Amaury Marti is currently hitting .424/.509/.633 in 39 games for the Mexican Red Devils of the Mexican League, also known as Liga de Amaury Cazana. Bud Selig ordered the Cardinals to banish him to there, in fear of the major leagues losing competitive balance.
Amaury also refuses to accept the watch curse. He has the power to curse, and the power to bless.
FirstInning.com: St. Louis Cardinals Daily Report
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Since votes were trickling in and McCormick had such a commanding lead, I’m wrapping it up. Not a bad little list overall. There were some no brainers, and a few surprises. What do you all think?
Filed under: Top 25
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erik
azruavatar
fewgoodcards
roarke49
theredbaaron
I think Garcia’s health concerns make his placement rather questionable. I think Herron is too high and Hoffpauir is too low. It’s hard to see how Jose Martinez rates above Hoffpauir as a Cardinal prospect right now. I agree with y’all that Steven Hill shouldn’t have been ahead of players like Haether & Jones. And I think the player not in the top 5 who is most likely to be in the top 5 going in to the 09 season is Boggs. Walters also should move up alot I would epxect. D.GOOCH
Well, Hoff didn’t reach AA until he was 23, and then he hit .247/.344./.355 there. Martinez played in AA at 21 and hit .300/.339/.472. I think that makes him a better prospect. Plus, as of right now, he plays a more premium defensive position. You can always move a SS to 2B, but not necessarily the other way around. I disagree that Hoff is the better prospect. I would agree that he is closer to the majors, but that is all.
I am uspet that Last year we all thought John Jay was a future Ml Batting champ and just cause some minor inj. we ranked him #18. Martinez should be above Kozma he is only 1 year older and has proformed @ 2a already.
Martinez is not going to be able to stay at SS. Some people have been under the impression that he is a very good defensive SS, but he lacks range and most scouts see him as a 2B. That is a big reason Kozma is higher, who scouts really like because he has an excellent all-around game.
My bet for most likely to make the top 5 next season but isn’t there now??? Clay Mortensen. I think we all are going to be very pleasantly surprised at his 2008 season.
A pretty good list, and for the most part I think the placement is pretty close to how I think it should be. I’d say Hamilton and Jay are probably a bit low.
The drop-off after Rasmus is just enormous, but I think there’s some pretty decent depth, especially in the lower levels of the system. But there’s not many potential impact players, particularly hitters. If I could change one thing about the Cardinals current draft strategy, it would be to gamble a little more often on boom or bust types. Just because Daryl Jones hasn’t worked out yet doesn’t mean taking guys like him is the wrong idea.
the top 25 is a fun thing to do and emphasizes to me the difficulties teams have in predicting future success. nothing new here and many of you are probably up on this more than me, but the amateur draft has always puzzled me a great deal because of its magnitude (so many rounds) and how inefficient a process it is after about the second round. if college basketball and football recruiting was as inefficient, we wouldn’t be worried about the BCS, playoffs, and paying college coaching staffs millions in salaries. just shows how tough a game it is and why the folks staffing a team’s scouting and minor league coaching positions are so important. i compiled the following to satisfy my own curiosity, but since i did, a summary is below:
cards top 25 by draft rounds are:
R1 (incl suppl): 6
R2: 3
R3: 1
R4: 1
R5: 1
R6: 1
R7: 1
R8: 1
R9: 0
R10: 0
R11-20: 4
R21-30: 2
R31-40: 2
undrafted: 1
Nice list sportsman, do you think you could add names to the rounds?
pretty amazing that 8 of the 25 came from rounds 11-40. luhnow and co seem to shine when it comes to finding sleepers.
I started voting for Kopp from about 19 on … and I was surprised that I didn’t get more (any!) support from anyone else in the community.
What are everyone’s biggest concerns about Kopp? What is it about Kopp that makes him such a lesser bet than, say, Todd in your guys’ minds?
JD-
I think the reason that Kopp isn’t getting much love is really just because we don’t know a whole lot about him. Personally, I like Kopp. A lot. I think he has really beautiful mechanics; the kind that will lend themselves well to durability, and he has nice stuff. So far, though, there’s not really a whole lot to hang your hat on with him. Todd we know has this killer slider; he closed some in college and he could rocket through the system as a reliever or be moved into a starter’s role. Kopp just doesn’t have anything that jumps out at you in the same way. Now, give him a year to pitch well and everyone will pay attention. But, at the moment, he debut wasn’t just absolutely ridiculous, a la Clay Mortenson, and he doesn’t have one attribute that you hear about constantly and can really pick out, like Todd.
Give him some time. He’s going to be good, I think. Everybody will know who he is eventually.
a paste from xl that i hope works:
rank round year
1 Rasmus 1 05
2 Garcia 22 05
3 Anderson 4 05
4 Perez 1 06
5 Ottavino 1 06
6 Herron 1 05
7 Mortensen 1 07
8 Barton 38 00
9 Boggs 5 05
10 Craig 8 06
11 Kozma 1 07
12 Jose Martinez FA 05
13 Walters 11 06
14 Hoffpauir 6 04
15 Maiques 37 05
16 Mather 3 01
17 Motte 19 03
18 Jay 2 06
19 Hamilton 2 06
20 Todd 2 07
21 Hooker 7 07
22 Edwards 14 06
23 McClellan 25 02
24 Steve Hill 13 07
25 McCormick 1 05
ryan 7 03
erik, it could be that they’re good at picking sleepers…or particularly bad at picking at the top of the draft.
