Here’s another article submitted by one our readers.  I think the conclusion is one that a lot of readers grudgingly accept because of the subject’s wide variation in his splits.  As before, the writer offers several comps to support his premise.

As always, neither the statistical opinions stated in a submitted article nor the interpretations of same are those of the staff here at Phuture Phillies.

Is Dylan Cozens A Legit Prospect?

by V1again

I like to use comparable players to gauge a prospect’s profile. I am not a scout and don’t pretend to be one. I look at stats, body type and scouting reports to try to find similar players and then compare their performance at similar ages. Here is my breakdown of Dylan Cozens’ prospect profile…

Dylan has been a lightening rod of a prospect since his high draft spot. He is truly an extreme prospect. Everything he does with the bat is extreme. He has a serious carrying tool in his 80 Raw Power. He is so strong that he doesn’t have to even swing hard to destroy a baseball. When he connects it is a thing of beauty. Majestic. Judge-esq power. It makes you dream…but the question is how that is going to translate against major league pitching.

Dylan is a giant of a man. I have seen him play live in Lakewood and he has a cannon for an arm in right. I saw both him and Tocci in the same outfield and I think Cozens has a stronger arm. I saw him throw a laser beam from right to home plate to get an out. It was very impressive. Cozens moves like a locomotive. I mean that analogy. He is not a fluid athlete, so he does not have great lateral movement, but once he gets going, he can move fast. Like a locomotive. He could probably play defensive outfield in the majors, but he will never be a “good” defensive outfielder at the major league level. In my mind, I was thinking a Pat Burrell type outfielder when I saw him play. Not going to cover a lot of ground, but will throw out guys with that arm. He will also never be a base stealer and no one thinks that he will be a high batting average guy. So the entire profile centers around his raw power translating.

As mentioned above, I looked for comparable players to see how he is performing relatively. Here are a few good comps:

Chris Davis is a strikeout machine. He led the majors in strikeouts in 2016, producing a 32.9% k rate. He also had a 13.2% walk rate and a .239 ISO and overall line of .221/.332/.459. This year his numbers are worse, but let’s go with 2016 as his profile. As a 23 year old in AAA (same age as Cozens) Davis had a 12.9% walk rate, a 20.1% k rate with a .194 ISO and a line of .327/.418/.521.

Compare that to Cozens line this season: 9.9% walk rate, a 34.3% k rate, a .220 ISO and a line of .223/.306/.443. I mean it isn’t close. Davis’ line is far, far superior. But focus on the k rates. In AAA, Davis had a 20% k rate. In the majors that jumped to a career 31.8% k rate. Cozens’ k rate is 2.5% higher in AAA than the MLB strikeout leader has at the MLB level and 14% higher than Davis’ comparable AAA season. Cozens also has a significantly lower walk rate.

As I have mentioned before, it is typical to see a k rate go up 4-6% from AAA to the Majors. Davis is a bit of an outlier as his went up nearly 12%. This 4-6% increase in k rate doesn’t happen all of the time. But it is pretty common. If this trend holds, Cozens is looking at a MLB k rate of nearly 40%. Who has nearly that k rate in the majors? It is very rare to find a major league player with a k rate above 35%. I went back to 2010 and only found it a few times. And even then, no one came close to 40% until this year…Joey Gallo has a 38.6% k rate this year. If that holds, Gallo would have the highest k rate since 2010 (note I didn’t go back further, but my guess is it would be the highest in a long, long time).

As a 23 year old in the majors Joey Gallo has the worst K rate in the majors. Here is Gallo’s line: 12.8 % walk rate, 38.6 % k rate, a .341 ISO (2nd in all baseball) with a batting line of .205/.318/.546. As a 22 year old, (a year younger than Cozens), Gallo’s AAA line was: 15.7% walk rate, 34.6 % k rate, .290 ISO, with a batting line of .240/.367/.529

