As you may know, AZ is in Vegas probably recreating the movie Hangover so that leaves me to mind the store while he’s gone. Consequently, we will not have the scouting reports up for draft picks in the rounds 11-50 until Monday probably. We will have them broken up into 4 posts as follows next week.
11-20
21-30
31-40
41-50
Please accept our apologies for the delay.
Entries (RSS)
no apologies needed, we appreciate the effort, plus none look too exciting anyway. I always puzzle that they bother to draft 50 players anyway.
In rare instances you get Mike Piazza in the 50th round, so its worth a shot
I wonder how many actual major leaguers have been drafted beyond 30. I’m guessing those guys are a thousand to one to even MAKE IT, let alone turn into a Piazza.
Garcia was a 22nd rounder, wasn’t he?
Just doing a very fast check on BR I found that Garcia was orginally drafted by the Orioles in the 30th round in 2004. In 2003 Scott Feldman (1.2 WAR), Mark Melancon (.9 WAR) and Johnny Venters (3.5 WAR) were drafted in the 30th round.
Looking at the 36th round only here are the positive WAR leaders from 2000-2010:
2000: Scott Baker (11.7 WAR), Tim Stauffer (3.7)
2003: Logan Ondrusek (1.3), Wade LeBlanc (.9)
2006: Matt Downs (.2)
So the 36th round hasn’t produced very much and for the two bigger names they were both high schoolers who did not sign with the Pirates (Baker) or the O’s (Stauffer) and were then taken in the first two rounds in 2003.
Out of Curiosity I also looked up the 50th Round and found some positive WARs there as well:
2000: David Murphy (5.5), Brian Buscher (.5, was drafted in the 50th round in 99 as well, then in the 3rd in 03)
2005: Buster Posey (4.3, for a guy drafted 6th from last to go to 5th overall must be fun)
2006: Jarrod Dyson (.8, was signed that year and has a .167/.286/.167 line with the Royals and a .316/.416/.342 line with Omaha this year)
Can’t forget Mike Piazza
Nice info. Would be nice to break it down into speculative high-school picks who didn’t sign (seemingly, most of the high WAR guys fit into that bracket – posey, Baker etc.) and guys who did actually sign.
I’m guessing Motte was a late round selection as well. I think the Cards have done better than most with post-10th round guys, mainly due to Pujols and Garcia (probably luck more than anything) but also guys like KMac, and Motte (I think).
Jason Motte’s BR page says: “Drafted by the St. Louis Cardinals in the 19th round of the 2003 MLB June Amateur Draft.”
BR’s draft site is: http://www.baseball-reference.com/draft/
when on that site just put in the round and year you are interested in and it will pull up the players. When on a certain year or round (say 2001 round 40) you will see a link to the same year and adjacent round (2001 39 and 2001 41) and same round adjacent years (2000 40 and 2002 40) so it is easy to start with 2000 and stick with the 40th round or to start with round 30 and work to round 50 for any given year.
I WANT THEM NOW…seriously though, I can’t imagine trying to find all that info…thanks for your time and hard work
Just saw that we took Colby Rasmus’s brother.
“#STLCards draft Casey Rasmus, C, Liberty U. in the 36th round (1,100th overall). Brother of Cardinals CF Colby Rasmus.”
Jeff, you guys do a hell of a job with this stuff. No apologies needed.
What an odd draft this is for the Cards.
Through 42 rounds, here’s my count of the picks by position:
6 catchers
6 outfielders
5 middle infielders
2 first basemen
1 third baseman (very late in the draft)
13 RHP
8 LHP
Most surprising is the distribution:
5 outfielders in the first 17 rounds, with 4 from HS
3 catchers in the first 20 rounds
5 LHP in rounds 21-30
Breaks from traditional patterns:
* Very few of these guys are from name-brand colleges; I don’t think any of our draftees are still active in the CWS.
