Category Archives: 03. Draft Central

Phillies take utility man Mike Martinez in the Rule 5 draft

Rule 5 Draft

I was going to do a bigger writeup on him, but I’ll save the words. As you can see from his track record, he has a limited offensive skill set. His batting average has fluctuated wildly, he doesn’t draw many walks, strikes out a fair amount, and hes capable of swiping a few bases. His greatest strength is his ability to play all over the field. With Wilson Valdez making the league minimum in 2011, it would seem Martinez will be in camp to compete for the 25th spot on the roster. The Phillies will, almost assuredly, go with 13 position players and 12 pitchers. So…

C (2) Ruiz, Schneider
INF (5) Howard, Utley, Rollins, Polanco, Valdez
OF (4) Ibanez, Victorino, Francisco, Gload

SP (5) Halladay, Hamels, Oswalt, Worley, Blanton
RP (6) Lidge, Madson, Contreras, Reyes, Baez, Bastardo

That’s 22 of 25 spots. If Brown makes the team, or if another OF is brought in, that is 5, and will leave one spot open for a utility infielder. Last year, Dobbs would have been the extra infielder. So Martinez could fill that role. Who knows. The roster is still wide open, 3 spots are uncertain. We’ll see what happens.

Rule 5 draft discussion

Rule 5 Draft

Here is where we can discuss the Rule 5 draft tomorrow. Will any Phillies prospects (Savery, Myers, E Garcia, Brummett, Kennelly) be taken? Will the Phillies take anyone? I’m sure they will. Here are the guys that interest me. My assumption is we’d take another possible bullpen piece, as there won’t be much room on the roster to carry a position player who won’t really get a chance to play.

Wynn Pelzer, RHP (BAL)
Aneury Rodriguez, RHP (TAM)
Michael Dubee, RHP (PIT)
Josh Wall, RHP (LAD)
Zech Zinicola, RHP (WAS)
Dylan Axelrod, RHP (CHW)
Yohan Pino, RHP (CLE)

Full list of eligible guys here.

Phillies sign Dominican LHP Franklyn Zavala for $330K

International Signings

Jim Salisbury has the scoop on twitter. 6’4 LHP. Fits the mold for the Phillies in terms of the money they like to spend. Should be interesting, and I’ll post more details as they are available.

Marti Wolever to leave the Phillies?

03. Draft Central

Update –> Former Phillies writer Andy Martino says the Mets have no plans to interview/pursue Wolever this winter.

According to this article, by a CSN reporter I’ve never heard of, Marti Wolever is reportedly thinking about moving on to a new challenge, to one of the Phillies biggest rivals no less. The Phillies scouting network is vast, and surely there are talented people who could come in and replace Wolever, but he’s been at the heart of the Phillies ascension to the upper echelon of MLB teams, finding lots of talent in the draft, talent that has both made it to the majors and also been used in trades. The scouting director relies on his scouts, obviously, but the directive for the type of players to target, and ultimately shaping the team’s drafting philosophy comes from the SD. Losing Wolever would be a loss, one the Phillies could deal with by replacing him with an equally capable guy, but it would leave me a bit uneasy, as its tough to know what to expect from someone you’re not familiar with. This should be an interesting sub-plot to follow as we get closer to the offseason. Here’s to hoping Marti changes his mind and the Phillies throw him a bone to keep him around.

2010 Draft Wrap-Up

2010 Draft

As we inch closer to the midnight deadline, it appears the Phillies are done signing picks for the 2010 draft, which means I can write my final wrap-up piece. As you know, I’m a big draft fan, I love the process, I love the buildup, and then I love waiting to see who does and doesn’t sign. If you’re new to the site, you can find all of the stuff I’ve written about the 2010 by following this link. My long draft recap, written right after the draft in June, can be found here and the more philosophical piece I wrote about draft strategy can be found here. That should be a good primer. I’m going to try and not repeat myself too much from the links above, so lets get to it.

Continue reading 2010 Draft Wrap-Up →

2010 Draft Signing Deadline Day

2010 Draft

The deadline to sign draft picks is midnight on Monday night, and the Phillies have some work to do. I figured it would be good to go over what the Phillies have done so far, and what I expect them to do on Monday in terms of tying up a few more signings. As you have probably heard, MLB tries its best to deter teams from spending more than the recommended bonus amount, especially after the first 5 rounds. The Commissioner urges teams to not give more than a $150K bonus to a player after the 5th round, and all bonuses over this amount must be approved by the Commissioner’s office before it is official. Because of this, teams generally wait until the last few days to announce overslot signings, because the Commish won’t approve them. Will the Phillies make any more plays in this draft class? Past history says its a good possibility. Check below for more.

