Minor League Wrap (5/25-31/09)
The top three catchers in the system are all still hitting well, which is good for whenever we get that situation figured out, though I should warn those of you anticipating Moore’s arrival that he has a pretty bad passed ball problem. I don’t have much to work with this week, so I ended up writing about three-quarters of a page on Liddi because it seemed like a good idea at the time. It’s partially to provide a soft letdown for the bad news that follows.
To the jump!
I Don’t Know is On Third:
The time may be coming for a complete reevaluation of Alex Liddi as a prospect. This may seem silly no matter what angle you’re coming from, as the optimist could point out how many weeks he’s been up here and the pessimist would readily point out the home park, the league, and old-time names like Juan Silvestre (even the 1.222 OPS at home to .882 on the road). I’m going to make the case that the Liddi we’re looking at right now is evolving, and is very little like the Liddi of the previous years and bears just a passing resemblance to the Liddi of April.
Coming into the final day of May, Liddi is hitting .336/.400/.609 in 110 at-bats for the month. Stack that against his April line, .388/.400/.725 in 80 at-bats, and you’ll notice a drop in slugging. But what about the corresponding leap in on-base percentage? Take a glance at his eye ratios for both months. In April he had 21 Ks to 3 walks. That’s nothing short of awful, and made his early performances look completely unsustainable. Now, check out his May numbers, 22 Ks to 11 walks. You can go through his career outside of the Arizona League and you’ll find that he’s run a 2:1 eye ratio exactly never. The closest he came was 19 to 8 last July. It’s not that they just refuse to throw to him either. If you look up the eye numbers of every other “slugger†in the Mavericks lineup, the best you’ll see is a proportional increase with the increased at-bats. Liddi is working counts better, while others remain mostly the same. Also note that he’s striking out once every five at-bats. In his time in Wisconsin, it was once every three and a half ABs. Right now, he only had three Ks in his last thirty-eight at-bats. Given his history, that’s jaw-dropping.
In the offseason, we were talking about the Mariners impressive third base depth, including names like Matt Tuiasosopo, Mario Martinez, and Jharmidy deJesus. As of right now, Tui is injured, Martinez has been somewhat injured and unable to hit, and deJesus is still in extended. I’m not going to make the claim that Liddi is now the best third base prospect in the system, because to do that off of two months of data would be absurd, but as time goes on, he is forcing his way into the discussion and it doesn’t look like he’s going to let up any time soon.
Raben Out for the Season:
News has finally come in, Dennis Raben has had microfracture surgery that is going to put him out for about a year. Obviously, this sucks, but at least we have Carp and the others in the high minors to talk up, right?
Tacoma Rainiers (4-3 this week, 27-23 overall)
The Week in Review:
Monday, May 25th 2009
Nashville 1 (MIL + 3), Tacoma 12
W: Seddon (2-3, 6.61); L: Green (2-3, 5.40)
Tuesday, May 26th 2009
Nashville 7 (MIL + 2), Tacoma 10
W: Hull (5-2, 3.00); L: Narveson (1-3, 4.94); SV: Messenger (7)
Wednesday, May 27th 2009
Nashville 8 (MIL + 3), Tacoma 6
W: Johnson, D (2-0, 3.72); L: Thomas, J (0-1, 5.59); SV: Smith, C (10)
Thursday, May 28th 2009
Nashville 3 (MIL + 4), Tacoma 5
W: Rowland-Smith (1-0, 1.00); L: Burns (6-2, 2.98); SV: Messenger (8)
Friday, May 29th 2009
Tacoma 9, Colorado Springs 13 (COL + 11)
W: Grube (1-2, 6.43); L: Johnson, T (0-1, 19.29)
Saturday, May 30th 2009
Tacoma 6, Colorado Springs 5 (COL + 10)
W: Seddon (3-3, 5.59); L: Hirsh (3-3, 5.59); SV: Messenger (9)
Sunday, May 31st 2009
Tacoma 4, Colorado Springs 12 (COL + 11)
W: Moss (5-0, 2.20); L: Baldwin (3-3, 4.95)
Hitter of the Week:
DH Jeff Clement, L/R, 8/21/1983
7 G, 27 AB, 9 R, 11 H, 3 2B, HR, 6 RBI, 5/5 K/BB, .407/~.500/.630
I think Clement is getting himself straightened out. He has a hitting streak of at least ten games now and is starting to have the hits fall in for him that weren’t going in April. He’s continued the roughly 45% xbh rate he had earlier, but his batting eye has started to make a strong pull towards even, which had been one of the main areas he’d lagged behind compared to his 2008 numbers. It could just be that the time off his knee has helped him focus a little better, so Zduriencik rightly didn’t make the call to have him brought up as a catcher, where he hasn’t played in a while. Of course, that hasn’t hurt the Rainiers any that he’s been playing off-position, as they’ve had more trouble finding places for all their big bats to play. When Adam Moore is your number eight hitter, the lineup is pretty good.