* Only 3 pitchers were drafted in the first 10 rounds.
* Of those, only Gaviglio profiles as a starter, and he’s an extremely polished sinkerballer with a marginal fastball, far from the Ottavino/Blair prototype of hard throwers with questionable command.
* I don’t see much if any projectable power in this group. Out of curiosity, I Googled Danny Stienstra, the 1st baseman we took in the 12th round. He’s a senior at San Jose State. Here’s his quote: “I got a call on my cell phone while I was working out and it was a scout from the Cardinals telling me I had been drafted,” Stienstra said. “To be honest, I wasn’t even paying attention to the draft and was a bit surprised that I was taken in the 12th round.” He’s a right-handed 1st baseman who’s known for his defense and plate discipline. I don’t know if he hit 10 homers in his 4 years of college.
I’m not dissing the draft. I just don’t know what the Cards were up to this time around. I’m sure they got guys they’re excited about.
Our first 2 picks — Wong and Tilson — were ranked #20 and #42 on Project Prospect’s pre-draft list, so they’re very legit picks at #22 and #79. In a year with less depth, they might’ve gone a lot higher.
PP had Wong as the 4th-best college hitter, following Rendon, Springer, and Mahtook. Here’s what they said: “College infielders with sustained track records of success (like Wong) fare very well in the pros. Ones with Wong’s plate discipline, contact ability, and improvement from sophomore to junior years are near certain to have solid big league careers. Wong is the safest of the late first round prospects.”
The only other guy who shows up on anyone’s radar is Martini, who was considered a top-50 draft prospect a few months back (can’t remember whose list) but slipped. Coming into the draft BA had him at #172, and expected him to go in the first 5 rounds. So he might be a third value pick in our top 10.
I just hope the Cards’ scouts unearthed some gems. Otherwise, it sure does look like they reached in almost every round after they got Wong and Tilson.
Wow Lou. . .this is outstanding information. Good job!
Tilson can possibly provide some sizzle to this class, but for the most part it was unusual draft for the Cardinals. Seems they emphasized getting young speed and athleticism into the system to the detriment of pitching and power.
Not a lot of the proven college bats taken either. I will say, it will be interesting following this group. We definitely upped our speed, but don’t see one 15 HR (over a full season) guy in the mix.
It’s not like our system is loaded with power prospects either. perplexing at best.
We got the best baseball name in the draft at # 530. Dutch Deol. If we can just sign him!!!
In past years it seems there was always a Steve Hill, Xavier Scruggs, or Andrew Brown after the 10th round. I figured they drafted those guys to make sure the real prospects had some protection in the lineup. And occasionally a guy like Matt Adams would emerge as a real prospect.
But they must’ve made some calculation that told them they’re wasting too many picks on sluggers who would put up good minor-league numbers but were unlikely to make it to the show.
I can’t imagine that at the end of the day they all looked at each other and said, “You know, I think we forgot to draft a slugger.”
Actually I can see them saying that after the fact. Sometimes you get so wrapped up in picking off your board you forget the balance. Pitcher/hitter balance is easier to see as you go along.
My thoughts exactly. Don’t get me wong – I’m all for the infusion of athleticism and speed into our system, because God knows we need it – but there’s not even one arm that I’m mildly excited about either.
I have a feeling our Johnson City team is going to lose a lot of 12-1 contests.
“I can’t imagine that at the end of the day they all looked at each other and said, “You know, I think we forgot to draft a slugger.”
lol that was funny, They may just not have been very high on any of the sluggers that were available to them when their picks came around, I’m glad they didn’t draft another all bat prospect that dosen’t have a position, we already have a bunch of minors guys that seem to be able to hit very well but can’t stick at any postion or butcher their OF positions
Exactly. Brown, Luna, Adams (OK, maybe he’s an exception the way he’s hit this year), Hamilton, even guys like Scruggs. A bunch of 1B/corner OF types with zero defensive value who all profile as above-average major league bats. There’s only so many of those guys you need in the NL.
