MLB teams play most of the regular season using a 25-man active roster, typically comprised of 11 pitchers and 14 position players, or 12/13 for teams preferring a seven-man bullpen. Teams then play with expanded rosters beginning September 1, enabling teams to give their top prospects “cups of coffee” with a little low-pressure big league experience, or to occasionally reward an organizational soldier for an excellent season and lengthy minor league career.
Forecasting a team for an upcoming season typically means, at best, an in-depth look at the projected 25-man roster – the team as it stands “on paper” before a single game has been played. Sometimes it means even less, simply giving a cursory look at a few notable players and taking an educated guess at how the final standings might appear. This strategy for projecting team performance is misguided, however, for the simple reason that it takes many more than 25 players to get through a six-month regular season with any hope for postseason play. In 2010, AL teams used an average of 36 position players (range: 32 – Chicago to 43 – Boston) and 21 pitchers (range: 17 – Tampa Bay to 25 – Boston, Kansas City). NL teams shuffled their rosters even more frequently, using an average of 43 position players (range: 40 – San Diego to 56 – Florida) and an average of 23 pitchers (range: 19 – San Diego, San Francisco to 31 – Florida). In even the best case, where most players on a given team avoid injury or dramatic underperformance, you can expect to see upwards of 50 players donning the team’s uniform.
Why, then, is more attention not given to overall organizational health and depth, and not just the perfect-world 25-man rosters that we all love to dream on before the first pitch of spring training? Frankly, it would be more time-consuming to do this (especially for major media outlets), and would deal with numerous players who will never sniff the big leagues at a time when much of the general public already has little interest in non-star MLB players. As far as televised and print media is concerned, there isn’t interest (and thus money) to gain in taking a deeper look at the sport, and this is just one example of that principle at work.
That said, it is my contention that there is a lot to be gleaned from observing why and how MLB teams make decisions about managing their vital and finite 40-man roster spots. I think that many of us (speaking as an avid baseball fan) often underestimate how vital depth and talent retention is for an MLB team. I also think that in some cases, especially with decisions as relatively minor as whether or not to add a prospect to the 40-man roster, it is easy to overlook the opportunity cost and/or potential upside of a given decision.
And speaking as someone who thinks that the top priority of every MLB organization must be to pour resources into scouting, signing, and developing potential star-level talent should they be concerned with long-term on-field success, I see the nature of roster management as a great and often overlooked argument in favor of principles such as system balance. It is very popular in minor league baseball and prospecting circles to emphasize tools and upside, often discrediting players who may project to top out as something less than a potential all-star player. You’ll find few people, myself included, who would advocate against investing heavily into trying to develop a given team’s next core of young and cost-controlled star players. There is a place for lower-profile players as well, however, and it’s on any team’s roster, especially those of small-market clubs that aren’t going to be able to otherwise spend their way to a capable roster. And sometimes those kinds of players exceed the modest expectations set for them.
A team doesn’t need a star at every position to succeed, much less attempt to meet an impractical and unachievable goal such as worrying about finding 50+ very talented players for a 162-game season. But when, say, Boston lost both their starter (Jacoby Ellsbury) and backup (Mike Cameron) in center field early this past season, it made a tremendous difference in their ability to stay competitive until late September when a capable replacement could be called upon from the lower rungs of the team’s planned depth chart. On top of a slew of other injuries, their Plan C - a minor league journeyman named Darnell McDonald - posted a .766 OPS in 363 plate appearances, contributing about a win more than could be expected from the pool of freely-available talent. Prior to 2010, no one would have foreseen McDonald racking up a remotely notable number of PA, much less contributing in a positive way to an 89-win season.
Key injuries and unexpected underperformance can severely damage a team; it’s the wise use of all means of talent acquisition, depth in both the upper and lower levels of the farm system, and prudent talent retention when possible that can salvage an otherwise lost season. These decisions have tangible benefits not only in the win-loss column, but in attendance and revenue as well. Some lousy teams will draw nice crowds for meaningless games in September, and great teams might have trouble filling Tropicana Field. But doing your best to put a quality product on the field within budgetary constraints certainly can’t hurt.
One of the first roster management concepts I’ll be dealing with is the Rule 5 draft, which serves as a segway into option years, the arbitration process, and free agency. But to talk about that, we need to briefly discuss the amateur draft as well, which occurs each June. Teams draft close to 1500 players (30 teams, 50 rounds) each year, of which fewer than 5% ever appear in a single MLB game. Each MLB team operates 6-7 minor league teams of increasing difficulty for their draftees to play on, with draftees from previous years, players signed from overseas, and so forth. However, unlike years ago in MLB, teams can’t simply retain the rights to these players forever, effectively hoarding talent and restricting them to minor league salaries in the thousands, not millions. If MLB teams don’t offer their prospects a reasonable path to the majors after a reasonable amount of developmental time, they will lose the rights to those players.
Specifically, minor league players become eligible for the Rule 5 Draft. This draft occurs each December, and allows MLB teams to pay $25,000 to draft prospects from the minor league systems of other teams. However, not all players are eligible: only those who have spent four years in the minors (if signed at age 19 or older), or five years in the minors (if signed at age 18 or younger). Teams can still protect prospects they really want to keep if they have exceeded either threshold – however, they must be added to the 40-man roster to do so. Once added to the 40-man roster, those players must be sent through waivers (i.e. all other 29 MLB teams get to be removed from the roster. Therefore, there is considerable risk in making these decisions lightly. Protect too few prospects, and you might lose some talented players. Protect too many, and you may hamstring your flexibility in the short-term at the MLB level, and still be forced to lose some of the players you chose to protect in the long run.
