Posts Tagged “Tyler Greene”

The appeals have already been made here and elsewhere to see Tyler Greene get the lion’s share of playing time this September. Shortstop is an obvious problem and one that needs addressing for the future. Ryan Theriot has proven that whatever defense might have been expected from him entering the season, simply was more than what he actually brought to the table.

To use a quick tautology: Apparent problems are obvious.  Do the Cardinals have a less apparent problem that they should be dealing with.

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The Cardinals have struggled this year at shortstop. They’ve seen six different players accrue time at the shortstop position. Veterans Nick Punto, Ryan Theriot and now Rafael Furcal have all manned the key defensive position and farm products Pete Kozma, Daniel Descalso and Tyler Greene have as well. Combined they have hit .255/.316/.330 and shown what could be generously described as porous defense.

The Cardinals will have some decisions to make as the year progresses and rosters expand in September. One such decision is whether to free Tyler Greene or not.

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Erik pointed out a great post on Royal Review by Scott McKinney in which Scott takes a look at a Success and Bust rates for Baseball America’s top 100 prospects over 13 years to see how they turned out.  And I thought that on the eve of spring training, this was a good check on the “hope springs eternal” optimism of Spring Training.

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Forgive the slowness of wrapping up this series, we still need to look at our beloved Triple-A affiliate.  I deleted pitchers and players with less than 100 at bats.

It was definitely a banner year for the Redbirds, who won the PCL Championship.

• Allen Craig is my favorite monster, as is yours, but if there is a red flag with him other than the fact that the Cardinals do not believe he can play third base, it’s his BB/K ratio.
• I must have been in a cave, but I had no idea David Freese had the type of season he had, even if it was an abbreviated one.  He’s a year older than Craig, and the Cards do believe he can play third base, which is why there’s talk of Freese starting at third base next year and we saw Craig not even receiving a September call up. I haven’t seen both players play at much length, but my judgment is Craig is the superior hitter, albeit not by a lot. If Freese can play third and be at least average while putting together a .320 OBP and .435 SLG, that’s more valuable than a left fielder who would give you a little better production at the plate.
• Tyler Greene quietly had himself one fine season. Among other things, look at that stolen base/caught stealing numbers. The man has some speed and knows how to pick his spots. With the Boogstache firmly holding on  the SS job, it’s nice to know Greene is there as a fallback option and backup. He may fill up a boxscore with steals, doubles, strikeouts and errors; it’s never a dull moment with Greene.
• As for disappointments, look no further than Bryan Anderson and Jon Jay. Jay pulled himself up after a nose-dive of a second half, but it’s hard to see him becoming better than a fourth outfielder at this point. The Cardinal brass bragged about Jay and his potential future batting titles, so that’s not quite the future they had pegged for the quirky outfielder. Anderson was once a Top 100 prospect and has since tanked it hard. Before hitting the DL he was allowing about a stolen base per game and his offense bit the dust. He’s currently hitting for a .630 OPS in 27 at-bats in the Arizona Fall League, for what it’s worth.

Sean “Chone” Smith has applied his TotalZone defensive metric on minor league data for the past few years, although it didn’t become available until last year at MinorLeagueSplits.com. Recently updated data has become available for games up to July 31st. While every defensive metric have their own quirks (especially metrics that depend on scorekeepers coding of batted balls as “line drives” or “fly balls”), the quirks can only be heightened when not dealing with a full season.

I’d trust the scouting reports first, then go with two or better yet three seasons worth of data before making any hard conclusions on a minor leaguer’s glovework. Or better yet, go watch them yourself for a few games.

But for what it’s worth, let’s check out some of the Cardinals’ top prospects and how their TotalZone numbers look. It’s also important to know these numbers translate a better for infielders than outfielders. Let’s start with the up the middle positions first.

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John Vuch has been with the Cardinals ever since he was a teenager, and has has played a vital role in several departments before settling into the role of being the Director of Minor League Operations. Few, if any, know more about the Cardinals and the inner workings the farm system. After settling down in Jupiter for spring training, John was kind enough to answer questions from myself and the other writers at FR. Good stuff, as always. Enjoy.

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The Arizona Fall League is also known as “prospect finishing school”. You need only to look at the past couple of MLB All Star games and you’ll find each team is packed with AFL grads. As a rule, the dry air of Arizona makes for a hitter’s league, and for Cardinal players, the rule stuck. Let’s give out the grades.

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Three first rounders stock are up, while three of the Cards’ better pitching prospects are trending down.

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