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Post by soxin8 on Sept 2, 2012 19:26:38 GMT -5
Has there ever been a more controversial prospect? I have heard it reported during a minor league game that at least one scout said he is the best defensive ss in baseball. He was also near the bottom of the international league this year in all batting categories, though young for the league. Watching the MLB network this week, Gammons said the Sox refused to part with him this summer in a deal for Justin Upton. Keith Law recently tweeted Xander may be able to stay at short. If Arizona or another club will overlook the offense, with X no more than a year away, is it time to move him? I would have put this in the trade proposal forum but it appears that is not accepting new threads, and there is some news you may not be aware of in this post.
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Post by redsoxprospects on Sept 3, 2012 0:06:48 GMT -5
I say keep him as he probably increases in value over time. His stroke is not bad. More experience and man strength will increase his offensive numbers. He may yet be a solid mlb level SS.
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Post by elguapo on Sept 3, 2012 2:19:47 GMT -5
Keep him - he'll have more value if he proves he can be non-disastrous at the plate in the bigs.
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Post by ancientsoxfogey on Sept 3, 2012 5:55:46 GMT -5
Has there ever been a more controversial prospect? I have heard it reported during a minor league game that at least one scout said he is the best defensive ss in baseball. He was also near the bottom of the international league this year in all batting categories, though young for the league. Watching the MLB network this week, Gammons said the Sox refused to part with him this summer in a deal for Justin Upton. Keith Law recently tweeted Xander may be able to stay at short. If Arizona or another club will overlook the offense, with X no more than a year away, is it time to move him? I would have put this in the trade proposal forum but it appears that is not accepting new threads, and there is some news you may not be aware of in this post. Actually, I think he is one of the LEAST controversial prospects ever, in that everybody knows and seems to agree on what he is, and on the basic limits of what he can be as he matures. Now Zach Daeges, THERE was a guy about whom there was a lot of controversy about exactly what he was, never mind what he could be. Then injuries completely derailed him, so the entire controversy was moot.
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Post by jmei on Sept 3, 2012 11:34:34 GMT -5
We need to see how his bat plays at the major league level, if only because he has over 800 PAs at AAA and it's unclear whether more time there will help his development.
Another quick note-- while the consensus is that he'll be a bad hitter, there are various levels of bad. If he can hit at the .260/.310/.320-ish level in Boston, he's a valuable player given his defense and a borderline starter (remember, league-average SS production is .314 OBP and .370 SLG). If he's more like .240/.270/.280, it really does become almost impossible to start him, however good his defense is.
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Post by jdb on Sept 3, 2012 12:00:02 GMT -5
Are you sure you heard that correctly? They wouldn't include Iglesias or Bogaerts?
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Post by spaceman1968 on Sept 3, 2012 15:21:21 GMT -5
Don't see Iglesias hitting in the Majors but he has an incredible glove.
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Post by jdb on Sept 3, 2012 15:56:55 GMT -5
Let's nor forget Iglesias is only 8 months older than Marrero. We were aggressive with him and he probably needs another year in AAA. I think he could still turn into a decent hitter. Maybe not someone who hits in the two hole but I don't think he will be an automatic out.
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Post by justen on Sept 3, 2012 16:59:44 GMT -5
I agree that another year of AAA would do him good, but I also like being able to see what we have and as soon as possible. I don't mind a .250 BA as long as he has an OBP about 40-60 points better. As long as he consistently works the count and is selective enough than that's all we can ask out of a shortstop. While it's nice to have a superstar at short hitting .300 every year, defense come's up huge in today's game and it saves some money to be able to bolster a weak pitching staff.
