This season this will be an abbreviated version of my Big Six prospects. I’ll be mostly doing it from memory plus a bit of player research.
Showing posts with label Big 6. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Big 6. Show all posts
Tuesday, March 11, 2025
Wednesday, May 24, 2017
Your 2017 Giants: Big Six Top Giants Prospect Lists
I sometimes post a Big Six Giants prospect list on my blog - as, generally, while there are a lot of interesting prospects, there are maybe 4-8 who are really interesting from the viewpoint of contributing this year or contributing in a big way in the future - but frankly have not made the time to do it before the season began.
The season has already begun, and we are pretty deep into it already, but I haven't really looked much at how the minor leagues are doing right now (though I did read about Shawsome doing well so far, that he got moved to LF), so I'll write some notes regarding what I knew about the season before the season, just to get this out there.
Ignore if you don't care or it's too late for you, it's cool, I just wanted to get it out.
The season has already begun, and we are pretty deep into it already, but I haven't really looked much at how the minor leagues are doing right now (though I did read about Shawsome doing well so far, that he got moved to LF), so I'll write some notes regarding what I knew about the season before the season, just to get this out there.
Ignore if you don't care or it's too late for you, it's cool, I just wanted to get it out.
Saturday, April 02, 2016
Your 2016 Giants: Big Six Top Giants Prospects
I sometimes post a Big Six Giants prospect list on my blog, but my answer to the Giants prospect chat will have to substitute for it this season. I like to read through the books and discuss why I like the top guys, and build my arguments why I think they are the top 6, but that is going to take a lot of time, and I like to get it done before Opening Day, and I just don't have the time. So this time, I'm just going to fan boy about the system.
Thursday, March 15, 2012
Your 2012 Giants: Big 6 Questions
In honor of the Big 6 himself, Christy Mathewson, I present my Big 6 Questions of 2012:
- The biggest is obviously how much they can get out of Buster Posey in terms of playing time.
- Also, if Matt Cain does not sign an extension, would that take his concentration down?
- Tim Lincecum has had declines over the past two seasons in certain key metrics, can he stem those declines?
- Can Pagan rebound to 2010 performance or will he repeat 2011?
- Can Vogelsong do well enough in the #4 spot, as expecting him to repeat would be asking too much?
- Can Zito be back of rotation good enough?
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
Your 2011 Giants: Big 6 Prospects
I am selecting, in honor of the Big 6 himself, Christy Mathewson, the top 6 prospects of the Giants farm system, in my estimation. I would rather focus on the ones who are most likely to do significant damage for us up at the major league level at some point in the future, with some plus factor for doing it sooner than later.
As far as methodology goes, I don't really care to predict the players most likely to contribute this particular season, as that usually include players who make a utility contribution; most teams do not get a significant contributor (like a new starter) from the minor leagues each season, let alone 6, 10, or 11 of them.
And, frankly, most people who do these sort of stuff focus a significant amount of their ranking on whether a player is able to make the majors that season or not. So, to be a little different, I try to focus more on the future potential rather than closeness to the majors, partly because that is the fun of prospect watching, part because I don't observe any of the prospects on the field, as others do.
What I do provide is my thoughts and analysis after reading through various available sources of information regarding the Giants prospects, including all the lists out there (which was captured quite nicely by Crazy Crabbers here). And, as noted, I lean more towards potential than closeness to the majors.
And to add to the Crabber's bounty, here is the Minor League Baseball Analyst's Top 15:
I love reading the Minor League Baseball Analyst, whole-heartedly recommend it.
2011 Giants Big 6 Prospects
In years past, it would have been hard to fill out the list without people who don't really deserve to be on the list. There would usually be a number of them who was a huge question mark on what type of contribution they will make at the major league level ever. And that is not a knock on the Giants farm system in the past, per se, the general rule of thumb is that the farm system at any time has four players who will make a mark in the majors in their career, 2 starters, 2 utility/relievers, but the Giants were even having problems with even 2-3 who look like sure things at times.
But 2011 is different again, just like 2009 and 2010, and we have a lot of players. We are starting to built up a lot of depth in the system and that will impact the majors over the next 2-4 seasons. The Giants were able to accomplish this because it had a lot of high picks in 2007 to boost this up, and made a number of astute selections in 2008, as if they had high picks, in selecting Gillaspie, Kieschnick, and Crawford, players who at some point were expected to fall in the first round, some early in the first. And 2009 had a number of excellent early picks in Wheeler, Joseph, Dominguez, and Stoffel. And 2010 had a number of excellent picks in Brown, Parker, Rosin, Hembree, Kickham, Chuckie Jones,
This year, it was pretty clear who the top 2 were but like last season, there were a lot of prospects who could make one of the four three spots, and I will list them in an honorable mention section.
Here are the Big 6 I've selected for 2011:
Honorary Mentions
As I noted before, the sad fact about prospects is that the vast majority will fail to become a major leaguer at any point, and an even smaller percentage ever become the starters we all love and follow. That's part of the reason I keep my list to 6, it is just so hard to make the majors as a starter that the Top 6 typically are those who make it. Still, part of the fun of prospect hounding is when prospects like Jonathan Sanchez, Pablo Sandoval, Sergio Romo, Brandon Belt, rise up the system fast and make the majors. Unfortunately, there is no way to know who will make that rise, you have to monitor and observe and hope for the best.
Sad Story of Angel: Continued
Unfortunately, sometimes real life intrudes on our revelry. Angel Villalona, who probably would have made the list somewhere this season, if not for his murder charge, is still being prosecuted for the murder that he was accused of doing. His visa has been revoked and I believe he was able to post bail and stay out of jail, living with his family, while the preparations for the trial continues.
Until there is a gun with his fingerprints on it, I don't see how he will get convicted, as there are as many people saying he shot the fatal shot as there are people who swear to his innocence because he was near them when the firing happened. Too many people on both sides for the truth to be exposed in the courtroom.
The odd thing is that if he is able to be found not guilty, assuming the trial is over sometime this year, he'll still be only 21 YO for next season and probably would be OK in San Jose, eventually, once he goes through instructional league to get back into baseball shape. However, given how fat he got previously as a pro, I would fear that he has gain a tremendous amount of weight while sitting around in jail and now at home.
As far as methodology goes, I don't really care to predict the players most likely to contribute this particular season, as that usually include players who make a utility contribution; most teams do not get a significant contributor (like a new starter) from the minor leagues each season, let alone 6, 10, or 11 of them.
And, frankly, most people who do these sort of stuff focus a significant amount of their ranking on whether a player is able to make the majors that season or not. So, to be a little different, I try to focus more on the future potential rather than closeness to the majors, partly because that is the fun of prospect watching, part because I don't observe any of the prospects on the field, as others do.
What I do provide is my thoughts and analysis after reading through various available sources of information regarding the Giants prospects, including all the lists out there (which was captured quite nicely by Crazy Crabbers here). And, as noted, I lean more towards potential than closeness to the majors.
And to add to the Crabber's bounty, here is the Minor League Baseball Analyst's Top 15:
- Brandon Belt, 1B
- Zack Wheeler, RHP
- Francisco Peguero, OF
- Gary Brown, OF
- Thomas Neal, OF
- Charlie Culberson, 2B
- Tommy Joseph, C
- Jarrett Parker, OF
- Brandon Crawford, SS
- Jose Casilla, RHP
- Chuckie Jones, OF
- Ehire Adrianza, SS
- Michael Main, RHP
- Heath Hembree, RHP
- Chris Dominguez, 3B
I love reading the Minor League Baseball Analyst, whole-heartedly recommend it.
2011 Giants Big 6 Prospects
In years past, it would have been hard to fill out the list without people who don't really deserve to be on the list. There would usually be a number of them who was a huge question mark on what type of contribution they will make at the major league level ever. And that is not a knock on the Giants farm system in the past, per se, the general rule of thumb is that the farm system at any time has four players who will make a mark in the majors in their career, 2 starters, 2 utility/relievers, but the Giants were even having problems with even 2-3 who look like sure things at times.
But 2011 is different again, just like 2009 and 2010, and we have a lot of players. We are starting to built up a lot of depth in the system and that will impact the majors over the next 2-4 seasons. The Giants were able to accomplish this because it had a lot of high picks in 2007 to boost this up, and made a number of astute selections in 2008, as if they had high picks, in selecting Gillaspie, Kieschnick, and Crawford, players who at some point were expected to fall in the first round, some early in the first. And 2009 had a number of excellent early picks in Wheeler, Joseph, Dominguez, and Stoffel. And 2010 had a number of excellent picks in Brown, Parker, Rosin, Hembree, Kickham, Chuckie Jones,
This year, it was pretty clear who the top 2 were but like last season, there were a lot of prospects who could make one of the four three spots, and I will list them in an honorable mention section.
Here are the Big 6 I've selected for 2011:
- Brandon Belt: He is the best by far, has a lot of potential plus he's basically in the majors sooner than later. His story is well known: Giants overdraft in Round 5 where many thought closer to Round 10, the former pitcher had his swing reworked suing new video tool leading to him leading the minors in a number of stats across the three levels he played in 2010, including AAA. Showing surprising stolen-base prowess to go with power, he used the whole field while being disciplined enough to take walks at high rates. Some have called him a left-handed Buster Posey and Will Clark said that Belt has a better swing than he did. Should be in the heart of the Giants lineup for most of this decade, the Decade of the Giants, hitting for good (20-25 HR) power and average (plus high OBP), probably in the #5 spot (Sandoval, Posey, Belt).
- Zack Wheeler: He is the best pitcher by far, in a system left almost barren by quick promotions of pitchers in recent seasons. He would be more highly ranked on most Top 100 overall prospect lists if he did not miss half the season due to a torn fingernail; yet, still, many ranked him roughly in the 50-75 range in their Top 100 list. High strikeout rates due to mid-to-high 90's heater, he also got an extremely high percentage of ground balls. He also has a good slider and power curveball. Good mechanics seals the deal, he's a potential #1 starter. Belt only beats him out because Belt is SOOO close to making the majors.
- Gary Brown: With speed to challenge anyone - he reportedly can get to 1B (as RHB) as fast as the best LHB - he can get to many balls in CF that other cannot. This also helps in elevating his BABIP plus is handy for stealing bases with abandon. Most analysts said that he's plus plus in defense in CF but that his jittery batting stance scared off most teams despite him leading the Big West in OPS, not just last year, but over the past seven seasons, which included Evan Longoria's breakout season (his ISO also beat out Longoria too). The major negative that anyone can throw at him is his lack of walks in 2010 in college, but they are ignoring his high walk totals when he was not that good a hitter his first season on college and the walks he got, albeit small samples, but still a significant percentage, in pro ball in 2010: he had 6 walks in only 54 PA, that's 11%, which is good. He's my guy to watch for 2011, I think he will prove that he knows how to take walks plus do all the other stuff the experts say he can, and if so, he can rise fast, like Belt in 2010 and Sandoval in 2008, and be pushing for the majors by season's end.
- Francisco Peguero: I've never been impressed with him but the major prospect services have, so I have paid attention to him. Baseball America says that he has the best blend of power and speed in the Giants system. He has plus plus speed, which helps him provide plus plus defense. With Brown around, he's probably headed for RF, which he has played in the minors. Doesn't walk a lot, but like Sandoval coming up the minors, he has kept his strikeout rate down low against pitchers much older than he is, so that bodes well for him climbing up to the majors. His coverage of the plate has been very good, as he exhibits good bat speed. He'll be in AA in 2011, most likely, but could be pushing for the majors by season's end with another good season.
- Heath Hembree: Reported 100 MPH in college, the Giants fixed up something with the RHP's delivery and he went from walking 18 in 29 IP in college to outright dominating in the Arizona League, striking out 22 in only 11 IP, but more importantly, 0, zero, nil, nada, walks. BA says that he profiles as a premium closer and that is what I'm thinking too. Brian Wilson won't last forever nor stay here forever, so Hembree would be someone we could groom to take over in 2-3 seasons, should Wilson not be around at that point. At worse, Hembree could be a shutdown set-up guy, which can be almost equally valuable sometimes.
