2009 Springfield Hitting Stats
Posted on September 29th, 2009 by erik in Season Wraps, tags: Daniel Descalso, Jim Rapoport, Mark Hamilton, Pete Kozma, Tyler HenleyWe’re making some real progress now, all the way up to AA.
Let’s preface by giving the context talk again. While Palm Beach is a hitter’s graveyard, Springfield is an extremely hitter friendly park. The HR factor for Palm Beach is 80, for Springfield it is 122. What that means is if you can hit down in Florida, you will really like the move up to Missouri. Using Jeff Sackmann’s MLE calculator to illustrate this, last year Daryl Jones hit .326/.406/.476 for Palm Beach. Translating that to the Springfield environment, Jones would have hit .334/.413/.485. It’s no surprise then that Jones’ number improved upon moving up to Springfield last season. (Not so much this year, no thanks to injuries)
So this is why you don’t get overly excited when you see a .180 ISO from Tyler Henley. There’s nothing really in his scouting reports or past history to suggest he’s some sort of slugger or will likely ever be one. He might be a decent hitter and a nice player, but a power hitter he is probably not.
The league average line is .266/.340/.391 to give you a little more context. The average hitter is 24 years old.
| Age | PA | H | 2B | 3B | HR | SB | CS | BB | SO | BA | OBP | SLG | OPS ▾ | HBP | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mark Hamilton | 24 | 195 | 50 | 11 | 0 | 8 | 0 | 1 | 28 | 46 | .307 | .421 | .521 | .942 | 4 |
| Daniel Descalso | 22 | 324 | 93 | 26 | 5 | 8 | 0 | 1 | 31 | 41 | .323 | .396 | .531 | .928 | 4 |
| Andrew Brown | 24 | 302 | 75 | 11 | 2 | 13 | 1 | 0 | 31 | 49 | .285 | .371 | .490 | .861 | 6 |
| Tyler Henley | 24 | 473 | 128 | 31 | 3 | 13 | 9 | 4 | 40 | 64 | .303 | .367 | .482 | .849 | 5 |
| Brett Wallace | 22 | 154 | 36 | 5 | 0 | 5 | 0 | 0 | 18 | 34 | .281 | .403 | .438 | .840 | 8 |
| Curt Smith | 22 | 70 | 20 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 9 | .308 | .357 | .462 | .819 | 2 |
| Steve Hill | 24 | 508 | 131 | 26 | 2 | 19 | 1 | 2 | 36 | 106 | .282 | .333 | .470 | .803 | 2 |
| Aaron Luna | – | 84 | 16 | 4 | 0 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 8 | 18 | .232 | .361 | .420 | .782 | 6 |
| Shane Peterson | 21 | 80 | 21 | 4 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 5 | 10 | .284 | .338 | .405 | .743 | 1 |
| Daryl Jones | 22 | 336 | 82 | 14 | 3 | 3 | 7 | 4 | 33 | 65 | .279 | .360 | .378 | .738 | 6 |
| Matthew Arburr | 23 | 85 | 15 | 2 | 0 | 6 | 1 | 0 | 7 | 38 | .195 | .259 | .455 | .713 | 0 |
| James Rapoport | 24 | 543 | 117 | 16 | 6 | 4 | 12 | 7 | 71 | 73 | .255 | .358 | .343 | .700 | 4 |
| Mike Folli | 23 | 235 | 50 | 11 | 4 | 4 | 6 | 1 | 18 | 31 | .237 | .300 | .384 | .684 | 2 |
| Colt Sedbrook | 23 | 209 | 41 | 5 | 0 | 3 | 8 | 2 | 23 | 30 | .236 | .348 | .316 | .664 | 8 |
| Antonio DeJesus | 23 | 222 | 41 | 6 | 2 | 1 | 4 | 2 | 26 | 39 | .229 | .356 | .302 | .658 | 10 |
| Arnoldi Cruz | 22 | 444 | 89 | 25 | 2 | 10 | 1 | 0 | 34 | 85 | .220 | .281 | .366 | .647 | 1 |
| Peter Kozma | 21 | 459 | 88 | 15 | 3 | 6 | 4 | 2 | 42 | 88 | .216 | .288 | .312 | .600 | 1 |
| Donovan Solano | 21 | 276 | 52 | 7 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 21 | 39 | .207 | .271 | .255 | .526 | 1 |
| Nicholas Derba | 23 | 131 | 14 | 5 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 21 | 34 | .130 | .277 | .231 | .508 | 1 |
| 51 Players | 22.9 | 5380 | 1194 | 235 | 35 | 119 | 59 | 30 | 509 | 958 | .253 | .333 | .393 | .727 | 76 |
I’m not saying it’s time to jump on the Jim Rapoport bandwagon, but those are some nice plate discipline numbers. His walk rate was 4% last year for Springfield, 13% this year. That’s quite a jump. He also has some nice range in CF.
