craig

Arguello has a ton of nice pictures up. Nice to get a kind of picture of the guys. That was sure a lot of guys they signed in the 15 class. With smart guys and strong development process, hopefully a number of them click.

Yeah, not sure they've really scouted great on the pitching. But, there's probably always a fair bit of luck involved. May also be that their scouting system is better established now than it was in the Blackburn draft. And you never know, maybe development will end up better than we think? *Zastryzny looked pretty good, maybe he'll be a useful lefty reliever or 6th starter? *Maybe the relief version of Pierce Johnson will stay healthy, and end up being a good reliever? He was 35K/22 inning as a reliever; there is some talent there, I think. *Chad Clifton has been a very nice development story, I think, even if Skulina and Sands haven't. Maybe Steele will make it in some capacity in the long run? *And then there's Cease, whose early development, in terms of control and stuff, seems pretty favorable. Heh heh, if we got a couple of pitchers in the 30's and another in the 2nd round, I'd certainly be delighted to give those scouts and development guys a couple more tries at it!

Thanks for correction on Weaver. He was pick 28, I think, so wasn't literally comp round either (but close enough). I'm thinking HS, because sometimes talented HS pitchers last that long, in part due to the obvious risk. But no problem taking a good college pitcher either. (Lance Lynn, for example.) I'm partly thinking like 2010 as an example: 34 Blue Jays *Aaron Sanchez (minors) 38 Blue Jays *Noah Syndergaard (minors) 43 Mariners *Taijuan Walker (minors) Our guy Mike Montgomery was a comp pick. When you look through the comp area for most drafts, there are a lot of guys who don't end up being very good, whether pitchers or players. The Cubs with Ryan Flaherty, Brett Jackson. The success rate isn't great, so pitcher-injury isn't the only risk. Will take some good scouting and some good luck. But there are usually some guys in that area who become variably good.

Marques and Perez are definitely interesting. Assad. Obviously Albertos. Ocampo. But yeah, as you say, the pitchability 6-footers, Antigua/Tseng types come to mind. Steele 91-93, hope you're right. But I assume those are topping velocities. The couple of game reports I've seen were predominantly 80's, with an occasional 4-seam 91-93. Maybe a Travis Wood ceiling, without the curve? Or Clayton Richard with less velocity?

Yeah, I'm not necessarily enthused about TJ rehabbers, but I'm fine with trusting the admin on this. They've got more info and will have plenty of time to do a lot of thinking/analysis. But I think a lot of good pitchers were HS picks in the comp-area. Syndegaard, Matz, Luke Weaver, some good talent is available in that area. We'll have two shots. Not sure I'd be trying to burn it all on one superslot and go cheap with the other; may just want to do two pure scouting picks. Not sure how our scouting is, though. Our scouts thought that Sands and Steele somehow had lots of projection, and Blackburn, and instead not of those guys ever got any faster than when they were in high school, with Sands getting slower. They scouted Stinnet as having this strong velocity and terrific control capacity; neither has proven remotely true. So, maybe we just don't know pitchers, beats me. Tom, I wonder how much talent some of the Latins have, in terms of "elite" potential. Being an effective finesse pitcher in the dSL is one thing; but elites kind of need some pretty good physical capacity and velocity and breaking balls and stuff. No idea which have high ceilings, versus being lmited-tool overachiever guys. Hopefully Arguello and Phil will get to see several of them and pass along some scouting observations.

My feeling is that by the time you're drafting in the 30's, there are some very talented and high-ceiling pitchers available, particular HS pitchers. Yes, they have significant injury risk, as do all pitchers. But by that point, the risk that a position player will fail because he's just not good enough is just as high-risk. Given the Cubs have almost no excellent rotation prospects, and that our staff is old, I'd like to see pitchers. We could use a couple of high-end arms.

Thanks for the links, guys. Cool to get some up-beat impressions on Morel. Will be interesting to see how some of these guys progress. Torres and Eloy stood out pretty quickly, and that class looks to be impact. Between Sierra, Morel, Amaya, Albertos, and Paredes, will be interesting to see if the Cubs can get a couple of guys out of last year's class. With nothing international on the sandwich years, and no high draft picks this year, it's probably VERY important that the Cubs get some significant impact prospects out of that international class. My guess is the Cubs won't be signing any draft-pick FA's this winter, so if Fowler goes, having a first and a comp pick could give them some chance to add a couple of good talents. Obviously two picks in the 30's isn't like having top 10 picks like we built with, and maybe you take a shot with a comp pick on a projection pick and he never ends up any faster than Paul Blackburn. But given the Cubs scouting, I'd be pretty happy to take two shots at a couple of pitchers with our two picks.

