Last week I started exploring the future of the Phillies with a luck at what could be in 2016.  The series continues with 2017 as some more money comes off the books and a couple more guys arrive in the majors. Just as before here are the starting assumptions.

• The Phillies are not trading away any players
• Minor Leaguers will progress as “normal” and will not have any career ending injuries.
• The Phillies will be rational about resigning players
• I am not accounting for FA acquisitions and Draft Picks, however I will have a salary total that can be used to dream on FA acquisitions that could fill in the holes
• Arbitration figures for salaries are taken from similar players

Catcher: Tommy Joseph and Andrew Knapp

This isn’t going to be a great defensive pair but it should provide plenty of offense.  In this scenario Knapp is likely in a back-up position given his inexperience, but he could overtake Joseph depending on how his hitting progresses.  More than anything else this pair should be really cheap. Salary: $1 million Continue reading Something to Dream On: The 2017 Phillies →

For Phillies fans this offseason really has been a continuation of what has been a rough 2 years.  The amount of hope left dwindles by the day, and the confidence that tomorrow will be better than today.  If you have hope, the year to target is 2016, it is when the contracts start to fall off and the first wave of prospects starts to arrive.  On the suggestions of John Stolnis (@FelskeFiles) and Corinne (@Ut26), rather than just start with 2016 or look at the end result in 2018, this is the first part of a step by step transition of a rebuilding team.

In working on this activity here are the starting assumptions:

• The Phillies are not trading away any players
• Minor Leaguers will progress as “normal” and will not have any career ending injuries.
• The Phillies will be rational about resigning players
• I am not accounting for FA acquisitions and Draft Picks, however I will have a salary total that can be used to dream on FA acquisitions that could fill in the holes
• Arbitration figures for salaries are taken from similar players

Obviously these are a lot of assumptions that will not hold true because prospects are unpredictable, draft picks especially the 2014 #7 overall pick could have large influences, and the front office will not be static for the next two years. Continue reading Something to Dream On: The 2016 Phillies →

In an article today on Baseball Prospectus Jiwan James’s Agent Joshua Kusnick laid out the offseason for a minor league free agent from his agent’s perspective.  He uses James’s offseason as his example, and it forms a really interesting narrative and rare look behind the curtain at minor league life.  The article is free so you have no excuse not to read it.

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=22236

After discussing who is on the roster, it is now time to discuss who might be on the roster going forward.  Pitching is a lot easier for a team to stash on a roster than it is to stash position players because bullpen arms can be regulated and coached without the need for constant in game work.  For the most part teams are looking for players who can provide a solid fastball and command out of the bullpen.  The Phillies have a couple of player who may be able to fill those roles, but more interestingly they have a couple of players who could provide rotation depth to the rate team.

Seth Rosin – RHP – Acquired from San Francisco for Hunter Pence

Seth Rosin is a big pitcher, and he generates good downward plane on his pitches.  Out of the rotation Rosin will show a plus fastball, a slider with good potnetial, and an average changeup.  Rosin will pound the zone with all of his pitches and has improved his walk rate every year.  Rosin wore down towards the end of the year as he passed his previous high in innings.  If he sticks in the rotation Rosin profiles as a back of the rotation starter, however if put back in the bullpen he could be an asset in 2014.  This potential bullpen use could make him attractive to a team in the Rule V draft.  MW: Protect Phillies: No Add Continue reading 40 Man Roster Decisions – Part 2 – Pitchers →

Hi all,

While there is some down time in the prospect world I will be doing some improvements to the site.  Some of them are in the testing phase such as the Twitter feeds of writers and reorganization of the pages at top under player profiles.  As for the profiles, I am working on good ways of linking them out to news posts, and I have further 18 that are in draft form and will be up over the coming weeks.  Additionally all the existing profiles will get a quick update.

If there are any improvements to your reading experience that you would like to see, just post them here and I will take them under advisement based on what I have time for and what the WordPress site will allow me to do.

If you feel that any players are missing from the profiles let me know, they may be in the works or they may have just fallen through the cracks.

Thank you to everyone who stops by, whether they post or not.

Matt

I’m short on time today and so I’ll leave the analysis to you all.

A note that Your Peoria Javelinas will be on MLB Network tomorrow night at 8pm EST, as they visit Surprise. The game’s being televised as they test the MLB replay system for next year. I’ve been watching parts of the games this week, and I’m hopeful we’ll get to see some of our guys on that big stage. Cam Rupp has played in two straight, so if he’s off today, he could be back tomorrow, and both outfielders have been playing plenty. Giles and Wright both have been off a couple days, so they’re in the mix if they don’t throw tonight, but I would guess we won’t see Nesseth or Simon, as they both threw yesterday and have been spread out to at least two days between outings all season.