What do we make of Dan Descalso? He tore the cover off the ball, put up great numbers, got good reviews from scoutts, but once he was moved up to Memphis he slowed considerably and played a lot of games at 1B or DH. Jarrett Hoffpauir is 26 doesn’t project as anything more than a utility player, but yet was hogging up all the games at 2B. Oh, and Hoffpauir is a lowsy defensive 2B. Maybe all the early season Descalso hype was a bit premature.
Hooray for Mark Hamilton, who also hit well for Memphis.
Brutal season for the Kozmanaut.
Entries (RSS)
Descalso had nearly as many XBH’s as strikeouts–simply a tremendous feat for a middle infielder with an isolated slugging north of .200 (.186 on the road). And he turned a *ton* of DP’s as well.
Despite being young for AAA, and receiving sporadic playing time, DD maintained his excellent BB/K/AB ratios at Memphis, which is a positive marker for 2010. I remain optimistic that Dan can be an above-average MLB regular by 2012. Maybe sooner.
I like De Jesus offensively more so than Rapaport. His OBP has been outstanding from day 1. He´s a year younger so hopefuly he can catch up in the avg department. I don´t know if he is Rapaport´s equal defensiely though.
I am on the Brown bandwagon. The guy was on a tear before he got hurt. After a slow start when he came back he went on a tear again. If he can play a passsable outfield I think he´ll make it to the show.
Smith played well in the world cup. If he can add a little power next year his stock could skyrocket.
If Luna can ever get his avg up he´ll be a top prospect as well. His OBP/power combo projects well. My gut tells me he may end up a 3B even though he hasn´t played there yet. He is only 22.
Is Tony Cruz done as a prospect?
Again, what strikes me is how young the team is for the league. Only a few of the players are even 24 years old. On Kozma, he certainly had a lousy offensive year. But if he was still in AA in two years, I would think his offensive stats would be much improved and he would still be younger than average. Much too soon to give up on him, given how much the Cards have pushed him. All the same, DD is only one year older and was much better offensively. Perhaps we see some of the same jump for Kozma next year.
I admit I’m a Descalso believer but I really think he was handled poorly when he was promoted. DD’s stats in the TL were truly terrific for a youngish middle infielder and would be even if you just doubled his road stats. He hit well initially at Memphis and then they started moving him around defensively so that the great Jaret Hoffpauir could dazzle Memphis fans with his defense. First that puts a young player in the position of having to divide his attention between adjusting to a higher level of pitching and learning a new defensive position. Second that’s got to be a blow to his confidence to be moved out of position in favor of a player who will remain in AAA because of his lack of defensive skills. I assume that was done so that, in a pinch, Hoff would be ready to be called up again but it’s not a good way to develop Descalso. Had DD spent the year as the starting 2b at Springfield I think he would be in the running for number one on many people’s prospect lists. I’m keeping him close to that on mine but I do worry if the damage to his confidence might extend to next year.
By the way the same might be true of Kozma. He was young even for high class A and, if he hadn’t been promoted we’d probably be a lot more excited about him. At least he was allowed to keep his natural position.
I ran Hamilton’s numbers through that Sackmann toy and was somewhat disappointed at the answers it gave, at least in terms of his potential major-league performance. You have to think that he’s not going to have a major-league career wearing birds on the bat, considering that he’s going to have to be a first baseman. Accepting this, one would think a team-leading OPS might translate into something that makes him attractive trade bait, if nothing else. However, it seemingly doesn’t. Even his more promising AAA stats (fairly similar to the AA ones, and at a higher level) still project him looking more like, say, James Loney than anything really useful (snark). So you wonder just what trade value he does have. We may find out this winter.
In relation to DD, the limited playing time and flip flopping positions can make it hard on anyone. In AA he played everyday, but in AAA he was every other or every third day. This will greatly effect timing and thereby his offensive #’s. He is excellent defensively, making webgems all the time, and is very good on the routine plays as well.
As for Hoffpauir, I do not know where people are getting that he cannot play defense. The times I have seen him (milb video and in person), he has been, at the very minimum, solid to possibly above average at least for AAA level. In addition, he has seemed to found some power this year and is very tough to strike out.