- Rafael Rodriguez: He is on this list because he's a true 5-tool talent. As much as people want to complain about his 2010 season, that was his 17 YO season, and it would be too much to expect him to dominate out of the chute, especially since he's playing against much older guys, most 2-4 years older than he is (and more experienced). Yet, his strikeout rate is not that high, around 19%, which means a contact rate of 81% when you ideally want to see the batter at 85% or above. That should come with time and experience. His power too. Meanwhile, he's learning the nuances of fielding and with his strong arm and his speed, he probably could play any of the OF positions when he reaches the majors. He's expected to make his full season debut in 2011 in low-A Augusta.
Honorary Mentions
- Nick Noonan: He didn't break out like I thought he would last season, but he was hampered by recurring hamstring problems. Also, they redid his batting mechanics, using the same video system they used to redo Belt's and the results were very positive: he started driving the ball and generating better bat speed. The Giants are talking about moving him back to SS, and if he can field decently there, his offense would carry the day. I think he's someone to keep a close eye on, as well as Brown, they could be pushing on the majors by season end, even if he ends up back at 2B, I think he's on the verge of putting it together as a batter. Probably repeats AA, but could join bottleneck in AAA by season's end, on merit.
- Ehire Adrianza: In the past decade, he probably would have made the list, but the team's system is deepening, as I noted. He reportedly could field SS in the majors now but his offense is what he needs to improve on. Still, people need to remember, he was only 20 YO last season in a league of 22-24 YO pitchers, and yet he still held his own with the bat, 20% strikeouts/80% contact rate: remember, San Jose's background ups strikeout rate for hitters. And he gets a good amount of walks too and flashes the speed to use them to steal bases. He's probably going to repeat in SJ, particularly if Noonan is at SS in AA.
- Brandon Crawford: Also with major league ready defense at SS, like Ehire, he just strikes out way too much. Breaking his hand didn't help either. Maybe he'll try out the new video system and take a leap, like Belt and Noonan. Should be SS in AAA for 2011.
- Tommy Joseph: Probably best power-hitting prospect and he did not disappoint, 16 HR in 436 AB as 18 YO in low-A Augusta, but struck out a lot too with few walks. C but a lot to learn and scouts felt 1B was his eventual position.
- Thomas Neal: The projection systems love him, think he can be solid regular starting OF this season in majors. He took slight step back in 2010, but I blame EL for sapping his power, which was his plus tool, much like how Ishikawa suffered there (and Crawford, for that matter). I think he'll be better in AAA playing LF, where he'll probably be in 2011.
- Eric Surkamp: He's healthy and looking to continue where he left off: leading Giants minor leaguers in strikeouts again. Got to love anyone with more than 1 K per inning and K/BB of almost 5, but since he's doing it as a polished pitcher, and not via one or two great knockout/strikeout pitch, he'll have to prove it at every level, like Pucetas. I would expect him to start in AA and to move fast to AAA, he could be our 6th starter alternative by then if he continues to dominate like this.
- Charlie Culberson: Breakout season, finally (and remember, only 21 YO in 2010), continued doing well in AFL. Now he has to repeat, probably plays 2B in AA, but very exciting burst of power, would be great to have at 2B (or maybe even 3B, where he played in 2009).
- Chuckie Jones: Had great start to pro career with an offensive explosion but 61 strikeouts in 165 AB is a huge question mark. Still, hit very well as 17 YO in AZL, 2-4 years younger and less experienced, so I would cut him huge slack on the strikeouts for now. Huge power potential, idolized Pujols growing up, grew up in area, St. Louis was ready to draft in next round. That's why better for teams to overdraft players they like than risk losing to another team.
- Jarrett Parker: 5 tool potential put him high on some Giants prospect lists. Nice package overall, still have to see more, as he had a down season in college in 2010.
As I noted before, the sad fact about prospects is that the vast majority will fail to become a major leaguer at any point, and an even smaller percentage ever become the starters we all love and follow. That's part of the reason I keep my list to 6, it is just so hard to make the majors as a starter that the Top 6 typically are those who make it. Still, part of the fun of prospect hounding is when prospects like Jonathan Sanchez, Pablo Sandoval, Sergio Romo, Brandon Belt, rise up the system fast and make the majors. Unfortunately, there is no way to know who will make that rise, you have to monitor and observe and hope for the best.
Sad Story of Angel: Continued
Unfortunately, sometimes real life intrudes on our revelry. Angel Villalona, who probably would have made the list somewhere this season, if not for his murder charge, is still being prosecuted for the murder that he was accused of doing. His visa has been revoked and I believe he was able to post bail and stay out of jail, living with his family, while the preparations for the trial continues.
Until there is a gun with his fingerprints on it, I don't see how he will get convicted, as there are as many people saying he shot the fatal shot as there are people who swear to his innocence because he was near them when the firing happened. Too many people on both sides for the truth to be exposed in the courtroom.
The odd thing is that if he is able to be found not guilty, assuming the trial is over sometime this year, he'll still be only 21 YO for next season and probably would be OK in San Jose, eventually, once he goes through instructional league to get back into baseball shape. However, given how fat he got previously as a pro, I would fear that he has gain a tremendous amount of weight while sitting around in jail and now at home.
Monday, February 14, 2011
2011 Big 6 Questions for Spring Training
In honor of Big 6 Christy Mathewson, I usually go over six questions facing the Giants at various points in the off-season. Today, I'm tackling spring training.
Question 1: Pablo or Panda?!?
Many people are saying the Giants are standing pat, going stagnant, but they are wrong. The Giants are betting on several players returning to their prior production, one of whom, in a big way, one of them being Pablo Sandoval.
Will he be the Pablo of 2010 or the Panda of 2009? Of course, nobody knows, but I think Panda will be back. I've gone over his personal problems before, so I won't go there again, but the thing I should have emphasized more before is that he's a classic bad ball hitter in the mode of Vlad Guerrero, Manny Sanguillen, and others like them, who instinctively can swing and connect with the ball. So his problems at the plate in 2010 was more mental and not physical. Most people without a knowledge of the history of the game just don't understand that, and those who do have a knowledge are ignoring it.
If he can harness that with Barry Bonds' tutelege, that would be great, but really, people should just be happy that he can do what he has shown he can do. People are going in the opposite way of the pendulum today, towards the sabermetric side, and just put him down for not taking walks. It don't matter he can't walk when you can hit like he showed he can in 2008, 2009, and April 2010. Hitting is ALWAYS more valuable than walking when he supplies the power that he does.
Of course, it would be great if he could take more walks, but WAIT, he actually wasn't that bad at it, the league average was 9.0% for BB% in 2009, and he had 8.2%, and the league average was 8.5% in 2010, and he had 7.6%, both within spitting distance of the league average. It is not like he was like Bengie Molina or Juan Pierre or anything like that. And his strikeout ratio was about the same as it was in 2009. And once he started hitting for homers in June, for the rest of the 2009 season, his BB% was 9.7%. I wouldn't be surprised if he beats the league average in 2011.
The main issue in 2010 was actually his BABIP. It was at or above .350 in his two prior seasons, was only .291 in 2010. As I noted, April 2010, he was basically the hitter he was before, and looking at the BABIP, it was, roughly, as his BABIP was .382. After that, he couldn't really get it over .300, for the most part.
Now, if it was because, as people posit, his poor plate discipline catching up with him or, as others say, his contact lens and vision problems, then why didn't his strikeouts skyrocket? It didn't, overall it was essentially the same as it was in 2009 (13.1% in 2009, 13.2% in 2010, an increase of roughly 0.25 strikeouts on a ratio basis, in other words, basically the same). For those theories to work, he should be striking out at a higher rate at minimum, and really, if these were correct, he should be striking out loads more, particularly for those who cite poor hitting approach: 13% strikeout rate is among the best in the majors, and he did that with his "poor plate discipline" or even his poor vision. If either or both were true, his strikeouts should have gone up a lot based on their theory.
In case it is not obvious, this is my opinion, you can call it psuedo-psychology if you wish, but I counter that is more poor analysis on the part of others. I'm happy to wait for the season to start and we'll see who is right and who is the psudo.
Question 2: Will Brandon Belt Belt?
One of the real no-brainer question of the spring. Some think he's a sure thing, but judging by how poorly he did in AAA (albeit small samples), he will probably need some time in AAA to prove himself after a 2010 season where he proved himself all through the minors plus the AFL, giving the lie to the Sabean Naysayers who say the Giants mishandle position prospects. The problem, as I've said before, is that the Giants position prospects haven't been that good.
But he could still break out and make the team with a great spring, and by that, it won't just be hitting well, many players have done great in spring only to fizzle in the regular season, Bowker being the latest example, Randy Elliott being a well known example to Giants fans of a certain age, but rather he will have to show the coaches that he knows what he is doing rather than just being lucky, as I think the Giants will err on the conservative with him.
So I can see the Giants sending him down while he's raking and the Sabean Naysayers will have a knipshin.
Whether or not the Giants are doing this because of control of the prospects, which is an understandable on the part of fans, people also need to remember that management needs to think long-term, we should want our team to get basically an extra year of control over the player. Let's put it this way, aren't you glad we got an extra year of enjoying Lincecum, Posey, and Bumgarner?
And to those who said it might have cost us in 2010, all I can say is: how did it cost us, the Giants are the World Champs.
Question 3: Who Will the Outfield Starters be?
To most, it would not seem to be that big a surprise: Burrell in LF, Torres in CF, Ross in RF. But this is a corrolary to Question 2, because the outfielders are not only competing with each other, they are competing with Brandon Belt, who if he makes the team, pushes Huff to the OF, leaving one less OF spot and then the musical chairs started.
However, Huff is now a year older on the wrong side of 30 and now has one bad season followed by one great season (albeit two great seasons out of the last three), and history is full of players who have one last great season, signs a contract, and is eatting dust the rest of the way (Robby Thompson is one Giants example).
Even if Belt does not make the team out of spring training, almost all the potential starters have question marks that need to be answered. First off, Torres is alwo a year older on the wrong side of 30 and haven't put together a full season of superior performance, though it is not totally his fault, he just figured out hitting before the 2009 season, and any team would make him prove himself (he did strike out an inordinate amount of time in 2009, which is not something you want to see out of your lead-off hitter). El Lefty Malo has made the point numerous times on his blog that his health is something we need to watch out for, given his age and body type (sprinter type something have lingering hamstring problems). I'm hopeful that his perseverance to improve as a hitter indicates the way he thinks, and he'll do all he can to avoid physical problems, unlike, say, Ray Durham or Aaron Rowand.
Ross is coming off a sub-par season, and it wasn't like he was consistently good previously, he only had two good full seasons previously. However, he was with a sinking team with a lousy owner. Once he was given the chance to start for the Giants in September, he hit like he did in 2008 and 2009, plus, of course, had his great playoff series. Still, he turns 30 and that is an age milestone warning sign, maybe he just got hot for a month, just at the right time for the Giants.
Burrell is also on the wrong side of 30 and the eldest among the probable starters (though just barely ahead of Huff). He's also a statue in the OF, though an above-average statue, as his defensive stats, per Baseball-Reference.com, says that he added a win with his defense, and according to the same stats, he was actually average in LF with Philly, contracting his image as a poor fielding and suggesting that perhaps defensive stats are still in need of tweaking, giving all the poor commentary on his fielding over the years. Either that or most LF are just that bad, that is where teams put their poor fielders just because of their bat, because, after all, these measures typically compare the player with other players playing the same position that season. Still, despite his great season for the Giants in 2010, most remember his poor 2009 and early 2010 with Tampa Bay and the scuttlebutt during the off-season was that Burrell wasn't going to be a starter. After seeing a guy hit like that in 2010, I find that hard to believe, but it is true that players his age is stumbling down their decline years, so we will see.
Then there is Aaron Rowand, Nate Schierholtz, and Mark DeRosa, the potential bench players. Rowand, as gamer as he was made out to be, got to be hurting psychologically. He probably won't get better until he leaves the Giants, but if he is as mentally tough as he was made out to be, Rowand, when he's going good, is actually a pretty good player: unfortunately, he can't sustain that good streak for very long before getting injured in a Giants uni, and his season is toast. Schierholtz is similar in that he would be world-beating for 2-4 weeks and look like the second coming, then he would hurt something and come back too soon, making his stats look bad overall. If either can stay healthy, Ross could have a hard time keeping his spot in the starting lineup and Burrell too.
