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Post by thegoodthebadthesox on Jun 2, 2023 20:21:54 GMT -5
The flip side to this is that at the regional I’m at, UVA’s coach pulled their starter after 5 innings and like 60 pitches while he had a perfect game going lol
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Post by thegoodthebadthesox on May 31, 2023 11:23:24 GMT -5
And for the crowd who still wants to send him down and is overreacting to what boils down to a singular at bat coming in an important time yesterday, I’ll use these stats to try to summarize the point being missed - nobody here thinks Casas is the 4th best first baseman in the game right now or anything close, but all of the “send him down” arguments are under the guise that he is going down to AAA to improve when the splits will show you he’s already making those improvements at the MLB level, making it completely nonsensical to send him down. If that trend flips back and he has a terrible June that more closely resembles April than May, then I think there’s a conversation to be had, but to tout his season line wholly ignorant of the context just isn’t a cogent argument. How come WAR is considered the definitive baseball stat EXCEPT when it comes to Casas? Why ignore how much of a true negative he has been this year? I’m not dismissing that he’s been a net negative in the aggregate, I just don’t think that it’s a valid argument in this case when he’s shown signs of a turnaround. WAR is useful but it’s not as predictive as some of the indicators that you are ignoring. I’m not as worried about what Casas did in April as much as I care about what the current trends indicate he’s likely to be.
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Post by thegoodthebadthesox on May 31, 2023 8:27:53 GMT -5
Regarding Dalbec… I haven’t been able to follow his hot surge in AAA all that closely. What kind of pitchers is he facing? Has he altered his approach at all? I say that because we’ve had stretches before with Bobby (especially in Spring Training) where’s he looked great against less difficult pitchers. Sure - we could call him up… but like, should I be expecting him to be able to hit against Shane McClanahan and Tyler Glasnow this weekend? Still striking out as often if not more than usual against AAA pitching Still hammers the ball when he makes contact. But we already knew this. He's doing exactly what a AAAA player should do. Hope he gets an opp somewhere, just not here
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Post by thegoodthebadthesox on May 31, 2023 7:58:25 GMT -5
Top five first basemen in MLB in May by xwOBA per Baseball Savant. I'm probably generally a little low on how much I buy into expected stats, and Casas is 18th in real wOBA for May. But interesting none the less. Player AB Hits wOBA xwOBA1 Freeman, Freddie 111 44 .486 .461 2 Alonso, Pete 94 20 .383 .422 3 Díaz, Yandy 71 23 .443 .421 4 Casas, Triston 68 17 .331 .403 5 Olson, Matt 103 23 .371 .399 And for the crowd who still wants to send him down and is overreacting to what boils down to a singular at bat coming in an important time yesterday, I’ll use these stats to try to summarize the point being missed - nobody here thinks Casas is the 4th best first baseman in the game right now or anything close, but all of the “send him down” arguments are under the guise that he is going down to AAA to improve when the splits will show you he’s already making those improvements at the MLB level, making it completely nonsensical to send him down. If that trend flips back and he has a terrible June that more closely resembles April than May, then I think there’s a conversation to be had, but to tout his season line wholly ignorant of the context just isn’t a cogent argument.
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Post by thegoodthebadthesox on May 30, 2023 15:53:44 GMT -5
Mayer isn't in the Portland lineup tonight. Most likely means he was promoted to Boston. FTFY
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Post by thegoodthebadthesox on May 30, 2023 12:25:18 GMT -5
Now that Mayer has been promoted, I'd imagine we are pretty much out of the woods as far as big time promotions go. Most of the other top prospects are pretty likely to stay where they're at, at least before the late season cup of coffee promotions start. The only guys that I think we should still see in the near future are the guys in that bucket of interesting mid-minors relievers (Troye, Fernandez, Guerrero). Troye has to be coming soon, as he's just destroying that level. Maybe Sikes has a shot at Worcester at some point if Portland winds up too crowded? But outside of the existing Worcester guys coming up to help in Boston in some capacity, I'd be pretty content with the rest of the top 20 staying at their current levels for the rest of the year. add: forgot Stephen Scott as another obvious promotion candidate remaining Not that I think he’s earned it, and I believe sticking at Portland might be best to keep working on his plate discipline, but I could see Cedanne getting promoted before September. Thoughts? Edit: don’t let my avatar stand in the way of this take… I think that the Sox would love to have reason to promote him, but I can't see it really happening right now. I actually sent an email to the podcast questions address basically asking what do the Red Sox do if his approach just straight up never improves? The defense and athleticism should carry him to an MLB spot at some point but I'm not sure how you'd go about setting benchmarks for promoting him if the thing he's at that level to work on never really gets any better. A pessimistic question to be sure, but I was interested in the thought experiment.
