Re: Rotoworld Top 150 MidSeason Prospects...
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Austin Kearns
I have trouble seeing him as a top 100 guy right now, but he's certainly top 150.
Yes he has struggled, but with his plate patience he still has a shot at reaching his potential. The raw power just needs to start coming in. There is still a lot of talent there.
Do you honestly believe he is a better prospect at this point than Sean Watson or Juan Francisco? If so, :eek:
Re: Rotoworld Top 150 MidSeason Prospects...
Quote:
Originally Posted by
dougdirt
Honest question though, and I doubt you really can find an answer becuase of how these things are, but does anyone jump out that was just hurt their first two seasons in the minors in those cases who seemingly underperformed (not even to Stubbs extent, but still not what was expected) and then once healthy kind of blew up?
I've been trying to think of one and no one leaps to mind. I Baseball Cubed a lot of players (though by no means was the search exhaustive). I'd actually like to find some comps for Stubbs. Perhaps the best out there is ... wait for it ... Chris Denorfia. Granted, Deno came from a small school, but he didn't light the rookie league on fire and I believe it was a hand injury that really dragged down his sophomore season in the minors.
Re: Rotoworld Top 150 MidSeason Prospects...
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Benihana
Do you honestly believe he is a better prospect at this point than Sean Watson or Juan Francisco? If so, :eek:
Watson would be a pretty fair debate, but I'm not a big fan of Francisco.
He's showing great power for his age, but I have serious reservations about the rest of his game.
Re: Rotoworld Top 150 MidSeason Prospects...
Quote:
Originally Posted by
M2
I've been trying to think of one and no one leaps to mind. I Baseball Cubed a lot of players (though by no means was the search exhaustive). I'd actually like to find some comps for Stubbs. Perhaps the best out there is ... wait for it ... Chris Denorfia. Granted, Deno came from a small school, but he didn't light the rookie league on fire and I believe it was a hand injury that really dragged down his sophomore season in the minors.
Its interesting that you bring up Denorfia. I honestly have almost always seen Stubbs on a similar plan through the minor leagues. I think the two are differnt kinds of players at the plate, but since we drafted Stubbs (once I got over the idea that we actually drafted him) I have seen him a as a guy who probably would not be in the majors until he was 24/25ish because of the work he needed on his game, but that by the time he got there he could be very useful.
Re: Rotoworld Top 150 MidSeason Prospects...
Here is the thing that I have trouble with. People are suggestion trading Stubbs 1 year into professional baseball, not to mention that he has played injured most of his professional career, because they don't like him. Ever since I started posting on this board there has been a huge anti-Stubbs contingent, IMO primarily because they took Stubbs instead of Lincecum. Look at the Lincecum thread and updates when Lincecum does good.
Heres the thing, Stubbs may be the best defensive CF in the entire reds organiztion. At the begining of the season the reds went into the season with a CF who has an OBP in the low .300, plays suspect defense, doesn't understand the fundamentals of baserunning, etc. Sure Stubbs is struggling but his OBP is .352 which would be welcomed if a current red could do that out of the leadoff spot. I just wish people would give him time to develop, maybe he never sees a major league field but to suggest to cut bait with him after 1 full season of professional baseball doesn't make sense to me.
Re: Rotoworld Top 150 MidSeason Prospects...
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Benihana
Do you honestly believe he is a better prospect at this point than Sean Watson or Juan Francisco? If so, :eek:
I think Watson is a better prospect than Stubbs is at this point. I think Francisco and Stubbs are about the same type of prospect. Both have good qualities going for them (Stubbs has the defense, speed and plate discipline. Francisco has a very nice arm and lots of power in his bat) but both have lots of questions surrounding their games and need to make strides to improve themselves.
I put out my Reds top 10 prospects last week and had Francisco at 9 and Stubbs at 10, although I could easily have switched them around without much thought.
Re: Rotoworld Top 150 MidSeason Prospects...
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Austin Kearns
Watson would be a pretty fair debate, but I'm not a big fan of Francisco.
He's showing great power for his age, but I have serious reservations about the rest of his game.
Well, he's only three years younger and putting up an OPS of almost 100 points higher (at the same level). I know his defense isn't the best, but I don't care if Stubbs is a better fielder than Torii Hunter, I still take Francisco looking at these numbers.
Re: Rotoworld Top 150 MidSeason Prospects...
