Observations from Des Moines – 5/30/08

I attended the Memphis Redbirds game on May 30th in Des Moines. I have not gone through and applied scounting grades like Az did for the 5/4/08 game, but I was able to make some useful observations. I also took a lot of pictures (I was a guest at the game of friends that have season tickets directly behind home plate) which I will share with you after the jump.

A Tale of Two Reyes

There’s been some recent furor over the demotion of Anthony Reyes. Iron Cap has gone from being the club’s top prospect to top problem child, and when you hear some of the current comments by Dave Duncan about his young righty, he gives the impression that he has little to no confidence in young Reyes. I don’t believe it’s that he doesn’t like him altogether. It’s hard to hate someone who was so brilliant in Game 1 against the Tigers. If it wasn’t for A-Rey, things could have taken a different tone for the Series, and there may not be a flag flying at Busch III.

So what has gone wrong?

Prospect Q + A w/Keith Law

Keith Law was kind enough to do a little email Q+A with the me. As many of you I’m sure already know, Keith is the lead baseball analyst for Scouts Inc. of ESPN.com. Before joining ESPN, he spent 4½ years with the Blue Jays as a Special Assistant to the GM, and he also was previously a writer for Baseball Prospectus. He’s a Harvard grad, so naturally he intimidates the crap out of me. I kid, I kid. Thanks again to Keith for taking his time to share his perspective on the Cardinals.

ZiP it good

Dan Szymborski has his 2008 ZiPS projections for the Cardinals. The prognosis is pretty negative for the team overall, but I won’t get too into that. There are some farmhands and recent ex-farmhands in the mix who I’d rather talk about, here’s the highlights and lowlights.

• ZiPS thinks Jaime Garcia could post a 4.65 ERA in the majors now. That’s over 24 projected starts. Please, someone tell me his elbow is going to be OK.
• ZiPS also thinks Anthony Reyes is capable of the exact same ERA, 4.65. With Jocketty gone and LaRuncan likely to follow maybe he will. Dan also give Reyes a 15% chance to break out, posting a 3.75 ERA. Let us remember, Cleveland’s Fausto Carmona had a 1-10 record with a 5.42 ERA his rookie season and look at him now. Reyes has some pretty serious issues to work out, and I worry about his health but I still have a glimmer of hope he can turn it around and live up to his prospect status of old.
• ZiPS ain’t crazy about Colby. .245/.329/.419 line. ZiPS thinks Jim Edmonds will still be better.
• I think the projection for Rick Ankiel is a dead ringer, .241/.285/.458 with 25 homers. All kinds of power, yet still well below average RF.
• Brendan Ryan is not the starting SS of the future at .265/.315/.351.
• Yadier Molina > Bryan Anderson, for now. .654 OPS for Anderson. .656 for Yadi. And of course, Yadi plays Gold Glove caliber D.
• I happen to think Mitch Boggs will eventually make a pretty decent back of the rotation starter, ZiPS thinks otherwise but isn’t as far off as you might think. 5.49 ERA over 28 starts, not much worse then Joel Pineiro.
• ZiPS projects Chris Perez to strike out nearly a batter per inning, but walk nearly 6 batters per 9 innings, thus making him a liability and not an asset. 5.28 ERA. Mark Worrell=Chris Perez. Of course, ZiPS makes no distinctions between gimmicky soft tossers and guys who throw 96.
• Is Ryan Ludwick under team control? I hope so. Play him in CF.
• [updated 10/9, 3:48 pm] I asked Dan if he could run projections for Mather, Motte and Hoffpauir and he obliged. ZiPS doesn’t think Hoff and Mather are much to get excited about, but likes Motte.

Take the projections for what they are worth. I don’t know how Dan calculates these as well as I should. He does leave this disclaimer:

Disclaimer: ZiPS projections are computer-based projections of performance.
Performances have not been allocated to predicted playing time in the majors -many of the players listed above are unlikely to play in the majors at all in 2008. ZiPS is projecting equivalent production – a .240 ZiPS projection may end up being .280 in AAA or .300 in AA, for example. Whether or not a player will play is one of many non-statistical factors one has to take into account when predicting the future.

I know there is a lot of debate on the subject of MLEs and not everyone likes them. AZ seems to know more about them then I, hopefully he’ll throw in his 2 cents on all this.

5/27/07 Daily Prospect Report

In a bizarre and somewhat unexpected move, Anthony Reyes was sent to Memphis with Troy Cate getting the call up. The move puts Todd Wellemeyer in the rotation. Duncan, you have now officially fallen in love with your own genius and clearly lost your mind. Reyes is likely to go down, be his own pitching coach, remind us all why he was once the prize of the organization, get called back up and suck. Wash, rinse, repeat. Has their been anything more agonizing to watch then the Reyes soap opera? I’m of the persuasion that he does not suck, nor does he make Jason Marquis look like a pitching genius. Now his stock is as low as it can get, and any slick GM who doesn’t have a pitching coach that has a “all pitchers must throw sinkers or die” mentality could probably swing him in a deal for pennies on the dollar to watch him turn into Dan Haren. (OK, he probably isn’t that good..)