DeRosa has been an excellent (+1 win) defensive player at four different positions (2B, 3B, LF, RF) and come up as a SS, so I think he probably would be passable in CF and 1B as well, and could start a game or three at SS - I would rather have him in there than Fontenot, just saying - so he's probably not making the starting OF, he's going to be rotating around those four positions and, if his batting stroke is back, probably get into 100-120 games with maybe 15-30 starts at each position, get some DH duty, plus a lot of defensive replacement duty, and be the first guy to start if anything happens to Sanchez at 2B or Sandoval at 3B. He's not going to get to start in the OF unless his surgery improves his hitting against RHP, which is the thing that has held him back offensively, though he's still OK against RHP, just not good.
So really, this is just another application of last year's risk mitgration practices that the Giants have been doing in recent years, where we can cobble together a performing starting lineup out of the people who are left standing after others have fallen, either physically or in performance.
Question 4: Playoff Starting Pitchers' Fatigue?
This is another obvious area for people to focus on, due to the large number of extra innings pitched by the starters, particularly for Lincecum and Bumgarner, and Sanchez because he basically hit the wall during the playoffs and wasn't that good in his last three starts. The Chronicle listed the grim stats as a part of their excellent series of daily articles about the Giants leading up to Spring Training (I wish they would provide one page to access all of the whole series):
I'm not that worried. Krukow's standard is jumping 25 more IP than the season before. Lincecum was under that and Cain was only 2 IP above that. FYI, they made much larger jumps in their first major league season and no bad effects showed up in the season afterward. Both of them should be as good in 2011, particularly Lincecum, who had some learning pains in 2010 plus learned a new pitch that now gives him an out pitch against any hitter. I would not be surprised by a sub-2.00 ERA season and approaching 300 strikeouts in the season.
Bumgarner, as I noted previously on another post, threw a whole lot more pitches between starts when he was in the minors. At roughly 20 IP over the 25 limit (and remember 2008 was an even larger jump for him from 2007 because of his turning pro) and assuming 15 pitches per IP (should be on high side for him), that is 300 extra pitches. With 24 starts in Augusta that season, all he had to do was roughly 15 extra pitches in-between starts to make up that difference, and remember, he was amazed that MLB starting pitchers threw so little in between starts and had said publicly that he would scale back his throwing because he suspected it was the cause of his poor velocity in late 2009. Plus, he was effortlessly throwing mid-90's in the World Series game and he felt fine when he started pitching again in January, he was not fatigued at all.
Sanchez is the biggest worry, but even then, I am cautiously optimistic. He has made an greater leap in IP before, when he became a starter in the majors in 2008. That did not affect him in future seasons, his ERA has dropped sharply two years in a row. He had deadarm in 2008, when he hit the wall he was pitching very well for a good dominant stretch and had an ERA just under 4.00 at that time, but he was great down the stretch in late 2009. He also has Scott Boras as his agent, and as much as I hate his tactics from a team perspective, he certainly seems to have it going for his clients and has a physical fitness center somewhere in Arizona that helps his clients train and be fit. He has a big investment in keeping Sanchez's performance at a high level in his last two season left with the Giants and will certainly make sure Sanchez gets the best medical advice on how to survive this jump in IP.
While the starters must and will be monitored by the Giants, I am not worried for the most part. Should one starter go down for a while, while Suppan or Runzler will not be an ideal long-term solution as the #5 starter, the Giants survived 2009 OK with very poor pitching from the #5 spot for much of the season, until Penny joined, and we now have a much better offensive team than we did back then. The key is surviving to the end is keeping four of our starters healthy and performing, not all five, a luxury we can do now that we have a better offensive lineup to trot out there.
Question 5: Who Will Win the Last Spot in the Pitching Staff?
The pitching staff is pretty much set, much to the joy of all Giants fans: Lincecum, Zito, Cain, Sanchez, Bumgarner as the starting pitchers, Wilson, Romo, Affeldt, Lopez, Ramirez, Casilla in the bullpen. That's 11 and the Giants normally carry 12 pitchers. Suppan, Runzler, and a bunch of players signed to minor league contracts will vie for that spot.
I'll bet that Runzler will end up in AAA Fresno to start recrafting himself as a starting pitcher. I believe that part of this exercise is to give Runzler more IP to work out his control problems, he just walks too many batters right now to be no more than a good reliever, but he would have closer ability with his strikeout rate if he could ever get that walk rate under 4.0, elite closer at under 3.0. And at just about the right time too, if he develops, as Wilson will be almost into his free agent years around that time.
I think Suppan will win that last spot, only Mota is the only real contender for that spot right now. If, that is, there is a spot.
Technically, there is no need for a long-reliever early in the season. Heck, technically no need for a 5th starter, but if IP is a concern with the pitching staff, you would help things by easing up on Bumgarner while piling on the other starters. So that spot could go to a position player, making this a trick question, a position player could win that last spot instead of Suppan.
Another reason this is the probably way to go is that there are so many potential OFs that the bench is full. Assuming that Belt does not make it as a starter to start the season and that the starters work out the way most of us think, that leaves Whiteside as the backup catcher, Ishikawa as the backup 1B, Fontenot as the backup middle infielder, Rowand and Schierholtz as backup OF, and DeRosa as backup corner positions. That is six bench players when there is only a five player bench when you carry 13 position players.
Given that Ishikawa is the most likely player to go once Belt makes the majors, I expect the Giants to showcase Ishikawa during spring training and work out some sort of trade. I've been thinking Seattle might want to give him a try since he grew up nearby and they could use a great defensive player since they rely on pitching with King Felix around. But any team that is re-building and looking for a starting 1B might be willing to give up some prospect that they have given up on but that the Giants like in exchange for Ishikawa.
I've liked Ishikawa for a while and think that he would be OK playing 1B offensively while shining defensively. He would be like a Rob Deer type, low-batting average, higher OBP because he can take some walks, higher SLG because he can hit the long-ball, but with the bonus that he is among the best fielders at 1B when starting regularly. I think he can stick around for a long while like Deer did in the AL.
Unfortunately for him, he did not seize the ring when given the chance in early 2009 and Huff returned to his regular hitting ways instead of duplicating his poor 2009 season. However, he'll have a nice memento for the rest of his life, knowing he contributed significantly to the team as a backup and as a non-grousing member of the bench, something Kevin Frandsen could have been doing for the Giants in 2010 had he didn't feel the need to mouth off to the press.
The only way he stays longer-term is if the Giants were somehow able to trade away Aaron Rowand during spring training. I think they will showcase him and let him hit and if another team is convinced enough by that performance that he is healthy and ready to contribute, like the Phillies or White Sox, two former employers who believe in him, the Giants might be willing to pay $6-8M of his $12M salary per season to get rid of him. If the other team wants any more than that, then he's basically being paid like a bench player by the Giants, so why not keep him around in case we need him for some awful reason?
Spring training should expose who will win this final spot on the roster, as many will be fighting to stay with the Giants via that spot.
Question 6: Will the World's Champ Crown Still Fit?
Sometimes when a player does great in his first season, he gets a swelled head and think very highly of himself, too highly. When you have a team like the Giants, winning it all in their first shot at it in the playoffs, it could lead to some over confidence on the part of some of the players, and the Giants the way they are built need virtually all their players to perform to their expectations in order for them to make the playoffs, which should be the goal of any team for the season, because the playoffs is such a crapshoot in terms of winning it all, in any case.
So far, all the players are saying the right sports platitudes about not letting it get to their head, keeping it real, and helping to remind their fellow players of that fact. But it is one thing to say it to the media, another to do that in the field and around your teammates. Huff and Burrell together, plus Cain and Wilson on the pitching side, look ready to prick the balloon of anyone who dares to be complacent. They have a chip on their shoulders because many people, including Giants fans (but not this one) are saying that the Giants in 2010 was a fluke.
Spring training should expose those who slacked off in any way, and with so many movable parts, the Giants could easily bench or even trade those players who are not sticking to the program.
Question 1: Pablo or Panda?!?
Many people are saying the Giants are standing pat, going stagnant, but they are wrong. The Giants are betting on several players returning to their prior production, one of whom, in a big way, one of them being Pablo Sandoval.
Will he be the Pablo of 2010 or the Panda of 2009? Of course, nobody knows, but I think Panda will be back. I've gone over his personal problems before, so I won't go there again, but the thing I should have emphasized more before is that he's a classic bad ball hitter in the mode of Vlad Guerrero, Manny Sanguillen, and others like them, who instinctively can swing and connect with the ball. So his problems at the plate in 2010 was more mental and not physical. Most people without a knowledge of the history of the game just don't understand that, and those who do have a knowledge are ignoring it.
If he can harness that with Barry Bonds' tutelege, that would be great, but really, people should just be happy that he can do what he has shown he can do. People are going in the opposite way of the pendulum today, towards the sabermetric side, and just put him down for not taking walks. It don't matter he can't walk when you can hit like he showed he can in 2008, 2009, and April 2010. Hitting is ALWAYS more valuable than walking when he supplies the power that he does.
Of course, it would be great if he could take more walks, but WAIT, he actually wasn't that bad at it, the league average was 9.0% for BB% in 2009, and he had 8.2%, and the league average was 8.5% in 2010, and he had 7.6%, both within spitting distance of the league average. It is not like he was like Bengie Molina or Juan Pierre or anything like that. And his strikeout ratio was about the same as it was in 2009. And once he started hitting for homers in June, for the rest of the 2009 season, his BB% was 9.7%. I wouldn't be surprised if he beats the league average in 2011.
The main issue in 2010 was actually his BABIP. It was at or above .350 in his two prior seasons, was only .291 in 2010. As I noted, April 2010, he was basically the hitter he was before, and looking at the BABIP, it was, roughly, as his BABIP was .382. After that, he couldn't really get it over .300, for the most part.
Now, if it was because, as people posit, his poor plate discipline catching up with him or, as others say, his contact lens and vision problems, then why didn't his strikeouts skyrocket? It didn't, overall it was essentially the same as it was in 2009 (13.1% in 2009, 13.2% in 2010, an increase of roughly 0.25 strikeouts on a ratio basis, in other words, basically the same). For those theories to work, he should be striking out at a higher rate at minimum, and really, if these were correct, he should be striking out loads more, particularly for those who cite poor hitting approach: 13% strikeout rate is among the best in the majors, and he did that with his "poor plate discipline" or even his poor vision. If either or both were true, his strikeouts should have gone up a lot based on their theory.
In case it is not obvious, this is my opinion, you can call it psuedo-psychology if you wish, but I counter that is more poor analysis on the part of others. I'm happy to wait for the season to start and we'll see who is right and who is the psudo.
Question 2: Will Brandon Belt Belt?
One of the real no-brainer question of the spring. Some think he's a sure thing, but judging by how poorly he did in AAA (albeit small samples), he will probably need some time in AAA to prove himself after a 2010 season where he proved himself all through the minors plus the AFL, giving the lie to the Sabean Naysayers who say the Giants mishandle position prospects. The problem, as I've said before, is that the Giants position prospects haven't been that good.
But he could still break out and make the team with a great spring, and by that, it won't just be hitting well, many players have done great in spring only to fizzle in the regular season, Bowker being the latest example, Randy Elliott being a well known example to Giants fans of a certain age, but rather he will have to show the coaches that he knows what he is doing rather than just being lucky, as I think the Giants will err on the conservative with him.
So I can see the Giants sending him down while he's raking and the Sabean Naysayers will have a knipshin.
Whether or not the Giants are doing this because of control of the prospects, which is an understandable on the part of fans, people also need to remember that management needs to think long-term, we should want our team to get basically an extra year of control over the player. Let's put it this way, aren't you glad we got an extra year of enjoying Lincecum, Posey, and Bumgarner?
And to those who said it might have cost us in 2010, all I can say is: how did it cost us, the Giants are the World Champs.
Question 3: Who Will the Outfield Starters be?
To most, it would not seem to be that big a surprise: Burrell in LF, Torres in CF, Ross in RF. But this is a corrolary to Question 2, because the outfielders are not only competing with each other, they are competing with Brandon Belt, who if he makes the team, pushes Huff to the OF, leaving one less OF spot and then the musical chairs started.
