just that Laporta isn’t that young and in his (very) limited time with Cleveland, he actually hasn’t done anything good. There are potentially good reasons for that (new organization, the olympics, sleeping on Wes Hodges couch, etc…), but I’d rather not have to make excuses.

Yeah, I’ll say getting Santana makes it all worthwhile. If he turns out to be as good as everyone thinks he will be, then this trade will go down with the Hafner trade in Shapiro’s legacy.

The appeal of Rivero is that he plays a skill position (ss) and while being young for his leagues (20 in High A), has held his own with the bat.

Something maybe to get real excited about, in the second half of this past year, he posted a triple slash line of .300/.371/.474, with a BB/K ratio of 24/37. Not sure if this is just a product of small sample size or things clicking for him.

this year was Goedert’s opportunity to step up and prove himself as an old, but decent prospect. sadly, that didn’t happen. add to that a switch from 2B to 3B, and….

I agree strongly.

I really like these groupings, Adam.

Really, really like them.

Those were both depressing posts…

If he really does have the bat, he has a position. He is a player with some athleticism. As I recall, his switch off of 3B had more to do with concerns about the health of his arm than his athletic ability (although he wasn’t more than an adequate defender). But he’s probably limited to 1B/DH, with a lesser chance at playing LF i would think.

OT, have you ever actually seen him play? I’m not questioning your “tweener” characterization or your account of his body type, etc., just wondering what they’re based on.

“not that Peralta has these talents”.

See, most players are tweeners. Even the good ones. Chisenhall was a great first round pick because he was a first or second round talent who came to us at a discount. His position is IF, which is an organizational need. He was almost 20, which seems to be the magic draft age number the Tribe has settled on for their high draft picks, because it’s an age where you can tell a lot about a player (very diferent from those 18 year olds), but they still have that pre man-muscle “upside”. Speaking of man-muscles, it’s foolish to try to pin a HR total on the guy. For one thing, he has at best a 50/50 chance of making the major leagues. If he does make it, and I believe and hope that he will, he can become a very good hitter, but I can’t yet tell what type of good hitter he’ll be.

At SS, his bat would play a lot better, and at 3B, his bat has less appeal.

This is pretty accurate, but the small piece you’re missing is that he could be a standout defender at 3B, and mixed with a 15-20 HR, that’s a pretty good player.

Has anyone ever done any sort of quant analysis to see if there is any sort of correlation to collegiate baseball stats and minor league production?

Very tough to do, mainly because it’s very tough to project how different hitters and pitchers will react to the change from aluminum to wood. Aluminum gives all the hitters more power, but it doesn’t make all of them better contact hitters — you want to find the ones who aren’t relying on it to make good contact, who will be hitting doubles instead of homers when they make the switch. As for pitchers, many college guys never learn to pitch inside effectively, because they’re scared to, and it’s hard to say which ones will adjust. Many teams (including the Indians) place special emphasis on college players that they’ve been able to scout at least a few times in a wood-bat environment, such as the Cape Code and Alaska Leagues.

Having said all that, I’m sure translation models are out there, but no serious statistician or scout would treat NCAA baseball monolithically — the translation factors would have to be specific to each conference at the very least.

comparing stats of players in the ACC, SEC, Pac 10 to those in the Big Ten will lead to invalid conclusions

Pretty confident I covered that by specifically asking if the apparent similarity in their triple slash lines accurately reflected the strength of schedules of their programs. Actually, if anything, I’m comparing Crowe’s college performance favorably to Swisher’s. And yet, who’s the major leaguer?

And in what galaxy does Chisenhall turning into a major league third baseman who hits 15 home runs a year qualify as an undesireable result? That would have been the eighth most home runs among all 2008 third baseman.

If that’s a tweener, I’ll take one every draft.

I believe some scouts think Chisenhall can play second, which of course makes his offensive numbers more impressive.

I have no idea what to think of Putnam. I actually watched him pitch while I was at Michigan, but I really have almost no idea how to evaluate guys who have less than a full season of professional ball. It’ll be interesting to see where Putnam starts this season.

labrum injury + low-A reliever = bad mojo

a big thing keeping me from putting Rondon among the “excellent prospects” is the gap between where he is now and the pros. Especially for a pitchers, I take this seriously. If a year from now Rondon has put up similar numbers at Akron and is now just one level away from Cleveland…he’ll be an “excellent” prospect.

Not that you’re wrong about any of that, but I think the real answer for most of us* might be not to pay attention to any of them, irrespective of country of origin, until they’ve put together a full, age-appropriate season.

Or, you can take BA’s route, and announce that T.J. House is going to be our fourth starter in 2012.

*Not Adam.

I spent a good five minutes looking for Gregario’s 2008 numbers and couldn’t find anything

I don’t know about that, most teams prefer a defensive standout for fourth outfielder, and Crowe isn’t one.

McBride is hitting well in the Hawaiian League, but unfortunately, its in the outfield, and not at catcher. Along with a position change, he’s had health problems, is 23, and has yet to conquer High-A pitching. Way more negatives than positives.

Jordan Brown should probably be in the “others” list. Although the decision to keep Aubrey on the 40-man and not roster Brown seems to justify my decision to leave him off. I have a hard time getting excited by McBride, who’ll be 24 next May, and has played a total of 17 games above A-. And in his last full season he put up a sub .800 OPS playing at low-A.

If Bryson can show he has recovered from the labrum problems, he might be interesting again. But as I said above, I’m doubtful.

You did not give any reason why those three names should be on the list.

Are you subscribing to the “anyone I’ve heard of should be ranked” philosophy?

i think its higher than that

Not sure this is warranted. He was pretty much mashing right up until the day of the trade, at which point his life went haywire. I’m inclined to give him a pass til spring.

I believe Tony Lastoria reported a while back that he retired so that he could go back to college and pursue a football career. Here’s a link.

If Frank Herrmann has a sinker, its not very good at generating groundballs. Two seasons in a row, he’s been more of a fly-ball pitcher.

If Herrmann is taken it is because a team has a particular scout who really loves him and who commands a lot of respect within the organization. there’s no reason, given his record, to take him.

Anybody have a pronunciation on “Jeanmar”? Is that a straight forward Spanish name, HEY-ahn-maar, or something else?

I love this site, and I’m not being sarcastic.

There are increasingly frequent days that I wish I had a similar mistake with my birthdate.

Kremlinology.

Jay, I’ve been noticing the same disparity over time and figgered he was a little older than I initially thought. But then I heard some Indians spokesman, I don’t know if it was Atkins or not and have no link, but he referred to him by the younger date. Not that it makes a whole lot of difference either way…