Hey we agree on something, we already have alot more speed and athleticism than we are given credit for. Very little power.
Really surprised that we drafted no Puerto Rican kids this year. Seems we’ve been getting a couple every year lately.
3 from Hawaii.
Non-sequitar of the year goes toooooo…..
Non-sequitur
Hawaii and Puerto Rico are both island, btw.
lol. I almost made that exact same point (the only thing they have in common being islands) in jest; now I see you actually meant it!
Sometimes you can get an athlete to play baseball, sometimes you can’t.
I hope we can!
I don’t know what we might have gotten in the way of baseball players, but it sure looks like we could field a couple of 4 x 100 relay steams now!!
“teams” sorry
What a freakin’ overview, Lou! Nice research, sir.
One guy who DOES seem to have power potential is 18-year-old 20th rounder Aramis Garcia. Good size at 6′ 2″ and 195 (too big to stay at catcher?) and a nice power progression during his H.S. career:
Freshman year, .115 isolated slg.
Sophomore yr., .240
Junior season, .391
And this year, .523
I know high school stats are very close to completely meaningless, but at the very least we know the kid’s power is on the upswing. :)
Funny thing, Baseball America projected Garcia to go in the 5th/6th round range—did he fall due to signability concerns, I wonder? (From what little I could find, his defensive rep is solid, too.)
Also, as far as projecting HS ballplayers, I wouldn’t fret overly about the lack of present power. I mean, unless a guy has an *unusually* slappy low-leverage swing, for instance.
For discussion’s sake, if our 2nd, 3rd, or 10th rounder turns into an MLB corner OF who hits, say, .290-.300, with 60-70 walks, 14-17 homers, 34-38 doubles, and above average baserunning/glovework….well, I’d guess that’s about a 4-win player. Good enough for me. ;)
(And who’s to say these 17/18 year old outfielders won’t grow some more anyway? [I grew 3-4 inches in college, myself.])
So did I but it took me a few more years to figure out what to do with my arms and legs.
As someone who doesn’t even know these guys’ names until the Cardinals draft them I just have a few contradictory and probably indefensible comments.
1. The pattern of drafting after the first two rounds indicates that the Cardinals thought that they had a better read on this draft than the pundits and publications. As a BA subscriber since it’s inception my impression is that this has more often gotten them in trouble in the past than ahead of the game.
2. Having said this, without knowing about the guys they passed up, I’m kind of happy about the choices. If the negative reaction to the Wong choice was inspired by a general denigration of the 2b position I think it’s misguided. Most of us were clamoring for Cox to be moved there. Now we have a fairly similar hitter with a proven ability to play the position leaving Cox free to compete with Carpenter and Freese at his own favored position. I think it’s a very good thing to have a late draft position, no extra picks and to be fairly confident that you’ve gotten a very solid major league baller.
Tilson also seems like a pretty defensible choice as some pundits, including KLaw had him going earlier.
3. After that it seems like a matter of who signs and ends up sticking to the wall. It does seem that, at this point, the Cards decided that the common wisdom about this draft wasn’t going to get them useful players. To tell you the truth it is at this point, third round or so, that that seems to be usually correct and that creativity and insider dope are worth more than the ratings.
From what we’ve heard about our picks the numbers 6, 7, and 10 guys seem to have some real upside behind them. The comments on the defensive ability of the #6 catcher sound great for a 6th rounder. Martini’s obp skills make him way more interesting to me than the average 7th rounder and the round 10 outfielder appears to have way more upside than the average #10 choice. The #’s3 and 4 picks may also but we don’t seem to know enough about them. As Bob points out re: the 20th pick, there may be more interesting ones in the mix.
In short I think the team wisely ditched the “stock the system with decent ballplayers” philosophy and made a couple of very solid choices followed by a bunch of dice rolls that might yield a diamond or two. I think that’s fairly exciting but it’ll a long time before we know what we got.
