2012 AA .279/.347/.385, 32 2B, 7 HR, 33 SB, 18 CS, 40 BB, 87 K.
2012 AFL .313/.357/.375.
Gary Brown was the Giants first round draft choice in 2010, #24 overall, out of CS Fullerton where he hit over .400 his junior season while stealing over 50 bases. He only got into 12 pro games that year hitting a meager .159, but blossomed in his first full pro season with high A San Jose in 2011 hitting .336/407/.519 with 14 HR and 53 SB.
The AA Eastern League has tended to be a huge challenge for Giants hitting prospects, and Brown was no exception hitting just .229 in April. He quickly got his feet on the ground, though, and hit .289 over the remainder of the season ending with the slash line listed above. This performance came as a disappointment to many analysts who perhaps had unrealistic expectations from his Cal League performance, despite many of them proclaiming that performance was due to the Cal League's extreme hitting environment.
I think Brown's performance last year was just fine, thank you. In addition to the obvious discounting of April for level adjustment and the notoriously poor Northeast spring weather, there is another factor that I have not seen mentioned before. I pulled up a list of Eastern League batting leaders and found Brown's name sitting at #22 for BA. I noticed that the 21 names listed above him did not exactly read as a who's who of baseball prospects, so I drilled down a bit. What I found was that all but 5 of those 21 names were either repeating the level, more than 1 year older or in most cases, both. In other words, when compared just to his peer group of first time AA players, Brown had the 6'th highest BA in the league.
In his recent Q/A for sjgiants.com, Fred Stanley reiterated that the jump from high A ball to AA is the toughest one in the minors. He also brought up an interesting point that Brown's reputation as a hitter and base-stealer preceded him to the EL and opposing teams spent extra time devising strategies to stop him. Seeing as how he was the only prospect of significance on the team, that would make some sense, although I've never seen that analysis before.
Brown went on to play in the AFL this fall, putting up respectable numbers. He will almost surely be assigned to AAA Fresno to begin the 2013 season and I expect him to do well there. He's had his trial by fire in AA and the PCL is much more like the Cal League in terms of hitting environment.
The one area I have a concern about is his CS rate. He had 19 in 2011 against the 53 SB's and then had 18 in 2012 against the 33 which is quite poor for someone who is supposed to be an elite basestealer. He is going to have to pick up that part of his game as it will have to be a big part of his value as a MLB'er.
The Giants are in full win-now mode and have their roster pretty much set with 4 veteran OF's already signed up. I would expect Brown to be available for a mid-season callup in case of injury or one of the veterans having a severely down season. Otherwise, expect a September cup of coffee and a chance to compete for a starting OF job in 2014.
My own projection for Brown is that he becomes a .270-.280 hitter with some gap power and some SB's with elite defense in CF which translated into a 3.5-4 WAR player. In other words, Dan Gladden with better defense, which is a pretty darn good return for a late first round draft pick. Anything more will be icing on the cake.
I saw Gary Brown play 2 years ago in San Jose and he looked like a man among boys. Everything came so easy to him I got the impression that he may have become a little overconfident from his success. In just one game I noticed twice he took bad routes to balls but was fast enough to recover and still make the plays and he basically did whatever he wanted on the bases with no repercussions.
ReplyDeleteAfter seeing how quickly guys like Timmy, Madison, and Buster came through the system and how Belt looked like he was going to be another shining star early on, I think everyones expectations were that Brownie would do the same. I'm ok with him taking a little longer and hopefully being a little more ready then if he had been fast tracked and now that we have a set OF for next year the pressure should be off.
I read in BA that the coaches made a slight change to Brown's hitting mechanics after 250 abs, since they figured he would be resistent because of his success in Aball. He went on to hit 429 in July and put up respectable #'s for 2012. John Barr likes to pick players with tools that translate well in big leagues and Brown's speed and defense fits well with AT@T. Brown had a good year in AA learning to make adjustments in pro ball, which is a positive thing.
DeleteLG
I would have liked to see Brown move up in 2010. My honest guess is that he might have been bored in San Jose toward the end of the year. He definitely needed a challenge and could have benefited from the promotion.
DeleteGood analysis on Brown's fellow 2012 hitters in the Eastern League.