So comparing Cozens’ AAA line to a year younger Gallo’s line, Gallo walked in 6.8% more plate appearances, struck out the same amount and Gallo had a 70 point higher ISO. Simply put, Cozens is Gallo with materially fewer walks and materially less in game power. What does that look like at the major league level? My guess is a hitter that has a line of .210/.280/.520, which produces a .800 OPS, that will strike out nearly 40% of the time. You can count on one hand the major league players with an .800 (or lower) OPS who strikes out 30% of the time. Of course, none strikeout 40% k rate. Cut the sample size down to Corner Outfielders, and the comparables looks even more bleak. If you focus on the 30% k rate benchmark, the player you are looking at is Kris Davis, on the As. His line this year is  11.3% walk rate, 31.6% k rate, .263 ISO, for a batting line of .238/.325/.500. In AAA, Kris had a 11.0% walk rate, 21.0% k rate, a .218 ISO and a line of .255/.349/.473. Comparing Kris Davis’ major league stats to Cozens’ AAA stats, Cozens has a lower walk rate, a significantly higher k rate while hitting with less power. That is to Davis’ major league stats. Comparing Cozens to Davis’ AAA stats and it is a blowout. Cozens has a lower walk rate, and a 13.3% higher k rate. Think about that for a second. It is astounding.

How about one more comp. As a 21 year old in AAA, Adam Dunn had a line of .329/.441/.676 with a k rate of 20% and a walk rate of 15%. Dunn was 2 years younger than Cozens’ AAA year and his statistical profile absolutely destroys Cozens’. I mean, not one stat is close. Dunn went on to have a career MLB K rate of 28.6%. Which is 5.7% lower than Cozens’ AAA k rate. Again, this blows my mind. When you think about Adam Dunn as a player, you think a true two outcome player – homers or strikeouts. Yet Cozens is striking out 5.7% more in AAA than Dunn did at the major league level.

Ok one last comp. Ryan Howard, a strikeout machine, had a career k rate of 28.2%. Ryan fricken Howard had a major league k rate 6% lower than Cozens’ AAA line.

Ok, I have made my point. I keep looking for extremes and I simply can’t find anyone who struggles to make contact with the baseball at the rate that Cozens’ does. That player just doesn’t exist in the major leagues. And that is the point. It is just too hard to make an impact if you don’t put the ball in play 40% of the time. Heck, it is hard to stick around if you don’t put the ball in play 30% of the time, especially as a corner outfielder.
Oh, I almost forgot, Cozens can’t hit left handed pitching. He has struggled against left handed pitching in the upper levels. So in all likelihood, he would be a platoon player with that line.

Now, I am 99% confident that Cozens will get a cup of coffee. And it is certainly possible that he runs into enough balls as a platoon to hang around for a few years. He will definitely make it on Sports Center with a big blast. But unless he can somehow dramatically lower his k rate, while facing far better pitching than he saw in AAA, then he doesn’t seem to have a major league comp of even a below average regular.

What’s the “hope” scenario? While it is possible that he dramatically lowers his k rate, it is extremely unlikely if you use MLB history as a guide. Very few players have a lower k rate in the majors than in the minors. And as you saw in all of the comps, it is far more likely with someone of his profile to see their K rate jump dramatically when getting to the majors. So the hope scenario is that he maintains his AAA k rate, while materially increasing his walk rate and also his in game power and becomes Joey Gallo. A player with an .860 OPS who strikes out 39% of the time and is average defensively. It seems like a low probability outcome to me, but anything is possible.

Here’s another article submitted by one our readers.  I received it Tuesday, but didn’t get around to reading it until this morning.  So, some of the data will be a couple days out of date, but nowhere near enough to invalidate the premise stated.

As always, neither the statistical opinions stated in a submitted article nor the interpretations of same are those of the staff here at Phuture Phillies.

Mickey Moniak and the 70 Hit Tool

by V1again

Everyone needs to dramatically lower expectations on Mickey Moniak. He is not a future star. IMO, his peak value is a poor man’s Odubel. Here is my argument.

First, I was a big fan of the Mickey Moniak pick. So this is a mea culpa. And I know he is only 19..but that is not as much of an excuse for his poor performance as you may think..at least for elite prospects.

