Minor League Discussion & Boxes 7-21-13

[wekim81]

My assumption is that the only reason we're getting a PTBNL instead of Ramirez right off the bat is because they were still awaiting Ramirez' medical results and wanted to make sure that Garza didn't pitch before they got him, but also didn't want to run into another Brigham situation if they did pull the trigger with Ramirez, and he turned out to be damaged goods.

wait what

[mul21]

My assumption is that the only reason we're getting a PTBNL instead of Ramirez right off the bat is because they were still awaiting Ramirez' medical results and wanted to make sure that Garza didn't pitch before they got him, but also didn't want to run into another Brigham situation if they did pull the trigger with Ramirez, and he turned out to be damaged goods.

wait what

 

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[CubColtPacer]

All he would need to cover his defense and be valuable as a corner OF would be an .800-ish OPS, and that would account for 100 lost OPS points, not out of the realm of possibilities at all.

 

PCL average last year was .278/.345/.430

National League average was .254/.318/.400

 

That's already 55 points right there. That doesn't even account for the normal loss in numbers from jumping up to the majors, or the thought that power hitters tend to have even more inflated numbers in the PCL than the averages would suggest.

 

Vitters' MLE equivalent last year was .253/.291/.409. Not awful for a solid third baseman. Pretty bad for a corner OF or a bad defensive third baseman. The odds of him hitting anywhere near an .800 OPS in major league action are pretty low still, although the limited action this year has some encouraging signs of continued progress.

 

Wouldnt a player significantly above the average slash line stand to lose less OPS point than the average player, though?

 

I've never seen great data for that, but my intuition from comparing those numbers is no. In fact, it's probably the opposite. The no power low K guys probably lose less from level to level because a few more singles turning into outs due to superior defense isn't as steep of a drop as power guys having HR and doubles turning into strikeouts and other outs due to less mistake pitches. Of course, the low power guys also don't have as far to drop before they become unplayable, so it's a hard comparison to make.

 

And of course the further to the extreme you get, the more that becomes the case (for example, Rizzo was almost always going to lose more than just about any other prospect because his numbers were so huge in AAA). I'm guessing the rare elite power bats translate better than the good/great power bats though, but that's just a guess.

 

Now with Vitters, there is always the chance that it clicks and the numbers start to catch up with the great scouting reports all along, but it's going to be awfully hard to decipher from the huge PCL effect.