Honorable Mention:
3B Chris Shelton, R/R, 6/26/1980
7 G, 31 AB, 4 R, 13 H, 4 2B, HR, 11 RBI, 3/2 K/BB, .419/~.455/.645
Also Honorable Mention:
C Adam Moore, R/R, 5/8/1984
5 G, 18 AB, 4 R, 8 H, 2 2B, HR, 5 RBI, 4/2 K/BB, .444/~.500/.722
Pitcher of the Week:
LHP Chris Seddon, 10/13/1983
2-0, 2 GS, 0.00 ERA in 11.0 IP, 5 H, 2 R (0 ER), 11/5 K/BB, 12/10 G/F
Choosing among the pitchers has rarely been so easy of late. Seddon picked up two of the Rainiers wins this week. He allowed five runners in each start, a hit and four walks the first time around and four hits and a walk the second time. The two starts were opposites in other ways too, on Monday, he was a flyball pitcher with a two to seven ratio and then on Saturday he was ten to three. Still, his season numbers aren’t good (hurt though he was) and he was pretty awful last week, so don’t consider him an option until he keeps it up for a while.
Honorable Mention:
LHP Ryan Rowland-Smith, 1/26/1983
1-0, GS, 0.00 ERA in 5.0 IP, 3 H, 3/1 K/BB, 7/5 G/F
Dishonorable Mention:
RHP Andy Baldwin, 10/20/1982
0-1, 2 GS, 10.03 ERA in 11.2 IP, 18 H (3 HR), 13 R (12 ER), 10/3 K/BB, 14/10 G/F
From The Training Room:
RR-S continues to rehab, but you knew that from above. Tyler Johnson keeps at it as well, although he’s not having the same kind of success. Jimenez was moved to the 60-day DL, so don’t expect him to be seen any time soon. That aside, the roster is much the same as it was last week, save for Mike Wilson changing his address. More on that later.
The Week in Preview:
6/1, at Colorado Springs (COL, 30-19), 6:05 pm PDT
6/2-5, vs. Reno (ARI, 23-28), all times 7:00 pm PDT
6/6-7, at Las Vegas (TOR, 19-31), 7:05 pm PDT Sat, 12:05 pm PDT Sun
West Tenn Diamond Jaxx (4-3 this week, 21-28 overall)
The Week in Review:
Monday, May 25th 2009
West Tenn 2, Huntsville 5 (MIL + 2)
W: Welch, D (3-3, 6.06); L: Souza (3-3, 3.50); SV: Aguilar (3)
Tuesday, May 26th 2009
Rained out.
Wednesday, May 27th 2009
Rained out (as I’ve said, the D-Jaxx are not allowed to play on Wednesday. Nature forbids it.)
