Matt Winkelman

Matt is originally from New Jersey, but after a 4 year side track to Cleveland for college he now resides in Madison, WI. His work has appeared on Baseball Prospectus, Crashburn Alley, Phuture Phillies, The Good Phight, and TheDynastyGuru.

The Hunt for the Paul Owens Award (Pitcher)

by

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.

Read more

Fastball Velocity and Brandon Leibrandt

by

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).

Read more

VSL Phillies fall to VSL Tigers in VSL Championship

by

The VSL is only a 5 team league with the top two teams going to the championship.  The Phillies took the first game from the Tigers but the Tigers took Game 2.  A rain delay yesterday allow the VSL Phillies ace Ranger Suarez to take the hill today.  Suarez is a diminutive LHP with a … Read more

Post Trade Deadline Mailbag

by

With the trade deadline passed and the minor league season coming down the home stretch I asked for you to give me some questions to answer.  You guys delivered. Scott Bailey: Do you really think that Ruben wasn’t getting value in his attempts to make trades yesterday? I do, with some caveats.  Amaro is looking … Read more

Let’s do a Mailbag

by

We are through the July non-waiver trade deadline, we have a month of minor league season left.  There is plenty to ask and talk about, so what better way than taking a lot of questions in and giving some answers. You can submit your questions in a couple of way: In the comments here On … Read more

Being Positive About the Future

by

Lets be honest, its been a rough month to be a Phillies fan.  We built a delusion of getting a big payoff at the deadline in the form of prospects with names we didn’t recognize that we could dream on.  Cliff Lee has been a shell of himself with an injured elbow that makes us … Read more