ReplyDeleteHow does he compare with past Giants hitters who spent time there?
"The AA Eastern League has tended to be a huge challenge for Giants hitting prospects."
Questions.
Is it just Giants hitters who find the AA Eastern League challenging or other teams' hitters as well?
Question #2: Is it challenging for pitchers in general in that league as well, or just hitters?
Question #3: Why is it the toughest test going from high A to AA, and not as tough, say, from low A to high A? You're seeing competition you saw before every time the overall group advances, except the group narrows a bit as only the good ones are promoted. The only reason I can think of, for this particular jump, is a fewer good players are promoted - that is, fewer good ones, (in other words, really elite ones) are promoted. Either that, you start to see a lot of old vets in the AA.
I think a big part of it is you start to see some repeater and minor league lifers in AA, guys who don't have the tools to make it to the majors but know how to play the game and enjoy schooling they young guns coming up.
DeleteIt's interesting that most of the Giants hitting prospects who have made it to the majors skipped AA altogether(Posey) or stayed there only a brief time(Sandoval and Belt). Travis Ishikawa, Nate and Crawford spent more time there and really struggled.
Pitching prospects generally do well in the Eastern League then hit a wall in Fresno.
Overall, the league ERA is lower and the league BA is higher in the EL than any other minor league, so there are definitely league factors that favor pitchers.
The older vets - that's the big part of it. You're right.
DeleteI agree with DrB. Part of it that that as you rise up in the minors, the level of talent is just that much better, as the funneling process winnows out the weaker. Part of it is that in AA, some of the better players who make AAA or the majors, are on the way down, and AA is where they get their final hurrah.
DeleteThat's because the A-level leagues are mostly players with not a lot of experience, many are experiencing pro ball for the first time, and thus are getting adjusted to their new life, and all are pretty young guys.
From what I recall, Nate did not struggle greatly in AA, like other Giants prospects, he just didn't hit great there. The names above shows how AA cleaves out who are the special hitters and who are the ones who are more of a tweener or below. I have to say that I'm really impressed with how well Crawford has done in the majors given how he struggled in the minors. He seems the exception to the rule.
The EL league is a pitchers league, so that actually makes it a good clear way to see which hitters are really good vs. those who have more challenges. I've noticed that for our Giants prospects, the ones who can hit over 1.000 OPS there at a young enough age seems to be MLB quality talents, but those who do it at an older age has some value but it varies, and contact rate seems to be very important in any case, hence why Schierholtz has done better than Bowker even though Bowker has flashier stats in AA-AAA than Nate.
The EL being a pitchers league makes it harder to see who are good pitchers vs. bad, other than if the pitcher can't hack it in AA, you can forget about him going higher. AAA, being a hitters league, can mask how good a pitcher is, I haven't developed any rules of thumb to try to set my expectations for the majors. For our pitchers, either they are good or they aint,
I've not seen any tweeners in AAA come up and surprise, like, for example, Arizona's Brandon Webb, who outshone all his fellow Baby-Backs even though he was so highly touted that the D-backs farm system analysis for that season did not even include his name, he literally came up from nowhere to become one of the better pitchers around.
#3 I think I've read that off-speed stuff in AA is of a different caliber than A. So it begins to really sort the hitters from hackers.
DeleteThanks for adding an additional explanation to the one cause we suspected - old vets.
DeleteSo, pitchers add off-speed stuff going from high A to AA.
Do hitters then adjust?
How long does it take? During the season? In the next level?
If the good hitters adjust, and if takes a year, we should see that even out in AAA? If they don't adjust, they don't make it to the show.
"The Giants are in full win mode."
ReplyDeleteTo everything, there is a season - A season for winning and a seaon for losing.
Only charlatans will tell you that you can win every season by analysing OBP stats to buy low(undervalue)/sell high(overvalue).
Okay OT a little bit. But I caught this interview with the Giants CIO, Bill Schlough. What a character. Nice to see the Giants have people of this caliber throughout the organization, not just the baseball side.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.informationweek.com/global-cio/interviews/9-inspiring-innings-with-sf-giants-cio-b/240144103
Enjoy. Oh and even better, the article is written by a die hard Bums fan, who really gets to eat crow on this one.
