Posts Tagged “St. Louis Cardinals”

Cory Jones
College of the Canyons, CA (JUCO)

Height: 6′ 5″
Weight: Not Listed
DOB: 09/20/1991
Bats: R
Throws: R

(<– High School Picture)

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Tim Cooney
Wake Forest, Junior

@t_coons

Height: 6′ 3″
Weight: 195 lbs
DOB: 12/19/90
Bats: L
Throws: L

AZ’s Snap Take: College left hander who will need some work. Control has been an issue in college. There’s enough fastball here that the Cardinals can work with him and he’ll have a chance to move up the ranks. The blessings of pitching with your left hand.

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Steve Bean
Rockwood HS, Texas

@_SteveBean_

Height: 6′ 2″
Weight: 190 lbs
DOB: 09/15/1993 (Ed Note: Oh God, I’m so old.)
Bats: L
Throws: R

AZ’s Snap Take: Steve Bean, a high school catcher out of Texas, isn’t as much of a reach as you might expect. He made both Keith Law’s top 100 and Baseball America’s top 100. Catchers, like shortstops, have always struck me as tricky players for the draft. So much of their value is tied up in their position that each team’s individual take on their ability to stick their can massively skew how they perceive that player. Bean has enough of a bat to make you think he could develop further and good enough instincts behind the plate to hang in the battery position. It’ll be 2-3 years before we know whether this pick has a chance at the majors. The Cardinals drafting record on catchers has been spotty of late.

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Stephen Piscotty
Junior, Stanford

Height: 6′ 3″
Weight: 195 lbs
DOB: 01/14/1991
Bats: R
Throws: R

AZ’s Snap Take: This is very much a classic Cardinals’ pick. Piscotty has a consistent track record in college with Cape Cod League success. This isn’t necessarily a bad pick but it sure looks like there were better players still on the board. In combination with the Cardinals #23 pick, James Ramsey, the Cardinals have refrained from grabbing a true upside play after taking a solid upside RHP in Michael Wacha with the #19 pick. Most fans will almost certainly deride this as a “safe” pick and that phrase feels more apt this time around. Piscotty may translate his consistency well to the minors and beyond but few believe he has the makings of a star. Instead, he looks more like an average or slightly better third baseman in a perfect world projection. For a third baseman who lost his position to a freshman during the season with limited power potential, Piscotty’s upside will be his main critique until he proves doubters wrong.

The one caveat to much of this is that Stanford coaching is often hell on position players offensive production. There’s always a possibility that you can re-train the player to leave his slap hitting Stanford ways behind. (Ed. note: I wrote this before reading the ESPN analysis. There’s some echo chamber effect going on from Austin Wilson decision to go to Stanford last year.)

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The Cardinals got some good news over the weekend when their projected Opening Day starter, Chris Carpenter, received a moderately positive medical review. Neck pain that was radiating down both arms was diagnosed as a bulging disc rather than a potentially more serious nerve condition or other injury.

The Cardinals clearly had a Plan B in mind and are internally equipped to replace Chris Carpenter with another pitcher, if not one who is as effective on the mound.  Today, Mike Matheny revealed that Lance Lynn gets that label as the back up plan to Chris Carpenter and will be stretched out over the next several Grapefruit League starts. Matheny offered some rationale for the semi-secret backup plans via Derrick Goold and Rick Hummel in the Post-Dispatch:

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Way back in October, I interviewed Tyrell Jenkins and Doug White (Johnson City pitching coach) for an article in the upcoming VEB Annual ebook (formerly the Maple Street Press Annual). It’s different from anything I’ve written previously in that it takes the conversation I had with both Tyrell and Doug and weaves them into the larger narrative of Tyrell as a player. It reads more like a newspaper column than a Q&A.  I learned a lot writing it and it’s something that I may do in the future but it’s dramatically more time consuming than posting a straight Q&A. Nonetheless, I was excited to get to work with Larry Borowsky (lboros on VEB) on the project and I’m sure that the ebook will be excellent. When more details on it become available, I’ll pass them along.

Below the fold are the remains of my conversations that didn’t mesh into the story.  Before you make the jump though, I have to say how appreciative I am that both Doug and Tyrell took the time to talk with me. Tyrell was far more thoughtful in his answers than I expected of an 18 year old (he was certainly less flippant than I was at 18) and it was clear to me that he was very much taking to heart the coaching he had received in Johnson City. Doug was generous with his time and I left with the impression of someone who understand that his job is as much about guiding a young player through the baseball “process” as it is making sure he has the right grip on a changeup.

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As of the time of this writing, 271 people voted in yesterday’s poll and 55% of you would utilize Matt Carpenter in a kind of super utility role between the corner outfield, corner infield and second base positions. there’s not a wrong answer to yesterday’s question and I think I personally would be inclined to keep in majors in that role as well.

One of the comments caught my eye, however. Lou Schuler wrote:

I love [Carpenter] as a utility player, but [Zack] Cox looks like a guy who’s going to be an everyday player hitting in the top half of the lineup.

It struck me as an undervaluation of Carpenter (the “utility player” label) but it’s one that I think consistently happens to him because of his somewhat unusual offensive profile.  Assume that Matt Carpenter is going to have an OBP between .320 and .340 (ZiPS projects .342). Since wOBA is scaled to OBP, we can use that as a decent approximation for his production. For someone with limited power potential, we would scale that number down slightly from his OBP.  That range (.320-340) is still going to make Matt Carpenter a league average-ish player.

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In my piece for Viva El Birdos on Sunday, I recapped a little of Tyler Greene’s history.  Prospect watchers will probably have been familiar with the term “prospect fatigue” and it’s connotative use with Greene but there’s another player this year — who likely has less of a shot at the major league roster right out of Spring Training — that I actually think of first when using the term prospect fatigue: Adam Ottavino.

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Stryker Trahan is a name I’ve heard tossed around by some in connection to the Cardinals this coming draft. At the moment, he’s generally regarded as the best backstop available in the 2012 draft. He’s currently in high school with a commitment to Ole Miss but should someone wave first round money at him, there’s a sense that he’d take it.

He’s a good catcher with better athleticism than your typical plodding catcher. A solid line drive swing helps to augment his power projection and overall hitting ability. He’s as near to a complete package as a high school backstop can be.

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Baseball America named him the best pitching prospect in the New York Penn League in 2008. It was hard not to notice Adam Reifer, the then 22-year old right handed relief pitcher, as he struck out over a batter an inning with a fastball that touched the high 90s.  In 2010, he was listed as the Cardinals 16th best prospect by Baseball America who noted his fastball velocity and “a slider that grades as a plus-plus pitch at times”.

The 2007 draftee was poised to have a big season in 2011 for the Memphis Redbirds. In competition for the closer’s role, Reifer would suffer a season ending injury on a cold April night against the Chicago Cubs AAA affiliate in Des Moines, Iowa.  Surgery would follow and the history books of baseball will note a season that totaled five appearances — the last of which was on April 17th, 2011.

A healthy Reifer, just arrived in Florida for Spring Training, took the time to talk with me last week. The weather is beautiful and Reifer is ready to fight for a job; to fight for what that unfortunate moment in 2011 delayed but, hopefully, didn’t take away from him.  He’s “100% go” and eager to be back in competition. Our conversation follows.

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