Transactions Update

It's been nearly a month, but Baseball America has finally posted an updated list of minor league transactions. There aren't a lot of new names on here - Jeremy Cummings and Carmen Cali were both mentioned in my last post related to transactions, and we've talked about the Rule 5 Draft results already, so that leaves just two moves to discuss, one addition and one subtraction.

First, the addition: The Twins signed LHP Jesus Carnevales of Puerto Rico to a deal, and he will presumably start his Twins career in extended spring training with a debut coming with one of the short-season teams. However, it's possible that Carnevales is decent enough to get a higher start than that - I haven't been able to dig up much on him (including his age). What I do know: he pitched in one game for the Puerto Rican Olympic Qualifying team (in the same tournament that Kevin Slowey pitched in for Team USA), and he posted pretty solid numbers for Camuy of the Federacion de Beisbol Aficionado de Puerto Rico (which, according to the MLB website, is the official baseball federation of Puerto Rico). I believe Carnevales went 5-1 with a 1.86 ERA - but you'll have to judge for yourself with this spreadsheet. Camuy is the third team listed, and Carnevales is the first Lanzador listed.

Now, the subtraction: The Twins released OF Richard Sojo, who hit just .228 in 34 games with Elizabethton last season. Sojo originally signed with the Twins back in April 2002, and didn't get to the GCL team until 2005, where he actually did pretty well (.318 in 43 games, with 11 steals). Unfortunately, the regression last year must have convinced the Twins that Sojo probably was never going to develop to the level that they wanted him to.