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Post by Chris Hatfield on May 11, 2023 9:07:21 GMT -5
Wouldn’t his arm be a problem out there, too? Have we tried forcing this guy to be a RHH, because aside from handedness he is a perfect complement to Valdez at 2B. I don't think taking a speed guy and moving him to the right side of the plate would be the move to make. (Understood that you're kidding)
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Post by Chris Hatfield on May 11, 2023 8:53:29 GMT -5
A premium pick on a pitcher, let alone a HS pitcher? That would be well outside the track record. Well, (a) new scouting director, so track record may not be a thing, and (b) the track record might just be that they take the best player on their board, and those have happened to be HS infielders lately.
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Post by Chris Hatfield on May 11, 2023 7:37:30 GMT -5
By the way, since we're all learning it, it's pronounced as though you are telling someone to back off: he's not Your Droth, he's My Droth. It's not pronounced as though you are living in the jungle: "You Tarzan, Me Droth."
This has been a public service announcement.
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Post by Chris Hatfield on May 10, 2023 10:54:07 GMT -5
He just finished throwing a bad game and is hopped up on adrenaline. Maybe a little unnecessarily pissy at a fair question from Chris but whatever, really.
By the way, as I tweeted, Cora's post game comment that Pivetta will start on Tuesday signals that Bello is getting sent down after his start today. I get it - it's the best way to maintain SP depth/Paxton insurance.
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Post by Chris Hatfield on May 10, 2023 10:49:52 GMT -5
Downs was ranked in the middle of the BA top 100 (49) when he was first acquired by the Red Sox but dropped off the list once he started playing in games again in 2021. Dalbec has one ranking at the end of the BA top 100 in 2021 (90) but that's it. Neither of them was a can't-miss prospect that would have gotten then a lot of value back on the trade market and they both came up at a time when the Red Sox were largely in rebuilding mode. Yes, it would be great if the front office knew exactly when each player and prospect was at the peak of their perceived value and traded them for a fortune. No, that is not a realistic expectation for any front office. The Rays do well on trades in part because they have a good front office but also in large party because they are usually trading veterans for prospects and those trades almost always do well from a $/WAR perspective in the long run. They don't really do prospect-for-prospect or prospect-for-veteran trades much, so not sure where the "they know who's worth keeping" narrative is coming from (there are exactly zero examples cited in this thread). I'll add that here at the site we thought BA was overvaluing Dalbec when he was in the Top 100 too.
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Post by Chris Hatfield on May 10, 2023 10:48:20 GMT -5
Man I completely forgot about the name thing. Good pull.
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Post by Chris Hatfield on May 10, 2023 10:14:54 GMT -5
Fwiw, I think he's talking about what's often called "power shagging." (giggle) There's shagging BP but then there's doing it at game speed, which is what Bradley used to do and is atypical.
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Post by Chris Hatfield on May 10, 2023 10:11:40 GMT -5
I could be wrong but I think all five Blaze HRs were on breaking pitches now He's always done that. Early last year the problem was velocity. His numbers against all pitch types are pretty consistent so far.
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Post by Chris Hatfield on May 10, 2023 10:09:33 GMT -5
Cleveland really screwed up the plans taking Frazier. Just seemed to obvious to take Meadows after that. Misses by everyone tho Read the redraft though. Frazier isn't on it. Meadows is back at 22 which sounds good until you realize he's with a bunch of relievers. We all would've fallen all over ourselves for Kohl Stewart, also absent. In hindsight, maybe they should've identified an Anderson, Renfroe (who they'd drafted previously), or Crawford, but this redraft is full of 2nd, 3rd, 4th round and later guys. It was a brutal class.
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Post by Chris Hatfield on May 10, 2023 8:57:19 GMT -5
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Post by Chris Hatfield on May 9, 2023 19:49:05 GMT -5
So, since Meidroth and Hickey aren't in the lineup tonight, I have to wonder out loud... why promote them on a Tuesday? Just seems like odd timing when there were no real injuries of any sort. Monday is the universal off day. The promotion only got announced today. They would've traveled yesterday.
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Post by Chris Hatfield on May 9, 2023 11:34:41 GMT -5
In his Fangraphs review of Sox prospects who might see the majors this year, Longenhagen doesn't have Drohan listed. Not surprising since they have him with a FV of 35. I'd hope they'd reevaluate those lists as the season progresses. If he continues on this track he might just get a look before the fall rolls around. I mean, they wrote that on March 24. Before the report from spring training I certainly wouldn't have listed him either. I'm not sure that's all that fair.
