Archive for February, 2011

MLB.com’s St. Louis Cardinals’ reporter Matthew Leach was kind enough to get more information about newly signed Dominican right-hander Fernando Gonzalez from farm director John Vuch.  Check out Leach’s full blog here.  If you don’t read his article at OYNAG or on MLB.com, you are severely missing out.  He and Derrick Goold are the two go-to beat writers for Cardinals news.  Anyway, to the money quote from Vuch:

“Gonzalez is an intriguing young kid. He’s 6’4 and very lean right now, making him very projectable. He’s got a very nice changeup already that projects as a future out pitch. While his velocity is currently a tick below average, with his age and size there’s plenty of reason to believe he’ll pick up additional velocity as he matures. Also throws a curve for his breaking pitch, and looks to be at least an average pitch for him down the road.”

I guess now we can see why the Cardinals got Gonzalez for only $66k.  Speed sells, even in the Dominican market.  Pitchers like Carlos Martinez, who already have an 80 fastball (on the 20-80 scouting scale) go for $1.5 million, but the Cardinals nab Gonzalez for considerably less.

I’m certainly not saying Gonzalez will not be a great pitcher some day, but players that are younger and pitch with less velocity are going to be less in demand, while the scouts gravitate to the pitcher that’s knocking over catchers on the other field.  Additionally, this is not a bad approach by the Cardinals either.  They have picked up a pitcher, whom all of their scouts like at age 16 and can get him into their coaches and develop him over a long period of time.  Just like AZ said, it is time to forget about Gonzalez for a few years until he will appear finally in our DFRs stateside.

And lastly, take John Vuch’s comments with a grain of salt, because it is in his best interest to talk up a new Cardinals signing.  I’m not sure what MPH equates to “a touch below average”, but that’s a telling line from a quote that is all positive except for that.

The Cardinals signed pitcher Fernando Gonzalez yesterday and today they have signed another per Derrick Goold of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. This signing is left-handed outfielder Jorge Araujo. Per Goold:

He throws and hits lefthanded, and vice president of player procurement Jeff Luhnow described him as “toolsy.”

And in his tweet, Derrick Goold hints that there “could be more coming”.

This is obviously not super relevant to the minor leagues of the St. Louis Cardinals which is Future Redbirds bread and butter, but we are all Cardinal fans here and I’ll be damned if I’m not getting this off my chest in the form of a blog post.  We’ve previously covered how the farm system can attempt to replace Albert Pujols from two different angles here and here.

Let’s take a look at what a real distraction would be…

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Per Dominican Prospect League via MLBTR

16 year old RHP signed for $66k drawing comparisons to Leo Nunez and you probably won’t hear his name again for another 2-3 years.

The Pujols negotiations are, well, pretty boring. If you are like me, you’re sick of hearing about aimless speculation about what will happen next. So lets speculate less aimlessly, if you will, about the future at first base without Five. We’ve got a few options. One, Matt Adams, may be a little far away, but that could change with an incredibly important, and what I cautiously see as a difficult, year for him in 2011. The other two are Mark Hamilton, and Allen Craig, viable mid-20′s players that could provide what most teams want from the corners — a hitter — one being more practical than the other. Let me explain…

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We’ll project our #1 prospect this week. I’ve debated what assumption to make regarding his level.  Let’s say that the Cardinals are aggressive with Mr. Miller and he gets his wish playing the entire season at Springfield.  Projections should be in the following format:

IP,Hits,BB,K,HR,ERA

Most projections have Descalso holding pace from last year and performing a tick better.  My personal line for him comes out to .276/.339/.391 as I think 2010 was probably about as good as we can expect from him. I’m n the minority there as the next closest projection still has .017 wOBA points on me — about 6 runs over the course of a season.

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The Cardinals are lacking anything resembling depth in their middle infield in the minor leagues and this is no more apparent than at the shortstop position.  They have no one in the system that is currently solidly projected to be a major league regular.  Tyler Greene at one point was projected that way (and may still become one) but has lost his luster through poor performance and the Memphis to St. Louis shuttle yo-yo.  Greene could quite possibly be “Punto’ed” (patent pending) off the major league roster and be back in Memphis for the 3rd straight season.  That actually would be a good move for the Cardinals short stop depth as they would actually have a prospect playing shortstop in Memphis.

