craig

It's pretty amazing that Veal has as respectable an ERA as he does, at only 3.33. Not often that a guy with a WHIP of 1.5 and such a high HR-rate (11 HR/100 innings) can keep his ERA below 4, especially with a now rather mediocre K-rate besides.

Ping, thanks for your input. You've seen him, and been unimpressed. That's meaningful, obviously I haven't. Second, your latter post was pretty interesting; that implied that it wasn't until late in the season that his velocity was "up" to 88-91. That sounds really weak.

BA: Shafer had established himself as one of the premier pitching prospects for the 2008 draft midway through the 2007 season. Then he strained his elbow, which didn't require surgery but sidelined him for a month. His fastball hasn't been the same since. Shafer used to work from 91-94 mph with his fastball and now ranges from 88-91 mph. The diminished velocity hasn't made him less effective, however. His effortless delivery allows his heater to get on hitters quickly, and it enables him to live in the bottom of the strike zone. He has above-average command of his fastball, 12-to-6 curveball and changeup. Shafer has a solid 6-foot-4, 205-pound frame and his arm has been healthy since tweaking his elbow. He's no longer a candidate for the first round, but he could go in the second or third. Keith Law's #46 prospect: Summary: Shafer had abdomen surgery before the 2007 season, then hurt his elbow, leading to a disappointing sophomore season after he was named the Missouri Valley Conference's Pitcher of the Year as a freshman. He has easy velocity, working with a solid-average fastball with some sink, and an average changeup with good arm speed. He's extremely athletic, and his curveball projects as plus; it's sharp with good depth but isn't consistent... Craig's comment: I'm guessing that if BA lists him as ranging from 88-91, that's the "working" velocity. And anybody who works at 88-91 is going to have a few that touch 92 or 93 (or more). So again, I'm guessing that Shafer and Bristow this spring in reality probably had comparable velocity. And I'm guessing that the Cubs scouted Shafer as having the better fastball, based on the alleged "easy" velocity mentioned by both BA and Law, and the "get on hitters quickly" reference by BA, suggesting a greater effectiveness perhaps than is common for most pitchers with equivalent mph. Or, perhaps the easy might also suggest that if he muscles up and throws for the radar guns, perhaps he can do so? We'll see. Hopefully Bristow will end up with a consistent 91-94 hard sinker/cutter, which could be quite nice. And hopefully Shafer will end up back with an easy 90-94, with some surprise/deceptively-fast aspect, with some sink, and with nice location. Would sure be nice to have some of the draft choices this year really work out wonderfully. We're due for a draft like that, I think.

I didn't get the impression that Bristow's fastball was any faster than Shafer's current fastball, and my impression was that Shafer had a better chance to get notably faster. (If he recovers his former velocity. Maybe he lost some as a result of temporary arm issues that will completely resolve that still impacted this year but will completely resolve later. Or, maybe he lost some as a result of a mechanical maladjustment that was prompted by the arm stuff, and if he resolves that he'll be able to hit 94-95.) Of course, I've never seen them, just based off what I read. I trust the draft standing and the pre-draft rankings for the three guys represents their chances. Shafer appears to have a pretty good start on a breaking pitch and on control, and has stuff that may be OK. I'd guess that if he fails, most likely it will be because of inadequate stuff. Carpenter at times flashes a faster fastball, and perhaps also a sharper breaking pitch. How often he's meaningfully faster I don't know. His control is obviously well behind, and his injury questions may be even worse than Shafer's. I'd guess that if he fails, it might be because of injury; or more likely it might be because of wildness; or it might be because his fastball ends up not being fast enough to make up for an inconsistent breaking pitch. But my guess is that while Shafer's reason for failure would more likely be stuff that's just not good enough, that Carpenter's will be because of control (or health) that's just not good enough. For Bristow, the impression I got was that his velocity was inconsistent, sometimes OK but sometimes not, and that sometimes his fastball was very straight, and that his breaking stuff was pretty raw. So he could fail based on inadequate stuff or inadequate control. (Or of course arm problems, which seem to befall converts more often than regular pitchers.) Obviously I don't know anything, I've never seen any of these guys, not even once or not even on TV, and have never talked to any scout or person who has, so my info could be way off. I guess maybe partly it's a question of how BA-type scouting reports get written. For a Bristow type, I think they tend to over-inflate the velocity, and sometimes refer more to the "touches 90-92" stuff, even if the guy may not touch 92 very often and may work at 85-91 for 95% of their fastballs. But sometimes a more familiar, more seen guy get "works at 88-91", which sounds more mediocre. But the "works at 88-91" guy may actually throw just as hard or harder than the other, and perhaps with more sink/tail.