However, Huff is now a year older on the wrong side of 30 and now has one bad season followed by one great season (albeit two great seasons out of the last three), and history is full of players who have one last great season, signs a contract, and is eatting dust the rest of the way (Robby Thompson is one Giants example).
Even if Belt does not make the team out of spring training, almost all the potential starters have question marks that need to be answered. First off, Torres is alwo a year older on the wrong side of 30 and haven't put together a full season of superior performance, though it is not totally his fault, he just figured out hitting before the 2009 season, and any team would make him prove himself (he did strike out an inordinate amount of time in 2009, which is not something you want to see out of your lead-off hitter). El Lefty Malo has made the point numerous times on his blog that his health is something we need to watch out for, given his age and body type (sprinter type something have lingering hamstring problems). I'm hopeful that his perseverance to improve as a hitter indicates the way he thinks, and he'll do all he can to avoid physical problems, unlike, say, Ray Durham or Aaron Rowand.
Ross is coming off a sub-par season, and it wasn't like he was consistently good previously, he only had two good full seasons previously. However, he was with a sinking team with a lousy owner. Once he was given the chance to start for the Giants in September, he hit like he did in 2008 and 2009, plus, of course, had his great playoff series. Still, he turns 30 and that is an age milestone warning sign, maybe he just got hot for a month, just at the right time for the Giants.
Burrell is also on the wrong side of 30 and the eldest among the probable starters (though just barely ahead of Huff). He's also a statue in the OF, though an above-average statue, as his defensive stats, per Baseball-Reference.com, says that he added a win with his defense, and according to the same stats, he was actually average in LF with Philly, contracting his image as a poor fielding and suggesting that perhaps defensive stats are still in need of tweaking, giving all the poor commentary on his fielding over the years. Either that or most LF are just that bad, that is where teams put their poor fielders just because of their bat, because, after all, these measures typically compare the player with other players playing the same position that season. Still, despite his great season for the Giants in 2010, most remember his poor 2009 and early 2010 with Tampa Bay and the scuttlebutt during the off-season was that Burrell wasn't going to be a starter. After seeing a guy hit like that in 2010, I find that hard to believe, but it is true that players his age is stumbling down their decline years, so we will see.
Then there is Aaron Rowand, Nate Schierholtz, and Mark DeRosa, the potential bench players. Rowand, as gamer as he was made out to be, got to be hurting psychologically. He probably won't get better until he leaves the Giants, but if he is as mentally tough as he was made out to be, Rowand, when he's going good, is actually a pretty good player: unfortunately, he can't sustain that good streak for very long before getting injured in a Giants uni, and his season is toast. Schierholtz is similar in that he would be world-beating for 2-4 weeks and look like the second coming, then he would hurt something and come back too soon, making his stats look bad overall. If either can stay healthy, Ross could have a hard time keeping his spot in the starting lineup and Burrell too.
DeRosa has been an excellent (+1 win) defensive player at four different positions (2B, 3B, LF, RF) and come up as a SS, so I think he probably would be passable in CF and 1B as well, and could start a game or three at SS - I would rather have him in there than Fontenot, just saying - so he's probably not making the starting OF, he's going to be rotating around those four positions and, if his batting stroke is back, probably get into 100-120 games with maybe 15-30 starts at each position, get some DH duty, plus a lot of defensive replacement duty, and be the first guy to start if anything happens to Sanchez at 2B or Sandoval at 3B. He's not going to get to start in the OF unless his surgery improves his hitting against RHP, which is the thing that has held him back offensively, though he's still OK against RHP, just not good.
So really, this is just another application of last year's risk mitgration practices that the Giants have been doing in recent years, where we can cobble together a performing starting lineup out of the people who are left standing after others have fallen, either physically or in performance.
Question 4: Playoff Starting Pitchers' Fatigue?
This is another obvious area for people to focus on, due to the large number of extra innings pitched by the starters, particularly for Lincecum and Bumgarner, and Sanchez because he basically hit the wall during the playoffs and wasn't that good in his last three starts. The Chronicle listed the grim stats as a part of their excellent series of daily articles about the Giants leading up to Spring Training (I wish they would provide one page to access all of the whole series):
- Lincecum: pitched 21.3 more innings than he ever did
- Cain: pitched more innings before the playoffs started, a total of 27 more innings than his high before.
- Sanchez: pitched more innings before the playoffs started, a total of 43.3 more innings than his high before (and as noted, it showed).
- Bumgarner: pitched 44.3 more innings than what he says he did in 2008 between Class A Augusta, their playoffs, and Arizona instructional league
I'm not that worried. Krukow's standard is jumping 25 more IP than the season before. Lincecum was under that and Cain was only 2 IP above that. FYI, they made much larger jumps in their first major league season and no bad effects showed up in the season afterward. Both of them should be as good in 2011, particularly Lincecum, who had some learning pains in 2010 plus learned a new pitch that now gives him an out pitch against any hitter. I would not be surprised by a sub-2.00 ERA season and approaching 300 strikeouts in the season.
Bumgarner, as I noted previously on another post, threw a whole lot more pitches between starts when he was in the minors. At roughly 20 IP over the 25 limit (and remember 2008 was an even larger jump for him from 2007 because of his turning pro) and assuming 15 pitches per IP (should be on high side for him), that is 300 extra pitches. With 24 starts in Augusta that season, all he had to do was roughly 15 extra pitches in-between starts to make up that difference, and remember, he was amazed that MLB starting pitchers threw so little in between starts and had said publicly that he would scale back his throwing because he suspected it was the cause of his poor velocity in late 2009. Plus, he was effortlessly throwing mid-90's in the World Series game and he felt fine when he started pitching again in January, he was not fatigued at all.
Sanchez is the biggest worry, but even then, I am cautiously optimistic. He has made an greater leap in IP before, when he became a starter in the majors in 2008. That did not affect him in future seasons, his ERA has dropped sharply two years in a row. He had deadarm in 2008, when he hit the wall he was pitching very well for a good dominant stretch and had an ERA just under 4.00 at that time, but he was great down the stretch in late 2009. He also has Scott Boras as his agent, and as much as I hate his tactics from a team perspective, he certainly seems to have it going for his clients and has a physical fitness center somewhere in Arizona that helps his clients train and be fit. He has a big investment in keeping Sanchez's performance at a high level in his last two season left with the Giants and will certainly make sure Sanchez gets the best medical advice on how to survive this jump in IP.
While the starters must and will be monitored by the Giants, I am not worried for the most part. Should one starter go down for a while, while Suppan or Runzler will not be an ideal long-term solution as the #5 starter, the Giants survived 2009 OK with very poor pitching from the #5 spot for much of the season, until Penny joined, and we now have a much better offensive team than we did back then. The key is surviving to the end is keeping four of our starters healthy and performing, not all five, a luxury we can do now that we have a better offensive lineup to trot out there.
Question 5: Who Will Win the Last Spot in the Pitching Staff?
The pitching staff is pretty much set, much to the joy of all Giants fans: Lincecum, Zito, Cain, Sanchez, Bumgarner as the starting pitchers, Wilson, Romo, Affeldt, Lopez, Ramirez, Casilla in the bullpen. That's 11 and the Giants normally carry 12 pitchers. Suppan, Runzler, and a bunch of players signed to minor league contracts will vie for that spot.
I'll bet that Runzler will end up in AAA Fresno to start recrafting himself as a starting pitcher. I believe that part of this exercise is to give Runzler more IP to work out his control problems, he just walks too many batters right now to be no more than a good reliever, but he would have closer ability with his strikeout rate if he could ever get that walk rate under 4.0, elite closer at under 3.0. And at just about the right time too, if he develops, as Wilson will be almost into his free agent years around that time.
I think Suppan will win that last spot, only Mota is the only real contender for that spot right now. If, that is, there is a spot.
Technically, there is no need for a long-reliever early in the season. Heck, technically no need for a 5th starter, but if IP is a concern with the pitching staff, you would help things by easing up on Bumgarner while piling on the other starters. So that spot could go to a position player, making this a trick question, a position player could win that last spot instead of Suppan.
Another reason this is the probably way to go is that there are so many potential OFs that the bench is full. Assuming that Belt does not make it as a starter to start the season and that the starters work out the way most of us think, that leaves Whiteside as the backup catcher, Ishikawa as the backup 1B, Fontenot as the backup middle infielder, Rowand and Schierholtz as backup OF, and DeRosa as backup corner positions. That is six bench players when there is only a five player bench when you carry 13 position players.
Given that Ishikawa is the most likely player to go once Belt makes the majors, I expect the Giants to showcase Ishikawa during spring training and work out some sort of trade. I've been thinking Seattle might want to give him a try since he grew up nearby and they could use a great defensive player since they rely on pitching with King Felix around. But any team that is re-building and looking for a starting 1B might be willing to give up some prospect that they have given up on but that the Giants like in exchange for Ishikawa.
I've liked Ishikawa for a while and think that he would be OK playing 1B offensively while shining defensively. He would be like a Rob Deer type, low-batting average, higher OBP because he can take some walks, higher SLG because he can hit the long-ball, but with the bonus that he is among the best fielders at 1B when starting regularly. I think he can stick around for a long while like Deer did in the AL.
Unfortunately for him, he did not seize the ring when given the chance in early 2009 and Huff returned to his regular hitting ways instead of duplicating his poor 2009 season. However, he'll have a nice memento for the rest of his life, knowing he contributed significantly to the team as a backup and as a non-grousing member of the bench, something Kevin Frandsen could have been doing for the Giants in 2010 had he didn't feel the need to mouth off to the press.
The only way he stays longer-term is if the Giants were somehow able to trade away Aaron Rowand during spring training. I think they will showcase him and let him hit and if another team is convinced enough by that performance that he is healthy and ready to contribute, like the Phillies or White Sox, two former employers who believe in him, the Giants might be willing to pay $6-8M of his $12M salary per season to get rid of him. If the other team wants any more than that, then he's basically being paid like a bench player by the Giants, so why not keep him around in case we need him for some awful reason?
Spring training should expose who will win this final spot on the roster, as many will be fighting to stay with the Giants via that spot.
Question 6: Will the World's Champ Crown Still Fit?
Sometimes when a player does great in his first season, he gets a swelled head and think very highly of himself, too highly. When you have a team like the Giants, winning it all in their first shot at it in the playoffs, it could lead to some over confidence on the part of some of the players, and the Giants the way they are built need virtually all their players to perform to their expectations in order for them to make the playoffs, which should be the goal of any team for the season, because the playoffs is such a crapshoot in terms of winning it all, in any case.
So far, all the players are saying the right sports platitudes about not letting it get to their head, keeping it real, and helping to remind their fellow players of that fact. But it is one thing to say it to the media, another to do that in the field and around your teammates. Huff and Burrell together, plus Cain and Wilson on the pitching side, look ready to prick the balloon of anyone who dares to be complacent. They have a chip on their shoulders because many people, including Giants fans (but not this one) are saying that the Giants in 2010 was a fluke.
Spring training should expose those who slacked off in any way, and with so many movable parts, the Giants could easily bench or even trade those players who are not sticking to the program.
Saturday, April 03, 2010
Your 2010 Giants: Big 6 Questions
This is my annual exercise on what the Giants big questions for the season are.
This is the critical question because he is the offensive linchpin to whatever offense the Giants will put up this season. I believe he is.
Even though he was not highly touted, he showed coming up the farm system that he had a great eye and the bat speed to make contact, as his strikeout rate was good. The big question was the lack of walks and his body. But he's much more athletic than he appears, as anyone who saw him score on either of those bang-bang plays at home plate in late 2008. And people forgot that he was young relative to any league he was in and inexperienced. He busted out in 2008 at age 21, and last year learned how to hit for HR power.
He continued to show his great ability to make good contact with the pitch in the majors that he showed in the minors (nobody has ever discussed this that I've seen, but I believe that his learning how to be ambidextrous, able to throw accurately with either arm, helped with his control of the bat), and that supports him continuing to do well.
In addition, I recently read that only three other hitters had a better batting average in their first full season in the past 40-50 years (don't remember period or where I read it but it was a long period). That's not really something you do by accident.
Plus, even if there is a drop off there, he started hitting for homers in June last season, meaning that there was two months of a low amount of homers, so as long as he hits for homers consistently in 2010, that should make up for any loss in batting average by boosting up his SLG.
