Breakout Candidates in 2012: Bats

Every year, guys reach that critical stage in their development when they finally translate their God-given baseball "tools" into on-field performance. They "break out," moving from longterm project status onto the major league depth chart. John Hellweg did it in 2011. Mark Trumbo and Tyler Chatwood did it in 2010. Over the next couple of months, I'm going to profile guys who are the most likely to burst onto the prospect scene in 2012, beginning with the bats.

Travis Witherspoon, CF: .250/.316/.392 with 13 HR and 46 SB in 2011 @ Low A and High A

The Dream: If I could wager on a prospect who's most likely to break out, I'd choose Witherspoon. Tom Kotchman is still using Mike Cameron as a comp, with his unique blend of speed, power and defense, for what Witherspoon's career could look like.

What He Is Now: Witherspoon's tools resemble those of Peter Bourjos and Jeremy Moore, balancing plus speed and athleticism with growing strength. His best present skill is defense: twice I've asked guys in and around the organization about other minor league centerfielders, and their response began with, "well, he's no Travis Witherspoon out there, but..." Witherspoon may not quite be as "historically good" as Fleet Pete, but he's the best of the present Angels' farmhands, and could be a plus defender at the major league level.

Witherspoon uses his plus speed extremely well on the bases, showing strong instincts for timing pitchers and getting good jumps. In 2010, he stole 20 bags without getting caught once. Last year, he swiped 41 bags at an above average 79% success rate.

Witherspoon is still trying to figure out what kind of hitter he can be. His strength and bat speed already give him average power versus minor league competition, and the pop should only increase as his pitch recognition improves. His batted ball data vacillated wildly last year, swinging from a flyball/linedrive power profile in April to an extreme groundball distribution in May, which corresponded with his move to the leadoff spot. He rediscovered his loft later in the year, even winning the Midwest League homerun derby at the allstar break and hitting a bunch of bombs in June and July. I see the vacillation as a positive marker, because while his efforts haven't yet translated into good numbers, he's showing the ability to make adjustments and work with coaching. His approach at the plate is still a work in progress - he has some issues with contact - but he's making an effort to work deeper counts and his walk rate is on the rise.

2012 Forecast: Baseball America reports that the Angels are having him focus on leveling his cut and hitting to the opposite field with the Inland Empire 66'ers in 2012, but he might just blow up the California League and knock 20 bombs while swiping 50 bags.

4 ) John Hellweg, 10/29/1988 -- rhrp/rhsp, High A

7 wins, 4 losses. 95.2 IP, 3.67 ERA, 76 hits, 121 K/63 BB. 13 runs saved, 2.9 WAR

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10) Kole Calhoun, 10/14/1987 -- Of/1B, High A

.324/.410/.547 with 23 HR and 20 SB. +33 runs bat, -3 glove, 4.0 WAR

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2) Garrett Richards, 5/27/1988 -- rhrp/rhsp, AA and MLB

12 wins, 2 losses. 143 IP, 3.15 ERA, 123 hits, 103 K/40 BB. 19 runs saved, 3.9 WAR in 2011

The 2012 Angels could use another power arm out of the pen, a guy who can shut the opposition down at critical, middle-inning moments with a timely K or groundball. In 2013, the Halos will need another cost-controlled, mid-rotation workhorse. Richards should be one - and hopefully both - of those guys, so how the Angels handle him will be one of the more interesting subplots of the upcoming season.

Despite his inconsistency in the majors last season, Richards flashes enough brilliance to play a big role with the Angels in 2012. He has two great pitches: a booming, mid-to-high 90's fastball that he can cut in against lefthanders, and a dynamite slider with hard downward bite. Every once in awhile he throws a sweet change-up, so with more consistent execution his arsenal could total three plus offerings. Bringing back his get-me over curveball down the road would be icing on the cake.

Former Angels' scouting director Eddie Bane drafted Richards in the 2009 supplemental first round, bucking consensus and betting big on the righty's arm strength and promising secondary arsenal despite a lackluster amateur track record. Richards lived up to Bane's hopes, steadily improving his stock over two and a half seasons as a pro. With his AA performance in 2011, it looks like his numbers have finally caught up to the superlative scouting reports.

Bane's legacy with the Angels not only includes Richards, but also the trust he puts in his player development people to mold high upside arms into MLB material; in my opinion, the success or failure of the 2011 draft will hinge largely on the development of strong-armed Nick Maronde, Nick Mutz and Austin Wood, all of whom flopped as starters in their amateur career despite impressive raw stuff. One or more of them could follow in Richards' footsteps.

