Nationals Arm Race

Lucas Giolito still leads the line of the Nats 2012 draft class. Photo unk via federalbaseball.com

(Useless blog information: this is my 900th post!  And we’ve had nearly 7,500 comments on those posts; that’s fantastic.  )

The next in a series: previously we reviewed the 2015 season stats for the 2015 draft class, 2014 draft class, and the 2013 draft class.  Like with the 2013 post, this one was easier to do thanks to having done the 2012 guys back in 2013 time-frame.  Is it worth going back one or two more draft classes at this point?  Maybe not; the 2012 draft class has mostly already been Rule-5 exposed, a good benchmark for prospects to make it or break it in terms of advancement or resignation as “org guy.”  I have gone back one more class to 2011 and that’s it, so one more in this series after this.

Web links to use while reading:

• Stats are pulled from milb.com and/or fangraphs.com; put the player name into the search bar to get his seasonal stats
• The MLB Draft Tracker (which I believe is the best draft tracker out there) is the best place to get draft class information.
• The Big Board and the Draft Tracker are the goto resources for prospects for any Nats fan.
• Baseball-reference.com’s draft database for Nats 2011 class.
• My working XLS in Google for all this data (cut-n-pasted at the bottom).
• TheBaseballCube.com for really obscure stats for players, like college stats for these  upper round 30s guys.

Without further ado:

Round 1: (#16 overall) Lucas Giolito HS RH Starting pitcher: 7-7, 3.15 ERA across two levels, starting at HighA and moved up to AA.  131/37 K/BB in 117 IP (21 “starts”) with 1.96/3.18 fip, and .352/.341 babip splits between HighA/AA.  A fantastic season for the newly-turned 21-yr old, who dominated HighA before moving up and holding his own in AA for the last two months of the season.  All the pre-season talk about how he was going to have “no innings limits” was bunk; he was kept in XST until the first week of May and routinely skipped starts so as to extend him through the whole season while keeping his innings year-over-year increase just below the magical 20% mark (98 IP in 2014, 117 in 2015).  He’s now routinely named as either the best or the 2nd best (behind LA’s Julio Urias) pitching prospect in all of baseball.  Not much else to say.  I’m guessing he starts 2016 in AA, moves to AAA and may even get tapped once he surpasses the Super-2 deadline as an injury fill-in starter in the majors.  Look for him to get about 140 innings in 2016 all told (that’s 20% bump from his 2015 117 total).  Trending Up.

Round 2: (80) Tony Renda, Coll Jr 2B: .267/.333/.340 in Harrisburg with 15/19 K/BB ratio and 13 SBs in a little less than a half a season in AA before he was traded to the Yankees on 6/11/15 for David Carpenter.   Renda had progressed nicely in the system as a defense and speed-first second baseman, but in the immediate seems like he was blocked by Wilmer Difo, perhaps the rising of Chris Bostick and the presence in the majors of three or four different guys who can play an adequate second base.  So the team flipped him for something they needed; reliever depth.

Round 3: (111) Brett Mooneyham, Coll Jr LH starting pitcher: was 0-2 with a 6.41 ERA in 19 ineffective innings for LowA Hagerstown before the Nats finally cut the cord and released him on 6/3/15.  Mooneyham was in Low-A for the third successive season, having failed to make the cut in Potomac in each of 2013 and 2014.  You’d have to say that he’s one of the more higher-profile drafting failures of the Mike Rizzo era.  Or maybe not; the team had to go over-slot to sign Giolito and may have skimped for the rest of the draft.

Round 4: (144) Brandon Miller Coll Sr Corner OF: .226/.301/.421 in 59 games with Potomac before voluntarily retiring on 7/10/15.  Despite showing some power (he hit 20 homers in the 2013 season), he never really solved HighA and made way in the Potomac outfield for some rising DSL grads.

Round 5: (174) Spencer Kieboom, Coll Jr C: Slashed .248/.344/.346 with 30/36 K/BB in 246 ABs with Potomac, which were incremental steps back from his great low-A numbers in 2014.  He missed a good portion of the season with injury (concussion) and is currently playing in the Arizona Fall League to make up for it.  He was starting to get some notice in the organization, appearing in the tail end of top-30 prospect lists.  Despite his step back in offense, Kieboom has taken a huge step forward in terms of his defense, his play-calling and pitch-framing.  Scouting reports on him are glowing in this regard, with most projecting him at worst as a backup catcher in the bigs because of his defensive capability.  I think he starts 2016 in AA with an eye towards getting his bat back on track, and if he keeps producing he could soon be a viable alternative to the current catching tandem in the majors.  Trending up.

Round 6: (204) Hayden Jennings, HS OF/CF: Released in May 2014 after two years in the GCL with big K numbers.

Round 7: (234) Robert Benincasa, Coll Jr. RH relief pitcher: Just 4 IP for Harrisburg this year until suffering a season-ending injury.  He made the AA bullpen out of spring (which is where he ended the 2014 season) and seemed to be in a decent spot but got almost no playing time.  Minor league relievers generally don’t get a lot of love from prospect hounds, but in a system where an able-bodied RHP who could throw strikes would have been nice to have in August and September, there’s still opportunity for Benincasa going forward.  Trending Steady if he’s healthy, looking at a ST2016 release if not.

Round 8: (264) Stephen Perez, Coll Jr. SS: slashed just .209/.302/.280 with 87/59 K/BB in 435 ABs between Potomac and Harrisburg.  2 homers, 16 steals.  Perez broke camp with Harrisburg but couldn’t cut it, hitting just .130 in April before getting dumped back to repeat High-A.  In 1300+ career minor league ABs he’s now hitting just .233 and doesn’t seem like he’s long for the organization.  As mentioned in this space before, the Nats drafted a ton of college middle infielders in 2015 and Perez may struggle to keep his slot given what’s expected to rise up.  Trending down.

Round 9: (294) Derek Self, Coll Sr. RH relief pitcher: 4-5, 3.56 ERA with 45/15 K/BB in 60ip.  3.71 fip, .291 BABIP in Potomac.  Broke camp as a member of the AA bullpen but got hit and was dumped back to high-A, where he spent most of the season.  This is the third straight  year he’s been in Potomac as a college senior draftee; odds are there won’t be a 4th.  He may break camp with a full season squad in 2016 but may fall victim to a numbers game once the short-season guys start pushing for promotions.  Trending down.

Round 10: (324) Craig Manuel, Coll Sr C: slashed just .206/.276/.242 between three levels but mostly with Potomac.  He had just 165 ABs on the year as he served as the backup catcher in High-A.  Its his third straight season of essentially being an “old for the level” backup catcher who has struggled to hit the Mendoza Line since leaving Low-A.  Its hard to read the tea-leaves on catchers since they’re so scarce, so I won’t summarily pass judgement that Manuel’s time is about to come to an end.  He could very well be the backup catcher again in Potomac next year.  He is a local guy (born in Rockville, MD though he went to HS in Florida and college in Texas), so perhaps he enjoys playing in the DC area.  Otherwise, just based on his offensive numbers I have to say he’s Trending Down.

Round 11: (354) Brian Rauh, Coll Jr RH starter/reliever: 4-7, 3.39 ERA with 84/24 K/BB ratio in 101 innings (18 starts) across *four* different levels.  2.61/4.95 fip in Potomac/Harrisburg where he spent the most time this year.  Rauh had a nice tour of the system this year, starting in High-A (he was the #2 opening day starter), getting hurt, doing some rehab in the GCL, then working his way back up the chain from Low-A to High-A to AA.  He ended the year in Harrisburg’s rotation, for what its worth.  He didn’t entirely impress at AA but had an incrementally better season in High-A.  My guess is that he starts the 2016 season in the AA rotation, but he has to show he’s worthy in AA.  Trending Steady.

Round 12: (384) Carlos Lopez, Coll Sr 1B: Slashed just .138/.265/.241 in 10 games in Hagerstown before being released on 6/30/15.  This was the third straight season that Lopez featured in Hagerstown, having spent the first two months of the season in XST after getting beat out for the 1B job in the spring.  Eventually there just was no more room for Lopez, with uber prospect Jose Marmolejos-Diaz soon taking over at 1B in Hagerstown and slugging 11 homers in a half-season.

Round 13: (414) Elliott Waterman, Coll Jr LH reliever: Struggled in two Short-A stints and was released on 3/15/14 prior to the beginning of the 2014 season when he couldn’t break into a full-season bullpen.

Round 14: (444) Jordan Poole, Juco-2 corner OF: Similarly to Waterman above, Poole struggled to hit in two seasons shuttling between  Short-A and GCL, and the Nats released him on 3/14/14 when he wasn’t set to make a full season roster.

Round 15: (474) Brandon Smith, OF: Didn’t sign.  Attending Division II Grand Canyon University, where he remains today.  He hit a robust .348/.402/.478 for them this season but was not drafted as a draft-eligible junior.  Maybe the Nats take a flier on him in a late round since they love doing re-drafts on late-round HS picks.

Round 16: (504) Ronald Pena, Juco-2 RH starter/reliever: threw just four rehab innings in 2015, spending the entire season on the Potomac Disabled List.  He was coming off a season where he had a 5.96 ERA in High-A and needed 2015 to show he could make the jump.  My guess is that he’ll get another shot at being the Potomac swing-man in 2016 but he may struggle to make the squad, given the huge number of college arms pushing into the system year after year.  Trending Down.

Round 17: (534) Blake Schwartz, Coll Sr RH Starting pitcher: 0-2, 5.87 ERA in 3 Potomac starts and then he called it quits, officially retiring on 4/24/15.  Schwartz was *so good* in 2013 for Potomac (11-4, 2.65 ERA) then struggled in AA before getting hurt in 2014 and missing half the season.  I thought the retirement was surprising; maybe his 2014 injury just killed his arm and with it his career.  Too bad; he was looking like a fantastic low-round find.

Round 18: (564) David Fischer, Coll Sr RH reliever: Released on 7/3/14 after bouncing around the system for a couple of years.

Round 19: (594) Bryan Lippincott, Coll Sr 1B: Retired ahead of the 2014 season after one decent season in Short-A.

Round 20: (624) James Brooks, Coll SR SS/3B: Released May 2013; he was a senior sign who played last season mostly in the GCL, save for a 2 week stretch where he went 1-32 in Short-A.

Round 21: (654) Austin Chubb, Coll Sr C: Released ahead of the 2015 season after struggling to a .221/.299/.324 line in Hagerstown in 2014.  Signed as a MLFA with Los Angeles and bounced around their farm system this year, missing huge chunks of the season with injury.  Backup Catchers can live forever. 

Round 22: (684) Will Hudgins, Coll Sr RH reliever: Suddenly retired 7/12/13 per his Twitter account.

