Jared Burton

[OnBaseMachine]

I would just like to take the time to point out that I am a huge fan of Jared Burton. Major props to Wayne Krivsky for stealing Burton from the A's organization. I really like this kid. He's a big strong kid with great stuff. Yeah he is still a little wild, but I don't really mind that out of my closer. Hey, it worked for Scott Williamson. This kid has three very good pitches from what I can see - a fastball that can touch 95 mph, a slider, and a changeup. IMO he has a chance to be a closer someday for the Reds.

Here are his stats so far this year:

8 IP, 5 H, 5 BB, 8 K, 1.25 WHIP, 2.25 ERA, 9.0 K/9

And here are his numbers since returning from the DL:

7.2 IP, 5 H, 2 BB, 8 K, 0.97 WHIP, 2.50 ERA, 10. K/9

His control has been better since his major league debut when he couldn't find the plate against the Cubs. I really like this kid. Krivsky found a gem IMO.

[CTA513]

He also throws a cut fastball which I believe I saw him throw the other day to strike out a left hander.

[OnBaseMachine]

The Reds have some good looking young bullpen arms in the majors (Burton, Coutlangus, Salmon) and in the minors (McBeth, Medlock, Guevara, and Pelland) who are close to being major league ready. Plus Billy Bray is a young guy with a good arm if he can just get healthy. Todd Coffey is another guy I like, but his problem is he throws his fastball too much. He needs to get back to throwing that slider if he wants to be a successful major league reliever.

I've already described Burton.

Jon Coutlangus - yeah he's been hit a little bit lately but I chalk that up to fatigue. Narron has used him way too much lately. Coutlangus is second in the league in stranding inherited runners (15 of 16). He's having a good rookie season and is still fairly young.

Brad Salmon - Salmon has looked great at times with the Reds. He's averaged nearly a strikeout per inning and has allowed only fours hit in eight innings, but the bad news is he's struggled with his control at times. Righthanders are OPSing just .492 against him. LH hitters are at .821, but are only 1-for-7 with that lone hit being a Lance Berkman 2-run HR. More often than not, I've liked what I have seen from Salmon.

Marcus McBeth - I have yet to see McBeth pitch, but from what I have read he has the stuff to be a good major league reliever. He has allowed only fours hits and one run in nine innings at Louisville while striking out eight batters. It's time to dump one of the older relievers and give Mcbeth a chance to show what he's got.

Calvin Medlock - All Calvin Medlock has did since the Reds drafted him was produce great results. He was a starter until last year when the Reds converted him to a reliever. Last year he posted a 2.97 ERA, 1.30 WHIP, and 28/70 K ratio in 63.2 innings at Chattanooga. He has repeated that performance this year to the tune of a 3.13 ERA, 0.83 WHIP, 3 BB/41 K ratio in 31.2 innings. Again, this is another guy I would like to see the Reds give a chance to.

Tyler Pelland - Failed starter who was moved to the bullpen a month ago by the Reds. The move has paid dividends as Pelland has seen his strikeout rate shoot up and his walk rate has dropped. His velocity his risen to the mid-90's and his secondary pitches are sharper than they were. Pelland is a lefty, which is a plus itself. I wouldn't be surprised to see him in the Reds bullpen sometime next season.

Tyler Pelland's last five relief appearances:

3 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 5 K
2 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 4 K
3 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 3 K
2 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 2 K
2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 4 K

Total: 12 IP, 6 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 18 K, 13.5 K/9

I like the future of the Reds bullpen if they decide to finally give the young guys a chance as opposed to continuing to sign old relievers in hope of catching lightning in a bottle. Hopefully the Reds learned their lesson this season, even if it was the hard way...

[icehole3]

Creeper says he throws a double circle change. I would like to see Narron continue to use the young guys even though we're taking our lumps this year. I'd like to see Mc Beth up here too.

[CTA513]

Originally Posted by icehole3

Creeper says he throws a double circle change. I would like to see Narron continue to use the young guys even though we're taking our lumps this year. I'd like to see Mc Beth up here too.

He was saying that change up was a pitch Burton developed in college and it looked pretty good the few times I saw him throw it today.

[mth123]

Good Post OBM. Shortly the Reds will have an excess of youth to choose from. Add in a few starters who may end up in the pen like Lecure and even Watson and Cueto and at the very least the team should be able to piece together a cheap and effective bunch allowing bigger dollars to be spent elsewhere.