9) Taylor Lindsey, 12/02/1991 -- 2B, Adv Rookie Ball

.362/.394/.593 with 10 HR's and 10 SB's. +14 runs bat, +4 runs glove, 2.7 WAR

Ranking in a Nutshell: If I could do it all over again, I would slide Lindsey forward two slots in the rankings because of this new data point. Our Pioneer League MVP was the only member of the talented 2011 Orem Owlz to receive an invite to major league spring training camp, which probably means that he impressed the brass with a good showing in fall instructs. Success in that environment tends to carry over into the following season, so I'm pumped to see him play with the big boys in March.

My reasons for putting Lindsey towards the back end of this list were two-fold: he's a bat first prospect, projecting to have below average speed, arm strength, and athleticism; second, there are some question marks about the bat, because he may only be good for batting average down the road if the patience fails to develop and his pull power doesn't play as well at the upper levels. It's not exactly an apple to apples comparison, but growing into a player similar to Alexi Amarista is a likely outcome. Or he's a left-handed Howie Kendrick - awesomeness - but guys who hit well enough for us to forget about walks and power are rare. At age 20, Howie hit .367 in full season ball, so the bar for Lindsey heading into his age 20 season is very high if that's the kind of player he's going to be.

Track Record: Lindsey put himself on the prospect map in high school by batting over .500 in two consecutive seasons, yet most analysts considered him an overdraft when the Halos tapped him in the 2010 supplementary round. He signed quickly and put up a solid .284/.325/.407 line in Arizona rookie ball. That was good but not great, since Angels fans had just watched Mike Trout and Randal Grichuk hit .360/.418/.506 and .322/.352/.551 respectively in Tempe the season before.

Needless to say, Lindsey broke out at Orem, competing all season long with teammates Frazier Hall and Jerod Yakubik for the Pioneer League batting title, hitting for the cycle at one point, and ultimately winning league MVP honors. There were a lot of positives: his strikeout rate dropped each month, reflecting skill growth even as the competition around him improved; he rapped 10 doubles and hit .353 to the opposite field, abating previous fears that he was too pull conscious; he mashed lefties just as well as righties, hanging in against breaking stuff and putting up a .352 BA against them; and his defense was rock solid, even if scouts don't like his range or arm much. On the other hand, he walked only 4% of the time. That's entirely understandable since Lindsey discovered early in the season that he could mash anything thrown his way, but it's something to look out for at the higher levels.

Like Kaleb Cowart, Lindsey added a leg kick to his swing despite not using one in high school. You can't argue with the results, but I'll be interested to see if he continues to use it down the road. He has quick hands, a short swing, and generally makes good contact. His plate coverage is above-average, and he shows good instincts for both dropping the bat head and turning on balls for power.

Win the Lottery Ceiling: Lindsey may be much closer to hitting .300 with 15 homeruns in the big leagues than Owlz teammate Kaleb Cowart, but he's still a long, long ways off.

6) Nick Maronde, 09/05/1989 -- LHSP, Adv Rookie Ball

5 wins, 0 losses. 51.1 IP, 2.10 ERA, 41 hits, 56 K/19 BB. 22 runs saved, 2.6 WAR

Ranking in a nutshell: As a big three-pitch lefty with easy velocity, Maronde has the raw ingredients to be a frontline starter in the big leagues. Tom Kotchman talked him up to me generally and labeled his change-up a "major league pitch," which is great news since that offering will be key to Maronde's success in pro ball. Baseball America likes his new two seam fastball, and especially his breaking ball, saying that "neither righties nor lefties could square up his slider when it was at its best."

Sources I like (here and here) are more conservative, projecting him as a back of the rotation guy or a set up man due to the mediocre offspeed stuff and iffy command that undercut his success as an amateur. Their position is perfectly reasonable; I just think, given the exciting reports about his stuff in pro ball and the success the Angels have had in recent years developing guys like this, that Maronde could wind up with a higher ceiling than expected.

Track record: He flamed out as a starter in at the University of Florida, despite the good fastball, but met success as a reliever in his junior season. His numbers at Orem were very good, but Pioneer League performance is usually not predictive. He's at a similar career crossroads as Pat Corbin and Tyler Kehrer were following the 2009 season, and one of those guys took off in full season league while the other couldn't throw enough strikes to get A-Ball hitters out consistently. The track record just doesn't give us a clear idea about what his numbers will look like next year.

