find mini-profiles for all Twins' picks of the 2012 MLB Draft here

 







.

Mini Profile of Twins 6th round MLB Draft pick: LHP Andre Martinez

The Twins with their 6th round pick (#190 overall) in the 2012 MLB Draft select  LHP Andre Martinez from Archbishop McCarthy HS in FL

Here is his MLB scouting video, here is his Perfect Game profile page.  He has signed with Florida State University.




Here are videos:







.

Mini Profile of Twins 5th round MLB Draft pick: RHP Tyler Duffey

The Twins with their 5th round pick (#160 overall) in the 2012 MLB Draft select RHP Tyler Duffey from Rice University.

Here is his Rice Profile, here are his statistics





Here are videos.

Mini Profile of Twins 4th round MLB Draft pick: RHP Zack Jones

The Twins with their 4th round pick (130 overall) in the 2012 MLB Draft, select RHP Zack Jones from San Jose State University

Zach has both started and relieved, projects as a reliever and can throw at mid 90s.  Here is his MLB Network scouting video.  Here are his statistics and here is his SJSU profile




Here are videos:




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Mini Profile of Twins 3rd round MLB Draft pick: Adam Walker

The Twins with their 3rd round pick (97th overall) in the 2012 MLB Draft, select Adam Bret Walker II, RF from Jacksonville University.

Adam Walker is one of the best power prospects in the draft. Here is his profile from Jacksonville University. Here are his statistics and here is his MLB Network scouting report.




Here are videos:

Mini Profile of Twins second 2nd round MLB Draft pick: RHP JT Chargois

The Twins with their second 2nd round pick in the 2012 MLB Draft, select RHP J.T Chargois from Rice University.

He throws hard and projects as a closer. Also a 1st baseman.  Here is his profile from Rice.  Here is a scouting report, here is another report after his Cape Code League appearance. Here are his stats.






Here are videos:

Mini-profile of the Twins first 2nd round 2012 MLB Draft pick: Mason Melotakis

With their first 2nd round pick (63rd overall) of the 2012 MLB Draft, the Twins select Mason Melotakis a LHP from Northwest State.


94-96 mph FB with good slider project as a RP.   Here are his stats Here is his MLB scouting video and here is a story on Melotakis before the draft



Here are videos:

Random Tuesday Twins Thoughts and Tidbits

Here is this week's installment; and it is going to be slight, because of the Draft today and tomorrow:

• The Twins selected Byron Buxton (OF, HS), Jose Berrios (RHP, HS) and Luke Bard (RHB, College) in the 1st and supplemental rounds of the 2012 Rule 4 Draft. Today will be the second day of live-blogging the Twins Draft. You can find all coverage, including mini-profiles of the draftees here
• The Twins are now 13-7 in their last 20 games. This is good news.
• Former Twins' OF Lew Ford, 35, is hitting .397/.441/.619 with 3 HRs in 68 PAs with Baltimore's AAA club Norfolk Tides
• A few Minor league transaction notes: Daryl Thompson and Brad Thompson (AAA and AA) have been released. Bruce Pugh was promoted to AA New Britain from Fort Myers and newly signed St Paul Saints' closer Dan Sattler has been assigned to Fort Myers.
• The Twins' Dominican Summer League team saw action last Saturday. So this gives a fifth Twins' minor league team to pay attention to. Also, I updated the the Twins organization birthday list with the newest Twins who are playing the the DSL.
• Beloit's AJ Achter, Jhon Goncalves, Tyler Grimes, Eddie Rosario, Miguel Sano, Michael Tonkin and Jason Wheeler made the Midwest League All Star game
• Ben Badler of Baseball America is writing of high profile arrests in Dominican because of trafficing of Baseball players
• Tom Veducci wrote this very interesting article on steroid use by Fort Myers Miracle players in the mid 90s, when current Twins' third base coach, Steve Liddle was the manager there.
• The Twins' product of the week is the Minnesota Twins Beach Towel

The parting shot today is of Twins' number one draft pick of the 2012 MLB Draft, Byron Buxton:

Mini Profile of Twins 2nd supplemental round MLB Draft pick: RHP Luke Bard

The Twins with their 2nd supplemental round pick in the 2012 MLB Draft, select RHP Luke Bard, the brother of Boston's pitcher Daniel Bard, from Georgia Tech University.