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Post by thegoodthebadthesox on May 30, 2023 11:51:49 GMT -5
Now that Mayer has been promoted, I'd imagine we are pretty much out of the woods as far as big time promotions go. Most of the other top prospects are pretty likely to stay where they're at, at least before the late season cup of coffee promotions start. The only guys that I think we should still see in the near future are the guys in that bucket of interesting mid-minors relievers ( Troye, Fernandez, Guerrero). Troye has to be coming soon, as he's just destroying that level. Maybe Sikes has a shot at Worcester at some point if Portland winds up too crowded? But outside of the existing Worcester guys coming up to help in Boston in some capacity, I'd be pretty content with the rest of the top 20 staying at their current levels for the rest of the year. add: forgot Stephen Scott as another obvious promotion candidate remaining Not 100% confirmed, but I believe Troye is also getting promoted to Portland with Mayer. Must've missed when that was reported, but I also missed Denlinger's promotion too so not all too surprising. Thanks!
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Post by thegoodthebadthesox on May 30, 2023 11:45:08 GMT -5
Now that Mayer has been promoted, I'd imagine we are pretty much out of the woods as far as big time promotions go. Most of the other top prospects are pretty likely to stay where they're at, at least before the late season cup of coffee promotions start. The only guys that I think we should still see in the near future are the guys in that bucket of interesting mid-minors relievers (Troye, Fernandez, Guerrero). Troye has to be coming soon, as he's just destroying that level. Maybe Sikes has a shot at Worcester at some point if Portland winds up too crowded? But outside of the existing Worcester guys coming up to help in Boston in some capacity, I'd be pretty content with the rest of the top 20 staying at their current levels for the rest of the year.
add: forgot Stephen Scott as another obvious promotion candidate remaining
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Post by thegoodthebadthesox on May 30, 2023 10:18:55 GMT -5
Also, FWIW - The Red Sox selection buries the big lede of that mock draft, which is Max Clark going first overall and Skenes falling to 5. Would be a monumental overthink on Pittsburgh's part.
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Post by thegoodthebadthesox on May 30, 2023 8:29:18 GMT -5
I got the opportunity to work Virginia's regional in Charlottesville this weekend, which I'm quite excited about and should get to have eyes on pretty much every game. Kyle Teel will obviously be the big draw, and UVA does have a couple other guys on that updated MLB list (I personally really like Jake Gelof as a second round guy if they want to go underslot in the first two rounds then have a bonanza later). Ultimately a bit disappointing otherwise in terms of prospects, ECU has a couple interesting guys including a very interesting 2024 pitcher, but I've already seen two Oklahoma games live this year and they're pretty thin on prospects relative to last year. Was really hoping for Maryland, Tennessee, or Iowa, knowing that I couldn't get Duke or UNC. That being said, it's a good problem to have, and I'm really looking forward to getting some fresh looks at different teams after seeing so much of the SEC this year.
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Post by thegoodthebadthesox on May 30, 2023 8:25:47 GMT -5
Kiley’s first mock draft today: “14. Boston Red Sox Jacob Wilson, SS, Grand Canyon The board is hitter heavy at this point and the Red Sox are looking at some safer, hit-first college players here, while targeting some upside/overpay types like Georgia prep shortstop Tai Peete later on. Mitchell and Aidan Miller are also candidates at this pot from the prep side. There's a perception that Wilson has slipped from a top-10 lock due to his lack of raw power, with teams opting for higher upside types. I think this is as low as Wilson or Bradfield will fall.” www.espn.com/mlb/insider/insider/story/_/id/37748894/2023-mlb-mock-draft-10-kiley-mcdaniel-first-round-projectionIt seems as if some of the high school guys are pushing Jacobs Wilson and Gonzalez down, which would be pretty ideal in my mind. Gonzalez > Wilson > Shaw > Troy but I'd be extremely happy with any of those four at this point
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Post by thegoodthebadthesox on May 29, 2023 9:30:49 GMT -5
Maybe the most under-rated Sox prospect. I'm guessing scouts don't like his body type but all he does is keep hitting. You have to ask at whose expense his playing time at Portland would come from. Meidroth, Kavadas, Hickey, Scott? It doesn't look like he's going to play anywhere other than 1B, 3B or DH. I’m historically aggressive with my calls for promotions when guys are performing, but I’d be pretty okay with Blaze being in Greenville for the entire year. I’d rather give him the time to let the bat fully come to form and then throw a challenge at him than push him to a level where he might flounder and risk being too far behind to ever really catch up. While getting Mayer up as quickly as realistically possible is a huge boost to the overall Sox team building (given how expensive up the middle players are), there’s not a whole lot of downside to slow playing Blaze’s development, IMO.