Win the Lottery Ceiling: A classic #2 lefty, ready to line up behind a right-handed ace in playoff action. In that way he's similar to CJ Wison, actually. If he doesn't reach that ceiling, it's very easy to imagine him winding up a fine, high leverage reliever.

8) Luis Jimenez, 01/18/1988 -- 3B, AA

.284/.332/.480 with 20 HR and 15 SB. +11 run bat, +6 run glove, 3.1 WAR

Ranking in a Nutshell: "Lucho" has the skills to help an MLB club soon - he racks up doubles and some homeruns, doesn't K much, plays great defense, and contributes in all of the little ways - making him a better prospect than he gets credit for nationally (except for here, interestingly). However, he doesn't currently project to hit in the middle of a major league line-up, and his strengths aren't a great fit for the current Angels' roster. The Halos need OBP. Lots and lots of OBP, especially from the left side. Adding Lucho's righty contact bat, especially if it's at the expense of current 3B Callaspo, would just exacerbate the Angels' lack of balance in the lineup, which dings his present value to the club.

Track Record: Jimenez won back-to-back homerun titles as a 19 and 20 year old in the Dominican Summer League and the Pioneer League, which, combined with his low strikeout rate, made him an exciting prospect entering 2009. Sadly, what appeared to be a minor injury at the conclusion of Orem's 2008 title run turned into a full blown labrum tear, sidelining Lucho for the 2010 season and temporarily removing him from the prospect map. When he returned to the field in 2011, he was mostly the same player, but his power tool didn't play quite as well in full season ball, and he continued to show his customary lack of patience at the plate. The issues are linked: Lucho believes he can hit anything, and he does in fact put the bat on most anything, except he can't go yard while leaning out on his front foot to hit a ball a foot outside. You can go here for a thorough breakdown of his hitting skills, including footage.

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1) Mike Trout, 8/07/91 - CF, AA & MLB

.326/.414/.544 with 11 HR and 33 SB. +32 run bat, +5 run glove, ~5 WAR in 2011

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7) Kaleb Cowart, 6/2/92 -- 3B, Advanced Rookie Ball

.283/.345/.420 with 7 HR and 11 SB

I'm surprised at how much slack folks are cutting Cowart for his underwhelming season in the Pioneer League. Other sites have ranked him second, third/fourth, and fifth in the Angels system based on his all-star caliber tool package. Folks just don't seem especially alarmed at his problems with offspeed stuff and the consequent 25%+ strikeout rate he posted in rookie ball. They accept how raw our 2010 first round, $2.3 million bonus baby has remained through a full season of pro development, yet still project him to be a middle of the order hitter.

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3) Jean Segura, 3/17/1990 - SS/2B, High A

Cal League: .281/.337/.422 with 3 HR's and 18 SB's; AFL: .310/.344/.425 with 0 HR and 5 SB

Dipoto just inked Howie Kendrick to a team-friendly, four-year contract extension, and is reportedly looking to do the same with Erick Aybar. Growing hype around Jean Segura must give Dipoto a little extra leverage in those negotiations, because entering the 2012 season, the young middle infielder ranks as high as baseball's 22nd best prospect. The twenty-one year old Dominican packages a knack for contact, explosive bat speed, savvy on the basepaths, arm strength and the athleticism to be a standout-out middle infielder. He combines the ceiling of an all-star shortstop with the floor of an MLB-average second baseman. Having Segura's growing reputation in his back pocket gives Dipoto a credible reason to leave the table if extension talks with our current shortstop don't go his way.

While it's great to see Segura receiving the attention, I'm beginning to get a little worried about his stagnant secondary skills. Both his California League and AFL slash lines were overwhelmingly batting average dependent, showing little in the way of patience or pop. He recognizes pitches well and doesn't have too much trouble with breaking stuff, but "discipline" for him mostly means putting fastballs into play early in the count. Given the organization's philosophy around hitting, I don't see much reason to hope that Segura's BB totals will jump, though I doubt he ever strikes out much.

