Back in the "old days" when the annual amateur draft was held about a week before the short seasons started, most of the college draftees were assigned to short season A ball while rookie leagues were made up of high school draftees and DSL graduates. Since the draft was moved to the All-Star break, the complex is used for an initial evaluation of almost all drafted players while the players who started the season either get promoted to A ball or see significant cuts to their playing time. I'm not going to try to keep up with the bewildering comings and goings of draft picks. There are a handful of younger players who merit a mention.
P. J. Hilson CF- .295/.381/.563, 5 3B, 9 HR, 13 SB, 210 PA's. Hilson was the undisputed star of the Giants Black squad. He's long been one of the more tooled up players in the Giants organization but very raw when drafted in 2018. He finally found traction in 2022 and continued to produce after a promotion to A San Jose. On the other hand, he's now 22 yo and already Rule 5 Draft eligible so his future is a bit hazy.
Elian Rayo 3B- .238/.359/.419, 6 HR, 192 PA. Kind of a 3-true-outcomes guy with some power. DSL graduate. 19 yo.
Onil Perez C- .275/.345/.383, 171 PA. I maybe should have mentioned him in the catching depth chart post. Contact hitter without much power so far. DSL graduate. 20 yo. M
Anthony Rodriguez SS- .251/.338/.389, 6 HR, 201 PA. $800 K bonus baby from 2019. Got a late career start due to COVID lockdown in 2020. Improved numbers from 2021 while showing some power. 20 yo.
Mauricio Pierre OF- .232/.293/.297, 151 PA. Faltered after a hot start. I think he has a lot of upside just based on his size. Size matters but it isn't everything.
Nomar Medina LHP- 6-0, 2.22, 65 IP, 16 BB, 70 K. 19 yo southpaw. Approximately doubled his IP from 2021 with similar results. Should move up to San Jose for 2023.
Miguel Mora RHP- 4-4, 3.29, 54.2 IP, 26 BB, 78 K. 20 yo DSL graduate.
Mikell Manzano RHP- 3-3, 3.93, 55 IP, 17 BB, 81 K. 19 yo DSL graduate. No scouting report but gets lot of K's. Got a cameo with SJ late which didn't go so well.
Gerelmi Maldonado RHP- 0-2, 2.27, 39.2 IP, 19 BB, 59 K. 18 yo DSL graduate with markedly improved numbers over 2021 DSL campaign. May be a better prospect than Manzano.
Diego Velasquez SS- .277/.369/.352, 7 SB. $1 M bonus baby. Switch-hitter. Projectable body. ACL holdover. Substantially improved numbers.
The Giants Black squad not only won the Eastern Division championship, they won the championship final agains the Rockies 2-1 in best of 3 series.
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Great news out of the Arizona Fall League where Luis Matos OF is raking it after struggling in A+ ball for much of 2022.
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And finally, it's a happy day for us Giants fans who perversely find as much or more pleasure in the Dodgers losing as the Giants winning. Buh-bye Dodgers!
Thank you Doc for your hard work researching these players. Pav's mentioned the new Giants GM Pete Putila has an extensive background in player development with the Astros. New owner Buster Posey mentioned player development has a main focus. It's good that they seem to want to get better at player development. The key to building a sustainable winning team. Go Giants! Yes so happy dodgers lost!
ReplyDeleteI hope Putila has some insight into how to develop raw toolsy players like Patrick Hilson and Grant McCray faster so they are not eligible for the Rule 5 Draft by the time they start to find traction.
DeleteWould you believe the Dodgers did trade Yordan Alvarez to the Astros for RHP Josh Fields in 2016. The Astros acquired Alvarez before he even played a minor league game! Someone should ask Putila his thoughts on Alvarez's development thru the Astros system.
DeleteI think Alvarez was considered a pretty serious prospect before the trade. His signing bonus with the Dodgers was $2 M. But it's true, not all $2 M international bonus babies pan out so maybe Putila can claim some credit.
DeleteIf a Rule 5 draftee must spend the entire year on the ML roster, would an A level player be drafted?
