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.
I'm not a system player. I am a system.
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.
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.
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.
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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.
I'm not a system player. I am a system.
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.
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?
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.
Cincinnati Reds: Farm System Champions 2022
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.
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