I like the "advanced" reference to Eloy. Also very encouraged at the Albertos input. *70-changeup. Hadn't appreciated that before. If a guy throws 97 but his better pitch is a change, that's a lot of possibility. *"Stuff guy". *"Will build up some instructional innings". That doesn't suggest there is a presently serious arm injury, or that any surgery has been done or anything.

We would be complaining about 38 of Daytona's last 49 games getting rained out if we were still there. Nice!!!

Myrtle scores 3 in the 7th to take a 5-3 lead. Eloy K'd with runners 2nd/3rd-no-outs-tied, but they got two after than anyway. had bases loaded one out, chance to score more, but DP ended threat. Pugliese pitching on into his 4th inning. Torrez and McNeil should both be available, I think, having last pitched 4 and 3 days ago.

Thanks for pointing him out. I'd been thinking the same thing, that he's been good for Eugene, just as he'd been good for Miss and in Cape. Sure, he's a short reliever. But a lefty who can throw strikes in the 90's, not sure why that might not play up. Will be interesting to see how he does going forward. I'm a huge believer in the value of relievers.

Thanks for passing along that stuff/scouting info, Win. The favorable report on the change is news to me. I believe it. That would help explain both how he's gotten to be so good at the end of the year, and also why he's been so very effective against lefties. Big curve and change, are there any harder pitches to control? Not sure how well that control will carry over into next year, but if he's actually developed a good change, and can throw his curve for strikes, that's a good combo.

Myrtle goes down deep in extra innings. Daury Torrez has an excellent game in relief, 4K's in 3 perfect innings. Offense-wise, that's a really weak roster, and other than Clifton not sure there's much very significant on the pitching-side, either. Still, when the big-league pitching staff normally carries 13 pitchers, the 6th starter and 12th/13th guys on the roster aren't always especially talented, but can still make a difference. So who knows with guys like Morrison, Leal, Underwood, Torrez, or McNeil whether one of them might develop favorably and end up being a useful 12th/13th pitcher type guy. Leal won't turn 22 till after spring training begins. I'll be curious to see whether the winter reports include any higher velocity compared to results 1-2 years past? His composite numbers are somewhat blah, but he's 39K/8BB/38 innings over his last ten starts. If we were to receive reports that his regular working fastball velocity has bumped up from upper-80's into low-90's now, and that he's now implemented an effective cutter to go along with improving change and slider, maybe he'd look more plausible as a 4th starter than he was perceived before. Torrez supposedly throws fairly hard now that he's in relief this year, and his low-slot fastball might seem kinda tough on righties. His composite K-rate is way up (almost as many K's this year in relief as he had last year in twice as many innings). And he's finished pretty strong, with some notably good box-scores within the last month. (27K/5BB/19IP, 4-of-12 hits in one outing.) Will be curious whether either Torrez or Leal get 40-man roster. Or Ryan McNeil.

Paredes-Martinez-Rose go 0-13, and Eloy only 1-4. South Bend loses in 10, 4-3. Nice 84-55 season, but they're done. Very fine record for a team that really only had Eloy as a high-end prospect.

"Markey, Skulina, Clark, Miller, Mekkes, etc have taken more seriously on this board than Kellogg" Kellogg is a much better prospect than Markey, Skulina, or Tseng. They have failed, he hasn't. Until he fails, he's a prospect, in my book. But certainly Tseng and Jokish are illustrations that having a resume of Kellogg-esque numbers in the Midwest League is little proof that a guy will be successful at higher levels. I'll keep an eye on Kellogg as long as he's having success; for a guy with minus-velocity I'll probably give up pretty quick if/when he fails. Here's Kellogg's resume: http://www.thebaseballcube.com/players/profile.asp?P=ryan-kellogg Not sure how exciting 3.15, 3.76, and 3.60 ERA's are in college, with K/9 of 5-6-7.

I'd sure put Clifton ahead. Plus curve, plus results, plus K-rate, plus velocity, more success in higher league at younger age.

