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White Sox Prospects of the Month, April 2018


NorthSideSox72
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3 hours ago, NorthSideSox72 said:

Luis Alexander Basabe and Michael Kopech take home the awards for April, with 4-5 honorable mentions in each category making strong cases as well. Here are the details!

 

Lots of reasons to be excited there, and the scary thing is this article made no mention of Eloy Jimenez, Luis Robert, or Alec Hansen. I have a feeling these articles are going to be very hard for you guys come June and July.

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If Adolfo can improve his K-rate he'd be a legit top 100 prospect. I'm still worried his number will regress significantly if he can't bring the K-rate down. Basabe I would imagine has probably made the biggest leap so far among the top 30. If he keeps this up you can make the case for him being our most valuable position prospect. While I'm convinced Eloy will mash with the bat I'm still not entirely sold on his plate disciple and he'll be at best net neutral on defense and speed. Basabe has the potential to provide above average value at a premium position on both defense and speed. If he keeps this up at a minimum he's a top 50 prospect by mid year. 

Edited by mac9001
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8 hours ago, mac9001 said:

If Adolfo can improve his K-rate he'd be a legit top 100 prospect. I'm still worried his number will regress significantly if he can't bring the K-rate down. Basabe I would imagine has probably made the biggest leap so far among the top 30. If he keeps this up you can make the case for him being our most valuable position prospect. While I'm convinced Eloy will mash with the bat I'm still not entirely sold on his plate disciple and he'll be at best net neutral on defense and speed. Basabe has the potential to provide above average value at a premium position on both defense and speed. If he keeps this up at a minimum he's a top 50 prospect by mid year. 

Basabe is a fun prospect, but to the bold - no and no. Not even close on either. No way Basabe passes Jimenez or Robert, nor is he likely to pass 3-4 others, at least right away. And he may or may not even make the T100 at mid-year, or even end of year.

It's true that he's had a big opening, but it's still less than a month in. Also true that he LOOKS different too, now healthy. But that doesn't suddenly elevate him to that elite level. Nor did last year's performance actually drop him down as far as some folks thought. It means that if he keeps raking, he could be in AA by June, and goes up a few runs on the org list.

 

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If his OPS is north of 1.000 and his ISO is still above .300 in mid June there's no way he's not top 50.  The ability to play CF at the big league level with legit offensive potential is a rare commodity. His contact rate and power appear to be sustainable. Robert still needs to prove he can handle CF before his high prospect status is justified and Eloy will need to mash as he's likely to be WAR negative in the field and on the base paths. Hayward was a 5 WAR player mostly due to defense and base running and he did that playing RF. Unless Eloy hits 50 bombs per year a speedy quality CF is still likely to be move valuable. 

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2 hours ago, mac9001 said:

If his OPS is north of 1.000 and his ISO is still above .300 in mid June there's no way he's not top 50.  The ability to play CF at the big league level with legit offensive potential is a rare commodity. His contact rate and power appear to be sustainable. Robert still needs to prove he can handle CF before his high prospect status is justified and Eloy will need to mash as he's likely to be WAR negative in the field and on the base paths. Hayward was a 5 WAR player mostly due to defense and base running and he did that playing RF. Unless Eloy hits 50 bombs per year a speedy quality CF is still likely to be move valuable. 

Players repeating a level usually get heavily dinged in terms of prospect rankings 

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Just to be clear I'm not making the case that he's a better prospect than Eloy right now. Eloy's offensive floor is so high it's hard to argue ranking him anywhere other than #1. But his profile is likely closer to someone like JD Martinez than a true franchise player like Trout. Basabe has a super low floor with high bust potential, but he an excellent athlete. He has the athletic ability to be a really good defensive CF. He has high end speed that has already demonstrated the ability to steal bags. While it's only a month, it's still a solid month  with a very respectable walk rate, moderate k-rate and decent pop. If this month is a reflection of his true hitting ability his long term peak potential is now probably a 6+ WAR player. It's perfectly understandable to be skeptical with such a low sample size of success. But there's a completely different (and fairly unique) range of peak potential when you have the intangibles Basabe possesses.  It's the same reason why Moncada was the top prospect in baseball, he has 10 WAR peak potential. You need a unique set of intangibles to have type of potential. The reality on a guy like Eloy is his value on defensive/speed is likely to diminish at the major league level over his current projections, which limits his peak potential to something closer to a 5-6 WAR guy.  While the odds are against Basabe, give me three more months of this production and it makes his case for elite prospect status a lot easier to make.

 

Just to add one more clarification. I don't necessarily think he will be on some of these top 100 publications, just that he should be. If he continues to produce at this level. 

