FORT MYERS, Fla. -- The Twins and Rays meet for the fourth time, already, this exhibition season when Jose Berrios faces Rays lefthander Ryan Merritt. Nelson Cruz is in the lineup for just the second time, as been on a "veterans" progression to spring training. Meaning: He lets Rocco know when he needs at bats. Ironically, Cruz faced the Rays in his only other game, the home opener on Feb. 23.
The Twins will announce their first cuts of camp after the game. Some of the players have already been informed of the club's decision. The first cut usually is prospect driven. As we get closer to Opening Day, the regulars need more at bats and starting pitchers need to be stretched out. So the younger players in camp usually are sent over to the minor league camp when the first cuts are made.
Patrick Reusse is going to have more on this later today, but eyebrows were raised earlier this week when it was learned that teams will be required to send their lineups into the league office before they get the go-ahead to release them to us losers...er...reporters. This has to do with MLB's agreement with MGM that includes MGM having access to the league's date feed so it can help them set gambling lines before games.
My take is that the league is looking to create a new market. Right now, MGM has access to the data feed and will have a leg up on other casinos. But I'm sure the league will be happy to work out a deal with other establishments to provide that information to them.
Don't forget: MLB sunk $77 million in startup costs into MLBAM (Major League Baseball Advanced Media) without knowing how profitable it could be. Last year, the league sold controlling interest in BAMTech - a digital media company spun off from MLBAM- to Walt Disney Company for $1.5 BILLION. Each club received about $50 million because of that deal.
And the players association never pushed to have internet revenue included in collective bargaining agreements!!!!! It all went into the owners' accounts.
So keep that in mind as MLB looks for revenue streams out of Las Vegas.
Anyway, the reason I wrote about this is because the league has had a few teams send in daily lineups so they could evaluate how the process of receiving the information and sending it to Vegas would work. The Twins have been one of those teams.
Make sure you read Reusse on this subject.
Rays
Brandon Lowe, LF
Avisail Garcia, RF
Ji-Man Choi, 1B
Willy Adames, SS
Joey Wendle, 2B
Michael Perez, C
Nate Lowe, DH
Christian Arroyo, 3B
Emilio Bonifacio, CF
Jake Faria, RHP
Twins
Max Kepler, RF
Jorge Polanco, SS
Nelson Cruz, DH
Eddie Rosario, LF
Jonanthan Schoop, 2B
Tyler Austin, 1B
Jason Castro, C
Byron Buxton, CF
Luis Arraez, 2B
Jose Berrios, RHP
