Fall League Review

8. Arizona Fall League

The Arizona Fall League came to its conclusion with the play of Jason Donald taking on a new importance in light of the hip injury to Chase Utley. The 24 year old Donald ended the Fall campaign hitting .407, with 5 HR and 17 RBI’s in his 91 at bats. His OBP was .476 and his SLG .747, both outstanding. Additionally, he won the Stenson Award for his hard work, unselfishness and leadership, traits that sound awfully similar to Utley (no I am not comparing them). He played primarily at SS and 3B, but is capable of playing second as well. His fielding, although not spectacular, was steady during the Fall. Jeremy Slayden, 26, did not play well enough in the Fall (in the Phillies minds at least) to earn a spot on the 40 man roster, now subjecting him to the Rule 5 draft. Slayden, as usual, hit .286, with 3 HR and 27 RBI in his 105 at bats. His OBP was low at .322 (he only walked 5 times), however his SLG was .476. His fielding was adequate, however, his projections as a #5 outfielder at best did not change. The soon to be 24 year old Quintin Berry had a good Fall hitting .311 in his 90 at bats, with 1 HR and 9 RBI, hitting high up in the Mesa order. His 6 walks continue to be problematic, along with his baserunning, which took a step backwards this Fall, having been thrown out as much as he stole. Tuffy Goosewich, 25, saw limited action this Fall in place of Lou Marson, while Marson was up with the Phillies. Goosewich hit .280 in his 25 at bats and generally called a good game behind the plate. He projects to open the season in Reading. Marson scalded the ball in his limited time in Mesa, hitting .324 in his .324 in his 34 at bats, collecting 10 RBI’s. Six of his 11 hits were for extra bases.

Looking at the other side of the table, the Phils pitching prosepcts struggled. Twenty Four year old Pat Overholt, struggled enough to be left off of the Phils 40 man, subjecting him to the RUle 5 draft. He has shown small glimpses of promise as a late inning reliever but was 0-0 with a 6.06 ERA in his 12 appearances this Fall, all in relief. His WHIP was 1.59 and his control remained an issue having walked 10 in 16.1 innings. I would expect to see him in the Lehigh Valley pen this fall, as I doubt a big league team would use a year long roster spot on him at this stage. Andrew Carpenter continued his year long funk, going 1-2 with a 5.88 ERA in his 7 Fall league starts. Home runs balls were a big problem, having given up 6 in his 7 starts. His WHIP stood at 1.46 and opponenst hit .282 against him during the Fall. 24 year old Tyson Brummett struggled mightily as well, used primarily in relief, a role he has recently been unaccustomed to. Brummett was 0-2 with a 6.23 ERA in his 12 appearances (11 in relief). His WHIP was 1.38 and opponents hit him at a .273 clip. Sergio Escalona was added to the Phils 40 man roster despiet having a difficult Fall, going 1-0 with a 6.14 ERA in 12 relief appearances. Escalona, 24, had a WHIP of 1.36 and opponents hit .262 against him. He did strike out an impressive 15 in 14.2 innings.

61 thoughts on “Fall League Review”

  1. Jason Donald is gonna be a good player. I just hope its with us. All the things said about him are pretty freaking similar to comments made about guys like Utley and Pedroia. Give him a chance already. Maybe Utley going down has a silver lining of us keeping Donald and him getting his chance.

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  3. Gotta give the organization credit. They had the leading hitter in the Hawaii Winter Baseball league in Dominc Brown and the second highest hitter in the Arizona Fall League in Jason Donald. Plus Carlos Carrasco is proving to be the best young starter in the Venezuelan Winter League. He has the third best WHIP among starters exceeded only by two AAA veteran journey men.

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  4. Is it possible that Andrew Carpenter is not in a year long funk, but rather not a good pitcher at higher levels?

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  5. great news about carrasco. i view him as the key to our future all other things being equal. meaning donald and marson. c marson ist howard 2nd utley ss rollins 3rd donald rf werth cf vic lf taylor or brown i guess bench dobbs, mayberry others unknown. staff hamels, myerws, blanton, happ, carrasco. pen lidge, madson, romero,eyre, durbin others unknown. iffy situations lf and one #2 pitcher. free agent or trade.

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  7. Don’t be too hard on Carp. In four of his 7 AFL starts he pitched a total of 16 innings and gave up only 10 hits, 3 runs, walked 4 and struck out 9. In one of those starts he outdueled the Red Sox Clay Buchholz over 5 innings 1-0. He did have problems in his other 3 starts with the long ball but that’s Fall ball in the desert.

