There has been a lot said about the lack of pitching in the Phillies system. A lot of blame has been put at the feet of the development staff for failing to get major league players out of the talent in the system. There have been other complaints about the prospects traded away or the prospects traded for as well. The end result has been that I only had 8 pitchers in my Top 30 Phillies prospects and of those only 2 starting pitchers began the year healthy (Biddle and Gonzalez).
The factor that no one seems to be talking about is the composition of the Phillies drafts over the past 6 years. With the “oldest” prospects in the system being from the 2008 draft class, it seemed like a good place to start. So here are all the pitchers the Phillies drafted either for high money or are still in the system from the 2008 to 2013 drafts.
| 2008 | 2009 | 2010 | 2011 | 2012 | 2013 |
| Jason Knapp (2nd Round – HS): Rangers (A-) | Matt Way (5th Round – College): Out of Baseball | Jesse Biddle (1st Round – HS): Phillies (AA) | Adam Morgan (3rd Round – College): Phillies (AAA) | Shane Watson (1st Round – HS): Phillies (A-) | Ben Wetzler (5th Round – College): Did Not Sign |
| Vance Worley (3rd Round – College): Pirates (AAA) | Stephen Inch (6th Round – JC): Phillies (A+) | Perci Garner (2nd Round – College): Phillies (AA) | Ken Giles (7th Round – JC): Phillies (AA) | Mitch Gueller (1st Round – HS): Phillies (SS) | Shane Martin (9th Round – College): Phillies (A-) ($5,000) |
| Jonathan Pettibone (3rd Round – HS): Phillies (MLB) | Brody Colvin (7th Round – HS): Phillies (AA) | Bryan Morgado (4th Round – College): Out of Baseball | Austin Wright (8th Round – College): Phillies (AA) | Alec Rash (2nd Round – HS): Did Not Sign | Jon Prosinski (10th Round – College): Phillies (A+) ($5,000) |
| Trevor May (4th Round – HS): Twins (AAA) | Josh Zeid (10th Round – College): Astros (AAA) | Scott Frazier (5th Round – HS): Did Not Sign | Yacksel Rios (12th Round – HS): Phillies (A-) | Hoby Milner (7th Round – College): Phillies (AA) | Denton Keys (11th Round – HS): Phillies (SS) |
| Colby Shreve (6th Round – JC): Out of Baseball | Colin Kleven (33rd Round – HS): Phillies (A+) | David Buchanan (7th Round – College): Phillies (AAA) | Jesen Dygestile-Therrien (17th Round – JC): Phillies (A-) | Jordan Guth (9th Round – College): Phillies (A+) | Dan Child (18th Round – College): Phillies (A+) |
| Julio Rodriguez (8th Round – HS): Unaffiliated Ball | Mario Hollands (10th Round – College): Phillies (MLB) | Braden Shull (27th Round – HS): Out of Baseball | Kevin Brady (10th Round – College): Out of Baseball | Lee Ridenhour (16th Round – College): Phillies (A+) | |
| Michael Stutes (11th Round – College): Out of Baseball | Garret Claypool (11th Round – College): Out of Baseball | Richard Bielski (14th Round – HS): Phillies (SS) | Mark Meadors (21st Round – JC): Phillies (SS) | ||
| B.J. Rosenberg (13th Round – College): Phillies (MLB) | Tyler Knigge (12th Round – College): Phillies (AA) | Nic Hanson (16th Round – JC): Phillies (A+) | Mark Leiter Jr (22nd Round – College): Phillies (A+) | ||
| Michael Schwimer (14th Round – College): Blue Jays (AAA) | Mike Nesseth (17th Round – College): Phillies (AA) | Drew Anderson (21st Round – HS): Phillies (A-) | Tyler Viza (32nd Round – HS): Phillies (A-) | ||
| Tyler Cloyd (18th Round – College): Indians (AAA) | Kevin Walter (20th Round – HS): Phillies (A+) | ||||
| Jarred Cosart (38th Round – HS): Astros (MLB) | Jonathan Musser (21st Round – HS): Phillies (SS) | ||||
| Ethan Stewart (47th Round – JC): Phillies (A+) |
That is a lot of names to deconstruct. The pessimist has already pointed out three names on the list, Scott Frazier, Alec Rash, and Ben Wetzler so we will address the first. The Phillies failed to sign 3 pitchers taken in the first 5 rounds over their past 4 drafts. Scott Frazier reportedly turned down $1,000,000 in 2010, in 2013 he was drafted in the 6th round by the Cubs and paid $267,600 and has been used exclusively as a reliever. Rash’s velocity dropped in his signing year (2012), the Phillies then used the pick on Jan Hernandez in 2013, Rash has been injured and ineffective at Missouri and has barely pitched in his sophomore season. The Wetzler story is well known, but even if he has signed he profiled as a #4 starter with more feel than stuff.
