Stories From Camp That I’m Reading, pt. 3
Has it been a week? Yes, it has been a week. Here are some things to tide you over until Felix! and Pineda! around noon.
• Geoff Baker of the Times did a feature on the thing that a lot of people are talking about, which is power production and where it’s going to come from, focusing on a couple of Mariners prospects in Chavez and Peguero. Most of the articles on Peguero this year have been about his batting practice home run, but this one opts to talk a bit about his attempts to improve on defense, where he’s had scattered horrible reports in the past. I’m still a little slow to get excited about him based off a few good BPs because nine of his twenty-three home runs last year were in April and the strikeouts are showing no signs of going away. Halman is in a similar boat at the moment. It’s not a very seaworthy boat.
• Paxton finally signed and is getting a NRI to camp, though it’s hard to say when we might see him. MLB.com had a piece that indicated that he might be brought along slowly to start out, though he has been working out at the Boras complex for a while now. The Seattle Times piece talks about the negotiation process and makes it known that he’s a starter now. Let no further questions be raised about it. Ever.
• We should talk about the big two prospects, right? MLB.com talks about Ackley’s adjustments, to the middle infield, to wood bats, to pro ball. Ackley has five walks right now and leads the team. By the end of Ackley’s second full season, I predict he’ll have more walks than Yuniesky Betancourt has for his entire career to that point. The News Tribune talks about Pineda’s last start and how he threw a slider to Xavier Nady, and how people are just calling him “The Big Guy” now, and how after the game he was going to call his mom and Felix. Felix and Pineda are homeboys. In more realistic and slightly soul-crushing news, Larry Stone spent some time talking about Super 2 status and what that means for our super two.
• MLB.com has been writing up Top Ten Prospects lists and got to the Mariners a few days ago. This list looks a lot like every other list except that some of them have Littlewood and not Beavan in the top ten. The top six or seven have developed an unusual consensus about them.
• Baseball America has released a new organization report for subscribers. I’m not usually a big fan of these because for the most part, if you’re reading BA you already know a thing or two about prospects and the reports only tend to cover the big names, but this one is on Alex Liddi and shares some details that I wasn’t aware of like how he got into baseball in the first place and how he keeps in shape in the offseason.
• BA also has a listing of all the international signing budgets. We outspent everyone by $1.2 million! It would have been a lot more had Esteilon Peguero’s bonus not been reduced! Ben Badler has been going division by division, talking about each team and the M’s will be up sometime this week.
• Spring training can be nerve-wracking for a lot of guys as there are typically a wave of releases the come at the end along with the assignments. A local Pennsylvania newspaper did a feature on M’s farmhand LHP Robert Rohrbaugh and how he’s trying to get back on track after a number of injuries these past few years. Of particular note: Rohrbaugh is wearing a Seahawks hat in all the photos.
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9 Responses to “Stories From Camp That I’m Reading, pt. 3”
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While I get the super-two stuff from Stone, I think it some times gets exaggerated. Pointing to a Cy Young winner as what happens when a guy goes to super-two status is a little distorting. Jay Bruce was a stud prospect who narrowly avoided super two status, but if he hadn’t, it would not have sky rocketed salary. On the whole, teams should be thinking about long-term buyouts of arbitration eligible players who are good, not trying to avoid early arbitration.
Boras clients and other guys who you know will try to take you to arbitration every time are an exception. If you know a guy won’t let you buy out his arbitration years, then avoiding super two status is more important.
However, both Ackley and Pineda have things to learn in AAA. Pindea’s innings also need to be managed. Unlike the Braves with Heyward, a good young player isn’t likely to make the difference in getting to the play-offs, so the M’s don’t really have any reason not to let Ackley learn his position better before he arrives in Seattle.
Speaking of M’s prospect lists, is the Future 40 now defunct? The linked version is just shy of 2 years old.
I wish! But no, I’ve been working on it off and on. I’m close to having the 40 names down and then it’s a lot of agonizing, sighing, and drawing numbers out of a hat.
Larry Stone talked about the minor league M’s reporting to camp today. We signed a new Brazilian player! Thyago Vieira!
Jay, how could you mention that article, even mention Thyago’s name and miss a name that instantly vies with Jetsy Extrano for best in M’s history: Aljeaurreau Bishop? Please let this be the first of a flood of caribbean prospects named for musicians of the 70s-80s-90s.
I noticed that 7 of the top 10 highest paying teams for international talent are not competitive year in and year out. Does it really make sense for the M’s to keep thowing cash at these international prospects?
How did Esteilon Peguero bonus get reduced by so much? He must really be 18-19?
I was certain we talked about this once before but now I can’t find the link. Blah.
That’s assuming way too much, like that the int’l spending has been constant for the duration of the team being bad and that the top ten spenders are generally the same. The Astros just opened up a new Dominican complex and their aggressiveness there is a new phenomenon. The Pirates had a lot of their bonuses tied up Luis Heredia, and are spending more on amateur prospects as part of a larger effort to get the farm system in shape.
No age issues, but the rumor is that the physical didn’t like his elbow.
Didn’t he sing the Moonlighting theme?