MLB Chatter Thread

Carp

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The Nats are said to be going after Cespedes too. Lots of guessing on this...the White Sox were said to be in the lead earlier in the week.

One thing that sucks...Det giving Upton the contract they did not help. The yearly average is fine, but there were reports out there that Cespedes might accept a 3 year deal...I don't think that can happen anymore.
 

Carp

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While the Nationals are said to have made a five-year contract offer to Yoenis Cespedes, ESPN’s Buster Olney reports that the Mets are now discussing a three-year contract which would include an opt-out provision after the first year of the deal (Twitter link). Olney also tweets that the expectation among some involved in the discussions is that Cespedes will make a decision within 24 to 48 hours.
 

Jiggyfly

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Astros See Minor League Titles Pay Dividends
January 15, 2016 by J.J. Cooper

It has been an impressive run of success at the minor league level for the Astros. Houston spent the first several years of Luhnow’s tenure as the worst team in baseball at the major league level before turning into a playoff team in 2015. In the minor leagues, the success came much more quickly.

From 2012-2015, the Astros won 55 percent of their minor league games, easily the best in the minors over that stretch (the Mets are second).

What makes that surprising is just how bad Houston was in the minors right before Luhnow and his staff arrived. From 2008-2011, Houston finished with the worst record in the minors three times in four years—and the one year they weren’t 30th, they were 29th.

During those four years, Houston’s minor league teams had a collective .417 winning percentage. From 2008 to the present, no other organization has had any one season where their affiliates finished with a winning percentage that poor. No other team has won less than 46 percent of its games over that time period.

“When Jeff and the regime came over a few years back, the organization not only wanted to replenish the talent in the system but also change the culture,” Astros’ director of player personnel Quinton McCracken said.

The rebuilding effort that began in 2011 under previous general manager Ed Wade started to lay the groundwork, but Luhnow’s scouting and analytics-based approach has helped the Astros’ win at every level in recent years.

When Luhnow was scouting director in St. Louis, the Cardinals had a knack for getting value both at the top and much deeper down in their drafts. Not coincidentally, the Cardinals won 52 percent of their minor league games and five minor league titles from 2008-2011.

Houston has seen a similar payoff. The Astros had developed an impressive depth of minor league talent. They are winning with youth and prospects. Fresno won the Triple-A National Championship with the youngest lineup and the second-youngest pitching staff in the Pacific Coast League. Double-A Corpus Christi had the best record in the Texas League (89-51) with the youngest lineup and the youngest pitching staff in the league. Greeneville won the Appalachian League title with the third-youngest lineup and second-youngest pitching staff in the league.

“It’s been a collective effort. Changing the whole image of the organization,” McCracken said. “When you draft players and develop them properly, the end results are teams that are competitive . . . It starts with the foundation of drafting quality, talented players that have those intangibles and that winning mentality. The Correas of the world, the (Alex) Bregmans, they make players around them better. That can be contagious. It raises the bar.”

So just how valuable is winning in the minor leagues? Well, it depends. It’s possible to have rather meaningless success by stacking a team with players who aren’t age-appropriate for the level. But if you can win with prospects then you might have the makings of something, especially if you are trying to turn around a team that has been losing for far too long.

“The primary goal of the development system is to produce major league value,” Luhnow said. “Developing players should always be the primary objective, and has been both with the Cardinals when I was there as well as the Astros since I’ve been here. Having said that, developing players while winning is the optimal outcome and the winning speeds up their development. Players that have a winning mindset in the minor leagues carry that over to the big leagues and it is an advantage. The talent gaps between teams is small in pro ball and often the teams that win are doing all the little things right. That’s a mindset that helps in the show.”

The Royals front office knew a lot about losing. When Dayton Moore’s front office staff arrived and started trying to rebuild the organization, they knew that they weren’t going to be winning in the big leagues soon, but they believed they could build a core of young talent that would win on its way up.

“It was a very conscious effort,” said Royals assistant general manager Scott Sharp, who formerly was the farm director. “We had not won at the major league level. The focus was on scouting and player development. The idea was, we’ll take this group and put them together. If they win in the minor leagues, that will translate to the major leagues. They will expect to win because they have won all along as teammates. So when they get to the majors, ‘Why can’t we win here?’ ”

Kansas City tried to group Mike Moustakas, Salvador Perez, Eric Hosmer, Danny Duffy and others together throughout the minors hoping they could build a tradition of winning together.