I’ll expand on this in a separate post about the Rule 5 Draft, but as it relates to the 40-man roster, decisions to protect Rule 5 eligible players are challenging for front offices and involve weighing a lot of different factors – the potential short and long-term impacts of prospects being considered, the roster space they need/want to keep vacated for potential trade targets or free agent signings, and the likelihood that teams will not only select a given unprotected player in the Rule 5 Draft, but commit to keeping the player on their MLB roster for a full season. If you’re curious, a rough rule of thumb for use this offseason is that players signed out of high school in 2006 or college in 2007 will become Rule 5 eligible for this December’s draft. Many of the no-name players you will see added to 40-man rosters over the next several weeks will be done so in order to avoid risking the loss of those players to the upcoming draft.
Saturday, October 16, 2010
Back to the Grindstone
For the past several weeks, I’ve toyed with beginning an ongoing series of MLB 40-man roster evaluations, effectively serving as a SWOT analysis (just like with any other business) emphasizing the given team’s payroll, young cost-controlled talent, and specific areas of strength over a one-year (2011) and three-year (2011-2013) window. This, along with numerous ideas with it that I may pursue, would be quite a commitment given the scope of what I’d like to turn a project like that into. But the more important point for now is that after burning a lot of time on message boards recently, I’ve realized I’m interested in writing about the game again and in trying to build on my own knowledge of roster development and analysis in the context of MLB. In the process, I hope to offer thoughts that might be entertaining and/or informative for at least a couple of people out there somewhere. This may turn into a much greater project, or it may not. We’ll see how it goes.
For now, I’m going to begin a series of articles regarding important concepts to digest for tackling roster development and analysis. These topics are both ones that I would like to become better versed in discussing, as well as a number of subjects that will be necessary to preface any kind of team analysis. These concepts include things such as the amateur draft, the 40-man roster, the arbitration and free agency process, the Rule 5 draft, the international talent market, and so forth. They may also branch out to cover personal baseball management philosophies –the risk/reward continuum and why a balanced (diversified) farm system is important, constructing a realistic preseason depth chart (knowing it takes many, many more than 25 players to crawl through a 162-game season), anticipating and avoiding 40-man roster crunches, and so forth.
Finally, I have to imagine I will need and/or want to cover some statistical analysis as well – not necessarily the calculation of or nuts and bolts behind given statistics, but certainly the information needed to interpret them, as well as the limitations and context needed to avoid fooling ourselves into thinking that we can rely on numbers at their face value to “make” the correct decisions for us.
In all of these cases, I anticipate linking to all of these articles from the main page as a reference/resource list for use with whatever direction this site takes. I will also gradually grow a reference list of outside sources and must-reads to supplement (or preface) these discussions.
Simply put, I’m not sure exactly what I’m going to be doing with this, and I’m not claiming to be an all-knowing authority of a sport that many, many people smarter than me have extensively researched and built an impressive library of knowledge about. But I’d like to write several times a week again, and I think I have some things to offer that could help augment the way in which many baseball fans watch and understand the game. Stay tuned, and bookmark me if you’re intrigued!
For now, I’m going to begin a series of articles regarding important concepts to digest for tackling roster development and analysis. These topics are both ones that I would like to become better versed in discussing, as well as a number of subjects that will be necessary to preface any kind of team analysis. These concepts include things such as the amateur draft, the 40-man roster, the arbitration and free agency process, the Rule 5 draft, the international talent market, and so forth. They may also branch out to cover personal baseball management philosophies –the risk/reward continuum and why a balanced (diversified) farm system is important, constructing a realistic preseason depth chart (knowing it takes many, many more than 25 players to crawl through a 162-game season), anticipating and avoiding 40-man roster crunches, and so forth.
Finally, I have to imagine I will need and/or want to cover some statistical analysis as well – not necessarily the calculation of or nuts and bolts behind given statistics, but certainly the information needed to interpret them, as well as the limitations and context needed to avoid fooling ourselves into thinking that we can rely on numbers at their face value to “make” the correct decisions for us.
In all of these cases, I anticipate linking to all of these articles from the main page as a reference/resource list for use with whatever direction this site takes. I will also gradually grow a reference list of outside sources and must-reads to supplement (or preface) these discussions.
Simply put, I’m not sure exactly what I’m going to be doing with this, and I’m not claiming to be an all-knowing authority of a sport that many, many people smarter than me have extensively researched and built an impressive library of knowledge about. But I’d like to write several times a week again, and I think I have some things to offer that could help augment the way in which many baseball fans watch and understand the game. Stay tuned, and bookmark me if you’re intrigued!
Monday, August 24, 2009
2009 Minor League Free Agents
Check out this post by RoyalsRetro at John Sickels' Minor League Ball prospect blog. Minor league free agency is a means of talent acquisition that flies far under the radar, but it can pay significant dividends for teams who take fliers on the right players and who, to an extent, enjoy good luck. Impact talent is virtually off the table here, but for a non-guaranteed roster spot and the league minimum, a number of teams have reaped the benefits of cheap flawed players who are true assets in supporting roles. After all, a roster requires 25 players and several capable reserves, not just stars.