Just behind these guys is a wave of lower level guys like Mateo, Roenicke, Viola, Geronimo...

I really hope the team doesn't trade off major parts to acquire a bunch of relief prospects. A big impact guy like Broxton or Zumaya would be a great addition (I could see one of these hard throwers like Pelland or Medlock growing into that) but numbers aren't needed here as much as rotation candidates or catcher or SS.

[jojo]

Originally Posted by OnBaseMachine

I would just like to take the time to point out that I am a huge fan of Jared Burton. Major props to Wayne Krivsky for stealing Burton from the A's organization. I really like this kid. He's a big strong kid with great stuff. Yeah he is still a little wild, but I don't really mind that out of my closer. Hey, it worked for Scott Williamson. This kid has three very good pitches from what I can see - a fastball that can touch 95 mph, a slider, and a changeup. IMO he has a chance to be a closer someday for the Reds.

Here are his stats so far this year:

8 IP, 5 H, 5 BB, 8 K, 1.25 WHIP, 2.25 ERA, 9.0 K/9

And here are his numbers since returning from the DL:

7.2 IP, 5 H, 2 BB, 8 K, 0.97 WHIP, 2.50 ERA, 10. K/9

His control has been better since his major league debut when he couldn't find the plate against the Cubs. I really like this kid. Krivsky found a gem IMO.

Burton is certainly a step in the right direction compared to the vanilla, allow-contact/rely-on-the-defense ilk that has been collected in the Reds bullpen especially since he was essentially free. However, I'm not nearly as giddy about him. Burton's stuff is good enough to show promise as he features an above average fastball (93-94), a good slider, and an ordinary cutter. However, while his stuff has translated into a pretty good K/rate (8.71) in the minors he's been prone to command issues and slow development (he has been old for each level he's been at in the minors especially considering he was a college pitcher). He should be considered a marginal prospect IMHO. The other arm the Reds got from the As intrigues me more as a high leverage guy. Likewise an arm like Cueto is a much more intriging one to pencil in as a future closer in my mind.

[Patrick Bateman]

So far during Krivsky's tenure, his best ability has been plucking high ceiling guys off of other teams' rosters for basically nothing in return.

Burton is different than the more heralded guys like Phillips and Hamilton in that nobody really knew a whole lot about him, but since Burton's major league debut, he has showcased the skills he does have.

I agree with you Jojo that his arsenal is probably not quite closer worthy, but his ability to strikeout batters is a very nice change to the usual stuff that has been taking the hill as of late. A collection of strikeout pitchers increases the chances of the Reds actually finding pitchers who can get outs without relying on the league's worst defensive unit to make plays. These are the types of guys the Reds need to be testing, and generally, guys like Burton are neccessary in building a strong bullpen. The Reds current collection of young guys does show more promise than in recent seasons and appears to be earmarking a new trend by Krivsky. If the trend continues, there's a pretty strong chance that the Reds can actually start building a bullpen from within, rather than relying on veterans on the decline to steer the ship.

Burton still has a long way to go, but his recent outings are reason for some optimism, and other than his 1st outing where his poor performance was probably due to some jitters, he has been pretty effective (albeit the small sample size).

[TOBTTReds]

Originally Posted by CTA513

He also throws a cut fastball which I believe I saw him throw the other day to strike out a left hander.

Right on. Actually, almost all of his fastballs are cutters. They stay around 93 mph, which is amazing for a cutter. Can't think of many guys that throw cutters that hard. Mariano Rivera is the only one that comes to mind.

[camisadelgolf]

Thanks to mlbfan30, who linked me to scout.com (http://www.redszone.com/forums/showthread.php?t=63743). At scout.com, I found this mention of Jared Burton with some good talk of the rule 5 draft.

Originally Posted by http://reds.scout.com/a.z?s=262&p=2&c=686078

OC: I know that before the season there were a number of guys from that large 2004 draft class that the A’s were going to have to protect from the Rule 5 draft at the end of the season – such as Kurt Suzuki or Danny Putnam – that the team ended up adding to the 40-man roster during the season. However, there are still some top prospects out there who will probably have to be protected. Is it difficult to know which players are going to be vulnerable if left unprotected? I know the team lost Jared Burton last season in the Rule 5 after he showed well at the Arizona Fall League, and he pitched very well for Cincinnati this season. Is it a guessing game in terms of what other teams are going to be looking for in that draft?