Thursday, May 28th 2009
Chattanooga 2 (CIN – 9), West Tenn 5 (seven innings)
W: Bray (1-3, 4.62); L: Lindblom (2-3, 4.78); SV: Rivera, M (1)
Chattanooga 2 (- 10), West Tenn 3 (seven innings)
W: Fields (2-0, 5.40); L: Durbin, J (0-2, 1.46)
Friday, May 29th 2009
Chattanooga 7 (CIN – 9), West Tenn 0 (seven innings)
W: Elbert (2-0, 3.63); L: Christensen (0-2, 5.65)
Chattanooga 2 (- 8), West Tenn 0 (seven innings)
W: Corcoran (2-4, 5.05); L: Ryan (2-4, 6.92); SV: Schlichting (1)
Saturday, May 30th 2009
Chattanooga 1 (CIN – 9), West Tenn 11
W: Souza (4-3, 3.16); L: Chick (3-2, 5.70)
Sunday, May 31st 2009
West Tenn 4, Mississippi 1 (ATL – 6)
W: M. Rivera (5-3, 2.77); L: Diamond (1-5, 4.20); SV: Varvaro (2)
Hitter of the Week:
1B Johan Limonta, L/L, 8/4/1983
7 G, 21 AB, 4 R, 7 H, 2 3B, HR, 6 RBI, 3/3 K/BB, SB, .333/~.417/.667
Few things have gone particularly well for the D-Jaxx offense lately, but Limonta’s hitting has been one of them. He’s not putting up power numbers anywhere near what he did last year when he slugged .500 between High Desert and West Tenn (and there was no drop off), but it seems that now he’s adjusting to the league having made adjustments to him over the offseason. He can’t really hit lefties (.467 OPS against LHP, vs. .825 against RHP), but he would make a somewhat interesting bat on the bench. As the triples indicate, he runs pretty well for a big guy, and the Mavericks even tried him in center a few times when they were in a pinch last season, but a corner is where he ought to make his home.
Honorable Mention?:
1B Marshall Hubbard, L/R, 4/16/1982
7 G, 22 AB, 3 R, 6 H, 3 R, 2 2B, RBI, 11/2 K/BB, CS, .273/~.333/.364
Dishonorable Mention:
CF Gregory Halman, R/R, 8/26/1987
6 G, 18 AB, R, H, 3 RBI, 14/2 K/BB, .056/~.150/.056
Pitcher of the Week:
RHP Justin Souza, 10/22/1985
1-1, 2 GS, 2.79 ERA in 9.2 IP, 7 H, 3 R, 9/4 K/BB, 10/10 G/F, 2 HB
This week posed a number of problems. Two games were rained out during and that ended up with double-headers on consecutive days, but even so, there were a number of pitchers who didn’t get a whole lot of work in during the week. Souza’s first start was awful. Two runs in three innings, three hits, three walks, two hit batters. And then his second was awesome. Nine strikeouts, just one walk, four hits in six and two-thirds innings. Chalk it up to inconsistency, but there wasn’t really anyone else out there who dominated any one game, though there were a few who had lines similar to, but slightly worse than Cotter’s in single starts.
Honorable Mention:
RHP Aaron Cotter, 1/2/1984
0-0, GS, 1.80 ERA in 5.0 IP, 3 H (HR), R, 4/1 K/BB, 7/4 G/F
Dishonorable Mention:
LHP Danny Christensen, 8/10/1983
0-1, GS, 11.25 ERA in 4.0 IP, 8 H, 5 R, 5/2 K/BB, 4/2 G/F
From the Training Room:
Carrera has landed on the DL, which brought Mike Wilson back to West Tenn, as Tacoma is pretty crowded at the moment. Ron Prettyman has also been placed on the DL and Ogui Diaz was called up to replace him as utility infielder. Fields came off the DL, and is pitching reasonably well (2.0 IP, 1/2 K/BB, but some grounders and no hits). The three starting pitchers are still on the bench, as they have ever been, but Hill has landed on the reserve list for some reason and Christensen is temporarily inactive, so Matt Renfree was called in. Renfree pitched in Everett last year. Jose Yepez replaced Quiroz.