The Moustakas-led Burlington Bees won the 2008 low Class A Midwest League title. Much of that same group won the Double-A Texas League title in 2010 thanks to Hosmer’s six playoff home runs, including two, two-run home runs in a 6-5 win in an elimination game against Springfield. A year later, many of the same players won the Triple-A Pacific Coast League title with Omaha.

When Hosmer hit a two-run home run in the 11th inning to beat the Angels in Game Two of the 2014 American League Division Series, many Royals flashed back to his Texas League heroics. When the team arrived in spring training in 2015 motivated to win a World Series, Sharp couldn’t help but think about how many of those same players responded to a surprisingly early playoff exit in the 2009 high Class A Carolina League.

“I think it was a very conscious effort to teach these guys, ‘Hey, you can win.’ You’re going to win with these guys here and at the major league level,” Sharp said. “When you bring those players up together they become accountable to each other. They have shared in those experiences instead of a collection of players who hadn’t played together before. I think it’s how you define winning at the minor league level is the most critical part. It’s extremely important to win at the minor league level, but you have to do it with the right types of players. You can’t put fifth graders in a second-grade dodgeball game to win it. But if you teach the second graders to win, that’s important.”

When the Royals get their World Series rings, it will be Duffy’s seventh championship ring (2008 Midwest League, 2010 Texas League, 2011, ’13 and ’14 Pacific Coast League, 2014 American League and now 2015 World Series). It’s fair to say that this latest ring will be a little pricier than the other six in his safe.

No Astros player has seven rings, but many have two or three. And more and more Astros are reaching the majors having won on a smaller stage. And Houston has reason to believe that will pay dividends in the big leagues as well.
 

Rev

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The Angels claimed Ronald Torreyes after the Astros released him.

Yep. The same Torreyes that the Astros chose to protect over Delino DeShields last winter.

:lol :tippytoe
 

E_D_Guapo

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Saw this stat not long ago and was completely floored by it.

Tony Gwynn had 323 total plate appearances against the combination of HOFers Maddux, Glavine, Smoltz, and Pedro Martinez. He batted .373 with 3 K.

Looking at just the Maddux/Pedro combo he hit .388 with 0 K in 143 plate appearances.

Think about that shit for a minute. If it weren't fact I would say that kind of strike out rate over that many plate appearances against pitchers of that caliber is impossible. It is absolutely unfathomable to me. So is the batting average against really, but 3 strikeouts in 323 plate appearances is just...wow.
 

Rev

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Just an amazing eye for the ball. Didn't know those stats and it's incredible to even think that could happen.
 

Jiggyfly

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Saw this stat not long ago and was completely floored by it.

Tony Gwynn had 323 total plate appearances against the combination of HOFers Maddux, Glavine, Smoltz, and Pedro Martinez. He batted .373 with 3 K.

Looking at just the Maddux/Pedro combo he hit .388 with 0 K in 143 plate appearances.

Think about that shit for a minute. If it weren't fact I would say that kind of strike out rate over that many plate appearances against pitchers of that caliber is impossible. It is absolutely unfathomable to me. So is the batting average against really, but 3 strikeouts in 323 plate appearances is just...wow.
I am amazed he never hit 400.

It just goes to show you how great that mark is.
 
D

Deuce

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Saw this stat not long ago and was completely floored by it.

Tony Gwynn had 323 total plate appearances against the combination of HOFers Maddux, Glavine, Smoltz, and Pedro Martinez. He batted .373 with 3 K.

Looking at just the Maddux/Pedro combo he hit .388 with 0 K in 143 plate appearances.

Think about that shit for a minute. If it weren't fact I would say that kind of strike out rate over that many plate appearances against pitchers of that caliber is impossible. It is absolutely unfathomable to me. So is the batting average against really, but 3 strikeouts in 323 plate appearances is just...wow.
All that tells me is, had he played last year he probably would have been on my fantasy team. :) :lol

In all seriousness, he and Junior Griffey were the two best pure hitters I've ever seen and I expect them to remain the top 2 for the rest of my life.
 

jsmith6919

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E_D_Guapo

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Boggs was a pretty good pure hitter too. And Rose of course.
Definitely agree on both of those guys. "Pure hitter" is a pretty ambiguous term but I get what people mean when they say it. I would put Ichiro in that category. He was a machine for the first 10 years of his MLB career.

