Mephistopheles

Baseball America did an article on Michael Main. BA also did a little scouting report on all the players for this weekends Aflac Game.

McCutchen used to get it up in the mid 90s his junior year. He stayed for his senior year at Oklahoma. I got to check him out in the Super Regionals against Rice and thought he was pretty impressive. He's a guy who loves to compete, dunno about the roids.

Extended Version: Teaching OBP in the minors is cheaper then buying. OBP is now overvalued in the market and young pitching, defense and speed are undervalued.

Colvin's 1/3 with 2 Ks. Dolis pitched 2 innings in Mesa, 2 K 1 BB 0 H. Anderson has a double.

KC is leading the league in walks and is fourth in walks allowed.

Matsuzaka used a more Americanized windup in the WBC. It shouldn't be an issue. I'm all for stops and stuff in windups. Give the pitcher's something. Either that or go back to the 1968 mound height.

I've watched Matsuzaka at least 10 times over the last two years, back when Seibu broadcasted all of their home games, a couple this season and two of the WBC. No, there's not a pitch he throws that's a gyro or something like that. He throws a fourseam fastball in the 92-96 MPH range, topping out at 100 at the Athens Olympics, the fastest I've seen him throw on a TV gun was 159 KPH a year ago, that's 98.8 MPH. To compliment it he has a forkball, curveball, slider and an occasional two seam fastball. The first three are above average offerings. His slider runs in 80-82 and his best and most used offspeed pitch. It's a very good slider. His curveball is thrown in the high 70s with very good movement. It's a very, very good pitch that he doesn't use often, unless it's to a lefty because his slider is much more efficient against righties. His forkball is like a change up with good downward action. He throws it in the low 70s, and it's actually a very good fourth pitch. He doesn't use it more than three or four times a start because he really doesn't need it and it's a popular pitch in Japan. I could seem him using it a lot and having a lot of success with it because it's not used with regularity in the states. He really made some of the Mexican and Cuban hitters look bad with it in the WBC. I remember a couple of the American players in the 2004 Japan/US All Star series hating that pitch in particular. His two seam is a very new pitch. With the balls that they use in Japan, it's very hard to get movement on it using the seams. They're really low seams, one of the reasons the forkball has become the staple of the league. It's also the reason a lot of Japanese pitchers lost consistency on the breaking pitches in the WBC but it actually gave them better movement on their pitches. Matsuzaka started working on his two seam last off season for the purpose of throwing it in the WBC and America when he comes here. It's a work in progress and I haven't seen him enough this season to really comment on it. Early reports were that he used it to baffle Japanese hitters in the preseason. He apparently used it a lot in the opening round of the WBC, but I can't verify that. Is slider, fastball and curve combination probably reminded you of Mark Prior, which he does a lot in his pitching. He's not a trickster, he'll throw 150 pitches a game with 100 of them being fourseam fastballs. He lives off his 93-94 fastball and has impeccable command on it (vintage Prior). His command on his offspeed pitches are not as crisp, but rate as solid across the board. He's also a gamer who loves to compete and go balls out. He's had his share of injuries in the past, but he's fine now and the only concern there could be the high pith counts he has sustained in Japan, although the concerns IMO are overblown, he usually pitches with five days of rest each time out, not four. Finally he won't come cheap if he's posted. Seibu may need the cash, but he's the face of the franchise. People at BTF have been floating around 20M to Seibu and 75M to sign him, making it a 9 figure investment on some teams.

Well look at what the Cubs drafting strategy has been the last few years, pitching and tough signs. Price will find himself in that category. Personally I am a believer that starting pitching wins championships, maybe not divisions. No one's saying Price is a sure thing, but he could be the surest thing in the draft and the surest pitcher since Prior. The Cubs inability to develop hitters actually wants me NOT to draft them because they'll xxxx them up. Not only that on the free agent market pitchers are overpaid a lot more than hitters. Secondly young pitching prospects are much more valuable in the trade market. For a team who has a big budget and several high end arms in their system, it's a good strategy. Of course keeping them healthy is another thing. The Cubs can get a decent offense through trades and signings, but how many teams have built a good pitching staff through signings? The Astros - sort of. New York did it a bit in the late 90s but still had key guys from the system. Also, pitching over the course of the season is about 52% of a teams success, if you believe Bill James' regressions. A top flight starter and a top flight hitter usually have a WARP in the 10.0 range and are similar in VORP etc. However, in the postseason where a teams better pitchers pitch in a higher percentage of their teams' innings than they do in the regular season, prorated to 162 games it would be like a 18 WARP for top flight SPs and still a 10 WARP for hitters because they still receive roughly the same percentage of the team's plate appearances. Since i believe in a strategy like this, David Price or any top flight pitcher is a good move, unless there is a cant mess up PURE HITTER not the BS toolsy ones we normally get.

Veal was in the latest Monday Ten Pack on BP. Sub required, I dunno if I can post what Goldstein said.

I hate everything about ESPN. Too mainstream. The only thing I ever use the site for are up to the minute stats. So if I reminded you of Bill Simmons it was completely incidental. Heck, I hade to google Bill Simmons to find out who he was.

Nate Spears is repeating High A. He hit .294/.349/.429 in the Carolina League last season. He doesn't have tools either. He's a baseball rat who gets as much out of his tools as he can, he's a homeless man's David Eckstein.

He'll be converted to a pitcher within 18 months. He was a pretty good pitching prospect in HS, topping out at 94 iirc.

Most importantly the best pitching prospect in the draft rarely goes in the top 5 it seems.

It sounds as if you're arguing that no one should take a pitcher because they're stuff deteriorates.

Look what Minnesota did with Matt Garza, although Garza has plus command.

Gotta love the starts from Guzman and Veal.

No one's saying that arms don't get hurt. Right now Price is the man, but 10 months is a long time in the realm of draft prospects. Price would have rated higher than Miller on a lot of teams' draft boards this year. Of course things will change but why not prioritize right now? There is nothing wrong with taking someone else if Price falters.

The scouting report from 2002 I am looking at says low 90s, which was down but he still came down even more once he signed with the Cubs.

Any shot Veal makes one or two starts for West Tenn if he keeps up his performance in Daytona?

Some stuff on BA. They're right, dont wanna be in Cuba right now...

Well the Twins probably are not complaining after passing on Mark Prior. Then again every other year Joe Mauer (or Mark Teixeira) would be the top player available. That draft's top was ridiculous. You're right, but Brownlie got hurt. If Price gets hurt between now and next June, obviously his draft status is going to go into a freefall. Actually Brownlie looked pretty special the day of the draft. Reports were that his arm was completely healthy and he had an MRI that showed that that was performed a week before the draft. His final year at Rutgers he flashed a mid 90s fastball and a power hammer curve. However after he signed and showed up at the Cubs' camp his velocity was down 5+ MPH and hasn't ever recovered. Still, it was a good pick at the time and Brownlie's status that year is comparable to Brad Lincoln's this year and the Cubbies got him in the last third of the first round.

Felix Pie won't ever be a player to build around but he's the kind of player Jim Hendry would *try* to build around.

Boise's up 2-0 in the eigth. Fabian Jimenez Angulo and Jeremy Papelbon have combined to throw a one hitter thus far. 6.0 IP 1 H, 2 BB, 3 K for Angulo Papelbon struck out one in a perfect inning.

Ah, those are close to Dial's. MGL listed UZR if you scroll down.

It was probably Dial's ratings, Jones was like -14/150 on that metric thus far this season. It's still quite early, but for what it's worth Jones' UZR was +9/150 through the same timeframe.