After a fast start, the Phillies VSL squad has fallen back to a 6-7 record.  With a younger roster the Phillies will probably have less success than last year championships squad, but may still have some prospects.  Several 16 and 17 year olds are getting lots of playing time.  A 16-year-old hitting .230 in this league may end up being a better prospect than a 20-year-old hitting .330.  Unlike last year the Phillies also do not appear to have a dominant starter like Moises Melendez last year.  The two best starters are 20-year-olds Juan Colmenarez and Freddy Ballesta.  Both are having good years, though not as effective as Melendez or Mauricio Romero from last year’s team.  As usual, the team is offensively challenged, though a couple of new signees (Winder Torres and Luis Martinez) are potential solid prospects.

Brief notes on the better prospects and performers are as follows:

Continue reading VSL Update – First Two Weeks →

May 14th is day one for the Venezuelan Summer League where the Phillies are defending champs.  The initial roster for the season has been posted at the minor league baseball web site:

http://web.minorleaguebaseball.com/milb/stats/stats.jsp?t=t_ros&cid=661

Continue reading VSL Opening Day →

Here are the players from the DSL and VSL who were on the minor league workgroup lists. Note that Moises Melendez was the only one who was on workgroup 4, so he may have a shot at something higher than GCL. He impressed in the senior Venezuelan winter league this fall.

Francisco Murillo – 1B/C – age 20 – VSL
Freddy Galvis – SS – age 17 – new signing
Jamie Morales – SS/2B – age 23 – VSL
Ambiorex Rincon – 2B – age 20 – DSL
Arlon Quiroz – OF – age 20 – VSL
Sergio Escalona – LHP – age 22 – VSL
Antonio Florentino – RHP – age 19 – DSL
Miguel Matos – RHP – age 19 – DSL
Mauricio Romero – RHP – age 20 – VSL
Moises Melendez – LHP – age 20 – VSL

6 total from the VSL (which was the league champ) and 3 from DSL. Melendez is the most polished and probably will merit at least a starting role at GCL. Matos and Florentino are intriguing projectible arms with good seasons in 2006. Murillo is the player most likely to make an offensive impact. Quiroz, a speedy OF, has been mentioned in several of the early spring training game reports.

The Phillies’ entry in the Dominican Summer League finished the 2006 season in 2nd place in the Santo Domingo North division with a record of 40-26. The Phillies have had relatively strong teams in the league over the past few seasons, though they have not turned out a huge number of prospects. Many of the Phillies better players turned out to be several years older than the team had thought. Last year’s team was a little younger than in the past, so hopefully the positive record is being fueled by real prospects.

This post will go through some of the better prospects from last year’s team. As usual for the Phillies, there seem to be better prospects on the pitching side of the ledger as opposed to the hitters. Here are the prospects with performance (mainly statistics) that stood out.

Hitters (age as of April 1)

Ambiorex Rincon (age 20) – Rincon is a 20-year-old switch hitting infielder (likely 2B/3B) who put up by far the best offensive numbers on the team. Rincon hit .320 with 5 HR and 31 RBI. He had a total of 28 extra base hits and more walks than strikeout (28/27). His OPS was a healthy .862. Add 12 SB and you have a well-rounded set of stats. Rincon is among the players with a shot at playing GCL this year.

Santos Mathiw (age 21) – Mathiw is an outfielder who hit .256 with mid-range power (15 2B, 3 HR), patience (30 BB), and speed (8 SB). His OPS of .766 was second on the team. None of the stats stand out as well as they do for Rincon, however. Mathiw turns 21 in March, so he will need to improve in 2007 to be considered a prospect.

Others of Note – Juan Mejia (age 21/1B) is a little old to be considered a prospect, though hit hit .263 and led the team with 40 RBI. Vladimir De Los Santos (age 20/OF) hit only .246 but with decent speed (15 SB). Luis Santa (age 19/SS) is one of the younger players on the team and held his own as the starting SS, hitting .272.

Pitchers

Antonio Florentino (age 19) – Florentino is young and projectible (6’4″, 180). He dominated the league last year, going 7-2 with a 1.44 ERA and posting outstanding peripherals (81 IP, 47 H, 27 BB, 65 K). While the strikeout rate is a little low, Florentino is clearly a prospect to watch if his age is correct.

Daury Luna (age 21) – Luna is a relatively small LHP (6’1″, 165) who has posted good DSL stats the past two seasons. In 2006 he went 5-4 with a 2.59 ERA and good peripherals (87 IP, 65 H, 27 BB, 88 K). Luna’s age and the fact that he repeated last year in the DSL put up a couple of yellow flags as to his prospect status. Left handed pitcher at the low levels often pile up quality stats simply because the hitter there have not seen a great deal of left-handed pitching.

Yohan Flande (age 21) – Flande is another lefty like Luna that put up a good season as a starter. A little bigger physically than Luna (6’2″, 170), Flande went 6-1 with a 2.08 ERA. Flande had great control with a 5-1 K/BB ratio (65 IP, 55 H, 12 BB, 60 K). Like Luna, his age is a concern regarding his prospect status.

Miguel Matos (age 19) – Matos pitched all of last season at age 18 and went 6-1 with a 1.71 ERA. Matos is also very projectible with decent size (6’4″, 178) and solid stats (52.2 IP, 40 H, 8 BB, 54 K)

Others of Note – Jose Perez (age 22) was a solid 5th starter (3-3, 2.45 ERA) but is a little old to be a top prospect. Kenny Fernandez (age 20) was one of the team’s closers and went 1-4 with a 1.67 ERA. Edwin Bernabel (age 21) had good peripherals in limited time (30 IP, 24 H, 8 BB, 36 K). Several other pitchers also had decent stats, though the team tends to give the innings to the starters who are the better prospects. Also note that the entire team had a 2.51 ERA. Most likely the Phillies play in a large park that favors the pitchers greatly.