Not necessarily easy to reconcile everything. The Cubs must like his tools pretty well to pay him that much. And his coach says has "great, great range and a great arm", so maybe he does and the Cubs think so too. But, at the same time he was going to get moved to 2B in college? That might suggest that he doesn't have SS tools for college, and certainly won't for the NL. I know, maybe it means no such thing. Maybe he has all the tools to be an A+ big-league SS, but WSU has an entrenched upperclass SS, so some freshman wasn't going to take SS away from him even if the freshman is Cal Ripken or Ozzie Smith defensively.

I have a confession. I developed Steve Blass disease.... as a slow-pitch softball pitcher! And it wasn't physical. I pitched in unlimited arch men's leagues in Wisconsin for a couple of years, and with the rules at the time (3-ball 2-strikes, with strikeout even if you hit the second strike foul; balls don't need to go through strike zone to be strikes, rather the zone defined by whether the ball lands on the plate itself or on a mat that extended another 2 feet or so behind the plate) I had a couple of games in which I record double-figure K's in 7-inning games. (If you get a strike on the first pitch, then you can throw it with 25 feet of arch and hitters will still swing, often with little chance to do much since the downward velocity is pretty fast and the downward arc is so steep.) But, I got Blass disease. Started to get too tricky, and try to do more with the ball, whether that be side-spins in the wind, or backspins, or more arch than I could really handle. Then, somewhat suddenly, I lost it. Trying to get back to original consistently good delivery, I started thinking and analyzing, from which ensued a downward spiral of compensate/correction attempts, which never succeeded. Once I started thinking too much, I couldn't just relax and let the ball go. The arm stroke lost any consistency, and I'm always trying to get it back, to compensate for what I'm doing wrong. Even when I have some good ones, the second I throw two bad balls back-to-back, the thought comes back "Are you losing it again? What are you doing wrong now, what were you doing right the first three innings that you're not doing this inning?" Obviously I'm no professional athlete like Blass or Hill. But I imagine that confidence stuff, and the thinking about control instead of just throwing the ball over the plate (or underhand lobbing the ball as was my case) just drives you nuts.

It's pretty remarkable how ineffective the Cubs have been in Latin America. I imagine this might be partly a Fleita effect. He ran the show for a while and hired the primary scouts, Serra and Ortega. It's not clear whether either is a very good scout down there. The job requires work (lots of players and scrounging around to find them). And lots of persuasiveness (everybody is a free agent. A smart scout in U.S. can project talent, and doesn't need to be like a college recruiter; you draft the guy, he has not option. But down there, you need to both recognize who's worth it and also persuade him that he should sign with you instead of the other 29 teams.) And lots of money. And scouting brains. You can say Alfredo Francisco and Larry Suarez are really special, but if Franscisco can't hit anything, and Suarez can't find the plate and has a surgery-destined delivery, you're sunk too. We've really been inept down there. Not sure which combination of factors kill us, but somehow or other Serra and Ortega have absolutely not gotten the job done.

This is totally unrealistic. Vitters is 18, in short season. You think it's likely that three years from now, at age 21, we'll be seeing him as a factor? And if things go well you expect him to be up in two years, at age 20? that's ridiculously over-optimistic. He's 5 steps from the major leagues. So if he has no setbacks and never has to repeat, he could be in Wrigely in 2013, at a youthful age 23. Good chance that he won't advance that fast and will need to repeat a level, between injuries or performance or defense issues. Raw is optimistic that he'll be up in 2012, and that's optimistic but certainly reasonable: skip one level. But skipping three levels and being up in 2010, I suppose if you're expecting him to be Alex Rodriguez or Griffey Junior. Other than the error in Lee's age, I agree with these points. Ramirez is a pure hitter, and this year a more mature hitter in terms of discipline. While his health has been iffy, he's got a fair shot to be an asset for another five years, or perhaps more. Given my more conservative Vitters advancement timetable, I think if Vitters could play 3rd and he blossoms as a wonderful hitter (both unlikely and anything but to be expected), then he might be able to replace Aram in good time. Even if Aram is still raking 4-5 years from now, I doubt he's going to be a premium defensive 3B 4-5-6-7-8 years from now. I think one possible super-optimistic scenario would be to have Vitters make it at 3rd, and have Aram move to 1st when Lee is too old but Aram can still hit.

