Kind of a lame title for today’s article, but essentially I wanted to point out 3 players who kind of had under the radar seasons. Guys we didn’t focus on, or that we maybe focused on in a not so positive light. I’ll explain all of the choices using some of the new statistics I’ve been focusing on as well as using the more basic numbers. I decided to narrow it down to 3, so lets get started…
1. Matt Rizzotti, 1B — Rizzotti, taken in the 6th round of the 2007 draft out of Manhatten College had a rather pedestrian debut in 2007, posting a .260/.355/.386 line at Williamsport. He followed that up with a .268/.380/.430 line at Lakewood. The average batting line for a player in the SAL was .257/.325/.382. His ISO of .162 is good, his ISO BB (OB% – Batting Average) of .112 is very good. He posted a .340 secondary average, 3rd on the team behind Michael Durant (.348) and Michael Taylor (.345). He didn’t strike out as much as Durant, only 22% of his PA’s compared to Durant’s 29%. Lakewood, as I’ve mentioned in the past, is a pitcher’s park, but Rizzotti was steady both home and away, with an OPS of .810 at home and .813 on the road. He struggled a bit in May, posting a .625 OPS, but finished the season strong with a 1.003 OPS in July and .839 in August. His strong finish could be a mirage, or it could be a sign that he was finally getting comfortable and adjusting to pro ball. The secondary numbers are very good. Obviously he was a bit old for Lakewood at 22, most legit prospects are in the 19-21 range, but he was basically an afterthought after 1 half season, so for me at least, he’s back on the radar.
2. Michael Durant, 1B — Durant finally stayed healthy after 3 seasons of sporadic playing time. He logged 450 PA’s in 2008 after a combined 378 PA’s in 2005-2007. Durant, as mentioned above, posted the highest Secondary Average at Lakewood this year at .348. He showed great isolated power (.212) and drew enough walks to post a .331 OB% despite hitting only .234. Obviously the latter is a problem, as he really had some contact issues, striking out 30% of the time and only hitting .234 when he did make contact. His BABIP of .305 isn’t abnormally high or low, so the low batting average is a legit concern. What he offers you are essentially the “old player’s skills”, meaning he can draw walks and hit for power. Of his 90 hits, 23 were doubles and 17 were home runs. 11 of his 17 HR came on the road, while 14 of his 23 doubles came at home, which makes sense considering the park. Durant is really tough to evaluate simply because he’s lost so much development time. Most guys that hit .234 in the minors, even if they have great secondary skills, aren’t going to make it in the majors. For now though, Durant’s 2008 season is worth a mention, and it will be interesting to see what he does at Clearwater.
3. Damarii Saunderson, OF — I touched on Suanderson in my draft preview, and honestly, looking at the rest of the players in our system, its hard for me to argue a strong case for anyone else but Saunderson. Guys who had solid seasons, like Dominic Brown and Jason Donald and Lou Marson aren’t undervalued. And the other guys who I wanted to include, I just couldn’t justify their inclusion. What makes Saunderson stand out (in a very very small sample) is his eye at the plate. He hit just .103 in 29 AB, but he managed to draw 8 walks, a pretty staggering number. Again, this may just be a fluke, and there’s no doubt he has a looooong way to go as a prospect, but I was looking for something that stood out, and that was it. I liked the pick a lot, and he should be a fun guy to follow over the next few seasons. He’s really raw, but he’s got time.
Tomorrow I’ll get to the pitching side, where we have some interesting choices.
Phuture Phillies 
I am more intrigued by Durant than Rizzotti, though both deserve mention. I would be curious to know what Durant’s athleticism grades out as. You mention old man skills, but that would be particularly troubling if he lacked athleticism. Hopefully his talents are just manifesting as old man skills at this point and he has some natural skills that can help him make adjustments.
The only other undervalued prospect I would point out is perhaps TJ Warren who was an 8th round high school signee a couple years ago and wasn’t thoroughly overmatched in Low A this year. More encouraging than his overall performace, described as a raw, athletic talent, he showed some decent plate discipline.
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A shout out to Jeff, because i agree that Q is undervalued this year. (funny, he maybe was overvalued last year with the position player award). but he put up a solid year and is absolutely a major league player. his plus plus speed and defense will keep him in the bigs for many years as long as he can slap his way to a .260 average. people don’t talk about him much, but he will have a very productive major league career.
