John Sickels' Top 20 Phillies Prospects at Minor League Ball
Not much to quibble with here... and we're certainly far from the "OMG THE FARM SYSTEM IS BARREN!" hysteria that a lot of people are stirring up.
over 1 year ago
WholeCamels
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carrying on Cormican's point from the other thread
Sickels is pretty high on Biddle, but I don’t think he’s too high. Biddle showed a lot in short-season and 6’5" lefties are pretty remarkable.
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I’m with you here, even with the general placement of Gillies, but it seems to be a difference in philosophy between us and Sickels as opposed to poor grading. If I was to guess, I think Sickels is looking to Gillies’ lost year as a pretty significant hurdle for him, especially given the ambiguous makeup issues in terms of the cocaine puff-up. I’m of the mindset that, while it’s unfortunate that Gillies is a year older without the added experience, that the “lost” year is just more of a break than anything.
That said, my more pessimistic side wants to believe Sickels, since he’s obviously more knowledgeable than I am, but I still think Gillies’ ability/promise ought to get the benefit of the doubt for now.
I’m too lazy to look it up right now, but I vaguely recall that Sickels gave Gillies a relatively low grade last year as well. If so, he’s being consistent at least, and not necessarily putting too much emphasis on the drug thing or the injuries.
He had Gillies #8 last year:
Tyson Gillies, OF, Grade C+: Draws walks, steals bases with outstanding speed, good glove, fun to watch. Most of his power came at High Desert; Double-A production could raise him to a B- or even a B. Could rank as high as fifth if you want to value his polish over pure upside of Gose, Valle, and Santana.
Honor is no substitute for victory.
So Rizzotti’s fielding is that bad? Is he that slow to keep him from playing LF or RF field? If he is blocked as Sickel’s says he is worth packaging in a trade with KK for a RH bat?
.990 FLD% at 1B across all levels, has 2 SB and 3 CS in his minor league career, and 6 triples in 1,595 PAs, all at the A+ level or lower. He’s got good plate discipline and slightly above average power, but is a “true” 1B or DH (he doesn’t have the foot speed to play outfield), and just isn’t quite enough offensively to be either of those positions at the MLB level. I’d put him at bench bat/AAA insurance player.
Honor is no substitute for victory.
Man, a lot of those comments are a hoot. Suffice it to say that a significant proportion of the commenters seem to be very certain of things that they have no factual basis for being certain about. Not necessarily because they aren’t knowledgeable people (although I do question how much some of these guys actually know about second- and third-tier prospects on a team they don’t follow, beyond what they read on thebaseballcube five minutes before posting), but because evaluating prospects is inherently speculative.
I realize that baseball blog commenters talking out of their asses is not a rare phenomenon on the internet, but what seems to set prospect blogs apart is that this happens even on the smart blogs. In fact, it seems to be the entire point of the exercise.
Permit Me A Tangent
I find people like this with my younger brother. He doesn’t know who someone like Mike Trout is, but goddamn if he’s all about calling Dom Brown a huge bust right now (actual conversation I just had a few minutes ago). It seems prospect watching is seriously undervalued among bloggers as few people actually put the effort into it, and everyone seems to know everything based off a random aside in an article they read 8 months ago.
"I remember being three and I wanted to be a baseball player, that's all I ever really wanted to be. That and Spider Man." -Raul Ibanez
by Jose and the Contrarians on Jan 2, 2011 8:43 PM EST up reply actions
You see a lot of comments there along the lines of “I saw him play in person once…” I like Sickels and some guys know their teams well (Dougdirt has a really good feel for the Reds system, for example), but most of it is schmucks like me who only know enough to occasionally sound like idiots when talking about other teams prospects.
Like any place, it depends on the commenter over there. A lot are pretty knowledgeable, even about the second-tier prospects in other systems, but plenty talk right out their ass. Personally, I think the key in amateur prospecting is to understand what you’re basing your opinions on, and not take too extreme a position unless you have a solid basis for that opinion.
I found this list pretty encouraging. My memory of Sickels’ past reviews of the Phils system (refreshed by a look at his list from a year ago) was that he liked one guy, thought about a half dozen more were okay, and dismissed everyone else. That he sees a solid half-dozen of our prospects as really promising is nice to read.