Round 23: (714) Casey Selsor, Coll Sr LH Starter/Reliever: Posted a 4.29 ERA in ShortA in 2014, then released on 3/20/14.

Round 24: (744) Kevin Dicharry, Coll SR RH pitcher: released 7/1/13

Round 25: (774) Freddy Avis, RHP: didn’t sign.  Attending Stanford, where in 2013 he appeared in exactly one game and pitched 2 innings before suffering a season-ending injury.  That injury never got better and he retired from baseball altogether in March of 2015.  Shame.

Round 26: (804) Skye Bolt, RHP: didn’t sign.  Attended UNC, had an excellent college career and was a 4th round pick in 2015 by the Oakland A’s.  He kind of reminds me of our 2015 pick Andrew Stevenson frankly; kind of an odd swing, defense-first speedy outfielder with limited power.

Round 27: (834) Cody Poteet, RHP: didn’t sign.  Attended UCLA and got drafted (like Bolt) in the 4th round of the 2015 draft by the Marlins.

Round 28: (864) Hunter Bailey, Coll Sr SS/2B: released May 2013.

Round 29: (894) Leonard “LJ” Hollins, Juco RH reliever: released 7/2/14 after struggling for half a season in Hagerstown.

Round 30: (924) Robert Orlan Coll Jr LH Starter: 3-1, 3.00 ERA with 85/28 K/BB ratio in 72 relief IP between LowA and HighA.  Orlan bounced between Potomac and Hagerstown all season, ending up in HighA with pretty good numbers in a “more than a loogy” role.  Especially impressive is 85 Ks in just 72 ip.  He’s older for these levels, inarguably, but could put himself in a good position by continuing to succeed in 2016.  I see him in the Potomac bullpen again with an eye towards a June promotion to AA when the short-season promotions come due.  Trending Steady.

Round 31: (954) Michael Boyden Coll Sr RH reliever: Released Jan 2014 after struggling for two years in Rookie ball as a college senior sign.

Round 32: (984) Michael Mudron, Coll Sr LH reliever: Released Jan 2014 after posting a 6.82 ERA in Short-A in 2013.

Round 33: (1014) Mike McQuillan, Coll Sr 2B/3B: Released 3/26/15 after hitting just .207 in Potomac last  year, likely losing out on a numbers game.

Round 34: Jake Jefferies, 2B: didn’t sign.  Attended Cal State Fullerton and subsequently drafted again by the Nats in the 39th round in 2015.

Round 35: Corey Bafidis, LHP: didn’t sign but Washington picked him in 2013. 

Round 36: Max Ungar, C: didn’t sign.  Attending Division III Denison, where he did not seem to even be playing.

Round 37: Tyler Watson, LHP: didn’t sign.  Attended Kansas U for a year, then bounced to McLennan Community College in Waco, TX and and got drafted by the Angels in the 38th round of the 2014 draft.  This is *not* the same Tyler Watson, by the way, that the Nats drafted in the 2015 draft.

Round 38: Jarred Messer, RHP: didn’t sign.  Pitched the last two years with the Kansas City T-Bones in the independent American Association

Round 39: Mitchell Williams, C: didn’t sign.  Attended the Marion Military Institute in Alabama, for which I cannot find any current stats.

Round 40: Ricky Gutierrez, CF: didn’t sign.  Presumably playing football for U-Conn, as per the Draft Tracker.

Trending Summary:

• Trending Up (2): Giolito, Kieboom
  
• Trending Steady (3): Benincasa, Rauh, Orlan
  
• Trending Down (4): Perez, Self, Manuel, Pena
  
• Did Not Sign in 2012 (11): Smith, Avis, Bolt, Poteet, Jefferies, Bafidis, Ungar, Watson, Messer, Williams, Gutierrez
  
• Released/Retired (19): Mooneyham, Miller, Jennings, Lopez, Waterman, Poole, Schwartz, Fischer, Lippincott, Brooks, Chubb, Hudgins, Selsor, Dicharry, Bailey, Hollins, Boyden, Mudron, McQuillan
  
• Traded (1): Renda
  

Executive Summary

Three years onward, there’s just 10 of the 40 names left active somewhere in the minors.  11 never signed and another 19 have been released or retired.  We cashed in Renda on a middle reliever who subsequently got hurt, and this class has one of the best 2 or 3 prospects in the game.  Otherwise … there’s just not much there.  It seems likely that the Nats 2012 class is going to end up producing just two MLB players; a near Ace and possibly a backup Catcher.  Maybe one of the trending steady middle relievers can make a run ala Aaron Barrett.  Otherwise, is this class a disappointment?

Jun 8, 2015; Atlanta, GA, USA; San Diego Padres manager Bud Black (20) watches a game against the Atlanta Braves in the second inning at Turner Field. Mandatory Credit: Brett Davis-USA TODAY Sports

Well, I wish I had published something predictive at the time, but as soon as I heard Bud Black‘s name being discussed as a candidate, I had a feeling he was going to be the choice.  Why?  I dunno; it was just a feeling.  Black was the 3rd longest tenured manager in the league when his under-performing/poorly constructed 2015 Padres team cratered, leading to his exit (behind only the bullet-proof Mike Scioscia and the excellent Bruce Bochy).  As noted by Ben Lindbergh in his post-axing Grantland.com piece earlier this year, Black had survived several changes in ownership and executive power, which speaks to his value as a skipper since most new regimes clean house to get “their guys” in place.  Point is, you don’t hang around that long unless you’re good … and he makes a lot of sense to be the next manager here.

In my “GM for a day” piece a few weeks back I wrote the following as “job requirements” for a new manager:

• … Here’s some quick qualifications for the manager i’d like to see: able to communicate properly, isn’t a Micro managing inflexible drill sergeant, knows how to read a Run-Expectancy chart, knows how to properly set a lineup, realizes that saves are useless and isn’t afraid to throw his best pitcher when needed, understands that bunting was exposed as mostly useless 10 years ago, is open to new ideas about usage, shifting, match-ups and statistics in general, listens to his coaches, understands that sometimes the 23 yr old precocious rookie is actually a better player than the 38 year old vet on an 9-figure deal, and lastly, relates to the frigging players.  Shouldn’t be too hard.  Oh one more thing; I want someone who has actually managed a f*cking major league team before.

That was quite a rant.  Lets look at Mr. Black and see how he fits in, requirement by requirement (paraphrasing in order from above without the swear words):

• Communication: Tom Boswell‘s leading point about Black relates to his communication.
• Player’s Manager: Black absolutely has the reputation of being a player’s manager, not a disciplinarian.
• Up on Sabremetrics: no idea, probably not as progressive as younger guys who havn’t spent a lifetime in the game.
• Lineup construction: remains to be seen; see above.
• Bullpen management/Meaning of the Save: purportedly a strength of Blacks, by virtue of his long career as a Pitching coach before becoming a manager.  Black himself had a long career (15 seasons) mostly as a starter in this league, so his presence as a manager makes him a rarity.  It should be noted though that Black has always had a dominant closer on his staff (Trevor Hoffman, Heath Bell, Huston Street and Craig Kimbrel this year) so maybe this is an area of concern.

What else?

• Small Ball/Bunting: remains to be seen, along with shifting, run-expectancy matrix, lineup construction and other factors.
• Open to new analytical ideas: presumably so to the extent required by *this* management team.  Mike Rizzo is not known as the biggest analytical guy in the game but certainly isn’t a Ruben Amaro type who completely discounts stats and still thinks Wins and RBIs are the biggest evaluation factors.
• Listens to his coaches: seemingly a no-brainer, since the Nats cleared their entire slate of coaches and probably give Black full reign to name his staff.  This, to be entirely clear, was not necessarily a benefit given to Matt Williams it should be noted.  Maybe it isn’t that big of a surprise that the lines of communication broke down between Williams and his staff.
• Rookies over Vets when appropriate: may be a problem given his own playing career (a similar issue that Williams ran into over and again), but then again, the team he inherits won’t really have an issue in that regard.  The only real high-flying rookie that he may end up having to deal with is Lucas Giolito, and he won’t be ready til mid-season/won’t be called up unless there’s an obvious injury to replace.
• Relates to the players: see “players manager” above; Black was himself an accomplished Major Leaguer (as was Williams) so should command the respect of both rookies and vets alike.
• Prior Management experience: plenty of it, and evidence (2015 notwithstanding) that he could do quite a lot with not a lot based on his low-payroll Padres having a bit of success during his tenure.

I read/heard an interesting analogy on divorce and remarrying once; often times people who re-marry end up over-emphasizing those specific faults they found in their first spouse.  So if your first wife was really opinionated and vocal … you find a second wife who is really demure.

What was William’s biggest faults in the eyes of management?  Lost the clubhouse, didn’t communicate, couldn’t manage the pitching staff.  Now look at Black’s purported strengths: player’s manager, great communicator and a former pitching coach.

Sound like someone who fits what the Nats are looking for?

Side note: I did a bit of quick-analysis of what positions the 30 managers this year played and came up with this analysis (this analysis was done at the end of the season, after Black’s removal but before the likes of Mattingly and Williams got fired):

• Infielders (9): Hale, Weiss, Mattingly, Counsell, Collins, MacKanin, Williams, Ventura, Molitor
• Outfielders (4): Hurdle, Showalter, Francona, McClendon
• Catchers (14): Gonzalez, Maddon, Murphy, Bochy, Matheny, Ausmus, Hinch, Yost, Scioscia, Girardi, Melvin, Cash, Banister, Gibbons
• Pitchers (2): Price, Farrell
• Unknown or unclear (1): Jennings (formerly the GM; played in college but can’t find what position).

So, Black will be just the third active manager who was a former pitcher while nearly half the managers in the league were former Catchers.  Does this matter?  Not if he can do the job.  Former catchers make great sense to be managers for the obvious observation that they “cross the lines” between hitters and pitchers unlike any other player.

My opinion: the right hire for this team at this time.  I completely subscribe to a theory that teams that burn out on a disciplinarian manager then immediately embrace a player’s manager, thankful for the overall “relaxing” of the clubhouse.  Lets hope the 2016 Nats react similarly (oh, and stay healthy, and play up to capabilities).

Can Batman bring a championship to New York? Photo: Brad Penner-USA TODAY Sports

Post season predictions so far:

• Wild Card Games: (link to my prediction post): got both Houston and Cubs WC wins right.
• NLDS: (link to my prediction post):  Got LA in 5 games wrong, got Cubs in 4 exactly right
• ALDS: (link to my prediction post): Got Toronto in 4 correct, got KC in 5 exactly right
• NLCS: (link to my prediction post): Predicted Cubs in 6, was Mets in 4 (ouch, not even close)
• ALCS: (link to my prediction post): Predicted Toronto in 6, actually was KC in 6 (wrong again).

