Wrapping up the review.
| 1 | Rasmus |
| 2 | Garcia |
| 3 | Anderson |
| 4 | Perez |
| 5 | Ottavino |
| 6 | Herron |
| 7 | Mortensen |
| 8 | Motte |
| 9 | Craig |
| 10 | Walters |
#10: Thus begins the start of my mistakes in the top 10. Pitchers, as a whole, are gonna take a big hit from last year to this year on my prospect list. Walters is a decent pitcher but I’ve watched him a couple times and I’m still not sold on him as a starting pitcher in the bigs. He should have been lower on this list.
#9: I’m a huge Allen Craig fan. I think he’s a better hitter than Freese and criminally underrated among position prospects in the system. Happy with his spot on this list.
#8: Good ole Jason Motte. Great fastball, terrible secondary pitches. I think this was an appropriate spot on the list but the pendulum swung from under appreciated to over appreciated after his brief major league stint.
#7: Mortensen is a good pitcher with some of the best stuff among starters in the system. He was horribly rushed last year in moving up to AAA. Probably too high again given the fluky drop in walks but this isn’t a horrible spot for him.
#6: Command pitcher with so-so stuff. I’ve learned my lesson with these players. Herron was ranked way too high on this list.
#5: Ouch. Too high again. Injuries have destroyed his professional record. Should have been lower on the list last year (although still on it) but moving forward he’s not on the radar. A move to the bullpen might be in his best interest.
#4 – #1: These are all basically dead on and arguments that they should be in a different order are quibbling.
The good picks: Craig, Motte
The bad picks: Herron, Ottavino
There’s some pretty big movement from last year’s list to this year’s. Like I mentioned above, pitchers as a whole are going to take a big hit for me. I’m not impressed with the quality of stuff that the Cardinals’ pitchers display nor the system’s ability to develop pitchers. Command problems seem like a severe weakness from top to bottom in the organization. The hitters for the most part hold par or move up by default. Stay tuned for the 2009 Prospect List.
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Couldn’t agree more on Craig, after seeing him everyday this year in Springfield I have been very impressed. Having not seen Freese in person I cant say for sure that Craig is better but on my own personal prospect list I have him higher…Ouch on the Herron pick…The Ottavino pick, while being high, isnt that bad considering how much hype and potential he came in with he has just petered out…cant wait for the 2009 lists!
Not sure Herron is such a big ouch. Many a pitcher gets beaten up in their first go round in the Texas League.
You are right about Craig though…he is severely underrated. He will probably come in at 14 over at Bird Land. I agree that he is a better prospect than Freese. Also, according to Goold, Craig has spent time at 2B:
dg – Do you think that there is any way that Craig could handle 2B. I know it is a common refrain around here (moving people to 2B, that is) but Craig seems fairly athletic and his bat would really stand out there.
— stldrakelaw
3:49 pm November 20th, 2008
Craig has already shown that he can move to the outfield and that he can play first base. His arm may be best suited for second base. Back in college, Craig played everywhere, and that did include some starts at second base. Haven’t seen him play there, so it’s difficult to say. But it’s something to look for during spring training.
— Derrick Goold
3:54 pm November 20th, 2008
BTW – I went back and looked up some of Allen Craig’s stats and boxscores from his time at Cal and while I did not take the time to look through every game, I saw that he did spend a fair amount of time at shortstop. Craig’s bat would be very very good at 2B if he could be average defensively.
http://calbears.cstv.com/sports/m-basebl/archive/cal-m-basebl-sched-2005.html
http://calbears.cstv.com/sports/m-basebl/archive/cal-m-basebl-sched-2004.html
http://calbears.cstv.com/sports/m-basebl/archive/cal-m-basebl-sched-2003.html
Wow. No extra draft picks (http://hotstove.mlblogs.com/). I’m surprised they didn’t offer to Looper, at least.
Unless I’m not understanding something, that is incredibly lame. Looper was a no brainer.