I think Jokisch is a good comp. Kellogg is 22 with 3.03 ERA in Midwest; Jokish had a 2.94 ERA as a 21-year-old in same league, with similarly good K/BB splits. Jokisch than followed that up with a 2.91 ERA in AA at age 22. So, in terms of accomplishments, Jokisch and Kellogg basically have identical years in Midwest League, although Jokisch was a little younger and confirmed with another effective year in AA at the age Kellogg is doing it in A. So if we're looking at accomplishments and performance, Kellogg doesn't look better. I thought mention of touching 90 was a little more common with Jolisch than what we've heard from Kellogg, but that's probably mostly because we don't get many reports on low-velocity college guys. That Jokisch didn't make it doesn't mean that Kellogg won't. Sometimes performance guys are able to carry it up the ladder. Hendricks is the exception not the norm, of course; but perhaps when a guy without velocity somehow keeps getting guys out, eventually we come to realize that there is reason. So long as Kellogg can perform effectively, I'll keep an open mind that he might have a chance to be effective. Good luck to him. Hopefully the Cubs can somehow help him add a little good velocity before it's all said and done. If the change is really good (see Hendricks), and the location is consistently masterful (again see Hendricks), you can have good results even without much velocity. But the emphasis on velocity sure helps to explain why so many pitchers took steroids. Temptation has to be pretty strong.

Bailey Clark is in Durham completing his fall semester at Duke. Semester started in late August. Thanks very much! That's good to hear. Way better to have him shutting down because he's a smart, self-motivated guy who wants to complete his degree rather than because he's got a sore shoulder!

I'm a little concerned that de la Cruz had 5 excellent starts after 3 months of rest/rehab, but then his last 3 were blah/bad. Maybe just the normal ups and downs hot-cold that players go through over a season. But I'm a little nervous that after resting for months his bad arm felt OK for a while, but maybe it didn't take long for it to start not being so good again. Paranoid, paranoid.....

Heh heh, 39K/21IP, that's a good way to wrap up a season. I wonder what kind of variants he has on his curve. A lot of guys will have the big, slow curve, maybe as a 2-strike chase pitch; but also have a much smaller curve that they can more consistently throw for strikes, even if it's more of a grounball pitch than a big K pitch. In this video from last night, his curve looks pretty big; can't imagine he can throw those for strikes real consistently, especially if guys could control themselves and just not swing. Hopefully he's got or will develop the smaller throw-for-strikes variant.

Cease listed for Eugene tonight, I wonder if he'll really go, or if they'll save him for playoff start. It's all about development, so probably no reason to hold him back. But perhaps they think the playoff pressure/excitement is almost better development experience, who knows. Nice finale for Kellogg. Ends 107/26 K/BB, that's a good >4:1 ratio. Ends 3.03 ERA, that's nice too. 8 HR's is kinda high, that's going to be an issue for him. Only 2 HR second half, 52K/9BB/2HR second half is very nice. Kellogg is a great example of why pitchers would have liked to dabble in steroids in years past. If he had his stats and control, but suddenly added solid velocity, he'd be a very popular prospect. Eloy back today, 0-3.

Yup, thanks a ton Cal for getting all of these started. Sad to see the minor-league season end. Hopefully the playoffs are fun. had a lot of good developments this season. Thanks also Tom for a lot of input and discussion.

Tyson Miller, who turned 21 at end of July, is now up over 130 innings between college and pro, but the Cubs hadn't shut him down as of Monday. By contrast, Bailey Clark, who's 8 months older, got shut down at 71 innings on Aug 10. Has anybody heard anything regarding Clark's situation? Each guy is unique, I'm sure But having pitched 60 fewer innings than Miller, I'm not sure Clark was just shut down merely because of innings workload. So, I wonder if he had an injury of some sort, and if so what and how severe? I'm actually rather surprised they've let Miller rack up so many innings.

I wonder how fast Paulino is, actually. I've got the impression that he's got a reputation for throwing reasonably hard, but I wonder how true that is. In a couple of the strikeout videos I saw on milb.com, he didn't look notably fast by my eye-ball look, but granted that isn't very precise. And maybe I was expecting too much. He looked like he might be largely a breaking-ball guy who mixes in some sinking/movement fastballs. Obviously a lefty who can throw strikes, throw with movement/sink, and throw a good breaking ball doesn't need to be a power guy. Not that many lefties, even the good ones, who are overpoweringly fast. Definitely a significant prospect. I'll be very interested to read the scouting reports on him this winter, including their velocity writeup. I'm kind of guessing he's probably a guy who's touched 94-95, who normally works in the 87-92 range with his fastball, whose fastball is fast enough to be a player but not fast enough to be his signature.

Last starts of the regular season for these guys now. Monday is last day, I think, for the full season guys. Eugene, SB and Myrtle will all be playoffs, right? Myrtle included? Tennessee should send Hedge back to Myrtle for the playoffs. Clifton-Morrison-Hedges would be a pretty tough sequence.