I've used the argument you outlined for Brown playing against league-repeaters in arguments on MCC. One point that was brought up as a counter was that list is generated from qualifying ABs, if you lower the bar to say 200-250 ABs you will get more of the age comparable players who are getting rotated in/out midseason. Because of all the attention paid to Brown's age, and the importance some prospect hounds attach to age/level, I thought it was a clever point to make - Brown's stats are actually quite good especially if you factor in the older more experienced players repeating. Brown was all over the leaderboard in the Eastern: 2nd in ABs, 4th in hits, 3rd in SBs... 1st in CS (Gulp!). He was 17th in OBP and BA. Its a rough adjustment no doubt, but that Stanley statement on him really put it in perspective. There were people aiming for him big time. On one hand welcome to the next level of professional baseball but on the other hand, he's sort of the lone ranger like you said.
ReplyDeleteHere's his splits: http://minorleaguecentral.com/player?pid=518502&split=2012 (This is a pretty good site, don't know if you've seen it DrB, they compile minor league stats and can give you splits and such). Like LG says up above, the Giants gave him some time to do it his way, watched him fail, and then went to work. The big knock is his huge drop in ISO. Well, look at his July, when he came alive after tooling around on it. Is it a SSS mirage, or is it a guy figuring it out? We don't know, he faded down the stretch!
He is a stubborn cocky guy, I think he needs to listen to his instructors a tad more. The big knock is tough RHP coming inside on him, and he needs to learn to adjust to that. And to advanced pickoff moves and paying attention on the basepaths. I really like Gary Brown, I think he's a fast twitch sneaky strong fast as hell guy. And I also think expectations went too high, and are now yo-yo'd way too low. I would be surprised if he doesn't get a cup of coffee, and I wouldn't be shocked if he's a call up if things aren't going well in July. I don't think he's going to be very challenged by Fresno. Great call leaving him as your #1 DrB.
Nice! Thanks for the link, site looks great, I had forgotten about it, been using First Inning, but will use this one going forward. However, just noticed that the SB numbers are incorrect for the monthly splits...
DeleteThe issue appears to be that Brown thought he knew it all. He alluded to this in his interview during the AFL this season, when he admitted that he did not take full advantage of his opportunity in the AFL last season and was approaching his second AFL differently. I've seen some Giants interview that alluded to him needing to fail to get him to listen to their instruction. I'm hopeful after that interview with him that he'll have the proper mindset heading into AAA in 2013, but I was a little afraid of that when I learned that he was a Boras client after we drafted him and still have a fear that the cockiness will rear its head again, that this is not the last time we see it.
One thing to keep in mind: Gary Brown might be our best trade chip. I totally agree with you that Crick has the highest upside in the system. But if something goes screwy with the plan next year, maybe Brown isn't the call to come up, maybe he's the guy that gets sent. The Giants have all these CFs right now, they have Galindo, Hollick and Gustavo coming at later points. They are all big questionmarks, but if they can't use Brown in the next year or two, he might be the trade chip. And here's where you have to really work on balance and not stack your guys up too much. I think the Rangers have a little issue (nice to have, but an issue) getting value for Olt and Profar right now and slotting them into their team.
DeleteIf brown is used as a trading chip, I would hope it would be a trade similar to the Pineda/Montero trade. Eventually we should start putting more cheap players in the starting lineup.
DeleteShankbone,
DeleteMy answer to the MCC'ers would be that those 200 AB sample sizes are just too small to compare. Anybody can have a great or terrible 200 AB's. It just doesn't mean much. I KNOW that's the retort they would give if you said Brown's April stats should be discounted due to league adjustment and weather. They'd just say you have to count the whole season to get a large enough sample size.
Actually I did discount the weather! Maybe that was a bit too over the top, but it was his first extended stay outside california, he's native and went to Fullerton. So I got ridiculed for that a tad. Funny theory but I think it was more getting exposed to advanced pitching where they can really spot their fastballs in hard places to hit like in on the hands. Still, I don't think it was easy for young Gary. But again, this is his first time failing. Is there no room for failing, getting smacked in the mouth? I think he rebounded well.