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  8. Carrasco has taken a HUGE step forward in the last 4 months of AAA and the VWL. He seems to be getting more consistant in harnessing his great stuff. He’s a great piece to have…He could very well get called up in the 2nd half of 09.

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  9. I’m excited about this upcoming season…this could be the first time in a while that a phillies team has the potential to benefit from an influx of so much rookie talent.

    There really hasn’t been anything since hamels.

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  10. Does anyone know if players actually start making any money once they hit the 40 Man? Guys in the Minors make what, $1200/month while playing? Do they get bumped up when they make it to the 40?

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  11. Does anybody else think Carpenter might have been the victim of the dredded ‘verducci rule’ this year? he saw a big increase in innings from 2006 to 2007.

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  13. Its nice to see Carrasco dominating in Venezuela, but how much practice is too much? Will he be able to pitch every 5 days for an entire season?

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  14. Everyone got shelled in the AFL this year pitching-wise, so be sure to take that into account. Plus, he may have been working on different pitches. It’s an instructional league at-heart.

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  15. We will see three worthy additions to the big club’s active roster during ’09.

    Donald, Marson, and Carrasco. INF, C, & SP.

    The infusion of newbies is a great thing for fan excitement and in disallowing self-satisfaction in the players.

    Interesting to see how soon other worthies can be expected to arrive: Taylor, Brown, Drabek, & Savery.

    The signing and development of prospects is the key to continued competitiveness and hopefully will continue to be the team plan.

    And…that’s why I have been advocating offering Pat Burrell arbitration (making no offer for more than one year) in hopes he will sign a multiyear deal elsewhere and yield us two high draft picks.

    Those high draft picks will offer opportunities to add better prospects to our farm system and be aided by better coaching which I perceive has been going on in the system for several years.

    The apparent fixing of Arbuckle’s loss was in the works in anticipation of his leaving upon Amaro’s taking over the GM position.

    With the hiring of lots of EXPERIENCED BASEBALL PEOPLE in the front office, without delay, seems to me to be a big feather in Amaro’s cap. The new signees have come to this org knowing enough about Amaro and the nature/worthiness of the Phils. That’s a tribute to THEIR evaluations of him and the entire org approach.

    With PG leading the way over the last several years, the whole Phils org seems to me to have no peer in progressive activism in the hands of better people.

    Amaro’s trade of Golson shows that he will be agressive in making this his team following the manner of PG.

    Good days ahead!

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  16. Does anyone have any thoughts or information on Escalona? I see nothing on this blog about him and in hindsight I’m a bit puzzled by his additon to the 40 man roster.

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  17. Rickey Branch makes a good point. our system should be ranked in the top half. time to start getting some respect. we got some damn good players.

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  18. My guess as to why he was added is that he is left-handed and he strikes out more than a batter per inning. Those are the two best reasons I can find.

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  19. PP fan, I agree we will be higher but our system really has no true impact guys (Taylor and Brown being possibles). I’d say we will be in the 20-24 range.

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  20. no real impact guys? how about marson, donald, carasco, taylor, brown at the higher levels and guys like d’arnaud, sampson, drabeck at the lower levels.

    these guys can play.

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  23. And I like those guys just as much as you do. I also said Brown and Taylor are possibles. Taylor needs to do it this year at Reading and then he is a true impact prospect. Brown needs to do it again this year, and D’Arnaud hasn’t even played a full season yet. The other guys sure we love em, but how highly are they regarded by the people that put out those lists? The early lists I’ve seen only have Carrasco in the top 50 and Marson and Donald occasionally in the top 100. Top 15 systems have more depth and more talent than us top to bottom. The cupboard is improving, but top 15 right now is just dreamin.

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  25. Not one of the players mention project to be a superstar or allstar player. Other organization have top sure fired talent coming up we don’t we are trying to think we do but right now there are no kershaw or posey or porcello, price or anyone in that cataglory maybe some guys get there but not now.

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  27. I’ll take a shot in the dark and say we’ll be in the 18-20 range next year for our minor league system. Its improving but its not up there with any of the elite systems yet. We are doing better than we used to do though.

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  28. BA had us at #22, Law at 27, and BP at 26. So around between 22-27 for the three. Like I said, we’ll move up but not into the top 15. 19 or 20 at the highest, more likely 23-24.

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  29. Players on 40 man roster , receive more pay when in the minors than other minor leaguers.