Segura's batted ball distribution tilted heavily towards groundballs, and more than 20% of his hits in both leagues were infield knocks. The speed is nice, but if the trend continues all of those grounders won't make him a star in the big leagues. He has an athletic, aggressive cut that scouts seem to love, but his swing path is flat in games and provides little loft. He swings early and often, not waiting for pitches to drive. That said, he's flashed some thunder in the past, with natural gap power to right-center and - at least in his summer with the Kernels - he occasionally turned on the ball with a vengeance. To reach his ceiling, he's going to have to do more of that, though I'm less optimistic about him learning to drive the ball consistently than I was a year ago.

And then there are the frequent injuries. His 2011 hamstrings in particular raise a red flag.

Due to Segura's abbreviated season, there are still some questions about Segura's ability to stick at shortstop. I asked 66er's announcer Sam Farber, who's now seen him on the field there as much as anybody, and he responded "[I] can't imagine why [Segura] wasn't considered a shortstop from the beginning"..."he's a phenomenal defensive talent"..."[having] the perfect reflexes for the position." Here's a little proof on that count.

If the Angels re-sign Aybar, now would be the time to sell high on the redundant Segura. Packaging him with Trumbo could return some very good young pitching from the Rays. Packaging him with another player and sending them to Arizona might just get us Tyler Skaggs back, which would be a huge boon to the Angels' post-Santana, post-Haren rotation. Or they can hold on to Segura and mold him into their future "supersub," the role that Mike Scioscia perfected and employed with so much success over the past decade.

Quick-twitch athleticism should allow Segura to contribute with the glove and on the bases from the very start, and that high floor more than anything else makes him valuable. I suspect he will have a career arc similar to Aybar's, with annual contributions swinging wildly from 1-5 WAR due to fluctuations in batting average. Like Aybar, he should be quite valuable, but the lack of secondary skills means he may never attain the consistency necessary to be a star.

We're kicking off the Angels' 2012 Top Prospect Rankings today with a look at #5, CJ Cron. I plan to skip around a little, focusing first on the guys we haven't looked at yet this offseason.

5) CJ Cron, 1/5/1990 - DH/1B

.308/.371/.629 with 13 HR's

CJ Cron hits baseballs vast distances. Full stop.

To be honest, I was worried when I saw him in July. Cron's pop was obvious - he lined a bullet over the right field wall and crushed two deep bombs to left (though one was called back on a horrendous umpire gaffe) - but his approach was a mess and his swing looked awkward. At one point, he came up against a guy who had thrown 8 of his last 9 offerings for balls, flailed at a first pitch curveball that bounced a foot in front of the plate, then proceeded to strike out on three more pitches, stranding a pair of baserunners. That was the worst of a string of poor AB's I witnessed over four games.

But sample size matters. Through the second half of July, Cron cut his K's down and ramped up his production, suggesting that I'd caught him at an adjustment period. The prior season, Cron had mashed like no other collegiate with the new, neutered metal bats, so it wasn't a surprise to see him come roaring back and slug .629 with a Pioneer League-best .321 iso. What did surprise me was his batted ball distribution: he slammed 5 of 13 HR's to right field, and went to the opposite field with almost 50% of his batted balls. For any player, that's rare. For a slugger, that's downright mind-boggling (the closest precedent that I know of to Cron's batted ball distribution is Jeremy Moore's 2010 season with the Travs, when he slugged .228 with 6 HR's to the opposite field). While no guarantee of success, Cron's feel for using the whole field should mean good batting averages to match his monster foul pole to foul pole power.

Cron's pop derives from explosive upper body strength, especially in his wrists, which allows him to accelerate the bat head through the strikezone with loads of torque. He takes a big stride, which may screw with his timing and make it difficult to adjust to good offspeed stuff. Stepping so far forward also causes his head to drop, which could also screw with his hand/eye coordination. Because he doesn't really need the stride to generate power, my guess is the Angels will have him cut the motion down and start his stance with a wider base, similar to Mark Trumbo or Albert Pujols (fun to say that!). Cron also looked like he might be fighting his body a little as he swung, but I might just be looking too hard for evidence of the bum shoulder. You be the judge:

The Pujols addition and Trumbo's ascension complicate Cron's path to the majors, but from what I saw, the 2011 draftee should only benefit from plenty of time in the minors. His plate discipline may need more polish than the Angels had hoped, so he might head to Cedar Rapids next year instead of making the jump to High A. But when he is ready, Cron has a very good chance of being an annual 30 HR masher in a major league lineup, which is the kind of bat you make room for. His lack of defensive tools limits his overall value, likely topping him out as a 2-4 WAR contributor, but he's the best bet -- the only good bet, really -- for becoming a true middle of the order hitter currently in the Angels' system.