So, neither LCS went as I thought it would and we have the #1 media market in the post-season for the first time since 2009.

Likely Pitching Matchups for Mets-Royals:

Mets-Royals:

• Game 1: Harvey vs Volquez
• Game 2: deGrom vs Ventura
• Game 3: Cueto vs Snydergaard
• Game 4: Young vs Matz
• Game 5: likely Volquez vs Harvey again
• Game 6: likely deGrom vs Ventura again
• Game 7: likely Snydergaard vs Cueto again

Discussion

The Mets, by virtue of their quite unexpected sweep, get to reset their rotation and opt (somewhat surprisingly) to lead with Matt Harvey instead of Jacob deGrom.  So be it; both guys likely throw twice in the series anyway, so perhaps its a case of getting Harvey a home start in game 5 where he’s likely to be unbeatable.  The Royals had to burn Yordano Ventura in the LCS game 6; he won’t be available until WS game 2, so they seem set to lead off with their 2nd most effective guy Edinson Volquez in the opener.

Man for man, the Mets seem to have an overwhelming pitching advantage here.  Their 1-2-3 starters each are significant throwers, Volquez doesn’t normally scare anyone, and Johnny Cueto had a 36.00 ERA in the LCS.  But the Royals are formidable at the plate: 2nd in the league in BA (by just a point behind the leader), Fewest in the league, by a fairly significant margin, in percentage of strikeouts.  Lastly, as a team they’re the 3rd best squad in the game at hitting fastballs.  So strength meets strength here.

I can see the Royals working the Mets pitchers, who are all young and may be at the tail end of their effectiveness after a season where almost all of them are pitching far longer than they thought.  If the Royals get into the Mets bullpen … are they in trouble?  Meanwhile, the Royals’ starters don’t exactly inspire confidence necessarily, but the Royals bullpen is 2nd to none and with so many off-days there’s no reason to think that their main bullpen arms can’t throw in practically every game.   With the possible exception of one game in NY, I can see the likes of Kelvin Herrera, Wade Davis and Luke Hochevar throwing each night and shutting down the late innings.  This could make the difference if this team can get a lead and hold on to it in a close game.

Side note: how funny is baseball; Wade Davis was an awful starter … 5.32 ERA for KC in 24 starts in 2013.  and in 2 years out of the pen he’s 17-3 with a 0.97 ERA across 139 IP!!  Read that statline again; it wasn’t a typo.  187/43 K/BB in 139 IP over the last two years as a 7th/8th inning guy.  Hochevar was the same thing: 5.73 ERA as a starter in 2012, then a 1.92 ERA when he got moved to the pen in 2013.  They also have the effective Ryan Madsen (former Phillie) out there, and all of this bullpen success is in spite of losing perhaps their *best* arm in closer Greg Holland to injury earlier this year.  Maybe there’s a lesson to be learned for our Nats in terms of bullpen construction and what it can do for you.

Can the Mets keep up their momentum after such a long layoff?  Will the rest help or hurt their young arms? (probably help frankly).

I have a feeling this is the Royal’s year.  I’m not sure how they do it, but I think the home field advantage and the fact that they’ve “been there before” gives them a bit of an advantage.  The Mets’ arms are not infallible; they’ll give up runs.  Is Daniel Murphy still the second coming of Babe Ruth?  Can Lucas Duda get hot again (when he’s on fire, he’s the best hitter in the league, as my fantasy team this year could attest).

Prediction; I like Kansas City in 7.  This goes against my better judgement, because I always favor the arms, but when the bats can neutralize the arms … go with the team that seems like its destined to win.

PS: in case you were not aware of the local connection … Kansas City’s GM Dayton Moore was involved with the baseball program at George Mason University, serving as an assistant coach from 1990-1994, right around the same time as some of my baseball colleagues were there (my former teammates who played at Mason would have graduated in the 92-94 range).  Now as GM in KC, he’s hired former local player Lonnie Goldberg as his scouting director; we mentioned Goldberg in this space back in Jan 2013 when talking about notable local pro players in my big “All-Virginia team” post, and Goldberg was on those Mason teams in the early 1990s with my former HS teammate Billy Emerson (now the AD at Paul VI in Fairfax).  Small world.

Loving what Austin Voth is doing for the Nats. Photo via mlbdirt

The next in a series: previously we reviewed the 2015 season stats for the 2015 draft class and the 2014 draft class.  Unlike these other two posts, this one was a bit easier to write.  Why?  Because I had done this analysis for the 2013 class previously … back in 2013.  All I had to do was cut-n-paste that post and all 40 draftees were already listed with key details.  Ahhh.  I may continue this with previous classes since it was easier to compile.  Hopefully I didn’t miss any obvious promotions for key guys like I did previously.

Web links to use while reading:

• Stats are pulled from milb.com and/or fangraphs.com; put the player name into the search bar to get his seasonal stats
• The MLB Draft Tracker (which I believe is the best draft tracker out there) is the best place to get draft class information.
• The Big Board and the Draft Tracker are the goto resources for prospects for any Nats fan.
• Baseball-reference.com’s draft database
• My working XLS in Google for all this data (cut-n-pasted at the bottom).
• TheBaseballCube.com for really obscure stats for players.

Without further ado:

Round 1: forfeited w/ Rafael Soriano signing, which as I noted in this June 2013 post cost the Nats a shot at one of several highly regarded pitchers drafted just behind our vacated spot.  In retrospect, here’s a quick summary of the careers so far of the guys I liked at the time in that spot (Rob Kaminsky, Sean Manaea, Ryne Stanek, Ian Clarkin):

• Kaminsky: so far, looks pretty good.  Career 2.22 ERA across multiple levels, finishing this year in High-A.  Flipped this  year to Cleveland from St. Louis (his drafting team) in the Brandon Moss deal.
• Manaea: looks awesome after some injury issues in 2013.  Finished 2015 going 6-0 with a 1.93 ERA for Midland in AA and was a key prospect going to Oakland in the Ben Zobrist deal.  I really liked him in 2013 and thought his hip injury bumped him down the line from being the top 10 talent he was initially projected to be, and nothing he’s done professionally has countered that.
• Stanek: dominated high-A for Tampa Bay this year, finished the year in AA.
• Clarkin: drafted by the Yankees, pitched his first full season of pro ball in low-A (impressive), giving Charleston 16 decent starts.  Hurt his elbow in 2015 spring training and didn’t pitch all year, but is apparently recovered and is now pitching in the AFL.

I dunno.  I hate to sound like a repeating record on the Soriano signing, but it looks even worse know knowing who we could have had.  Knowing how Mike Rizzo loves college arms, you have to think he was likely looking at either Manaea or Stanek, and both those guys are looking like mid-rotation starters perhaps by mid 2016.  All for an overpriced malcontent closer we didn’t need and who was eventually supplanted from the role by the same in-house option (Drew Storen) who the team AGAIN tried to supplant with another unnecessary over-priced malcontent (this time Jonathan Papelbon) in 2015 to disastrous results.  Do you think Rizzo and Lerner have learned their lesson by now?

Back to the analysis.

Round 2: Jake Johansen, Coll Sr. RH Starting Pitcher Dallas Baptist U..  1-7, 5.44 ERA  with 48/27 K/BB in 48 relief IP, 4.69 fip, .358 babip for Potomac this year.  He was pushed to the bullpen full time for 2015 yet was, frankly, awful in relief.  This is on top of his 5.19 ERA in 2014 in Hagerstown.  This pick is looking more and more like a disaster.  I don’t see any silver linings here, other than his K/inning rate (which is thrown off by his 4.5 walks/9 inning rate for his career).  Trending Down.

Round 3: Drew Ward, HS 3B. Slashed .249/.327/.358 with 110/39 K/BB in 377 Abs, 6hr for High-A Potomac.  Missed a month with an injury, but otherwise took incremental steps back on his performance from his 2014 campaign in Low-A.  Where’s the power?  Slugging .358 isn’t great, especially for a corner infielder.  But there doesn’t seem to be anyone else really preventing him from suiting up for Harrisburg as the starting 3B in 2016.  Also worth remembering; he’s a HS draftee so he was a 20-yr old in High-A; quite young.  That tempers any criticism.   He’s in the Arizona Fall League, a good sign for the team’s opinion of him, so even my opinion may be slightly conservative. Trending Steady.

Round 4: Nick Pivetta, Juco RH Starting Pitcher.  7-4, 2.29 ERA for Potomac in 2015 before getting traded to Philadelphia for Jonathan Papelbon.  Was working on a nice improvement over his 2014 campaign for Hagerstown (13-8, 4.22 ERA).  Was bumped up to Philly’s AA affiliate in Reading PA and struggled to finish out 2015.

Round 5: Austin Voth, Coll Jr RH Starting Pitcher: 6-7, 2.92 ERA and 148/40 k/bb across 157 ip (28 starts) for AA Harrisburg.  3.07 fip, .284 babip.  Another excellent campaign after his three-level jump in 2014.  He’s now regularly mentioned in the back-end of Nats top 10 prospect lists and seems like he could be one of the first options considered in 2016 if a MLB starting pitcher gets injured.  Looks like a steal of this draft and could be the best player to come out of it by the time all is said and done.  Trending Up.

Round 6: Cody Gunter, Juco 3B: 1-0 4.15 ERA, 23/8 K/BB in 21.2 IP for Short-A Auburn, 3.84 fip, .259 babip.  Gunter was drafted as a 3B and after two non-descript seasons in Auburn converted to the mound.  so far, results look promising; he maintained a K/inning ratio with good control and could be better based on the ERA-FIP delta.   I see him getting pushed to the Low-A bullpen in 2016.  Trending Steady.

Round 7: Jimmy Yezzo, Coll Jr 1B.  Slashed .192/.250/.256 with 36/13 K/BB in 49 games at Potomac, with just one homer, before the team pulled the plug and released him on 7/22/15.  Yezzo showed some power in Low-A in 2014 (13 homers in 123 games) but clearly not enough to justify keeping him around as a 1B-only player.  This was always going to be the jeopardy with drafting him; he was positionally limited from the start and, despite a great college campaign, couldn’t make the transition in pro ball.  Immediately after his release he picked up with a Frontier League team, finishing out the season, so hopefully he gets another shot.

Round 8: David Napoli, Coll Sr LH relief pitcher.  Went 7-5, 4.01 ERA with 62/36 K/BB in 60 relief IP mostly for LowA Hagerstown.  3.57 fip, .289 babip.  He started with Potomac but spent most of the year in Hagerstown, despite turning 25 during the season.  If anything,  his numbers took a step back from his 2014 Hagerstown campaign, and given his age and the glut of arms in the system, time may be running out.  Or maybe not: i mean, he signed for $15k and basically cost the team nothing and eats innings; that kind of guy is useful to have around.  See McGregor, Scott for AAA the last couple of years.  Trending Down.