DeleteI always worry much more about a prospect who starts out a level hot the cools off than one who struggles at the start then pulls it together. Brown did slump a bit in August, but I think he was beat up a bit by then and possibly getting fatigued. He rebounded in the AFL, so I'm not going to worry about it too much.
DeleteI really like him as a prospect. I agree with DrB that he is the #1 prospect in the chain, though mostly because it is a combo of talent and closeness to the majors. If it was just by potential, I would give Crick the nod over Brown and I would have to think hard with Stratton and Blackburn.
ReplyDeleteI like that he has adjusted well to each new league and generally gets better in the league when he repeats it. I like that he understands his value is as a leadoff guy, getting on base a LOT and stealing a lot of bases because of his speed. I like even better that he understands that even leadoff guys can provide a lot of value by having a good SLG/ISO, and that his approach to hitting is to hit for power as well as OBP. I love his speed but hate that he gets caught so much. Why? Giants need to find the answer and soon, 2011 was fine as that was his first pro season, plus he improved from the first half to the second half, percentage-wise, but now it is two seasons, and catchers get better as one rises.
He was neither as good as people thought he was in 2011 nor as bad as they now they he is in 2012. I think his ranking in the overall majors show that dichotomy well, as he has been in the 80-100 range overall. He's got great enough skills that he could break out and do well in the majors, but enough issues that he might never make it. People saw the former in 2011, the latter in 2012, but forget that he's a mixture of both. I prefer to keep an even keel on a player unless there is a big outlier performance in either direction. I think he did just fine in 2012 and continue to be very positive that he'll be the leadoff guy we have been looking for, while providing great defense for us in CF, though I'm not so positive that he'll be great at stealing bases. But with his speed and our middle lineup hitters, his speed will show up frequently in the boxscore with him scoring from 2B on singles and 1B on doubles.
Very interesting analysis. I strongly adhere to the comparison to age analysis, I used to do that at my blog when I had more time to dig into each minor league team, player by player. I like using OPS, though, not BA. He did not show up well that way. Counting 23 YO and younger, there were 27 hitters with better OPS, meaning he was 28th. However, since OBP is his ticket to the majors, I took a look at that, and out of 23 YO and younger, he was #19, which is still not great.
What I thought was good was that his contact rate was still 84% for the season despite his struggles. And 85% in the last three months. And 24 BB/50 K, you want at least 50% and over 100% ideally. He also had a .361 OBP in the last three months. Which would have tied him for 9th among 23 YO and younger. Now it's looking very interesting.
As Shankbone noted, he petered out in August/Sept in ISO, but I wonder if that severe flu (bad enough that it was thought that he might have caught the bad Valley Flu) he had in the AFL affected his stamina late in the season. Once he got some rest, he did better in the AFL. Still, despite that bad last month, he had a 140 ISO in the last three months, which would work nicely for a leadoff guy who gets on base above average times.
I'm really looking forward to seeing him perform in 2013 in AAA. I think he's there all season, most likely, even if injuries and poor performances might tempt the Giants to bring him up. It would take a true breakout season on his part PLUS a true breakdown on the parts of everybody else capable of playing the OF for the Giants, plus inability to trade for anyone mid-season, to bring him up, given comments in the last season or so, about how Giants management sees that they may have perhaps been advancing their prospects too quickly, and thus they will take the slow and easy route going forward. He'll most likely will be held back because of that and because of his challenges in 2011 and 2012, which shows that he is not an elite prospect and thus we must treat with more gloved hands.
DeleteI definitely think he's a sure September Call-up, barring a catastrophe season on his part, and he'll probably be pushing for a starting spot in the majors starting 2014. When he is ready, Pagan would move to a corner spot, where he's adequate offensively but very good defensively.
I think he's going to have a nice BA (.270+), good OBP (.350+), good enough SLG (.400+), leading to a .750+ OPS, which is good to great for a CF and leadoff hitter, plus he should provide great defense with his speed in AT&T, I think we saw a taste of that with Peguero in September, how great he was there. He'll easily be in double digits stealing but whether he becomes a great basestealer that we envisioned when he was drafted, is now in huge question. Hopefully somebody can work with him extensively in AAA to prep him for majors (Randy Winn?). But leadoff offense with great defense should provide 2-4 WAR easily each year, which is great value anywhere in the draft.
