Why is there so many position player flops?

[craig]

In the time that Jim Hendry has been in charge of drafting, how many college position players has he taken in the first three rounds?

 

I'm not sure what you mean, and I don't remember when Hendry turned things over and Stockstill took over.

 

But if you include Stockstill's drafts as being under Hendry's supervision, and being by a guy that Hendry tutored and hired, , since Hendry began drafting in 1996, the Cubs have taken 6 position players out of college and 10 from HS during the first three rounds. But the college picks have been concentrated in the 3rd round, where the odds of any pick becoming good is slim, and by which point I believe the cubs figure they're lucky to get a solid player, but they shouldn't expect a high-ceiling star-potential guy.

 

Anyway, of the six college selections in the first three rounds, five were 3rd rounders: Ryan Gripp, Nic Jackson, Ryan Theriot, Matt Craig, and Jake Fox. Each of these they already knew had some limitations in their toolboxes, with the exception of Nitro Nic.

 

The only college player taken in the 2nd round was Bobby Hill, and at the time Hendry said they Cubs ranked him as the #10 or #13 player on their board, somewhere in that range. It's funny in retrospect; back then, I recall much board discussion about whether the Cubs were idiots to move Hill to 2B, leave him at SS! Now his defense is considered to be no more than average even at 2B, much less at SS.

 

I also remember how much fuss there was when Hendry didn't fork over all the money that Hill wanted, and stalled before eventually settling at $1.5 or whatever it was. Kind of like with Brownlie, how Hendry was nuts to hold the line to only $2.5 million for the guy.

[CubDad4Ever]

Craig, great overview and well thought out with documentation. I was totally on board with your view, until i read Scouts Honor. The Braves use high ceiling , but only with consideration to killer make up. I think you are correct to a degree that hitters are born with certain tools. I do think that mechanics can be altered and approaches can be taught to people with great desire and confidence(make up) . That being said nervous sysyem response , eye sight , lever size are genetic. I think where your going with this has some validity. I dont by the pure stat scouting espoused by Depodesta and Beane for the June Draft. But the cubs , as you intimated Craig could use some means beyond athletic tools for helping their ability to identify draftable hitters. I understand their desire to have athletes fill positions. I feel defense is still difficult to quantify numerically , therefore under-rated by many.

 

Craig again good post, i find myself wondering what the right mix for drafting in june is. Coach L

[Ding Dong Johnson]

i find myself wondering what the right mix for drafting in june is. Coach L

 

4 parts gin, 1 part vodka, splash of vermouth. You know, same mix as in the last 10 drafts...

[Transmogrified Tiger]

What slot money did EPatt get? He was a 7th round pick if memory serves, but paying him 3rd round or earlier money might be relevant to evaluating their drafting emphasis.

[Tim]

Craig, great overview and well thought out with documentation. I was totally on board with your view, until i read Scouts Honor. The Braves use high ceiling , but only with consideration to killer make up. I think you are correct to a degree that hitters are born with certain tools. I do think that mechanics can be altered and approaches can be taught to people with great desire and confidence(make up) . That being said nervous sysyem response , eye sight , lever size are genetic. I think where your going with this has some validity. I dont by the pure stat scouting espoused by Depodesta and Beane for the June Draft. But the cubs , as you intimated Craig could use some means beyond athletic tools for helping their ability to identify draftable hitters. I understand their desire to have athletes fill positions. I feel defense is still difficult to quantify numerically , therefore under-rated by many.

 

Craig again good post, i find myself wondering what the right mix for drafting in june is. Coach L

Can you please show me any quote (and I mean any quote not from the highly entertaining, but not entirely factual Moneyball book) where Bean or Depodesta espouse pure stat scouting? If that is what you believe, can you please explain why Oakland still employs scouts, cross-checkers, etc? Can you explain why Depodesta retained Logan White when he took over in LA?