Edited by mac9001
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I know Rutherford is sort of a guy whose on the backburner but he deserves an honorable mention. He's tearing the cover off the ball.

Blackmon is a 24 year old in A ball.

Booker is a 24 year old in high A ball

I mean comeon they are ancient for their levels.

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1 hour ago, caulfield12 said:

Basabe might SNIFF the back end of the Top 100 (85-100) if he can sustain this pace statistically for a full season (and stay healthy)...

But he's not going to be passing Jimenez/Robert anytime soon.

Why would we care anyway?

1) Moncada by himself seems like he will win that trade for the White Sox. Kopech may also be able to pull that off. If Basabe also hits, that's icing on the cake.

2) Publications don't always get it right. I know I'll be excited about Basabe if by the end of the year he's a 22 year old CF mashing AA pitching. If he is that and he's not Top 100, I think that would be a mistake by the publications.

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21 minutes ago, wrathofhahn said:

I know Rutherford is sort of a guy whose on the backburner but he deserves an honorable mention. He's tearing the cover off the ball.

Blackmon is a 24 year old in A ball.

Booker is a 24 year old in high A ball

I mean comeon they are ancient for their levels.

Something interesting I noticed today is Rutherford's insane go/fo ratio. It was 3/1 coming into today. It's a cause for optimism and pessimism, as he will definitely hit for more power if he elevates the ball more but is he actually capable of the adjustments?  It's been a nice rebound so far but I still think he's destined to be part of a trade down the road. 

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6 minutes ago, fathom said:

Something interesting I noticed today is Rutherford's insane go/fo ratio. It was 3/1 coming into today. It's a cause for optimism and pessimism, as he will definitely hit for more power if he elevates the ball more but is he actually capable of the adjustments?  It's been a nice rebound so far but I still think he's destined to be part of a trade down the road. 

There are definite concerns about Rutherford I'm not discounting that. All I'm saying is to me the numbers he is putting up as a 21 year old in high A ball is much more impressive then the numbers put up by a bunch of 24 year olds with terrible plate discipline.

 

 

 

 

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8 hours ago, wrathofhahn said:

I know Rutherford is sort of a guy whose on the backburner but he deserves an honorable mention. He's tearing the cover off the ball.

Blackmon is a 24 year old in A ball.

Booker is a 24 year old in high A ball

I mean comeon they are ancient for their levels.

 

If you read the intro to the article, you will see what the article is. It's about best performances. It is not an evaluation of prospect value. Blackman isn't even on the radar, and Booker is fringy.

 

9 hours ago, mac9001 said:

Just to be clear I'm not making the case that he's a better prospect than Eloy right now. Eloy's offensive floor is so high it's hard to argue ranking him anywhere other than #1. But his profile is likely closer to someone like JD Martinez than a true franchise player like Trout. Basabe has a super low floor with high bust potential, but he an excellent athlete. He has the athletic ability to be a really good defensive CF. He has high end speed that has already demonstrated the ability to steal bags. While it's only a month, it's still a solid month  with a very respectable walk rate, moderate k-rate and decent pop. If this month is a reflection of his true hitting ability his long term peak potential is now probably a 6+ WAR player. It's perfectly understandable to be skeptical with such a low sample size of success. But there's a completely different (and fairly unique) range of peak potential when you have the intangibles Basabe possesses.  It's the same reason why Moncada was the top prospect in baseball, he has 10 WAR peak potential. You need a unique set of intangibles to have type of potential. The reality on a guy like Eloy is his value on defensive/speed is likely to diminish at the major league level over his current projections, which limits his peak potential to something closer to a 5-6 WAR guy.  While the odds are against Basabe, give me three more months of this production and it makes his case for elite prospect status a lot easier to make.

 

Just to add one more clarification. I don't necessarily think he will be on some of these top 100 publications, just that he should be. If he continues to produce at this level. 

I think what you are missing here is that "production" is not a key factor in these lists. Also, even with all factors in consideration, 3 months of play does not turn someone well off the T100 into suddenly T50.

 

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8 hours ago, wrathofhahn said:

I know Rutherford is sort of a guy whose on the backburner but he deserves an honorable mention. He's tearing the cover off the ball.

Blackmon is a 24 year old in A ball.

Booker is a 24 year old in high A ball

I mean comeon they are ancient for their levels.

Average age at high A appears to be 22.5. 

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8 hours ago, southsider2k5 said:

Average age at high A appears to be 22.5. 

What are the standard deviation and median?  

Depending on those measurements, 24 could be quite old. I have to imagine one standard deviation is 18 months or less. 

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