The next place to look is the failures. The highest profile names are Brody Colvin and Mitch Gueller. Both pitchers could show you 3 plus pitches on a good day, but ultimately neither has shown the consistency to put the stuff to use. Colvin is now in the Reading bullpen and Gueller has yet to make a full season assignment. The biggest failure might be Bryan Morgado who had immense stuff that just never translated. Also there have been injuries, but we are talking about pitchers here. Before the string of injuries in the past year the Phillies were fairly light on pitching injuries across the system.
So lets looks at the composition of their drafts. Players in the draft come from 3 sources, highschool, junior college, and 4 year college. In general college players have the least upside, especially outside of the first round. This is due to the natural maturation of players and the weeding out process of injuries and ineffectiveness. For the most part a college pitcher is who they are, there are of course exceptions, but they involve changes that prove the concept. This is not to say taking college pitchers outside the first round is bad, they tend to be safer players and they move quickly, and while they lack upside, having players with good probability of being back of the rotation arms is a good thing for a system. Junior college players tend to be pop up guys, this often involves pure arm strength, guys who just started throwing harder as they filled out. There are often fatal flaws to their games, but enough talent that if you work with it you can get something out of it. This can lead to guys like Ken Giles being a 7th round pick, if you can find a JuCo pitcher to work with it is worth it, but they are few and far between, as both mlb and college teams race to add more pitchers.
This brings us to HS arms. Highschool arms have the most upside and risk, they have more development to do, but have many more developmental paths in front of them. They will get 3 more years of professional instruction and training than a college arm. The upside of a system’s pitching depth is their HS pitching talent. In 2008 the Phillies spent 4 Top 10 round picks on HS arms in Jason Knapp, Jonathan Pettibone, Trevor May, and Julio Rodriguez, while also handing a hefty bonus to Jarred Cosart. Since then the Phillies have only drafted 6 HS pitchers over the Top 10 rounds of the next 5 drafts and only signed 4 of them. Furthermore they only handed large late round bonuses to 5 more HS pitchers (and signed a few more than that). There have been some disappointments in that group, as is to be expected, but there are just not the numbers to deal with the attrition.
The end result is that the Phillies pitching shortage has a direct correlation with not bring high upside pitching talent into the system to create a level of depth to survive natural attrition. They have had some misses, but they have not been acquiring the type of talent needed to succeed. The 2014 draft will hopefully change this, but it remains to be seen if the Phillies will adjust their overall strategy from its current trend.
Phuture Phillies 
Solid article…It’s easy (and lazy) to say “Well, it’s hard to bring in talent when you’re always at the back of the draft”…but we have seen MANY other teams dig deep into the draft and get quality MLB arms. I’m not gonna savage the Phil’s draft team suffice it to say pitchers are a bit of a crapshoot. Sometimes you get a Mitch Gueller and sometimes you get a Henry Owens. Heck, the 2011 draft featured the Phils taking a toolsy HS kid named Larry Greene Jr….any guess who went next??? Jackie Bradley…but in the 7th round the Phils got Kenny Giles. Win some lose some…it just seems like the Phils lose more…either way you HAVE to be happy about the likes of JP Crawford, Hoby Milner, and Dylan Cozens (just to name a few)…I’m actually pretty confident about this summer’s draft as well….but I’m weird, I’m an optomistic Phillie fan 🙂
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Great article. The main downfall for me is a guy like Colvin. At this point, he should be where Pettibone and Buchanan are. If not being in the rotation already. Instead , he looks like a guy who will never make it and is an extreme long shot at best.
Of course, Morgan is another guy who could be helping this team and is hurt. Here’s hoping that Viza or Keyes or D. Anderson give us hope in the lower minors this year.
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Yeah, it is hard to not look at Colvin as a disappointment, especially since he got nearly twice what Dugan got in the 2nd round that year. The reality is these guys fail and it sucks when they do. That is some of the point with pitching, it breaks down and so you need more of it to just deal with the failures
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This continues to show how important it is we draft a pitcher at #7 this year that can be a true #1. They are so hard to find and like always, pitching is what wins championships most times.
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Ugh. You can’t force these things. I’d like them to draft the best player – period.
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Excellent analysis of Phillies minor league pitching (you did miss Nick Hernandez-9th round, 2009–another one of the high hopes when drafted but injuries hurt what looked like a good prospect). Sometimes I think most of the draft problems are due to poor scouting and analysis. I am amazed at how well the Cardinals draft consistently over the years–they have pitchers who spend a year or two in the minors, then are successful in the majors. Are the Phillies looking at those guys at all? I also wonder about the coaching in the minors and the way pitchers are instructed? Looking forward to seeing Hoby Milner at Reading this year–he seems to be holding his own so far.
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Terrific article, and great discussion starter. Like many discussions/debates there are points to be made on both sides. On the one hand you can definitely subscribe to the “just take the best person available” idea. Which generally is a very good strategy if there is a significant perceived gap (and at the end of the day, it’s all “perceived” when you are talking about the draft) between players but you say “but I need a second baseman”. Don’t think you would ever do that, nor should you. But in my humble opinion unless there is yet again that dreaded perceived gap with players if I am playing the odds wouldn’t you want to normally take a pitcher over a position player if it’s a crap shoot anyway?