[CubDad4Ever]

Tim, first of all , that was not meant as a slap at moneyball, i have said before on my first thread about Scouts Honor, i believe both books glorify their end of the argument. Writers not the people involved wrote the book. However in the chapter on evaluating the prospective talent for the June Draft . The chapter made it clear that they had a formula , that favored taking college athletes based on stats. I believe the term bells and whistles went off on Depo's computer when the right numbers came up. Second stat with the dodgers Scouts Honor pointed out the exact names of scouts fired when Depo took over, plus he dropped the number of hs picks in half his first two years on the job. The fact he favors less scouting and more numbers cannot be denied. Thats his right as a GM or ex GM to make those decisions. My point was to use him as a point of reference not make fun of moneyball. I know you read the rest of my points showing i would favor a better balance. I would favor a throw the darts technique , if i saw improvement. Thanks Tim I appreciate your input Coach L

[goonys evil twin]

Tim, first of all , that was not meant as a slap at moneyball, i have said before on my first thread about Scouts Honor, i believe both books glorify their end of the argument. Writers not the people involved wrote the book. However in the chapter on evaluating the prospective talent for the June Draft . The chapter made it clear that they had a formula , that favored taking college athletes based on stats. I believe the term bells and whistles went off on Depo's computer when the right numbers came up. Second stat with the dodgers Scouts Honor pointed out the exact names of scouts fired when Depo took over, plus he dropped the number of hs picks in half his first two years on the job. The fact he favors less scouting and more numbers cannot be denied. Thats his right as a GM or ex GM to make those decisions. My point was to use him as a point of reference not make fun of moneyball. I know you read the rest of my points showing i would favor a better balance. I would favor a throw the darts technique , if i saw improvement. Thanks Tim I appreciate your input Coach L

 

Less scouting and more stats isn't the same as "pure stat scouting". They believe that baseball was far too obsessed with the subjective opinions of scouts and wanted to bring in more objective analysis. And the LA organization was not in great shape when Depo came in, it's absolutely the right of any GM to fire scouts, and either replace them with new ones or deplete their ranks when he takes over.

[Tim]

Tim, first of all , that was not meant as a slap at moneyball, i have said before on my first thread about Scouts Honor, i believe both books glorify their end of the argument. Writers not the people involved wrote the book. However in the chapter on evaluating the prospective talent for the June Draft . The chapter made it clear that they had a formula , that favored taking college athletes based on stats. I believe the term bells and whistles went off on Depo's computer when the right numbers came up. Second stat with the dodgers Scouts Honor pointed out the exact names of scouts fired when Depo took over, plus he dropped the number of hs picks in half his first two years on the job. The fact he favors less scouting and more numbers cannot be denied. Thats his right as a GM or ex GM to make those decisions. My point was to use him as a point of reference not make fun of moneyball. I know you read the rest of my points showing i would favor a better balance. I would favor a throw the darts technique , if i saw improvement. Thanks Tim I appreciate your input Coach L

You may want to review Oakland's 2005 draft if you actually believe this. You might just open your mind about how close-minded their approach is.

[UK1679666180]

You've seen some development of positional prospects with a good eye at the plate. Choi, Harris, Theriot, Fuld, Dubois, Hill, etc. Of course, you'll see a parallel there, they've come from more structured forms of instruction beyond HS. The Far East typically has more advanced HS hitters than the US or Latin America.

 

You haven't seen that much from the toolsy HS prospects, is Coats the one toolsy HS draftee with the best eye at the plate?

 

Unlike Craig, I do think some blame is needed by the Cubs for not developing a better eye at the plate. While the task is difficult to develop plate recognition, it does stand a chance of occuring, the earlier they address, the better off everyone will be. But, if you promote a player w/out addressing it enough, it'll probably not improve and will be exposed more frequently, the higher he goes based on his natural abilities.

 

I do agree w/Craig that they need a more balanced approach as far as drafting positional players.

[Tim]

In retrospect, would you have taken Aubrey over Harvey?

 

Looking back, Millege would have been the right pick at #6.

[illiniguy]

In retrospect, would you have taken Aubrey over Harvey?

 

Looking back, Millege would have been the right pick at #6.

Until one of them doesn anything at the big league level there is no sense losing any sleep over this pick. After all we could have picked Jeff Allison, staying with the great prospect pitchers.

[UK1679666180]

In retrospect, would you have taken Aubrey over Harvey?

 

Looking back, Millege would have been the right pick at #6.

 

No, between the two, Harvey was the right choice.

