Luis Castillo To the Twins
Comments Off Minnesota Twins General Manager Terry Ryan tossed his hat into the off-season ring yesterday, trading two solid pitching prospects, Travis Bowyer and Scott Tyler, for Marlins 2nd Baseman Luis Castillo. The trade is a phenomenal one for the Twins for two reasons. One, they have addressed a major need. They were dreadful at 2nd in 2005, and have now turned a decided weakness into a clear strength. The other nice part of this deal from the Twins’ vantage point is they were able to trade from depth and not cut into their higher-end minor league pitching talent. Francisco Liriano and Scott Baker will be staying put.
Castillo will never wow anybody with his power numbers but he is an excellent defensive 2nd baseman and he has a penchant for getting on base. He hit .301/.391/.374 last year, while playing strong defensively. Twins 2nd Basemen hit just .256/.320/.345 last season, and none of the principals that saw regular action there fielded particularly well. Now they have an above average offensive player there, and one who fields his position about as well as anyone else in the league. After catcher Joe Mauer, Castillo immediately becomes Minnesota’s second best position player. Hats off to Terry Ryan for identifying a need, finding a viable option to fill it and managing not to part with too much in order to execute the acquisition.
