John Mayberry Jr’s setup at the plate, and his profile, reminds me a bit of Mike Cameron with a bit less speed. Am I off base there?
Modest OB%, good power, decent speed. In his career, Cameron has hit lefties much better than righties, the same thing I’m expecting out of Mayberry.
For some reason, I feel I must comment on the first Phillies boxscore of the year as it relates to the potential Iron Pig roster. Both Joe Bisenius and Scott Nestor were lit up, Bisenius giving up 4 runs on 2 hits in his inning of work and Nestor allowing 3 runs on 3 hits in his inning, in which he struggled with his control giving up 2 walks as well. Dave Borkowski, Jake Woods, and Mike Koplove all pitched scoreless innings today with Koplove looking the best, stiking out 2 hitters.
Quickly going through the hitters who may end up on the Pig roster…Jeremy Slayden was 2-2 with a run and a double, John Mayberry was 1-2 with an RBI, Andy Tracy was 0-2, Jason Donald 0-1, Marcus Giles 0-2, Lou Marson 0-1, Ronny Paulino 0-1, and JJ Furmaniak 0-2.
Just giving everyone something to talk about on this opening day of boxscores….
I was planning on rolling out some college baseball related info today, but its taking longer than I expected, and I want to devote the next few days to working on my Top 30. So instead, I’m going to push the college baseball stuff back. I’m sure some prospects will see game action today, so we’ll have something to talk about. You can talk about it here until my Top 30 hits the site.
Last year I took a look at how PECOTA, the Baseball Prospectus forecasting system, felt about Phillies prospects. The two metrics I used were UPSIDE and Beta, and I’ll use the same numbers again this year. For a full explanation of these metrics, check last year’s post here. Basically, the higher the UPSIDE the better, and the lower the beta, the more reliable the forecast is. PECOTA is unique, in that it takes many more factors into account than your typical projection system. If you’re unfamiliar with PECOTA, here is a good primer. For reasons that I don’t know, only three of our position player prospects have PECOTA’s, in Marson, Mayberry and Harman. My guess is that has to do with them being on the 40 man roster. But there are 13 pitching prospects with PECOTA’s, many of whom aren’t on the 40 man, so I have no idea. I’m going to try and get ahold of someone at BP and find out what the story is there. When/if Donald and others have forecasts, I’ll write up a supplemental post. But for now…
Continue reading PECOTA and Phillies prospects, 2009 edition
Just wanted to give a quick heads up. This is subject to change, but right now here is my plan
Tuesday: PECOTA and the Phillies prospects
Wednesday: A look at some college baseball related things
Friday: My personal Top 30
So stay tuned.
ESPN has added a draft blog, and Keith Law will be adding tons of stuff there leading up to the draft. Law had this to say
Based on my own evaluations and conversations with many scouts and scouting directors, the pool of first-round talent seems to run only about 20 players deep; since the first round has 32 selections this year, we could see some teams calling audibles at the end of the round, overdrafting players who’ll sign at discounts or taking players they like but whom the industry views as second- or third-round talents.
While I’m still bitter we tossed away a first round pick on Ibanez, this draft class, at least at first glance, doesn’t appear to be especially stacked, especially in the range where we’d have picked. If the Phillies can employ a strategy of grabbing 2-3 premium talents that slip a bit, they could still end up with an above average haul in 2009.
Everyone here knows how much I love the draft. Part of the luster from this year’s draft is gone because we won’t have a first round pick and will pick near the end of the second round, but as always, I’m excited about the draft nonetheless. Steven Strasburg is the clear #1 pick, Grant Green is likely the 2nd best player in the draft, and the Phillies will be looking much further down the board. While we need to target the best player available with our first few picks, what areas of the system do we really need to strengthen? My first glance, when looking at our current prospects, is that we need to focus on corner infielders, as well as middle infielders. We have a glut (relatively speaking) in the outfield, as well as at catcher. I suppose we could also use a few more prospects with plus raw power, as Taylor is really our only legit power prospect. And I suppose it never hurts to have a few more arms, particularly lefties.
I’m getting close to unveiling my new prospect evaluation toy I’ve been building, and I will also crank out my Top 30 list, hopefully by the end of next week. And once spring training games start, we can monitor the progress of Jason Donald, Carlos Carrasco, Lou Marson, and others. Should be fun to watch, so stay tuned.
Look for the ‘Pigs bullpen to be almost completely revamped from the Pen of last year, with a number of free agent signings that have Major League experience. Although probably almost totally devoid of any big time prospects, the Lehigh Valley bullpen should provide the Phillies with some reliable depth if any of the relievers on the big club are down for a significant period of time. Continue reading Iron Pigs Bullpen Report
One of the big themes I’ve noticed while reading talks about Phillies prospects has been the comparison between Marson and D’Arnaud. Last winter, Keith Law jumped D’Arnaud over Marson, and this winter Kevin Goldstein bumped D’Arnaud above Marson. Baseball America still puts Marson ahead, and the readers here who voted for the top 30 put Marson ahead. So I wanted to take a deeper look….
Kevin Goldstein unveils his Top 100 prospects for 2009 here. Carrasco comes in at #43, Taylor comes in at #55 and Drabek comes in at #92. Former Phillie Adrian Cardenas comes in at #93.
Phuture Phillies 