Danny Santana, Kennys Vargas named to Baseball America's All-Rookie Team

Danny Santana was a godsend of many varieties this season. He not only played an adequate center field when the Aaron Hicks experiment failed for the second in a row, but he was slotted into the leadoff spot in the lineup when Ron Gardenhire really didn't have another good option available.

Kennys Vargas, meanwhile, demolished Double-A pitching for the first three months of the season before falling into a little funk. That didn't stop him from being promoted to the big league club, though, where - like Santana - he gave the Twins life where before there was none.

Both players have their weaknesses (being bated into taking swings they probably shouldn't take), but that's to be expected of any rookie. Still, Santana finished second among position players for the Twins in fWAR (3.2) for his .319/.353/.472 campaign, and Vargas, in roughly half the time given to Santana, finished with 114 wRC+ thanks to his .274/.316/.456 triple slash from the designated hitter spot.

The future of both players is uncertain, but being named to Baseball America's 2014 All-Rookie team speaks to the impact they had this season and also, to an extent, to the strength of the Minnesota farm system.

Here's the full roster.

C - Travis d'Arnaud, Mets
1B - Jose Abreu, White Sox
2B - Mookie Betts, Red Sox
3B - Nick Castellanos, Tigers
SS - Danny Santana, Twins
CF - Billy Hamilton, Reds
OF - Kevin Kiermaier, Rays
OF - George Springer, Astros
DH - Kennys Vargas, Twins

SP - Jake deGrom, Mets
SP - Collin McHugh, Astros
SP - Marcus Stroman, Blue Jays
SP - Masahiro Tanaka, Yankees
SP - Yordano Ventura, Royals
RP - Dellin Betances, Yankees

Here's hoping guys like Byron Buxton, Miguel Sano, and Alex Meyer are in contention for this team in 2015.