[craig]

Just to clarify, I'm not at all opposed to drafting HS players. Nor am I opposed to valuing high-ceiling guys and valuing non-hitting tools. Speed, defense, throwing arms that enable guys to play positions other than LF and 1B, those are all excellent.

 

My main points were two-fold:

*1 That the Cub success with drafted position players has been poor. It's not just a matter, as I inferred scotti to have suggested, that they've used so few high draft picks on players that the lack of success should have been expected.

 

and

*2 I'm very dubious that guys can "learn" to hit, or to recognize/respond to pitches, or to have the plate discipline and walk/K profiles that I associate with pure hitters and good-discipline guys, if they aren't born with the innate "toolbox" for rapid sight/process/respond to fast-moving balls-in-flight.

 

If a guy has that hitting toolbox, then with instruction and proper development he'll hit. And perhaps walk a reasonable amount, without K'ing a ton. Murton seems to have that. It appears that Cedeno does as well. (He doesn't walk much, but his pitch recognition and see-respond-hit abilities seem good, no problem with his toolbox. I think he's a case where if he did choose to walk more, it's within his toolbox ability to do so. Corey, not true.)

 

I don't think that by getting a guy at 18, that you can teach him to be a good contact hitter and have good pitch recognition and have a good walk rate while at the same time not K'ing much, unless he has the toolbox to start with. I hypothesize that Corey never did. Some blame the Cubs (they handled him wrong!), others blame Corey (bad makeup, doesn't take instruction, must be really dumb to swing at those high fastballs, yada yada..). I suspect that he doesn't have the talent to see-recognize-respond well. You could keep him at AA for ten years without that changing; he could have all the will and desire and makeup in the world, but if he didn't have the see-recognize-respond ability, it wasn't going to work out.

 

UK, you noted that the Cubs do have some guys who take walks. Indeed. Dubois, Hill, Harris, Sing, Soto, Choi, Fuld, Choi. I don't see a strong college flavor to that. Soto and Sing are HS guys, and Choi essentially. They had some aptitude.

 

At the same time, just taking walks doesn't to me mean you've got the read-recognize-respond-rightly toolbox. Having the hitting tool goes beyond deciding what is and isn't worth swinging at. It also involves being able to hit the pitches that are worth swinging at! Choi, dubois, Sing, and Eric Patterson may have the kind of patience so many posters like; but none actually has the "tool" to hit the ball very well when they decide to swing. They all K like crazy, Eric included. Hard to be a good big-league position player when you miss the ball on so many of your swings. There's more to being a good big-league hitter than just walking. Hitting counts, too! Murton and Cedeno seem able to hit; Dubois and Eric and Sing, not so well.

 

Fuld, he seems to have that ability, but he hits it so softly. Theriot, kind of the same limitation.

 

I have rarely seen a hitter whose profile changes drastically, in the Cub system or in any other. (Sammy is the greatest example, going from a low-walk guy to a 100+ walker...). Usually guys who don't have the pure see-and-hit toolbox always have lots of K's. Sammy's walks improved, and of course his power, but his K's and contact limitations never went away. Fuld is a contact/good-eye guy now, he was as a freshman already. Nobody taught him that. Corey was a high-K low-OBP guy from the start; that never changed. (He was about 8th on his A- team in OBP.

 

A guy can be doing worse than his toolbox allows as a result of bad mechanics, bad approach, etc.. But it's pretty uncommon that a guy changes a lot.

 

But, of course, some do. We can always hope that Harvey or Dopirak will become one of those happy exceptions.

[CubinNY]

*2 I'm very dubious that guys can "learn" to hit, or to recognize/respond to pitches, or to have the plate discipline and walk/K profiles that I associate with pure hitters and good-discipline guys, if they aren't born with the innate "toolbox" for rapid sight/process/respond to fast-moving balls-in-flight.

 

Aside from better than average eyesight and foot speed I cannot think of one tool that a baseball player can be born with. However, the question is, can pitch recognition, plate discipline, and hittiing for power be developed later in life then little league?

 

I would have to anwser yes. If not, why have coaches?

 

Patence can be taught, pitch recognition can be taught.