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Benihana
Well, he's only three years younger and putting up an OPS of almost 100 points higher (at the same level). I know his defense isn't the best, but I don't care if Stubbs is a better fielder than Torii Hunter, I still take Francisco looking at these numbers.
I don't think Francisco's disciplien will play very well as he moves up.
Re: Rotoworld Top 150 MidSeason Prospects...
Quote:
Originally Posted by
dougdirt
Its interesting that you bring up Denorfia. I honestly have almost always seen Stubbs on a similar plan through the minor leagues. I think the two are differnt kinds of players at the plate, but since we drafted Stubbs (once I got over the idea that we actually drafted him) I have seen him a as a guy who probably would not be in the majors until he was 24/25ish because of the work he needed on his game, but that by the time he got there he could be very useful.
Though that difference at the plate is significant. Denorfia's got a nice compact stroke. Stubbs doesn't. Denorfia didn't have to deconstruct his game, he simply had to enhance it. Stubbs may very well have to tear himself down to the foundation and do a complete rebuild of his stroke (something Mike Cameron did in between 1998 and 1999, fwiw).
The other thing about Denorfia is few players come with his combination of drive and unrealized game potential. Denorfia literally blasted through his ceiling twice in the minors and he'll have to do it a third time if he wants to be a major league regular. It's only an extreme few players who can do that. Most guys only achieve a percentage of their potential, not a multiple of it.
Re: Rotoworld Top 150 MidSeason Prospects...
From what I have seen from the Reds and Stubbs, his foot condition has done more harm than we realize this season. Because of his swing, he was never going to put up sexy numbers this year, but it was clear when he was in the lineup everyday for the month of June, he wilted badly, more badly than we expected. Now that they have given him some rest, he has stagnated his decline and his walks are back up.
I would have advised to fix his injury in May, but that is not my decision to make.
Stubbs future depends on how he developes his swing by shortening it to stroke. It will close holes and raise his contact ability. BJ never could do this(while also unlike Stubbs, doesn't walk a whole lot) and we see what happened to him.
Re: Rotoworld Top 150 MidSeason Prospects...
Is anyone else intrigued that they called Cueto's slider a top notch second pitch? It seemed like it was described more as a solid breaking ball last year. I don't trust rotoworld, but maybe Cueto's added some bite to the slider this season?
Re: Rotoworld Top 150 MidSeason Prospects...
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Superdude
Is anyone else intrigued that they called Cueto's slider a top notch second pitch? It seemed like it was described more as a solid breaking ball last year. I don't trust rotoworld, but maybe Cueto's added some bite to the slider this season?
In Baseball America's writeup on Cueto in last year's top ten prospects rundown, they describe Cueto's slider as overmatching hitters at times last season. Johnny Cueto definitely has the stuff to be a top-of-the-line starter.
Re: Rotoworld Top 150 MidSeason Prospects...
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Originally Posted by
Aronchis
Stubbs future depends on how he developes his swing by shortening it to stroke. It will close holes and raise his contact ability. BJ never could do this(while also unlike Stubbs, doesn't walk a whole lot) and we see what happened to him.
For a guy who, allegedly, brings as much speed to the table as Drew Stubbs does, I'm wondering if someone should just burn all the reports about "great power potential" and concentrate on just getting this guy to put the baseball in play to let his legs drive him through the early part of his minor league career.
Re: Rotoworld Top 150 MidSeason Prospects...
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Originally Posted by
M2
The majors are not full of guys out of college programs who got off to starts anywhere near as bad as what Stubbs is doing. I've looked. I can't find anybody even close.
If Stubbs becomes a productive major leaguer after getting off to this bad a start then he's going to be a fairly unique animal. There is nothing normal about what he's going through (at least nothing that qualifies as normal for good players).
Good point, I haven't found many.
Three examples, of varying degrees, are Mike Lowell, Jeff Kent and Tim Salmon, who all posted below .800 OPS's with little power in their early years.
Stubbs keeps a decent OBA. With his premium fielding skills, even a little power will go a long way.
And he's only had about 1 year in the minors.
Re: Rotoworld Top 150 MidSeason Prospects...
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Originally Posted by
PuffyPig
Stubbs keeps a decent OBA. With his premium fielding skills, even a little power will go a long way.
And he's only had about 1 year in the minors.
And most of that entire year he has spent injured but still playing.