Does anybody know if Vitters got hurt yesterday again? He got pulled after two AB's. He's rough defensively now. But it's going to be many years before his bat is big-league ready, if ever. The other positions he might eventually be switched to are LF, RF, and 1B. Those aren't necessarily the hardest or slowest positions to learn. No rush to switch him. Obviously sticking at 3rd would be nice. If he moves super fast and becomes surprisingly good (certainly not to be expected based on any Cub prospect), you've still gotta figure he's 5 years out. By then Aram will be 35, Lee will be 38, Fukudome 36, and Soriano 37. So the needs will be wide open at potential Vitters spots if/when he would hypothetically be ready to hit. 3B would obviously be nicest. Even if Aram is still a bat, how likely is it that he'll be playing good 3B beyond age 35? But if Vitters can hit (big question) and if he's a butcher at 3B, obviously he'll need to move. But the primary question is whether he'll be able to hit. Lots of guys can hit the crummy Northwest league pitching. Lots of challenges ahead for him to prove he's one who can hit at higher levels.

Cubs signed 24th rounder David Cales, the SS/P who started at Mizzou, and then played at a couple of colleges in Illinois. As a pitcher. He's kind of interesting, and has been doing well in summer league. Not very tall. Bigger story is that they signed 21st rounder Logan Watkins, an infielder (all-state QB, I think). One draft list had him at 5'11", but article about him says he's 6'1". Cubs super-slotted him to the tune of $500,000, plus the $100,000 college guarantee. So BA will probably list this as a $600,000 value deal. Not sure what his game is, but apparently has a strong arm and good range defensively. BA didn't know much about him or rank him real high, but in a pre-draft article Watkins said that pro scouts had told him he could go in the top-5 rounds, although his college commitment would make him hard to buy away. I wonder if he's a true SS prospect? Or if he'll outgrow that? Is he really a 2B or a CF guy? Any power projection, or more a table-setter type? Who knows? Up until Sonny Gray, we've now signed all but three, Cashner 1st round, Shafer in the 2nd, and Alex Wilson in the 10th. Cashner it's just a matter of time. I'm surprised Shafer hasn't signed yet. I wonder what's up with that? Wilson obviously is not likely to sign unless he impresses during summer and gets a serious offer. Early results certainly don't support that, at present. But with Watkins in, and assuming Cashner and Shafer and all the guys they hoped to sign do sign, I'd assume they won't really have any leftover 1st round money to make Gray a crazy offer.

Pastor Tom, thanks much for the game report. Sounds really good. A 3-pitch control pitcher whose fastball has some sink/run and can work in the 90-91 range, that's a good package. Glad to hear that Donaldson looked good behind the plate. That way if he ever does start to hit, we'll be comfortable that his defense is fine. Two questions/comments: Latham and Parker both have some very impressive numbers. Latham, 21, is around 2.0 ERA, has a K-per-inning, has only 12 walks in 47 innings, and until the bad outing you saw had a WHIP under 1.0. So obviously the bad outing you saw was the exception, not the rule. I know you only saw him for a couple of ineffective batters faced. But just from looking, if he made any impression, did his fastball look major-league fast? Or did he look pretty average? Same question for Parker. You mentioned he looked impressive. His numbers are also fantastic, not as good walk-control as Latham, with 18 walks in the same 47 innings, but with a 1.3 ERA, 51 K's, a WHIP barely over 1. His results have been great, especially lately (only 4 walks in his last 21 innings). Did he look like he threw pretty hard and would have a good big-league fastball? Or more like a good average fastball and a good slider that probably makes him excel in A-ball?

I'd guess it's two names for the same pitch.

Pretty weird, Caridad even more than Ceda.

Carpenter

DSL 2 Cubs: http://web.minorleaguebaseball.com/milb/stats/stats.jsp?t=t_ibp&cid=2270 DSL 1 Cubs: http://web.minorleaguebaseball.com/milb/stats/stats.jsp?t=t_ibp&cid=609

JR Matthes has incredibly compiled 2.48 ERA at Iowa. They have gotten some remarkable pitching, from some non-regarded prospects. Gallagher was very good there, obviously as a status guy. But Burns, Matthes, and Wells have put up some really good ERA's, even while the status guys Hart and Marshall have gotten ripped. I wonder if Matthes isn't basically what the good Marshall was supposed to be? Marques Smith didn't play for Peoria today. My guess is that he's on the move to Daytona, and will play the full second half with Daytona.

McDaniel and Sontag. McDaniel is 14th rounder who just turned 20. Had bad stats, but apparently was pitching most of the year with injured ribs.

