Deolis Guerra was on the fast track with the Mets until the Johan Santana trade sent him to the Twins, and though the talent is the same, the future for Guerra looks a little bit different these days. Instead of sending Guerra to AA to start the season as the Mets might have done, the Twins opted to send the 19 year old right handed pitcher back to A+ to work on developing his pitch repertoire, as well as his control.
So far, Guerra is showing the flashes of talent everyone thought he had hidden deep down in that 6' 5" frame of his, posting a 0.60 ERA in 15 innings, with 12 strike outs and 7 walks. Those K/9 and BB/9 rates are very similar to the numbers Guerra posted in A ball as a 17 year old. Looking at his game to game stats, if you ignore his second start of the year Guerra has actually averaged a K/9 of 9, and a BB/9 of less than 2. Numbers like those sustained over the next few months would put Guerra well in the path of a spot in the top 25 pitching prospects in the nation come this fall.
With Guerra's future being guided by the Twins, I think he'll only get better. I am concerned that his current BABIP of .214 will float back closer to .300, meaning that those impressive ERA stats will slowly rise over the summer. But if there's a farm system capable of squeezing the greatness of of Guerra, it's the Twins farm system, and he's in much better hands than he was with the Mets.
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