The Week in Preview:
6/1-4, at Mississippi (ATL, 22-28), all times 5:05 pm PDT except Tues (4:05 pm PDT)
6/5-7, vs. Huntsville (MIL, 29-20), all times 5:05 pm PDT except Sun (12:05 pm PDT doubleheader)
High Desert Mavericks (3-3 this week, 33-17 overall)
The Week in Review:
Monday, May 25th 2009
High Desert 12 , Lancaster 11 (HOU – 19)
W: Jensen (1-0, 7.43); L: Abad (1-2, 6.30); SV: Richard (3)
Tuesday, May 26th 2009
Off day
Wednesday, May 27th 2009
Lake Elsinore 5 (SD – 6), High Desert 6
W: Hensley (1-0, 5.73); L: Pelzer (6-2, 4.41); SV: Aumont (8)
Thursday, May 28th 2009
Lake Elsinore 1 (SD – 7), High Desert 0
W: Hynes (1-0, 1.42); L: Richard (4-1, 6.86); SV: Oland (14)
Friday, May 29th 2009
Lake Elsinore 7 (SD – 6), High Desert 2
W: Hefner (4-6, 4.99); L: Hume (5-2, 5.11)
Saturday, May 30th 2009
Lake Elsinore 1 (SD – 7), High Desert 4
W: Adcock (4-2, 3.55); L: Breit (0-2, 4.34); SV: Aumont (9)
Sunday, May 31st 2009
Inland Empire 13 (LAD – 6), High Desert 8
W: McCarter (1-0, 0.00); L: Paredes (3-3, 5.06)
Hitter of the Week:
C Travis Scott, L/R, 4/24/1985
5 G, 18 AB, 2 R, 7 H, 3 2B, HR, 3/2 K/BB, .388/~.450/.722
In past years, I complained that Scott simply didn’t hit well enough on the road and that his numbers were inflated and probably not worth paying any heed. This year, it’s the opposite. In away games, he’s hitting .391/.443/.781 compared to .262/.387/.508 at Mavericks Stadium. That’s not exactly common. What makes it more interesting is that he’s more of a contact hitter on the road, running a 9/5 K/BB compared to a 17/13 K/BB at home. Maybe he still has a bit of a home swing, but he’s effective nonetheless, and if Clement isn’t our lefty catcher of the future, Scott could potentially be the lefty back-up to Moore.
Honorable Mention:
3B Alex Liddi, R/R, 8/14/1988
6 G, 23 AB, 8 H, 2B, 2 HR, 5 RBI, 2/1 K/BB, .347/~.375/.652
Also Honorable Mention:
SS Juan Diaz, S/R, 12/12/1988
5 G, 19 AB, 4 R, 6 H, 2 2B, 3B, 3 RBI, 4/0 K/BB, .316/~.316/.526
Pitcher of the Week:
RHP Nathan Adcock, 2/25/1988
1-0, GS, 1.29 ERA in 7.0 IP, 8 H, R, 4/2 K/BB, 13/3 G/F
All other things being near equal, I’ll probably give the nod to the starter over the reliever, so here we have Adcock who had one of the better starts of the week. The most notable thing wasn’t in the hit totals or the control, but the sheer ability to keep balls on the ground, as evidenced in the thirteen to three ground/fly ratio, although for the year he’s just at 1.77 grounders for every fly. His ceiling isn’t as high as some of the others on staff, but he remains the only one with a complete game, has pitched more innings (averaging just under six each time out), and allowed fewer baserunners than of the other regular starters.