Rod Carew is another all-timer. He was past his prime by the time I started following/watching MLB but he was still hitting well above .300 even at his advanced age. He was ridiculous in prime.
 
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E_D_Guapo

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2016 ranking of all 30 farm systems
Keith Law
ESPN Senior Writer

To kick off my look this week at the best prospects in the minor leagues, I've ranked all 30 MLB farm systems from top to bottom, considering only the players who are currently in the systems and have not yet exhausted their rookie year of eligibility. (I use the same criterion for the individual player rankings that will be posted over the next few days.)

There's a real concentration of talent among the top few farm systems, teams that have been bad in recent years and stockpiled prospects, plus a couple of clubs that have wielded their financial might to bolster their farms. The top few clubs can all boast a dozen or more prospects with decent chances to become average big leaguers or better, whereas at the bottom of the list, you might find only one or two such prospects per club. (My top 10 rankings by team will be released early next week.) The rankings favor teams with more of those "average big leaguer or better" prospects because of the scarcity of those players and the increasing cost of a fourth starter or just an average everyday player in free agency. Quality relievers and bench players are nice to have in your system -- it sure beats paying for them on the open market -- but they don't measure up to clubs that have lots of potential grade 50s (on the 20-80 grading scale) in their systems.

Let's get to the rankings.

1. Atlanta Braves
2015 rank: 6
Players in Top 100 (2016): 7

This system was among the bottom five just two years ago after years of bad drafts and questionable player development, but a series of trades -- including several fleecings of the Diamondbacks -- has stocked the system with pitching depth that is the envy of the industry. They tied for the most players in my top 100 and had a couple of other players who could make cases for inclusion, and their 11th-to-20th-ranked prospects still include a lot of prospective major league value. It has been a remarkable turnaround for general manager John Coppolella and his front office, and the future is even brighter with the team having the third overall pick in this June's draft. The team's agreement to sign Venezuelan prospect Kevin Maitan on July 2 is the worst-kept secret in the industry.

2. Los Angeles Dodgers
2015 rank: 10
Players in Top 100 (2016): 7

You can say that they bought this farm-system ranking, and you'd be right, and I don't think they'd particularly care. However, that doesn't do justice to the successful draft picks in 2013 and 2014 that line their top 10 around the various high-dollar Cuban signings (and that one Mexican lefty named Urias).

3. Minnesota Twins
2015 rank: 2
Players in Top 100 (2016): 7

If you'd asked me to just wildly guess at these rankings before I started the research process that goes into them, I might have pegged Minnesota 10 spots too low, but this system is stacked. They have high ceilings, they have probability, they have starters, they have relievers, they have lots of position players ... I guess they don't really have catching, if you want to pick nits. But for a team that runs low payrolls, they're in damn good shape.

4. Chicago Cubs
2015 rank: 1
Players in Top 100 (2016): 6

They graduated Kris Bryant, Kyle Schwarber and Addison Russell, but are still loaded with talent, albeit most of it unlikely to help before 2017. The system has long been light on arms, but there's some pitching coming if you squint hard enough into the distance.

5. Milwaukee Brewers
2015 rank: 28
Players in Top 100 (2016): 4

They've gone from having the majors' worst farm system just two years ago to a top-five system thanks to a series of shrewd trades, starting with former GM Doug Melvin's work last summer to begin the rebuilding process, as well as one of the strongest draft classes in 2015.

6. Philadelphia Phillies
2015 rank: 25
Players in Top 100 (2016): 5

The Cole Hamels trade might turn out to be the Phillies' Herschel Walker moment, trading their best asset for a huge package of prospects who look like they'll boost the major league club for years to come. The next step is maximizing their output from this year's draft, in which they hold the first overall pick.