Furthermore, he was making progress at the end of last season in terms of taking more walks. He also spoke with our new hitting coach, Bam Bam Meulens, about working to avoid pitches out of the strike zone because, even if he can hit that well for a hit, getting into a better pitch count could force the pitcher to throw a strike that he could hit even more authoritatively.
And along those lines, it was discovered over the off-season that he needed glasses. Now, he said in the interview about this, he can see the pitches clearly whereas before they were blurry. The ability of hitting the baseball improves with the ability to see the baseball. It was rumored that Ted Williams was far-sighted and that helped him recognize pitches earlier. Imagine that: Panda did as well as he did last year hampered by his vision but he is unimpaired this season.
Most projections have him regressing "to the mean". But the mean they are using are based on faulty data. First, it considers to some extent this stats before he figured out how to hit in the minors. Second, it includes stats before he figured out how to hit for homerun power. Third, he was hampered by his poor vision last season. I think he should not only match what he did, but he should be able to improve on it.
2. Can Lincecum Compete for a Third Straight Cy Young?
I say compete because there are so many factors into winning the award, but first he has to have the stats great enough to compete for it. I understand doubting it. Nobody had won a Cy Young in their first two seasons, so winning a third would be even more unprecedented. Plus, there is the article about Lincecum dealing with less top shelf velocity.
But in his last outing of the spring, Lincecum said that he's ready. His pitches were in the 93-95 MPH range. Baggarly quoted him, "Definitely. I felt like I had the right stuff.
The breaking balls, both of them, were good. Change-up was good. Fastballs feel like they're getting the life on it. I feel ready for the season."
The more important thing is that he is not experiencing any pain. The human body will eventually result in lessening functionality, and luckily, Lincecum has experience dealing with finding another edge against batters, due to all those doubts brought to his attention. That will help him find the way to do well and get in position to compete for another Cy Young.
And the Cy Young is not what is important, but rather that he performed well enough to be considered again. I think the Giants pitching rotation's performance will depend greatly on how well he does. Not that Zito and Sanchez don't have to take another step forward and duplicate their great late 2009 season surge for the whole 2010 season, or that Cain don't have to keep up his improvement from 2009 into 2010 (which will be hard because his FIP is much higher), but if Lincecum does have a poor season, I think that will be a domino fall that affects the other pitchers, pressuring them to do better.
3. Can Renteria Return to Prior Goodness?
Some may not consider this a key, and scoff, but since he is batting in the #2 position, he will need to do well there to set up the hitters in the middle for RBIs. And he was actually a plus hitter previously, with a good OPS period, and great for a SS.
The #2 hitter is key because an out here would result in: 1) no advancement of any base runners most times, 2) two outs facing the #3 hitter, wasting his AB's potential for scoring, and 3) even one out limits the potential, whether the first hitter got on or not. One study of lineup creation maximizing found that you would want your best hitter batting #2. If Renteria is hitting like he used to, one of better hitters would be batting there (only Sandoval beat that last season for the Giants).
This is also key because if he does poorly, then the Giants will have to play Uribe more at SS to get offense. And he's really not a good hitter, 2009 notwithstanding. Then SS would become a sinkhole offensively, another hole in the lineup, like it was in 2009.
Also, if Renteria is hitting, then we have good hitters 2, 3, 4, and 5, maybe 6 with Molina, creating a good mass of hitting ability to generate runs more regularly. Else, then we are looking at only 3, 4, and 5, realistically.
4. Can Jonathan Sanchez Be Consistently Good Over a Full Season?
This is important because one of the keys to last season's good standing was not just our top guys doing well, but our back of the rotation guys beating the asses off the other teams' rotations. Even though Lincecum and Cain pitched well in September and Zito actually kind of poorly, they had poor W/L records for the month while Zito won a lot of games. Penny too. That was because they pitched well enough to beat the back of rotation guys that the other teams threw at us.
Sanchez is our #4 starter this season, and as my PQS study showed, he can be very dominating a pitcher when he is on, as good as any front-line pitcher on any team. However, he's our #4 starter, so it could be lambs being brought out for slaughter pitting him against the lousy starters that other teams have in the back of their rotation.
My experience with fantasy baseball finds that most pitchers lineup to face their fellow rotation order buddies, as long as everyone is on a 5 man rotation. As our #4, he will get to face mainly #4's plus some #3 and #5, and a smattering of #1 or #2 performances when you have breakout performances. If he is pitching well all season long, he should be in the conversation for the Cy Young because he should be winning a lot of games, in the upper teens, which usually catches the eyes of the Cy Young voters. With 5 votes instead of 3 this season, he could be in the conversation with a strong season.
5. Can Rowand Return to Prior Performance Levels?
I was wrong with Rowand's possible performances the past two years, he has not hit anywhere near where I thought he might. He underperformed by a lot.
However, now that he's gotten himself into shape, he can help himself greatly, both offensively and defensively. He has been a hitting god this season. As we have seen the past two seasons, he can be totally on as a hitter, but once he tires or injures himself, then he's pretty bad. He reportedly has worked hard this offseason to improve his overall fitness and not have that second half lag that he had the past two seasons.
Meanwhile, reports are that with the weight loss, he is running more effortlessly in CF. That would improve his range a lot, meaning that he would get to a lot more balls in the OF, improving our OF defense overall, as he was a weak link last season. (Both DeRosa and Schierholtz have been plus OF defensively, by a large margin)
And we will need both types of improvement. His defense because we greatly rely on our pitching to beat other teams. His offense because he is going to be leading off for us again. His hot streak last season leading off helped the Giants go on a nice winning streak in the middle of the summer (that and Panda's HR emergence). Both at his prior goodness would be a great boon to our team, either at the reduced levels of the past two seasons, could sink us.
6. Can Huff Be Enuff at 1B and Cleanup?
It is all interlinked. If he is not good enough defensively, then it don't matter if he hits as well as he did before, they will have to play Ishikawa. If he is not good enough offensively, then they will have to play Ishikawa or worse be tempted to start Posey there. In any case, then Bochy could be tempted to bring back the Bengie Molina Clean-up Experience if Huff is out. That would not be good news for our offense, I think Molina did all he could there but he really hurt us there offensively due to his low OBP as well as his inability to run even averagely.
Giants Thoughts
I think the Giants will have enough good answers that they will be competitive in 2010. I think they can win 90+ wins, and with all the question marks facing our NL West competitors regarding key players in their plans (Manny and the Divorse, Street, Webb), we have as good a chance of winning the division as anybody else.
I expect both Posey and Bumgarner to come up in the early August timeframe. Posey will become our backup catcher and platoon at 1B with whoever is starting at 1B, Huff or Ishikawa, giving us a great bat off the bench and a potential DH if we get to the World Series. Bumgarner will be a reliever at minimum, starter if Wellemeyer isn't doing that well again (he didn't really do that well in 2008 either, his FIP was much higher).
I am hopeful that one or both of Bowker and Schierholtz will hit well enough to win a starting position in the outfield. I think Panda will take another leap forward this season and bring the Giants with him. I think the bullpen will make our starting rotation that might more airtight, and that will have a positive feedback loop into the starters relaxing more and pitching better. I think the defense will be enough to enable the pitching to be the best in the majors in 2010, topping what they did in 2009.
I think the Giants, once they get into the playoffs, are capable of getting to the World Series, and with Posey as a potential DH, would have a good chance of winning it, if they can survive the gauntlet that is the MLB playoffs, as it is structured against a better team winning a majority of the time. So the key will be having a pitching staff that is dominant in terms of PQS, which will result in more games for the Giants where there is a great pitching performance, giving their offense more chance to score and win a game.
In any case, I think that we will have a great season, one that we will long remember, for good or bad. I think we are on the cusp of a recurring playoff team that will do damage deep into the playoffs, and finally win that elusive World Series championship we all long for. This is just year One.
Go Giants!
1. Is Panda Real or Not?
This is the critical question because he is the offensive linchpin to whatever offense the Giants will put up this season. I believe he is.
Even though he was not highly touted, he showed coming up the farm system that he had a great eye and the bat speed to make contact, as his strikeout rate was good. The big question was the lack of walks and his body. But he's much more athletic than he appears, as anyone who saw him score on either of those bang-bang plays at home plate in late 2008. And people forgot that he was young relative to any league he was in and inexperienced. He busted out in 2008 at age 21, and last year learned how to hit for HR power.
He continued to show his great ability to make good contact with the pitch in the majors that he showed in the minors (nobody has ever discussed this that I've seen, but I believe that his learning how to be ambidextrous, able to throw accurately with either arm, helped with his control of the bat), and that supports him continuing to do well.
In addition, I recently read that only three other hitters had a better batting average in their first full season in the past 40-50 years (don't remember period or where I read it but it was a long period). That's not really something you do by accident.
Plus, even if there is a drop off there, he started hitting for homers in June last season, meaning that there was two months of a low amount of homers, so as long as he hits for homers consistently in 2010, that should make up for any loss in batting average by boosting up his SLG.
Furthermore, he was making progress at the end of last season in terms of taking more walks. He also spoke with our new hitting coach, Bam Bam Meulens, about working to avoid pitches out of the strike zone because, even if he can hit that well for a hit, getting into a better pitch count could force the pitcher to throw a strike that he could hit even more authoritatively.
And along those lines, it was discovered over the off-season that he needed glasses. Now, he said in the interview about this, he can see the pitches clearly whereas before they were blurry. The ability of hitting the baseball improves with the ability to see the baseball. It was rumored that Ted Williams was far-sighted and that helped him recognize pitches earlier. Imagine that: Panda did as well as he did last year hampered by his vision but he is unimpaired this season.
Most projections have him regressing "to the mean". But the mean they are using are based on faulty data. First, it considers to some extent this stats before he figured out how to hit in the minors. Second, it includes stats before he figured out how to hit for homerun power. Third, he was hampered by his poor vision last season. I think he should not only match what he did, but he should be able to improve on it.
2. Can Lincecum Compete for a Third Straight Cy Young?
I say compete because there are so many factors into winning the award, but first he has to have the stats great enough to compete for it. I understand doubting it. Nobody had won a Cy Young in their first two seasons, so winning a third would be even more unprecedented. Plus, there is the article about Lincecum dealing with less top shelf velocity.
But in his last outing of the spring, Lincecum said that he's ready. His pitches were in the 93-95 MPH range. Baggarly quoted him, "Definitely. I felt like I had the right stuff.
The breaking balls, both of them, were good. Change-up was good. Fastballs feel like they're getting the life on it. I feel ready for the season."
The more important thing is that he is not experiencing any pain. The human body will eventually result in lessening functionality, and luckily, Lincecum has experience dealing with finding another edge against batters, due to all those doubts brought to his attention. That will help him find the way to do well and get in position to compete for another Cy Young.
And the Cy Young is not what is important, but rather that he performed well enough to be considered again. I think the Giants pitching rotation's performance will depend greatly on how well he does. Not that Zito and Sanchez don't have to take another step forward and duplicate their great late 2009 season surge for the whole 2010 season, or that Cain don't have to keep up his improvement from 2009 into 2010 (which will be hard because his FIP is much higher), but if Lincecum does have a poor season, I think that will be a domino fall that affects the other pitchers, pressuring them to do better.
3. Can Renteria Return to Prior Goodness?
Some may not consider this a key, and scoff, but since he is batting in the #2 position, he will need to do well there to set up the hitters in the middle for RBIs. And he was actually a plus hitter previously, with a good OPS period, and great for a SS.
The #2 hitter is key because an out here would result in: 1) no advancement of any base runners most times, 2) two outs facing the #3 hitter, wasting his AB's potential for scoring, and 3) even one out limits the potential, whether the first hitter got on or not. One study of lineup creation maximizing found that you would want your best hitter batting #2. If Renteria is hitting like he used to, one of better hitters would be batting there (only Sandoval beat that last season for the Giants).
This is also key because if he does poorly, then the Giants will have to play Uribe more at SS to get offense. And he's really not a good hitter, 2009 notwithstanding. Then SS would become a sinkhole offensively, another hole in the lineup, like it was in 2009.
Also, if Renteria is hitting, then we have good hitters 2, 3, 4, and 5, maybe 6 with Molina, creating a good mass of hitting ability to generate runs more regularly. Else, then we are looking at only 3, 4, and 5, realistically.