And when I say “crap shoot” I am really referring to the “high risk/high reward” strategy the Phillies have employed. And I have been totally in favor of this where they’ve been drafting of late. I know there was the “don’t give me that comment” but at 26th and up you are always out side the “sure things”, even if there is such a thing, so I’ve been cool with the risk/reward. But my point would be, if you are doing that – why not do risk/reward with pitchers? This article makes a great point that the Phils haven’t done that based upon the number of pitchers drafted. If you want to hit the lottery your chances go up if you play more. We’ve played more on positional players and I actually think we’ve done ok.
Maybe these guys know more than we do – that later in the draft there are less pitchers who “surprise” than positional players. Maybe that’s the case. Probably a next good article to look at that 🙂
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“Since then the Phillies have only drafted 6 HS pitchers over the Top 10 rounds of the next 5 drafts and only signed 4 of them. Furthermore they only handed large late round bonuses to 5 more HS pitchers (and signed a few more than that).”
Matt — do you see this as a change in philosophy, or just they way the board has lined up the last few years?
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I think it is a bit of both but also coupled with the changes in draft rules. Before the slot system of the present draft the Phillies were more likely to spend 200k on a high schooler late to buy them away from college. They have tried in recent years, but have been reluctant to punt Top 10 draft picks to try and sign guys later.
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I’m not sure what you are trying to say about not punting top 10 draft picks to try to sign guys later. You list both Shane Martin and Prosinsky as $5K signees from the last draft in the 9th and 10th rounds. That frees up about $200K of bonus allocation, allowing a $300K signee from the later rounds, without dipping into the 5% overage allowed without severe penalty.
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They did it last year in the 9th and 10th. They did not do it 2012. Many teams are punting earlier picks to free up even more money.
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You know, I have to question at least some of the coaching of pitchers in the system. It seems like the gems get hurt, and the guys with crazy raw stuff never learn to put it together. I have a feeling if the group of De Fratus, Diekman, Aumont, Rosenberg, Stutes, ect came up in the Cardinals system, they would be a dynamic bullpen. I really question the organization from top to bottom…very few players this team drafts gets better upon arrival. Sure you have a few surprising guys per year, but it just seems like this team struggles to develop a complete pitcher. Electricity can’t be taught…Aumont, De Fratus, Diekman…all electric….even BJ throws hard…but none of these guys seem to learn how to pitch in the minors.
Really hoping for the best from Biddle, even though I do think the organizations views him as more than he is going to be, and I really hope that Giles rides this hot start to a true breakout year and doesnt go back to being Charlie Sheen in Major League.
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Stutters is out of baseball? No one picked him up when he was waived. Think it’s a little too soon to quit for him.
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It might be a bit premature, but that shoulder is shredded, if he comes back it is going to be a year plus down the road when he has had a long rehab
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Stutes*
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Thanks for a very enjoyable article. I noticed Jason Knapp was listed as pitching in the Ranger organization – wasn’t he out of baseball for a while? Also probably a question for a later time but do you think the Phillies would take a HS pitcher with the seventh pick?
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Knapp made a comeback this year and signed with the Rangers as a reliever. CJ Wittman saw him pitch and wrote it up for BP http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=23295 93-95 with sink, 91-92 cutter (plus potential), and a curveball with plus plus potential. Little control, and should be a reliever going forward, but has late inning potential if healthy.
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Latin America…
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I am really excited about the upcoming draft but i am also nervous about it I look at it like we have to get 1 of the top 5 pitchers C.Rondon, J.Hoffman, B.Aiken, Kolek, Beede, and being at pick 7 we might miss out on all of them according to most mock drafts. I thought we could choose between LHP Brady Aiken or RHP Tyler Beede but both seemed to have climbed in the rankings with Aiken being projected to go #1 in some mocks. The next best thing would be to draft Alex Jackson but he could go #6 to Seattle. That is my worst fear about the draft. The next grouping of guys i know very little about RHP Luke Weaver, RHP Luis Ortiz, RHP Grant Holmes, RHP Aaron Nola, OF Bradley Zimmer. I guess i should study them more but as of right now i would hate to miss out on one of the 5 best pitchers. I know i worry to much but i like most fans are starving for a elite pitching prospect. Does anyone know if we get a pick back for failing to sign Wetzler?
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Agree that more ‘inventory’ is needed, but if those guys are just as bad as replacement level guys it is no big deal.
I did like the 2008 ‘strategy’ of getting later round college relievers. Roseberg, Stutes, Schwimmer were all very good choices who did make the majors with some upside. So I like the Dan Child signing. Losing Wetzler is terrible on so many levels.
I see the biggest miss as Garner (and maybe Gueller). Colvin, Morgado, and Way (who was a poor choice from the start) also seem like misses. Frazier not signing (and supposed signing of Walter,Musser,Pointer in his place) was a negative. Injuries to Morgan, Watson and Wright are part of the expected attrition.
Phillies did get excellent value out of the 2008 class, but since it is only Biddle. The ‘big’ guys from other drafts have fallen (Colvin 2009, Morgan 2011, Watson 2012) and trades of vets have not brought back anything either.
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