I still am mildly skeptical about Liriano, but there is no way you can not be just a little bit excited if you are a Twins fan about his performance this winter. Last night, in the final game of the championship series of the Dominican Winter League, Liriano threw 5 scoreless innings, striking out 10 [...]

Who: Danny Valencia
Position: 3B
How Acquired: 2006 draft, 19th round
Highest Level In 2009: AAA Rochester
I probably like Danny Valencia less than any Twins person out there, and that’s fine with me. He certainly has improved over the course of his minor league career, as he was drafted in the 19th round as I said above, but [...]

According to the Twitters of the Pioneer Press and MLBTR (MLBTR one linked cause I’m too lazy to find the Press’s) the Twins have inked Jim Thome to a one year deal that is heavily incentive based.
Thome’s wOBA has declined each of the last three years, but he was still worth some 23 runs above [...]

All week long I begged. I pleaded. I prayed. Please don’t make me write a post on this Jim Thome nonsense.
Alas.
Jim Thome has, in the last three years, had wOBAs of .367, .370 and .410 the past three seasons. Even with an alarmingly high strikeout rate, Thome can still hit the ball, especially righties. But [...]

I am going to be doing a UZR primer sometime in the near future, but Marlin Maniac has it covered for now
Taking a look at how many runs the Yankees might score next season (River Ave. Blues)
A look at the Rick Ankiel signing (KoK)
Our Tigers blog was on Hotstove.com TV (Motor City Bengals)
We have [...]

Up until the start of the season, we here at Twinkie Talk will be counting down our top 15 prospects. Today’s prospect is outfielder Joe Benson.
Who: Joe Benson
Where: Outfield
How Acquired: 2006 Draft (2nd round)
Highest level in 2009: Fort Myers
Benson is an athlete. He was highly touted as a high school football player, but chose to [...]

With the arbitration cases all taken care of, it’s time to see the payroll the Twins are committed to, and to see if there is any money leftover to sign a 2nd baseman. I have included my projected 2010 WAR too. The projection method I use isn’t terribly complicated, so don’t worry too much about [...]

And we’re back! Like I said when reviewing the hitters, I’m glad we got all this nonsense done today and didn’t have to go to any hearings.
Jesse Crain
Crain got roughly 2 million from the Twins. His walk rate climbed to 4.70/9, which is very steep, but he did improve as the season went along. I [...]