4. Can Jonathan Sanchez Be Consistently Good Over a Full Season?
This is important because one of the keys to last season's good standing was not just our top guys doing well, but our back of the rotation guys beating the asses off the other teams' rotations. Even though Lincecum and Cain pitched well in September and Zito actually kind of poorly, they had poor W/L records for the month while Zito won a lot of games. Penny too. That was because they pitched well enough to beat the back of rotation guys that the other teams threw at us.
Sanchez is our #4 starter this season, and as my PQS study showed, he can be very dominating a pitcher when he is on, as good as any front-line pitcher on any team. However, he's our #4 starter, so it could be lambs being brought out for slaughter pitting him against the lousy starters that other teams have in the back of their rotation.
My experience with fantasy baseball finds that most pitchers lineup to face their fellow rotation order buddies, as long as everyone is on a 5 man rotation. As our #4, he will get to face mainly #4's plus some #3 and #5, and a smattering of #1 or #2 performances when you have breakout performances. If he is pitching well all season long, he should be in the conversation for the Cy Young because he should be winning a lot of games, in the upper teens, which usually catches the eyes of the Cy Young voters. With 5 votes instead of 3 this season, he could be in the conversation with a strong season.
5. Can Rowand Return to Prior Performance Levels?
I was wrong with Rowand's possible performances the past two years, he has not hit anywhere near where I thought he might. He underperformed by a lot.
However, now that he's gotten himself into shape, he can help himself greatly, both offensively and defensively. He has been a hitting god this season. As we have seen the past two seasons, he can be totally on as a hitter, but once he tires or injures himself, then he's pretty bad. He reportedly has worked hard this offseason to improve his overall fitness and not have that second half lag that he had the past two seasons.
Meanwhile, reports are that with the weight loss, he is running more effortlessly in CF. That would improve his range a lot, meaning that he would get to a lot more balls in the OF, improving our OF defense overall, as he was a weak link last season. (Both DeRosa and Schierholtz have been plus OF defensively, by a large margin)
And we will need both types of improvement. His defense because we greatly rely on our pitching to beat other teams. His offense because he is going to be leading off for us again. His hot streak last season leading off helped the Giants go on a nice winning streak in the middle of the summer (that and Panda's HR emergence). Both at his prior goodness would be a great boon to our team, either at the reduced levels of the past two seasons, could sink us.
6. Can Huff Be Enuff at 1B and Cleanup?
It is all interlinked. If he is not good enough defensively, then it don't matter if he hits as well as he did before, they will have to play Ishikawa. If he is not good enough offensively, then they will have to play Ishikawa or worse be tempted to start Posey there. In any case, then Bochy could be tempted to bring back the Bengie Molina Clean-up Experience if Huff is out. That would not be good news for our offense, I think Molina did all he could there but he really hurt us there offensively due to his low OBP as well as his inability to run even averagely.
Giants Thoughts
I think the Giants will have enough good answers that they will be competitive in 2010. I think they can win 90+ wins, and with all the question marks facing our NL West competitors regarding key players in their plans (Manny and the Divorse, Street, Webb), we have as good a chance of winning the division as anybody else.
I expect both Posey and Bumgarner to come up in the early August timeframe. Posey will become our backup catcher and platoon at 1B with whoever is starting at 1B, Huff or Ishikawa, giving us a great bat off the bench and a potential DH if we get to the World Series. Bumgarner will be a reliever at minimum, starter if Wellemeyer isn't doing that well again (he didn't really do that well in 2008 either, his FIP was much higher).
I am hopeful that one or both of Bowker and Schierholtz will hit well enough to win a starting position in the outfield. I think Panda will take another leap forward this season and bring the Giants with him. I think the bullpen will make our starting rotation that might more airtight, and that will have a positive feedback loop into the starters relaxing more and pitching better. I think the defense will be enough to enable the pitching to be the best in the majors in 2010, topping what they did in 2009.
I think the Giants, once they get into the playoffs, are capable of getting to the World Series, and with Posey as a potential DH, would have a good chance of winning it, if they can survive the gauntlet that is the MLB playoffs, as it is structured against a better team winning a majority of the time. So the key will be having a pitching staff that is dominant in terms of PQS, which will result in more games for the Giants where there is a great pitching performance, giving their offense more chance to score and win a game.
In any case, I think that we will have a great season, one that we will long remember, for good or bad. I think we are on the cusp of a recurring playoff team that will do damage deep into the playoffs, and finally win that elusive World Series championship we all long for. This is just year One.
Go Giants!
Your 2010 Giants: Big 6 Prospects
I am selecting, in honor of the Big 6 himself, Christy Mathewson, the top 6 prospects of the Giants farm system, in my estimation. I would rather focus on the ones who are most likely to do significant damage for us up at the major league level at some point in the future, with some plus factor for doing it sooner than later.
As far as methodology goes, I don't really care to predict the players most likely to contribute this particular season, as that usually include players who make a utility contribution; most teams do not get a significant contributor (like a new starter) from the minor leagues each season, let alone 6, 10, or 11 of them.
In years past, it would have been hard to fill out the list without people who don't really deserve to be on the list. There would usually be a number of them who was a huge question mark on what type of contribution they will make at the major league level ever. And that is not a knock on the Giants farm system in the past, per se, the general rule of thumb is that the farm system at any time has four players who will make a mark in the majors in their career, 2 starters, 2 utility/relievers, but the Giants were even having problems with even 2-3 who look like sure things at times.
But 2010 is different again, just like 2009, and we have a lot of players. We are starting to built up a lot of depth in the system and that will impact the majors over the next 2-4 seasons. The Giants were able to accomplish this because it had a lot of high picks in 2007 to boost this up, and made a number of astute selections in 2008, as if they had high picks, in selecting Gillaspie, Kieschnick, and Crawford, players who at some point were expected to fall in the first round, some early in the first. And 2009 had a number of excellent early picks in Wheeler, Joseph, Dominguez, and Stoffel.
This year, it was pretty clear who the top 3 were but like last season, there were a lot of prospects who could make one of the final three spots, and I will list them in an honorable mention section.
2010 Big 6 Giants Prospect
Here are the Big 6 I've selected for 2010:
As far as methodology goes, I don't really care to predict the players most likely to contribute this particular season, as that usually include players who make a utility contribution; most teams do not get a significant contributor (like a new starter) from the minor leagues each season, let alone 6, 10, or 11 of them.
In years past, it would have been hard to fill out the list without people who don't really deserve to be on the list. There would usually be a number of them who was a huge question mark on what type of contribution they will make at the major league level ever. And that is not a knock on the Giants farm system in the past, per se, the general rule of thumb is that the farm system at any time has four players who will make a mark in the majors in their career, 2 starters, 2 utility/relievers, but the Giants were even having problems with even 2-3 who look like sure things at times.
But 2010 is different again, just like 2009, and we have a lot of players. We are starting to built up a lot of depth in the system and that will impact the majors over the next 2-4 seasons. The Giants were able to accomplish this because it had a lot of high picks in 2007 to boost this up, and made a number of astute selections in 2008, as if they had high picks, in selecting Gillaspie, Kieschnick, and Crawford, players who at some point were expected to fall in the first round, some early in the first. And 2009 had a number of excellent early picks in Wheeler, Joseph, Dominguez, and Stoffel.
This year, it was pretty clear who the top 3 were but like last season, there were a lot of prospects who could make one of the final three spots, and I will list them in an honorable mention section.
2010 Big 6 Giants Prospect
Here are the Big 6 I've selected for 2010:
- Buster Posey: Just showed everything he was expected to be (unfortunately on the defensive side) plus more power than expected. He looks on track to be our catcher from 2011-2016 and hopefully with some more development, he will be ready to be one of our best hitters in our lineup, maybe hitting 3rd and Sandoval cleanup.
- Madison Bumgarner: Disappointing season only because his velocity went down. Still, despite that, he was still able to strike out major league hitters at a high rate for us in September. I think even if he don't recover his velocity, he can become an ace-quality starter for us. If he does get the velocity, Lincecum and him would pair off as one of the best righty-lefty combo the majors have seen in my lifetime, harking back to the D-gers Koufax-Drysdale combo.
- Zach Wheeler: Always hard to say with someone who has not thrown an officially recorded professional pitch yet, but all the reports I've seen on him plus rankings, make me comfortable in saying he's third. He's a high schooler who can already reach mid-90's easily and already shows three plus pitches at times: fastball, breaking ball, changeup. However, he'll be 20 YO for this season, as it appears he was held back a year and didn't graduate until he was 19. Still, he projects as a(nother!) front-line potential pitcher, and is more advanced than Bumgarner was coming out of high school.
- Tommy Joseph: Some had Neal here but as nicely as he did in San Jose last season, that doesn't translate to a great major leaguer, at least not yet. Joseph's bat is seen by some as good enough for 1B, which is a high threshold, so he is highly regarded, particularly for his power. Add to that, he's playing at premium position, catcher, which makes his hitting that much better. However, he, like Posey, is new to catching, so he probably has a lot to learn, though at least he has a great arm. In an ideal scenario, he works his way up the Giants minors, one level at a time, starting with Augusta this season, and by the time he's ready to play in the majors, maybe he and Posey can swap off catching duties while sharing 1B, or if Panda is there by then because of his size, Posey probably could start at almost any other position (3B?) while Joseph would catch most games with Posey as backup and Sandoval as third backup.
- Thomas Neal: Had a breakout year in San Jose after missing almost the whole 2007 season due to injury and only doing OK in 2008. He has some power and can take a walk, though he also strikes out too much still and don't have any speed, and thus range in the OF. A great year in Richmond AA this season would vault him into the Top 3, though that is partly because Posey and Bumgarner most probably will not be eligible for the list next season, Posey for sure, Bumgarner maybe.
- Rafael Rodriguez: Like last season, this was tough to chose, but I went with RafRod. He is a 5-tool guy with plus plus power potential and plus speed and defense, and he knows how to take a walk. One book thinks that he could become a CF, which is a premium position to have both hitting and power, especially plus power. That is a tough package to beat. He did OK in rookie league, hitting .299/.392/.362/.754, with the only negative being a tick too many strikeouts and no power, but given all the walks, I think as he catches up in age and experience to others, he should be able to reduce his strikeouts, and at 6' 5" already, his power will eventually come as he fills out. Like Villalona and Noonan before, he'll be a young buck in Augusta, only 17 officially for the season (turns 18 in July), so he might again strikeout a bit, but I think he will do better than Villalona and Noonan in that regard, I just wonder if any power will show up.
Honorable Mentions
I still want to note other names, plus maybe a comment or three, because we have so many players who could become something but have obstacles of some sort:
- Dan Runzler: Looks like he can be a good closer eventually, his main problem is giving up too many walks. Our bullpen should be golden with Wilson, Affeldt, Romo, and him.
- Nick Noonan: He is the dark horse I would recommend people keep an eye out for. His main knock has been his lack of plate discipline, his one big skill when he was drafted, but he apparently was just a tick behind the pitchers until the last two months of last season, when suddenly he went from striking out 20+ times a month to keeping his BB/K ratio over the 1.0 ratio you want to see from a good hitter and his K-rate comfortably under 10%. That plus using his speed to get more stolen bases, and he should be ready to take over 2B when Sanchez's contract is over.
- Ehire Adrianza: He's already considered good enough to field SS in the majors, the main question is his bat. With no power, his ticket will be getting on base and stealing a lot of bases. He hasn't shown the SB-ability yet, but he has been good at taking walks and not striking out a lot, just a tick more than we would like to see, but he was 19 facing mostly 21-23 YO in Augusta last season. Giving his advanced understanding of the strike zone, he should continue to rise as he catches up with the pitches physically and experientially. These three could have been 6th (if not higher) easily almost any other year.
- Roger Kieschnick: Great first pro season, but he just strikes out so much that I'm worried that will be his downfall in higher levels. If he solves that, he'll be a five-tool guy who could hit in the middle of the lineup for us. Even if he doesn't, if he can continue to hit like that at every level, he'll be a great 5th or 6th hitter for us.
