Month: August 2014

The Uneven Distribution of Prospects

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There have been a lot of questions lately about the strength of the Phillies system.  This is not going answer where the Phillies are because Top 100 prospects are not an exact sign of the strength of system.  This is because not all prospects are equal, but also because the depth of the system factors into the overall ranking.  However, what we can do with Top 100 prospects is see how uneven the distribution of prospects is in baseball.

For this exercise we are going to use MLB.com’s Top 100 prospect list because it is the only fairly live updating list including the 2014 draft class.  What I did was see how many top 100 prospects each team had and then grouped them by the number in each and here was the results:

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The Ones that Got Away

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We always like to dream about the ones that got away, the draft picks unsigned, the draft picks untaken.  Here lets look at the guys the Phillies took, but couldn’t make a deal for some reason.

Those That Got Away:

Brandon Workman (2007 – 3rd round – 107 overall):  Workman was an up and down guy out of high school, he would show a fastball up to 95, but his mechanics scared scouts.  The Phillies offered him $275,000, Workman wanted $350,000.  Three years later, Workman was a second round pick of the Boston Red Sox and has racked up 104.1 IP in the past two years in the majors as a starter and reliever, his likely home is the back of the bullpen.

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Phillies Acquire 2B Jesmuel Valentin for Roberto Hernandez

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The first of the two PTBNL for Roberto Hernandez have been revealed, and it is Dodgers’ supplemental first round pick in 2012 Jesmuel Valentin  (#51 overall).  Valentin is the  son of Jose Valentin who played 16 years in the major leagues.  As an amateur he played second base next to Carlos Correa, and while there was some chance he would play SS, he has found his natural spot at 2B in the Dodgers system.  Baseball America had this to say about him when he was drafted:

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Jose Pujols to be Promoted to Williamsport

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According to Ian Catherine, GCL right fielder Jose Pujols will be promoted to Williamsport.

Pujols will be rejoining the other big signing of the Phillies 2012 International FA class, Deivi Grullon.  Pujols signed for $540,000 out of the Dominican Republic after showing impressive raw power that had one scout invoke the name of a certain Marlin slugger.  At the time Pujols’ swing showed incredible bat speed but a lot of uppercut and natural miss to it.  Last year the Phillies worked to retool his swing to be more level, the end result was a more contact oriented swing that did not sacrifice any of what may be 80 grade raw power.  Pujols has made large strides in pitch recognition, but he still has approach and aggression issues at the plate that have lead to high strikeout totals, but he has also shown a willingness at times to work deep counts.  Last year Pujols tied for the GCL lead in home runs, but most of his power was to the pull side, this year he has shown the ability to hit the ball hard to the opposite field as seen in his spray chart.

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Freddy Galvis, Cesar Hernandez and Building the 2015 Bench

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There are few things to say positively about the 2014 Philadelphia Phillies season. We’re nearing the final stretch to the season and September promotions should bring about an ounce of excitement for the faithful fans that still decide to watch this team. One area of the ball club that has been abysmal this season along with the previous years has been the bench.

The collective group of John Mayberry, Tony Gwynn, Cesar Hernandez, Wil Nieves and Reid Brignac is a group of mostly below replacement level players that don’t provide value offensively or even defensively. Nieves is the lone exception and works well with the pitching staff.

Offensively, the Phillies rank 24th in major league baseball, with a .245 on base percentage this season when pinch-hitting. They have a collective .542 OPS, 19th in the league. Their bench options lack positional flexibility and they struggle to get on base. Regardless of how the manager plays the matchups beyond John Mayberry against left handed pitchers, there are no strong options that will yield a positive outcome.

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Some Roster Shuffling

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Some quick transactions: Nick Rodesky promoted from GCL to Lakewood Aaron Brown promoted from Williamsport to Lakewood Jesen Dygestile-Therrien promoted from Williamsport to Lakewood Daniel Child demoted from Lakewood to GCL Aaron Baker promoted from Lakewood to Clearwater Samuel Hiciano placed on Lakewood disabled list Jesse Biddle promoted from Clearwater to Reading A lot of … Read more

The Hunt for the Paul Owens Award (Pitcher)

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Every year the Paul Owens Award goes to the top hitter and pitcher in the Phillies organization.  The award does not go to the best prospect in the organization, but rather to the one that has performed the best during the past season.  The hitting award should easily go to Phillies top prospect J.P. Crawford who is not only putting up a great stat line (.286/.376/.401), but he has done it across two levels as a 19-year-old playing good defense at a premium position.  On the pitching side the Phillies top prospects have been hindered by being hurt, ineffective, both hurt and ineffective, or having just been drafted this past June.  This leads to a very wide open race for the Paul Owens for pitching.

The Paul Owens Award for pitching has not been the site of illustrious and major league successful names, but it does have its share of top prospects.  The last 10 pitchers in reverse order to win it are Severino Gonzalez, Tyler Cloyd, Trevor May, Scott Mathieson, Kyle Drabek, J.A. Happ, Mike Zagurski, Carlos Carrasco, Robinson Tejeda, and Scott Mitchinson.

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Fastball Velocity and Brandon Leibrandt

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Phillies 6th Round pick Brandon Leibrandt has been on a roll recently which has started the round of questions about how good he can be, which ultimately end up on fastball velocity.  Velocity is the most tangible and quantifiable aspect of a pitcher’s arsenal.  Movement, command, and deception are all in the eye of the beholder and once we start talking secondary pitches the amateur eye is really out of its league.  So we debate velocity and whether it is enough for a pitcher to survive in the major leagues (should the prospect in question survive the other levels in between them and their major league aspirations).

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