Round 9: Jake Joyce, Coll Sr RH relief pitcher.  Released in July 2014 as the 2014 signees started reporting to Vermont after just one season in Auburn where he posted a 5+ ERA.  A cheap, senior sign who had to do more to impress and stick around as Napoli has done.

Round 10: Brennan Middleton, Coll Sr SS/2B. Slashed .198/.252/.264 for half a season while repeating LowA despite his age and was summarily released in July 2015.  Senior sign, low bonus figure, poor performance all contributed.

Round 11: John Simms, Coll jr RH relief pitcher.  6-6, 2.74 ERA with 48/25 K/BB in 88.2 (15 starts) for Potomac.  4.15 fip, .236 babip.  Earned a mid-season promotion and ended the season with 6 starts in Harrisburg’s rotation.  Excellent season-over-season improvement for Simms, who will look to do the same thing in AA’s rotation for 2016.  The team clearly sees the same potential and sent him to the Arizona Fall League this year.  Trending up.

Round 12: Andrew Cooper, Juco RH relief pitcher.  2-2, 3.53 ERA with 35/16 K/BB in 63.2 relief IP for LowA Hagerstown, 3.63 fip, .283 babip.  Improved his numbers across the board while repeating LowA.  Still isn’t getting the K/9 we’d like to see though.  He’ll be 24 in High-A next year in what probably is a make or break season.  Trending Steady.

Round 13: John Costa, Juco RH relief pitcher.  Released 4/1/15 after being injured most of 2014.  Without knowing the details, I’d guess that whatever injury he suffered was a career ender, that he couldn’t show enough improvement in spring training 2015 to merit keeping around.  Tough break.

Round 14: David Masters, Juco SS.  Slashed .226/.311/.285 with 69/40 K/BB in 354 Abs, 2hr, 3SB mostly in LowA, missed most of May and June.  Did earn a promotion to HighA in August to finish out the season.  With so many MIF in the system and the likes of Chris Bostick blasting homers in the AFL, Masters may not be long for the organization.  Trending down.

Round 15: Isaac Ballou, Coll Sr OF/CF.  Slashed .271/.344/.397  with 82/47 K/BB in 431 Abs, 8homers 21steals CF/LF as  he jumped two levels (from HighA to AAA) in 2015.  A nice season from the local product (hails from Germantown, MD, went to Marshall U).  An .876 OPS in AA greased the skids for him to move up the line.  He has some speed (56 career SBs in 322 games) and can hit and can play all three OF positions; can he push the likes of Matt den Dekker for a  utility OF spot on the big club?  Maybe not for 2016, but a strong AAA campaign would help.  Trending up.

Round 16: Willie Allen, Juco Corner OF from Oklahoma/Newtown, MA.  Did not sign; transferred to Lewis-Clark State (ID).  Allen was an odd case at the time; it was literally impossible to find information on him.  But he’s definitely playing college ball at Lewis-Clark now.  Now known as “William Allen” if you’re trying to find him in various databases, fyi.

Round 17: Geoff Perrott, Coll Sr C.  released/retired (2015): never played in 2014 and no record of his official release in milb.com, but clearly he’s done playing.

Round 18: Cory Bafidis, Coll Sr LH relief pitcher.  Released July 2014 once the 2014 draftees started showing up in Auburn.  This release has troubled me; he had decent numbers in 2013, then got axed after just 6 innings in 2014.  Seemed too fast to me.

Round 19: Niko Spezial, Coll Sr LH relief pitcher.  Released in May of 2014, even before the draft.  Only threw 19 innings in 2013 and none in 2014, not getting a full-team assignment and likely just losing out on the anticipated numbers game.

Round 20: Brenton Allen, Coll Jr Corner OF.  As with Bafidis, Released in June 2014 once the 2014 draftees started showing up in Auburn.  He only hit .197 in Auburn in 2013 and was clearly replaceable with new 2014 OF draftees.

Round 21: Justin Thomas, Coll Sr LH relief pitcher.  1-6, 3.43 ERA with 50/18 K/BB in 57.2 relief ip for Potomac. 2.84 fip, .300 babip in HighA.  Oddly, he’s a lefty but he has much better L-R splits than loogy splits.  But, he also wasn’t really used as a loogy, accumulating 57 innings in 28 games.  He was more of a swing-man/innings sponge for the team despite never getting an official start.  Good peripherals, good K/9 rates, I see him moving up to the AA bullpen easily.  Nice find in the 21st round.  Trending up.

Round 22: Cody Dent, Coll Sr SS.  Slashed .193/.257/.224  with 42/12 K/BB in 161 abs, 1hr, 2sb, mostly in LowA.  Played 3B, got moved up to HighA and then went 0-24 in Potomac.  He didn’t play after 7/31 but did not appear on any injury report; he was on the TIL for basically the rest of the season.  The son of Bucky Dent seems to be getting similar treatment as Ryan Ripken and Cutter Dykstra (also sons of former MLBers); he’s hanging around despite poor numbers.  How long can it last with all the MIF options moving up the line?  Trending down.

Round 23: Garrett Gordon, Juco Corner OF.  Released in March of 2015; hit just .230 in Auburn in 2014 as a corner OF and, as with Allen above, was deemed replaceable with the 2015 crop of players rising up.

Round 24: Matt DeRosier, Juco RH relief pitcher.  0-2, 3.58 ERA with 30/7 K/BB in 27IP (7 starts) mostly in the GCL, having gotten dumped out of Auburn after a couple of poor starts.   2.02 fip, .435 babip in Auburn, so perhaps it was a short-sample-size that was unflattering.  He needs to put together a nice string of healthy starts somewhere outside of complex ball though.  Trending down.

Round 25: Travis Ott, HS LH starting pitcher.  Traded 12/17/14 along with Steven Souza in the Trea Turner/Joe Ross deal.  Despite his sterling short-A 2014 season, Tampa had him repeat the NY Penn league, where he was 6-3 with a 3.90 ERA in 13 starts.  Odd.

Round 26: Garrett Hampson, HS SS from Reno, NV.  Did not sign; honored commitment to Long Beach State.

Round 27: Bryce Harmon, HS LH starting pitcher from Richmond, VA.  Did not sign; honored commitment to East Carolina University.

Round 28: Joey Webb, Coll Sr LH relief pitcher.  Released 6/25/15, losing out in the numbers game when the 2015 short-season college draftees started flowing in.

Round 29: Mike Sylvestri, Coll Sr RH relief pitcher.   Retired on 6/13/14 after struggling in low-A.

Round 30: Ryan Ullmann, Coll Sr RH Starting pitcher.  Released 6/25/15, in a similar fashion to Webb above.

Round 31: Willie Medina, Coll Sr SS.  Released in Jan 2015 after a mediocre season between LowA and ShortA in 2014.

Round 32: Pat Boling, Coll Jr LHP: Did not sign, chose to return to U. of Georgia for his senior season.  It does not look like Boling was re-drafted, nor does it appear he played any independent ball.

Round 33: Andrew Dunlap, HS C/RHP from Houston.  Did not sign.  Honoring a commitment to Rice University.

Round 34: Jake Walsh, Coll Sr LH relief pitcher.  2-1, 1.96 ERA, 32/14 K/BB across 36ip as he was promoted from LowA->HighA.  3.51 fip, .273 babip in Potomac.  After starting the 2015 season with 17 scoreless innings for Hagerstown, he got bumped up and spent the rest of the season there.  Despite his lowly draft status, Walsh has now impressed at every stop and owns a career 1.65 ERA across the various Rookie/A-ball levels.  Maybe its time to give this guy a shot at AA?  At the very least he looks like a left-handed specialist in training.  Trending up.

Round 35: Lukas Schiraldi, Juco RHP from Texas.  Did not sign; instead transferred to U Texas.  Drafted in 2014 in the 15th round by Seattle, but he has since struggled as a low-A starter, with two straight seasons of 5+ ERA.

Round 36: Reid Humphreys, HS SS from Missouri.  Did not sign.  Honoring commitment to Mississippi State.

Round 37: Karsten Whitson, RH starting pitcher from Florida.  Did not sign, returning to U Florida for his senior/4th year.  There’s plenty of cautionary stories about Whitson, who turned down 1st round money and eventually was drafted by Boston in 2014 as an 11th rounder (likely bonus; max of $100k).  His pro season looks like its a struggle right now; he had just 7IP in 2014, and was listed as “inactive” for all of 2015.  Hate to see such a promising arm apparently fizzle out.

Round 38: Caleb Hamilton, HS SS from Washington State.  Did not sign; honoring commitment to U of Washington.

Round 39: Robbie Tenerowicz, HS 2B/SS from California.  Did not sign; honoring commitment to UC Berkeley.  Washington sure loves 2nd basement from Cal-Berkeley, doesn’t it?  See Tony Renda in 2012 or Jeff Kobernus in 2009.  I’m sure we’ll revisit Tenerowicz when the time is right.

Round 40: Shaun Anderson, HS RH starting pitcher from Florida.  Did not sign; honoring commitment to U of Florida.

Trending Summary:

• Trending Up (5): Voth, Simms, Ballou, Thomas, Walsh
• Trending Steady (3): Ward, Gunter, Cooper
• Trending Down (5): Johanssen, Napoli, Masters, Dent, Derosier
• Did Not Sign in 2013 (11): Allen, Hampson, Harmon, Boling, Dunlap, Schiraldi, Humphries, Whitson, Hamilton, Tenerowicz, Anderson
• Released/Retired (13): Yezzo, Joyce, Middleton, Costa, Perrott, Bafidis, Spezial, Allen, Gordon, Webb, Sylvestri, Ullmann, Medina
  
• Traded (2): Pivetta, Ott

Executive Summary

The 2013 class is being whittled down quickly; of the 39 initial names, 11 never signed and another 13 have already been cut loose.  That only leaves 15 guys to draw conclusions from.  I think its safe to say the loss of the 1st rounder and the failures of our 2nd rounder severely dampen this draft, but Voth and Simms give us some promise.  I also like what we’re seeing out of long-shots Thomas and Walsh, with some lingering hope that the  youngster Ward could make the leap.  Meanwhile, two important names out of this draft (Pivetta and Ott) were used to acquire important players; especially Ott’s role in acquiring two every day players of the planned 2016 25-man roster.

cut-n-paste of Working XLS of data:

Fedde has returned from TJ surgery successfully. Photo via chicagonow.com

Following in the footsteps of the stat review of the 2015 draft class, here’s the same analysis for the 2014 draft class, looking at their 2015 numbers and making some snap judgements.

I last did this project in 2013 (got too busy this time last fall at a new client), so this is the first time I’ve really run through the 2014 draft class in this detail.  In fact, getting into the lower picks I don’t even recognize some of the names, having only really focused on the top 10 guys at the time.  Its definitely interesting to see where they stand one year on.