ReplyDeleteYes, teams have been known to stash players like that letting them pretty much ride their MLB bench for a full year then using their 3 options years to resume their development in the minors. Maybe not super likely but it has happened.
DeleteIs there something wrong with a playoff scheme when 3 of the 4 winningest teams – all with 100+ season wins – are eliminated before the League Championship Series? Plus a fourth on the brink?
ReplyDeleteIs it good that the National League has eliminated all 3 of its Division winners, with the 5th and 6th seeds – neither even winning 90 games in the league that had 3 100+ game winners – playing for the League Championship.
Philadelphia finished 3RD in its division, 14 games out of 1st/2nd place while San Diego finished 22 games behind LA.
One of these teams will be in the World Series with a chance to win.
Is that good?
The Owners have brought this upon themselves by pushing for more and more teams in the Playoffs to expand their revenues which mostly go into the players’ salaries – making them beneficiaries, too.
Nine of the 12 playoff teams were in the top 12 in payroll – interestingly, the team with the lowest payroll according to betmgm.com has made the Final Four.
What’s with struggling through a 162-game season to determine advancement when it’s easy to lose to 2 ace pitchers or a bad outing by a good closer?
Really nothing new under the sun. 1954: No playoffs. Top teams in each league go straight to WS. Giants sweep heavily favored Cleveland Indians who had a 111 win regular season. 1973: Mets eked out a Eastern Division title with an 82-79 record. Beat the heavily favored Big Red Machine in the NLCS and took the A's to 7 games before losing the World Series. A lot of people still don't think the Giants were the best team in MLB in 2010, 2012 or 2014. Winning in the postseason has always been, in my estimation, about 1/3 team talent, 1/3 pitching and bullpen management, 1/3 luck. I remember the Yankees winning a World Series where the heroes were Bucky Dent and someone named Brian Doyle. If that's not luck, IDK what is.
DeleteCould we have gotten in, with a record similar to the Phillies, had we bought (didn't have to be big purchases), and not sold?
DeleteAnd once in, anything could happen, like we are seeing now.
Giants ended up 6 games out of the Wild Card. Tough to see any trade or trades making up those 6 games. J.D. Davis was arguably the biggest difference maker acquired at the deadline.
DeleteDidn't the 1960's Giants have the best cumulative regular season record for the decade yet only played in one World Series and won none?
DeleteAs they say: the season is a marathon, the post season is consecutive 100-yard dashes.
ReplyDeleteYes, there are results like 1954's 154-game season going to the underdog Giants with just 1 dash in 4 consecutive days, beginning the 3rd day after the last day of the regular season.
Was it really a huge upset?
That was a very good Giants team, 97-57, and were in 1st from June 9th, clinching the pennant with 6 games to go and going 9-3 down the stretch.
They had a winning record against every National League team.
Cleveland's record was 111-43, beating up on most of the AL but were 11-11 against both the Yankees and the White Sox. In July they lost 4 in a row against Chicago. They had W-L-W-L-W-L to end the season.
They took over 1st in the AL on June 12, 3 days after the Giants.
They didn't play inter-league games then so there was no head-to-head.
The series began in Cleveland, played in 4 consecutive days, with no day off for travel. The Giants sent Game 3 pitcher to New York the day before the 2nd game so he was rested after the overnight train unlike the Indians’ pitcher who was hit hard in Game 3.
Personal note:
I was 14 then and an avid fan. I could name every position player on every team. I was pretty sure Cleveland would win the series and I bet my lunch money (25¢) on them every day. Fortunately, the last game was on Saturday so I only lost 75¢. The guy I thought I was taking his money was just a novice as far as baseball - sometimes you can know too much!
154 games wasn't a magic number and neither is 162. The season could be shorter with, say, the top 4 teams in each league playing 7-game series, that would take 30 days. All in October. Make the season fit.
I completely agree with shortening the regular season and making the DS series 7 games regardless of what they do with the Wild Cards.
DeleteI have enjoyed the 1954 conversation. I really like this site and the commenters. I also enjoy seeing how the International signings like Diego Velasquez, Onil Perez, and Anthony Rodriguez are doing. Thank you!
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