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Post by Chris Hatfield on May 9, 2023 10:12:35 GMT -5
Just wrapped up the latest BA Future Projection pod. Was excited because in the show notes it mentioned they were going to talk about Bleis. Unfortunately, he was in their disappointments category. Their reasoning was that he wasn't showing any consistency with his hard hit ABs. They squashed their prediction of him being this years Jackson Chourio. Hopefully we see an uptick in hard hit from Bleis to put an end to those questions. I think the context that's missing there (which I don't think you can fault them for - I always mention this is the hard part of covering all 30 teams and the nice part of focusing on one) is that the book seems to be out not to throw him fastballs because he's going to punish them, and he's having to adjust to a steady diet of offspeed and breaking stuff. I think, as a result, he's more holding steady than a disappointment, but I get how, without that context, you could look at the drop in things like his batted ball data and see it as a disappointment. I don't think they're looking at his slash line when they say this. Like his hard-hit rate is down from 40.0% to 28.3% and his 90th percentile exit velo from 104.1mph to 99.9mph. That said, Carlos and Ben did say they weren't really worried about him either.
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Post by Chris Hatfield on May 9, 2023 9:53:03 GMT -5
Using Wayback Machine because BA doesn't archive this stuff: Graduated: Henderson, Carroll Moved ahead of Mayer in post-ST update: Volpe Moved ahead in this update: Holliday, Wood, Carter, Lawlar. I get Volpe and Holliday for sure. The others, I'm not sure how you have information now that justifies the movement after one month. Carter has been destroying the Texas League at the same age so I kind of get that but the other two, meh? Is that Carter as in Evan, the Rangers' prospect? I don't have a BA sub. If so, hell of a job doing the eval on him, as people were BAFFLED by that pick when it was made. Yeah. Carter started the year as a top 30 guy and he's been crushing AA, albeit in a hitter-friendly league. They note his main question was power and he's hitting with power, so I get it. Keep in mind they probably discussed all this prior to Mayer's big week that completely changed the complexion of his line (which I think is an argument for why you don't move guys a ton a month into the season).
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Post by Chris Hatfield on May 9, 2023 9:49:20 GMT -5
I think you're all overthinking this. A high-walk rate guy is pretty clearly... a guy who walks a lot. We've got walk rates here on the site. Yorke walked at an 11.8% rate in 2021 and 8.8% last year. Those are on the low end. 16.2% this year, so we'll see if that stays a bit higher, but again, that's more middle of the pack.
His high OBP in 2021 was largely hit-driven (IsoD <.100). That's fine, but squares with Law's comment.
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Post by Chris Hatfield on May 9, 2023 9:41:33 GMT -5
Wait, Mayer moved down three spots? The heck? Using Wayback Machine because BA doesn't archive this stuff: Graduated: Henderson, Carroll Moved ahead of Mayer in post-ST update: Volpe Moved ahead in this update: Holliday, Wood, Carter, Lawlar. I get Volpe and Holliday for sure. The others, I'm not sure how you have information now that justifies the movement after one month. Carter has been destroying the Texas League at the same age so I kind of get that but the other two, meh?
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Post by Chris Hatfield on May 9, 2023 9:27:17 GMT -5
I think this is right. Valdez kind of slotted in perfectly with Arroyo in a 2B platoon. My guess is Dalbec is going to see time at 2B against LHP until Arroyo comes back. What I do find a bit confounding is that Hamilton’s splits against LHP are surprisingly good (despite a 25 AB sample size). With Dalbec’s 40% K rate thus far in AAA, wouldn’t it be better to see what Hamilton can offer at the big league level before Arroyo gets healthy? Dalbec is a RHH, which is what they need. They're not playing Hamilton over Valdez against RHP, hence Dalbec.