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Post by thegoodthebadthesox on May 26, 2023 11:08:18 GMT -5
I'll be here bosoxnation! 🫡 I forgot to add - If he goes to the Rays/Jays i hope he sucks! lol I think new age baseball with these big bases and having players like him that have ELITE speed is super important. I'm not taking a stand on this argument in either direction as I'm just not really sure how I feel about it, but I think you can just as easily make the argument that with the new rules, speed is LESS important because you can now manufacture value on the basepaths with slower runners. Anyway, I think you're misinterpreting the counterargument here. To say "What don't you like about Enrique Bradfield? He's so fast!" misses the point. We all know he's fast, the problem is his skeptics don't think he's going to hit enough to maximize his speed. I certainly think he's a first round player because, as I've said before, floor is valuable in this context and his floor is just about as high as anyone's in this draft, but if someone isn't convinced he impacts the ball enough to be a good MLB hitter, defense and speed isn't worth the 14th pick IMO.
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Post by thegoodthebadthesox on May 26, 2023 8:11:25 GMT -5
How can you not like those 2 guys? Teel will be top 10 pick imo. Probably Oakland at 6. I'm generally wondering why you don't like Teel as well. Waldrep is the only guy out of the top 20 prospects that scares me. Wanted to add i can for sure see Bloom loving McGonigle. Fits the Yorke/Mikey draft style with him being a Plus hit tool HS SS. Teel doesn’t have enough power. I don’t think he or Bradfield are elite when it comes to contact, and neither will hit for power so I think I’m both cases you’re hoping for a league average bat and good defense at a premium position. That’s fine, but not what I want to aim for in the first round. And I also don’t like Waldrep with his 5 BB/9 this year. Yuck But there’s a reason I work in finance and not baseball. If Waldrep were a high school guy coming out with that stuff I think he’d be a no-brainer top 10 pick but having what will be likely 200+ innings under his belt at the college level and not having really improved the control during that time in addition to the mileage, just doesn’t seem worth the risk unless you want to fast track him as a reliever a la Garrett Crochet
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Post by thegoodthebadthesox on May 26, 2023 8:07:40 GMT -5
Sometimes I don't know whether I'm the boxer or the bag. To me, it’s Chris’ job to make sure that you and the rest of the staff don’t feel that way, so if you are, I’d say it’s probably because he could’ve Ledbetter. (Too easy)
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Post by thegoodthebadthesox on May 25, 2023 15:27:04 GMT -5
I know minor league W-L records should be taken with a grain of salt, but hard not to see Portland’s play thus far as a very positive sign of health for the Sox system. I care less about the record (not that you're wrong to care about it) and more about the fact that Portland is far and away the most prospect-loaded it's been in a long, long while IMO. Typically Portland and Worcester have a couple exciting prospects here and there, but is mostly question marks and MLFA signings. Now pretty much every Portland lineup has 6 or 7 ranked guys on it. Worcester, on the other hand, is a good example of what the "norm" usually looks like. Wilyer Abreu has been super interesting, David Hamilton is certainly intriguing, but after that it's a bunch of vets or semi-known quantities. I'd say the rotation is much more interesting than normal, especially with the addition of Drohan, but sadly most of the other guys (Murphy/Mata/Walter) are seeing their stocks fall to varying degrees this year.
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Post by thegoodthebadthesox on May 25, 2023 9:58:04 GMT -5
Once this actually works (not really loading well and the simulate feature doesn't work at all) I'm going to spend a completely unhealthy amount of time on this
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Post by thegoodthebadthesox on May 25, 2023 8:46:39 GMT -5
It's a bit conflicting for me because my whole thing has obviously been "getting a major league player is super valuable in a draft system that's such a crapshoot" and you can make a legitimate argument that Bradfield is the safest bet to be a big leaguer in this draft outside of Crews and Langford (and maybe even safer than Langford) because of the speed and the defense, but I think the bat is quite overrated and it's just not a profile I understand valuing that highly, even for the sake of certainty. Totally agreed. He and Teel (every year there’s a college catcher with 40-50 power and a .500 BABIP that teams reach for) are my two big no no guys that are in the Sox range. I'm a pretty big Teel guy, but I get it
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Post by thegoodthebadthesox on May 25, 2023 8:31:59 GMT -5
Ditto. MLB.com Scouting grades: Hit: 55 | Power: 40 | Run: 80 | Arm: 40 | Field: 70 | Overall: 55 He may be the fastest player I've ever seen. Elite fielder and will create havoc on the bases. An .880 OPS and .152 ISO really aren’t good for college, especially for a first rounder. And his 13% K Rate is good but nothing amazing given the low quality of contact. I’m not buying the 55 hit tool. He’s a super fast slap hitter with a good glove. That’s not what I’m looking for this early in the draft personally. It's a bit conflicting for me because my whole thing has obviously been "getting a major league player is super valuable in a draft system that's such a crapshoot" and you can make a legitimate argument that Bradfield is the safest bet to be a big leaguer in this draft outside of Crews and Langford (and maybe even safer than Langford) because of the speed and the defense, but I think the bat is quite overrated and it's just not a profile I understand valuing that highly, even for the sake of certainty.