Honorable Mention:
RHP Jake Wild, 8/18/1984
0-0, 3 G, 1.17 ERA in 7.2 IP, 8 H, R, 5/2 K/BB, 9/7 G/F
Dishonorable Mention:
RHP Adam Harben, 9/19/1983
0-0, 2 GS, 17.36 ERA in 4.2 IP, 9 H (HR), 12 R (9 ER), 2/11 K/BB, 9/3 G/F, 2 WP
From the Training Room:
As Yepez got the call to West Tenn, he was replaced by a call-up from extended, Flaming Bees Fleming Baez. Pineda is back in the DL, which is bad because that’s meant Harben starting. I don’t know how he got two no decisions this week. Most importantly, Joe Dunigan is back with the team, and immediately hit a home run because that’s simply what he does.
The Week in Preview:
6/1-3, vs. Inland Empire (LAD, 22-28), all times 7:05 pm PDT
6/4-7, at Stockton (OAK, 20-30), all times 7:05 pm PDT except Sun (2:05 pm PDT)
Clinton Lumberkings (3-4 this week, 26-24 overall)
The Week in Review:
Monday, May 25th 2009
Great Lakes 8 (LAD + 2), Clinton 5
W: Miller (3-2, 4.72); L: Venegas (0-1, 3.72); SV: Guerra (11)
Tuesday, May 26th 2009
Clinton 9, Peoria 3 (CHC + 3)
W: Hann (2-0, 2.31); L: Beliveau (0-1, 4.78)
Wednesday, May 27th 2009
Clinton 2, Peoria 3 (CHC + 4)
W: Cabrera (4-2, 3.57); L: Flores (1-2, 3.10)
Thursday, May 28th 2009
Clinton 8, Peoria 3 (CHC + 3)
W: Jimenez, J (3-1, 2.28); L: Hatley (3-3, 5.27)
Friday, May 29th 2009
Clinton 1, South Bend 4 (ARI 0)
W: Sinclair (2-1, 2.83); L: Lorin (4-2, 1.79); SV: Hose (5)
Saturday, May 30th 2009
Clinton 1, South Bend 5 (ARI + 1)
W: Morgan (2-1, 2.86); L: Venegas (0-2, 4.97)
Sunday, May 31st 2009
Clinton 10, South Bend 2 (ARI 0)
W: LaFromboise (3-1, 2.90); L: Miley (2-4, 4.13)
Hitter of the Week:
Kris Sanchez, L/L, 1/9/1984
6 G, 20 AB, 3 R, 7 H, 3 2B, 4 RBI, 4/2 K/BB, .350/~.409/.500
Remember when the Lumberkings were challenging for the division lead? It seems like a long time ago, like around the time the Mariners were doing the same. Since then, things haven’t really been coming together for the them. Early producers such as Almonte have slowed down a bit, and while others have come around, the offense has become a weakness. The once-powerful rotation is having trouble picking up the slack minus Pribanic and Hensley. As a 25-year-old (one of two on the roster), Sanchez shouldn’t really be on the roster, but as one of the few players who’s actually hitting, I can’t just overlook him.
Honorable Mention:
Nate Tenbrink, L/R, 12/21/1986
6 G, 23 AB, 2 R, 7 H, 2B, 4 RBI, 9/1 K/BB, .304/~.333/.347
Dishnorable Mention:
CF Maximo Mendez, L/L, 11/24/1986
6 G, 17 AB, 2 R, H, RBI, 9/3 K/BB, SB, CS, .059/~.200/.059
Pitcher of the Week:
RHP Kenn Kasparek, 9/23/1985
0-0, GS, 1.42 ERA in 6.1 IP, 5 H, R, 4/0 K/BB, 7/7 G/F
This was not an exciting week for pitching either. The Lumberkings got two outings from Venegas, both of which were terrible, one good and one bad from LaFromboise, and one bullpen day led off by Blake Nation. Kasparek, though an inferior prospect to Lorin, gets the nod here because he managed to go deeper than anyone save LaFromboise the second time out, and he let the fewest batters reach. Although, one would think for as tall as he is (6’8), he’d get more grounders. Lorin gets silver because even when he doesn’t have the command, he still seems to get by.