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Post by psusox14 on Sept 3, 2012 18:12:11 GMT -5
I haven't yet established my definite opinion post Nick Punto trade. However, my pre trade ideas consisted of this: last year we led the league in runs scored with Scutaro at short at about a 750 OPS and average defense. This year we are still in the top 5 in runs scored with Mike Aviles at short with about a 700 OPS. Clearly, production out of the SS position is not the most critical to the team scoring. We need to do a better job preventing the opposing team from scoring, which obviously starts with pitching. I personally only ever saw Iglesias in person once on a day which he wasn't really tested, but if his defense is as goodas advertised as the best glove on the planet, I think he'll be worth it. If he hits 230 with a 600 or even a 580 OPS, but has a fantastic defensive WAR, Jon Lester will reimburse John Henry all 6 mil of Iglesias's signing bonus. IMO, it'd be more fun as a fan to watch Iglesias snag a ball in the hole that no one else will reach with a bullet to first, than watch a home run get hit. Great defense is just more rare than power. I'm not a huge advanced stat guy, but I would assume that his great defense would at least offset his poor bat with how many runs he can save. Now, I'm not entirely sure how I feel without Gonzo's potent bat in the lineup, but I am leaning towards thinking Iglesias will still be worth it. Who knows maybe someone it the bigs teaches him to keep his weight back and hit oppo and he develops into a 280/650 guy.
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Post by James Dunne on Sept 4, 2012 10:52:48 GMT -5
OPS is a silly statistic, because it over-inflates the importance of SLG while understating OBP's pre-eminence.
I don't care what Iglesias's SLG ends up at. Anything at all he can give in terms of power in the future is a bonus - it's simply not a skill he has right now. For Iglesias, I think the break-even point for OBP is somewhere around .290 to .295 - if he can stay above that, he's so good with his glove that he'll make up for those outs he makes on offense. If it's below .290? Then it starts to get dicey.
The reason I make the point of ignoring SLG/OPS is that the difference between a .300 or .330 SLG is sort of negligible, while the difference between a .285 and .315 OBP is monumental - for Iglesias, it's the difference between being below replacement level or being among the top half of shortstops in the league.
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Post by jsk793 on Sept 4, 2012 10:56:06 GMT -5
Iglesias is rey ordonez. There problem solved
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Post by sdiaz1 on Sept 4, 2012 12:06:00 GMT -5
Here is a list of 5 shortstops on playoff contending teams (and the Blue Jays) who despite having OBP% below .300 have been useful contributors to their team's success. The WAR totals are based on ZIPS end of year projections for each player.
Zach Cozart OBP: .285 WRC+: 82 WAR: 2.6 (Has plus power for SS .402 SLG and .160 ISO) JJ Hardy OBP: .276 WRC+: 73 WAR: 2.3 (Has plus power for SS .384SLG and .153 ISO) Alexi Ramirez OBP .293 WRC+ 76 WAR: 2.0 Yunel Escobar: OBP .298 WRC+ 74 WAR: 2.1 Brendan Ryan OBP: .281 WRC+ 59 WAR: 1.5
Seeing that Iglesias is likely better defensively than most of those guys, the offensive bar that he needs to reach in order to be a viable starting shortstop is pretty low.
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Post by elguapo on Sept 4, 2012 13:25:55 GMT -5
Mike Aviles OBP: 284 wRC+ 78 WAR: 2.2
Is there a standing agreement to use Rey Ordonez as the bar by which Jose Iglesias is measured, and similarly Adam Everett for Deven Marrero?
Should each light-hitting SS get their own bar in turn or can we combine for efficiency? For example, what about Jose Vinicio?
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Post by widewordofsport on Sept 4, 2012 14:29:01 GMT -5
"OPS is a silly statistic, because it over-inflates the importance of SLG while understating OBP's pre-eminence."
While I am fully on board with the anti-OPS charge, as it is an uninterpretable stat with no baseball meaning, is this really true? I'll have to run some numbers on it, but I'd imagine that for Aviles, IsoD (additional bases gained) and IsoP (representing the propensity for additional bases gained, but more valuable bases) provide about relatively equal contributions to OPS.
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Post by widewordofsport on Sept 4, 2012 14:39:09 GMT -5
Actually I take that back mostly. If you take OPS for a typical IF's batting line, and take away 25 singles, and make them walks (meaning OBP the same, but BA down) the OPS drops dramatically.
Like I said, I hate OPS.