Friday, August 21, 2009
Keeper League Update / Prospect Profiles
Here is a brief overview of my primary keeper league team's farm system that I wrote last week on our forums. I know this doesn't really count as coverage, but it has some information on a bunch of well-known and lesser known prospects. All numbers are as of about a week and a half ago. Also, for purposes of this article (the league), rookie eligibility is defined as less than 50 IP or 150 AB for a player to be considered as having one year of MLB service. It's a 24-team league, so with graduations this is actually an above-average collection of young core talent. Below is a top 10, a 'just missed' listing, and a list of my current year graduations:
1) 1B Justin Smoak - AAA TEX - Tempted to put Latos ahead, but Smoak has shown power, patience, and plus defense in his first full pro season. Struggled at first in AAA but has been better lately. Looks ready for a job in mid-2010, could survive sooner though.
(2) RHP Mat Latos - MLB SD - Pretty certain to keep his ML status. 21 YO, who despite pitching just 112.1 IP at low A or lower coming into the year, is already enjoying substantial MLB success. He's still a flyball pitcher and not yet quite as good as his ERA indicates, but the BB/K rates are nice and his stuff is simply absurd. Fourth-fastest average fastball among all SP in baseball with a wicked, wicked slider. Looks like the rotation-fronting potential we've heard about is real, hopefully he can lose the 'fragile' tag soon enough.
(3) LHP Martin Perez - AA TEX - Perez got shelled in his AA debut, which is absolutely fine since he's 18 and the youngest player above (IIRC) low-A. Perez features plus heat and a plus curve, but some have even reported his once-middling change as looking like a third plus offering. Sky's the limit. ETA late 2011, conceivably could be ready earlier but probably needs a full year in AA in 2010.
(4) 1B Freddie Freeman - AA ATL - The former youngest player in the CAR league is now struggling a bit in AA, but showing a good approach at the plate. Freeman has legit power which hasn't yet been fully realized at age 19, and though not generally regarded as more than an average defender at 1B, he was recently named the Southern League's best defensive 1B. ETA Sept. 2010 or early 2011.
(5) RHP/SS Casey Kelly - A+ BOS - Ok, Casey, that's not awful for a 19 YO shortstop in Low-A, but you are a pitcher. K rates were just OK, but that's nitpicking when considering Kelly's ARL, upside, and excellent H/BB/HR ratios. ETA 2012.
(6) RHP Jordan Walden - AA LAA - Previous owners of guys like Jeff Mathis know all about the Angels' hitter-friendly parks. Here's a fun case study for you. Walden played a third of last season at high-A last year after 18 stellar low-A starts. ERA and FIP for 2008 (A+)/2009 (AA): 4.04/5.25, 3.81/3.77. Basically, here's what's changed for Walden: his K rate has increased a decent amount, he's walking an additional batter per inning, and his hit rate has increased substantially. He's had a nagging non-shoulder/elbow injury this season, and he has certainly had some struggles. But these items together are absolutely not enough for me to drop Walden out of the 30-60 range as a front-mid starter to virtually off the radar (150+) on a prospect list, when this is all occurring in a hitter's park at 21 years old. I think Walden should be dropped a bit from where he was last year, but that given the almost complete lack of talk on him, that he is approaching the territory of criminally underrated. ETA 2011
(7) OF Angel Morales - A MIN - An unbelievably slow start makes Morales' age-19 full season debut season (.264/.320/.457) all the more impressive, as something has clicked this summer. After a disastrous June, Morales has posted a .916 and 1.194 OPS in back to back months. Morales still has a problematic plate approach, but while walking at a rate of 6% (12% last year), he's cut his K rate from an ugly 39.3% to a much less bad 27.7%. Given his age and league, this isn't yet a major problem and is encouraging growth. I want to see further improvement, but this guy is loaded with tools and could be a pretty good player even with a low walk rate. ETA 2013.
(8) RHP Simon Castro - A SD - Promote me! Castro isn't young or old for low-A at 21, and has been moved slowly, one year per level. His past track record is erratic, but he's gained lots of command/control this year, dropping his BB/9 to 2.42 while bolstering his K/9 from strong to an excellent 10.40. Castro's K rate has actually increased every month, peaking at 13.06 in July. I want to see him against better competition, but the stuff and improvement is there for him to rapidly ascend prospect lists next season. He has to be in San Diego's top 5 right now. ETA mid-2012.
(9) C Angel Salome - AAA MIL - Looks like .400 BABIPs from 5'7" 200 lb. catchers aren't sustainable after all. In all seriousness, Salome's BB/K rates are a little worse, but not significantly, than last year. His ISO is down a fair amount, but he's had many fewer runners attempt to steal on him and increased his poor 25% CS to a fair 31%. Overall, he hasn't helped his stock any and it has to have dipped a little bit. But as a 23 YO C getting his first taste of AAA, I'm not particularly concerned. His skill is somewhere between 2008 and 2009, which would make for a handy starting catcher. ETA mid/late-2010.
(10) RHP Adys Portillo - R SD - I don't really know who goes on the list at this point, so I went with pure upside. Portillo is making his stateside debut as a 17 YO in the AZL. The results aren't earth-shattering, but he was regarded as #2 behind Ynoa last summer in the int'l. class and has heaps of potential. It's going to take a while, but early returns are at least encouraging with a BB/9 under 4 and a K rate approaching 8. No, R-ball stats don't mean much, but it is nice to see a kid his age coming to the US and holding his own from the start. ETA 2014-2015.