Here’s the link for the Phils’ Off-Season League stats. Freddy Galvis is tearing it up. He’s got four multi-hit games and five XBH in his last six contests.

http://mlb.mlb.com/milb/stats/org.jsp?id=phi

Continue reading AFL Update – 11-8-2013 →

First reported here by Murray but we now have confirmation from Jim Salisbury http://www.csnphilly.com/baseball-philadelphia-phillies/good-news-bad-news-2-phillies-prospects?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

Quinn ruptured is achilles doing sprints near his Florida home. He has already had surgery to repair it, the Phillies are also looking into having him get surgery on his wrist which has been healing slowly since it was broken by a pitch in June. It took Ryan Howard 10 months to return to the field so Quinn could see action towards the end of next year, but odds are he will be highly limited and without the aid of his speed for much longer. This is a severe blow to the Phillies farm system as a whole.

In better news Tommy Joseph is headed to the Dominican to play winter ball. He will be behind the plate for Estrellas de Oriente.

One of the most interesting and potentially rewarding part of the offseason is finding former prospects and guys with tools in minor league free agency.  Most of these guys will switch orgs to man AA and AAA teams with the hope that they might get a cup of coffee in the majors.

The Phillies have already locked up their biggest names that could have been available in Jim Murphy, Leandro Castro, and Jiwan James.  All will be back in the org next year and will all make at least a visit to big league camp.  There are some names of interest left, but there is no one who would be a huge loss if they left the org.  The full list from Baseball America http://www.baseballamerica.com/minors/minor-league-free-agents-2013/.

Philadelphia Phillies
RHP: Gabriel Arias (Hi A), Justin Friend (AAA), Mike MacDougal (AAA), Juan Sosa (AA)
LHP: Bobby Bramhall (AA), Tom Cochran (AAA), Mauricio Robles (AAA), Greg Smith (AAA)
C: John Suomi (AAA), Shawn Williams* (AA)
2B: Matt Tolbert (AA)
3B: Josh Fields (AAA)
SS: Miguel Abreu (AAA), Andres Blanco* (AAA)
OF: Derrick Mitchell (AAA)

First go read the free version here http://www.baseballamerica.com/minors/2014-philadelphia-phillies-top-10-prospects/, and then if you give BA money go read the scouting reports here http://www.baseballamerica.com/minors/2014-philadelphia-phillies-top-10-prospects-with-scouting-reports/, and if you give them money read the chat transcript here http://www.baseballamerica.com/minors/2014-philadelphia-phillies-top-10-prospects-chat-with-josh-norris/.

For those lazy the Top 10 are:

1. Maikel Franco
2. Jesse Biddle
3. JP Crawford
4. Miguel Alfredo Gonzalez
5. Roman Quinn
6. Carlos Tocci
7. Ethan Martin
8. Cesar Hernandez
9. Aaron Altherr
10. Severino Gonzalez

Rather than give a word for word recap of all of these reports I am going to give my reactions and quick thoughts. Continue reading Baseball America Top 10 Phillies Prospects →

So we’re about half way through the AFL season, and we’ve finally got our first Phillies’ AFL home run. Cameron Rupp “went yard” (as the kids say) on Tuesday. He’s been the healthiest position player thus far, with Kelly Dugan gone with turf toe, Aaron Altherr missing a lot of time with a hand injury, and Cam Perkins now possibly shelved after taking a fastball (“only” 89mph) to the helmet, per a Twitter report from @JoshOrensteinTM from Trackman.dk.

As for hurlers, Ken Giles has gotten nine outs and allowed 12 baserunners in his last three outings. Mike Nesseth got lit up yesterday, while Kyle Simon had another good outing earlier in the week before giving up a run yesterday. Austin Wright also with a mixed bag of a week – a bad outing last Friday, followed up with a clean inning with two Ks yesterday.

Here’s the link for the Phils’ Off-Season League stats. Cesar Hernandez has gone deep twice now, and is OPSing near .850. Jesus Manuel Chavez seems to be getting use, at least sometimes, as a lefty specialist. He’s faced a couple more LHB than RHB and he’s been used for less than an inning a handful of times. In total, he’s struck out seven and walked just one in 7.2IP.

http://mlb.mlb.com/milb/stats/org.jsp?id=phi

Continue reading AFL Update – 11-1-2013 →