Minor League Thread (Second Half)

When Will the AAA Season End?

Recently, Jeff Luhnow indicated that outfielder George Springer would finish out the AAA season with Oklahoma City. With the recent surge by the RedHawks, a play-off appearance seems very likely. As a result of this likelihood, determining when the season will end becomes a bit more complicated.

Possible end dates:

End of Regular Season: September 2

Latest End of First Round of Play-offs(Best of Five series): September 8

Latest End of PCL Championship Series(Best of Five series): September 15

AAA Championship Game vs. International League Champion: September 17

NOTE: The Astros only have four home games scheduled after the AAA Championship Game- September 18 vs. Cincinnati and September 27-29 vs. New York.

 

10 BB to go with 10 SO with a .386 OBP also though.

Could be he is getting pitched around (no good looks) and has been reaching at pitches out of the zone accounting for the BA.

Still, there is no doubt he will be in the majors. Just a question of when.

I did see something regarding the AAA playoffs and if they get to the final round it may be as late as Sept 27th before its done, a mere 4 games before the end of the ML season. So if the Redhawks go all the way, we may not see him this year at all.

 

This all goes back to us trusting Luhnow to do what it takes to have a major league team with sustained success... not a minor league system that is winning AAA championships because they have a guy who shouldn't be in the minors playing for them.

There's no doubt he knows how to develop a minor league system... hell, he's already proven that he could do that before he ever got here (St. Louis). What we have no clue about is how he can translate that success into building a championship major league team. Not a team built up of players he once liked when he was scouting/drafting, or guys he hand-picked and groomed through his systems, but an actual team.

Very rarely are championship teams all home-grown players or former high round pick castoffs from other systems. It takes a combination of development, free agent signings, luck, taking chances, and some guys outperforming expectations.

 

Not a chance in hell...seems like a rather easy choice. Boom or bust is fine with me, if there's no middle ground.

There is no way you take Shane Reynolds' pedestrian career from your #1 pick before his career even kicks off. That is crazy talk.

 

Shane Reynolds career would be the middle ground. It would also guarantee that he makes it to the majors without significant injury, and pitches over 200 innings in several seasons where he's an integral part of a division winning ball-club.

Unfortunately, even with him having all the expectations in the world, the odds are that he could have a worse career than Reynolds.

 

Right, i'm saying in this fantasy world, is it still possible that Appel can end up with a Reynolds-like career even if I don't commit to it before his career starts?

There's just no way that you can justify reducing your #1 pick's ceiling to that of shane reynolds before he throws a pitch. That's crazy talk.

Would you also take Julio Lugo's career for Carlos Correa's right now if you could?

 

Actually, though Correa is younger, while in the same league Buxton's OPS was .990 with 32 steals while Correa was right at .900. That is a significant difference. Shortstop is a more premium position but centerfield is also a premium defensive position.

I really don't get the Buxton hate in here. I'll just attribute it to homerism. They both outstanding, star caliber prospects.

 

While agree it would be a a disappointment, if Shane Reynolds is his floor I'm OK with that. You are selling Reynolds short to call him pedestrian, he was a solid 2 or 3 starter for 8 years and a bonafide workhorse, who's career completely overlapped with the juiced ball era so it hurt his overall numbers.

Julio Lugo save for 2 solid years was merely servicable, so if Correa ended up like him it would be a complete disaster.

 

I was looking at that ten game stretch and was curious due to the 10 walks if they were starting to pitch around him. Does anyone watch his games? I'd be curious to see how he's handling that, not getting any pitches to hit.

 

yes, but we aren't talking about it being his floor, we are talking about it being his ceiling. and committing to that before he ever throws a pitch in the big leagues.

and the juiced ball era stuff doesn't apply, we aren't adjusting for that, we're simply giving appel those same numbers in today's game.

 

I think pitchers are just more unpredictable due to the injury factor, so if you're offering Appel to be a guaranteed solid starter for 10+ years for contending teams, I'm more reluctant to take it.

Obviously I wouldn't be thrilled about Correa taking Lugo's career path... Correa has a better body type, is more athletic, projects to have more power, and has posted tremendous numbers in his brief time in the minors. Being a #1 position player pick has a different set of expectations, without the fear of injury and arm development hanging over the player.

Would we be ok with a Shawon Dunston like career from Correa? He also was a former #1 pick SS and made 2 all star games. Again, probably not.

 

Well thats just stupid, if Shane pitched now his ERA would have been better, a 3.88 ERA in the late 90's was a hell of a lot better than a 3.88 ERA now.

As for a guarantee of Shane vs door 2, I'd probably still take it, albeit with hesitation.

 

You know who would take a guaranteed Shane over the unknown of Appel's future career? Tim Pupura.

 

My interpretation of the hypothetical is, "If Appel could put up the exact same numbers over his career as Shane Reynolds did, would you take that now?"

So basically nothing else matters outside of taking his exact statistics and inserting them under Mark Appel's name, and changing the years to 2014-2024, or whatever the exact time span is.

 

Who in the hell would interpret it that way, everybody knows numbers from certain eras are better than others. If you took some mediocre pitcher from the 80's and dropped his numbers into the late 90's he would look like a stud.

 

Probably off topic, but it was interesting to see the analysis about why power #'s and scoring is down now compared to the late 90's. Easy thing is to blame the steroids, but they've actually found the rates of HR/contact to be about the same.

The main factor is the increased strikeouts. Players are striking out now more than ever. Its gone beyond "trend" phase now... its how young hitters are being developed (rather have a 2-5 game with 3 K's, as long as the 2 hits were XBH).

 

Me, I guess? Most likely Nick too, since he only cited innings, health, and longevity as his arguments in favor of Reynolds, while "being a much better pitcher than his era-inhibited numbers would suggest" would have been the much more prudent argument if it was available to him?

Maybe ask the OP what his parameters of the argument are.

Either way, it doesn't change my answer. Reducing your #1 pick's ceiling that much before his career begins is nuts to me. And missing out on a Shane Reynold's-like career isn't that big of a shot to the gut, in my opinion.

 

While I agree, i wouldn't be doing backflips over a Shane Reynolds like career, the simple fact is that of the last 9 pitchers selected 1st overall, not including Gerrit Cole, only 2 were better than Shane. Pitchers are very risky, and have proven to be much less apt for success than position players.

 

Springer just hit #12. Yay