Web links to use while reading:

• Stats are pulled from milb.com and/or fangraphs.com; put the player name into the search bar to get his seasonal stats
• The MLB Draft Tracker (which I believe is the best draft tracker out there) is the best place to get draft class information.
• The Big Board and the Draft Tracker are the goto resources for prospects for any Nats fan.
• Baseball-reference.com’s draft database
• My working XLS in Google for all this data.

Unlike the 2015 draft class analysis, we’ve already shedded a large number of 2014 draftees.  And mostly we have full seasons worth of work on which to judge.

Without further ado:

Round 1: Erick Fedde RHP COL jr from UNLV.  4-1, 2.57 ERA in Short-A Auburn with 36/8 in 35ip (8 starts), 2.60 fip, .346 babip.  He then got bumped up to Hagerstown where he threw another 29 innings across 6 starts with lesser stats (1-2, 4.34 ERA).  A good  post-Tommy  John debut season for Fedde, despite the rather restrictive innings limits put on him; he was limited to just 5ip per start for a total of 64ip on the season between two levels.  I’m not sure why they were so restrictive: he threw many more innings in his college career (90, 96 and then 76 before getting injured in 2014).  I guess the theory was to limit him to half his pre-injury innings limit first  year back, with a goal of getting back to that level of production in 2016.  You Look for him to be in the Potomac rotation on perhaps a 90-100 innings limit for 2016 (or, exactly what Giolito did his 2nd year back from TJ surgery in 2014).  Trending up.

Round 2: Andrew Suarez LHP COL jr  from Miami (FL).  Did not sign: returned to Miami for his senior year where he led his team to the CWS before getting shelled in Omaha.  Drafted in the 2nd round again, slightly later than the Nats did and signed for slot for San Francisco.  He did not significantly improve his draft position by playing college another year, but may have gotten more cash (we do not know what bonus amount he declined in 2014).

Round 3: Jakson Reetz, C  Norris HS (NE).  Slashed just .212/.326/.248  between ShortA/GCL with 37/13 k/bb in 113 Abs, 0homers 3sb just 36 games.  A curious season for Reetz: why was he at short-A to begin with?  He seemed to play mostly half and half time with an older DSL grad catcher and seemed outmatched in the league; why not just bring him back to Florida for another year of seasoning?  Definitely a set-back year for Reetz.  What do they do with him next year?  Try him at Low-A after doing poorly in Short-A?  Have him repeat the rookie league for the third time?  Where’s the power?  a .248 slugging percentage is incredibly weak.  Trending Down.

Round 4: Robbie Dickey, RHP  from Blinn College (TX).  0-3, 6.65 ERA starting in Hagerstown and getting demoted to Auburn.  16/17 k/bb in 23ip (6 starts).  He was incredibly wild and then didn’t pitch after 7/25/15, accumulating just 23 IP on the year.  Was he hurt?  There was no record of a D/L trip, just an assignment back to XST after a while.  All in all, a pretty disappointing season for our 4th round pick.  Where does he go from here?  Is the team just being too impatient with him, yanking him from Hagerstown after just a few innings?  Trending Down.

Round 5: Drew Van Orden RHP COL sr from Duke.  5-5, 3.61 ERA  for Hagerstown with 47/34 K/BB in 92ip (15 starts), 4.33 fip, .254 babip.  Not a bad season for an under-slot senior sign, who’s clearly sticking around.  He was mostly a spot starter for Hagerstown this year, getting a bunch of starts during the turmoil of the rotation.  He ended the season on the DL after giving the team 92 decent innings.  His FIP is a bit weak thanks to overall lucky BABIP contact but he has given no reason not to put himself into the discussion for that same role in Potomac next year.  Trending Steady.

Round 6: Austen Williams RHP COL jr from Texas State.  12-8, 2.58 ERA while making the jump from Hagerstown to Potomac (with one AAA spot-start).  106/33 K/BB in 139.2 ip (25 starts).  He was 8-1 for Hagerstown before getting bumped up and continued to be effective all year.  Great season for Williams, putting his name on the map in the organization and starting to get some notice in the prospect rankings (he was #14 in the farm system in J.P. Schwartz‘s topprospectalert post-2015 rankings and in the upper 20s for Scout.com and MLB.com).  In the mix for a AA rotation spot in 2016.  Trending up.

Round 7: Dale Carey CF COL sr from Miami (FL).  Slashed .234/.340/.345 for Hagerstown with 91/66 K/BB in 415ABs, 8 homers, 10/9 SB/CS playing CF.  Another under-slot/cost savings senior sign who is sticking around, Carey showed some power but not great overall numbers playing CF this year.  He’ll be pushed out of CF by budding uber-prospect Victor Robles unless Carey can earn a promotion, which may be hard to do.  Needs to show a better hit tool if he wants to keep a job.  Trending Steady.

Round 8: Jeff Gardner, LF COL sr from Louisville.  Slashed .226/.296/.345  in Hagerstown with 90/38 K/BB in 403ABs, 5 homers, 8/7 SB/CS playing LF.  Unlike his fellow senior sign and outfield partner Carey, Gardner is stuck in the unathletic corner and isn’t showing nearly the power or bat that he needs to stick around.  He’ll get pushed out of a corner job in Hagerstown for 2016 and may lose out in a numbers game.  Trending down.

Round 9: Austin Byler, 1B COL jr for Nevada (Reno).  Did not sign: returned to Nevada for his senior season, led his team into the CWS playoffs and showed a ton of potential .. .but slipped out of the top10 rounds.  He was the first pick of the non-bonus controlled rounds, in the 11th by Arizona, meaning his fortunes dipped slightly by staying in college another year.  One last unfortunate footnote; a quick google search shows that Byler was suspended for PED-usage at the end of the 2015 season.  Whoops.

Round 10: Matthew Page, RF COL sr  from Oklahoma Baptist U.   Slashed .270/.362/.384 between ShortA and LowA, with 54/39 K/BB in 263ABs, 2 homers, 6 sbs.  Not a bad return for a $30k bonus on a college senior from a small school.   He isn’t lighting the world on fire, but he’s keeping his head above water.  He’ll compete with his fellow senior sign OFs Carey and Gardner for a spot in the 2016 Potomac outfield.  Trending Steady.

Round 11: Weston Davis RHP Manatee HS (FL).  He did not play (injured) in 2015.  He had just 16 IP in all of 2014 for the GCL Nats.  No word on the nature of the injury, but 16IP in two pro years is never a good start to a career.  Trending down.

Round 12: Domenick Mancini RHP from Miami-Dade CC South.  He was released 6/27/15; no 2015 stats after 14.2 IP in 2014.  He lost out in the numbers game thanks to the massive influx of college arms competing for Short-A roster spots.

Round 13: Austin Davidson, 3B COL jr  from Pepperdine.  Slashed just .202/.302/.314 for Hagerstown with 47/26 K/BB in 258 Abs, 6 homers, 6/7 sb/cs playing 2B and 3B.  His bat definitely took a step back in Low-A and there’s a glut of middle infielders in the 2015 class.  He may not be long for the organization.  Trending down.

Round 14: James Bourque RHP COL jr from Michigan.  dnp – injured; no IP in 2015.  He was in the Auburn rotation for 2014 and pitched adequately, but never got started in 2015.  Lets hope he makes it back to compete for a job in 2016.  Trending Steady.

Round 15: Ryan Ripken 1B COL soph from Indian River State (FL) Slashed .250/.296/.391 with 15/5 K/BB in 92ABs while repeating the Gulf Coast league.  A curious case; why so little playing time at age 22, repeating the GCL?  The team had all spring to evaluate him yet put a senior nominal slot signee (David Kerian) at 1B in Auburn instead of Ripken.  Is he hurt?  Is he just being rostered because of his name?  Trending down.

Round 16: Cole Plouck LHP from Pima CC (AZ): went 1-0, 1.80 ERA in a 5 inning stint in Auburn… and then was released on 6/29/15.  Why??  Such a strange case; why send him to Vermont if you’re going to release him a few days later?  Understood if he gets lit up maybe, but it just seems odd timing.  It does not look like he’s picked up elsewhere, so perhaps it was a “retirement.”

Round 17: Alec Keller CF COL sr from Princeton.  Slashed .294/.341/.374 while getting promoted from LowA->HighA.   63/30 K/BB in 425 Abs, 0 homers, 11/9 Sb/cs playing CF.  Not bad for a most unlikely college senior sign.  If he can keep the average and OBP up and perhaps improve his SB success rate, he could put himself in a pretty good position.  Trending up.

Round 18: McKenzie Mills,  LHP, Sprayberry Senior HS (GA).  0-5, 7.27 ERA  with 24/28 K/BB in 34.2 ip across two levels.  He posted a 4.46 fip, .405 babip  while in Short-A then got dropped back to the Rookie league.   Rough season for Mills, who couldn’t make the jump to short-A, then struggled when back in rookie ball.  Just way too many walks to be effective, but likely hangs around a bit longer since he can just hang out in XST and try to pick back up on next year’s short season squads again.  Trending down.

Round 19: Clay Williamson,  RF COL jr from Cal State Fullerton.  Slashed .211/.318/.316  in 5 Auburn games and then was released 6/29/15 as the 2015 signees started rolling in.   Never really impressed in 2014 (hitting .236 in short season) and may wish he had stayed in school instead of signing as a 19th round junior draftee.

Round 20: Bryan Langlois, RF COL jr from Pepperdine: no 2015 stats, was in XST the entire season.  He had 141 mostly non-descript ABs in Auburn last  year, then never got assigned this year.  But, he wasn’t released either; is he injured?  Converting to a new position?  Trending down.

Round 21: Connor Bach, LHP COL sr from Virginia Military Institute.  Posted a 6-4, 3.85 ERA with 106/69 K/BB in 110 ip (20 starts) in Low A as a member of the rotation for much of the season.  4.08 fip, .311 babip.  Not too shabby for a 21st round senior sign from a relatively unknown baseball school.  Perhaps too many walks, but nearly a K/inning in full-season ball portends well for his future.  At the very least he could move up as a lefty specialist.  Trending up.

Round 22: Daniel Salters, C COL soph  from Dallas Baptist: did not sign: returned to DBU for his junior season and then was drafted by Cleveland in the 13th round of 2015 draft.  He had a good 2015 short-season, so going back to school definitely helped his career.

Round 23: Chris Riopedre, SS COL jr, East Tennessee State.  Went 1-4 in one game for Auburn this year and then was released on 6/25/15.  He only hit .214 in Auburn last  year, and the team drafted a ton of MIF players in 2015, but it does seem harsh to make the kid go all the way to Vermont just to release him after *one game*.

