ESPN.com’s Jim Caple provides some interesting background on Twins prospect Max Kepler, ranging from his professional ballet-dancing parents to his unlikely introduction to the game of baseball in Germany. Needless to say, the old ballgame still doesn’t have a very high profile in the European nation, but it may surprise some to learn that there’s a fairly notable niche of enthusiasts. As Kepler puts it, “I think since I started playing as a small kid, when it was mainly Americans who were playing baseball, now it’s actually Germans who are starting to play.” No doubt, Kepler’s own career could have a significant impact in driving future growth. (By the way, if you’re interested in the topic, check out this MLBTR podcast episode from last fall, when I chatted with Euroball expert Josh Chetwynd.)
Here’s more from the American League Central:
- Mat Latos has paid huge dividends to the White Sox cin his first three starts for the organization, as Colleen Kane of the Chicago Tribune writes. Since signing for just $3MM in an effort to rebuild his career, Latos has spun 18 1/3 innings in which he’s allowed just six hits and one earned run. While there are plenty of indicators suggesting that Latos hasn’t been quite as dominant as those results would suggest, and his velocity is back down, he’s been in the zone more than ever before and has still managed to induce a lot of easy outs (35.3% soft contact rate; 11.8% line-drive rate).
- The Royals activated Jarrod Dyson from the DL yesterday after he missed the first several weeks of the season with a strained oblique. Manager Ned Yost says he’ll be deployed in a “loose platoon” with Paulo Orlando, Rustin Dodd of the Kansas City Star tweet. Of course, the left-handed-hitting speedster figures to get a solid majority of the action in that arrangement.
- Meanwhile, the Royals’ vaunted bullpen hasn’t been quite the well-oiled machine thus far in 2016 that it was in the recent past, as Dodd explores. Really, it’s mostly a matter of some early struggles from Joakim Soria, who has allowed six earned runs on ten hits and five walks over his first seven frames. Notably, he’s only managed to get hitters to chase pitches out of the zone 14.7% of the time, which is less than half his career rate. For now, at least, the club isn’t ready to move him out of the primary set-up job, though Kelvin Herrera and Luke Hochevar have both looked strong. “Our roles are set until we need to change our roles,” Yost says.
- The Tigers received fairly promising news on the injury front yesterday, as manager Brad Ausmus noted in an appearance on MLB Network Radio on Sirius XM (Twitter link). Catcher James McCann’s absence is expected to land “on the shorter side of the two to four week timetable” that he’d been given for a sprained ankle. (Though it’s fair to note that Jarrod Saltalamacchia has filled in admirably in his stead.) Also, outfielder Cameron Maybin is nearly ready to make his season debut, opening up some options with Anthony Gose off to a slow start.
Typo* Latos is on the White Sox guys
Yup, silly typo on my part. Fixed.
“Mat Latos has paid huge dividends to the Royals in his first three starts for the organization, as Colleen Kane of the Chicago Tribune writes.” <– Royals? White Sox….FYI
To those who wanna watch Baseball season in Germany (currently ongoing), you can watch their videos and highlights here (link to youtube.com).
The white sox could be a sleeper in the al central
Im a White Sox fan and hope you are right. The SP is very solid. But we need another hitter or two to contend with a really good Royals team. My dream is CarGo and Lucroy. But that won’t happen. But we are getting nothing from our catchers or from Avi. The Avi experiment must stop. He is just not good.
Agreed on everything you said, especially Avi. The Sox need a solid power hitting RF. Move Eaton to LF and Melky to DH.
I couldn’t imagine Colby Rasmus or Jay Bruce costing too much. But, I’m not a baseball GM,
I wonder if the White Sox would be willing to take on Kemp. Being used mainly as a DH might help his bat find some of its old glory. If they are willing to pick up most of his contract they might be able to get the Padres to add Norris to the trade. Picking up both for a middling prospect or two would be a solid move. Just my two cents.
Why not do that really, all of kemps contract and norris for realativly nothing. I know garcias been a bust in Chicago, but maybe San Diego would take him to be a place holder or hope he finally breaks out. The only problem would be their lineup would be very right handed but that shouldn’t be to big of an issue
I have to admit the fact Kemp and Norris both bat right handed didn’t even cross my mind. This is the best lineup that I could think of:
Norris RH
Eaton LH
Kemp RH
Abreu RH
Cabrera SH
Frazier RH
Lawrie RH
Rollins SH
A-Jax RH
Ideally, Jackson with his speed would figure out how to get on base again and would lead off. Having Norris there when he should be much further down the order isn’t perfect. But, he has shown very good table setting skills before he moved to the Padres. Also, I would much rather have Frazier batting 5th but like you said that would make the heart of the order completely right handed. Next year Cabrera will once again be playing for a contract and as he has shown in the past when he is in a contract year hitting 5th or pretty much anywhere 2-6 is not out of the question (I know placing him 5th based on what he might do next year is foolish but I am figuring a trade like this won’t happen until much closer to the deadline thereby setting them up for next year too) Of course this trade will never happen but it is still fun to speculate and the lineup even with Kemp and Norris isn’t exactly scary. But, it is very solid and with their rotation would be more than enough to make them contenders. Plus, this trade wouldn’t require a prospect like Anderson to get it done. If they took all of Kemp’s contract (minus what the Dodgers are chipping in) I could see Norris being added for maybe 1 top 10 prospect and 1-2 top 30 prospects. They have LaRoche’s salary available so they would only be adding another $10m or so and adding an additional 4-5 total WAR in positions of need. In a crowded AL Central 5 games will probably be the difference between the top 3 teams and Kemp alone will probably win them 5 games with his bat in the second half. If Ross’ MRI comes back bad, the Padres are going to be setup perfectly for a fire sale. Their chances were slim to begin with but losing their ace should squash any illusions Preller! has left. Sorry about the long ranting post. Sometimes I get carried away when a trade like this that just makes too much sense gets rolling around my head.
Kemp has a 1.6 fWAR from 2013 to present. DHing would get some of the negative numbers out of there but I still wouldn’t count on him being a franchise-altering player.
Yep. The rebuilt infield is probably going to be good, but there are still a couple major holes on this team. I wouldn’t mind another SP either, seeing as how the plan right now involves Latos keeping this up.
I don’t think the Twins are tagged in this post… Didn’t show up in the twins feed.
Regarding Kepler, the makers of OOTP baseball game are German. So as you say it is a small sport but there is interest there.