Welcome to Minnesota Delmon Young

After hours of speculation it is now official. The Minnesota Twins and Tampa Bay Rays have completed a huge six-man swap which sends prized pitcher Matt Garza, shortstop Jason Bartlett, and pitching prospect Eduardo Morlan to Tampa Bay and 2007 Rookie of the Year runner-up Delmon Young, shortstop Brendan Harris, and outfield prospect Jason Pridie to Minnesota.

This deal not only marks the first big move by new Twins general manager Billy Smith, but also the first big move by the Twins for as long as I can remember. As sad as that may be, think about when the last time the Twins made a move where they went out and got a big name talent or traded away a valued prospect. I bet you won’t come up with one…

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Catch my column “Twins Killings” every day only on the Most Valuable Network.

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Upcoming Prospect Rankings

I just wanted to make some announcements regarding the prospect coverage here on “The Diamond Cutter” over the coming months. Since there really isn’t too much to affect the rankings right now, this is the perfect time to start unveiling lists for the upcoming season. With that being said, here is a look at some of the lists/rankings that will be coming soon:

– Top 10 NCAA players
– Top 10 MLB prospects at each position
– Top 5 MLB prospects for every team
– Top 100 MLB prospects

These will be the main ones that will be coming up very soon. I wanted to put dates on when to expect each of these but due to the holiday season coming up, my Minnesota Twins column, and just the exhausting work it is to compile these lists and rake through all the scouting reports I have done I decided to just give estimated times.

You can expect the top 10 NCAA players list in early December and a combination of the top 10 prospects at each position and the top 5 prospects for every team following after that through December and January. The top 100 prospects list for 2008 will be unleashed in February just before spring training.

In the meantime, let me know if there are any other lists or rankings you’d like to see. Also as always I will be mixing in my “Prospect Spotlights” as we go along with any updates on my ongoing top 25 prospects. Again, this can all be found by visiting the “Prospect Central” tab at the top of the page.

Thanks again everyone for reading “The Diamond Cutter” and I hope you enjoy the next few months of prospect coverage as it is an exciting time here and in all of baseball.

Catch my column “Twins Killings” every day only on the Most Valuable Network.

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Santana in Pinstripes?

Since this is a hot topic, I thought that I would post something I wrote in my Minnesota Twins column about the Johan Santana trade talks between the Twins and the Yankees. I generally don’t link up my posts from my column “Twins Killings” on here in order to keep some separation but I figured anytime there are trade talks involving the best pitcher in baseball, its worth mentioning. Here’s a look:

There have been many reports bouncing around about the Minnesota Twins in trade talks with the New York Yankees about the best pitcher in the world, Johan Santana. ESPN.com just posted an article here discussing the situation. We all knew this would be an inevitable case as there was very little hope that the Twins would pony up the large pile of cash that Santana would require. I’ve mentioned on here for months that if the Twins weren’t going to knuckle up in the Santana sweepstakes that they needed to trade him before the season started. It looks like that now will be the case even despite the Twins having a large amount of salary space with the departure of center fielder Torii Hunter late last week…

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Catch my column “Twins Killings” every day only on the Most Valuable Network.

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