- Brandon Crawford: He's also considered good enough to field SS in the majors, and the Giants came out and called him the SS of the future. He was en fuego in San Jose last year but totally lost in AA after his promotion. He'll probably be there this year, and perhaps playing in a better park in Richmond will help him do better, Connecticut's Dodd Stadium could screw with a player's head, particularly one where power is a strong part of his offensive game. Still, strikes out way too much, something he must solve to make the majors.
- Waldis Joaquin: Until his TJS, he was rated a potential #2 starter, but now he's probably a setup/closer. With mid-90's heat, he definitely got the chops to be closer-worthy at some point. He walks a little too much, but strikes out a heck of a lot. He will be in the bullpen equation the next few years. He had a great spring and is battling for the final relief spot.
- Henry Sosa: He's also battling for the final relief spot with his great spring. He was a top rated prospect a couple of years ago, but injuries have held back his progress and potential. Still, he throws mid-90's heat, and did not walk that many batters the last two seasons, a good sign. A bad sign was his greatly reduced K/9 in 2009, perhaps the only thing to keep him from the majors.
- Jason Stoffel: Our steal in the 2009 draft, he did not disappoint last season, with a great fastball. A college closer, I'm not sure that he'll be able to do that in the majors, but he doesn't walk much while striking out a lot, which is good no matter what in the bullpen, and he should rise fast.
- Darren Ford: Never thought I would write about him here, because last season was his third in just Advanced A, and he's done poorly but he had a great second half of 2009 and a great spring with us. Defensively ready (an oft-repeated characterization for Giants prospects) for MLB CF, he has plus plus speed that he can utilize for SB when he is able to get on base. As he is already 24, he will have to continue hitting like that in AA Richmond Flying Squirrels to keep it going - unlikely because even while hitting well, his strikeout rate was still very high and his BABIP was very high too, though I would note that he used to have high BABIP early in his career too, it only got low in Advanced A the prior two seasons. Still a very high BABIP though, so he'll probably falter somewhere up the ladder, but if he can solve it like he did last season, he could be ready soon.
- Angel Villalona: His murder trial is now at least scheduled to be reviewed by a judge this month. His potential is still there and he's only 20 YO, so this could just be a very horrific bump in the road. It will never be known by outsiders what exactly happened, so as long as he is found not guilty or the trial is dropped, he should be able to continue his career in the U.S., though hopefully he will move his family to Californy, though not to Beverly Hills, hopefully some place like San Jose, CA, since that is probably where he should go back to if he returns back to professional baseball. Unless there is something stronger than a "he said, she said" situation - and there has been no news about finding the weapon or any connection between Angel and the weapon, other than they both were at the bar - he should be released by the judge for insufficient evidence or the trial would be relatively quick.
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
Your 2009 Giants: Big 6 Prospects
I am selecting, in honor of the Big 6 himself, Christy Mathewson, the top 6 prospects of the Giants farm system, in my estimation. I would rather focus on the ones who are most likely to do significant damage for us up at the major league level at some point in the future, with some plus factor for doing it sooner than later.
I normally don't do this that early, I usually do this in spring, but there is a poll going on at MCC and I had most of this written already, was basically stuck on the last pick, as I'll get into below, so I thought may as well do it now.
As far as methodology goes, I don't really care to predict the players most likely to contribute this particular season, as that usually include players who make a utility contribution; most teams do not get a significant contributor (like a new starter) from the minor leagues each season, let alone 6, 10, or 11 of them.
But 2009 is different, we have a lot of players. And that's true even though players like Schierholtz, Sandoval, Burriss, and Velez are no longer eligible, even though none are currently starters (though Sandoval and Burriss are slotted for spots, much like Wilson was slotted for the closer spot for 2007 and did poorly enough to get sent back to the minors, let alone make the bullpen).
That is quite a long list of prospects, we are starting to built up a lot of depth in the system and that will impact the majors over the next 2-4 seasons. The Giants were able to accomplish this because it had a lot of high picks in 2007 to boost this up, and made a number of astute selections in 2008, as if they had high picks, in selecting Gillaspie, Kieschnick, and Crawford, players who at some point were expected to fall in the first round, some early in the first.
Here are the players I think would normally be all deserving of making the list this season if it were almost any previous season:
- Ehire Adrianza
- Tim Alderson
- Madison Bumgarner
- Brandon Crawford
- Wendell Fairley
- Conor Gillaspie
- Travis Ishikawa
- Julio Izturis
- Roger Kieschnick
- Joe Martinez
- Nick Noonan
- Kevin Pucetas
- Buster Posey
- Rafael Rodriguez
- Ryan Rohlinger
- Sergio Romo
- Hector Sanchez
- Henry Sosa
- Angel Villalona
However, it is pretty clear for the most part who the top players are, while there are a number of players who are borderline for the list, which made the selection for the final spot difficult to come to a decision on.
2009 Big 6 Giants Prospect
Those are the 6 top prospects, in my opinion, for the Giants in 2009.
2009 Big 6 Giants Prospect
Here are the Big 6 I've selected for 2009:
- Madison Bumgarner: On top of how stellar he did in 2009, he suffered through 3 horrible starts before returning to his old mechanics and generating a 0.90 ERA the rest of the season. He led the league in wins, ERA, and strikeouts. All at age 18, in a league where players average 22 years of age. I don't see how they don't jump him up two levels to AA and pair him up with Alderson there in Connecticut. As far as I'm concerned, he's ready for the majors but it won't hurt him much to have another professional season under his belt plus push the start of his career more into when the Giants have rebuilt than while still rebuilding. For comparision, Jonathan Sanchez when he did so great in Augusta in 2005 when he was 22 years old, rose quickly to the majors in 2006, as he dominated in brief stints in AA and AAA before making the majors for good. And his stats there was not quite as good as Bumgarner except for strikeouts, Bumgarner was better or equal by most measures:
Sanchez pitched 125.2 IP with 122 hits, 39 walks and 166 strikeouts in A-ball at age 22 and was brought up to the majors the next season because he was so dominating.
Bumgarner pitched 141.2 IP with 111 hits, 21 walks and 164 strikeouts in A-ball at age 18. Better H/9, BB/9, K/BB, WHIP, and ERA, plus had a lot less experience. He’s basically ready for the majors in comparison to what Sanchez did in a similar league and level. - Buster Posey: Buster would probably grab the first spot for almost any team in the majors, I think he is that good. But Bumgarner was too dominating, much like how Lincecum was dominating when he was briefly in the minors, while Posey is still raw in terms of catching defense, that I had to make him first. But Buster is definitely a close second, or 1B to Bumgarner's 1A.
He did a lot to earn such a high ranking. Winning the Golden Spike award (third in Giants history after Will Clark and Tim Lincecum; nice company indeed), among other awards established that the experts think a lot of him. In limited play so far, he has not disappointed, hitting everywhere he has played professionally so far, fulfilling the high expectations that he is going to be an excellent hitter in the professional ranks. The experts say that he won't have the power he showed in college but should hit 15-20 per year, which is good for a catcher. And while he's a catcher now, he was formerly a shortstop and thus could be like a Craig Biggio, capable of playing multiple up-the-middle positions. He would be a plus hitter at any up-the-middle position (but not a corner position, though).
He should be assigned to AA because he did well when he was playing in the Hawaiian Winter League, which Bobby Evans compared to AA level talent, plus he is comparable to Matt Wieters who probably should have been in AA to start this past season. In addition, the promotion of former catcher Steve Decker as the manager of Connecticut cinches that too, as Pablo Sandoval got his help in San Jose, and he should be coaching Posey full-time on learning the nuances of the catching position.
Like most Giants prospects, Posey will probably stay in Connecticut all season, as the Giants seem to like to keep their prospects in one spot in their first full season (unless absolutely forced, in the case of Lincecum) plus he seems to need a lot more experience behind the plate, including calling games, and learning the position. Also, he would get to know and handle two pitchers who he'll see a lot of in the future, Bumgarner and Alderson. - Angel Villalona: Here he is, living away from home for the first time for an extended period, living in a land where he cannot communicate very well with the people around the area, only 17 years old for the season (turning 18 late in the season), which is a year younger than any other player in the league, and still hitting above the league average OPS and knocking out 17 homers, good for a tie for 12th in the league overall, plus he got better as the season went on, finally hitting .308/.362/.529/.892 with 5 HR in 104 AB (21 AB/HR; about a 30 HR per year pace) in the last month of the season, and learning a new defensive position at 1B while still taking balls at 3B during practice. The experts talk has been that he has 30-40 HR potential, so he seems to be fulfilling that at the end of the season.
Yet, while he was #1 last season in most rankings, he has "fallen" to #3 this season. But that is a function of the other players earning their higher rankings than reflecting poorly on Villalona. While he did disappoint early on, one can credit the newness of the situation for him, both locationally and positionally (playing 1B for first time), and he quickly found his bearing and started doing better. Still, while he did really well for a 17 year old playing against 22 year olds on average, it wasn't like he was dominating them either, at least not until the end of the season (which could have been a function of the better pitchers getting promoted as well) and certainly nothing like what Bumgarner and Posey did.
He will probably be promoted to Advanced A San Jose and it sounds like they will play him at 1B again. I was hoping that they at least split his time playing 1B and 3B, because supposedly he's capable of playing both right now, so that he can keep up his skills in game time situations. The good news is that he was already considered a plus defender at 3B prior to the season and perhaps the Giants are hoping to have him learn to be equally good defensively at 1B, so that he could play either position with plus defense, depending on need, once he reached the majors.
- Tim Alderson: Only 19 years old, one of the youngest pitchers in the California League, where the average age of a player is 23 years of age, he had the 4th most strikeouts and the best ERA of any pitcher with over 16 starts or over 100 IP. Normally that would probably rank him higher than 4th, but Bumgarner outdid him, Posey had an incredible season in college, and Villalona could be a monster in the majors and showed a strong hint of that at age 17.
The caveat on Alderson is that his season was mostly driven by his success at home: 100.0 IP with a FIP of 2.79, .218 AVG, 0.94 WHIP, 1.35 BB/9, 8.55 K/9, and 0.18 HR/9 versus on the road: 49.0 IP with a FIP of 4.49, .266 AVG, 1.33 WHIP, 3.49 BB/9, 5.33 K/9, 0.37 HR/9. Research has shown that San Jose's Municipal Stadium has one of the worse outlier for stadiums in terms of strikeouts in all of the minor leagues, which hitters like John Bowker attested to the poor background for hitters there. This puts him behind Villalona, I believe.
Still, he had a marvelous season, nonetheless, and will be promoted from San Jose most probably to Connecticut as I don't see the Giants feeling the need to move him up faster since he'll be only 20 for next season plus they need to overlap his prime years with our current players already up in the majors, so that he'll be ready to take over should we need to move or lose anybody, plus have his career start once we are competitors again which would extend the years we can be contenders; this same logic goes for Bumgarner as well, except that he's obviously ready for AA.
Both will probably just move up one level at a time going forward unless either one pitches like Bumgarner did in 2008 at a higher level. If either of them is that ready, I think the Giants would make the move and trade somebody already in the rotation to bolster the lineup, most likely Sanchez. - Rafael Rodriguez: Just one phrase says it all, "5 Tools." Well, that and $2.55M, the largest bonus ever given a Latin American hitter. He has raw power coming out of his 6' 5", 198 pound 16 year old body. Above average speed combined with an above average arm makes him the right future right-fielder for AT&T. Comparisions with Vladimir Guererro and Andres Galarraga have been offered.
However, the Achilles Heal for this Adonis is that while he has a lot going for him, the one thing suspect with him is that some scouts are not sold on his hitting mechanics and his overall feel for hitting. That could be the weak link in an otherwise stellar package for a position player. Still, obviously, the Giants scouts think otherwise and hence the big bonus, even bigger than for Villalona and as noted, the largest given a Latin American position player ever. Five Tools, big bonus, good comparisions, these all put him as the fifth Top prospect for the 2009 Giants. - Travis Ishikawa: This was truly the hardest one to pick for me. A lot of players appeared worthy of this spot for one reason or another. But Ishikawa had a monster year in 2008, an overall MLE season of .252/.331/.458/.789 with 18 HR in 421 AB (23 AB/HR) and 49 BB/88 K, which is pretty good for him. It was even better in actual production: .299/.377/.578/.955 with 24 HR in 405 AB (17 AB/HR) and 49 BB/81 K. Plus, he is known for his defense. However, he still had a weakness against LHP, hitting only .206/.333/.308/.641 in 107 AB with only 2 HR vs. .332/.394/.674/1.068 in 298 AB with 22 HR (it looks even worse in MLE).