Those are good points, easy. The way this draft was conducted also makes me wonder what the organization’s activity level/approach will be this year in Latin America, or if it will have any effect at all..
I get a feeling that they think that their money is better spent there but we’ll have to see.
Easy, I liked your analysis above.
Regarding the International signing period, Strauss said the following today in his chat: ” I’m hearing that the Cardinals may be very active in the Caribbean next month but that they are less likely to vie for top-dollar talent…it’s more likely the club will spread the same dollars ($1.5 million) among a number of players this time.”
I was hoping for a bigger splash that what he is describing but we will have to see. I hope they are grabbing some shortstops and catchers.
That makes no sense with us cutting the VSL our system is pretty much filled. We need to make high impact talent, but I guess i like getting alot of guys and seeing who will develop.
Maybe they believe there are no players the caliber of Carlos Martinez they can get this year? Just a guess.
I thought I read that Oscar Tavares signed for $100k so perhaps it is not that big a deal. I don;t know how many kids from the DR command bonuses over $250k. Anyone have figures on that?
Tilson may be the first position player at a high round who comes from the north, since Ferris in 2004 taught them a lesson. They must really like Tilson to violate a geographic rule.
I wonder what its like to be after the 33rd round, when youre picked after a guy who is paralysed
It’s a little bit funny to hear a lot of grousing about balance a few days after the “best player available ” and drafting for need discussion that follow the wong draft.
Doesn’t the same principle apply to rounds 2-50? Shouldn’t we draft the best player available? If we get 4 jon jays, couldn’t we just trade a couple of them? I’d much rather draft guys who are interesting to the club than, say, add to the shorey/stavinoha/brown/hill/hamilton mash of players who can hit all right but maybe not well enough to get to the majors and don’t have a position. Especially in a club with one or maybe both of the all bat positions filled for years to come.
Getting a slugger just to say we got one seems like a flawed strategy.
Tom the issue with what your saying is 09 percent of the guys we draft there purpose is organizational filler and the main purpose is so that they can field teams around the better players and give them competition so they can advance. You never want to draft for need in the Top 10 rounds I believe but we did but after that alot of it has to do with minor league needs and just throwing players at a wall and seeing who will stick. Also the lower lower rounds alot has to do with what positions need to be fille din the Short Season teams. If a SS team already has 8 outfielders it makes no sense to choose an OF at 47 when we have no platying tim for them.
The first choice, Wong, was traditional, collegiate, Cape Cod League. Also 5, 7, 14.
Many departures from tradition. 4 high school position players among the top 6 picks. McElroy one of the speediest draftees since Vince Coleman.
Just 8 college RH starting pitchers, not high rounds 5, 11, 20, 30, 35, 37, 42, 49
Almost as many RH relievers from colleges, 9, 16, 23, 33, 43, 44
Some injury bounceback plays, 14, 31, 34
A few tough signs, 26, 47
Catchers, CF, middle infielders, LHPs, and few 1B/3B and premium pitchers. Players from many low profile schools. A bold draft.
Sorry this wasn’t bold at all. This draft was taking a safe pick at 1 with alot better talent on the board and then reaching for guys in rounds 2-10. I believe we could have gotten our 3rd and 4th round picks in the 7th through 12th rounds. Yes there are some interesting guys but this wasn’t a bold draft at all. THis is a bold draft if we go over slot at 22 with a top arm or we take one of the 10 or 12 guys that fell due to signability. We did no such thing.
Who was the “better talent on the board” than Wong? I can see lots of guys who were probably “as good as” Wong, but “better”? I don’t see it.
There was no better position player on the board but Guerrari, Norris, Howard and Owens were all clearly better in my mind. Should have said clearly more upside.
I really don’t buy your argument. Those guys are no more certain to produce at the major league level than Wong. They’re pitchers…who may do well or may not…not a guarantee in the bunch. So much consternation over a decision made by capable people so much closer to the problem than you are.
