Friday, December 7, 2018

Scouting the 2019 Draft: Shea Langeliers

While we wait with baited breath for Farhan Zaidi's first major transaction as Giants GM, we'll keep on scouting the 2019 draft in which the Giants will make the 10'th pick.

Shea Langeliers, C, College(Baylor).  B-R, T-R.  6'0", 190 lbs.

2017:  .313/.388/.540, 14 2B, 2 3B, 10 HR, 9.88 BB%, 15.23 K%, 243 PA.
2018:  .252/.351/.496, 18 2B, 2 3B, 11 HR, 13.06 BB%, 16.79 K%, 268 PA.
2017(Cape Cod League):  .234/.324/.469, 8 2B, 2 3B, 6 HR, 9.66 BB%, 24.14 K%, 145 PA.

Langeliers is the other college catcher rated as a top 10 pick on many early draft boards.  He's not as big as Adley Rutschman but defnitely has a catcher's frame.  Whereas Rutschman exploded offensively in his sophomore season, Langeliers shined as a freshman then took a step back in 2018.  If you look closely at the secondary numbers though, the lower sophomore numbers were almost entirely due to a BABIP drop from .337 to .263, both of which are likely to regress to something in the middle.  He hit just .234 on the Cape but more than half of his 30 hits went for XBH's.

Langeliers has a simple, quick swing with almost not load and only a minimal slide step with his front foot.  I do not see an arm bar. He is still able to generate power with quick torso rotation.  One scouting report from a professional scout on the 2080 website seemed to really like the swing and projects him as a plus hitter with power.  I actually like his body and swing mechanics better than Andrew Vaughn, plus he has the positional advantage on Vaughn.

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DrB's Updated 2019 Draft Board:

1.  Bobby Witt Jr., SS, HS:  5-tool athlete with bloodline who can stick at SS.

2.  Adley Rutschman, C, College(Oregon St):  Excellent catching prospect whose bat had a huge sophomore breakout.

3.  CJ Abrams, SS, HS:  4+ tool prospect with best wheels in draft. Power lags a bit.

4. Shea Langeliers, C, College(Baylor):  Solid catching prospect with potential to be a plus bat.

5.  Andrew Vaughn, 1B, College(Cal):  Top college power bat in the draft.  The numbers guys will like him more than the scouts.

5 comments:

  1. It's beginning to sound like you believe that Andy Vaughn is overrated. I've seen him rated as high as the third pick and as low as the 35th pick. I suspect it will be somewhere in between.

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    1. He's got a very bad body and I'm not in love with the swings I've seen on video.

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    2. There have been any number of major league players who had bad bodies , but could hit. The few that quickly come to mind was Ernie Lomabardi, John Kruk, Steve Garvey, Kirby Puckett,Pr5ince Fielder and Babe Ruth (lol).

      All this guy does is hit at every level.

      I would love to find a site that has his splits and see how he has done against Friday night pitchers ( usually the best college pitchers) as aginst his other at-bats against lesser pitchers.

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    3. If he had Steve Garvey's swing, I'd be right there with you. I'm not in love with his swing, at least what I've seen on video.

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    4. OK went back and looked up some Garvey video and compared it to Vaughn's. Maybe I'm being a bit rough on Vaughn. I found a nice video of him doing an on-field interview with Eric Byrnes where he breaks down his swing and discusses the leg kick. Pretty interesting.

      I do try to keep an open mind on these rankings and players do move up and down over the course of the draft cycle.

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