I assume from the last two comments that they did not offer arb to Looper. I also don’t understand this at all. They would either get a draft pick or a useful starter with only a one year commitment. Win win. Happens every year with someone. Don’t get it. If Carp doesn’t come back they’ll need Looper badly. If Carp comes back Looper’s way better than Piniero. They’ve already given Lohse 10 mil a year for four years and now they’ll probably do the same for another mediocrity. It seems to me, given the probability that starting pitchers will be inconsistent or get hurt that one year contracts for decent ones are a great deal. Someone please give me a rational explanation for this.
Well at least the Cards wont have to worry about those nasty sandwich round bonuses this year
Cheap, Cheap, Fun, Fun!
Extremely frustrated right now.
Even offering to Izzy would have been preferable. The Mets are starved for relievers right now, and you know they would offer more St. Louis. This screams of to evert risk at all costs to me. This is a very disturbing development
Even offering arbitration to Izringhausen would have been nice. The Mets are starving for relievers right now, and you could be assured that they would have made a better offer than St. Louis. This screams of everting risk at all costs to me. A very disturbing development to be sure.
I guess I am getting tired of drafting the same college right hander every year in the sandwich round.
Unfortunately, the pitching side of things didn’t go as well. Justin Fiske posted a 4.91 ERA (though he had nearly as many unearned runs as earned), but Tyler Norrick and Brad Furnish were hit hard.
Luhnow pointed to Adam Ottavino, though, as a case where the numbers didn’t tell the whole story. Ottavino put up a 6.17 ERA over eight starts, but he struck out 25 against 10 walks. Three of his eight starts were scoreless outings.
“He had at least three starts when he was down there where he could have pitched in the big leagues and had success,” Luhnow said. “That’s what we’re looking for. He needs to make that a consistent thing next year, but I believe when you do that, and you’re punching guys out that are going to be big leaguers next year, it develops a sense of confidence that he really needs.”
^^ Thats from Stltoday.
cardsfan1–that and the AFL is an incredibly hard league to pitch in. The AFL hit for a collective .838 OPS. His FIP in the AFL is pretty respectable at 4.28. From what I’ve been told, Ott has struggled with mechanics all season long and was sent to Arizona to iron out his issues. I’m not sure if he just got in a rut trying to get back to his mechanics in college or what, exactly, but I think he’s getting at least a little overlooked now. I still have hopes he’ll put it all together.
I’m sure he will get overlooked, just like a lot of other good prospects that never get mentioned.
Just out of curiosity, do you think if Jamie Garcia was drafted in the top 5 rounds he would still be considered the top pitching prospect in the organization? Personally, I think he is a great player, but had he been drafted top 5 rounds he would have been expected to be doing what he is. I think him being drafted so late is part of the reason he is so high on prospect lists.
Jess Todd has put up good numbers but I don’t think he will be placed particularly high on prospect list as he was a second rounder and is expected to do what he is doing.
My other problem with a lot of these prospect lists (not this one) is that most of the people that compile these lists have never seen a majority of the players play, and they also get their “scouting” from other organizations, and I don’t think that is very reliable to use for rankings.
For example, with the 2006 draft, 9 teams passed on Tim Lincecum. If you were to do prospect rankings with information from those 9 teams, obviously Tim would not have been number 1 going into the draft. I think that based on what Tim has done this year and last, we can agree that he was the #1 prospect in that years draft class.
I know this was convoluted, but I hope you understand the points I was trying to make.
For me, I don’t care that Garcia was picked in the 22nd round or whatever. The fact that he was a successful lefty with a plus breaking pitch mattered more to me. His combination of Ks and grounders is why I rated him highly (and I would hope this is why others do as well).
re: Todd
The organization certainly set him up for success by framing his drafting in the context of a college reliever. That said, his numbers aren’t that good and I’m not on the bandwagon so I can’t speak to what was expected because I’m not overwhelmed by what he’s done. There’s a valid argument to be made that expectations are higher for those drafted earlier but I think that diminishes over time.
Nothing is ever said about Nick Additon, and he is a left-handed starter!
Nick Additon has an 84 MPH fastball and meh complimentary pitches. I don’t consider him to be much of a prospect.