I know what your saying what I’m saying is a Top of the rotation talent has a potential much greater impact than a second baseman. Unless you happen to get lucky with a Robinson Cano/Chase Utley/Ryne Sandberg/Jeff Kent 2b has very little value to me compared to pitcher.
How does a pitcher, who maybe reaches the team 4-6 years from now, make a much greater impact than a kid who in a year or two may play every game for the next ten to twelve years? We have been running a deficit at 2d base for about a decade. They decided to take a big step to fix that. Hurray for them!
I understand your thought that the pitcher has a huge ceiling…but that just isn’t in any way guaranteed. We may have mistepped with Kozma but all the hype about Porcello was just that. He’s turned into a very expensive #3 or 4 pitcher who has 211 K’s in 399 innings. He was supposed to be the pitcher of the decade. Guerrieri shows no such “promise” from the pre draft scouts.
There is no way that Wong would have been available for round 2, so really, it was a no brainer. We drafted for need and hit the mark. It’s really simple, frankly. BPA is just in the eye of the beholder.
We have no idea if he’s going to hit a mark or not until he’s in the bigs. I do think its pretty much guaranteed that Wong can be a starter on some times a that he will hit .270 but other than that I don’t think he’s a sure thing to do anything.
Regarding Porcello you may say hes an expensive 3 or 4 BUT look at how much it costs to sign a 3 or a 4. 7 million for 6 years of Porcello or 8 a year for a Westbrook? Heck before Lohse turned it around he was makign 12 mil and he was a 5. It’s just a matter of how you look at it.
Who is to say that Wong will end up being a better ball player than Greg Garcia. It seems like people are overlooking the actual chance that Wong wont reach his potential.
That’s right. We don’t know what any of these kids are going to do. We do know that Wong has an excellent chance to play 2d base, just not sure how good he’s going to be. How different when you take a kid out of HS who has played SS or 2d base than when you take a kid who has excelled in college and Cape Cod. We play the odds with our picks and the odds are pretty good that this kid is going to fit well into our plans. That’s why they call him a high floor player.
The team has to decide how best to help themselves. Taking a kid who has a pretty good chance to help you fill a huge void isn’t a bad choice and I don’t think you should waste another minute lamenting it. It’s a done deal and there’s plenty of logic for the decision. It’s not like Guerrieri was a lock.
P.S. You misrepresent Porcello. He wasn’t a 3 or 4 in 2007 or 2008 when he received his first $5M. He was in the minors. In 2009 he was a 4 or 5 who gave them 165 innings of 4 ERA and lost a one game playoff. $1.2M.
The next year it’s 162 innings of 5 ERA… #5 starter. $1.02M.
This year it’s early but he is finally looking like a #3. $1.54M.
Despite his option next year, he will qualify for arbitration. If his 2011 stands up, he’ll likely cost more than Westbrook next year…when Boras is through with the Tigers.
What we got from Westbrook was a wily veteran who is giving us exactly what we bargained for…. What Detroit got is a kid who will go to arbitration next year and in 3 years will qualify for FA…giving the Tigers only a few of his best years. And I reiterate, Porcello was one of the most hyped pitchers ever…until Strasburg. Oh, and how is he turning out? $15M and so far a -1.5 WAR and 12 starts. He’s gonna really have to tear up next year to earn that money. And who knows what he’ll look like in 2012?
Just sayin’, none of these guys, particularly pitchers, are locks.
I think I can come of with a short post that sums this draft all up. I don’t see any ML level arms or size here. I was pretty pissed that they passed on Meyer @ #22. This is where you draft the big horse top pitcher on the board. You land all the other undersized guys later.
I’m ok with passing on Meyers he has Adam Ottavino written all over him and I dont know if he will ever be consistant. I think the pick at 22 should have been Guerrari, Howard or Owens.