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Hey PP Fan, it looks like a post got deleted (at least in my world). Who is the “Q” you are referring to? If it’s out man Quentin Berry I would agree with you. He seems to have very solid leadoff skills – after a slow start this year he seemed to adjust and put up decent OBP% numbers and obviously has the speed to steal bases. I’m not as up on his defense but I would put him in the “undervalued” category as you don’t hear much about him, and we don’t chat about him much.
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I had mentioned Rizzotti — his second half numbers, the plate discipline, etc. — on a Lakewood thread several weeks ago, and I’m glad to see that you view him similarly. I know he’s locked in at 1B on the defensive spectrum, but he’s certainly a sleeper going forward: the plate discipline and power potential (6’5″, 235 lbs.) is there. And to be honest, I really like guys from small colleges who dominated their conferences — that’s why I liked Jeremy Hamilton, and Dan Murphy springs to mind here as well.
And speaking of sleepers, agreed that Saunderson is certainly worth monitoring going forward. I’d expect him to start at Williamsport next year — as a raw, cold weather project, he’ll need to be moved slowly, but maybe we’ll be lucky enough to see a Dominic Brown-type breakout in the NYPL next year.
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I’m intrigued by Rizzotti’s late season stats but I always wonder when I see that whether player movement brought up less experienced pitchers mid year that were easier for him to hit. He’s old for that league and for first baseman that make it to the bigs, they usually put up eye popping numbers in the low minors which he hasn’t so far. Neither has Durant, who for the person asking about his athletic tendacies, think very large and very slow. Durant just doesn’t seem to get enough good swings. A guy that big should have a much higher average on the balls that he puts into play. Neither projects to be a major league player to me. As for Berry, I would love to see him continue to develop. He had a horrible first half but a much better second half. Again, did he improve or did the pitching quality become easier for him to handle? I certainly disagree that he’s a guaranteed major leaguer although I hope that he can be. He’ll get his shot at Reading next year and if he produces there, he’ll have a chance to be another Bourne, although he’s not as good as Bourne defensively.
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Not sure what the cutoff for undervalued is or how it relates to underdiscussed, but I will throw a few more names into the hat.
Clay Harris, Sam Walls, Brian Schlitter, Chance Chapman, Chris Kissock, Troy Hanzawa, Robert Roth, Jordan Ellis, Michael Schwimer.
Some were discussed or valued more than others, but most of these can qualify as under the radar for many fans, even some posters here. They have have one or two things going for them where you can project them as getting into high minors and maybe a cup of coffee in majors, if not more.
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And some are pitchers, which is tomorrow’s topic.
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Q = Quentin Berry
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Brian Schlitter got traded for Scott Eyre.
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Pitcher is a fielding position!
(Not a good answer, but my only sorry defense.)
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Maybe we were not supposed to respond with our own lists … BUT… I have 3 players that come to mind:
* Harold Garcia: good speed; .299 Avg; .511 SLG; .913 OPS & almost 1/2 of his hits were for extra bases
* Troy Hanzawa: .297 Avg.
* Neil Sellers: .275 Avg.; career high 19 HR; (a lot of errors)
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Rizzotti’s strong finish could be due to the fact that he went back to his normal swing after trying the “Phillies way” for a month or so.
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You sometimes have to be wary of “2nd half stats” in the minor leagues because if you think about it, what happens to the better pitchers and hitters in the 2nd half? Most of them are promoted and then replaced with younger and less experienced guys. Not saying that is the reason for 2nd half surges but it is always a possibility. As for Durant, I saw him in the spring in ST and he is not a very athletic and as for his defense, he makes Howard look like Keith Hernandez!
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Laura how did you find out about him going back to his swing. And not listening to the phillies way.
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Hanzawa interest me. I wonder if he goes up to clearwater because he is a college player, and his age. or is that too big a jump from williamsport.
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Rizzotti was banged up early in the year I believe. Definitely someone to keep an eye on.
I think there a ton of other guys from Lakewood that could be listed. Most of them have a few flaws in their games, but most were athletic and they found ways to win games. If some of them put “it” together there could be some big leaguers there.