 

I had really crappy little league coaches but when I got to high school our coach preached plate discipline and "hitting your pitch". We practiced it. During BP we were not encouraged to swing away even if it mean we only took 5 or 6 swings in 40 pitches.

[UK1679666180]

They all K like crazy, Eric included. Hard to be a good big-league position player when you miss the ball on so many of your swings. There's more to being a good big-league hitter than just walking. Hitting counts, too! Murton and Cedeno seem able to hit; Dubois and Eric and Sing, not so well.

 

I agree with Sing and Dubois, but not Patterson, he did K too often for my taste as well as others, but he is a couple of levels ahead of the likes of Sing/Dubois type of hitters as far as his natural hitting ability, who don't have the short stroke to maintain a higher avg. but generate more power. He'll likely have to become a better two strike hitter as he progresses to maintain that avg., the odds of him reducing his Ks to a more satisfactory level are greater than those of long-armed 6'4" 230LB hitters.

 

UK, you noted that the Cubs do have some guys who take walks. Indeed. Dubois, Hill, Harris, Sing, Soto, Choi, Fuld, Choi. I don't see a strong college flavor to that. Soto and Sing are HS guys, and Choi essentially. They had some aptitude.

 

I think you've seen the Cubs draft collegiate players that have better plate recognition that the more toolsy HS players. Obviously, Sing, Soto, and Coats are the exception rather than the norm. Many of the collegiate players have pitch recognition as one of their strengths, I would consider someone like Nic Jackson as the exception rather than the norm as far as the Cubs drafting collegiate position players, he's obviously more toolsy than fundamentally sound.

 

I don't think that by getting a guy at 18, that you can teach him to be a good contact hitter and have good pitch recognition and have a good walk rate while at the same time not K'ing much, unless he has the toolbox to start with. I hypothesize that Corey never did. Some blame the Cubs (they handled him wrong!), others blame Corey (bad makeup, doesn't take instruction, must be really dumb to swing at those high fastballs, yada yada..). I suspect that he doesn't have the talent to see-recognize-respond well. You could keep him at AA for ten years without that changing; he could have all the will and desire and makeup in the world, but if he didn't have the see-recognize-respond ability, it wasn't going to work out.

 

I don't think you can get drafted and not be a good contact hitter, it's improssible for a scout to watch a hitter like Patterson in Kennesaw, GA and have him predict that Patterson will not be a good contact hitter. Even at various showcases where the talent is multiplied greatly, I'm sure Corey was head and shoulders above all the pitchers he faced. Statistically, it's impossible to look at, I'm almost positive Corey throughout his HS career has more BBs than Ks and a low amount of KS, while hitting mostly nothing but line drives.

 

It's the hardest part of scouting, it's something all scouts look for and all position players must do well at, but it certainly doesn't guarantee that'll carry over to the next level. Obviously, college and 3 additional years of advanced comp. gives a scout a much clearer picture.

 

You're not going to turn a frog into a prince, but you can improve upon it. There are certain absolutes when drafting a player, there's a core that expected to be there, if a scout makes a mistake, it'll be almost impossible to mold the player into something useful.

 

I think when looking at players like Mallory, there's something to be molded from their abilities and the possibility was there for his faults to be improved upon. There's no guarantee of anything that could've been done, but I think the absolutes were there to build from.

[UK1679666180]

*2 I'm very dubious that guys can "learn" to hit, or to recognize/respond to pitches, or to have the plate discipline and walk/K profiles that I associate with pure hitters and good-discipline guys, if they aren't born with the innate "toolbox" for rapid sight/process/respond to fast-moving balls-in-flight.

 

Aside from better than average eyesight and foot speed I cannot think of one tool that a baseball player can be born with. However, the question is, can pitch recognition, plate discipline, and hittiing for power be developed later in life then little league?

 

I would have to anwser yes. If not, why have coaches?

 

Patence can be taught, pitch recognition can be taught.

 

I had really crappy little league coaches but when I got to high school our coach preached plate discipline and "hitting your pitch". We practiced it. During BP we were not encouraged to swing away even if it mean we only took 5 or 6 swings in 40 pitches.