FZ: Jared was a little bit of an exception. If you go back and look what he had done in our organization, at least the couple of years leading up to when he was taken in the Rule 5, we have very detailed reports on how our players are performing throughout the year, and his velocity, for the most part, if you go back and look at our game-by-game report, was along the lines of 88-92. He was a consistent performer, but he wasn’t a stand-out, I guess would be a fair way to say it. His results were good, but they weren’t at a level where he would be an absolute obvious Rule 5 choice.

I guess what happened with him was – I don’t know if he had lingering injury issues or what – but he went to the Fall League and showed very well there. His velocity spiked and he was now throwing more 90 to 94 and touched on 95, which is what he pitched at this year. So I think that was a case of timing for Jared because he peaked in the Fall League and that is where a lot of people saw him and it was good scouting by the Reds. They probably had reports on him during the regular season and the Fall League and probably figured that it was worth the roll of the dice that he was the guy that they saw in the Fall League and that was the guy that they would see going forward. And that was the guy that they got and he has done very well for them. He’s the kind of guy that you can never have enough of as an organization.

There are times when you go with the information that you have and sometimes there is new information on player that comes available. Sometimes organizations have different information on a player than you do or concentrate on different information and, a lot of times, that is how the Rule 5 ends-up playing out. The organization that has the player has one set of information and other organizations have a different set of information. They are both subsets of the total information of the player, so neither is necessarily right or wrong. Occasionally, a team will use the information that they have and take a risk on a player and it will work out well, and other times it will turn out badly.

I would say, in general, you have to be very cognizant of players who are going to be Rule 5 eligible, not just those from the draft, but also international players that you have signed, and you have to evaluate not just how much the player is worth as an asset in general, but also how prepared [to play in the major leagues] that that player is. As an example, it is very difficult to carry an extra infielder or outfielder if he’s not a player that you can rely on for certain things, such as being a defensive replacement or a pinch-runner. With a relief pitcher, there are always mop-up innings and that sort of thing at the back-end of your bullpen where you can afford to take guys. In truth, that is what we did with Jay Marshall [this season]. We knew that as a relief pitcher, he would be a guy that we could probably use very situationally, which is exactly how a player like him should be used. It’s a little bit easier to manage a Rule 5 player’s ups and downs as a relief pitcher than as one of the 13 or 14 position players on the roster.

You have to look at what the player’s talent level is, what his standing is within the industry, and how prepared you think a player is [to play in the major leagues]. You might think a player is a very talented player, but you also might think to yourself that there is no way that a team is going to be able to carry this player for an entire season. The team might take a look at him in spring training and realize that he is too raw and that he would be a bit of a liability to carry that player for the entire season. That figures into it a little bit. The biggest issue is making sure that you protect your best talent. That’s kind of where we are at right now, and we are still working on it. I don’t believe that the roster freeze date is until mid- to late-November, so it isn’t something that we have to decide on right now.

The other thing that is going to come into play for us a little bit this season is with injured players. We have a couple of injured players who are roster eligible – Landon Powell is an obvious example [torn ACL in early July] and Mike Mitchell, who had shoulder surgery in July. That will lend a completely different angle to the whole thing because in some sense those players are easier players to draft because a team can take a player like that, keep him on the DL for the year. What winds up happening is that if they take that player and he ends up spending the entire season on the disabled list, then they only have to carry him for the first 90 days after he is activated.

So what a team could do with a guy like, say, Landon Powell – who is obviously under strong consideration to be protected and probably will be, but no final decision has been made – but if you take a player who is in Landon’s position and has been injured, a team could take that player and could activate him actually September 1st next year when rosters expand and at that point you are carrying 40 players so it isn’t that big of a liability to carry a player that you might not be using that often. Then actually in 2009, you would only have to carry the player for the first two months of the season.

That is another dynamic that we are having to deal with, and it isn’t always the case, but certainly this year it is an issue with at least a couple of our players. There are a lot of things that go into a) who you are going to protect on your Rule 5 list, and b) whether you are going to try to keep a roster spot or even two roster spots open and be willing to roll the dice on a Rule 5 pick of your own. That is stuff that will all play itself out, partly in conjunction with all of these other roster moves.