Next 5 (in no particular order):
C Luis Exposito (AA - BOS), 2B Scott Sizemore (AAA - DET), RHP Tyler Chatwood (A - LAA), SS Derrick Gibson (A- BOS), RHP Jairo Heredia (A NYY)
Graduations (or likely graduations): LHP Phil Coke, LHP Ross Detwiler, LHP Jose Mijares, RHP Tyler Clippard, RHP Tommy Hanson, RHP Kevin Hart, RHP Kris Medlen, OF Nolan Reimold, OF Seth Smith
System overview:
The system has thinned considerably, partially due to a series of trades that netted Jon Lester, Evan Longoria, Carlos Beltran, Ryan Howard, and some lesser regulars such as Luke Scott. It has also graduated perhaps the best pitching prospect in baseball along with what should form most of my bullpen, a couple of starting outfielders, and Kris Medlen, who I believe still has long-term rotation potential (check out his impressive 2nd half numbers, by the way - 11 K/9 in his last ~30 IP).
Overall, I'm happy to have somehow pulled off a firesale/full-scale rebuild that should see only one poor year before a return to contention next year, with impact prospects (though fewer of them) still in the pipeline. The central tenet of our league is cost control, as it's filled with good owners and a salary cap. Having all of the above guys through five years of MLB service cheaply should at least give me the chance to contend for a while, which is all you can really ask for.
1) 1B Justin Smoak - AAA TEX - Tempted to put Latos ahead, but Smoak has shown power, patience, and plus defense in his first full pro season. Struggled at first in AAA but has been better lately. Looks ready for a job in mid-2010, could survive sooner though.
(2) RHP Mat Latos - MLB SD - Pretty certain to keep his ML status. 21 YO, who despite pitching just 112.1 IP at low A or lower coming into the year, is already enjoying substantial MLB success. He's still a flyball pitcher and not yet quite as good as his ERA indicates, but the BB/K rates are nice and his stuff is simply absurd. Fourth-fastest average fastball among all SP in baseball with a wicked, wicked slider. Looks like the rotation-fronting potential we've heard about is real, hopefully he can lose the 'fragile' tag soon enough.
(3) LHP Martin Perez - AA TEX - Perez got shelled in his AA debut, which is absolutely fine since he's 18 and the youngest player above (IIRC) low-A. Perez features plus heat and a plus curve, but some have even reported his once-middling change as looking like a third plus offering. Sky's the limit. ETA late 2011, conceivably could be ready earlier but probably needs a full year in AA in 2010.
(4) 1B Freddie Freeman - AA ATL - The former youngest player in the CAR league is now struggling a bit in AA, but showing a good approach at the plate. Freeman has legit power which hasn't yet been fully realized at age 19, and though not generally regarded as more than an average defender at 1B, he was recently named the Southern League's best defensive 1B. ETA Sept. 2010 or early 2011.
(5) RHP/SS Casey Kelly - A+ BOS - Ok, Casey, that's not awful for a 19 YO shortstop in Low-A, but you are a pitcher. K rates were just OK, but that's nitpicking when considering Kelly's ARL, upside, and excellent H/BB/HR ratios. ETA 2012.
(6) RHP Jordan Walden - AA LAA - Previous owners of guys like Jeff Mathis know all about the Angels' hitter-friendly parks. Here's a fun case study for you. Walden played a third of last season at high-A last year after 18 stellar low-A starts. ERA and FIP for 2008 (A+)/2009 (AA): 4.04/5.25, 3.81/3.77. Basically, here's what's changed for Walden: his K rate has increased a decent amount, he's walking an additional batter per inning, and his hit rate has increased substantially. He's had a nagging non-shoulder/elbow injury this season, and he has certainly had some struggles. But these items together are absolutely not enough for me to drop Walden out of the 30-60 range as a front-mid starter to virtually off the radar (150+) on a prospect list, when this is all occurring in a hitter's park at 21 years old. I think Walden should be dropped a bit from where he was last year, but that given the almost complete lack of talk on him, that he is approaching the territory of criminally underrated. ETA 2011
(7) OF Angel Morales - A MIN - An unbelievably slow start makes Morales' age-19 full season debut season (.264/.320/.457) all the more impressive, as something has clicked this summer. After a disastrous June, Morales has posted a .916 and 1.194 OPS in back to back months. Morales still has a problematic plate approach, but while walking at a rate of 6% (12% last year), he's cut his K rate from an ugly 39.3% to a much less bad 27.7%. Given his age and league, this isn't yet a major problem and is encouraging growth. I want to see further improvement, but this guy is loaded with tools and could be a pretty good player even with a low walk rate. ETA 2013.
(8) RHP Simon Castro - A SD - Promote me! Castro isn't young or old for low-A at 21, and has been moved slowly, one year per level. His past track record is erratic, but he's gained lots of command/control this year, dropping his BB/9 to 2.42 while bolstering his K/9 from strong to an excellent 10.40. Castro's K rate has actually increased every month, peaking at 13.06 in July. I want to see him against better competition, but the stuff and improvement is there for him to rapidly ascend prospect lists next season. He has to be in San Diego's top 5 right now. ETA mid-2012.
(9) C Angel Salome - AAA MIL - Looks like .400 BABIPs from 5'7" 200 lb. catchers aren't sustainable after all. In all seriousness, Salome's BB/K rates are a little worse, but not significantly, than last year. His ISO is down a fair amount, but he's had many fewer runners attempt to steal on him and increased his poor 25% CS to a fair 31%. Overall, he hasn't helped his stock any and it has to have dipped a little bit. But as a 23 YO C getting his first taste of AAA, I'm not particularly concerned. His skill is somewhere between 2008 and 2009, which would make for a handy starting catcher. ETA mid/late-2010.
