Comments on: Prospect Tiers; Pitchers

By: DiamondDerby

DiamondDerby — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 01:51:34 +0000

I see Carrasco differently. Many, MANY young pitchers need a lot of patient development (re: Gavin Floyd, many others). Carrasco should begin competing for a rotation spot in 2010 and should wind up there consistently in 1-2 years, with his stuff. He could well be a solid #3, a very good #4, or more than those. We did not give up a problem. We gave up a high-value resource who will likely be a starter that helps a team.

By: NEPP

NEPP — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 16:20:49 +0000

Its very rare to have a Top farm system and a great MLB team…that’s the rarity. Usually one has one or the other, not both.

By: Alan

Alan — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 15:56:34 +0000

BA rated our system #7 prior to 2003. I believe at that time we were looking at Marlon Byrd, Chase Utley, Ryan Howard, Gavin Floyd, Cole Hamels, Ryan Madson, Brett Myers. And that’s not even considering the flameouts like Zach Segovia and Eude Brito.

By: Ed

Ed — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 15:50:17 +0000

Mostly thanks to this site, many of us have now been following the phils pharm teams for a few years now. Iguess we are naturally complacent and cannot fathom how big our top 3 are. According to Callis we have a top 5 system. We have 3 blue chippers, 3 or 4 promising arms in the pipeline, and time to wait on our many lottery ticket outfielders. That top 5 system thing is hard to really take in, am i right?

By: Art D.

Art D. — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 04:17:56 +0000

On Knapp and Carrasco:

Either one or both (or neither) may become a star.

The question in the Phils’ collective mind was really on Carrasco. His intriguing promise and “stuff” gave dreams of a top of the staff guy w2ho’d be young enough to last for plenty years as a #2,#3 ,or 4 at least.

This assessment has suffered greatly over the last two seasons when he has failed to meet the challenge of AA and particularly AAA ball.

Particularly unimpressive has been his failure to deal with adversity on the mound. Loses his cool resulting in happy opposition bats. Pretty consistently.

Golden arm; leaden head?

His recent history as said, gave the Phils a willingness to give him up as long as, in a combination, something decent would come back.

In fact, IMO Carrasco was becoming a problem…for explaining his consistent failure to measure up and the FO’s mistaken evaluation of such a seemingly premium prospect.

In that way, the Indians took a problem off the Phils’ hands and heads.