FWIW, I still have Gillies in the top ten. At the end of March last year some liked him better than Brown. The guy knows the strike zone, is fast as hell and is strong enough that pitchers can’t just try to blow it past him. To dismiss him as a prospect is to conclude that he’s just too much of a mess personally for his talent to win out; maybe that will prove to be the case, but I don’t think any of us knows remotely enough to draw that conclusion.
fair assessment
I think it’s way, way too early to sell out on any of the Cliff Lee Three.
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by WholeCamels on Jan 2, 2011 10:08 PM EST up reply actions 1 recs
Has anyone confirmed whether Aumont is getting moved to the pen this year, as the guy on, I think, BA reported? (I hope not. Too soon for this.)
The last I heard was in that BA chat, where Matt Forman relayed that that’s what he’d heard from Phillies officials.
I’m not entirely sure how I feel about this. On one hand, I do agree with the general premise that you shouldn’t move someone to the bullpen unless you have to. On the other, I wonder if Aumont has the chops to make it as a starter in the long run anyway. Ultimately I think I’d give him one more season in the rotation, then go bullpen in 2012. Either way, I really do like his chances as a power armed reliever.
Speaking of a personality mess, I am glad this guy is no longer in the Phillies system… http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/blog/big_league_stew/post/Police-allege-Orioles-Simon-shot-2-men-killing?urn=mlb-302546
Nice. Here are the stats for all four aces at age 21.
Syracuse (INT, AAA): 9-5, 3.79 ERA, 21 G, 21 GS, 116.1 IP, 53 BB, 71 K, 11 HR
Clearwater/Reading: 4-0, 2.31 ERA, 6 G, 6 GS, 35.0 IP, 19 BB, 37 K, 2 HR
Cape Fear (SAL, Lo A): 1-4, 5.24 ERA, 11 G, 11 GS, 44.2 IP, 36 BB, 63 K, 1 HR
Michigan (MDW, Lo A): 13-4, 4.46 ERA, 22 G, 22 GS, 151.1 IP, 54 BB, 143 K, 8 HR
And their age 22 seasons.
Toronto (MLB): 8-7, 3.92 ERA, 36 G, 18 GS, 149.1 IP, 79 BB, 82 K, 19 HR
Lakewood/Clearwater/SWB: 3-1, 1.10 ERA, 8 G, 8 GS, 49.0 IP, 12 BB, 68 K, 1 HR
Jupiter (FSL, Hi A): 6-7, 2.79 ERA, 21 G, 20 GS, 109.2 IP, 46 BB, 129 K, 13 HR
Kissimee/Round Rock: 15-7, 2.21 ERA, 27 G, 26 GS, 175.0 IP, 33 BB, 188 K, 6 HR
aumont's age 21 season
Clearwater: 2-5, 4.48 ERA, 16 G, 10 GS, 72.1 IP, 42 BB, 77 K, 6 HR
Reading: 1-6, 7.43 ERA, 11 G, 11 GS, 49.2 IP, 38 BB, 38 K, 4 HR
Aumont’’s a tall pitcher, so this guy may be helpful as a comparison. The Big Unit was in low-A ball at age 21.
I’ve had a hard time finding a good comp for Aumont. Aumont has 2 things working against him: 1. his height, which can cause timing issues when pitching and 2. he’s a cold weather pitcher, meaning he spent less time pitching when younger than someone like Johnson or Chris Young who both grew up in Texas did. That means rough mechanics that he spent less time working to correct as a youth.
I’ve had a hard time finding an MLB player who is a comp for both of those.
I just think the key is he’s way too young to give up on starting. Even Mariano Rivera was a starter until he was 25. Who knows what Aumont will be if/when he catches up.
We aren’t. But the lack of MLB comps has thrown up a bit more of a red flag for me. I hope he makes it because his ceiling is huge, but I worry it may be too many obstacles to overcome.
Of course, I could look at this as glass half full and say his relative inexperience may make it easier to fix his mechanics than Johnson or Young, since his bad habits aren’t as strongly ingrained.
That’s fair. Although I don’t think the main explanation for the absence of comps for Aumont is that the failure rate for Aumont-like pitchers is high. Instead I think the main explanation is that there just aren’t many people out there who are similar to Aumont to begin with. That is, there’s no success rate or failure rate at all – it’s just zero for zero. So it doesn’t raise a red flag for me so much as a giant question mark.