The other tale of lost luster is former 1st round pick Pete Kozma, who’s story has been told a thousand times, but he has not had the upside of a major league starter since the evening when he was drafted (if even then).  Kozma’s play has not done anything to silence his doubters as he has piled up strikeouts at the plate and errors in the field.  He still has time to prove people wrong, but the clock is ticking.

Ryan Jackson might be the next best hope for a major league regular just because of his defense and he can pick it.  He has never been known for his bat, but he put up a line drive % around 23 last season, which is a good start.  If he continues to get solid contact at the plate, his defense will take him to the majors.  But as far as projecting him as a major league regular, that is still a long way off.

Sam Tuivailala is a 2011 draftee and highly projectable shortstop out of college.  However, he is not a sure thing to stay at short, he might move to third because of his size or to the mound.

Other guys kicking around are Yunier Castillo who was in short season Batavia last year and Ronny Gil (ex-Grabriel Hernandez) .  I’ll still always hold out hope for Gil, all his scouting reports and numbers were glowing from the Dominican.  He was out last year for false documents (and name).   Now that he is all set with his identity and slightly older, he could make an appearance in the US-based system this season.  Domnit Bolivar is another, yet smaller name.  Cesar Valera is also notable only for the fact that he started at short at Johnson City in his age 18 season.

So all these spilled pixels and names mean the Cardinals are dreadfully thin at short in the minor leagues and have not in quite a long time had a plus prospect at shortstop.  Other teams have had big time prospects but for mistakes or players not developing the Cardinals have not had one of their own and they continue the tradition with this motley crew of low upside and imperfectly projectable prospects.

The Cardinals do not only look thin at the major league level at 3rd base, they look pretty thin in the minors as well minus a few exceptions.  We are considering Freese and Allen Craig major leaguers at the position.

Matt Carpenter will play every day at Memphis at 3rd base to build on his breakout 2010.  Carpenter is the emergency third baseman should something happen to Freese and the Cardinals decide they do not want Allen Craig or Nick Punto starting every day at third.  Craig is much more palatable than Punto, but Carpenter is the “next man up” as far as 3rd base is considered.

The next step away from the majors has a bit of a empty space unless Zach Cox gets pushed to Springfield right away.  That seems unlikely, so Niko Vasquez might be the next in the depth chart here.  Vasquez finally began to hit again last season and finally gained his promotion to Quad Cities.  He will soon be hard pressed to turn his project-ability and swing into numbers in the mid to high minors.

Jermaine Curtis is also kicking around Springfield at third, but his projection does not take him anywhere above a 4-A player.

Further away from the minors is top 2010 draftee Zack Cox, who we have see so little of in the professional leagues that the jury is still out on how he will translate to the pros.  Scouts are mixed on Cox’s projection and whether he is a better fit on 2nd or 3rd, but his first full season in the minors should tell us two things.  First, where the Cardinals place him should tell us a lot about where they think he stands on his pro progression and his numbers should tell us a lot about where he actually stands.

John Rodriquez part 2 is also in the low minors with bonus baby Roberto De La Cruz.  At this point, De La Cruz has lost a lot of his luster and J-Rod 2 is waning.

After taking a second, third and forth look at the third baseman depth it is not as scary as I initially thought.  However, if Zack Cox moves off of third base, the Cardinals will need a huge year from either De La Cruz or JRod 2 to keep the quality of this group high.  What do you think?  Do the Cardinals have enough here?

I saw an interesting Keith Law tweet today:

Early view is that it’s the best since I joined the biz. RT @Studz2389: @keithlaw How deep do you consider this year’s draft?

I’m not fully versed on the 2011 class yet, that will take me a couple months yet, but I’m a little disappointed by Law’s tweet.  The Cardinals will have their typical draft pick in 2011 and that’s it. They’ll have no extra draft picks from free agent players.  The Rays in contrast will have a bevy of picks in the first round.

This isn’t a criticism of the Cardinals so much of a lamentation of the upcoming draft.  We’ll pick 22nd overall and while it’s impossible to know who will be available then 5 months in advance, there’s more college pitchers than I’d like to see in the top ranks of the draft.  The Cardinals need the opportunity to snag some additional position player talent and a single pick in the first round doesn’t really give them the latitude to take many risks.

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