1) Matt Shoemaker, 9/27/1986 - rhsp, AA & AAA

12 wins, 7 losses. 177.1 IP, 3.15 ERA, 160 hits, and 141 K/47 BB. 31 runs saved, 6.1 WAR

Shoemaker put up the best 100+ inning Double A campaign of any Angels' pitching prospect in at least two decades. That's not hyperbole; it also wasn't especially close, as the next best guy trailed Shoemaker by almost two full WAR.*

From May onward, the burly righthander tossed gem after consecutive gem, unstringing AA lineups and propelling the Arkansas Travs to the Texas League championships. His AA numbers were outstanding: 12 wins and 5 losses, a 2.36 ERA, 5 complete games, and 146 K's to 38 BB's. He capped the season with eight dominant, one run innings and ten punch-outs in the playoff opener. The numbers earned him Angels' Minor League Pitcher of the Year and Texas League Pitcher of the Year honors, as well as a trip with Team USA to the World Cup.

Prospect ranking season rolls around, and Shoemaker is nowhere to be seen on anyone's organizational top twenty list. Why is that?

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Let's put this feature series to bed, shall we?

First, by way of explanation, I went AWOL these past few weeks for the best of reasons: I now have two healthy, precocious little daughters, both of whom are doing great. They were born two months early, but after a long stay in the hospital they're finally home.

Another cause for delay - and all-around-annoyance - is that some kid broke into my classroom and stole my laptop, which not only had a month's worth of otherwise un-backed-up baby pictures saved to it, but all of my baseball-related databases. That means that my WAR calculations and batted ball data from July onward are gone, so I'm going to have to go off memory below.

Four years of teaching in an inner city school in Boston, and the only thing that ever disappeared from my classroom were a few snickers bars. Three months in Portland, and this.

The obvious lesson here? Skaters can bite me.

2) Mike Trout, 8/07/91 - CF, AA & MLB

.326/.414/.544 with 11 HR and 33 SB. +32 run bat*, +5 run glove, ~5 WAR

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3) Kole Calhoun, 10/14/1987 -- Of/1B, High A

.324/.410/.547 with 23 HR and 20 SB. +33 runs bat, -3 glove, 4.0 WAR

Some interesting tidbits regarding Calhoun:

• Calhoun had the best offensive season in the minors of any Angels' COLLEGE draftee in five years. You have to go back to Chris Pettit's 2007 campaign to find anything comparable.
• Calhoun is the Halos' first 20-20 farmhand since Terry Evans' AAA campaign back in 2009.
• Calhoun's left-handed cut in instructional league last year was a mirror image of Mike Napoli's much-missed stroke. Seriously. Go to the FutureAngels.Com video gallery, and watch their respective clips side by side. Uncanny.

So what do these factoids tell us?

1. The Angels don't like to draft college position players.
2. Calhoun does have some tools, especially power, to augment his strong command of the strikezone.
3. In terms of production, Calhoun's age 23 Cal League campaign is a dead-ringer for Napoli's age 22 Cal League campaign, so the similarities don't end with swing mechanics. But let's not make that comp for real quite yet; just because Calhoun channels Napoli's mechanics doesn't mean he has the big guy's strength, timing, or mojo.

Calhoun was a beast in 2011. At age 23, he would have been old even for a college guy in the Midwest League, so the Halos jumped him to High A, where he very quickly established himself as the 66'ers best hitter. He showed all of the skills that a bat-first college draftee needs to show, maintaining control of the strikezone (73 BB/99 K) and hitting for solid power (.228 iso). All of the offensive stats looked good: he ranked 6th in the league for doubles, HR's and walks; 4th in both OBP and slugging; and 3rd in total bases and OPS. I don't see the 23 HR's as a Cal League fluke, and believe he will repeat or improve upon that number as he moves up in the system. While he won't steal 20 bags again, pitchers aren't going to forget about him either. Plus, he showed enough range and instincts in the outfield for the Angels' to plug him into centerfield after Matt Long's promotion to AA in the final month of the season. He wasn't Jim Edmonds out there, certainly, but that's just one more example of Calhoun contributing above his modest tools.