7. Colorado Rockies
2015 rank: 8
Players in Top 100 (2016): 5

This is a system full of athletes, with lots of high-upside position players and a significant contingent of hard-throwing starter prospects behind them. However, there's some reliever risk on all of those starters. If any club were to value reliever prospects a bit higher, though, it probably should be the Rockies.

8. Pittsburgh Pirates
2015 rank: 7
Players in Top 100 (2016): 4

For the Pirates to maintain this strong of a system with a low payroll and a highly competitive major league team is one of the more under-the-radar stories in the game over the past few years. They landed four players on the top 100 and could easily land six or seven next winter.

9. Texas Rangers
2015 rank: 11
Players in Top 100 (2016): 5

Formerly a system dominated by big international signings, the Rangers have since become a more focused team in the draft, going for ceiling and hitting on an impressive fraction of their high picks, including the Lewis Brinson/Joey Gallo parlay from the 2012 draft.

10. Boston Red Sox
2015 rank: 5
Players in Top 100 (2016): 4

Decimated by promotions the past two years and the recent trade for Craig Kimbrel, which cost them two top-100 prospects and two others of some value, yet big international spending and some productive drafts still have them a top-10 system overall. Drafting Andrew Benintendi, who showed in pro ball that his huge spring for the University of Arkansas wasn't just a four-month fluke, also helped.

11. Cleveland Indians
2015 rank: 16
Players in Top 100 (2016): 4

This is a system full of projectable young, high-ceiling arms and topped off with a couple of very promising bats, but somewhat light on potential impact for 2016. I liked their 2015 draft, which focused on those projection high-school pitchers over guys who throw hard now but might not have the same athleticism or repeatable deliveries.

12. Cincinnati Reds
2015 rank: 17
Players in Top 100 (2016): 4

I haven't been a huge fan of the returns on the Reds' recent trades other than the Johnny Cueto deal (which yielded just one prospect for these rankings), but the aggregate result is a big influx of talent on top of a system with a couple of first-round and supplemental-round picks that are looking very promising.

13. New York Yankees
2015 rank: 20
Players in Top 100 (2016): 4

The Aroldis Chapman deal didn't make much of a dent in the system; the Yankees bought the troubled reliever with quantity rather than quality, and a strong draft in 2015 helped make up for some recent promotions.

14. Tampa Bay Rays
2015 rank: 23
Players in Top 100 (2016): 4

A quietly deep system, light on potential stars but full of potential regulars and back-end starters. These are the types of players the Rays will never be able to afford in free agency in their current market.

15. Washington Nationals
2015 rank: 9
Players in Top 100 (2016): 3

A top-heavy system with a couple of potential stars, some depth in position players up the middle, but a somewhat quick falloff after the first 8-10 names. It doesn't set them up well for many trades, but you have to be a potential star to crack the lineup or rotation in D.C., and they do have a few of those prospects.

16. New York Mets
2015 rank: 4
Players in Top 100 (2016): 4

Still well-stocked with position players, but most of the pitching is gone in trades for Tyler Clippard and Yoenis Cespedes, leaving them very dependent on the health of the five young stars in the big league rotation. With a little luck, the next wave of hitters will hit Citi Field just as there are openings in the right spots in the lineup, helping them continue to compete behind their phenomenal young rotation.

17. Houston Astros
2015 rank: 3
Players in Top 100 (2016): 4

With all the trades and promotions, the system has finally dropped out of the top 10, but it's far from barren thanks to a huge draft haul last year and big steps forward by several prospects in the system. There just isn't another Correa coming ... yet.

18. Oakland Athletics
2015 rank: 26
Players in Top 100 (2016): 2

A couple of big trades brought back four of their top-10 prospects in a system that is back on the upswing after a few fallow years. They have a bunch of guys in the 101-150 range of prospects, players who could still have real major league value but have a little less probability because of issues like contact rates.

19. St. Louis Cardinals
2015 rank: 13
Players in Top 100 (2016): 3

This is surprisingly low for a team that has been so productive over the past decade, but they've promoted much of their top talent and are now buttressed by their international department rather than their domestic drafts.

20. San Diego Padres
2015 rank: 18
Players in Top 100 (2016): 2

The Padres strip-mined their system last year in a series of trades to boost the big league club, but then added their new top-two prospects in the trade that sent Craig Kimbrel to Boston. This year's draft will be huge for them, as they have three picks in the first 27 and six in the first 85.