 

Patience/pitch recognition can't be taught, it can be improved upon though. I agree w/Craig, there's an undefined mental aspect to hitting that can limit their abilities or those who do not have this mental block can maximize their approach. I believe Zone Hitting is one of those ways to improve a hitter's approach, the younger, the better. There's a steep learning curve to hitting, the older they get, the more difficult it becomes for them to improve and the less likely the hitter will improve. dramatically.

[goonys evil twin]

Patience/pitch recognition can't be taught, it can be improved upon though. I agree w/Craig, there's an undefined mental aspect to hitting that can limit their abilities or those who do not have this mental block can maximize their approach.

 

Isn't this just semantics? It can't be taught but in can be improved? Well, that undefined mental aspec tot hitting shows up in the kids who can't go from tee-ball to little league no matter how hard they try, or from little league to high school. Those without the undefined mental aspect are weeded out early. A combination of natural ability and teaching will determine how far up the weeding out ladder you climb.

[UK1679666180]

Patience/pitch recognition can't be taught, it can be improved upon though. I agree w/Craig, there's an undefined mental aspect to hitting that can limit their abilities or those who do not have this mental block can maximize their approach.

 

Isn't this just semantics? It can't be taught but in can be improved? Well, that undefined mental aspec tot hitting shows up in the kids who can't go from tee-ball to little league no matter how hard they try, or from little league to high school. Those without the undefined mental aspect are weeded out early. A combination of natural ability and teaching will determine how far up the weeding out ladder you climb.

 

No, nothing sematical about it. It's one of the absolutes, I've seen plenty of hitters in HS who try and get by w/out pitch recognition, they're typically good enough in the field or sound at other fundmentals to stick on a HS team. There has to be a core there, 1st, and from that core comes from the improving. You can improve a pitcher's velocity and you can do so with a pitcher who doesn't have the arm to get to the next level, but you can't improve it to get to the next level.

[craig]

UK, good points, and I kind of agree with many of them.

-You can't turn a frog into a prince, but you can improve a bit on whatever a guy has to work with

-guys can learn and improve to some degree.

-Most of the college guys have begun with better plate discipline than than the HS guys.

-Most of the college guys have begun with lower non-hitting tools and ceiling than the HS guys

-Eric's current K-problem is not quite as extreme as with Sing. And his current K-problem probably has more chance for correction than does Sing's or Dubois. All laws of physics and levers and momentum suggest that a 5'10" guy has more chance to shorten his swing or check his swing on bad-balls more easily than the 6'4" guys. He may be able to learn to shorten his swing and stop his swing when bad-balls are breaking, in a way that Sing has no chance to ever "learn" to do.

-most real prospects are somewhere in between the "frog" and "prince" extremes. Harvey may be a frog, not chance. But Eric and Pie, while not necessarily princes, may have enough to work with.

[UK1679666180]

Craig, now what do you think could be done as far as improving the lack of position prospects within the system?

 

If they made a greater commitment in Latin America, could they allocate more early draft picks towards the collegiate picks while spending more internationally on the typically younger, less disciplined, more athletic position prospects?

 

Would they justify it as getting collegiate position players quicker to the majors to help the major league club in a shorter amount of time?

[CaliforniaRaisin]

In retrospect, would you have taken Aubrey over Harvey?

 

Looking back, Millege would have been the right pick at #6.

Until one of them doesn anything at the big league level there is no sense losing any sleep over this pick. After all we could have picked Jeff Allison, staying with the great prospect pitchers.

 

I disagree, these prospects do have trade value and a better prospect would give us the chance to net a better major leaguer.

[craig]

Craig, now what do you think could be done as far as improving the lack of position prospects within the system?

 

If they made a greater commitment in Latin America, could they allocate more early draft picks towards the collegiate picks while spending more internationally on the typically younger, less disciplined, more athletic position prospects?

 

Would they justify it as getting collegiate position players quicker to the majors to help the major league club in a shorter amount of time?

 

Signing international players would help. I think with the Latin stuff as well as domestic, the Cubs are much better at scouting pitchers. From the last couple DSL teams, a bunch of pitchers always look good enough to come over and get at least a look stateside. The DSL team has graduated hardly any position players that even get to short-season ball.

