The Twins announced a few baseball operations changes on Tuesday, including the hiring of 27-year-old Jeremy Zoll as the team’s new director of minor league operations. Brad Steil, who had previously been the team’s farm director since 2013, will now instead head up the Twins’ pro scouting department. Zoll has spent the past few seasons in the Dodgers organization, most recently holding the title of assistant director of player development. Zoll has also worked as an advance scouting coordinator with the Angels. “We’re really fortunate and excited to have him,” said chief baseball officer Derek Falvey of the newly hired Zoll (link via MLB.com’s Rhett Bollinger). “He came in highly recommended from the people he worked with and around. He’ll bring some new ideas into what we’re doing developmentally.”
A bit more from around the league…
- While it’s been suggested that surgery isn’t expected for Twins slugger Miguel Sano, GM Thad Levine said today that surgery is still an option for the third baseman’s ailing shin (via Mike Berardino of the St. Paul Pioneer Press). Levine painted surgery as a last resort, however, and said the team will explore other avenues. A decision will be made sooner rather than later though, as the procedure Sano would theoretically require would come with an eight-week recovery, so the Twins understandably don’t want to wait too long before making the call. Whether Sano requires surgery or avoids going under the knife, manager Paul Molitor said today that he doesn’t think Sano needs to play in the Dominican Winter League this year, per Berardino.
- In some other notable injury news, C. Trent Rosecrans of the Cincinnati Enquirer tweets that Reds righty Anthony DeSclafani threw seven innings in an instructional league start today. That could be DeSclafani’s final start of instructional league play, though it’s nonetheless a positive step for a key part of the Cincinnati pitching staff after missing the entire 2017 season. DeSclafani was diagnosed with a sprained ulnar collateral ligament early in the year and was never able to make it back to a Major League mound during the regular season.
- The Rangers could have interest in right-hander Miles Mikolas as he eyes a return to the Majors after a strong three-year run in Japan, writes T.R. Sullivan of MLB.com. (We noted at MLBTR last week that Mikolas was aiming for an MLB comeback.) Limiting walks is high on the Rangers’ wishlist in terms of offseason pitching targets, and Mikolas excelled in that area over his three-year career with the Yomiuri Giants, Sullivan points out. He also notes that the Rangers have had success on the Japanese market in the past under GM Jon Daniels, getting value out of signings such as Colby Lewis, Yu Darvish and Tony Barnette. Obviously, a pursuit of Mikolas would more closely resemble the modest contracts given to Lewis and Barnette than the massive financial commitment that the Rangers spent to acquire Darvish, but Sullivan notes that Texas is likely to explore as many avenues to rotation upgrades as possible this winter. Mikolas’ most recent stint in the Majors came with the Rangers back in 2014.
Sad…another Sabermetric Statchild in the Twins front office! Anybody over 40 is a fossil according to foWAR (Front Office WAR).
maybe because if you’re 40, you probably don’t have the bat speed to be great, and you probably aren’t good defensively. WAR measures a players overall game, and 40 year olds probably aren’t very well rounded anymore
He’s talking about the front office youth movement. Not a ballplayer
I think he was referring to Front Office personnel.
I get your point to a degree, but there are definitely sabermetric personnel over 40: Luhnow (51), MacPhail (64), Beane (55), Cashman (50), Mozeilak (48) and Epstein (43) are among the more notable top executives who are known for this despite “advanced” age. Furthermore, some lesser known guys: Mike Fishman (NYY) and Keith Woolner (CLE) have become well known for their usage of New-Age Analytics.
Wake up, you’ll be forty in 30 more years!
I’m not a huge fan of metrics either but you have to keep up with the times. Pedal faster or eat dust.
You’re not a fan of metrics? wtf does that mean? Are you also an opponent of logic? This is an absolutely puzzling statement considering that almost every facet of our life is measured in some way. Please explain because baseball has had metrics since the beginning, avg, OBP, these are all forms of metrics, counting stats like HR’s & RBI’s are counting stats that are measured.
I can’t figure out how this is sad… didn’t the twins just make the playoffs (ahead of schedule) using, in part, advanced metrics on how they value players?
This dudes a troll, don’t encourage him.
You still need to be able to know WHAT you are seeing on the field before you can use the data to tell WHY and HOW it is happening.
I mean, yeah, but these guys know what they’re looking at. Just because they weren’t physically talented enough to play at a high level doesn’t mean they can’t understand what’s happening on the field
Perfect point. You can’t hit a curveball with a mouse
No, but some decent analysis will give you an idea of who does what best in different situations. It’s not really that hard to get your head around.