(10) RHP Adys Portillo - R SD - I don't really know who goes on the list at this point, so I went with pure upside. Portillo is making his stateside debut as a 17 YO in the AZL. The results aren't earth-shattering, but he was regarded as #2 behind Ynoa last summer in the int'l. class and has heaps of potential. It's going to take a while, but early returns are at least encouraging with a BB/9 under 4 and a K rate approaching 8. No, R-ball stats don't mean much, but it is nice to see a kid his age coming to the US and holding his own from the start. ETA 2014-2015.
Next 5 (in no particular order):
C Luis Exposito (AA - BOS), 2B Scott Sizemore (AAA - DET), RHP Tyler Chatwood (A - LAA), SS Derrick Gibson (A- BOS), RHP Jairo Heredia (A NYY)
Graduations (or likely graduations): LHP Phil Coke, LHP Ross Detwiler, LHP Jose Mijares, RHP Tyler Clippard, RHP Tommy Hanson, RHP Kevin Hart, RHP Kris Medlen, OF Nolan Reimold, OF Seth Smith
System overview:
The system has thinned considerably, partially due to a series of trades that netted Jon Lester, Evan Longoria, Carlos Beltran, Ryan Howard, and some lesser regulars such as Luke Scott. It has also graduated perhaps the best pitching prospect in baseball along with what should form most of my bullpen, a couple of starting outfielders, and Kris Medlen, who I believe still has long-term rotation potential (check out his impressive 2nd half numbers, by the way - 11 K/9 in his last ~30 IP).
Overall, I'm happy to have somehow pulled off a firesale/full-scale rebuild that should see only one poor year before a return to contention next year, with impact prospects (though fewer of them) still in the pipeline. The central tenet of our league is cost control, as it's filled with good owners and a salary cap. Having all of the above guys through five years of MLB service cheaply should at least give me the chance to contend for a while, which is all you can really ask for.
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
Shiny New Toy Syndrome
Today, I made several posts at John Sickels' Minor League Ball blog on the SBNation network. These were in reference to one thread discussing SD AA RHP Mat Latos' imminent big league promotion as well as subsequently a referendum on his mechanics, as well as a comparison of 2006 high school draftee and BOS AA 1B Lars Anderson against #3 overall pick in the 2009 draft, Seattle prospect and UNC alum OF Dustin Ackley.
The posts were a bit of a stream of consciousness tirade against "shiny new toy syndrome" (SNTS), which states that newer prospects sometimes are underrated and older prospects overrated on the almost sole basis of being new/old, as newer prospects have not yet had any significant flaws exposed against higher competition.
I think this is a topic that deserves some more attention, as IMO there is no perfect way to balance evaluating these two groups of players, but the pendulum has swung way too far in favor of fresh new faces. Here are some excerpts on the topic below:
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Every scouting report said the same thing about Lars, and now that he’s a 21 YO in EL, people go sour b/c its a challenge. I’d lean Ackley here b/c of the defensive spectrum, but I’m sure when he has a rough April-May 2011 we’ll be talking about him vs. the next big bat ’11 draftee.
I don’t disagree and like Ackley better. What I’m saying is really a larger complaint about where prospect evaluation is at right now in that I think independent of which players we’re talking about, X is almost always favored over Y if X is the next big thing and Y has to make adjustments, even if ahead of the age/promotion curve.
I think that’s a very big issue and causes a lot of players to get overlooked since almost every player’s expectations are set entirely too high (i.e. turning ‘upside’ into an almost expected outcome).
For example, now that his defense is considered by many to be above-average by MLB standards, how come Reid Brignac is so far under the radar right now? Probably because his CAL league season bought him some high expectations, and he took time to adjust to the high minors when young for his leagues.
Back to the first paragraph though, or Ackley/Lars specifically, here’s what was said about Lars in BA shortly after the 2006 draft (early preseason 2007):
Sounds like a can’t-miss guy, right? In retrospect, isn’t this more of a best-case upside scenario that reads like what should be expected of him? He’s only 21, he’s got time to put together a productive MLB career despite a disappointing season, but I guess I have trouble seeing how one guy’s stock can drop SO dramatically in only a little over two years. He, and many others, went from pretty overrated to potentially underrated. In both cases, true value was probably between those two points.
So yes, I’m not trying to take Ackley down a peg at all, because it’s a broader criticism than that, and he’s a good player.
I think it works better for more comparable players than Lars and Ackley, but the general idea that we overreact to hype re: new players and value them over guys who have had the disadvantage of having their flaws exposed against tougher competition. But those same guys were someone’s shiny new toys a couple years prior to that.
I think it works better for more comparable players than Lars and Ackley, but the general idea that we overreact to hype re: new players and value them over guys who have had the disadvantage of having their flaws exposed against tougher competition. But those same guys were someone’s shiny new toys a couple years prior to that.
Homer Bailey might be an oops in progress…all good names though. Danks and Floyd both burned me before I started trying to be less reactive to MiLB numbers and more patient. For a while I kind of just absorbed what people said on new guys and went with it, but there’s so much time for something to go wrong and stock to drop for new guys – you can’t predict the wall they might hit at AA or AAA three years down the line, etc.
There are some very, very good owners in my main keeper league, but I think SNTS is an exploitable weakness. It’s just easy to become frustrated with guys whose names you’ve seen for years and who succeed especially with +ARL early only to hit a wall in the upper minors. The talent’s usually the same or similar as it was straight out of the draft, but different context sometimes alone can drastically change perception. Once a guy struggles even once, his perceived value rarely gets that full value back, either.