 

Other than that, I have no idea. Just scout better and get luckier.

 

I don't think the Corey or Kelton picks were bad ones. You might take another Corey, and have him turn out able to recognize high fastballs and wide sliders, and he might turn into a 10-time allstar.

 

I'm not convinced that the solution is going college instead. Pre-Hendry, results weren't any better with Kieschnick, Orie, Glanville, and Ty Griffin, all college guys.

 

Also, while perhaps the Cubs have had some bad luck with position guys, recently they may be in for some good luck. If Cedeno and Murton both work out, and if Pie was to work out as well (we hope!), to generate three quality position players within a 2-year period would be very good production. Maybe lucky, given how thin our position pool is; but perhaps we're due for some good luck after the bad luck we've had for a while.

 

Maybe we'll get real lucky and Eric will work out, or perhaps even Harvey or Sing or somebody, it isn't likely but sometimes you do get lucky.

 

I just hope that they don't naively assume that just because a kid can run and throw and hit long BP-drives, that they just assume he's capable of learning to hit real pitching. And I also might personally be willing to sacrifice a little ceiling for some probability. Murton doesn't have Harvey's RF arm, RF-defensive possibllity, nor Harvey's HR power. But right now there's no way I'd choose Harvey over Murton.

 

I think to some degree they are always choosing between options, and I might like them to sometimes take the more conservative picks? Sometimes that might involve taking a college guy rather than a wildcard HS guy. But not that much point in taking college guys if you know they can't run or play a position well enough to be useful big-leaguers (as has turned out to be the case for Craig and Gripp).

 

I'm hoping that Wilken might help some. Toronto seems to have more experience with ID'ing some good position players. Cubs seem great at scouting pitching talent (if not projecting pitching health), but I'm not sure they really know what to look for in hitters. Perhaps Wilken has an eye for that in a way that Stockstill or Hendry didn't really have.

[UK1679666180]

I think they've had better luck with signing international FA position players than HS position prospects. Of course, much of that is negated by not knowing how much value an Interional FA has. You assume a hitter like Mallory has a higher value simply b/c he was drafted, but w/out full disclosure of signing bonuses it is very difficult to get a gauge on a player unless they are already rated high or the rare case of someone like Joel Guzman who gets the early bidding war.

 

I'd like to see some more conservative picks early on as well. If they're scouting a HS position prospect like Dopirak who probably had his raw power rated as a 7, if they see a power hitting collegiate who maybe ranks in the 65 range for power, but has shown some advancement at the plate vs. more experienced comp., they should consider going after the college player.

 

I have no problem with the drafting of Corey and Kelton, either. I do think under Hendry they have had more success with collegiate position players (none selected in the 1st as Hill was the highest) than HS position players. Much of that has to go to Swoope.

 

Players like Cedeno, Murton, and Pie give me hope, but it addresses the same questions as far as drafting HS position prospects.

 

I do believe in a balanced approach starting with a BPA philosophy.

 

That is an interesting question you raise as far as Wilken, will he be the primary cross-checker on all highly slotted picks? If it sub-divided as I suspect, will those cross-checkers be from the Hendry/Stockstill regime or will they have been brought in/schooled by Wilken?

 

I wish I could answer those, but I haven't been aware of much turnover between the cross-checkers, area scouts, or even the bird-dogs.

 

I assume most of the scouts still remain and have been influnced by Wilken to some extent.

[illiniguy]

In retrospect, would you have taken Aubrey over Harvey?

 

Looking back, Millege would have been the right pick at #6.

Until one of them doesn anything at the big league level there is no sense losing any sleep over this pick. After all we could have picked Jeff Allison, staying with the great prospect pitchers.

 

I disagree, these prospects do have trade value and a better prospect would give us the chance to net a better major leaguer.

yes and no, yes they do have value. no way would we be trading lastings though so what value would he have the club until he does something, anything at the big league level. The Mets thought so highly of him they went out and drastically overpaid for Carlos Beltran to block him for years to come.

[TXCubsFan]

I want to thank UK, Craig, Scotti, Tim and others who provided the rest of us with an insightful and thought-provoking thread. Discussions like these are the reason why this website is one of the best in baseball. =D>