Miguel Sano

I've been reading a lot about the Twins number one prospect the last couple of weeks.

I wasn't going to comment on him because he's still at least a couple of years away from playing major league ball, but since I have nothing else to talk about today, I figured I might as well.

He's a 19-year old Dominacan player who is 6 feet 4 inches tall (he was 6 foot THREE last year, so he MAY still be growing) and he weighs about 230 pounds. The Twins signed him to a bonus worth more than $3 million a little over a year ago and he has more POWER than every other prospect in baseball.

Last year he had 28 homers and 100 RBI in the minors.

Don't get too excited just yet, though. His batting average is around .250. That's NOT a good sign for a hitter in the minors. It means he's willing to sacrifice disciplined hitting so that he can swing for the fences. The Twins typically to NOT promote minor leaguers with low batting averages unless they have a great glove.

And that's the major problem. Originally, the Twins were thinking about using him as a 6 foot TWO third baseman. He quickly grew to 6 foot THREE and is now Six foot FOUR. There are not a lot of good solid third basemen who are that big in all of baseball history. MVP and triple-crown winner Miguel Cabrera comes to mind, but basically NO ONE else. A-Rod is tall, but not that heavy.
That's the entire list.

A bigger problem? He really has NEVER played third base very well. His range is limited and his glove is best described as an immobile brick. Though he's bound to get better with some instruction, the Twins already have a third baseman who can hit with power while not being so great with defense in Trevor Plouffe. Plouffe could conceivably hit thirty home runs a season if he stays healthy and is ALLOWED to play every day, but the Twins don't trust his defense.

As one scout observed, Plouffe is a gold-glove in comparison to Miguel Sano. If the Twins don't trust Plouffe as a power hitter playing third base, they probably aren't going to use Sano there either.

So WHERE will he play IF he gets even bigger and better as a hitter?

That's the 3 million dollar question. At least the Twins are an A.L. ball club, but no team EVER uses someone that young as a permanent DH. In fact, the Twins like putting Mauer and Morneau in that role regularly to give them a day off and to keep them fresh. Even if the Twins get rid of BOTH over the next two seasons, the Twins will most likely still give the DH role to a bunch of guys rather than just one. That's just how they do things.

Sano currently has power but no full-time role. That's a bad combination.

But he has lots and lots of power. On a scale of 20-80 on the power scale, fan graphs puts him at a perfect 80. There just aren't a lot of guys out there who get a rating like that.

He also has a .884 fielding percentage (.950 would put him 11th in the majors among third baseman. 900 wouldn't even GET him in the majors) and he strikes  out more than 25% of the time.

Let's not forget that he's Dominican. There is concern that he MAY be 24 years old. Most Dominican's hide their age so that they can PRETEND that they are young and inexperienced and that they have more potential than they really possess.

He has power, but he also has a lot of question marks.

He may be the Twins number ONE prospect but I'm afraid we will never see him as a regular in the majors.

Only time will tell.