For example, using Brignac I think you’d be downright nuts to leave a MLB-ready SS with solid power and defensive skills out of a top 50. But would he make more than 2 out of 10 of a random sample of prospectors? Doubtful – he’s a 23 YO has-been now, and not even BA gave him an honorable mention with their top 25! He’s toast.
Moustakas and Hosmer are great examples. Latos and Drabek were both completely off the radar before this year, and all of a sudden turned into ace-potential guys again? When Casey Kelly has a 5 ERA in his first six weeks of AA next year as a 20 YO, he probably drops out of a top 50, right?
Most importantly, you are looking at three months of minor league statistics. I agree that those numbers are dubious to heavily weigh, and would also note that especially if you’re not going to adjust for context, you can’t learn very much about a prospect based on such a small sample. If the numbers alone are enough to analyze a player, let’s go ahead and anoint all those 24-year-old non-prospects in high-A as the next big thing.
I think you need to reward a player for what he’s doing well and the progress he is making. Keep in mind most 21 YO are either in high-A (if they’re lucky and good), or still in the process of signing their first pro contracts as college draftees. That Lars is holding his own with production that’s neither truly great nor truly bad – simply a bit above-average for his league – is a plus in his favor. Also consider that despite KG’s anti-Lars campaign, we have multiple sources including John noting that there are some serious tools here. He has continued to show some skills to pair with those tools, and has been reasonably productive. Strong plate discipline and some power with below-average defense…he looks like the same guy to me…wait, why is he doomed again?
He’s not without weaknesses and has a lot of work left to do to be an above-average MLB player, but despite numbers that aren’t eye-popping, he is doing alright given context, and to call it a lost season or “just not pretty” is pretty ridiculous IMO.
(on Latos - John Sickels hates his mechanics, Kevin Goldstein likes them) - But my point was that there’s no consensus that they’re problematic. However, because it’s now been said, it’s my opinion that in what tends to be a pretty overreactive community (prospect followers, myself included), sentiments like these begin to just be repeated verbatim until they’re a characteristic of the prospect.
Does that make any sense? I think there are two credible arguments on Latos:
(1) injury history combined with complicated mechanics increase risk of future injuries (arm or elsewhere)
(2) stuff and results speak for themselves, injury risk is overblown b/c he has avoided major arm trouble, different expert says mechanics are clean
I lean more toward the latter but think the former could easily be true. It’s just annoying that that connection has only been made because John stated it yesterday. Still guessing this makes more sense in my head than it does on paper.
I was speaking to the community’s perception, not yours specifically. I think it’s a really legitimate argument against Latos, I just think it will get a disproportionate amount of traction because one of the big three (John, BA, KG) recently commented on it. That’s just what bothers me – that this IMO might quickly turn from a credible perspective with some solid evidence to a foregone conclusion.
Tate and ‘questions’ about the bat are a great example from this year’s draft.
The posts were a bit of a stream of consciousness tirade against "shiny new toy syndrome" (SNTS), which states that newer prospects sometimes are underrated and older prospects overrated on the almost sole basis of being new/old, as newer prospects have not yet had any significant flaws exposed against higher competition.
I think this is a topic that deserves some more attention, as IMO there is no perfect way to balance evaluating these two groups of players, but the pendulum has swung way too far in favor of fresh new faces. Here are some excerpts on the topic below:
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Every scouting report said the same thing about Lars, and now that he’s a 21 YO in EL, people go sour b/c its a challenge. I’d lean Ackley here b/c of the defensive spectrum, but I’m sure when he has a rough April-May 2011 we’ll be talking about him vs. the next big bat ’11 draftee.
I don’t disagree and like Ackley better. What I’m saying is really a larger complaint about where prospect evaluation is at right now in that I think independent of which players we’re talking about, X is almost always favored over Y if X is the next big thing and Y has to make adjustments, even if ahead of the age/promotion curve.
I think that’s a very big issue and causes a lot of players to get overlooked since almost every player’s expectations are set entirely too high (i.e. turning ‘upside’ into an almost expected outcome).
For example, now that his defense is considered by many to be above-average by MLB standards, how come Reid Brignac is so far under the radar right now? Probably because his CAL league season bought him some high expectations, and he took time to adjust to the high minors when young for his leagues.
Back to the first paragraph though, or Ackley/Lars specifically, here’s what was said about Lars in BA shortly after the 2006 draft (early preseason 2007):
Strengths: Anderson doesn’t just have tape-measure power, but he generates it with ease. One scout compared him to Carlos Delgado for his ability to flip the barrel at the ball and have it explode off his bat. There’s plenty of room for more strength on his 6-foot-5, 190-pound frame, and for a big power hitter he has a short swing and a very good approach. He sees the ball well and uses the opposite field already. He’s a solid athlete.
Weaknesses: He has to put in some time on his defense, though Anderson has the hands and footwork to become at least an average first baseman. Once he fills out, he’ll be a below-average runner but shouldn’t be a baseclogger.
The Future: Anderson could make his pro debut in low Class A Greenville as a 19-year-old. The Sox can’t wait to see what he does in game action, and he could be hitting in the middle of their order as early as the end of 2009.
Sounds like a can’t-miss guy, right? In retrospect, isn’t this more of a best-case upside scenario that reads like what should be expected of him? He’s only 21, he’s got time to put together a productive MLB career despite a disappointing season, but I guess I have trouble seeing how one guy’s stock can drop SO dramatically in only a little over two years. He, and many others, went from pretty overrated to potentially underrated. In both cases, true value was probably between those two points.