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Post by thegoodthebadthesox on May 24, 2023 19:34:22 GMT -5
No one outside of the draft room can say for sure, but can we really call it BPA if a large chunk of the available player pool is filtered out, or deprioritized well below a median board? Like, if there are twenty pitchers taken, it’s hard to imagine there wasn’t some deliberate intent there. If I think high school hitters are the best value relative to college hitters, and then I go out and only draft high school hitters, did I take the best player available, or the BPA from among my search criteria? How in the heck would they be getting all of the priority Greenville players five starts a week if there were, say, another two shortstops on the roster? If they came up with data that showed "hey, taking pitchers actually produces far greater value than taking hitters" then you can absolutely call it BPA even if a portion of the available player pool was filtered out, because they'd be filtered out specifically because they didn't fit what the team considered to be the "best" value. That's largely hypothetical, we don't *know* what their intent was, but I think the BPA argument makes much more sense than the need argument because that would be considerable overkill on the need side.
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Post by thegoodthebadthesox on May 24, 2023 19:13:24 GMT -5
When a team like (recently) the Guardians or the Angels drafts 20 pitchers, does that poke a small hole in the idea of drafting best player available, regardless of fit? What are the odds of a pitcher and not a position player being on the top of a draft board twenty consecutive times? Is an all pitcher, or very pitcher heavy draft class, something that anyone else would like the org to consider? Chris and Ian make repeated references to the infield logjams we have at both Portland and Greenville; the pitching in the system appears to be top heavy, and guys we had dog-eared as potential breakout/step forward types have had command problems so far this year. It seems like the roster at every level has multiple arms starting who probably don’t need to be starting games. A team like the Angels or Guardians drafting 100% pitchers is actually an exact example of drafting BPA. Unless I’m missing them outright saying it was for need, I don’t think they were drafting pitchers because they needed them but because they thought there was value in drafting pitchers relative to drafting hitters, making pitchers their best available.
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Post by thegoodthebadthesox on May 24, 2023 19:03:15 GMT -5
Blalock reached 96 mph in his first inning back, I think that's the fastest reported for him. Baby Drohan!!
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Post by thegoodthebadthesox on May 24, 2023 13:01:27 GMT -5
I don't know much about him outside of all the available write-ups, but Troy doesn't seem like the most exciting/upside guy at 14. Maybe it was save some $$$ to be spent in the 2nd Q&A going on now: Isaac S. 53m ago What differentiates Matt Shaw and Tommy Troy? And which of the two do you prefer? Unlike Keith Law · 8m ago isaac S. Shaw has to go to second base for me. Troy at worst is at third, I think. Both can really hit. Honestly you can take either and I won't argue. To me they're two of the three most underrated college bats in the draft along with Colton Ledbetter. I've said it before and I'll say it again because I think "has to go to second" is a little too dismissive, I feel like Shaw has the athleticism to play center field. Whether or not he can I have literally no idea.
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Post by thegoodthebadthesox on May 24, 2023 11:16:15 GMT -5
Yeah he is hitting everything on the ground. Probably he is also a big time xwOBA underperformer if such a stat exists for the Carolina league. His best swings, one of which is in yesterday's game thread, look exactly like a major leaguer destroying a baseball. One thing that probably doesn't matter is that he has made lots of really boneheaded outs on the bases.
Nobody can buy XBHs on that entire roster. I’m itching for some power from he and Bleis. Weird season in Salem. I’d expect the same as you given his EV and contact rate. Friendly PSA that Salem's ballpark is widely considered way towards the pitcher friendly side of the spectrum, which suppresses XBHs, at least according to Chris & Ian.
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Post by thegoodthebadthesox on May 24, 2023 11:09:51 GMT -5
Drohan really struggled in his second AAA start. 2.2IP 6H 5ER 3BB 1K 1HBP (67 pitches, 36 strikes, 4 swinging strikes) David Hamilton was also caught stealing, so I'm willing to chalk these anomalous events off as just not being Worcester's day #analysis.
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