Palm Beach is up this week. Frankly this is a very unimpressive group of hitters. We’ve got players that had injuries and players that were probably pushed too fast but also, this team was poached of it’s talent so that Springfield could make a run at the championship in AA. So we’re left with some of the chaff when I compiled this weeks numbers. Click the tag to see previous entries of Visualizing Hitters.
Click on the thumbnail and then “All Sizes” for larger viewing options.
Thoughts:
- Like I said, a pretty ugly group. No one really jumps off the page as having a standout year.
- Buckman’s numbers look the best although a great deal of those were compiled at QC where he was tearing things up. Everything slipped a little after his promotion to Palm Beach. I don’t think he’s a true .300 hitter in the long run but, regardless, increasing that walk rate would be a massive step forward for his game.
- Erik discussed Dan Nelson here as a sleeper. I have an admitted obsession with walk rates but a player still has to be able to hit for some semblance of a batting average.
- Robinson and Solano are the control artists striking out in less than 10% of their PAs. Solano was obviously over his head at age 19 in High-A, however.
- Luke Gorsett quietly put together a decent season.
- I was enamored with Jay last year after he hit for a .340 AVG andposted an OBP north of .400 but I’ve been tempering my initial enthusiasm based on what I’ve read and his lackluster numbers this year. Obviously, the shoulder injury was a problem and I’m willing to contextualize the numbers with that information but Jay’s ceiling is inhibited by the lack of power as a corner outfielder.
Raw Data:
| Name | Age | AVG | OBP | SLG | ISO | BB% | K% | BABIP | GB% | LD% |
| Chris Grossman | 26 | 0.287 | 0.348 | 0.410 | 0.123 | 8.2 | 14.3 | 0.323 | 50 | 17 |
| Brandon Yarbrough | 22 | 0.278 | 0.326 | 0.416 | 0.138 | 6.7 | 20.1 | 0.343 | 52 | 19 |
| Brandon Buckman | 23 | 0.310 | 0.346 | 0.508 | 0.198 | 5.2 | 15.8 | 0.338 | 39 | 15 |
| Jose Contreras | 22 | 0.215 | 0.311 | 0.258 | 0.043 | 12.2 | 22.6 | 0.290 | 61 | 3 |
| Isaias Garcia | 23 | 0.262 | 0.315 | 0.360 | 0.098 | 5.9 | 10.2 | 0.282 | 44 | 16 |
| Dan Nelson | 23 | 0.262 | 0.378 | 0.335 | 0.073 | 15.3 | 18.5 | 0.328 | 44 | 22 |
| Donovan Solano | 19 | 0.240 | 0.283 | 0.266 | 0.026 | 4.6 | 9.6 | 0.267 | 57 | 12 |
| AJ Van Slyke | 23 | 0.283 | 0.334 | 0.383 | 0.100 | 7.2 | 19.5 | 0.352 | 47 | 18 |
| Ian Church | 26 | 0.244 | 0.271 | 0.422 | 0.178 | 2.7 | 16.7 | 0.276 | 40 | 14 |
| Luke Gorsett | 22 | 0.295 | 0.342 | 0.451 | 0.156 | 4.1 | 15.1 | 0.333 | 43 | 15 |
| Jonathan Jay | 22 | 0.265 | 0.328 | 0.387 | 0.122 | 6.5 | 18.2 | 0.311 | 50 | 18 |
| James Rapoport | 22 | 0.231 | 0.295 | 0.284 | 0.053 | 7.9 | 19.2 | 0.289 | 53 | 10 |
| Shane Robinson | 22 | 0.249 | 0.318 | 0.345 | 0.096 | 9.2 | 8.7 | 0.265 | 54 | 12 |
| Nathan Southard | 23 | 0.239 | 0.297 | 0.331 | 0.092 | 6.6 | 15.0 | 0.281 | 46 | 16 |
Averages for minor league levels
(Stats via MILB.com — except BABIP, GB & LD which were compiled from First Inning.)
Filed under: Visualizing Hitters
erik
azruavatar
fewgoodcards
roarke49
theredbaaron
Jim Rapoport’s numbers really stand out. He is a player whose game revolves around speed yet he strikes out 19% of the time and only walks 8%. That is a deadly combination….to his career.
http://www.whiteyball.com
I have to admit that I was surprised by Rapoport’s number. I had it in the back of my head that he was having a decent if unspectacular season (I’m not a huge fan of the all-speed/no-power OFs) but he was really quite bad. Most of these players still have a year or two to establish themselves so outside of Grossman and probably Church there isn’t anyone who doesn’t at least still have an outside shot of making the majors.
Rapoport’s August numbers really hurt his overall avg. Jim has a lot of upside that you can not see from looking at stats. I went to most of the PB games this season. Jim is probably one of the fastest players in the organization. His speed also helps him cover a lot of ground in the OF, and he has a really good glove and arm. He had quite a few OF assists this year. I think if he is able to get his obp% up and cut the k’s he’s going to do really well. If you can’t tell I’m a big fan of his and I think he has a lot of upside.
Gorsett’s stat string is really odd to me. As he’s moved up his walk rate went down, but his slugging went up. I think he may be the most intriguing out of the group. I think he’ll be my sleeper. I think he’ll come back to Palm Beach to start with and continue to develop his power and by midseason will develop some discipline and then move up to Springfield. He will outplay a healthy Jay next year.
This is probably a stupid question, but are these numbers adjusted for park effects?
If not, then some of these guys should show jumps in power at the next level.
Also, regarding Jay, I’d be surprised if these numbers are indicative of his real ability. He’s a pretty muscular guy, and Carlos Gomez gave his swing a good review. If he’s fully recovered by next spring, I expect to see fewer Ks, a higher line-drive percentage, and more XBHs.
(Or maybe I should say, “I hope to see …”)
my guess is that 1 or 2 out of Rappaport, Southard, and Van Slyke will not be back next year as there just won~t be room as others move up and the pipeline above them is jammed. My guess is Rappaport has the best chance of sticking followed by Van Slyke.
Lou - no, the numbers aren’t adjusted for park effects. Besides being a colossal undertaking on my part to adjust if they were all in one park, I had to aggregate several players across levels for the BABIP, GB and LD myself. It wasn’t pleasant. . .
That said, there are some park effects of Palm Beach on some of these numbers — to what degree. . . I just don’t know. I’ve become a little more wary of park effects the last few months because different people adjust in slightly different ways. I’m not arguing the overall tenet (I’d be a fool to do that) but I’m not going to pretend that I’m adept enough to make exact translations between parks.
Cardsfan - Rapoport is very very fast according to reports but his ceiling is a fourth outfielder type.
AZ, good to know, and thanks for the effort.
I’ve never gotten into it deep enough to quantify it, but I’ve observed what you said about park effects — some guys crap out in the FSL (Chris Duncan is a good example), while others don’t seem affected.
Cody Haerther, for example, had great FSL numbers (.318/.380/.584), but hasn’t repeated them in AA in parts of three seasons. It could be the sample size (47 games in the FSL), or something about the park that worked in his favor. He had 7 triples there in two months in 2005, and since then he’s hit a total of 4 triples (one of which was on rehab in the Gulf Coast League).
Probably just a fluke, but it could bolster your point that hitters don’t always suffer in big ballparks or thrive in smaller ones.
I hate the idea of assigning guys “ceilings”. If we make a mistake in our initial evaluations (and given the limited amount of information we have to work with, that is virtually guaranteed to happen) then future evaluations of a player who may have improved past the “ceiling” defined for him will be skewed…