His value as a 1:1 pick (and thus a possible star) was entirely due to a 70 hit tool projection. He has good, but not elite speed and will likely slow down as he adds weight. He will never have more than 40/45 power. His defense is good, but I don’t hear reports of a future gold glover. So it all comes back to the 70 hit tool. Does he have a 70 hit tool or not?

Since I am not a scout, I looked online into what a 70 hit tool really is. I found this article:  http://www.fangraphs.com/ blogs/scouting-explained-the- 20-80-scouting-scale/

It is a good article. In order to have a 70 hit tool, you have to hit.300+ in the majors. Not one season. Across a career. It probably should focus on OB% rather than BA, but it is good enough for now.

I then looked at the minor league numbers of those who have a 70 hit tool in the majors. By the way, many of them were 19 in low A (killing the “he’s so young argument”). Here is what I found:

• All of them killed low A
• All of them had low k rates and very high walk rates in the minors. Particularly in the low minors. Some of them actually had a higher walk rate than k rate in low A.
• Many of them had very low ISOs, so it wasn’t like they had a lot of power and pitchers feared them. They just had an elite eye.

That was basically across the board. I also found, with rare exception (Mookie Betts):

• All of them had about a 4-6% higher k rate in the majors than in AAA.
• K rate basically always goes up from low A.
• Walk rate is basically the same as minor league production.

My theory on hitting is that all a hitter can do is make hard contact in pitches in the zone.

As of this writing, Moniak has two red flags:

1. A 21.5% k rate, and
2. A 6.3% walk rate.

Those are not elite by any stretch. Neither is really good to be honest. His BABIP is higher than his OB%, which is not good. It means he is likely lucky to have the OB% that he has, which at .312 is not good.

As a comp, Mookie Betts was 19 years old in Low A. His walk rate was 11% and his K rate was 10% and his ISO was .04. The next year in high A his walk rate was 17%, his k rate was 12% and his ISO was .181. That is what an elite hit tool looks like.

Another comp, Christian Yelich.  As a 19yo in low A, Yelich had a 10.6% walk rate, a 19.6% k rate with a 171 ISO and 32 stolen bases. He hit 312/388/484. Again, that is what an elite hit tool looks like in low A.

As a player moves up, the pitching gets better. So if you can’t hit Low A, you are in trouble.

I would also say Mickey’s 3rd red flag is that he isn’t improving as the year is going on. On the contrary, his July numbers are his worst. They are just awful. Look at the top hitting prospects, all of them improved at each level as the year went on.

Now, I am not saying Mickey is a bust. And I know he is only 19. What I am saying is that his performance indicates that he does not have an elite hitting tool.

So what is he? Well, the chart says that a 60 hit tool is a .280 career hitter. That sounds like his peak value to me. So let’s go with the profile of 60 hit, 40/45 power, 55 speed, 60 defense in center (60 arm). That is a good player. A productive player. A player who one year might make an All-star team at 28/29 years old. But not an elite player by any stretch.

You know who that sounds like?

Last year Odubel hit 286/361/420 with 15 homers and 25 stolen bases. That is a 60 hit / 45 power profile according to Fangraphs’ chart. Odubel also played really good CF defense (let’s call it a 60, but again, I am not a scout). The 25 stolen bases separates him from Mickey. I don’t see Mickey doing that in the majors but maybe. Hopefully. And hopefully Moniak can get to 15 homers in the majors.

One last comp, as a 19 year old in low A, Odubel had a 15.4% k rate, 4.8% bb rate and hit 306/349/394 with 34 stolen bases. He did that with only an .088 ISO. Those numbers blow away Mikey’s performance this year to be honest.

Power always fills in with age, but contact ability doesn’t. It is what it is. Mickey does not have a 70 hit tool. I hope he has a 60 hit tool. I believe that he will be a productive major league player, but has no chance of being a star.

I wrote this article because I like Mikey. I am NOT a “hater.” And I sincerely hope that I come to regret putting this in writing. I wrote this article because I want you to enjoy him for what he is. Don’t hold his 1:1 draft pick against him.