That’s what burns people about Adam Ottavino. Excellent FB sloppy command. I wish the guy would quit trying to pattern his delivery like Chris Carpenter which seems to make him off balance on his follow through and delivery and go to some thing a little more balanced. Like Lynn’s delivery well balanced.
Ottavino’s delievry used to be a complete mess now its simpler. He’s still walking alot but he’s about the locate his slider very very well and has been good this year minus a few performances. I’m still really high on him I just don’t didn’t want the Cardinals using the pick on Meyers who seems more destined for the pen than Guerrari is.
One impression I got from this draft is that nobody drafting above the Cardinals made as egregious a screwup this year as in the past couple (notably Shelby). A problem with drafting 22nd is that even in a good year, there aren’t more than about 10 or 12 real big-time talents. In 2009 that was enough, because Miller inexplicably went undrafted. Nobody screwed up that way this year. (Well, nobody except the Cubs, and that wasn’t enough for a top-10 talent to drop to the 22nd pick.)
This whole draft looks “normal” to me. The question is whether a diamond in the rough will emerge from the later slots _a la_ Jaime Garcia, Matt Carpenter, Kyle McClellan, etc., not to mention that guy drafted in the 13th round a few years back. It’s always possible, but if any of them could be predicted to be such a diamond in the rough, they wouldn’t have lasted as long as they did, by definition.
Tayler Guerrari was our Shelby Miller this year. He was rated the 3rd best prep pitcher and the 10th guy on the BA board. Him falling to 22 was the same as Miller falling to us in 09.
I like the Cubs first round pick alot more than ours.
Andrew, I propose a new rule: If you’re going to use every post to criticize the Cardinals for not drafting Taylor Guerrieri, you should at least spell the kid’s name correctly.
FWIW, I also like the Cubs’ first-round pick more than I like ours. I like all the picks in the top 9. But I would’ve hated to sit through a miserable 2010 season with the only consolation being the #9 overall draft pick. It was hard enough watching our team underachieve its way to the #22 pick.
I have no problem with passing on Guerrieri. Sounds like there are serious makeup issues. HS pitchers are risky enough i bet the Cards did there homework and decided he wasnt worth the risk.
Guys like Kevin Goldstein reported that the Cards were heavily scouting HS pitching. He and others predicted the Cards would draft the best of whoever was still available. I think BA was the only publication to correctly forecast Wong at #22.
I don’t understand the Cards’ strategy in this draft — just as a practical matter, I don’t see how they’re going to distribute playing time at JC and in the GCL with all these new outfielders, assuming they get them signed in time to play this summer — but I have to assume they did their homework on all the HS pitchers who were available and decided they liked other guys better.
The more I read about Kolten Wong, the more I like the pick. He may be a safe choice, but a safe choice who produces 2-3 WAR a year starting in 2013 or ’14 is a tremendous value that late in the first round. If Guerrieri has a more valuable career, then whoever made the decision to draft Wong will have to accept that he made the wrong choice. I don’t know who has final say — Mo? Luhnow? the owners? — but they had no shortage of information and chose the college second baseman over the high school pitcher.
Did they know something about Guerrieri that the rest of us don’t? Was it his price tag? Something about his delivery? We may never know.
At this point, I think we all understand that some of us don’t like the pick. But what’s done is done, and we won’t know for years which team made the better choice.
There’s also something to be said about our position as an org, our budget, and our current farm system. Arguably, we didn’t NEED to go high-risk with our pick, or our strategy in general. With one of the best teams in the NL, and a decent number of high-upside talents on the farm, plus a competitive payroll every year, there’s an argument that an 80% chance of a few 2-3 WAR players is worth more to us in terms of staying competitive than a 20% chance of a 5-6 WAR player (i.e. a high school pitcher). It’s teams like the Pirates that NEED to take those risks, because they’re not going to become competitive any other way.