    Escalona came out of Venezuela a couple years back, always looked at his stats, and they always seemed pretty
    good to me especially strike out wise. Was doing 2 an
    inning for awhile, I think , though he slowed some at AA.
    I think I saw somewhere he has a couple of pretty
    good pitches.

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  30. where were we ranked last year? who won the ws with minor league produced players. what were seattle, baltimore, i honestly dont know. the only thing ba and bp are good for is giving an overview of a player not ranking anyone in my humble opinion. by the way having 4 players on the olympic team shows you what a bunch of bums we have.

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  31. So how exactly is Keith Law the equal of Baseball America or Baseball Prospectus? I’m not a guy who thinks that Law hates the Phillies but I question putting him (and his “Vaunted” opinion) up there with those organizations.

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  32. Well yeah John…our core was all home grown but that was from our late 90s/early 00’s system. We’ve had a dearth of talent since then though.

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  33. Right now Carrasco and donald aren’t coming out as five tool superstars players. They can in the future be allstars but right now Donald by most accounts is a utility or average player not a five tool stud and Carrasco is a 4 or 5 by most scouts. look at milkaukee farm and boston , rays and oakland a lot of top prospect. star potential. doesn’t mean they will be stars but have shown that potential in the minors.

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  34. mike sorry but Donald has outplayed 99 44/100 of the super stars. I dont need opinions of others to see the light is green
    Baseball people almost never tell the truth to the public

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  35. Actually, most reports have Carrasco as a #3 type talent and that’s because of his inconsistency, not overall ability. I never seen him as a 4/5 guy…that would be Happ that was a 4/5 guy.

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  38. Analysts all over baseball say that Carrasco has the “stuff” to be a 2/3 if he can become consistent. Can I remind you guys of something? HE’S 21! The fact that there is a CHANCE to become our 4/5 next year out of ST is a testament to how well he has answered the critics over the years. Can you imagine two more years of development for this kid?

    Also, if you are expecting all of your prospects that come to the majors to be 5 tool players than you are deluding yourself. Ripken wasn’t 5 tool, Gwynn was 5 too. The list of bonafide superstars that have 3 tools is endless. If Donald can be a 3 tool guy(Avg, Def, with some speed) then I’ll take it all day. Also, his power might develop into a respectable number.

    Oh well. Nothing to do but wait and see at this point.

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  42. I was just reading a article by Peter Gammons on florida marlins. this is a team who has a good record since winning the title over 500 without any money to spend and unlike Tampa Bay doesn’t draft at the top , Why doesn’t a team like the phillies go there and pay them more to get who is scouting and signing and making these trades that keep them competitive. without a real budject. When I talk about our lack of superstar prospect. according to gammons .they are loaded. In fact the one kid who they drafted in 22 round was tearing up Arizona Fall League. they have two under twenty monster coming up plus three top rated starter. Just can’t think why we didn’t go after there people. Guys who get talent and make great trades with no money . who would you rather have Hanney Raminez or beckett at this stage of there career. the one kid had 39 homruns at greenboro I don’t think our clearwater team as a whole hit that many. I wonder what they would do with the phillies budject of 120 million. It would be interesting just a thought.

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  43. To RodeoJones: Simply awesome comment…ROTFLMAO.

    On the Beckett/Ramirez trade: I think that was the ultimate “fair” trade in which both teams won. Dont forget that “Lowell” was a throw-in in that deal as well. Both teams got what they needed and thus there was no loser in that deal.

    To Joe: I agree completely on Carrasco. He’s a good player.

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  44. Nepp point is Marlins trade stars and get good value back. How many teams could trade Cabera, burnett, beckett, and others stars and still be good over 500 record without a budject.

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  45. mikemike, don’t you feel that the two are correlated? Meaning, the Marlins always seem to have young, budding superstars because they trade all of their great MLB players. Imagine what our farm system would look like if we traded Howard, Utley, Rollins, Werth, Victorino, Burrell, Hamels, Myers, Madson, and Lidge. I think our farm system would have a few more keepers!

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  46. You should get good value back when you trade an elite pitcher AND a very good 3B. Only guys like Ed Wade get crap back when they trade that level of talent.

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  47. Neduol Caz based on what we got for schilling and rolen. that is a poor argument. and the giving away of Gio Gonzalez and Galvin Floyd. what do we have to show for those players.

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  48. Excuse me meant also this isn’t only about what they get back but how they draft. Just look where they draft. not much difference then us yet they are loaded a 22 round pick who is a top player in arizona plus others ,just maybe I don’t get it but we went after arbuckle when atlanta was tops in there farm. why not now go get the scouts or gm who makes the moves for florida.