So does a cold weather pitcher means he hasn’t pitched year round? If so I see that as a plus. Many doctors believe year round baseball is one of the reasons behind the large number of Tommy John surgeries they see every year. Now it’s one thing to compete and then train in the off season as a year round affair and quite another to compete in a sport year round. The latter can lead to overuse injuries and chronic pain conditions.
Yeah, I think that’s right. I can definitely see how there would be both pros and cons.
In a way, calling Aumont a cold weather pitcher fails to adequately describe him. Jesse Biddle is considered a “cold weather pitcher” based on being from Philadelphia. Aumont is more like a frickin’ freezing weather pitcher. You probably can’t start the season in Gatineau Quebec until mid-May.
It’s not perfect, as he’s shorter than Aumont, but he crosses the tall pitcher threshold of 6’6" and he’s from a cold weather climate (Montreal). His numbers are not great and he hasn’t been a starter in 5 years, but I looked at every Canadian pitcher to have pitched in the Majors the last 10 years and every pitcher ever to have been born/raised in Alaska (Ola, Senor Schilling). And this was literally the only comp.
Interesting. It does seem like he was a late bloomer, for what it’s worth. He started to improve a lot at age 23, which is also when he was moved to relief. He still hasn’t succeeded in the big leagues, but he probably also has a lower ceiling than Aumont, talent-wise, since he was only a 7th round pick.
Throws a mid-90’s Fastball (per Fangraphs ~75% of the time), but has major control issues.
One report I found on him made him sound like a Joe Savery type. Rated higher than his draft slot, but coming off an arm injury (Tommy John), so he was selected lower than he was rated the year prior to the injury.
Speaking of Shilling, he was walking almost 4 batters per 9 at age 21 as well.
I’m curious if the decision to move him to the pen will be made by someone who is watching him and deciding his skills would be best suited for relieving, or if it is performance based.
Does anyone know how Aumont did the second and third time through the lineups compared to the first?
by EJL on Jan 4, 2011 8:59 PM EST up reply actions
interesting that Halladay was such a highly regarded prospect despite not terribly impressive numbers. Halladay was Baseball America’s #12 prospect after posting those numbers at AAA.
21 is fairly young for AAA, and Halladay’s 3.79 ERA was pretty good for the league (8th among those with 100+ IP). but still, his K rate and walk rate were below the league average.
we all know Halladay pretty much totally reinvented himself after his horrible 2000 season, but it’s really striking how dramatic it was. his first 231 ML innings (through 2000), he struck out 5.4 and walked 4.8 per 9. his next 2,066 innings, he struck out 6.9 and walked 1.6.
by perfectdepth on Jan 3, 2011 10:54 AM EST up reply actions
I realize that Sickels is a tough grader, but I’m still surprised to see De Fratus as a C+. He’s big, possesses a power arm and has posted an excellent walk rate and a respectable K/9 as a reliever. And as a 23 year old in AA, I don’t think he’s particularly old for his league.
He isn’t old for his league, but as a reliever it’s tough to get anything higher than C+. There are extremely few high impact relievers in baseball that it’s tough to grade a pure relief prospect very highly. Frankly, C+ is a pretty good mark for a reliever, most guys he gives a straight C.
Someday which, admittedly for baseball is a geological measurement of time, the Scarlett R will be a fossil.
In non-Phillies prospecting news, the Texas Rangers just signed a Venezuelan shortstop by the name of Rougned Odor. Awesome.
That’s not enough half as good as Marlins prospect Sequoyah Trueblood Stonecipher
Outstanding stuff. But if he becomes a Brave I’ll vomit.
by Wet Luzinski on Jan 4, 2011 10:29 PM EST up reply actions
So would his family I venture.
Aristotle was not Belgian, the principle of Buddhism is not "every man for himself", and the London Underground is not a political movement.
Have Atlanta (or Cleveland) had a Native American player in recent times?
I know Kyle Lohse and Jacoby Ellsbury are at least part-NA, but neither of them has played for those teams.
I didn’t realize they were part-NA (or Joba Chamberlain, for that matter). Looks like the last was Jack Aker, a pitcher on the 1974 Braves for part of the season. Link here.
What would be even cooler would be to get a Stonecipher jersey for you, and a Graham Stoneburner jersey for the missus.
Honor is no substitute for victory.
Late to the party here...
…thanks to a busted Internet connection at home and a hellish week at work, but I have to say, I always eagerly await Sickels’ list. Now excuse me while I sprinkle my comments throughout the thread (which had some pretty good discussion, I should say)…
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