Rex Hudler

I'll get to it in a bit........

I'm sticking with BOTH

Antoin Gray, 2B/3B Born: May 19, 1981 Height: 5'9" Weight: 195 Bats: R Throws: R School: Southern University Career Transactions: Selected by White Sox in the 25th round of the 2003 draft; signed June 6, 2003 Gray finished fourth in the NCAA Division I batting race with a .449 average in 2002, finishing behind future first-round picks Rickie Weeks and Khalil Greene, as well as Curtis Granderson, who has hit .304 since signing with the Tigers. One of six players drafted off Southern's 44-7 team last year, Gray hit .407-26-133 in 108 games in his two years in the same lineup as Weeks. Though he faced a huge jump in competition when he turned pro, there was a minimal learning curve for Gray. He continued to hit, finishing third in the Pioneer League in runs and doubles. He has promising power and a keen eye for walks, though he must improve his bunting and cut down on his strikeouts. Beyond his bat, Gray doesn't have a plus tool. He played third base at Southern while Weeks played second, the position Gray is better suited for. His arm fits better at second base, though he'll need a lot of work defensively, especially on the double-play pivot. If Gray can beocme adequate defensively, he could have a big league career as an offensive second baseman. Unless the White Sox decide to hold Pedro Lopez back, Gray will report to low Class A to start 2004. CAREER BATTING RECORD YR Club LG CLASS POS AVG G AB R H TB 2B 3B HR RBI GW SH SF HB BB IB SO SB CS GDP SLUG OBP TPA 03 Great Falls PIO R 2B-3B .292 69 277 63 81 125 20 0 8 43 0 2 3 6 49 0 62 4 1 4 .451 .406 337 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- MINOR LEAGUE TOTALS .292 277 81 20 8 0 3 49 62 1 .451 337 69 63 125 0 43 2 6 0 4 4 .406 Rex' Comments: - Something just doesn't seem right here. I can't figure out why a guy that can hit as well as Gray was selected so low. Obviously his size doesn't appeal to what scouts look for, but I would think with a plus bat including power potential would go higher. He could always move to a corner OF position. Perhaps the Sox found something here. I just wonder why the Sox passed on him 24 times and every other team did at least that many times. What am I missing?

You're an idiot or you are 12......... or both

Damn, you want me to do a lot of typing today, don't you?

Upside........ I can see their rationale

My guess is a lot of the reason Reed is down at #25 is that his upside isn't likely as high as some of the others. Reed is probably more of a sure thing, but he projects to be a solid #2 hitter. If he develops further (power), he will drop into the three-hole and exceed expectations. The best comparison I can come up with is Grady Sizemore of Cleveland who comes in at #9. I am not sure why he is that much higher, unless they think he will be in the Majors this year and factored that in. Creating a list like that is so difficult because there are so many great players who play different positions and are at different levels of development. I'm sure if they put the list together a week later, there would be variances. One of the guys that jumped out at me is JJ Hardy at 19. Hardy is a great player and was very good at AA at a young age, but I don't really see his upside any higher than Reed's and Reed is more developed right now, IMO. Hardy may be starting at SS for the Brewers this year and is two years younger than Reed so that may be the reason for the high ranking, but Reed was clearly the better player this year in AA. Both should be in the Big Leagues for a long time, however.

Fabio Castro Born: Jan. 20, 1985 Height: 5'8" Weight: 157 Bats: L Throws: L Career Transactions: Signed out of Dominican Republic by White Sox, Dec. 26, 2001 If his talent came in a bigger package, Castro already would have become a highly touted prospect. Don't be surprised if he emerges as one in the next couple of years. All the undersized lefthander has done for the last two years is get outs, first in the Rookie-level Dominican Summer League and then as an 18-year old in the Appalachian League, where he faced mostly hitters coming from college. Castro has very good command of an 89-91 mph fastball, a breaking ball and a changeup. His secondary pitches need more consistency, as is typical with young pitchers. He made two late-season starts in low Class A, impressing with his poise as much as his stuff. Should he catch a growth spurt, he could turn into a monster. He'll return to Kannapolis in 2004 and could get a full-time look as a starter. CAREER PITCHING RECORD YR CLUB LG Class W-L .PCT ERA G GS CG SHO GF SV IP H AB TBF R ER HR SH SF HB BB IB SO WP BK AVG AGAINST 02 Chicago Ws DSL R 10-2 .833 1.95 25 2 0 0 17 8 64.2 37 232 258 17 14 3 1 1 3 23 4 89 2 1 .159 03 Bristol APPY R 6-2 .750 1.72 19 0 0 0 10 2 47.0 29 168 190 14 9 1 1 1 1 19 1 59 6 2 .173 Kannapolis SAL A 0-2 .000 3.27 2 2 0 0 0 0 11.0 8 40 45 5 4 0 0 0 0 5 0 16 0 0 .200 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- MINOR LEAGUE TOTALS 16 .727 1.98 4 0 10 74 493 27 2 4 5 8 6 46 0 27 122.2 440 36 4 2 47 164 3

JimH, for you, I will happily oblige....... I can't spend all day on it though, and I am not the fastest typist..... LOL I'll start with the three you mentioned.

Jason, no mention of Loaiza??