I hate the whole staying competitive. Why not focus on winning and not just staying competitive. We can have a bad team and still stay competitive in the NL Central most of the time. Our farm system is better but its still far from excellent.
I’d rather be competitive every year (80-90 wins) than good one year and out of it the next. Although I can see the alternative argument as well.
I disagree. You can’t judge a draft pick by how well some other draft pick does. If he produces a 2-3 WAR its a success no matter what Guerrieri does. It means they already beat the odds.
Those who fail are teh the other 15+ teams who won’t develop a 3 WAR talent out of the first round.
And while Guerrieri might turn into a good player, it means 9 other HS pitchers from this draft will not.
For me its just opportunity cost, and using possibilty your last pick that you can go over slot on ever on a slot signing. It’s a good possibility the next time we can get a pitcher as talented at Guerrarai in the draft is when we have one of the 10 worst records in the MLB. Hopefully that won’t be in awhile.
There’s guys like Guerrieri around in the 20s most years, and they often fall for similar reasons to Guerrieri this year. And, as Lou noted, you really should make an effort to spell his name something even VAGUELY close to the way it’s spelt if you’re going to name-check him in every Wong-related discussion.
Obvious weakness in our system #1: No MLB-quality middle infielders. Solved, as far as you can with one draft pick. I would have liked for us to get a SS, too, instead of a 2B. But, show me the college SS, likely to stick at his position, who has a proven top hitting record against good competition, who drops to #22.
Obvious weakness in our system #2: Not a lot of speed. As someone noted earlier, we could field a pretty good 4×100 relay team from our first ten picks. Are they too small, and can any of them really play baseball? Again, the speedsters that can avoid both of those concerns are a scarce commodity, and tend to go high in the draft.
Obvious weakness in our system #3: No big mashers, no high-upside starters, no 3B prospects, no closers/set-up men. OK, the last one is actually true, because they all graduated to the big leagues recently. The only thing I would have liked us to add instead of what we got is more young starting pitching. You can never have too much. But aside from Norri$, who went before our 2nd round pick, I’m not sure who.
Is looking at things this way a version of drafting for need? Probably. We needed some impact position players to balance our system and we went and got guys who might turn into good ones. I don’t know if it is a strategy I like, but it is one way to go at it.
Why do you repeat that we have no speed in the system, I’m assuming you just dont know who the players are that are fast but we have PLENTY of speed in our system. Anthony Bryant, Reggie Williams, Virgil Hill, Starlin Rodriquez, Ronnie Gil, D Ingram, Adron Chambers, Daryl Jones, Shane Robinson.
We have less higher up yes, but we have tons down in Low A and short season ball.
Most of those guys are not going to have major league careers, and those that do are 4th or 5th outfielders or backup middle infielders at best. Although I don’t really think speed matters very much at the major league level (except to some extent from a defensive point of view, its importance tends to be traditionally hugely over-rated, like arm-strength), I also think it’s fair to state that we don’t really have any guys on the farm with a good speed tool who profile as starters down the line, and I’d say that Tilson, at the very least, fits that description (don’t really know much about McElroy but it wouldn’t surprise me to see him have an underwhelming Ingram-esque career).
Honestly it’s impossible to say with the speed guys who projects to be an MLB player. The first threw I mentioned are very very raw but superior athletes. It’s just a matter of if they turn into baseball players or not. The whole point of drafting guys like this is you never know whats going to happen and your hoping one turns into a ball player. Tilson in my mind is already an advanced ball player who is also a good athlete.
You know darned good and well that we look weak at position players in the system. This draft may go a long way to rectify that.
Surely, as you mention that it’s impossible to know with speed guys who projects, that having lots of options is key.
This draft does very little to improve how our system looks in terms of position players. We add maybe 2 people to our Top 20 prospects. We surely do have some interesting guys that could develop just as all the athletes we have in our system could develop. Other than Wong what do we have in the MI other than 7 or 8 more names who may or may not be any better than the guys we have out there now.