Round 24: Kyle Simmons RHP COL jr Texas Lutheran U.  Assigned to GCL but dnp – injured and no IP in 2015.  He had just a 5.03 ERA in limited innings last year in the GCL and now missed this year.  As a small college junior draftee, he’ll be entering his 3rd pro season with just 19 poor innings of rookie ball performance; hard to see him making an impact.  Trending down.

Round 25: Kyle Bacak C COL sr  from Texas Christian U.  He went 4-28 for Auburn last year and was released 1/20/15.

Round 26: Chase McDowell RHP COL 5S  Rice (TX): retired 4/9/15 after putting up a 4.50 ERA in 28IP for Auburn last year.  If I had to guess, he probably lost out on a full season job, was looking at sitting around in XST until June and (as an older guy, a 5th year senior) may have looked at the guys in camp who were all 4-5  years younger and called it quits.  I had a friend who did exactly this: graduated a 4-year program as a highly decorated college player, then was sent to short-season ball.  He got all the way to Idaho or some random place and looked at his teammates: he said they were all just as good as he was but all 3 years younger and mostly Dominican.  He had a college degree, a job waiting for him and came to a quick realization that he could push for several years of below-minimum wage money looking at an uphill battle where his age worked against him, or he could just face reality and start his life.  You wonder how often this really happens.

Round 27: Conor Keniry SS COL sr Wake Forest U.  Slashed .250/.323/.310 while moving up from ShortA->LowA.  27/10 K/BB in 116ABs, 1hr, 3sbs as 2B.  Not bad; he was clearly the backup middle infielder “guy who can play any infield position in a pinch” guy for Hagerstown.  Can he stay in that role?  Maybe, maybe not.  He’ll have plenty of competition for that spot in 2016 thanks to a slew of 2B/SS draftees in 2015 plus rising DSL players.  Trending Steady.

Round 28: Kida De La Cruz, RHP from Volunteer State CC (TN).  Went 0-0, 5.43 ERA in just 1.2 IP for GCL in 2015.  But he has no injuries listed.  He threw 18 rather non descript innings for the GCL last year too.  Perhaps they just don’t bother with D/L postings for kids on teams based out of spring training facilities since the lines seem rather blurred between “XST” and “GCL.”  There were 4 or 5 guys this year who spent the entire year in “Extended Spring Training” or “To Be Determined” fashion, including a couple of very long-serving minor league arms (see the final column in the Big Board link).  Either way, De La Cruz is now 21, has 20 innings in GCL with more walks than strikeouts; hard to see him making an impact.  Trending down.

Round 29: DJ Jauss, RHP COL 5S from U. Mass. Amherst: was released 3/26/15 after getting hit hard in the GCL last season.  Just no room for a guy who is now 25 who couldn’t cut it in the rookie league.

Round 30: Tyler Mapes RHP COL sr from Tulane U. (LA).  Went 7-3, 2.23 ERA with 75/17 K/BB in 96.2 ip (8 starts) between  LowA->HighA, 2.78 fip, .324 babip.  Ended the year in Potomac’s rotation.  What a great result set for a 30th round college senior sign.  At one point he was even up in AA, though he had no appearances.  Good K/BB ratio, good peripherals.  Great find from the draft team.  Trending up.

Round 31: Samuel Johns RHP COL 5S U. Evansville (IN).  Went 3-4, 4.31 ERA between LowA and ShortA with 39/17 k/bb in 62.2 relief innings, 4.63 fip, .290 babip in lowA.  He struggled in LowA, but then dropped back to ShortA and was dominant.  Not great, but certainly not bad for a 31st round 5th year senior as compared to what has happened to other 5th year senior signs on this list.  Maybe not the best stuff, but has been effective.  My guess is that he either makes the Hagerstown team next spring or is cut loose, but the fact that he hung around this long gives him some more room to work with.  Trending Steady.

The rest of the 2014 draft class was HS kids who were long shots to sign and a Juco kid in the 40th who already had a transfer agreement to a good baseball school; one more piece of evidence to perhaps shorten the draft to 35 or even 30 rounds?  Here’s a quick summary.

Round 32: Cary, Elliott CF Clackamas HS (OR): did not sign: honored commitment to Oregon State.
Round 33: Casey, Clay CF DeSoto Central HS (MS): did not sign: honored commitment to Mississippi
Round 34: Skoug, Evan C Libertyville HS (IL): did not sign: honored commitment to TCU
Round 35: Doyle, Tommy RHP Flint Hill School (VA): did not sign: honored commitment to Virginia.  At UVA, Doyle played an integral part in getting UVA out of the regional but did not really factor after that.
Round 36: Styles, John Henry LHP Episcopal HS (TX): did not sign: honored commitment to Stanford
Round 37: Brodey, Quinn LHP Loyola HS (CA): did not sign: honored commitment to Stanford
Round 38: Fairchild, Stuart RF Seattle Prep (WA): did not sign: honored commitment to Wake Forest
Round 39: Littell, Jon OF Stillwater HS (OK): did not sign: honored commitment to OK State
Round 40: Hill, Jacob LHP JUCO Orange Coast Coll. (CA): did not sign: transferred to U San Diego, then was drafted by Cleveland in the 32nd round of 2015 but had no 2015 innings as far as I can tell.

Trending Summary:

• Trending Up (5): Fedde, Williams, Keller, Bach, Mapes
• Trending Steady (6): Van Orden, Carey, Page, Bourque, Keniry, Johns
• Trending Down (10): Reetz, Dickey, Gardner, Davis, Davidson, Ripken, Mills, Langlois, Simmons, De La Cruz
• Did Not Sign in 2014 (12): Suarez, Byler, Salters, Cary, Casey, Skoug, Doyle, Styles, Brodey, Fairchild, Littell, Hill
• Released/Retired (7): Mancini, Plouck, Williamson, Riopedre, Bacak, McDowell, Jauss

Executive Summary

While I still think this draft was a failure for the lack of Suarez and Byler signings, we are seeing some great surprises from later picks Keller, Bach and Mapes.  Reetz and Dickey under-performance hurts the class too.  Fedde’s return was good, but he needs to make himself into a legit #3 starter prospect for me to start thinking more favorably about this class.  However, 19 out of 40 picks either never signed or are already gone after just one year, and another 10 are trending towards a release instead of production .. this can’t be good.  Lotta red in that trending summary.

PS: I created an XLS to do this analysis; if you prefer, you can see my working XLS in Google for all this data which is also listed as a link to the right (2015 Stats for 2014 Draft Class); quick XLS below:

Stevenson was our first pick, and also one of the best performers of the draft class. Photo via nola.com

Here’s a fast review of the 2015 draft class, looking at their 2015 numbers and making some snap judgements.

This post idea was stolen from minorleagueball.com’s John Sickels, who used to do this for nearly the entire draft class a couple of  years back.  It is quite a bit of clicking around so it isn’t surprising that he gave up on it.  I did this kind of review a couple of years ago and may try to find time to extend it to 2015 performances of the 2014 (and earlier) classes, because its a nice way to check in on everyone all at once.

Baseball America had some limited information for every kid taken in the first 10 rounds and this post expands on the BA information for our entire 2015 class all the way to round 40.

Web links to use while reading:

• Stats are pulled from milb.com and/or fangraphs.com; put the player name into the search bar to get his seasonal stats
• The MLB Draft Tracker (which I believe is the best draft tracker out there) is the best place to get draft class information.
• The Big Board and the Draft Tracker are the goto resources for prospects for any Nats fan.

At the end of each player write-up i’ll put in a color coded trending line for the player: Green for Trending Up, Blue for Trending steady, Red for Trending Down.   This is just my knee-jerk opinion of the prospect status of the player system-wide.  And yes I realize this is their first pro ball season, short-sample sizes, scouting the stat line, etc etc.  So apologies in advance if you think i’m being too harsh passing judgement on a 15 inning sample size.  Of course I am; what else are we going to argue about this off-season?  🙂

Without further ado:

Round 1: forfeited by virtue of the Max Scherzer signing.  Would have been the 26th pick overall, which ended up being Taylor Ward, a C from Fresno State that many thought was an overdraft by the Angels but which looks pretty good in retrospect (he slashed .348/.457/.438 in his first pro season split between rookie and low-A).  Knowing the Nationals’ proclivities, they likely would have taken one of two polished college hurlers here if they had the pick: Jon Harris (who went 29th overall) or Kyle Funkhouser (who went 35th overall).  Also still on the board was well-regarded HS pitcher Mike Nikorak, who went just after Ward.  I’m not complaining about the loss of this pick as I did with the Rafael Soriano signing; just pointing out how things could have gone otherwise.

Round 2: Andrew Stevenson, OF (CF).  COL jr from Louisiana State.  Slashed .305/.358/.376 across 3 levels, getting promoted up to Hagerstown relatively quickly.  16/30 K/BB in 214 Abs, 1 homer, 23SBs in 55 games.  Stevenson so far is pretty much what we expected; a speedy plus defender in center with blazing speed (nearly a half a SB per game), little pop but a decent bat.  He had very few strikeouts (just 16 in 214 ABs across 55 games): a great trait for a guy who probably profiles as a lead-off hitter.  I’d like to see better OBP though going forward.  Whether this translates to MLB production eventually remains to be seen, but so far so good.  Trending Up.

Round 2: Blake Perkins, OF (CF) from Verrado HS, Buckeye, Ariz.  Slashed .210/.265/.281  in the Rookie league, with 36/13 K/BB in 166 Abs, 1 hr, 4sbs.  Somewhat disappointing debut for Perkins, who some had pegged as an even better prospect than Stevenson.  We’ll chalk this up to a youngster facing pro pitching for the first time.  His first full season should be telling, though its hard to see him breaking camp with a full-season squad after this debut.  Odds are he’ll be in XST until June and then will give Short-A a try.  Post-posting update: thanks to AndrewR in the comments section for the Baseball America 2015 Nats Draft class review link, where it is pointed out that Perkins was asked to start switch hitting this year.  Well no wonder his average was so low.  A quick look at his splits: .111/.122/.222 versus lefties (going just 5 for 45), .248/.316/.306 versus righties.  Now, what’s kind of odd about that split line is this: he already batted R when drafted and *added* a lefty swing … so why was the slash line so bad versus lefties?  You’d think the split would have been the other way around?  I could not find traditional splits as a L or as a R on either fangraphs or milb.com; not sure if I just missed them or if Perkins started switch hitting later in the year.  Either way, you have to give his overall split line a pass.   Trending steady.

Round 3: Rhett Wiseman, OF (corner), COL jr from Vanderbilt.  Slashed .248/.307/.376 in Short-A with 52/18 K/BB in 210 Abs, 5 homers.   Honestly, I would have expected a bit more from Wiseman, a very polished college hitter from a good program.  Just 5 homers in 210 ABs?  I know the NY-Penn is a pitchers league … but that’s just one homer every 42 ABs.  He profiled as a power-hitting corner outfielder out of college; is this what he can be?  Milb.com reports that he played a lot of CF, which would be a nice little bonus if he could stay at the position.  Trending steady.

