A major coup; Phillies sign Jiwan James

2007 Draft

Less than 12 hours after deciding to pass on pro baseball for now, Jiwan James changed his mind and signed with the Phillies. The article talks about James going back and forth, including attending an orientation session at Florida, but ultimately deciding to sign. The Phillies had contacted James on draft day and offered him the money if they took him in the 6th round, but he said he wouldn’t sign for that. Within the article linked above, it mentions the Phillies visiting him and upping their offer. My guess? Between $250,000 and $350,000, around 3rd-4th round money. We’ll know eventually, as Baseball America normally gets all the bonus amounts right. This leaves Julian Sampson as our prized prep prospect, as the Phillies already came to terms with 30th round pick Jacob Diekman, a live armed JuCo lefty. Mark Adzick is 99% committed to Wake Forest, leaving Sampson as our main target. I’m not sure how the signing of James will affect the latter, time will tell, but for now, this is quite an exciting development.

Want the skinny on James? Check out the writeup on PhilliesDraft.com

16 thoughts on “A major coup; Phillies sign Jiwan James”

  2. Good news! speaking of prime targets, while I assume that savery will sign soon, what about our 3rd round picks- Workman and Spencer- any news on what is happening with them?

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  3. If they can sign Sampson, then this draft suddenly becomes ALOT more palatable. Certainly good news.

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  4. Evidently Spencer has already signed but I am unsure of the holdup at this point. Baseball America has shown that he has signed and the Phillies brass has stated that he signed. Maybe he’s just taking time off after the CWS.

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  6. This may be off-topic for this thread, but i took a ride to see Carlos Carrasco pitch last night. The first two innings he threw changeups and curves. He was very hittable and gave up two runs. I didn’t figure out they were changeups until the third inning when he comes out firing his fastball constantly in the 94-95 range and it’s basically lights out for the hitters. He put away the changeup then and mixed in some curves. He was basically working on locating those two pitches, with the changeup in the first 2 innings. When he’s come inside, he stays there for 4-5 pitches, then goes outside for 4-5 pitches. Hitters could detect a pattern, but his fastball was still not very hittable. Very little solid contact. To me, he still needs more polish and better location of his pitches. Guessing here, I’d say he needs a 1/2 year year in AA next year until a move to AAA is warranted. The majors… whenever after that.

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  7. Well, I don’t think it’s really possible to put a timetable on his development. I assumed that he’d spend an entire year in Clearwater this year, but he clearly showed after a half season that he was ready for a new test. It’s only been two AA starts, so it’s a tad pre-mature to speculate on his adjustment period. He could fire off 6 straight starts where he shows immaculate command of all of his pitches and dominates….or he could get lit up. WE’ll know more about his path in about 2 months. However, AAA isn’t really the proving ground it once was, and today’s top prospects are often times making the jump from AA to the majors. I suspect that’s the case even moreso with the Phillies because of the AAA affiliate being in another country. Next year, it might be a different story.

    All things considered, I think the Eastern League is much tougher than the International League, in terms of roster strength and prospect strength.

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  8. I saw Carrasco pitch last night also. Let’s keep in mind that Harrisburg is a truly horriffic team this year and they did have some hard hit balls against CC. I was sitting on the 3rd base line and couldn’t tell if he was mixing in his change or curve, but once he decided to rely on his fastball, Harrisburg had no chance.

    IMO, he needs to further develop those secondary pitches before he gets to Philly.

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  9. Maybe he was throwing change ups and curves for the first few innings because he was instructed to (same with the pattern)? Sometimes minor league games are used as exercises to strengthen something or give confidence to a player that he can use something. Im sure the change will look alot better with fastballs thrown in with them.

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  10. His changeup is the best in the Phillies system. Some nights out, a guy just doesn’t have his A stuff. Hamels’ changeup, arguably the best in baseball, has been flat at times this year. It happens to every pitcher.

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  12. Now that James has signed (apparently, although it’s not yet listed at the Phillies official site), I wonder how you would rank the second day of the draft. In your initial post you said you’d give the team a “C” if they signed three out of seven picks that you liked. So far, they’ve signed four of those seven, plus James. That seems pretty encouraging.

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  14. Jim Salisbury said on his article “Taking stock of Phillies’ farm system” that Carrasco’s best off-speed pitch is his curveball not chnage-up.

    “Carrasco features a three-pitch mix – a fastball that can reach 93 m.p.h., a plus curveball and an above-average change-up.”

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  15. Well, everything I’ve ever read is that his changeup is far ahead of his curve. He threw a lot more curveballs last year to try and get a feel for the pitch, but his changeup was his best pitch, and was rated the best in the organization by Baseball America.

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  16. well from being his friend and playing against him for a few years i can honestly tell you he has a nasty splitter. rang me up on a full count. of course later he laughed at me about it. modest guy.

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