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  49. New beginning just hope Ruben learned what NOT to do from
    his old GMs. So far so good 2010 or 2011 are the years to build toward when the Marlins challange. Until then the only
    real worry is if the Mets sign about five of the many relief
    guys out there (but we know they will get all the wrong ones)

    note to Ruben “dont rush Utley back” especially if Donald is even ok
    another note to Ruben bring back Adrian if show you are a good gm

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  50. What is crazy is the mets need bullpen help and the market is loaded. Just hope Minaya screws up again.For the life of me can’t figure out why he got a new contract. If he ran the phillies with all those bad signing he would have been run out of town.

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  51. Minaya had one year, 2006, in which his every decision paid off. He got John Maine and Oliver Perez for very little, brought in guys like Valentin and Alou who performed for him, and traded for Delgado who was a run producer and helped ensure that Wright could develop as a player without having to be “the man” so early in his career.

    Since then, almost everything he’s done has gone wrong. Probably the single biggest reason we beat out the Mets the last two years was the trade that sent Heath Bell and Royce Ring to the Padres for basically nothing. Put Bell in the Mets bullpen the last two seasons and I’m really not sure the Phils would have won the division.

    He seems fairly determined to proceed with caution this winter. I guess we’ll see, though I’d be surprised if the Mets didn’t add at least two quality relievers. They might get another two out of the younger guys who showed up for them at the end of this season (Kunz, Parnell, et al).

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  52. This may not be logical but I love numbers
    some prospects as go up the ladder fall in average and fail
    some take a while at each level then go(Taylor)
    some get better as they go up
    some maybe like Slayden just hit the same at every level. This “aint no thinkin thing” it just happens hence the last three years Slayden stats are remarkably the same and might translate to the same in the majors. Worth a shot.

    ” Slayden, as usual, hit .286, with 3 HR”

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  54. mikemike, I do not think the Schilling and Rolen trades prove your point. The Phillies were not actively pursuing a trade for either player, which would have allowed them to maximize their value in return. Unfortunately, both players forced the issue which did not allow the Phillies to exactly peruse the market for the best deal. Now, if you want to argue that the Phillies should have foreseen both players refusing to sign long term, and thus should have traded them sooner, I suppose you can make that point. However, I do not think it is fair to judge Wade on those trades’ returns, as I am sure Wade himself knew the players we received were not of a high caliber.

    Also, mikemike, draft position is mostly irrelevant in MLB. This is not football, where a strict pay scale is adhered to and thus the talent mostly falls in order. I cannot find Morrison’s (the 22nd round player you referred to) signing bonus. So, I do not know if he was simply a great find by the Marlins, or if he had the talent to be selected much higher. I did find out that he was the 666 overall pick, meaning we shouldn’t worry, as the devil will always be lurking. Also, he was a draft and follow guy who went to a community college for one season, before signing with the Marlins in 2006. The last little nugget I found while doing some research was that the 667th overall pick in 2005 was none other than Pat Overholt. That should give your fire plenty of fuel, mikemike.

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  56. Hard to say where the Phillies farm will rank. Looking at our BA top 10 going into the season —
    #1 Carrasco — good season, not blowout quality that screams super stud

    #2 Cardenas — traded

    #3 Savery — I’d list him as disappointing, but still hopeful

    #4 Outman — traded

    #5 Drabek — back from injury, pitched well in few IP at low levels

    #6 Brown — nice season

    #7 Golson — traded for Mayberry, whom I think ranks a little lower — he was #17 for Texas

    #8 Marson — great season

    #9 Carpenter — disappointed

    #10 Jaramillo — disappointed

    Among the guys who just missed top 10:
    Happ good; Mathieson reinjured; Galvis good; Garcia good; Donald great season; D’Arnaud very good; Correa suspended for disciplinary reasons; Mattair disappointed; Sampson did ok; Harman severely disappointed.

    Very good draft, not much on the international front.
    I think we stay around #22-23.

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  57. Didn’t want to mess James’ count up on the Readers top 30 but man that thing is close for number 1 between Lou and CC!

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  58. Why is it assumed that J. Mayberry Jr. would rate lower on the Phillies list, just because he was #17 on the Texas list?
    Contrary to what many believe, I think there are quite a few teams that could supplant most of the Phillies top 10.
    Especially when last seasons’ top ten included such fall-worthy candidates as J. Jaramillo and A. Carpenter.

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