Here is his profile from Georgia Tech and here is his MLB.com scouting profile



Here are some videos:

Mini Profile of Twins 1st supplemental round MLB Draft pick: Jose Berrios

The Twins with their 1st supplemental round pick in the 2012 MLB Draft, select P Jose Orlando Berrios from the Papa Juan 13th High School in Bayamon, Puerto Rico.  The same High School of current Twins' Catcher Rene Rivera

Here is his Perfect Game Profile and here is his MLB.com scouting report

Here are videos of Jose Berrios:

Here is a video of his reaction to being drafted by the Twins

Mini Profile of Twins 1st round MLB Draft pick: Byron Buxton

The Twins with their 1st round pick in the 2012 MLB Draft, select OF Byron Buxton from Appling County High School in Baxley, GA.

Here is his perfect game profile and here is a story by ESPN.  And this is the story in the official Twins' site.  Here is the FSNorth story on the pick

Byron Baxton twitter is @ByronBaxton1




The following are videos of Byron Buxton:



















Here is his reaction and the MLB Network analysis after he was selected by the Twins:

Minus Ten minutes to the Astros' pick

All indications are that the Houston Astros will select Mark Appel with the number 1 pick.

The word is that the Twins will select High School Outfielder Byron Buxton with the second overall pick.

We will see in minutes.

Covering the Twins 2012 MLB Draft

It has been pretty much a tradition at The Tenth Inning Stretch to live blog the MLB rule 4 Draft from the Twins' perspective.   I will cover every single pick all 3 days of the draft

I will follow what I did in 2010, which is:

Live draft coverage on each day of the draft, both with live blogging and on twitter. I will tweet each pick as happens, then I will blog details about the player including scouting reports, projections, videos etc, in this space. You can follow me on twitter @thrylos98, or you can come here and refresh the page often. My tweets will appear on the left hand side of the page, as always. I will do a single post with the details of each draftee.

At the end of the draft, I will have the reactions of the players drafted, about being drafted by the Twins and also have more detailed profiles of the new Twins, as they sign.  These profiles would be very similar to my top 22 pitcher profiles I did before the draft.

To see the individual profiles in 2010 (and the reactions piece on top) so you have an idea of what the coverage will be like, they are all at this link.

All the 2012 MLB Draft picks, profiles and related posts (including this one) will be at this link .  Not that I will be blogging much else during the draft, but that link is 2012 Draft exclusive content.

A reminder about what this draft includes: The Rule 4 Draft, or the First-Year Player Draft (all those 3 things are synonyms), includes players who are residents of the U.S., Canada and U.S. territories such as Puerto Rico, U.S. Virgin Islands, American Samoa, Guam, Northern Mariana Islands and Minor Outlying Islands. Residents of other countries are not subject to the Rule 4 Draft, but are signed as free agents either when they are young (the majority of Latin American, European, African and Australian players) or when are established (the majority of Japanese players.) Free agents have the ability to negotiate with each team and actually, depending on the perceived value of a player, induce a bidding war for their services. Thus, a lot of Cuban refugees do not take residence in the U.S. or a territory, so they will not be subjected to the amateur draft, but take residence in a Latin American country like Bolivia or Mexico. The minor league draft is a way for organizations to restock their systems.

With the new Collective Bargaining Agreement, each pick in the draft has a bonus ceiling.  The sum of those bonus ceilings is the maximum a team can spend in the draft (bonus allotment).  There are severe penalties for surpassing their bonus allotment, including fines and losses of future 1st round draft picks.  So most teams will stay tight within their allotment.  However, a team like the Twins can sign their first round pick to a $5.7 million bonus instead of the allotted $6.2 and have an extra $500K to spend in another pick.  Because of all the supplemental picks and the fact that are picking second in every round (but the second where they are picking third because of the Willingham signing), the Twins have the highest bonus allotment in the draft with $12,368,200.

 Another housekeeping item:  I have been re-posting a lot of the content here at the Twins Daily site also, a great site, btw, make sure you join and participate.  A can't miss for every Twins' fan.  Because of the time urgency (and because I do not want to clutter their site with 25 posts a day), I will be live blogging the Twins 2012 MLB Draft only at The Tenth Inning Stretch.  Might post some summary posts there after all is settled later next week.

Profiles of the Top 22 Pitchers for the 2012 MLB Draft (Bonus) : Mitch Brown

With the Twins having a severe need for pitching in the organization as well as six picks among the top 100, it is certain that more than one of those picks (and probably the second overall pick) will be used to draft a pitcher. To this respect, I am presenting profiles of the top 22 pitching prospects for the 2012 MLB draft.