Why is anyone particularly surprised that there’s a third of our top prospects coming from 75% of the draft rounds. We’re saying that the last 30 rounds produced 1/3 as much talent as the first 10 rounds.
They often draft guys that have upside but question marks attached to them in the later rounds. When those prospects pan out, they become awfully good. When they don’t, you never hear about them again.
I’m a bit surprised Hamilton fell to No. 19. If the Eric Karros (circa 1996) comp comes through (I think Bryan Smith made the comp), Hamilton could be a valuable player for some time.
If nothing else, he could be a nice trade piece in a deal with somebody looking for a 1B (San Fran, for example).
I’m skeptical about Hill. He started off hitting like he was too good to be true and ended up darn near proving it. He almost literally couldn’t buy a hit for the last month or so of the season. Was this just a slump after an incredibly fast start, did he wear down because he wasn’t accustomed to the rigors of a long season, or did the pitchers simply catch up and discover his weaknesses? If the latter, struggling against low-A pitchers at his relatively advanced age doesn’t bode well for the future, particularly since his bat seems to be his only plus tool. Can anyone shed any light on the true state of his play?
as i noted earlier, it’s the inefficiency that struck me. 9 of 25 are from first 2 rounds makes some sense. on the other hand, albert was a 13 and if garcia or maiques makes it…. just wonder how guys at 22 or 37 get so far down the list, not to mention what happened to the so many top ten draftees. the crap shoot aspect makes it easier to understand how kozma got his spot.
While I think the future of the Cards system is brighter than the past (not saying much)…I think this list exposes the lack of quality positional players in the system. While there are many pitchers on the list, we know from past history that very few of them will be productive at the major league level. OTOH, position player prospects have a much higher success rate. Therefore, since we only rate 3 position players in the top 10, the Cards desperately need some more high ceiling position players.
Some pretty obvious comments. For quantity of prospects it’s pretty impressive. I can see virtually all of these guys having a chance to make the show. What’s lacking of course are blue chippers beyond Rasmus. Not bad though having a potential blow ‘em away fast baller at 25.
I would rate Boggs, Mortenson and Kozma a little lower, Martinez, Maiques, McClellan and Jay a little higher. Would not rate either Hamilton or Hill in the top 25 but it I think we did a good job.
I rated Walters and Jay higher.
Perez and Garcia lower. I never can see a reliver as an impact player, espcially not with his walk rates still. Garcia is a major injury risk right now.
i feel like anderson and ottavino are overrated. i see no reason why anderson has any chance to hit better than molina, given his limited power at a level at which some other prospects (martinez & rasmus) have exploded. ottavino seems like the second coming of chris lambert.
would community projections be too much to ask of this site? i feel like the ranking already took a lot of effort and has, perhaps, made our imput a bit too prominent on this site. so, i would understand any reservations.
I feel like Walters is overrated because of the positive results he’s had. He has good numbers, but I think it will be tough for him to fool major league hitters with his low velocity.
From scanning the list, there are scarcely few “impact” bats (aside from Rasmus, of course). Some pretty good arms, some guys who will probably be good role players. . .but our hitters are light in the loafers. After Colby, our best bet for someone who might be able to rake at the ML level is Craig. I think Anderson will be a good hitter - not a great one. Cards top priority in this year’s draft IMO is adding some high ceiling hitters, rather than relying on college bats who have already peaked. They need to roll the dice on a “boom or bust” type with that top pick, rather than staying so conservative early in the draft.
I’m not really surprised we have just one elite prospect. That’s what happens when
a) your team drafts 28th in 2001 and 2003 and 30th in 2005 and 2006;
b) blows the 13th pick in 2000 on Shaun Boyd and the 19th pick in 2004 on Chris Lambert, and blows off the first two rounds of the 2002 draft (not that I minded giving up the 30th pick for Izzy);
c) fails to compensate for low draft picks by aggressively signing players from Latin America (until recently).
d) fails to offer arbitration to several players who’re certain to depart for free agency, punting those compensatory draft picks.
e) fails to allocate money for bonuses to the highest-upside players (the highest bonuses the Cards have paid were to Drew, Ankiel, Hutchinson, Boyd, and Looper — all between ‘96 and ‘00)
So some of the failure of our farm system comes from the success of the major-league team, and some is from bad strategic decisions by people no longer with the organization.
The downside of these mistakes is that we probably won’t be any better in 2008 than we were in 2007. The upside is that we have the 13th pick in June 2008, and strong potential for an even better pick in 2009. So we’ll at least have a few shots at the top talent in the next two drafts.
How about some new material guys
Yeah, no kidding. I need my FR fix!