So yes, I’m not trying to take Ackley down a peg at all, because it’s a broader criticism than that, and he’s a good player.
I think it works better for more comparable players than Lars and Ackley, but the general idea that we overreact to hype re: new players and value them over guys who have had the disadvantage of having their flaws exposed against tougher competition. But those same guys were someone’s shiny new toys a couple years prior to that.
I think it works better for more comparable players than Lars and Ackley, but the general idea that we overreact to hype re: new players and value them over guys who have had the disadvantage of having their flaws exposed against tougher competition. But those same guys were someone’s shiny new toys a couple years prior to that.
Homer Bailey might be an oops in progress…all good names though. Danks and Floyd both burned me before I started trying to be less reactive to MiLB numbers and more patient. For a while I kind of just absorbed what people said on new guys and went with it, but there’s so much time for something to go wrong and stock to drop for new guys – you can’t predict the wall they might hit at AA or AAA three years down the line, etc.
There are some very, very good owners in my main keeper league, but I think SNTS is an exploitable weakness. It’s just easy to become frustrated with guys whose names you’ve seen for years and who succeed especially with +ARL early only to hit a wall in the upper minors. The talent’s usually the same or similar as it was straight out of the draft, but different context sometimes alone can drastically change perception. Once a guy struggles even once, his perceived value rarely gets that full value back, either.
For example, using Brignac I think you’d be downright nuts to leave a MLB-ready SS with solid power and defensive skills out of a top 50. But would he make more than 2 out of 10 of a random sample of prospectors? Doubtful – he’s a 23 YO has-been now, and not even BA gave him an honorable mention with their top 25! He’s toast.
Moustakas and Hosmer are great examples. Latos and Drabek were both completely off the radar before this year, and all of a sudden turned into ace-potential guys again? When Casey Kelly has a 5 ERA in his first six weeks of AA next year as a 20 YO, he probably drops out of a top 50, right?
Most importantly, you are looking at three months of minor league statistics. I agree that those numbers are dubious to heavily weigh, and would also note that especially if you’re not going to adjust for context, you can’t learn very much about a prospect based on such a small sample. If the numbers alone are enough to analyze a player, let’s go ahead and anoint all those 24-year-old non-prospects in high-A as the next big thing.
I think you need to reward a player for what he’s doing well and the progress he is making. Keep in mind most 21 YO are either in high-A (if they’re lucky and good), or still in the process of signing their first pro contracts as college draftees. That Lars is holding his own with production that’s neither truly great nor truly bad – simply a bit above-average for his league – is a plus in his favor. Also consider that despite KG’s anti-Lars campaign, we have multiple sources including John noting that there are some serious tools here. He has continued to show some skills to pair with those tools, and has been reasonably productive. Strong plate discipline and some power with below-average defense…he looks like the same guy to me…wait, why is he doomed again?
He’s not without weaknesses and has a lot of work left to do to be an above-average MLB player, but despite numbers that aren’t eye-popping, he is doing alright given context, and to call it a lost season or “just not pretty” is pretty ridiculous IMO.
(on Latos - John Sickels hates his mechanics, Kevin Goldstein likes them) - But my point was that there’s no consensus that they’re problematic. However, because it’s now been said, it’s my opinion that in what tends to be a pretty overreactive community (prospect followers, myself included), sentiments like these begin to just be repeated verbatim until they’re a characteristic of the prospect.
Does that make any sense? I think there are two credible arguments on Latos:
(1) injury history combined with complicated mechanics increase risk of future injuries (arm or elsewhere)
(2) stuff and results speak for themselves, injury risk is overblown b/c he has avoided major arm trouble, different expert says mechanics are clean
I lean more toward the latter but think the former could easily be true. It’s just annoying that that connection has only been made because John stated it yesterday. Still guessing this makes more sense in my head than it does on paper.
I was speaking to the community’s perception, not yours specifically. I think it’s a really legitimate argument against Latos, I just think it will get a disproportionate amount of traction because one of the big three (John, BA, KG) recently commented on it. That’s just what bothers me – that this IMO might quickly turn from a credible perspective with some solid evidence to a foregone conclusion.
Tate and ‘questions’ about the bat are a great example from this year’s draft.
Saturday, July 11, 2009
Futures Game Preview
I'm not sure if this is going to make the main site, so I'll post it here. This is just a brief overview of how the Futures Game rosters are constructed, as well as a few brief bios on players on the U.S. roster. The Futures Game takes place on Sunday at 2pm EST and features an elite collection of minor league talent. I was having major problems with formatting my table; I'll deal with it later...maybe.
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US takes on World in 2009 Futures Game
Sunday’s All-Star Weekend Exhibition features six USAB alumni
This Sunday, the 11th annual Futures Game will take place at Busch Stadium, home of the St. Louis Cardinals and the host of this season’s MLB All-Star Game festivities. The game pits 50 of the best minor league players against each other; 25 playing for the United States, and 25 representing the rest of the world. It’s both a great opportunity to recognize superb performances over the first half of the minor league season, as well as to identify and get a sneak peak of blossoming talents who will soon begin to appear on major league rosters.
