#18 Conor Gillaspie. 3B. B-R, T-R. BD: 07-18-1987. 6'1", 200 lbs.
2009 Stats: High A- .286/.364/.386, 4 HR's, 31 doubles.
For a supplemental first round draft pick who hit over .400 in college, Conor Gillaspie had a disappointing season in 2009. While his BA wasn't terrible, he showed very little power and struggled on defense. One explanation, from Giants Director of Player Development Fred Stanley, is that Conor's knowledge of the strike zone was too good for high A ball. The theory is that he had a lot of strikes called on pitches that were actually out of the strike zone, and would have been balls with better umpiring. His IsoOBP of .078 was good, so maybe there is something to it. He'll have to be able to handle umps giving pitchers the benefit of the doubt when he's a rookie in the big leagues, though.
I saw Conor play 3 times last season. The most worrisome part of his game is on defense. He looks quite awkward at 3B and appears to struggle to make routine throws. The 3'rd time I saw him, he made several routine plays without incident and looked a bit more confident. He reportedly voluntarily went to Arizona Instructionals in the fall to work on his defense, so maybe it will come around.
I would project Conor to be a Bill Mueller/Dave Magadan type of hitter with a high BA, marginal power, marginal defender. If he can play a passable 3B, he can have a solid MLB career if he can consistently hit >.300. He'll start 2010 at AA Richmond.
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Hey DrB,
ReplyDeleteI was wondering when Gillespie would pop up...He kinda is a forgotten man becasue of his relative struggles last year, but the boy can hit and play ball (Bill Mueller is a really good comp) and I can really see him taking off at Richmond this coming season....
BTW, I really hope the Giants load the Flying Squirrels with talent this season beasue I will be going to alot of games...Should be some real nice hitting...
SteveVA
They should have a good group of talent there. You'd figure, at least, the following:
ReplyDeleteNeal
Kieschnick
Ford
Gillaspie
Noonan
Tanner
Clark
Also, maybe Crawford for a bit. Pretty much all the minor league teams will be interesting next season, the least interesting probably being Fresno - and they might have Bumgarner and Posey there to start the year.