Minnesota Sports Forum

bleedspeed177 wrote:Astudillo seems to bring more to the team than his play. Based on what I saw he was a clubhouse favorite too. I know I am a big fan of him.

monsterpile wrote:

longstrangetrip wrote:Interesting stuff, jester. We'll all be watching to see how the catcher situation shakes out with Castro, Garver and Astudillo. If Mollie were still manager, I would have predicted Garver to back up Castro...he always seemed to consider Willians only when necessary. But we don't know how Baldelli will look at this. We all talk about Astudillo's bat, but as jester points out, his defensive numbers aren't bad. He has allowed no passed balls in his 109 innings behind the plate, and ranked 38thh out of 115 catchers in called strikes above average (framing). I think he will get a lot of innings behind the plate in spring to either earn a spot on the roster as a catcher or be forced to make the team as a utility guy. In any event, it will be fun to watch!

None of these guys really blow you away overall as players but I feel like they can be an asset (as opposed to annoverall liability) as a group for the Twins. I agree it was a bit confusing what the Twins did with Astudillo last year. I mean I can come up with reasons why what was done was done but I would have liked to see him more at catcher. I'd be curious to know if Jester has some contacts that could give us some insight as to his abilities there.

jester1534 wrote:

monsterpile wrote:

longstrangetrip wrote:Interesting stuff, jester. We'll all be watching to see how the catcher situation shakes out with Castro, Garver and Astudillo. If Mollie were still manager, I would have predicted Garver to back up Castro...he always seemed to consider Willians only when necessary. But we don't know how Baldelli will look at this. We all talk about Astudillo's bat, but as jester points out, his defensive numbers aren't bad. He has allowed no passed balls in his 109 innings behind the plate, and ranked 38thh out of 115 catchers in called strikes above average (framing). I think he will get a lot of innings behind the plate in spring to either earn a spot on the roster as a catcher or be forced to make the team as a utility guy. In any event, it will be fun to watch!

None of these guys really blow you away overall as players but I feel like they can be an asset (as opposed to annoverall liability) as a group for the Twins. I agree it was a bit confusing what the Twins did with Astudillo last year. I mean I can come up with reasons why what was done was done but I would have liked to see him more at catcher. I'd be curious to know if Jester has some contacts that could give us some insight as to his abilities there.

Sadly monster I don't have a lot of connection since Rocco took over the guys I knew in scouting department are now with tigers and marlins. My one buddy did tell me the twins did win a bidding with 4 other teams to sign Astudillo back in the day.

bleedspeed177 wrote:No not SLEGERS! (I had to look up who he was)

bleedspeed177 wrote:No not SLEGERS! (I had to look up who he was)