Round 4: Mariano Rivera Jr, rhp COL sr from Iona.  1-2, 5.45 ERA in Short-A with 26/3 K/BB in 33IP (19 app, 3 starts).  2.70 FIP, .388 babip.  Rivera was tried as a starter and quickly failed, getting moved to the pen, where he was much better.  Starter ERA: 13.00.  Reliever ERA: 2.63.  His seasonal ERA isn’t nearly as bad as it looks thanks to some bad luck; his FIP is good and his K/BB rate looks good as well.  He profiles like his father; slight, live arm, good stuff as a reliever.  I can see him moving up the ladder as a back-of-the-bullpen reliever.   Perhaps a disappointment that a 4th round pick was relegated to the bullpen after just three starts … but could be a quick moving arm on a team that clearly needs them.  Trending Up.

Round 5: Taylor Hearn, lhp COL jr from Oklahoma Baptist.  1-5, 3.56 in the GCL Short-A with a 38/13 K/BB in 43ip (10/10 starts), 3.40 fip, .346 babip.  (Editor note: he was in Auburn most of the year; he just started in GCL briefly).Perhaps too old to be in the GCL, but was decent nonetheless in 10 starts.    Nothing earth shattering here; I would like to have seen him going against other college hitters in Short-A frankly.  We’ll see what he does next year.    Hearn joined his fellow lefty first 10 round starters in the Auburn rotation and was completely effective, averaging nearly a K/inning with decent control.  He’s done nothing to jeopardize his advancement for 2016 and should compete for a low-A rotation gig.  Trending steady.

Round 6: Matt Crownover, lhp COL jr. from Clemson.  1-4, 3.81 ERA in Short-A with 34/9 K/BB in 49.2 ip (13 app, 10 starts), 3.40 fip, .301 babip.  As with Hearn’s numbers, nothing bad but nothing mind blowing out of Crownover’s numbers in Short-A.  Not a bad return for an under-slot ACC lefty starter.  I like the 4-1 K/BB ratio.  Trending steady.

Round 7: Grant Borne, lhp COL jr from Nicholls State.  1-4, 3.59 in Short-A with 32/7 K/BB in 47.2 ip (15 apps, 5 starts), 2.99 fip, .321 babip.  Its amazing how similar Hearn, Crownover and Borne’s numbers were, each profiling as a command/control lefty starter in Short-A.  Trending steady.

Round 8: Koda Glover, rhp COL sr from Oklahoma State. 1-1, 1.80 ERA across 2 levels, getting promoted to Low-A.  38/2 K/BB in 30 ip (19app), 2.44 fip, .288 babips in LowA where he spent most of the year.  38 to 2 (!!)  K/BB ratio in 30 innings.  That’s great.  No wonder he was an over-slot deal.  Glover profiled very well and should be in the mix for a High-A bullpen slot in 2016 already.  Trending Up.

Round 9: David Kerian, 1b COL sr from Illinois.  Slashed .251/.336/.338 in Short-A with 41/25 K/BB in 195 Abs, 0 homers.  Kerian signed for just $25k in the first of the Nats two big “save bonus money senior draftee” picks.  Zero homers as a first baseman and a .338 slugging?  That’s just not going to do it.  Trending Down.

Round 10: Taylor Guilbeau, lhp COL sr  from Alabama. 3-3, 3.54 in the GCL mostly in Short-A with 31/9 K/BB in 51 ip (11/10 starts) .2.89 fip, .356 babip.  Another senior sign, Gilbeau was 3-4 years older than his competition in the GCL yet “only” struck out 31 in 51 innings.  He may struggle to find a full-season job next year (what with all the other college lefties being drafted) and could quickly find himself out of organized ball.  Trending Down.  Turns out, I mis-read Guilbeau’s assignment; he was in Auburn basically the entire year and his FIP looks solid based on his competition.  I’m amending this report to say he’s Trending Steady based on his 2015.

Round 11: Andrew Lee, RHP COL jr from Tennessee.  Posted a 5-1, 1.63 ERA across 3 levels, ending up in Hagerstown.  47/10 K/BB in 38.2 innings (16/5 starts), 2.19 fip, .250 babip in lowA where he spent most of his time.  An intriguing arm for sure and more than held his own in 5 Low-A starts.  He’s in the mix for the Hagerstown 2016 rotation.  Trending Up.

Round 12: Tommy Peterson RHP COL jr  from South Florida.  0-0, 2.66 in Auburn with 13/4 K/BB in 20 relief innings, 2.83 fip, .318 babip as part time closer.   Not too many innings to judge on here; looks like a good option for the Hagerstown 2016 bullpen.  Trending steady.

Round 13: Max Schrock, COL jr from South Carolina.  Slashed .308/.355/.448  in Short-A with 16/13 K/BB in 172 Abs, 2 homers.  Drafted as a 2B, played mostly SS.  Schrock was the big over-slot deal the team signed in 2015, getting $400k over-slot as a 13th rounder (the rough equivalent of a mid 4th rounder).  He hit pretty well in Short-A in his debut too, with a good OPS figure for a middle infielder who made a ton of contact (just 16 Ks) but also needs to work on his batting eye (just 13 walks).  Trending Up.

Round 14: Mack Lemieux LHP from Jupiter Community HS (FL): did not sign, never seemed like he was even close to signing from articles and twitter.  Committed to Florida Atlantic University (FAU).

Round 15: Kevin Mooney,  RHP COL jr from UofMaryland.  1-0, 5.40 ERA in Short-A with a 15/13 K/bb in 21.2 innings, 4.95 fip, .333 babip.  Not a great debut for the local kid Mooney, who was last seen blowing both super-regional games that enabled UVA to surprisingly make its way to the CWS (where even more surprisingly they ended up winning).  Far, far too many walks given how many punch-outs he had, his FIP was still way up there even given a BABIP not really that out of line.  Needs to step it up if he wants a full-season job.  Trending Down.

Round 16: Ian Sagdal, SS COL sr  from Washington State U.  Slashed .235/.323/.327 in Short-A with 36/20 K/BB in 162 Abs, 1 homer, 1 SB.  Played mostly 2B per milb.com despite being drafted as a SS.  No power, little speed evident, tough season in Auburn for Sagdal.  With the collection of middle infielders the Nats drafted in 2015 plus the rising DSL guys, Sagdal may not be long for the system.  Trending Down.

Round 17: Dalton Dulin, 2B from Northwest Mississippi CC.  Slashed .273/.410/.354 in Short-A 21/18 K/BB in 99 AB as part time 2B.  Not too bad for a younger guy in short-A ball.  Trending steady.

Round 18: Melvin Rodriguez 2B COL sr from Jackson State U. (MS).  Slashed .200/.294/.282 in Short-A with 17/15 K/BB in 110ABs, 0hr, 0sb as part time 2B.  Well, if you’re not going to hit for power, you need some speed.  And if you can’t show speed, you should show a good hit-tool.  Rodriguez didn’t show much of anything this year and may not make it out of spring next year.  Trending Down.

Round 19: Clayton Brandt SS COL sr from MidAmerica Nazarene U (KS).  Slashed just .193/.304/.261 in the Rookie league, with a 28/10 k/bb in 88 Abs, 0 hr as SS.  Not good, especially as a 22-yr old.  Trending Down.

Round 20: John Reeves C, COL sr  from Rice (TX): did not sign.  Despite being listed as a “College Senior” he really was a 4th year junior and opted to return for his 5th year.

Round 21: Matt Pirro, Matt RHP COL sr  from Wake Forest.  0-0 3.71 ERA  across two levels, ending in Short-A.   14/11 k/bb in 17ip, 4.52 fip, .372 babip in short-A.  Not great numbers; too many walks, but his ERA/FIP likely the result of a bit of unlucky babip.  In a battle to stay employed though going into next year by virtue of his senior sign status.   Trending Down.

Round 22: Adam Boghosian RHP COL 5s from North Greenville U. (SC).  3-0, 4.28 era across 2 levels with 16/18 k/bb in 27ip, 5.59 fip, .162 babip in short-A.  Anytime you have more walks than strike-outs, its a bad thing.  And he posted a mediocre ERA despite an unbelievably low babip; his numbers are likely even worse with a longer sample size.  Another senior sign that may get the axe once full-season rosters get set next spring.  Trending Down.

Round 23: Alec Rash, RHP COL jr from Missouri: did not sign.  Rash has barely pitched while in College and was a better bet to try to regain some draft value by pitching a full senior season.

Round 24: Blake Smith RHP COL jr  West Virginia: did not sign.  Listed in some places as a senior but WVU’s site lists him as a junior, so he still has eligibility and opted not to sign so as to increase his draft status with a good senior season.

Round 25: Calvin Copping RHP COL jr from Cal. State Northridge.  1-2, 4.76 ERA in the GCL 14/5 K/BB in 17ip, 4.01 fip, .305 babip.  So-So numbers for a college guy in the rookie league.  As with his fellow middle-of-the-road senior sign pitchers, he needs to show more dominance if he wants a job out of spring 2016.  Trending Down.

Round 26: Russell Harmening. RHP COL jr Westmont Coll (CA).  1-0, 2.86 ERA in the GCL with 16/4 K/BB in 22ip, 3.26 fip, .303 babip.  Better numbers than Copping or Pirro or Boghosian, so we’ll give him a leg up in next year’s bullpen competitions.  Trending steady.

Round 27: Ryan Brinley, RHP COL jr from Sam Houston State U. (TX).  Was 1-4 1.44 ERA  across 3 levels this year with a 16/1 K/BB in 31.1 ip, 3.85 fip, .292 babip in low-A (where he ended up).  Great 27th round find so far in Brinley, who may not have a ton of swing and miss but certainly seems to have some command (1 BB in 31 innings??).  Could be a nice little middle relief option going forward, someone who can keep his team in games.  Trending Up.

Round 28: Mick Van Vossen RHP COL sr from Michigan State U.  0-2, 4.83 ERA  across 2 levels.  23/13 K/BB in 31.2 ip, 4.09 fip, .260 babip in GCL (where he spent most of the year).  Nothing too special here; struggled when he got to Auburn but only had 6ip there.  Needs to show a better K/BB ratio to compete next  year.  Trending steady.

Round 29: Philip Diedrick OF COL sr  Western Kentucky U.  Slashed just .146/.208/.292  in the GCL with 33/6 k/bb in 89 Abs, 4 hr as LF.  Not a good season for Deidrick at all, striking out a third of the time with little in the way of average or OBP to show for it.  Trending Down.

