SB Nation User Blog: wcw

2 Giants in top 10 BA Midseason Top 25 Prospects

wcw — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 17:18:15 -0000

Baseball America's Midseason Top 25 Prospects are out, and the Giants have two in the top ten, plus the first of the honorable mentions:

Top 25 Prospects

...
5. Madison Bumgarner, lhp, Giants
6. Buster Posey, c, Giants
The Next 25: Tim Alderson, rhp, Giants...

Me, I put Posey above Bumgarner, but since BA are the authorities here, not I, I should really defer to them. naturally, deferring to BA feels a smidge better when they agree with me on the consensus top prospect out there. Whom, I shall never tire of reminding folks here, I wanted to draft instead of Bumgarner back in 2007.

Having the #5 and #26 prospects in all of baseball is a very nice thing. But wouldn't it be nice to have the #1 overall and a legitimate major-league starter instead?

It would, I posit, have been very nice indeed.

I told you so.

I love to say I told you so

wcw — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 05:54:21 -0000

Really. Freaking love it. I mean, who doesn't?

So, Jason Heyward and Rick Porcello.

Heyward is the guy I wanted at #10 instead of Bumgarner back when. Not that Mr. Bumgarner was so much a bad pick as, y'know, really, more pitching? All he's done so far (after crushing the Sallie League last year, which granted Bumgarner did himself) is hit .325/.438/.650 in the pitcher's paradise that is the Florida State Leage.

Go ahead, Sabean lovers, say it with me: "small sample size, small sample size, small.." and reach for the brown paper bag. If some internet crank like I could see it, what was keeping the Giants brain trust?

And then there's Porcello. Alderson was a fine prospect, but the only think keeping the team from a much, much better prospect were bonus demands. Nothing personal, but screw bonus demands. This is a team blowing $20m a year on Barry Zito. Leaving Porcello lie for want of $10m (and I bet they could have had him for less; taking a year off doesn't help you make the big bucks down the line, y'know?) was just stupid. I mean, Timmy 2 is fine, but he's in high A. Porcello is in the majors today.

Now, I am as big an idiot as Sabean in my way. Brackman or Smoker don't look too hot right now. But still, on Heyward and Porcello, I think I look pretty good.

50th-rounder pitches seven perfect innings

wcw — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 04:29:23 -0000

Yeah, it's short-season A ball, and he's a four-year college player who's only two years younger than Matt Cain and didn't even make it out of rookie ball last year. Still, you have to give the man props. His line tonight: 7 innings, 7 strikeouts, 7 ground balls, 7 fly balls. No walks, no hits, no wild pitches, no nothing. And his season thus far looks pretty impressive: 29 innings, 27 strikeouts, 8 hits, 2 home runs, 3 runs total.

He has not walked a batter. Including last year, he has walked one (1) batter in 45 professional innings. It's like he saw wood bats and said to himself, I can just pound the strike zone against these things. (His walk rates in college are fine, but nothing like this.)

I'm a sucker for these names. 50th rounders don't usually go anywhere (Brian Horwitz, who went undrafted, has managed a cup of coffee), but after performances like tonight's, you have to give it up.

So, go Mike Loree. Tonight, you are the man.

Pablo Sandoval and small sample size

wcw — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 13:57:12 -0000

Now, I liked Pablo Sandoval last year. Not as a real prospect, but as someone interesting. He played catcher, at least sometimes, and after he hit 338/346/581 in June and 304/309/543 in July at age 21, I figured, hey -- even in the Cal League, a name worth watching.

This year, he wasn't promoted, then hit like Babe Ruth in April. Et voila, he was, perhaps justly, seen as a real prospect in a system almost entirely bare of hitters. Promote the man now, cried the assembled masses. He's clearly too good for high A.

Since that incredible April, he hit a merely solid 321/385/431 in May and a disappointing 243/263/378 in the short portion of June we've played. Neither of which worries me. Both of which remind me that anything can happen in a hundred plate appearances.

Now, Sandoval did step up in the spring and 453/500/895 for a month. That's a good thing, and portends more hope for future performance than a Giants fan can usually expect from a non-overaged hitter in its farm system. I have hopes. Still, until he puts up more months like that, there's no rush to promote him, and he won't be much of a hitting prospect outside this very thin system.