Not that I advocate such a change, but for clarification........ Koch was a starter exclusively in the Minor Leagues. I am pretty sure he was a starter in college as well, but cannot say so for sure. I believe I recall seeing him start in the College WS. He was part of a Clemson staff that had three great pitchers. Ken Vining was one of the other two. I cannot recall the name of the 3rd pitcher. Koch must have gotten hurt right after college. He was taken in the 1996 draft, but did not play that season, which could simply mean he signed late. But he only started three games in 1997, so my guess is the injury happened somewhere in that 96-97 time frame. He came back in 98 and was again used as a starter, making 27 starts. In 99, he started 5 games in AAA and was then promoted to Toronto and immediately placed in the bullpen, where he racked up 31 saves. It is possible they were grooming him to be a closer but using him as a starter. The Blue Jays handled him quite differently. He jumped from Class A to AAA in 98 and made two starts there. He made 5 the next year in AAA and that is all of the time he spent above Class A before jumping right into the role of Major League closer. He did have 56 appearances for Toronto that first year, so it is possible he wasn't the closer right away, but with 31 saves you have to figure it wasn't too long before he was the closer.

When I am deleting 300+ spam emails today, I will think of people who do stupid things like you did and utter a few choice words for you. Whether you get it or not, that was NOT cool.

Isn't spamming illegal? Regardless of my personal feelings toward your actions, I want to thank you on behalf of any Sox fan that would ever try to legitimately email Mariotti ever again. Forget it....... if you think that's cool, go ahead. You'll never get it anyway....

I know very little about Morse.... Gonzalez is toolsy, but questionable mentally, or so I hear. Morse's numbers just don't impress me. BA's write up talked about his power as being his biggest asset, yet he only hit 11 HR this year and never hit more than 4 in his three previous seasons. He hit .245 at Winston last year. I will have to wait and see, but I am just not sure what come see in him.

In the FWIW category, BA poster their Top 100 prospects today. Reed was #25 and Hone was #55, the only two Sox players on the list.

I was surprised to see Morse so high as well. Also, a bit surprised that Nanita was so low.

Here is the list....... I'll let someone else do the honor of typing the scouting reports on each player. Rank Player Position, Bats, Throws Opening Day 2004 Age 1. Jeremy Reed, OF, B-L, T-L - 22 2. Kris Honel, RHP - 21 3. Neal Cotts, LHP - 24 4. Ryan Sweeney, OF, B-L, T-L - 19 5. Joe Borchard, OF, B-S, T-R - 25 6. Ryan Wing, LHP - 22 7. Brian Anderson, OF, B-R, T-R - 22 8. Shingo Takatsu, RHP - 35 9. Chris Young, OF B-R, T-R - 20 10. Arnie Munoz, LHP - 21 11. Brandon McCarthy, RHP - 20 12. Brian Miller, RHP - 21 13. Robert Valido, SS, B-R, T-R - 18 14. Jon Rauch, RHP - 25 15. Enemencio Pacheco, RHP - 25 16. Fabio Castro, LHP - 19 17. Mike Morse, SS, B-R, T-R - 22 18. Felix Diaz, RHP - 23 19. Ryan Meaux, LHP - 25 20. Pedro Lopez, 2B/SS, B-R, T-R - 19 21. Micah Schnursteain, 3B, B-R, T-R - 19 22. Corwin Malone, LHP - 23 23. Antoin Gray, 2B/3B, B-R, T-R - 22 24. Ricardo Nanita, OF, B-L, T-L - 22 25. Andy Gonzalez, SS, B-R, T-R - 22 26. Tim Tisch, LHP - 24 (Turns 24 on 3rd day of season) 27. Ruddy Yan, 2B, B-S, T-R - 23 28. Josh Stewart, LHP - 25 29. Orionny Lopez, RHP - 20 30. Jason Stumm, RHP - 23 (Turns 23 on 5th day of season)

I guess my explanation of Mariotti's job description didn't work, huh? lol

Of course it is arguable that you could ever play basketball.. ;-)

I'll ask again, Yas, what the hell are you doing up during daylight hours??

Hell, I can hit better than .450 on playstation. ;-) Speaking of, the new MVP Baseball coming out this spring will feature teams sporting the Minor League uniforms of all AA and AAA clubs. That should be pretty cool.

Tex, how common is using union laborers to build a house? I would think electrical contractors and such could be, but general contractors aren't usually union are they? I'm sure at the level of money Frank was spending he could have had more control than if I built a house, but generally the builder decides what sub-contractors he will use, right? I am not trying to challenge your point, just asking out of curiosity. I built a house about 16 months ago and have no clue which if any of the workers on the house were union. It never entered my mind... Then again, as you said, I am not a big union guy.

Baseball America has winterball numbers and that is what they list. 3 games, 10 AB's, 2 hits..... Can't find any other stats than those.

Yas, my post was directed more toward the masses. Your email to him was great. You presented a point of view in a professional way. I was very disappointed in his response to you. I just think Sox fans take what he writes too personally and think he is the scourge of the earth for doing so. If someone has a beef with a guy, they should handle it with class as you did. There is a difference in arguing a point versus attacking someone's name and character because you don't like what he writes. Then again, that is probably the reaction he was hoping for....

And if he shuts up now, people will claim he is being a baby and pouting because the media is unfair to him.