21. San Francisco Giants
2015 rank: 29
Players in Top 100 (2016): 1

Just one top-100 prospect but a passel of intriguing arms -- both starters and relievers -- which should succor the ailing major league rotation soon and help keep the bullpen rolling (a strength of all three World Series-winning Giants teams). They keep finding value in later rounds of the draft, too, and made a big splash internationally for the first time in several years.

22. Chicago White Sox
2015 rank: 12
Players in Top 100 (2016): 1

Gradually improving thanks to some productive drafts, although they lost a little bit by trading three of their top 10 prospects for Todd Frazier (a good trade all the same). There's definitely a new emphasis on improving their player development, even if it's just to trade pieces for big league stars as in the Frazier deal.

23. Kansas City Royals
2015 rank: 15
Players in Top 100 (2016): 2

No complaints here, as the Royals used the fruits of the system to win a World Series and another American League pennant, but they are very light on position players now and many of their remaining pitching prospects are several years away.

24. Arizona Diamondbacks
2015 rank: 14
Players in Top 100 (2016): 2

Two good pitching prospects, one or two decent hitting prospects, then a big drop-off, which is what happens when you keep sending away your top draft picks in trades. They took some middling college arms last year who could surprise this year and establish themselves as top-five prospects in the system ... or look like busted picks by next winter.

25. Toronto Blue Jays
2015 rank: 19
Players in Top 100 (2016): 1

Badly thinned out by trades over the past 18 months, but saved by the sudden emergence this year of their top two prospects, one a football player who finally chose to focus on baseball full-time, the other a projection high-school arm who saw his velocity shoot up last summer.

26. Detroit Tigers
2015 rank: 30
Players in Top 100 (2016): 1

They traded for prospects last summer, helping land their new No. 1 prospect and add a little depth to a system that had been depleted by trades in the other direction for years. It's still not a good system, but it's the first time in maybe a decade that it's trending upward, and I think the new emphasis on building from within will continue under GM Al Avila.

27. Baltimore Orioles
2015 rank: 22
Players in Top 100 (2016): 2

Hunter Harvey has been out for a year and a half, Dylan Bundy can't stay healthy and may be done as a starter, and their best prospect is a catcher who might be a singles hitter. Their upside was almost entirely in short-season last summer, but they wouldn't be in this situation if the last wave of arms had panned out.

28. Seattle Mariners
2015 rank: 21
Players in Top 100 (2016): 1

Their best prospect took a big step back in 2015, their top pitching prospect has huge upside but hasn't performed and has major makeup questions, and their draft was my least favorite of all 30 in 2015. New GM Jerry Dipoto has the unenviable task of keeping the big league club competitive while trying to restock the fallen system.

29. Miami Marlins

2015 rank: 24
Players in Top 100 (2016): 1

They barely placed one guy on the top 100 and their No. 2 prospect is probably a reliever when it's all said and done. They have some high-upside bats in the lowest levels, but they're low-probability prospects, and their pitching is light everywhere.

30. Los Angeles Angels
2015 rank: 27
Players in Top 100 (2016): 0

I've been doing these rankings for eight years now, and this is by far the worst system I've ever seen. They traded their top two prospects in the Andrelton Simmons deal and had no one remotely close to top-100 status. They need a big draft this year to start to restock the system or we're going to start talking about whether it's time to trade Mike Trout.
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I am surprised and somewhat skeptical of such a high ranking for the Cubs system. It was incredible when Bryant, Russell, Schwarber, Soler, and Baez were still in the minors, but those guys have lost their prospect status. They have some pretty good depth I guess but there just aren't any really high ceiling players left. Ian Happ maybe, but he loses some value if he proves he can't play 2B and has to move to the OF. Gleyber Torres has some real upside too but just turned 19 so who knows. He is currently their highest rated prospect by every source I have seen so far this offseason.

I have to leave it to the experts but my gut feeling is that the Cubs system may be a bit overrated right now. They were top 10 on another list I saw but I think another listed them as #20, which would be fine with me considering the core of players already on the Big League roster that are 26 and under.
 
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