Still it was a monster year where he struggled greatly in April, but busted out in May and had close to a 1.000 OPS in the minors after April, with 23 HR in 321 AB (14 AB/HR). In addition, once he made the majors, he hit a nice .274/.337/.432/.769 with 3 HR in 95 AB (32 AB/HR or roughly a 20 HR season) and 100 OPS+.
As noted, I had a hard time choosing this spot. Ishikawa has had huge ups and downs during his minor league career and still strikes out too much for my tastes. However, nobody in the minors had a better year out of the remaining prospects I was comparing him against. His MLE alone was better than what most of the other position prospects did without adjustment downward to MLE in the minors.
Among pitchers, while a lot of pitchers did well, none of them were really considered that good a prospect, which for me meant that they really need to show that they have the ability to do well at least in AAA. The best rated pitcher NOT above Ishikawa is Henry Sosa and he had a so-so season in only Advanced A. Clayton Tanner is also up there but only did OK in Advanced A. Waldis Joaquin similarly. Nick Pereira got up to AAA but didn't do that well there. Joe Martinez did well in AA, but he couldn't even beat 7.0 K/9 there and didn't make the Baseball America Top 30 last season.
So Ishikawa not only outdid the rest of the prospects but has the potential to be a 25-30 HR hitter at 1B with great defense and OK to good OBP. He's horrible against LHP but JT Snow had a long career with a similar offensive contribution plus Ishikawa profiles better as a power hitter, which I think is necessary for a left-hander to hit homers at AT&T. Plus he made great progress in reducing his strikeouts in 2008, previously he would strike out about a third of the time (<>
Sunday, March 30, 2008
Your 2008 Giants: Big 6 Questions
Named in honor of Big 6, Giants Hall of Famer Christy Mathewson, I will posit on what I see as the Big 6 questions that the Giants face this season. I will give my thoughts on the possible answers.
1) How Many Losses?
As I've outlined in previous posts, I think the Giants are capable of besting last year's 71 win total, even without Bonds and Feliz, and perhaps even reach the .500 mark, or 81 wins. I think they will be closer to 81 than they will be to 71. I'll give further detail in my upcoming post on my thoughts on the 2008 season.
But I will say that it looks like the theory that Sabean has been espousing in recent years, that the league will switch from power to speed, much like the 80's and the Cards, will be put into practice, as speedsters like Davis, Velez and Lewis are added to the Giants roster, with Bocock, Burriss, Richardson, and others moving up the system as well. If they can execute this well, then their offense will be better than expected (and not much is expected), and will contribute to getting their record closer to .500 than last year's record.
2) Which Young Position Players Will Shine, Which Will Fail?
Obviously, I cannot answer this question at this time but can give some thoughts. I think Dan Ortmeier can hit well enough to hold the position until one of our better prospects come up and take it over, most probably Angel Villalona by 2009-11, but it could be another prospects, as I'll go into later. Kevin Frandsen might have lost his best chance to get to start in the majors, as Eugenio Velez looks to take 2B this season at some point, but either appear to be keeping the position warm for when Nick Noonan is ready, 2010-11 time period.
The Giants could keep 3B waiting for Frandsen for 2009, but while I like his bat, I don't think it's one that is suited for 3B unless we can get power (or speed) from other positions. But there is no one in the minors who look ready to take 3B, so that works to Frandsen's advantage. My only speculation there would be perhaps the Giants might move Travis Denker there, as he has shown some power in the minors (but not real 3B power, just more than Frandsen). Velez will get a chance to be the Giants "Figgins" until he finds a position he can stick at.
In the outfield, I think Nate Schierholtz will take RF at some point, and it looks likely to me that John Bowker will eventually win LF, but unless trades happen neither will do it this season. Fred Lewis' defense appears to be pretty bad, and his offense is not good enough to counter that. As athletic as he is, he might be best suited for the DH role in the AL, utility OF role in the NL. Rajai Davis can't hit righties but mashes lefties; Dave Roberts can't hit lefties but mashes righties. Both run like the wind and are similar leadoff hitters. A better match for platoon buddies does not exist.
I think Winn will be traded by mid-season once Schierholtz shows that he can duplicate his hitting for average and power again to start the 2008 season in AAA. Winn might go earlier if the Giants are serious about letting Lewis start more, but they admit that Lewis doesn't hit lefties that well.
3) Will the Pitching Rotation Be As Good As Advertised?
I think they will be better than projections currently show, and they are pretty good already. I guess the corollary question is then, will they be healthy? And by they, I mean Cain and Lincecum. Right now, it looks good, but you can never really know. Lincecum has developed a new slider that appears to be working quite fine, thank you. So the top of our rotation looks pretty good right now and should be quite an effective 1-2 punch eventually; they will be manning the #2 and #3 spots this season, which is good, less pressure on them, particularly Lincecum, to do well.
I think Zito can do as well as he was doing in the last 1-2 months of the season, plus he added some tweaks this spring training by changing his pitching motion. He should be in the high 3's ERA range. Lowry I think will do as well as he has been doing for most of the past two seasons (around 4.00 ERA) once he returns from the DL in early May/late April and become the best #4 starter in the majors. And between Sanchez and Correia, I think at least one will do well enough and that would be good enough for the #5 starter.
4) Will Brian Wilson Sing At Closer?
I think he is finally ready. He needed his butt kicked last season and responded well to being sent down. He was superb at the end of the season pitching for us as the closer. He will greatly improve the 2007 bullpen all by himself.
5) Which Vets Will We Eventually Trade?
I think the fire sale rumor was true, as it was reported from two different media sources citing their own sources. So I think that eventually all the ones named will be traded - Aurilia, Durham, Winn, perhaps even Roberts, opening spots for young prospects to take over. I think some of the young bullpen might be traded as well, as add-ons, to get a better position player.
In a recent interview, Sabean noted that he wants a lefty to break up Molina/Rowand/Durham, but if they trade away Randy Winn and insert Nate Schierholtz there, Nate can be that lefty bat. In fact, if Schierholtz can hit like he has, we could put Molina lower in the lineup and bat Rowand or Durham in the #4 and #6 spots, with Schierholtz #5.
6) Who Will the Giants Pick With their #5 Pick Overall?
The Giants need an impact bat. Most experts I've seen think that such a bat exists for us at the #5 overall. Unfortunately, most of them are 1B, which is where the Giants are trying to move Villalona to this season. Most mock drafts have the Giants picking Justin Smoak, college 1B. There were some speculation that they might go for pitching again, but in a recent interview on KNBR, Sabean admitted that they may have overdone the pitching drafting thing, and thus would put more emphasis on position players. There is also a current 3B in Pedro Alvarez, but he's expected to go #1 and some think he's eventually moving to 1B.
The Giants also have a high supplemental first draft pick because of the Phillies signing Feliz, and a number of good hitters fell there in 2007, such as Nick Noonan. But each year is different in terms of talent pool, so you can't rely on that fact, you can only note that 2007 was good. And Noonan is no sure thing to reach the majors and do well.
1) How Many Losses?
As I've outlined in previous posts, I think the Giants are capable of besting last year's 71 win total, even without Bonds and Feliz, and perhaps even reach the .500 mark, or 81 wins. I think they will be closer to 81 than they will be to 71. I'll give further detail in my upcoming post on my thoughts on the 2008 season.
But I will say that it looks like the theory that Sabean has been espousing in recent years, that the league will switch from power to speed, much like the 80's and the Cards, will be put into practice, as speedsters like Davis, Velez and Lewis are added to the Giants roster, with Bocock, Burriss, Richardson, and others moving up the system as well. If they can execute this well, then their offense will be better than expected (and not much is expected), and will contribute to getting their record closer to .500 than last year's record.
2) Which Young Position Players Will Shine, Which Will Fail?
Obviously, I cannot answer this question at this time but can give some thoughts. I think Dan Ortmeier can hit well enough to hold the position until one of our better prospects come up and take it over, most probably Angel Villalona by 2009-11, but it could be another prospects, as I'll go into later. Kevin Frandsen might have lost his best chance to get to start in the majors, as Eugenio Velez looks to take 2B this season at some point, but either appear to be keeping the position warm for when Nick Noonan is ready, 2010-11 time period.
The Giants could keep 3B waiting for Frandsen for 2009, but while I like his bat, I don't think it's one that is suited for 3B unless we can get power (or speed) from other positions. But there is no one in the minors who look ready to take 3B, so that works to Frandsen's advantage. My only speculation there would be perhaps the Giants might move Travis Denker there, as he has shown some power in the minors (but not real 3B power, just more than Frandsen). Velez will get a chance to be the Giants "Figgins" until he finds a position he can stick at.
In the outfield, I think Nate Schierholtz will take RF at some point, and it looks likely to me that John Bowker will eventually win LF, but unless trades happen neither will do it this season. Fred Lewis' defense appears to be pretty bad, and his offense is not good enough to counter that. As athletic as he is, he might be best suited for the DH role in the AL, utility OF role in the NL. Rajai Davis can't hit righties but mashes lefties; Dave Roberts can't hit lefties but mashes righties. Both run like the wind and are similar leadoff hitters. A better match for platoon buddies does not exist.
I think Winn will be traded by mid-season once Schierholtz shows that he can duplicate his hitting for average and power again to start the 2008 season in AAA. Winn might go earlier if the Giants are serious about letting Lewis start more, but they admit that Lewis doesn't hit lefties that well.
3) Will the Pitching Rotation Be As Good As Advertised?
I think they will be better than projections currently show, and they are pretty good already. I guess the corollary question is then, will they be healthy? And by they, I mean Cain and Lincecum. Right now, it looks good, but you can never really know. Lincecum has developed a new slider that appears to be working quite fine, thank you. So the top of our rotation looks pretty good right now and should be quite an effective 1-2 punch eventually; they will be manning the #2 and #3 spots this season, which is good, less pressure on them, particularly Lincecum, to do well.
I think Zito can do as well as he was doing in the last 1-2 months of the season, plus he added some tweaks this spring training by changing his pitching motion. He should be in the high 3's ERA range. Lowry I think will do as well as he has been doing for most of the past two seasons (around 4.00 ERA) once he returns from the DL in early May/late April and become the best #4 starter in the majors. And between Sanchez and Correia, I think at least one will do well enough and that would be good enough for the #5 starter.
4) Will Brian Wilson Sing At Closer?
I think he is finally ready. He needed his butt kicked last season and responded well to being sent down. He was superb at the end of the season pitching for us as the closer. He will greatly improve the 2007 bullpen all by himself.
5) Which Vets Will We Eventually Trade?
I think the fire sale rumor was true, as it was reported from two different media sources citing their own sources. So I think that eventually all the ones named will be traded - Aurilia, Durham, Winn, perhaps even Roberts, opening spots for young prospects to take over. I think some of the young bullpen might be traded as well, as add-ons, to get a better position player.
In a recent interview, Sabean noted that he wants a lefty to break up Molina/Rowand/Durham, but if they trade away Randy Winn and insert Nate Schierholtz there, Nate can be that lefty bat. In fact, if Schierholtz can hit like he has, we could put Molina lower in the lineup and bat Rowand or Durham in the #4 and #6 spots, with Schierholtz #5.
6) Who Will the Giants Pick With their #5 Pick Overall?
The Giants need an impact bat. Most experts I've seen think that such a bat exists for us at the #5 overall. Unfortunately, most of them are 1B, which is where the Giants are trying to move Villalona to this season. Most mock drafts have the Giants picking Justin Smoak, college 1B. There were some speculation that they might go for pitching again, but in a recent interview on KNBR, Sabean admitted that they may have overdone the pitching drafting thing, and thus would put more emphasis on position players. There is also a current 3B in Pedro Alvarez, but he's expected to go #1 and some think he's eventually moving to 1B.
The Giants also have a high supplemental first draft pick because of the Phillies signing Feliz, and a number of good hitters fell there in 2007, such as Nick Noonan. But each year is different in terms of talent pool, so you can't rely on that fact, you can only note that 2007 was good. And Noonan is no sure thing to reach the majors and do well.
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