After trading from strength to shore up the major league roster and graduating Jose Miranda, this system looks thinner than usual. Royce Lewis brings a nice big name to the top, but he’s kind of a prospect in name only at this point. Would have graduated long ago if healthy. I like a lot of the guys they have. It’s just: they’ve missed a lot in the first round. Keoni Cavaco, Aaron Sabato, and I kind of want to throw Austin Martin in here, too, because if you’re missing on your big evaluations, you’re not likely to thrive for long. To their credit and savior, Minnesota has made some shrewd plays on the market, flipping a couple months of Nelson Cruz for Joe Ryan chief among them, and have built an impressive core group of under-the-radar, homegrown talents like Jorge Polanco, Luis Arraez, Max Kepler, Jose Miranda and of course, Byron Buxton. They’re not all good all the time, but they’re pretty great when they’re good, especially for cost-controlled (gag me with a sock full of dimes for using the lingo) young veterans. The club has a knack for zeroing in on the hit tool to unearth the Astudillos of the baseball world, and while not every Astudillio is an Arraez or a Miranda, some of them can be, and godspeed to the Twins for trying to find them. I love the player type. Hardest thing in the world is to barrel up a big-league-level pitch. Could do much worse on the scouting front than separating guys who can do that someday from guys who can’t.