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I agree with the discussions above but I might throw Leandro Castro into the mix. He’s old for GCL (19) but he’s a .298 hitter. He came out of the DSL and we might see some upside from here.
Isn’t it sad when a kid of 19 is old for anything?
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I am not sure that Castro would qualify for “Undervalued”? I have him in my Top 30.
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gkit –
I’m with you on Durant. Granted, my sample size is small (1 game), but he struck me as a Poor Man’s Howard – less power, less athletic (IIRC didn’t score from second on an outfield single, then got thrown out at home on a grounder), less fielding ability (he booted a very easy grounder hit to him).
Rocky –
I’m with you on Hanzawa. He’s supposed to be a good field/no hit shortstop, yet he put up adequate numbers at WPT. I guess it depends on what the team does with Galvis. Given his age, Galvis could (and probably should) repeat at Lakewood and Hanzawa could be double jumped to Clearwater. That works for me.
– Jeff
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I have never seen Durant. But it strikes me that what did the scout see to draft him. You should be able to judge athletism , speed, and be able to project a little if the kid can at least field, Hitting is another thing hard to judge. Most scout look at bat speed .
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My guess is that they saw a potentially big power bat – and that aspect of his game is still there (even if it’s not Major League Power, he can still hit the longball). I don’t know what his high school career was like, but I saw that he is from Oakland, which I believe is a strong baseball area.
Keep in mind that he has had some injury problems, so perhaps that has put a damper on his athleticism. From what I remember, he didn’t look very “fluid” when he ran – almost like something was bothering him. Of course, he was about a week removed from a month-long layoff, so rust may have been a factor. And since I’m arguing against myself right now and making minimal sense, I’m going to get back to work.
– Jeff
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Jeff O,
Your analysis is spot on with Durant. I saw the game where he got hurt in Lakewood (had just started to rain) and it was is lack of athleticism that got him hurt. He’s almost too big for his body. Does that make sense? Some refer to bigger guys as being prone to “breaking down”, and that’s what happened that day as he obviously slipped on the wet ground but couldn’t adjust.
What did the scouts see in him out of HS? 6’6″ (at the time) 265. He’s bigger now. One could accept the obscene number of strikeouts (similar to Howard) if he had hit 25-35 HR’s this year like several guys in the SAL did.
B, Would love for you to be more specific on some of the guys from Lakewood who you think played under the radar. I’m a big Blueclaws fan, have the same feeling (there were just too many position duplications this past year for some guys to shine), but would like to hear your take.
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Pictures of Blueclaws:
http://photos.woodsportsphotography.com/p160569822/h194f29fe#h1c933c1f
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I would like to ask a question. I got into a talk on fielding, The person told me the player only had so many errors .and because of his fielding percentage he was the best, my argument is the player has no range,and you can’t judge a fielder just by errors, if a fielder has no range he will in most cases not get to a lot of balls others do and thus more chances for errors. Pat Burrell has two errors this year. He has no range thus you can’t say because of his low errors he is a good outfielder..
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I agree that fielding % is one of the worst measurements to use in evaluating fielding. Overall, defense is difficult to measure statistically. There are other stats like range-factor and zone-rating that try various ways to better capture defensive abilities but IMO, these also have their flaws.
For example, in 2007 Miquel Tejada had a higher zone rating than J. Rollins. I doubt you will find to many people in the game who would agree with that…
And for 2008, Tejada led ALL short-stops in Zone Rating. Again, I doubt anyone believes he is the best defensive SS in the game.
For me, defense is something that requires seeing a player perform on a regular basis..
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Re: defensive stats, there are more advanced measures than Zone Rating, Revised Zone Rating and the like — Baseball Prospectus utilizes Fielding Runs Above Average (FRAA), and I’m a big fan of the Fielding Bible plus/minus system. I don’t subscribe to Bill James online, but as far as 2007 Fielding Bible stats go, Jimmy Rollins was +7 and Tejada was not within the Top 11 or Bottom 5. (For comparison’s sake, Tulowitzki was tops among SS with a +35.)
The point stands though, rocky: anyone using fielding percentage to make an argument about a player’s defensive ability has got blinders on.
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My pick would have to be Derrick Mitchell. Had a better season then Galvis or Mattair at the same level but didn’t show up on anyones lists for top players.
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