Honorable Mention:
RHP Brett Lorin, 3/31/1987
0-1, GS, 1.80 ERA in 5.0 IP, 6 H, R, 5/3 K/BB, 6/4 G/F
Dishonorable Mention:
RHP Alfredo Venegas, 5/11/1986
0-2, 2 GS, 7.04 ERA in 7.2 IP, 13 H (2 HR), 13 R (6 ER), 5/6 K/BB, 8/10 G/F, BK
From the Training Room:
I don’t get to write about Suriel sucking this week because he’s on the DL now, which leads one to think that there may have been something else going on. Something other than sucking. RHP Aaron Pribanic, C Juan Fuentes, and CF Daniel Carroll remain out.
The Week in Preview:
6/2-5, vs. Kane County (OAK, 31-19), All Times 5:00 pm PDT
6/6-7, at Quad Cities (STL, 23-26), All Times 4:00 pm PDT
Comments
24 Responses to “Minor League Wrap (5/25-31/09)”
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Jay,
Given the glut of nominal starting pitchers in High Desert, the struggles of Ramirez, the age/inexperience of Pineda, is there a chance that we see Brett Lorin completely bypass High-A ball this season and make the jump straight to Double A? Granted it’s probably not the smartest thing to do but, given his age relative to the other top pitching prospects in the system, he seems like a better bet of making the transition to the higher levels. Or will his lack of frontline stuff be better served in gradual promotions?
Jay, what is the story with Moore’s passed ball problems. That would certainly not play out well in the “bigs”. I would imagine the M’s have had their catching coach working with him? If he does not get that straitened out he won’t be coming up.What is it with the M’s and catchers? I had thought Moore would have been the answer.
Jay, thanks a lot for the brief write-up on Liddi’s progress in the comments last week; even happier to see an extended write-up this week.
I’m delighted each day to see Liddi (and Dunigan, when he’s in the lineup) continue to hit. Travis Scott also, come to think of it.
Jay, what is the story with Moore’s passed ball problems. That would certainly not play out well in the “bigsâ€.
Considering how terrible Rob Johnson is at plate blocking I doubt anyone will care very much.
“what is the story with Moore’s passed ball problems. That would certainly not play out well in the “bigsâ€.”
This is a problem that’s not limited to Moore. Clement’s defensive struggles are well known, but Rob Johnson had 21 PBs in 90 games in Tacoma last year, while Moore had 23 in 107 in W. Tenn.
It doesn’t seem to be a minor-league-wide phenomenon either, as Kurt Suzuki/Landon Powell never had massive problems with PBs. Mike Napoli’s high was 13, and Jeff Mathis was fine in the high minors. Joe Mauer had a terrible start in rookie league, but his career PB mark (in 222 games) is only one more than Moore had last year.
This isn’t all that charitable, but I’m beginning to wonder what Roger Hansen does with our C prospects. Every time a catcher has defensive problems, we are reassured that he’ll work with Roger Hansen and that everything will be fine. There’s always the bit about how amazing the kid’s natural talent is, and with a tweak here and there, he’ll be Varitek (who Hansen coached through PB problems in the M’s system). We’ve heard it for Miguel Olivo, Jeff Clement, Rob Johnson, and I’ve never seen a marked improvement in their stats. Maybe the scouting folks send Hansen guys who just shouldn’t be Cs, but I’m seeing a pattern here.
I still think we should just make them play hockey as goalkeepers during the offseason.
I know this is un-related to our minor league system. But the draft is coming up in 8 days. Over the weekend in his NCAA regional, Dustin Ackley went 10/14 with 3 walks, and posted a 0.714/0.765/1.143 for a 1.908 OPS. He was named the most outstanding player in the regional. His season line is now 417/520/781 for a 1.301 OPS. There are 3 more games this coming weekend in the super regional. Is there any chance barring injury, even if he went 0-fer in the next 3 games, that Dustin Ackley wouldn’t be in the M’s organization next Tuesday? Have the M’s seen enough of this guy to say this is clearly the 2nd best player in this draft?