I have been presenting these alphabetically, and at the end I will rank them.  I will be doing about one a day and I will finish before the June 4th draft day. You can find all the profiles (in reverse alphabetical order) as they are presented here.  I will start with RJ Alvarez and end with Kyle Zimmer.  Each profile with contain a bit of background information and statistics, a mini scouting report and videos and photos. Because Mitch Brown is local, and the Twins have been linked with him, and there is a good possibility that they might select him in the supplementary or second round, I am presenting his profile, in addition to the other 22.

Profile 23: Mitch Brown

Profile/Stats:

Mitchell Brown is a senior at Century High School in Rochester, MN. He committed to play for the University of San Diego. He is listed at 6'2" and 210 lbs. He was born on April 13, 1994 . He throws right-handed. Mitch is also playing the infield, but will be drafted as a pitcher. His father is a former Korean power lifter. You can find a web page with a lot of information on Mitch here. In 2012 he is 7-1 with 0.91 ERA and 103 strikeouts in 58 innings. Here is a recent 'CCO story and a video by Mark Rosen on Mitch Brown. He was recently named Minnesota Gatorade player of the year and this is a great story on him, by Tyler Mason.

Mini Scouting Report:

Mitch Brown throws an above average Fastball that sits in the low nineties and reportedly jumps to 95. He has excellent command and control of that pitch. He also throws a plus cut fastball in the low 90s that has good movement and deception. His breaking ball and changeup are works in progress. His delivery is nice and easy and his mechanics are good. Very coachable. Good strikeout to ball ratio at the high school level, but his breaking ball and change up need to improve to make the leap and they will improve with professional coaching.

Videos/Photos:

Here is an 11 minute video of Mitch Brown pitching:







Here is a scouting video from last summer:







Here is a video of Mitch Brown pitching this season:







His Perfect Game profile page has links to 5 additional videos, and his homepage links to 7 additional videos.

Profiles of the Top 22 Pitchers for the 2012 MLB Draft: Kyle Zimmer

With the Twins having a severe need for pitching in the organization as well as six picks among the top 100, it is certain that more than one of those picks (and probably the second overall pick) will be used to draft a pitcher. To this respect, I am presenting profiles of the top 22 pitching prospects for the 2012 MLB draft.

I will be presenting these alphabetically, and at the end I will rank them.  I will be doing about one a day and I will finish before the June 4th draft day. You can find all the profiles (in reverse alphabetical order) as they are presented here. I will start with RJ Alvarez and end with Kyle Zimmer.  Each profile with contain a bit of background information and statistics, a mini scouting report and videos and photos.

This profile completes the top 22 profiles.  However, due to recent developments with the Twins, I will present have a bonus profile  of another pitcher (number 23) this weekend.

Profile 22: Kyle Zimmer

Profile/Stats:

Kyle Zimmer is a Junior at the University of San Francisco. He throws right handed. He was born on . He grew up in La Jolla, CA and went to La Jolla High Schoool. He is listed at 6'4" and 220 lbs. He was not previously drafted. He pitched 5 games (all in relief) in his freshman year and was turned into a starter his sophomore year. He was also a position player (mainly third baseman) and has been making the transition to pitcher. This season he started 12 games (83.1 IP) walked 15 and struck out 96. His record is 5-3 with a 2.59 ERA and 1.01 WHIP. Was a honor roll student and Cum Laude Society member in High School.

Mini Scouting Report:

Kyle Zimmer has three pitches: a fastball, a slider and a change up. His fastball averages 92-94 and gets up to 96-98. It is a plus pitch with good movement and life. His curve ball is a plus 12-6 curve ball that he throws at high 70s with excellent movement. His changeup is a low 80s pitch and is an average pitch with not much movement. This pitch needs work at the next level. Very good consistent delivery with the ball jumping off his hand. Excellent control of both his fastball and curveball, can improve the command of both pitches. In addition to the main 3 pitches he has been experimenting with a slider that he still has to master.

Videos/Photos:





Here is part 1 (5:37 minutes) of a scouting video taken this March:







And here is the continuation (6:26 minutes) of the same video







Here is an almost 9 minute vido of Zimmer pitching this April:







Here is a video blog of Kyle Zimmer during his time at Cape Cod League

List of Players Invited to Attend the 2012 MLB Draft Live

The following five players have been invited to attend the 2012 MLB Amateur (Rule 4) Draft in person in New York City next Monday night at 7 PM EDT:

• Gavin Cecchini, SS, Barbe High School, Louisiana
• Carlos Correa, SS, Puerto Rico Baseball Academy
• Clint Coulter, C, Union High, Washington state
• Courtney Hawkins, OF, Carroll High, Texas
• Andrew Heaney, LHP, Oklahoma State University