The US roster features six players who once played on a USA Baseball amateur national team in international competition. Five infielders (Pedro Alvarez, Danny Espinosa, Josh Vitters, Brett Wallace, and Jemile Weeks) as well as one pitcher (Jarrod Parker) will make appearances for the US team. A summary of those players’ seasons to date is featured below:
Last First MLB Team Level MiLB Team AVG HR RBI
3B Alvarez* Pedro Pittsburgh AA Altoona, PA .245 17 63
SS Espinosa Danny Washington A+ Potomac, MD .263 9 41
3B Vitters* Josh Chicago (N) A+ Daytona, FL .303 15 49
3B Wallace* Brett St. Louis AAA Memphis, TN .294 11 35
2B Weeks Jemile Oakland A+ Stockton, CA .323 7 24
Last First MLB Team Level MiLB Team ERA W SO
RHP Parker* Jarrod Arizona AA Mobile, AL 2.51 5 82
3B Alvarez* Pedro Pittsburgh AA Altoona, PA .245 17 63
SS Espinosa Danny Washington A+ Potomac, MD .263 9 41
3B Vitters* Josh Chicago (N) A+ Daytona, FL .303 15 49
3B Wallace* Brett St. Louis AAA Memphis, TN .294 11 35
2B Weeks Jemile Oakland A+ Stockton, CA .323 7 24
Last First MLB Team Level MiLB Team ERA W SO
RHP Parker* Jarrod Arizona AA Mobile, AL 2.51 5 82
* Indicates combined statistics for multiple minor league teams
Pedro Alvarez played on the USA Baseball National Collegiate Team for two consecutive summers (2006-2007). As a sophomore, he led Team USA in batting average (.379) and RBI (43) while starting every game and clubbing five home runs during the summer of 2006. As a result of an impressive junior season at Vanderbilt University, Alvarez was named a finalist for the 2007 Golden Spikes Award, given annually by USA Baseball to the best player in college baseball. That summer, after becoming the 2nd overall selection of the 2007 MLB draft, Alvarez hit .315 with seven round-trippers and a team-leading 30 RBI in a second summer with Team USA.
Danny Espinosa batted .483 while appearing in every game for the 2003 16U National Team, which went 7-1 en route to the gold medal in the World Youth Championships in Taipei, Taiwan. He later became a teammate of Alvarez’s on the 2007 National Collegiate Team, and was drafted by the Washington Nationals in the 3rd round of the 2008 MLB draft. Additionally, he was ranked among the twenty best prospects in the New York-Penn League following the 2008 season.
Josh Vitters was a member of the 2005 16U National Team, which took home the silver in the World Youth Championships. He was drafted by the Chicago Cubs 3rd overall in the 2007 MLB Draft, and has since risen to prominence as the consensus top prospect in the organization. He is among the youngest participants in the event at 19 years old, and boasts immense power potential.
Brett Wallace, a 2008 Golden Spikes Award finalist, worked his way into the 2007 National Collegiate Team’s lineup as a sophomore, batting .312 while starting 29 of a possible 37 games. After being selected by the St. Louis Cardinals 13th overall in the 2008 MLB Draft, he has worked his way all the way up to AAA in just a full calendar year. With former top prospect Colby Rasmus now entrenched as the Cardinals starting center fielder, Wallace is the heir to the unofficial organizational honor. The honor may be short lived, however, as whether the big league club can afford to keep him stashed away in the minor leagues much longer is another story.
Jemile Weeks was the catalyst of the 2006 National Collegiate Team that won the FISU Championships and won 28 of 31 total games throughout the summer. Weeks started all 31 games and responded by batting .348 with 14 steals and 23 walks. He was drafted 12th overall by the Oakland Athletics in the 2008 MLB Draft and hasn’t stopped hitting. Given Oakland’s recent aggressiveness with promotions, Weeks is already among the most promising in a talented organization and could find himself in the big leagues before long.
Jarrod Parker was a member of the 2006 18U National Team, which won the silver medal in the fall IBAF Junior World Championships. Parker threw 3 2/3 innings in relief in the final, allowing just four Koreans to reach base and giving his team the chance to briefly retake the lead. He surrendered only a single earned run during the tournament, good for a 0.77 ERA; opposing hitters managed just a .154 batting average against him. Drafted 9th overall by the Arizona Diamondbacks in the 2007 MLB Draft, Parker is considered the top prospect in Arizona’s farm system.
The Futures Game begins at 2:00 pm (EST) this Sunday, July 12th. Those interested can watch the live action on ESPN2 or MLB.TV, while XM subscribers can tune in to channel 175 for a radio broadcast of the game.
Friday, July 3, 2009
Sean O'Sullivan's Early Success
I wrote an article on USAB alum Sean O'Sullivan (16U 2003, 18U 2004) and his MLB debut. Check it out here.
In early June, most 21-year-old baseball players were eagerly awaiting a phone call notifying them of their selection in the MLB amateur draft as draft-eligible rising seniors in college. Sean O'Sullivan received a phone call of his own just a few days later. However, this one notified him not of a team drafting him, but instead of his promotion to the big leagues to make his major league debut in place of injured pitcher Ervin Santana.O'Sullivan, a right-handed starting pitcher, was drafted by the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim in the third round of the 2005 draft out of Grossmont, a junior college in California. He had long been on the radar of talent evaluators, having been recognized as the top 12-year-old player in the country in Baseball America's "Baseball for the Ages" series in 2000, as well as being named the 2004 high school player of the year. Through his junior season at Valhalla High in San Diego, O'Sullivan had produced monster numbers as both a starting pitcher and an outfielder with a powerful bat. He batted .472 with 22 home runs and 104 runs batted in over three years, in addition to his dominant 25-6 record, 1.87 ERA, and 219 strikeouts.
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