Kozma is young, reevaluate next year. Henley has a great stroke and seems to be a gamer and Brown has great power and made a huge comback this year. Hamilton homered 14 times in less than 300 AB’s and led Springfield in OPS and was second to only Craig in OPS in Memphis, posting almost identical #’s at each level. He also hit over .400 in the playoffs with another homer…. add another 200 AB’s to that and who knows how many homers/doubles.
Curt Smith should be interesting in a full year at AA next year in that hitter friendly park.
Living here in Springfield, I don’t see a place for Rapoport or Dejesus here or on any of our minor league rosters next year.With the log jam @ Memphis there is talk that Jones won’t move up right away but start the year @ AA and with Chambers, Swauger and probably Pham moving up I believe they will be the odd men out.
Descalso and Henley are gamers, more durable than Hamilton and Jones. Hoffpauir will be traded this winter to get him out of the way.
Rapoport and De Jesus have the long term potential to reach AAA for some organization. Kozma will be a ML player.
mike, by any chance did you see king, mulligan, or fick pitch after their last season call ups? scouting reports on king are nasty and mulligan and fick put up good numbers.
It will be interesting to see what happens with Jarrett Hoffpauir. He starts the year at age 26 with virtually no chance to make the big club. Moving Skip to 2B, the acquisition of Lugo and his inability to play any position but 2B shut the door. T. Greene also plays 2B. So he’s blocked from moving up and has pressure from below in the form of Descalso. Descalso needs to play every day at 2B next season, period. For Hoffpauir’s sake, I hope he gets released and then picked up by a team thin at 2B. There are plenty out there. If Hoff stays at Memphis for the 2010 season, then it should be as a 3B.
Loogy, I’m very impressed with Mulligan. Of the 3 names you mentioned I’d say he has the best chance to make it to the big leagues. He throws hard (91-93), but think King throws harder (93-95), but has much better control than King. He’ll be back in Springfield at the start of the year but wouldn’t be suprised if he finishes 2010 with Memphis. I just saw King once against Tulsa he pitched a couple of innings and gave up 3 or 4 runs and alot of walks. It may have been just a bad game but he doesn’t have a smooth pitching motion and to me it looked like he’s an arm injury waiting to happen. Fick is not a hard thrower and can’t really think of anything exceptional about him( a pitch to contact pitcher) but he did have a good ERA which is saying something in the Texas League ballparks. If he hadn’t had 1 bad game he wouldn’t have an ERA at all.
I was wondering if hamilton and hoffpauir would make sense in a trade, say, to the giants. Hoff as a backup 2b and hamilton to contend for a 1st base role.
Unfortunately Hoff and Hamilton, like most of our AAA players, have very little trade value despite the fact that they are likely to play some in the majors. Jay, Stavinoha, Craig, Freese, Greene, Anderson et al are in the same boat. The latter four have more potential but I can’t see other teams giving someone worthwhile up for them. I give Freese the best shot at having a real career partly because I think DeRosa will leave and we’ll give him a shot as the everyday 3b. Like everyone here I would like to see Craig given a shot. We get no reports on his outfield D but, as an ex shortstop and third baseman you’d think he’d have the speed and arm to be a far better left fielder than…say C Dunc. The rest are great guys to be able to call on in a pinch but I think they’ll all spend their careers bouncing up and down between AAA and the show.
There will be 5 or 6 openings next year in STL if the Cards re-sign Matt Holliday. Look for the following players to possibly not be re-signed if this happens:
Derosa
Ludwick
Ankiel
Wellenmeyer
Pinero
Thurston
With Glaus, Pineiro, K. Greene, Welle, Ankiel, and Adam Kennedy coming off the books, roughly $35 million is available for next year, even if payroll remains the same as 2009.
So obviously, there is plenty enough dough for Matt Holliday and much, much more. ;)
Thurstom makes near the major league minimum so tying his re-signing to Holliday makes no sense (on a financial basis).
Ludwick is arb eligible and will be re-signed but he could be traded after that.
With Matt Holliday your probally looking at 20 -22 Million plus you have to add in pay raises in several players contracts. Thurston is probally gone if the Cards opp to have T Greene at the bigs and use him for a back up at 3RD, SS and 2nd. Also noticed that they had him in CF the other day. With Thurston its not the $$, its the playing time and the 40 man limit. We have developed a number of players that are a year or so away and must be added to the 40 man if the organization doesn’t want to lose them to other clubs via the rule 5.