In both of his full seasons playing, Adam Moore has had 20+ passed balls in 100+ defensive games. The only guy who would have rated worse on that front last season was Kevin Cash, who had fourteen in 57 games. In most other years, you see far far less, provided it’s not a Doug Mirabelli situation and you’re catching Wakefield much of the time. The most a full-time catcher had last year was 10, and that was Ramon Hernandez with 127 games logged behind the plate.
As I keep telling people, “good defensive catcher” means nothing other than “pitchers enjoy throwing to him” most of the time.
[In Everett I saw him lose a ball underneath him for quite some time. He hasn’t gotten much better]
In my opinion, I think it would be better to have Lorin work up the ladder. His stuff isn’t bad, but his approach is mostly command based and he has a few kinks to iron out on that front. I think that for fundamental things like that, a prospect would be better served with gradual promotions even though they appear to be “dominant” on any given level.
Scouts sometimes make some preposterous judgments based off of the last handful of performances by a draft prospect, but I think Ackley has done enough in the past few weeks to really establish himself as the number two prospect in the draft. The various outlets I’ve read basically say that anyone after us would leap at the chance to draft him, but no one really expects to get that opportunity at this point.
Yeah, it concerns me too. I think we may have become overly reliant on him to perform miracles. Johnson was actually an outfielder for quite some time before being drafted as a catcher, but I think that Clement and Moore both played on position throughout their careers, they were just never regarded as quality defenders. Most other teams had major questions about their ability to stay there.
Hansen is probably pretty good, but there’s only so much one can do if the natural ability isn’t quite there.
Hansen is probably pretty good, but there’s only so much one can do if the natural ability isn’t quite there.
That’s undoubtedly part of it – Clement was never regarded as a defensive whiz – but given the sheer numbers we’re talking about, Hansen seems like he’s got to take some of the blame.
I mean, Landon Powell and Kurt Suzuki weren’t considered defensive geniuses either – Suzuki has 19 PBs in the cal league one year – but by the time they hit the high minors, the PBs are basically gone. Mike Napoli is anything but a guy with the ‘natural ability’ to be a great defender, but he’s not had this problem.
I think part of it may be that the M’s simply don’t really care about PBs that much. They don’t see PBs as being a vital part of the mix that makes up ‘defense’ for a catcher. They’d love to see zero PBs, but it doesn’t seem like high totals factor a whole lot in how they evaluate a catcher.
I thought Rob Johnson was going to head to West Tenn. this year, given his sterling reputation under Bavasi was not supported by his PB totals. Tony Blengino is going to have this guy in the cal league, I thought. Instead, he’s the starting C for the Mariners and Blengino sounded like he wanted to erect a statue of the guy in front of Safeco (from what I’m told). Clearly, PBs aren’t all that important to this FO (or the last FO).
I don’t know that it’s that, but I don’t know what it is really. I’m getting ten kinds of cognitive dissonance on that, because they emphasized the Dan Wilson mold for so many years it seems just bizarre to see them swing to the opposite end while still valuing Hansen’s instruction.
Maybe it’s just the Wilson years rubbing off on me, but I view passed balls as sloppy, demoralizing mistakes that are probably curable with instruction, not that I’ve donned the tools of ignorance myself (throwing lefty makes that problematic). I get the impression from the fluff articles in the paper that Hansen sets them on a regiment of performing tasks like that non-stop through the offseason, but they don’t seem to improve, and higher-ups don’t seem to care. The org has always loved Johnson and Moore in spite of those truly glaring faults.
I’d like to give them the benefit of doubt and say something like they must have figured out that passed balls aren’t as bad as we make them out to be or there are other less quantifiable factors that make up for those deficiencies, but mostly I just don’t get it.