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4) Matt Long, 04/30/1987 -- OF, High A and AA

.299/.378/.502 with 18 HR and 34 SB. +23 bat, +1 glove, 3.9 WAR

This one takes me back to April of 2010. I'd travelled deep into Illinois to get a first-hand look at that epic 2010 Kernels club featuring Mike Trout, Tyler Skaggs, Jean Segura, Garrett Richards, Pat Corbin, and others. I arrived a little late, so was just settling in when this short, skinny little guy - seriously, he was downright puny standing next to Trout - comes up to hit in the two slot. Who's this dude? I look him up on the roster, and find him: Matt Long. Dammit. I felt a pang of mild disappointment that it wasn't Jake Rife or Richard Cates, both of whom were coming off of interesting 2009 campaigns.

Long, a 30th round draft pick, reached base like twenty times over the next three games.

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Note that this is not a traditional "best prospect list," but rather a ranking of individual Angels' prospect performances in 2011 according to (W)ins (A)bove (R)eplacement. However, rather than running through the year's statistical ups and downs, the profile below leans heavily in the direction of a scouting report.

5) Garrett Richards, 5/27/1988 -- rhrp/rhsp, AA and MLB

12 wins, 2 losses. 143 IP, 3.15 ERA, 123 hits, 103 K/40 BB. 19 runs saved, 3.9 WAR

Richards is now the consensus top pitching prospect in the Angels' system due to outstanding raw stuff and ability to pound the strikezone. Because Richards is currently the organization's best bet for a young, cost-controlled arm, molding him into a rotation workhorse before Dan Haren and Ervin Santana complete their contracts is among the Halos' key long term challenges. We've all seen him perform on the big stage now, so we undoubtedly all have opinions about whether or not he will successfully assume that role.

Before projecting him though, let's run through the data. At the MLB level, Richards' average fastball velocity was 94.5-94.8 mph (depending on your source), and he frequently augmented the pitch by cutting it to his glove side at roughly the same speed. That velocity would have ranked fifth or sixth among all MLB starters had he sufficient innings to qualify. Scouts who saw him midseason in AA reported even more gas, and graded out his fastball as "top of the scale." Moreover, he touched 96 mph multiple times in his final start of a 157+ inning season, pointing to good stamina. His slider routinely sat in the mid to high 80's, and features good downward tilt. Hitters swung and missed 11% of the time at the breaker, and RIchards will likely induce more empty swings when he learns to set it up more effectively. Most evaluators grade the pitch out as plus. While he used his change-up infrequently, he tossed a couple of really good ones to Josh Hamilton on the final day of the season, so it flashes as plus and has the potential to be at least an average pitch with more consistency. It's a hard change, usually in the mid 80's, but he throws his fastball with such oomph that there's adequate separation. He's dropped the curveball for now, but I wouldn't be surprised to see him throw it as a get-me-over pitch to lefties in 2012.

All of his offerings produced negative run values in the majors according to Fangraphs. Richards' grooved far too many pitches in his major league debut season, leading to 4 homeruns in just 14 innings (why did he have to throw ANOTHER slider to Edwin Encarnacion?!?). However, that's not uncommon for young guys - the best right handed pitching prospect in baseball, Julio Teheran, also gave up four long balls, albeit in 19 innings - so we can cut Richards some slack given his good minor league track record of homerun prevention. More concerning is the reoccurring bouts of hittability that have afflicted Richards since his college days, and he tends to give up a lot of line drives. I still consider Chatwoods' 93 mph heater down in the zone as a more difficult pitch to square up than Richard's 96 mph on either side of the plate. I suspect that Richards is going to suffer from some big inning syndrome for at least his first few years in the majors, much like John Lackey and Ervin Santana did early in their careers.

Prospect watchers have bashed Richards for his 2011 drop in K-rate, which sank from 10.6 per nine innings in High A ball all the way down to 6.5 K's per nine in Double A. While that rate stat is among the best indicators when evaluating minor league pitchers (for many good reasons), it breaks down with Angels' guys who advance to Arkansas. The Halos promote a "three pitches, one out" mantra to their young arms at that level, encouraging them to get ahead in the count and then pitch to contact within the safe confines of the Travs' home park. Pitch efficiency, and not missed bats, is the organizational evaluation criteria, and prospects generally respond to it. Major leaguers Ervin Santana, Jered Weaver and Joe Saunders all saw their K-rates drop in their initial exposure to the level (though Santana's K-rate rebounded when he returned the following season). Prospects Nick Adenhart, Tyler Chatwood, Trevor Bell, and Trevor Reckling are additional examples. Given Richards' history of missing bats, his consistently good groundball rates, and his solid control, I think concern over his mediocre AA K-rate is misplaced.

