FanPost

Through the Fence: On the Backfields 3/27/2015

Reinhold Matay-USA TODAY Sports

The Twins never surprise, with the forecast calling for torrential downpours in the afternoon the 1pm Hi-A and Low-A games against the Rays' squad were moved to 10am.As many of you have seen Philip Hughes was gearing up and working on few things with catcher Kurt Suzuki to be ready for the season opener.Hughes looked good, showing command of his arsenal, I didn't watch him in-depth but Paul Molitor sure did. Molitor could be seen standing behind homeplate against the fence watching the game intently, more so with Hughes pitching.

Kohl Stewart was the bat boy to start the game and was extremely cordial and friendly with the fans signing autographs and taking pictures when he left midgame. After Hughes was done throwing a few innings of in-game work, he threw 20-30 pitches with Kurt Suzuki in the pen working on locating and running his pitches before he was carted off to the clubhouse.

At the same time, Sam Gibbons was pitching for the Low A squad which also featured a cameo from Levi Michael with Nick Gordon playing most of the game at SS.After a few innings Gordon left for the infield practice field with Sam Perlozzo for some glovework. Perlozzo was stressing to Gordon the importance at times of not funneling the ball up to the chest when fielding groundballs.Instead Nick was to field ball away from his body with his arms extended and not bringing it in.

The purpose of this was to acclimate Gordon on working a quicker transfer and thus a quick release of the ball for those times of slow rollers and/or speedy runners.Visually one could see him struggle with it at first and even told Perlozzo that it didn't feel natural but at the end of it Gordon had it down.

Back in the Low A game, Tom Kelly could be seen on the field behind Twins' 1B Trey Vavra giving advise and direction during the game.Kelly was literally behind and shadowing Vavra while live pitching was going on, only in Spring Training and Instructionals do you see that going on. The endcap of the day was seeing JT Chargois (this is how you say his name) enter the game throw for an inning, but boy was it a great appearance.He showcased his fastball that sat anywhere from 95-99 mph along with a breaking ball about 20 mph slower, so it wasn't even fair to the Rays Low A hitters especially Pujols.All In all, a great day for baseball and a good call to start the game early as the MLB which started at 1p was called early due to the weather.

Also here is the latest MiLB roster for the Twins released on 3/26/15

Almost forgot Max Kepler fielding grounders and taking reps at first base along with with Jorge Polanco and Niko Goodrum in the middle infield. Here is a picture of Kepler in action.