In Canada a lot of the kids who play as goalie in the winter play catcher in little league (in fact there may be extra LL players with goalie experience, since there’s a goalie per six in hockey and a catcher per nine in baseball). You’d think with all the fragile pitchers the major leagues have been finding in Canada lately they’d turn up at least a couple of catchers. Of course a really athletic catcher is probably a pretty good goalie, which means he’s already in the hockey minors by the time he’s a teenager. But still, among the leftovers…
“The org has always loved Johnson and Moore in spite of those truly glaring faults.”
Given the evaluations of C defense recently, I’m coming around to the notion that the spread in runs from best to worst for PBs just isn’t much. It does make me wonder what, exactly, the organization DOES value in C defense. Do they simply poll the managers/starters? CS% (Moore/Johnson have been above average, but not amazingly so)?
My money’s still on those ‘less quantifiable factors’ you mentioned. I don’t know what to think about that.
“You’d think with all the fragile pitchers the major leagues have been finding in Canada lately they’d turn up at least a couple of catchers.”
And they have! Russell Martin’s from Ontario, AAAA C Pete LaForest was from Quebec, and hey, Justin Morneau was drafted as a C out of BC.
Every time a catcher has defensive problems, we are reassured that he’ll work with Roger Hansen and that everything will be fine. There’s always the bit about how amazing the kid’s natural talent is, and with a tweak here and there, he’ll be Varitek (who Hansen coached through PB problems in the M’s system). We’ve heard it for Miguel Olivo, Jeff Clement, Rob Johnson, and I’ve never seen a marked improvement in their stats.
No, G-Bo, it isn’t. As for Davis, he was San Diego’s busted prospect; I’m not sure what’s to hang on Hansen there.
Hansen didn’t just work with ‘prospects.’
He worked with Olivo after Miguel was a catcher with the M’s, and from the sounds of things tried to work with Davis, but Davis was less than receptive.
Blast from the past article here.
Jay, which prospects do you think would bring the most value on the trade market this summer? I know we have some near untouchables in Truinfel and Aumont, but which guys would bring the most return out of the others? Any guys you would consider moving who have value to other teams but appear to have less value within our organization?
Uh… well, if we’re talking about trading prospects I think at this point we should be looking to form a core to build around, and I think that one would be more likely to get that trading the MLB players. Eventually we’re going to have a surplus of outfielders, and can trade from that. Beyond that, I think most of what we have is too low down the chain to be worth much.
Trading prospects (Jones, Tillman, Choo, Asdrubal Cabrera…) is how we got into this hole. You don’t get out of it by digging deeper. As Jay says, you try to turn some of your vets into more prospects and then see who sticks.
I was not inferring we should trade prospects by themselves. I was just trying to get a feel for the value of guys in our system on the trade market. Perhaps we could package a prospect of ours with say Washburn to help us get a higher talent, higher need position player in return. It is difficult to project this since you can’t really get in the heads of other scouts and GM’s but with us having so much more depth at certain positions over others it seems like we may benefit from moving one or two of them. That is why I wanted to get a feel for their value on the trade market in relation to value within our system both due to philosophy and depth at position.
That’s sort of what I was getting at, joser. I don’t want to say never trade prospects, but most… okay all of the Bavasi trades I can think of didn’t make meaningful progress and jobbed us pretty badly in the greater scheme of things. It’s a results way of looking at it, but I think that most of us were questioning whether adding Bedard to an already volatile team was what was going to push us over the top. I would be content with Zduriencik trying to rebuild the system internally (because, surprise, even though we said we weren’t going to rebuild we still need to), but he can also make some smart external signings, so I guess we’ll see. I just want something to build around really.
The Rainiers media relations intern (Drew Samuelson, whom you may remember from Pacific Prospect Report) just dropped me a line with these nuggets. Here, I’ll just paste a few of them…
He also says we should keep an eye on Fister.
Fister’s going to be an interesting one. The command’s fine (30 Ks to *3* walks*), but I just wonder how many MLB bats he’s going to miss. There’s being let down by your defense, and then there’s being really, really hittable.
Still, don’t walk anybody, keep the ball down, get a half-decent number of Ks, and you can be a solid #4/#5.