The Twins will promote top prospect Byron Buxton prior to tomorrow’s game, tweets Phil Miller of the Star Tribune.
The 21-year-old Buxton is the game’s number one prospect according to MLB.com and Baseball Prospectus. FanGraphs, ESPN’s Keith Law, and Baseball America all ranked Buxton as the second best prospect behind Kris Bryant. Buxton was selected with the second overall pick of the 2012 draft.
The call up is a mild surprise despite the club’s obvious need in center field. Buxton was hitting .283/.351/.489 with six home runs and 20 stolen bases at Double-A. By activating Buxton tomorrow, the Twins should avoid the Super Two cutoff if he remains in the majors for the remainder of the season. No matter how he’s used, he’ll remain club controllable through at least the 2021 season.
Unlike the Bryant promotion, service time considerations don’t seem like a major factor in the Twins decision. Buxton missed most of the 2014 season with various maladies. Given his age and inexperience above the High-A level, it made perfect sense for the club to continue developing him in the minors. Minnesota’s surprise contention and the poor performance of Aaron Hicks may have forced the team to reevaluate their development plans. Hicks is currently day-to-day with an elbow injury, and he’s hit just .247/.293/.301 on the season.
Manager Paul Molitor has not commented on how he plans to use Buxton, but one can assume he’ll play regularly. He may feature prominently in the lineup. He should provide a spark to an offense that has relied heavily on leadoff hitter Brian Dozier, third baseman Trevor Plouffe, and outfielder Torii Hunter.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images
Buxton’s last 22 games: 364/447/580/1.026 wRC+ of 192
He hit some absolute bombs in Low A. He was in Cedar Rapids a year following Trout and was maybe a better overall Low A bat….Was like Eric Davis with Torii Hunter defensive ability
I am excited. Buxton time!
About time the league to end my ridiculous 6 team blackout so I can actually watch Buxton
this seems rushed
He might have been there already if not for the injuries…
I can’t imagine the Twins would give any consideration to what Houston is doing.
How rushed? He’s hitting .294/.363/.505 with 7 doubles and 12 triples since April 13…while playing excellent defense.
Sounds ready for the challenge to me.
Not to mention the whole not-having-a-center-fielder issue.
Yes, though I was fine with Hicks in CF for the most part. I mean sometimes he does make route mistakes and misses catches, but overall he’s decent to good. It’s not like he’s Schafer and I know that’s a low bar to compare him to.
Offensively is where he hurts you. He needs to improve his OBP and SLG to be an average player. His AVG right now is fine. Of course you want his AVG to improve, but I’m not expecting stud level average (.250 to .260 is fine with me).
Rushed? How so?
he could of made at least 1 stop in triple-a along the way………
A lot of guys jump AAA. A lot of people actually believe AA is just a good if not better than AAA.
Some teams have had issues with exposing prospects to negative veteran influence at the AAA level. Not saying it always happens… But AA to AAA is not the jump that A to AA is generally….even though those nasty curves and changes start showing up more out of AAA arms
Most top prospects play at AA until the Majors because you’re playing against other top prospects. At AAA, you’re playing against AAAA guys and former MLBers for the most part, why that could be beneficial for most, teams don’t view it as necessary for everyone because those former MLBers are ‘former’ for a reason.
This depends on the organization. Some teams “require” their guys to have a certain number of AB in AAA, regardless of prospect status
Very cool for the Twins. Having a shocking year, now they get the cream of the crop as far as prospects are concerned. Man, prospect lists by the end of this season are going to be radically different than they were at season’s start.
Nice to see…but the peripherals don’t look good on it continuing over the summer…future is looking brighter for sure
Yeah, I don’t know if it can continue to go this well, but it’s been one of those stories that I can’t help but check in on every day, it’s been impressive, and with a bright future, you can’t ask for much more.
Every season a team outplays their stats…I’m not counting them out..tough division. KC and Detroit solid and likely Cleveland and Chicago’s best baseball are yet to be played. Oakland is the polar opposite… Top 5 in pitching and offense and can’t buy a win….dead last in defense…with a knack to have a single defensive error lead to a loss
Only prospect who won’t get a call up this year is corey seager. Even though he’s better than rollins at SS
There are hundreds of prospects that won’t get a call-up this year. Seager will be up in September.
Yes, i know that but i rather see seager than any other prospect. They’ll probably do what they did with joc last year.
I follow some prospects in that league and the thing that popped out to me was how many more triples he had than anyone else in the league as well as his excellent stolen base record.
So that makes Corey Seager the #1 prospect according to BA and K.Law. Cool
Crawford will probably be number 2 on his list come AS Break.
Saw this headline and made a mad dash to add him in all my fantasy leagues.
Funny. A guy I know has been stashing him in a keeper league since he was in Low A. I haven’t spoken to him yet, but I’m guessing he’s passing out cigars like he just had.a baby.
I’m beyond excited. Another thing of note is he had 12 triples already this year.
The MLB site has a very humorous article comparing Buxton to five superheroes. Check it out. It shows him rounding second at an impossible speed in one .gif. This guy’s speed is amazing. I can’t wait to see it in person.
Now the Twins needs a big change. This news is very good‼︎
Time to Show Case him for a trade to the Phillies for Cole Hamels and Bennie( The Jet ) Revere
Not happening.
Who? Buxton? No way.
We already had Revere and dumped him for minor league pitching. The Twins won’t be clamoring to get him back anytime soon.
September if he not Hurt !
Seager Will get the call in July…..
I’m going to predict that Buxton will struggle for a while at the major league level.
He couldn’t do any worse than the rest of the Twinkies outfield right now.
Schafer was slashing .217/.250/.261 while playing below replacement level defense on a good day before he went on the DL. Atleast Buxton will give you stellar defense even if he hits just as poorly.
Not a bad prediction, he has struggled hitting in the minors when he first starts out in a new level but he cant hit worse than the trash (Hicks, Schafer, Robinson) that have played in CF this year
I’m with you, though I wouldn’t be shocked if the first couple weeks are hot. After that, pitchers, coaches, and scouts will expose some weaknesses and he’ll struggle a bit. We’ve seen it time and time again in recent years with the Twins. Remember Wilson Ramos and Chris Parmalee? They looked like Paul Goldschmidt for a month after they were first called up, and then went into the tank.
All in all, I bet he bats .260, swipes 25 bags, scores a bunch of runs out of the leadoff spot, plays grade-A defense, and makes a bunch of Twins fans happy over the rest of the season. I don’t think we’ll see Aaron Hicks starting in CF ever again.