#11 Jarrett Parker, OF. BD: 1/1/1989. 6'3", 190 lbs. B-L, T-L.
College(Virginia): .333/.428/.593, 17 2B, 8 3B, 10 HR, 12 SB, 2 CS.
Remember the early days of this blog when several of us were saying we wanted the Giants to draft one of several 5 tool CF's out of college in the 2010 draft? Leon Landry, Tyler Holt and Jarrett Parker were the names most often mentioned. Parker had burst onto the scene as a sophomore in 2009 putting up a .355/.451/.664 line with 16 HR's and 20 SB's. To ask him to top that, or even repeat it might have been a bit unrealistic. Parker got off to a slow start, but finished pretty well and didn't have a bad season. It was just disappointing in comparison to his breakout in 2009.
The Giants stayed true to their recent form scooping up formerly highly touted prospects whose stock dropped in their draft season, taking Parker in round 2. The pick was strangely greeted with a yawn from a lot of watchers and he seemed to completely fall off the radar screen when he didn't sign in time to play pro ball in 2010. I really like the pick and think the Giants may have gotten themselves a real gem here. Parker has hit for average and power and has shown excellent plate discipline. Even though his batting line looked worse in 2010 than 2009, he dropped his K rate from 80 in 265 AB to 56 in 243 AB. He has lots of room to fill out his frame, so projects to even more power in the future.
It will be interesting to see where he is assigned in 2010. Will the Giants put him in RF alongside Gary Brown in CF in San Jose, or do they put him in CF in Augusta while keeping Chuckie Jones back in camp and then Salem-Keizer?
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I had a question in my mind for a long time, and Jarret Parker is the perfect illustration of my question. How much money are we talking about that prevented him from signing back in June? I am guessing that it'll be at most in the mid 5 figures. Wouldn't it make sense for someone like Parker to just sign, and get the two months of experience, and possibly accelerate his time to major leagues? Look what it did for Chuckie Jones. Unless you are a top 10 pick holding out for millions, or a later round guy with questionable shot at the major leagues where you don't have a good chance of recouping the difference, it makes no sense to delay signing for a few thousand dollars, or even a few tens of thousands.
ReplyDeleteHe signed for $700,000 which was the slot estimate for a supplemental 1st rounder. The guy right before him (Robert Rasmussen) only got 500k, the player after him (Jordan Swagerty) got 600k.
ReplyDeleteThe whole signing period and slotting system in baseball is a joke. It's a joke from both directions. You are absolutely right that in the big picture, $100 K doesn't make that much difference to Parker, but if it doesn't make much difference for Parker, it makes a whole lot less difference to the Giants. Wouldn't they be better off to get the player signed for an extra $100 K and get him playing earlier?
ReplyDeleteI'm not so sure getting them on the field right away is all that important anyway. Look at Brandon Belt. He didn't play at all the summer of his draft, went to instructional league in the fall where he learned a new batting stance and swing and less than a year later was playing in AAA.
I disagree about the waiting for $$ thing. It's advantageous from both sides to wait.
ReplyDeleteFrom the player's perspective, six to eight weeks of time can garner tens of thousands of dollars. That "doesn't make a difference" to the player? I'm sure that lots of 18-22 year olds probably agree with you, which is why I'm glad they have professional representation to stop them from making stupid fiscal decisions like giving up tens of thousands of dollars in exchange for 100-200 at bats, which are going to be a fraction of the at bats they will take as a professional. They still participate in fall instructional leagues and possibly in winter leagues, then report back to spring training in February. The loss of months July and August in the overall picture isn't worth $50,000 to a young man just starting off and who has no guarantee of making big money through professional sports. It's the same principle that should animate salary negotiations before taking a new job -- you should never just say "yes" to a job and take the posted salary unless the market is entirely in the employer's favor. You should do your research, find out the likely salary range of the position is and start off with a counterproposal to the posted salary near the top of that range -- a couple days of waiting (and, admittedly, some risk) can produce annual salary increases of 5%, 10%, sometimes even 25%. Parker held out for such an increase (of a bonus, not a salary) -- that's just smart business.
From the team's perspective, while the development time of July and August would be nice, it's not like these guys haven't been and aren't playing baseball. Parker played quite a bit of baseball that year against pretty good competition, albeit not as good as what he would have seen in short season ball. But if you were a team, would you sacrifice $50,000 for an extra 100-200 ABs? Put another way, would you like Jarret Parker to play for 6-8 weeks additional weeks as a pro, or have Jarret Parker and a free agent Latin American arm that has hit 92 mph as a 16 year old?
All things being equal, both the team and the player usually want to sign a deal quickly (unless we're talking about a pitcher who was overworked during his college season, but that's a different story). But things aren't equal. We're talking about money that's a significant portion of a team's development budget, and a significant portion of a young man's career earnings to that point of his life.
Before the last agreement with the Player's Association, there was talk of eliminating short season leagues altogether. Drafted players would to to Instructional League first and then a full season league the following season. I'm not so sure it wouldn't be better to bring them to camp, let the coaches get a good look at them, correct any obvious flaws during camp and then go out and practice the newfound skills the next spring, kind of the Brandon Belt formula.
ReplyDeleteI strongly disagree with Dave, particularly for high school draftees. See what Chuckie Jones did? He probably advanced a year closer to the majors by getting to play rather than doing nothing when signing late.
ReplyDeleteOf course, that is presuming that he makes the majors and the vast majority do not. So you can go either way on that, really, from a player's perspective.
From a team's perspective, however, it matters greatly. Sure, the amateurs have played a lot of baseball, but as we all have seen, things change once they turn pro and face more uniformly good players on the other team. Things also change when you are now being paid, it makes it different for some people. Better to find out sooner what a player is made of. That is especially true for high school players.
Now, most teams end up paying around slot anyway for the draftees, so if they are delaying offering slot, then they should be offering that from the beginning and make it clear that that is the final offer, please sign now. But it just seems to me that agents seem to want to justify their cut of the bonus by trying to wait out the team. But I'll admit here that I don't know the process of this, so perhaps I'm getting it wrong somewhere.
I'm not sure where the $50K figure comes from, though. Sounds like Dave is talking about the salary for the player if he signs early and plays pro ball. My understanding is that pro ball pays squat, maybe $20-40K, and I am thinking more the low end. So at worse, a team is only out $15-20K with the prospect signed early and playing.
Ultimately, most sign for slot except for players who fell in the draft, and the average team is spending $5-10M on bonuses in the draft, so ultimately, the amount of money being squabbled over is maybe 5-10% of the total budget, not a large portion of the budget and you lose some valuable experiences, I think.
For me, Parker is a huge question mark. We don't yet know what position he should play, although I'll agree with most that a CF-ish guy in RF makes a lot of sense at GiantPhoneCo Park. I have him slotted at #22, mostly for a lack of knowing who he is and what to do with him.
ReplyDeleteIf he turns out to be a 20HR/20steals guy with excellent defense in RF and a decent OBP, then yeah he's a great draft steal. And while I appreciate guys with all-around skills, I also recognize that he doesn't have the speed of a Darren Ford or Gary Brown, nor the power of a Roger Kieschnick or Thomas Neal. Maybe he's a domestic Francisco Peguero?
As for where he goes, I can't see how Chuckie Jones deserves anything less than a starting OF spot in Augusta. If Parker is next to him, that's fine. Maybe they'll do the Perez/Peguero Shuffle in east Georgia. Wherever Parker goes, I'll be very interested to see how he handles pro ball.