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Post by James Dunne on Sept 4, 2012 16:43:57 GMT -5
Actually I take that back mostly. If you take OPS for a typical IF's batting line, and take away 25 singles, and make them walks (meaning OBP the same, but BA down) the OPS drops dramatically. Like I said, I hate OPS. Exactly, that's just one example. From what I can gather, a point of OBP is worth about three points of SLG, so the best (most crude) way to calculate better simple OPS type ranking is OBP*3+SLG, and that will give a better indication of who is better than who. My biggest problem with the stat, though, is that they measure different things. They're different skills. A player with a .340 OBP and .440 SLG is markedly different than one with a .280 OBP and .500 SLG - calling them both ".780 OPS players" as some writers (even some of the good ones) have gotten in the habit of doing just fails to tell the story. And so it is with Iglesias. His SLG is going to stink for awhile now, and random fluctuations in it will be just that - random. So ignore it (and by extension his OPS). Keep the eye on the OBP, that's where the indication will be whether or not he's getting anywhere.
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Post by jioh on Sept 4, 2012 20:32:40 GMT -5
Who is this mythical person with a .280 obp and .500 slg?
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Post by jmei on Sept 4, 2012 20:44:46 GMT -5
FYI, per BP's custom leaderboard, there is no season where a player had a .280 OBP and a .500 SLG with more than 100 games played.
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Post by jioh on Sept 4, 2012 21:32:52 GMT -5
I also skimmed the stats of a few teams' minor league teams, and couldn't find a 500 slg with an obp of less than 300. How would this mythical person get enough good pitches to hit with power?
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Post by elguapo on Sept 4, 2012 21:51:47 GMT -5
.238 / .286 / .506 / .793 - the Wrath of Kong, 1976
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Post by Guidas on Sept 4, 2012 22:03:15 GMT -5
Who is this mythical person with a .280 obp and .500 slg? Dave Kingman? (close enough - had a .302 obp and a .478 slg; ISO was .242 while he hit those 442 HRs. Crazy stuff)
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Post by fenwaythehardway on Sept 4, 2012 23:56:12 GMT -5
Who is this mythical person with a .280 obp and .500 slg? OPS: sure it works in practice, but what about in theory?
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Post by bighead on Sept 5, 2012 7:50:26 GMT -5
I think the Sox have a pretty good idea what Iglesias is going to be at this point and I still say they should keep him.
The Sox can't bank on Bogaerts sticking at short though he seems to have a bright future at some position once he masters advanced pitching/offspeed stuff. 3B and move Middlebrooks to 1B? LF? Who knows?
Marrero is a ways away but it seems the consensus is that he can stick at short but any number of things can happen between now and then.
Iglesias has some work to do but he is close. He may have to do some on the job learning in the MLB but his future is a lot more certain at this point than any SS in the system. If he is Rey Ordonez that is awesome. Bat him 9th, let the pitchers benefit from his fielding and bring stability to the position. If Marrero becomes ready in the meantime then the Sox have SS depth to play with which could be valuable.
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Post by James Dunne on Sept 5, 2012 9:07:16 GMT -5
OPS: sure it works in practice, but what about in theory? Yes, I was exaggerating to prove a point. And yes, the best hitters have a high OPS, while the worst have the lowest. In 1989, Ruben Sierra went .306/.347/.543 while Wade Boggs had a .330/.430/.449. Very close in OPS (Sierra a tad higher), but Boggs is the more valuable hitter. (Totally irrelevant aside:, talk about beer and fried chicken, Boggs put the entire 2011 pitching staff to shame.) A more extreme example: back in 1954, Richie Ashburn had a seemingly impossible .313/.441/.376 line (125 walks with a .063 ISO!), while Jim Greengrass hit .280/.329/.494. This year, Saltalamacchia's line this year is .228/.283/.464 - not quite as extreme as my hypothetical, but in that vein. Elvis Andrus, meanwhile, is at .298/361/.392 - .006 difference in OPS, but radically different hitters. We've gotten away from my original point as to how it relates to Iglesias specifically, though. Iglesias has very, very little power. This may produce one month with a .325 SLG, and another with a .290. When a player has such a low slugging percentage, an increase of 35 points is going to seem more noticeable than, say, the difference between a player with a .450 baseline SLG having a .485 month (which makes sense, considering the difference in the percentage of the increase). The key stat for Iglesias, the one to watch for in regards to his development, is his OBP. It doesn't particularly matter if he's getting on base due to singles or walks (a difference that will cause variation in his SLG), it simply matters how many outs he is(n't) making.
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