Finding A Silver Lining.

For most of us Twins fans, looking for a silver lining in the season is a hard thing to do.  We are out of practice at it.  We haven't practiced since the mid to late '90s.  Right now there may be some Twins fans who want us to lose now that the season is all but over in hopes of securing a top three pick.  With added losses we can "Timberwolf" the system and move higher in the draft in hopes our Lebron James comes around, or at least a guy who is a starting pitcher and has a fastball that could break a window.

I'm not here to argue the merits or lack thereof of fans who cheer or rather hope for losing.  It's just gonna go in circles and whatever.  What I will say is that if the Twins continue to lose and do poorly, it stands to reason that our current players are sucking.  And being that some of our current players hope to become useful if not necessary tools for the club down the road, that would be bad.  Let's look at some numbers and names after the jump.

 Let's pretend the rest of the Twins season can only go two different ways.  With 19 games left, lets say that one of the ways is 13-6 and the other way is 6-13.

                                                            OPS                                ERA

Twins Wins(59)                                .779                                1.96

Twins Losses(84)                           .578                                 7.91

 What we have here is that the Twins are decent offensively and mighty good pitching wise in wins, and suck something terrible in losses.  Duh.  I didn't look at every team, but in our losses, we must be one of the ugliest teams to watch.  And in our wins, we must be one of the ugliest teams to watch.  Even all our wins seem to have been 4-2.

Anyway, does it matter to go 13-6 the rest of the way?  With guys like Joe Benson, Parmalee, Hendricks and all the other rooks getting a vast majority of the playing time it would have to mean that they are doing good, right?  And if they did good to finish out this year at the big league club, would they then carry that over to next year?  Maybe.  And maybe is a lot better than not at all in a million years.

What if the Twins went 6-13 and secured say the second pick in the draft instead of going the other direction and picking 7th?  How much would that matter?  Do we gain an advantage by getting to pick a not supremely better, but marginally better player?

Draft                                              2nd pick                                                                     7th pick

2001                                      Adam Johnson(MIN)                                               Matt Harrington(Col)

2002                                      Mark Prior(ChiC)                                                      Chris Smith(Bal)

2003                                      BJ Upton(TB)                                                            Prince Feilder(Mil)

2004                                     Justin Verlander(Det)                                               David Bailey(Cin)

2005                                     Alex Gordon(KC)                                                       Troy Tulowitzke(Col)

2006                                     Greg Reynolds(Col)                                                 Clayton Kershaw(LaD)

2007                                     Mike Moustakas(KC)                                                Matt LaPorta(Mil)

2008                                     Pedro Alvarez(Pit)                                                      Yonder Alonso(Cin)

2009                                     Dustin Ackley(Sea)                                                    Mike Minor(Atl)

2010                                     Jameson Taillon(Pit)                                                Matt Harvey(NYM)

2011                                     Danny Hultzen(Sea)                                                  Archie Bradley(Ari)

Obviously the difference is huge some years, one way or the other, and not so huge the others.  Again, does the difference between picking 2nd and 7th matter as much as having Benson and the other prospects hit well for the remainder of the season?  Thats a question I will leave up to you guys. 

The only thing that could f**k this all up is if the Twins go on a tear down the stretch and it's led by guys like Repko, Dumatrait, Diamond, Rivera, guys who don't belong in the Twins long term plans.  Or short term.  Seriously, if this happened, I would be immensely annoyed.