Round 30: Jorge Pantoja RHP COL jr Alabama State U.  1-1, 5.84 ERA in the GCL, 11/3 K/BB in 12ip, 2.74fip, .395 babip.  Looks like some potential there with a K/inning and a FIP that flatters  his ERA.  Probably needs more time.  Trending steady.

Round 31: Nick Sprengel LHP from El Dorado HS (CA): did not sign.  A strong commitment to the U of San Diego, Sprengel was never likely to sign.

Round 32: Dalton DiNatale 3B COL jr Arizona State U.   Slashed just .232/.326/.341  in the GCL 23/10 K/bb in 82abs, 1 hr, 2 sbs.  I would have expected more from a Pac-12 hitter in the GCL.  Trending Down.

Round 33: Angelo La Bruna SS COL 5S  from U. Southern California.  Slashed .269/.303/.355 in the GCL with 15/3 k/bb in 93 Abs, 0 homers.  Drafted as a SS but played 1B; anytime you have a 5th year senior in the rookie league who hits zero homers, warning flags go up.  Trending Down.

Round 34: Tyler Watson LHP from Perry HS (AZ).  1-1, 0.00 ERA  and 16/4 k/bb in 13ip, 1.81 fip, .226 babip in the GCL.  The Nats final over-slot signee ($300k over slot likely on top of the $100k you can throw at any post 10th rounder compensates him on a par as a mid 4th rounder), Watson did not disappoint.  He’s young but he looked dominant in his first pro innings.  I’ll bet he stays in XST and debuts next year on a short-A squad.  Trending Up.

Round 35: Coco Montes SS from Coral Gables HS (FL): did not sign.  Montes honored his commitment to South Florida.

Round 36: Taylor Bush SS from The Linfield School (CA): did not sign.  Bush honored his commitment to Westmont College.

Round 37: Steven DiPuglia SS from Cooper City HS (FL): did not sign.  DiPuglia  honored his commitment to Western Kentucky.

Round 38: Matt Morales SS from Wellington Community HS (FL): did not sign.  Morales honored his commitment to Stetson University.

Round 39: Jake Jefferies 2B COL jr  from Cal. State Fullerton.  Slashed .241/.276/.296  in Short-A.  5/2 K/BB in 54ABs, 0 homers, 3 steals in part time MIF.  Zero power.  Good bat control though.  The Nats have drafted Jefferies multiple times so they clearly see something in him; he sticks around for a bit even given his unimpressive 2015 campaign.  Trending steady.

Round 40: Parker Quinn 1B from The Benjamin School (FL): did not sign.  Quinn honored his commitment to Hofstra.

Trending Summary:

• Trending Up (7): Stevenson, Rivera, Glover, Lee, Schrock, Brinley, Watson
  
• Trending steady (11): Perkins, Wiseman, Hearn, Crownover, Borne, Peterson, Dulin, Harmening, Van Vossen, Pantoja, Jefferies
• Trending Down (12): Kerian, Guilbeau, Mooney, Sagdal, Rodriguez, Brandt, Pirro, Boghosian, Copping, Deitrick, DiNatale, La Bruna
  
• Did Not Sign (10): Lemieux, Reeves, Rash, Smith, Sprengel, Montes, Bush, DiPuglia, Morales, Quinn

Executive Summary

I like what I see out of a handful of guys, and its great to see a couple of the lower-draft pick guys pop up a bit.  I want to see more out of Perkins and Wiseman in particular; their success makes or breaks this draft.  The three over-slot guys (Glover, Schrock, Watsh) all performed well, indicating great use of those funds by the Nats brain-trust.

PS: I created an XLS to do this analysis; if you prefer, you can look at it in Google XLS or use the select cut-n-pasted info below:

(Whoops!  forgot to post this on friday.  I have a good excuse; it was my kid’s 3rd birthday and we have family in town.  I swear I didn’t “cheat” on the Harvey prediction in game 1 from last night … and I still think the Cubs win the series).

Post season predictions so far:

• Wild Card Games: (link to my prediction post): got both Houston and Cubs WC wins right.
• NLDS: (link to my prediction post):  Got LA in 5 games wrong, got Cubs in 4 exactly right
• ALDS: (link to my prediction post): Got Toronto in 4 correct, got KC in 5 exactly right

Lets get to it; this series is going to be fun.

Mets-Cubs:

• Game 1: Harvey vs Lester
• Game 2: Snydergaard vs Arrieta
• Game 3: Hendricks vs deGrom
• Game 4: Hammel vs Matz/Colon?
• Game 5: likely Harvey vs Lester
• Game 6: likely Snydergaard vs Arrieta
• Game 7: likely Hendricks vs deGrom

Thoughts: Here’s a fun stat: The Mets went 0-7 against Chicago this year.  *Winless* in seven games.  New York dodged a major bullet by only  having Snydergaard have to throw one inning in the NLDS game-5 clincher; when he got up in the third to warmup, that could have blown their NLCS rotation plans (even though he apparently threw 100 pitches between the pen and the game).  Now as it stands, even though the Mets havn’t announced anything their rotation for the NLCS lines up so that their three best arms each will get 2 potential starts, with their best arm (deGrom) in line for crucial game 3 and game 7 outings.  I see Harvey dominating in game one behind a raucous New  York crowd, Arrieta being Arrieta in game 2, then having the strategic fun start.  Do you throw Matz in game 4 with Chicago’s heavy lefties or go to the veteran Colon?  Can New York steal one in Chicago somehow?  Maybe the deGrom game 3?

I dunno; if the Cubs have already shown themselves capable of handling the Mets pitching staff, why would we think anything would change?  Something just “feels” different about this Cubs team; they’re a bunch of kids on offense who have no connection to failings of yesteryear and their pitchers all made their bones primarily with others teams.  I can see the Mets sneaking one or two games but think this is Chicago’s year.  Prediction: Chicago in 6.

Good reference links for the above analysis:

• Baseball-reference’s post season page:
• SportsonEarth.com’s Will Leitch’s previews on the ALCS, NLCS
• Depth Charts at Baseball Prospectus.com
• MLB Probables:

Post season predictions so far:

• Wild Card Games: (link to my prediction post): got both Houston and Cubs WC wins right.
• NLDS: (link to my prediction post):  Got LA in 5 games wrong, got Cubs in 4 exactly right
• ALDS: (link to my prediction post): Got Toronto in 4 correct, got KC in 5 exactly right

While my overall predictions were pretty good, on an individual game-by-game basis i’ve been awful.  Silly me thinking that regular season dominance on the mound would lead to performance in the playoffs (ahem, Clayton Kershaw and Zack Greinke).

Toronto-Kansas City:

• Game 1: Estrada vs Volquez
• Game 2: Price vs Ventura
• Game 3: Cueto vs Stroman
• Game 4: likely Young vs Dickey
• Game 5: likely Estrada vs Volquez rematch
• Game 6: likely Price vs Ventura rematch
• Game 7: likely Cueto vs Strohman rematch

Thoughts: Its hard to root against Toronto, the presumptive AL favorite since they remade their team at the deadline.  The incredibly curious handling of David Price seems really odd though.

Game 4 is where I think this series turns.  RA Dickey absolutely shut down the Royals when he saw them this year (7ip 2hits) while the Royals basically have no fourth starter; they went to a 3 man rotation in the ALDS because they could thanks to Ventura’s short outing but they likely won’t have that luxury in the ALCS.  No less than three Nats rejects (Estrada, Stroman, Young) will be pitching in this series and they all could have serious impact. I think the Blue Jays can steal a game in KC, take 2 of 3 at home and then have Price pitch them to a win in game 6.  Prediction: Toronto in 6.

Good reference links for the above analysis:

• Baseball-reference’s post season page:
• SportsonEarth.com’s Will Leitch’s previews on the ALCS, NLCS
• Depth Charts at Baseball Prospectus.com

A dirty play from a dirty player. Photo via sbnation

[Editor’s note: after writing this but before posting, Utley was suspended by the league for 2 games…. but is appealing, enabling him to keep on playing.  Very effective deterrent.  I guess he’ll get his hearing after the playoffs are over.  Don’t dig in tonight Chase.]

The Chase Utley play in NLDS Game 2 was dirty.  I don’t care if you can claim it was “within the rules.”  He *broke a guy’s leg* who was BEHIND THE BAG.  He basically jumped past the bag and hit Ruben Tejada on the fly, fracturing his leg in the process.  It was a ridiculously awful slide from a guy who has done it many times before (ask Jesus Flores what he thinks of Utley’s sliding techniques).  Think Utley has never done this before?  Here’s a couple of his greatest hits:

This slide on Jedd Gyorko earlier this year didn’t result in injury but was just as egregiously bad.  Video link here

In fact, it isn’t even the first time Utley has gone hard in on Tejada!

Its not the 2nd or 3rd such situation we’ve faced this year where a guy was injured on an awful looking slide.  The Pirates were significantly weakened late in the season when a Chicago player (Chris Coghlan slides into ) did the same thing, snapping 2nd baseman Jung Ho Kang‘s leg.  See that image here:

Another awful slide. Via wtvm13.com

You can’t tell the angle Coughlan is taking, but its very far off the bag.  The “rule” says that as long as you can ostensibly touch the bag, a runner can slide wherever he wants.  I think the rule is wrong and has empowered some players to take advantage of the situation and basically try to go straight after players.  Kind of like how in soccer you can jump slide tackle into someone’s knees, but as long as you hit the ball first your slide is “legal.”

This Matt Holliday slide from a couple years ago was just as ridiculous; somehow Marco Scutaro avoided serious injury (video here):

(Photo by Ezra Shaw/Getty Images)

Much like we’ve now eliminated purposeful catcher collisions after a series of high profile (Buster Posey) injuries occurred, I think its high time to do the same on these middle infield plays.  And clearly the sentiment is the same in the industry.  Even C.J. Nitkowski’s notoriously “gorilla-man” anonymous surveying of his current and past connections in the industry on Jabo.com showed that a plurality of players think the slide was dirty and needs to change.

That Utley was eventually suspended admittedly seems hypocritical; change the rule THEN suspend the player; you can’t suspend the player for doing what he’s been doing for the last 20 years.  Put a new rule in place in the offseason that eliminates this situation much like we’ve eliminated needless defenseless catcher injuries.

(side note: the fact that the play was even reviewable, and that Utley was awarded the base after this vicious slide and having never touched the base is even more ridiculous.  Explain this one to me; when a batter swings at a pitch in the dirt for strike 3 but walks off the field … eventually the ump calls him out.  Why?

Nice Hair bro. Photo via his instagram

Every year, Dave Nichols over at DistrictSportsPage.com runs a fun little pre-season survey, asking the various Nats bloggers to do predictions about various things.  Here’s a navel-gazing look back at how my predictions turned out.