Heh, my mistake, I checked BB-cube, which doesn't include 2008. So Opitz hadn't hit over .300 previous years, with no power, and with a lot more K's than Harrison. Yeah, that's a pretty good 2008 for Opitz. (Was he a senior, just a really old junior, I don't remember?) Is the Big East that bad of a conference? I know it's not SEC good, but being conference player of the year there, it's not like it's a bad conference. Obviously Garrison may be a total fiasco, and may not hit at all. Most 6th rounders don't pan out. And obviously he's not going to hit many HR's. And I know it's obvious that the Cubs can make some pretty dumb picks sometimes. And I also know this isn't thinking for myself, it's just trusting the Cub scouts who have no track record of deserving trust; but I still think if they took him in the 6th and Opitz in the 12th, the Cubs at least think he's much better, and the odds are they are correct. I like him better because he's been a consistent contact hitter every year, and I think contact hitters/slap hitters can progress pretty well. Contact hitters who lack HR power but have no holes can be better able to handle improved pitching, whereas the boom-or-bust stronger guys have a harder time handling promotions. If you are a contact guy at one level who consistently takes a lot of walks and has very few K's, that impresses me as perhaps having the most fundamental hitting tool, the ability to see pitches well, and to respond to them accurately. That Harrison can respond accurately but still not hit the ball over the wall is a major limitation, but Opitz hasn't power either, and if I could get a good-average good-OBP disciplined 2B in the 6th round, that would be a good value even if he doesn't hit for power. We'll see how it goes.

Vance, what did Shark look like for fastball and breaking ball?

Not the right topic, I think. But I noticed a kid who debuted in the DSL box score, Ramon Garcia. He lists at 6'2", 170, 16 years old. Pitched 2.1 innings, no hits, one walk, and 5 K's. Might be one to keep an eye on?

I'd rather keep Harrison in the infield. He was drafted 6th round to Opitz's 12th, is a year younger, and was the Big East player of the year. He's got some very impressive BB/K ratios in college, and has been an outstanding OBP guy, with an OBP around .440 for his college career and an OPS around .960 or so. Opitz has been more a career .280 hitter (in college!) with an OBP more in the .370 range and OPS around .790. So I'd rather go with Harrison, and hope he has enough OBP/bat to be something in the Derosa/Theriot class of hitter as a 2B.

James O'Donnell has signed, since he's on the Boise roster. Flaherty is also on the roster, so that signing is further confirmed if there was still any question about it.

http://www.idahostatesman.com/sports/story/410788.html Initial roster. Vitters 3B, Flaherty SS, Harrison SS, Opitz and Marwin Gonzalez for utility, Rebel Riding and Keedy for 1B. (My interpretation of usage.) Some of those guys will need to do some OF, because the only listed OFers are Burke, Rundle, and CF Campana. C: Flores, Brenly, and Carlos Perez. A zillion pitchers from the draft, so hard to guess who will start and who will pitch relief. James O'Donnell in there, so he signed. My first guess at the starters might be: Hatley, Jay Johnson, Coleman, Pawelek, and Jose Pina. Not sure if Pawelek or Pina have enough control or in Pina's case rehab progress to start though. The list has 14 pitchers, so it will be kind of chaotic spring-training-like or like how they do the rookie league team at first.

I may be misremembering, but I thought Kemp was on a short visa and would need to get sent out soon.

Gray obviously doesn't plan to sign. But the guys who are available in the 27th round are mostly either college guys who will be roster-fillers, or HS/JC guys who you probable can't sign or else aren't very talented. So you take a pick, and wonder if he'll maybe change his mind? Sometimes teenagers do. He might be wise to do so. Somebody observed that his delivery is incredibly violent, and that there's a good chance that he'll need surgery before he becomes eligible to be drafted again. Might be wise to take some the money while he can. But, obviously that isn't his plan. On the HS thing: I think there has been a dramatic reduction in the number of HSers drafted since they dumped the draft-and-follow process. At present, will the team offer enough to make it better for the kid to sign than to go to college? Seems to me that unless the signing bonus is $150K (top 5 rounds area), the kid is better to get free college, have all the fun and personal development that comes with college, and then have chance to make a million (or more) as a college pick. Why should I sign for 7th round money? If I'm going to become a good major leaguer, then I'll have elevated to 1st-2nd round status by my junior year, so financially I'm as well off in college. If I'm not going to become a good major leaguer, then it would be better for me to get free college, be prepared for a life after baseball, be a star athlete on campus with lots of girlfriends and team camaraderie, rather than to experience night after night of frustration as a failing inadequate low-minors bust. My point is, for the average kid, either he needs to be a high-draft pick who gets a high-dollar bonus, or else he should go to college. In the DFE days, of course, the team could draft the kid without committing 1st/2nd round money to a kid who might but probably won't work out; then if he did blossom, pay him that via draft and follow.