Today's bullpen - Saturday 2/23/2013

There are seven bullpen pitchers who will be travelling with the team today, Ryan Pressly, Josh Roenicke, Tim Wood, Tyler Robertson , Anthony Slama, Luis Perdomo, and Bryan Augenstein.

Rotation Competition - Updated 2/23/2013

2/21/2013 Here is how the competition for the rotation starts out. If they are healthy, the first four are pretty well set. Who the leader is for the 5th spot is anyone's guess. It is wide open with the outcome depending how people pitch in spring training. I will update this ranking as spring training continues.

2/23/2013 The Twins are going to use two of these guys today in their spring training opener. Correia is the starter. The other starter on the list of pitchers travelling to Sarasota is Martis who is getting ready to pitch in the World Classic.  On Sunday, Hendriks will start and Gibson is on the list of pitchers. The plan apparently is for the starters to go a couple innings in both games.

Watching Spring Training - Competition Starts Today

The competition for roster spots starts heating up today with the Twins first spring training day. Here are some basic pointers of what to watch for.


Established Veterans

There are a number of veteran players who aren't competing for a spot on the roster. They are just getting themselves ready for opening day. During the first couple weeks of spring training that may mean working on some part of their game, but mostly it just means shaking the rust off and getting in game shape.

Mauer, Doumit, Morneau, Carroll, Plouffe and Willingham fit this description. They are all locks to make the roster. Plouffe was supposed to have competition at third base, but it does not appear that is the case any more. Carroll is in a sort of competition for an everyday position, but it depends less on what he does than on whether the young players competing for second and shortstop are ready to play in the big leagues. Perkins and Burton roles are set in the bullpen. Duensing, Burnett and Swarzak are probably set as well, but they are in competition for what roles they will play.  Worley, Pelfrey, Diamond and Correia are set in the rotation, assuming they are healthy. Whether these players have good games or bad games in spring training won't effect their places on opening day. The competition is really for the other 8 roster spots and to some extent which roles some of those veterans will have.


Its How you finish, not how you start, that matters

For players competing for positions the most important time is the last couple weeks before opening day. That's because, during the first couple weeks of games in spring training the level of competition is much lower. Veterans aren't in game shape yet. There are a lot of young players who will be assigned to AA and even A ball who are still in camp. So no matter how impressive a player is early against weak competition, the real tests will come in the last couple weeks. Almost every year someone looks like a lock to be on the roster and then falls apart in the last week as rosters are narrowed, players are sharp and the competition starts to be major league quality. This is one of the reasons that spring training statistics are basically pretty meaningless. So the real competition starts in mid-March, after the minor league camp has opened and spring training rosters shrink.

Bullpen Competition Update

The Twins are likely to carry seven relievers. Perkins and Burton are set. Duensing might be given a brief look for the rotation again, but will probably end up in the bullpen. Burnett is in the bullpen unless he pitches his way out of it. Swarzak probably has a job if he is healthy and ready to go opening day.  That leaves two spots with a bunch of pitchers competing for them.

The players with and "S" are at least nominally in the competition for the fifth spot in the rotation. With perhaps the exception of Harden, none of them are very likely to end up there.

The groups are ranked by how likely they are to be in the bullpen. They are also ranked within each group, but those rankings will change from day to day as spring training competition proceeds. I will update this ranking as spring training progresses and we see how people perform.

Outfield Competition Update

Josh Willingham is set as the Twins left fielder. There is competition for center field and right field. In addition, the Twins will carry at least one additional player who can play center field as a fourth outfielder. Here is how the competition looks for each of those, the second group in each competition are longshots at best. Bold players are assured of roster spots, but not as starters.

Pop off the Bench

There is a report the Ron Gardenhire would like to have some "pop off the bench" this year. So who are some of the players in camp who might win a spot and provide some power as bench players? Here are the possibilities in approximate order of how likely they are to make the team:

Infield Competition Update

The Twins are likely to carry five infielders. Morneau is set at first base and Gardenhire has apparently abandoned any idea of competition at third by making Plouffe his third baseman. So the competition is really for three spots in the middle infield, second base, shortstop and utility infielder.

Because Carroll can play all three infield positions, it isn't necessarily essential that the utility infielder play shortstop if Carroll is the starting second baseman.  Its also possible the Twins would carry a sixth infielder, which would give guys who do not profile as shortstops a better chance at making the roster.

I will  update this list as spring training progresses.

Morneau (1b)
Carroll (2b, ss, 3b)
Plouffe (3b)

Florimon (ss)
Dozier (2b, ss)
Escobar (2b,ss,3b)

Olmedo (2b, ss, 3b)
Sobolewski (3b)
Romero (3b)
Clement (1b)
Beresford (2b, ss)
Colabello (1b)

Santana (ss)