Sorry your premise makes no sense. Neither you nor I have any idea who amongst these players could become impact players. You pick kids with tools and allow them to develop at their own pace. You have disappointments like Jones and pleasant surprises like Taveras and Pham.
I’m not seeing it really the shortfall in our system was with results not tools. We have plenty of talent in our system but not results from that talent. This draft added alot of extra tools to our system and I’m extremely happy about that but in actuality thety didn’t do much to address positional needs. They just drafted another batch ofplayers hoping to find one that develops. With the exception of Wong who obviously does fill a need that the organization saw. Do you not think they will continue to take MI next year because we filled our positional need in the minors this year?
Clearly the team believes they have addressed position player shortfalls.
Why do you say that? I think they think they have drafted guys that they hope will address the shortfalls.
Which is why they’ll participate in the draft again next year.
Your right, you said you think the team addressed there needs if your truly addressing needs your drafting guys who project to fill the need. Drafting Wong allows the team to feel they filled that need. If we would have drafted Fisher we could have said we reasonablyl filled at need in RF. Most of our picks dn’t really project to do anything or are more a hope and a prayer. We filled a need at 2b and we are hoping we found someone to fill needs as a LHP.
That’s right and that’s what we’d have said if we’d picked “high ceiling” pitchers who are every bit as unreliable as starters…if not moreso.
As Verducci said:
“Those 2000-02 numbers caught me by surprise, even with an appreciation of how hard it is to develop pitching. In summary, the 2000-02 drafts suggest almost half the first-round pitchers will never make the big leagues, only one in four will win as few as 10 games, and only one in 10 will become winning pitchers with at least 10 wins.”
Read more: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2011/writers/tom_verducci/06/10/yankees.pitchers/index.html#ixzz1OtSAeYnk
With 4 picks in the first 2 rounds last year, how many picks from last year’s draft would you put in our top 20? Idoubt it is more than the number of picks we had in the first 2 rounds (just as it is this year at this point).
And of those guys, who currently projects as a MLB starter, much less an impact player?
I have some hope for Gil and S. Rodriguez, but Wong is younger than either one, and figures to vault past them next year, if not in 2011.
I can’t imagine the Cards set out just to get fast players. Speed alone only gets a kid to AA, at best. And in our system, even the fast players rarely steal 20 or more bases a year. I’m sure they’re hoping for a lot more than what the guys you listed can hope to deliver.
The whole point of drafting athletes is that non project as impact players and you try to develop them into impact players. Was Vince Coleman thought to be an impact player when he was drafted? Wong and Gil are completely different IMO. One’s a 2b and thats it the other is a SS and thats it. Fact is we don’t know how developed as a baseball player that McElroy actually is. You would hope somewhat with having a major league father. That said when Luhnow talked about him he said hes one of hte most exciting athletes we have seen ever i.e. his time scouting……but he didnt say the most exciting baseball player. Not sure his stats either. Anyone know where we can fnid them?
You don’t know how developed McElry is but I bet the Cards have an idea.
McElroy hit just .319 as a Junior…then .488 this year, with 5 homers and 33 steals.
His head coach says: “I had a few scouts tell me he was as good (defensively) as some major league outfielders right now.”
His father, Chuck, is listed at 6′ even, so maybe C.J. still has a growth spurt left….
.488 in Texas is pretty good hopefully it was against good competition. Wonder why he wasn’t on the showcase circuit? Maybe because of football?
The McElroy choice wouldn’t bother me so much if we hadn’t drafted multiple players in the first four rounds that fit pretty much the same profile. . .very good speed, questionable bat, very little power. Would have preferred to have a projectable power arm around round 3 or so.
I don’t think there’s much questionable about Wong’s bat.
He went to Clear Creek HS (I think) which is suburban Houston big school baseball. The competition is about as good as your gonna get at the high school level.