Just like Black Friday, the Friday Links are moving closer to the middle of the week, and going forward you can expect your Friday Links on Thursday, so we’ll start calling them Thursday Links starting next week, to avoid any confusion.

The Jamey Carroll signing is finally official, $6.5 million for 2 years, with an option year in 2014 for $2 million more if he reachest 401 plate appearances in 2013.  Joe Christensen thinks the Twins overpaid, and I tend to agree. Not exactly a bargain, but this helps bridge the gap to Brian Dozier as he fine tunes his game in AAA.

Now on with the links!

Fangraphs is working their way through Top 15 Prospect lists for all of the MLB franchises, this week they rolled out the Top 15 Minnesota Twins Prospects.  Checking in at number 1? – Miguel Sano.  Last year’s number 2, Aaron Hicks, dropped all the way down to number 6, the biggest loser of the bunch, after a fairly disappointing 2011 season.  Last year’s number 1, Kyle Gibson dropped only 3 places, despite season ending Tommy John surgery.

Beyond the Boxscore finds an interesting little picture that alludes to wOBA being invented nearly 100 years ago.  Fangraphs, the great sabermetric site it is, has all the details.  Pretty amazing to consider that 100 years ago baseball minds were noodling on the inadequacies of Batting Average, and yet in 2011 Batting Average is still king on the back of baseball cards.  (more…)