The most exciting aspect of Richards' scouting report is his smooth delivery and effortless velocity. "Easy gas" is an excellent indicator of endurance and future improvements in command, which are crucial to projecting Richard's upside. On the other hand, he attracts some criticism because of his "cross-fire" delivery (he whips his throwing arm around in a diagonal that verges unusually close to a horizontal motion across his body). Published reports oftedn cite concern that the motion could lead to shoulder problems. However, there are a number of pitchers, Jered Weaver among them, who do just fine with that type of follow-through. Also, Alex Eisenburg at Baseball Intellect provided good documentation of Richards "tipping" his curve and change-up earlier in his career, but the pitcher eliminated the curve (for now) and made the necessary tweaks to his change-up delivery. Overall, I rate Richards' mechanics as a big plus.

Richards' unique combination of outstanding scouting reports, crappy amateur track record, and solid but not quite dominant rate stats over young minor league competition provide a lot of dissonant information, which all point to him being a bit of an enigma. I can't say that I have a good intuitive sense of which direction his career will take, though I think that his most likely outcome is a streaky, high upside, brilliant-one-start-and-frustrating-the-next rotation horse in the Ervin Santana or even Javier Vasquez mold. He'll be valuable most years, completely undependable in others, with career numbers that eventually even out to those of a solid mid-rotation starter. He still has the upside of a strong number two, but his pitchability has a long way to go in order for him to reach that ceiling. For a young, cost-controlled guy, that's still great value. I think he's one of the best seventy-five, maybe top fifty prospects in all of baseball.

6) Chris Scholl, 10/27/1987 -- rhrp/rhsp, AA

4 wins, 3 losses. 93.3 IP, 2.12 ERA, 63 hits, 71 K/23 BB. 26 runs saved, 3.6 WAR

As with Hellweg and Schugel, Chris Scholl is a 2011 top performer who began the year as a marginal bullpen arm, but worked his way into rotation anchor status by season's end. Even when turning over line-ups multiple times, he baffled the opposition with guile and consistent execution of his three-pitch arsenal, and capped the year with eight dominant, scoreless innings in the Texas League playoffs.

The Angels are always a little more ready to roll the dice with short righties than most clubs, and they scooped up the 5'11", 190 right-handed reliever out of Green River Community College in the 8th round of the 2008 draft. They ignored the lack of projection, and instead focused on his arm strength, athleticism, and ability to spin the curve ball.

On the surface, Scholl has been a remarkably consistent performer throughout his minor league career with the Angels, aggregating a 2.87 ERA across four seasons of work. Those consistent year-end ERA's mask his tendency to turn in some so-so early months, before coming on especially strong down the stretch of the season, when he becomes virtually unhittable. The trend held true in 2011, when, even after moving the to the rotation, Scholl held hitters to .133 batting average against (BAA) in August. Over the whole season, he yielded only a .196 BAA.

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7) Ariel Pena, 05/20/1989 -- rhsp, High A and AAA

10 wins, 6 losses. 163 IP, 4.39 ERA, 166 hits and 196 K/87 BB. 6 runs saved, 3.4 WAR

Pena received some attention after his stellar 2008 Dominican Summer League campaign, when he put up video game stats as co-ace of an outstanding rookie league rotation that also included Fabio Martinez Mesa and Orangel Arenas. He put up good but not great numbers stateside in 2009 and 2010, showing a propensity to strike guys out at an above average rate, but yielding too many walks and hits.

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8) Carlos Ramirez, 03/19/1988 -- C, A, High A, AA

.312/.385/.463 with 7 HR's and 3 SB's. +11 runs bat, +4 runs glove, 3.2 WAR

After putting up a .236/.346/.378 line over a forgettable year and a half with the Kernels, Ramirez finally got his midseason promotion and mashed .348/.403/.530 in the California League.

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I cover the minor leagues over at SBN's Halosheaven, so have monitored Angels' prospects closely these past few years. I'm counting down the top 2011 performances now, and found these three guys especially interesting, either because they outplayed expectations, or they generated similar numbers to more highly touted prospects at the same age, yet continue to receive little attention.  You can click the following links to see the reports:

John Hellweg

Luis Jimenez

AJ Schugel

I know this is a shameless plug, but I really do think these guys will play their way onto the radar in 2012. I'd love to hear your opinions about how they compare with higher profile prospects across the minors.  

