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Minor League Resources

As those who have been around here for awhile know, I'm a fairly obsessive follower of the Indians minor league system.  The full organizational perspective, including player acquisition, development, and major league usage is part of why I like baseball so much.  Most of what I post is simply gleaned from a host of websites that provide minor league data.  For convenient reference, here are some of the ones out there.  For comparison, I've linked all these sites to Matt Laporta's page.

Baseball Reference (minors) - the major league site is the grand poo-bah of wasting time on the internet looking up baseball stuff (and is fantastic).  The minor league site has been up and running for awhile and is pretty good at providing you with basic stats for hitting and fielding.  For players who have switched leagues in-season, it provides the individual as well as cumulative lines.  Also provides some basic league and team summary data for perspective (league OPS, team OPS).  If you wander around for awhile you can find more league data, like average age, as well.

milb.com - Major League Baseball's official minor league site.  Provides minor league scoreboards as well as team and individual data.  Provides basic offensive stats, but only for the current and former season, as well as career totals.  Also provides some basic splits.

The Baseball Cube - it has been around for awhile and for some time was the only convenient source of data extending back into college stats.  Provides just basic stats and does not provide cumulative lines like B-Ref.  Has a nice draft index which allows you to look through year by year, round by round, or team by team drafts with links to player stats.

First Inning.com - One of the newer websites, provides some extended stats (K%, BB%, BABIP, etc) in addition to the basic stats.  Also includes some BIP data (LD%, GB%, FB%) and splits.  Data does not go back very far for older players.

FanGraphs - Another site which recently added minor league data.  Also includes basic and extended batting/pitching statistics.  Site has been regularly updated with new features over the past two years.

MinorLeagueSplits.com - For a long time was the only place to get good split data, but had a terrible interface.  Very recently got a major overhaul and now provides season, level, and cumulative splits of all kinds.  Also allows you to park and luck neutralize the data.

Baseball Prospectus - I have to admit that I'm not a subscriber to BPro, so I don't use it much as much of their content is pay-only.  They do have links to minor league players that are in their proprietary PECOTA projection system.

Baseball America - another site that puts most of its content behind a pay-wall.  As far as stats go, they don't have much to offer (current season feed only). Does have lots of commentary extending into the high school and college ranks with a heavy focus on providing scouting reports for the draft (if you get really excited about knowing who the 13th ranked high school outfielder in Florida is this year).  These days I almost never go there.

MinorLeagueBall.com - a fellow SBN site run by Jon Sickels.  Provides scouting reports and commentary on minor league players throughout the league.  I used to follow it closely until I came to realize Jon, who seems like a nice and informative guy, knows very little about the Tribe's system or its players.  Also the commentators on the site are the diehard fantasy baseball type.  Like BA, it's fallen off the list of places I visit.

Anything I'm missing out on that people use?

Also, for specific Indians coverage, Tony Lastoria runs a great blog for the goings-ons in the Tribe's farm system.  TheDiatriber, an LGT regular, also has a great blog providing general Tribe system commentary.  Be sure to check out his Lazy Sundays.

 

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Sickels posted his review of his own Indians top 20 list the other day.

It really showed how little he’s paying attention both before the season and during.

I could only roll my eyes when he said about Beau Mills “Should be moved up to a B+?”

Seriously?

by afh4 on Aug 24, 2008 11:44 AM EDT reply reply actions actions   0 recs

Yeah, seriously. You’re taking the fanboy view that anything less than an A means he isn’t a good prospect. You save A grades for potential impact guys.

Mills realistically is not a potential impact guy, he projects as Garko with more power, but still only at first base. He put up good numbers but not monster numbers — not even as good as Santana, and that guy’s a catcher! — and he just turned 22 without reaching Double-A.

This is not to defend Sickels’ work on the list overall — it’s pretty weak — and it’s not to say Mills isn’t a very good prospect. But he could be younger or higher, he could have better numbers, he could play a skill position, and those are things that would make him an A prospect.

by Jay on Aug 24, 2008 2:44 PM EDT to parent up reply reply actions actions   0 recs

Here’s my point and it doesn’t have anything to do with what defines an “A” or “B” prospect in Sickels’ system because I don’t even really know.

If Mills was already a B before he played a game this year how is he not a B+ now? If a season like Mills has had, essentially mastering the age appropriate level and preparing for promotion on a pretty studly route, isn’t worth half a grade over an uneven first season in pro ball then what’s the point of such a vague grading system?

In other words, if Mills last year and Mills this year are graded the exact same way what does this dumb letter system really communicate?

by afh4 on Aug 24, 2008 3:27 PM EDT to parent up reply reply actions actions   0 recs

I think Mills’ rank/grade last season were based on high expectations for a first-rounder. I don’t think he has significantly exceeded anyone’s preseason expectations. I would not have been shocked had he slugged his way to Akron by the break.

by Jay on Aug 24, 2008 3:57 PM EDT to parent up reply reply actions actions   0 recs

From Sickels, pre-2008:

I’m not a super-huge fan of Beau Mills, and probably rank him a tad lower than other analysts. I think he’ll hit for power but I have questions about his other skills and want to see more pro data.

This is obviously a dumb argument I’ve started. The larger point is that Sickels doesn’t know anything, at all, about the Indians’ farm.

Josh Rodriguez 4?

Brad Snyder 6?

Adam Davis ranked at all?

by afh4 on Aug 25, 2008 2:34 AM EDT to parent up reply reply actions actions   0 recs

I don’t fault Sickels too much for this. He lives in Kansas and primarily scouts teams (college and pro) in the Midwest. The Indians really don’t have any teams or many opponents in his area. But the Adam Davis ranking is laughable.

by APV on Aug 25, 2008 7:45 AM EDT to parent up reply reply actions actions   0 recs

I mean, he takes this on and uses the site to sell a book.

Obviously, he provides a lot of free content but still-how can you sell a book with those rankings? He might as well just mimic the BA rankings for teams where he’s going to rank Adam Davis in the top 20.

by afh4 on Aug 25, 2008 1:00 PM EDT to parent up reply reply actions actions   0 recs

I posted a very brief critique there.

by Jay on Aug 25, 2008 2:11 PM EDT to parent up reply reply actions actions   0 recs

Nice work, Adam – we probably should add this to our Essential Links, it’s a great overview. I don’t know if everyone has noticed that I put direct links to the Milb.com stat pages for each of our full-season minor league clubs in that block.

One thing I would update is that Baseball Prospectus has an interesting little Minor League Stats page, and I believe it is free content. It includes a Hitters page and a Pitchers page for each full-season league with the “real statistics” for every player in that league. It then adds two other versions of each of those: (1) a “translation” version, which translates all the stats for league and park and level, arriving at a fully adjusted major-league-equivalent line for every player. (2) a “peak projection” version of the translation, where a standard age/performance curve peaking at 27 is applied to each translated line, to give you an idea of how the player’s current performance, this season only, might translate to the majors at his peak. It’s a pretty sloppy projection, but interesting nonetheless.

by Jay on Aug 24, 2008 2:55 PM EDT reply reply actions actions   0 recs

yep…it’s free

by APV on Aug 24, 2008 3:37 PM EDT to parent up reply reply actions actions   0 recs

Hello Adam,

Thanks for putting that together – greatly appreciated. I was wanting a page with links to the main Minor League baseball resources – it’s easier to do cross-checking and such. Thanks also to Jay for that info. about Baseball Prospectus also.

The "cream of the crop" doesn't always rise to the top.

by indiansfan on Aug 26, 2008 12:51 AM EDT to parent up reply reply actions actions   0 recs

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