Wellemeyer actually has been used as a starter primarily in the minors. He’s made 96 starts out his 106 appearances with a fielding independent ERA of 3.38. For someone who’s been so wild throughout his career, he’s been nothing but a strike thrower since coming over to St. Louis. It’s odd to say the least to me that he doesn’t emerge as the primary set up man when you have Franklin who’s already made 106 MLB starts…but I digress, this blog ain’t for talking about the majors. Welcome to the show, T.R.O.Y.

Memphis 2, Round Rock 0

Blake Hawksworth went 7 strong innings where he allowed only 1 run, all of his outs coming on contact. He allowed 5 hits and didn’t walk a man. He allowed three straight singles in the second, but Skip Schumaker threw out Mark Saccomanno at the plate. (Any relation to Kramer’s friend Bob Saccomanno?) He had 8 ground outs to 12 flies.
Rick Ankiel drove in a run on his only hit of the game.
Brian Esposito drove in the other run by hitting a solo shot.
Brendan Ryan went 2 for 4.

Springfield 4, Corpus Christi 8

Starting pitcher Kevin Ool was only able to get two outs and allowed 6 runs.
Mighty mite Sean Danielson went 3 for 5 with a double.
Colby Rasmus went 0 fer for his 2nd 3rd game in a row.
Chris Perez struck out 2 of the 3 batters he faced and didn’t allow a base runner. For the season, he’s struck out slightly more then 40% of the batters he’s faced, that’s just a sick ratio. The bad thing is he’s walked 16% of the batters he’s faced. He didn’t walk a man today, though.

PB Cardinals 3, Lakeland Flying Tigers 2

A.J. Van Slyke scored the go-ahead run in the ninth inning on an error. He also went 2 for 5.
Jose Martinez went 3 for 4 with a double.
Tyler Norrick had a funky ratio, 5 walks, 1 K, with 6 hits allowed. He only allowed a couple of runs in 6 innings, which was good enough for the win.
Luke Gregerson picked up his 11th save. He struck out 1, got 2 ground balls and lowered his ERA to 0.95.

QC 3, Beloit 2

The 9th inning went like this for the Swing:

* Jared Schweitzer doubles (2) on a line drive to left fielder Brian Dinkelman.
* Offensive Substitution: Pinch runner Willian Sandoval replaces Jared Schweitzer.
* Dan Leatherman intentionally walks Brandon Buckman.
* Mark Shorey singles on a bunt ground ball to third baseman Daniel Valencia. Willian Sandoval to 3rd. Brandon Buckman to 2nd.
* Chris Grossman singles on a line drive to center fielder Joe Benson. Willian Sandoval scores. Brandon Buckman to 3rd. Mark Shorey to 2nd. Game over.

Buckman tied the game in the 7th with a HR for his only hit. He also drew a walk.
Mark Shorey went 2 for 4.
Elvis Hernandez started the game. He went 4 and a third and gave up 2 runs on 10 hits while striking out 4.
P.J. Walters allowed no runs on 3 hits while striking out 4.

gratuitous miscellanea

In his Monday morning 10 Pack Kevin Goldstein at BP notes Ross Detwiler’s draft stock is soaring:

In last week’s draft notebook, I noted Detwiler’s early heat based on just one start. Taking advantage of pitching on a Thursday with more the 20 scouting directors in attendance, Detwiler whiffed a career-high 13. Take two on Friday was nearly as impressive, as the beanpole righty went seven shutout innings, allowing two hits and striking out seven. With three pitches that grade out at least as average and a projectable frame, Detwiler went into the season projected as a mid-first round pick. Just two weeks into his team’s season, he’s looking like he might go in the single digits.

Mike Findelski at Beyond the Boxscore thinks out own Flat Hat could be a sleeper Cy candidate. That’s sort of hard for me to envision this year, but Rob Neyer did say he has the Cy Young stuff. With word that Reyes is getting a feel for the sinker, perhaps it’s not complete fantasy. I’d be pleased if he pitches close to his projections. (Save his Marcel, which seems overly bearish.)

One draft possibility for the Cardinals could be St. Louis native Nick Schmidt, lefty pitcher for the Arkansas Razorbacks. Brewerfan.net has a scouting report on Schmidt:

Schmidt was last year’s SEC pitcher of the year, which is a pretty big honor given the conference he pitches in, not to mention he was a sophomore. He enjoyed success immediately upon stepping onto Arkansas’ campus, being named a freshman All-American. Schmidt has stuff and size for a lefty that you just don’t find very often, unless you’re looking at some of the other talented southpaws available for the 2007 draft. He pitches comfortably in the 88-92 range and also mixes in a solid slider and change up, giving him a proven, three-pitch repertoire. He has the size to sustain long innings while maintaining his velocity, and the natural pitching moxie to get batters out when he doesn’t have his best stuff. A strikeout lefty with his stature and stuff won’t last very long on draft day ’07.

His stock may be dropping some this season so far, Schmidt’s struck out 15 while walking 14, but only allowed a .183 batting average against.

Jason Scott at the Birdhouse has the low-down Fernando Salas and Angel Rivera. It’s subscription only, I will say both players sound promising, particularly Rivera.

The first round of cuts happened today, Mark Worrell, Mike Parisi, Mike Sillman, Chris Lambert, Mark Worrell, Bryan Anderson, Danilo Sanchez, Ryan Christianson and Michel Hernandez. Notable NRI’s are still there is Colby Rasmus and Rick Ankiel.