Are any of those 23 or younger repeaters?
Deleteogc,
DeleteMaybe by AA it's not as important, but I still think the single best predictor of future success when looking at minor league stats is BA followed by SLG%, but SLG% only if it is accompanied by a good BA.
Proximity to the majors is certainly a factor in ranking Brown above Crick. I just think he was #1 last year and his AA campaign was actually quite good when league and level factors are taken into account. Passing the AA test is a big deal for hitting prospects, especially in the EL. I guess Brown's prospect status is diminished in many people's eyes after what looks on the surface to be a mediocre AA campaign but I think he did well enough that in my eyes his status at worst stayed even and maybe was even enhanced. Therefore I see no reason to drop him in the rankings.
DeleteI agree with your assessment of Brown, I think his talent is still there, just cloudy because of a bad early start to his 2012 season, whatever the reason, but I like his 2012 season. As you have noted before, not all prospects will have a great season start to finish or overall, we need to look in context to the league and how he progressed during the season. That is why I still like Noonan. So like you I think that his 2012 performance showed me that he has the talent he showed before, just that he didn't advance enough in other's eyes because they had heightened expectations.
DeleteI was only trying to delineate how I viewed Brown vs. Crick. I think Brown is a clear #1 prospect for most lists blending potential and proximity, other than those focused solely on potential.
I am very glad the Giants now have the luxury of taking their time with Brown. Since his #1 weapon is speed, until I see his CS rate drop, I remain on the unconvinced side of the fence. Hopefully he breaks through in Fresno - which would mean the Giants actually can teach someone to steal bases AND Brown can listen and apply it. I want to see proof of improvement.
ReplyDelete2014/15 is just fine for me with Brown. On the plus side, he does represent some farm backup depth if Pence can't become a productive hitter in 2013.
Proof of improvement on two levels! I see what you done there.
DeleteLearned from my wife...
DeleteI don't think he has to steal bases to be an effective major leaguer, but if he's not going to steal bases he will have to hit closer to .300 and with at least gap power.
DeleteWell just look at Denard Span. He's a great CFer, gets on base well, only has a small amount of power, but is not an elite basestealer, or at least wasnn't one last season. he was still highly regarded as a big leaguer. He looks a lot like Span to me, and I would love to have a guy like that on the team. Brown can be a good major league starter without the base stealing, but it definitely would be huge if he could fix his issues.
DeleteI read somewhere that Brown acknowledged his CS issues, and it will be his main focus in 2013. He says he is still reluctant on his first step. Hopefully he can put it together at fresno.
Brown has shown some power once he figures out a level, as he has progressed through college and the minors. So I would expect to see some gap power from him when he reaches the majors, particularly triples. But otherwise, Span does look like a good comp for Brown. I would also expect better defense as well.
DeleteHe acknowledged his CS issues last year as well, if I remember right, so I was very disappointed by the regression in this season. But that's what the minors are for, for him to learn to correct his weaknesses. I think he really needs to put it together in Fresno, else he's looking at a second year there in 2014. Hopefully the Giants will work on him a lot more with him in AAA. I still can't believe that they only have a roving baserunning coach, they should at minimum have someone in AAA coaching him one-on-one, but really, should have had someone at San Jose helping him then so that he's ready when he reaches the majors.
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeletereaching atmosphere......?
DeleteNot sure why anyone would waste their precious time writing something like that.
DeleteI believe it is someone going on blogs to advertise. I've seen it before, they quickly try and make up relevant info in a comment so that you will go to their profile and see their product.
DeleteI get the occassional spambots too. I delete the whole comment because, as you can see here, their job is done, their link is still here, offered up for anyone who should notice and click on it. Removing the comment is no big deal to them, they planted their link in their name link.
Deletethink of it as a compliment doc
ReplyDeletewhen you get hit by a spambot, it means your site is getting traffic
all that spam protect means nothing...except more typing for real people
giants sign casilla for 3
working hard to keep the pen and depth
nice to see that sabean no longer takes pen arms for granted
I like Casilla, but have to say this one looks like at least a moderate overpay both in annual salary and in years. The Giants are going to develop all those bullpen arms and then have no place to put them
Delete