Update 9:38 PM —> According to this article (which provides no source), the Phillies signed Brian Pointer and Jonathan Musser. The article mentions “high 3rd round money” for Pointer, which would be somewhere between $350-450K.

Update –> Jim Callis mentions on Twitter that Pointer got $350K. So if the $300K on Musser is correct, that means $650K so far. Solid.

Update –> 5:08 PM According to Phillies scribe Matt Gelb, Kevin Walter has signed. This is fantastic news. You can find a scouting report on Walter in the link below.

Update –> 9:50 PM Gelb now says the Phillies won’t sign Frazier. Kind of a shame, but with the other signings announced, it makes sense I suppose.

You can find scouting reports for Walter, Pointer and Musser in my Draft Review piece.
Video of Brian Pointer can be found here.

Continue reading 2010 Draft Signing Deadline Day →

Phillies sign Venezuelan SS Anderson Gonzalez

International Signings

In today’s Gelb-Brookover collaboration, they note the Phillies have signed Venezuelan SS Anderson Gonzalez for $300K, the amount that seems to have become the Phillies comfort amount over the last few years in Latin America. For reference (and this is off the top of my head), a $300K bonus for a player drafted in June would be 3rd round money. Here is what G-B have to say

The Phillies lost a talented prospect when they surrendered single-A Lakewood shortstop Jonathan Villar in the deal with Houston that brought them righthander Roy Oswalt at the trade deadline. They are hoping they signed another talented shortstop prospect in Anderson Gonzalez, who recently received a $300,000 bonus. That’s the largest bonus the Phillies have paid to any of their international signings this year. “I love his hands, his athleticism and the way he plays the game,” said Sal Agostinelli, the Phillies’ international scouting supervisor. “He’s built a little bit like [Derek] Jeter. It’s a body that he will fill into. The thing I really love is that he can hit. He doesn’t have a lot of power, but he’s only 16.” Gonzalez is the second Venezuelan shortstop the team has added during the international signing period, which began July 2. They also signed Francisco Silva for $180,000. The Phillies could not sign Gonzalez at the beginning of the international signing period because he was not yet 16 years old. He turned 16 July 25. Agostinelli said Gonzalez will soon join the Phillies’ Venezuelan Summer League team and report to the Florida Instructional League later this year. He will also play in the Venezuelan Parallel League during the winter.

Andrew Susac #13 on Keith Law’s Cape Cod Top 30

2009 Draft

2009 draftee Andrew Susac makes the list. You can see the whole list here.

13. Andrew Susac, C, Oregon State/Falmouth. Susac is age-eligible as a sophomore in 2011 and seems to be the consensus pick among scouts as the Cape’s best catcher. He has arm strength behind the plate and raw power at the dish, but he needs to demonstrate he can handle better quality stuff — which he’ll see often in the Pac-10 next year.

Phillies sign Venezuelan shortstop Francisco Silva

International Signings

For about $200K, per Baseball America. Like Freddy Galvis, it appears his glove is ahead of his bat, but we don’t know a ton about him yet, obviously. Still nice to see the Phillies active early.

2010 Draft Review

2010 Draft

I’m going to start off my annual 2010 draft review with a quick note. I’m not one for self-editing. When I sit down to write something, I normally do it in one shot. I’ve written some very very long pieces in the history of this site, and off the top of my head, I think all of them were written in one sitting. Its the way I work. When I want to write something, I generally sit down and either it happens or it doesn’t. I have ideas, I want to talk about them, then I move on. But in writing this draft recap, I did a lot of self-editing. I started writing last night and ended up writing 5,500 words which I’ve since scrapped, or more accurately put, shelved until a later date. I started writing and realized my draft recap barely even talked about the 2010 draft, it was more of a philosophical writeup on the draft mechanics as a whole. Which I want to save for a later date, because I think they are still valid, but they’ll require me doing more work. And right now, all it seems anyone wants is my take on the draft. I’m going to pull a few small parts from that previous writeup, and its still going to be somewhat philosophical, but I’m going to focus more on the 2010 picks, and I’ll polish up that other piece for a rainy day while we wait for the signing deadline in August. So, for what is sure to still be a really long piece, check below…

Continue reading 2010 Draft Review →