9) Luis Jimenez, 01/18/1988 -- 3B, AA

.284/.332/.480 with 20 HR and 15 SB.  +11 run bat, +6 run glove, 3.1 WAR

Will Lingo at Baseball America on Luis "Lucho" Jimenez:

Good defender with a good arm, but no plate discipline and fringe-average power for a third baseman. Ultimately, the bat probably isn't there to be an everyday third baseman.

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11) John Hellweg, 10/29/1988 -- rhrp/rhsp, High A

7 wins, 4 losses.  95.2 IP, 3.67 ERA, 76 hits, 121 K/63 BB.   13 runs saved, 2.9 WAR

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12)  Efren Navarro, 05/14/1986 -- 1B, AAA

.317/.368/.488 with 12 HR and 5 SB. +7 runs bat, +15 runs glove, 2.8 WAR

I have it on good authority that Navarro's defensive prowess was "off the charts" according to at least one MLB team's proprietary defensive metrics.  PCL managers affirmed the data by voting Navarro the best defender in his league for the second straight year. Rawlings jumped on the bandwagon last week, awarding Navarro their minor league gold glove and recognizing him as the top defender at his position across all minor league teams. Given all of those kudos, a +15 glove may be lowballing Navarro's total contributions with the leather. 

This is a case where being left-handed may actually be a competitive disadvantage for Navarro. He clearly has a knack for picking it, but the defensive metrics imply a level of agility and range that, if he threw righty, would likely move him up the defensive spectrum in the infield. If he were a second baseman, for example, the lefty contact bat might play enough to grant him more major league consideration. But when you compare him to the average first baseman, his bat comes in at -3 runs because of all of the mashers playing that position (lead-footed and brick-handed though they may be). This presents a difficult profile for the Angels, who already do well on the run prevention side of things, but who struggle mightily to put their own runs on the board. If you're carrying three sub .300 OBP's in your lineup every night, and receive league average production from most every other position, than you have to get offense from first base.  You just have to in order to score runs, and Navarro doesn't pack enough punch to provide that.

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15)  Nick Maronde, 09/05/1989 -- lhsp, Adv Rookie Ball

5 wins, 0 losses. 51.1 IP, 2.10 ERA, 41 hits, 56 K/19 BB. 22 runs saved, 2.6 WAR

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Schugel admires one of the many pop-ups he induced on a muggy July afternoon.

18) A.J. Schugel, 06/27/1989 -- rhsp, A and High A

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Please note that the rankings below DO NOT comprise a traditional "best prospect" list. I simply ranked players according to their 2011 Wins Above Replacement ("WAR"), which provides a rough estimate of total contributions to their respective teams. 

19)  Loek Van Mil, 09/15/1984-- rhrp, AA

3 wins, 5 losses. 73.1 IP, 2.09 ERA, 51 K/27 BB. 16 runs saved, 2.4 WAR

After a forgettable 2010 season that saw the Twins trade him for Brian Fuentes, Van Mil bounced back to set career bests in innings pitched, strikeouts, and ERA.  He was a workhorse for the Travelers, especially through an endless August grind when the team was down starters and needed significant help in the middle innings. He even made a spot start on August 10th, twirling five innings of shutout baseball. If you haven't heard of this guy, get ready to see a lot of ink spilled over him from now through spring training, because his career now has momentum in addition to novelty. Van Mil is the tallest professional baseball player on record, measuring in at 7'1", 220. He can therefore do things that other players cannot, delivering plus fastballs that have extreme downward angle and a point of release ridiculously close to home plate. You will see more scouting reports on this guy throughout the offseason, but the take-away here is that Van Mil resurrected his career in 2011 and appears likely to debut in the big leagues, even if just for a cameo, at some point in 2012. 

Please note that the rankings below DO NOT comprise a traditional "best prospect" list. I simply ranked players according to their 2011 Wins Above Replacement ("WAR"), which provides a rough estimate of total contributions to their respective teams. 

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Please note that the rankings below DO NOT comprise a traditional "best prospect" list. I simply ranked players according to their 2011 Wins Above Replacement ("WAR"), which provides a rough estimate of total contributions to their respective teams.

Continue reading this post »

Please note that the rankings below DO NOT comprise a traditional "best prospect" list. I simply ranked players according to their 2011 Wins Above Replacement ("WAR"), which provides a rough estimate of total contributions to their respective teams.  

27)  Dan Tillman, 3/14/89 - rhrp, A and High A

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