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Post by Chris Hatfield on May 9, 2023 9:22:51 GMT -5
Coffey: 88% Z-contact, 24% chase rate, 9.1% hard-hit rate, 94.8 mph 90th percentile exit velo. Great contact rate. Chase rate is also good. Quality of contact among the lowest in the system - only Liendo and Ferguson are lower. I'm not necessarily super concerned yet - I think he's being challenged with this assignment and probably would've gone to Lowell if that were still a thing - but few needs to work on making better contact, even if it's less contact. Don't think anyone would have predicted this profile on draft day. Right? Could certainly be part of working on things. Fwiw, his numbers last year in a 41 PA sample: 89% Z-contact, 27% chase rate, 15.0% hard-hit rate, 97.0 mph 90th percentile exit velo. So it's consistent.
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Post by Chris Hatfield on May 9, 2023 9:17:50 GMT -5
To expound on the point I just tweeted without a character limit, it's very much a tale of 2 contact rates.
Anthony: 88% Z-contact, 16% chase rate, 44.2% hard-hit rate, 108.4 mph 90th percentile exit velo. Needless to say, impressive. He'll keep rising if he keeps this up. Those exit velo numbers are near the top of the system, which is excellent for a guy that young. If he has numbers like this on June 1, I'm going to be very tempted to move him into 6th on my list (he's currently 8th - I have him ahead of Perales).
Coffey: 88% Z-contact, 24% chase rate, 9.1% hard-hit rate, 94.8 mph 90th percentile exit velo. Great contact rate. Chase rate is also good. Quality of contact among the lowest in the system - only Liendo and Ferguson are lower. I'm not necessarily super concerned yet - I think he's being challenged with this assignment and probably would've gone to Lowell if that were still a thing - but few needs to work on making better contact, even if it's less contact.
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Post by Chris Hatfield on May 8, 2023 20:50:31 GMT -5
Could it be they'd just rather he get regular playing time at AAA to work on the defense while Valdez has more immediate utility to the big club because his bat is ready for a platoon role? On the scale of things, being able to hit righties is more valuable than baserunning and for a fill-in/bench guy, you need to be confident they can fulfill the niche role you ask of them. I think this is right. Valdez kind of slotted in perfectly with Arroyo in a 2B platoon. My guess is Dalbec is going to see time at 2B against LHP until Arroyo comes back.
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Post by Chris Hatfield on May 8, 2023 20:49:24 GMT -5
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Post by Chris Hatfield on May 8, 2023 15:40:27 GMT -5
Hamilton is hitting the ball harder this year. His hard hit rate is up from 18.4% last year to 34.4% in April, and his 90th percentile exit velo is up from 99.2 mph to 101.8 mph. (To answer the question I'd ask, no, we don't have data for just, say, last September for him when he got hot.)
For context though, those numbers still aren't great - they're OK at best. For the 15 WooSox hitters* with enough at-bats, his hard-hit rate was 11th and his 90th percentile exit velo was 14th. Add the 13 Sea Dogs and it's 19th/28 and 22nd/28. In other words, OK, not great. That said, it's still early and today numbers can still move a bunch.
* Exit velo has a very strong correlation to age/level, which is why I'd compare only to AAA and maybe AA.
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Post by Chris Hatfield on May 8, 2023 15:25:18 GMT -5
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Post by Chris Hatfield on May 8, 2023 15:22:14 GMT -5
BA updated their top 100 Mayer 13 Yoshida 39 Rafaela 75 Bleis 96 Casas graduated, Yoshida made a big jump, no Yorke Volpe moved up to 4 and finally surpassed Mayer on BA's list after being the only outlet to prefer Mayer for the last year or so Yorke wasn't in there (unless you meant only to point out he hadn't jumped back in, which I don't think would be warranted myself). For reference, their previous rankings 10. Mayer 29. Casas 71. Rafaela 87. Yoshida 88. Bleis
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Post by Chris Hatfield on May 8, 2023 12:19:12 GMT -5
This is a talent-rich draft where the top three players - Skenes, Crews and Lankford - profile as legit impact players who will rise through the minors quickly. At least, those are the projections. Here's where MLB is really falling flat on its face with not allowing teams to trade draft picks. Pitts, Wash and Detroit could all greatly expand their draft potential and ability to add first round talent and volume to this year's draft (and, potentially for next year's draft and beyond). Every team in MLB would be trying to deal for one (or more) of those players and their associated draft money. So short-sighted. OK, draft rant over. In a time before draft bonus caps/of MLB deals for draftees, I disagreed with the rule but could maybe see the argument for not allowing teams to trade picks. No excuse at all for it now.
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