- Rasmus
- Garcia
- Anderson
- Perez
- Ottavino
- Herron
- Mortensen
- Boggs
- Craig
- Kozma
- Jose Martinez
- P.J. Walters
- Hoffpauir
- Maiques
- Joe Mather
- Motte
- Jon Jay
Announcement: Derrick Goold will be doing a chat Friday morning at Baseball America at 11am to discuss the Top 10 Cardinal prospects, which will be out early tomorrow. I know many of you are subscribers, be sure to go over there and pick his brain. Derrick has been working with BA for a few years now and has a lot of contacts in the organization who let him in on a lot of good info. You won’t want to miss it. He has assured me that he is working on our questions we already sent him, but covering the beat even in winter can keep you busy, and now he’s been given Mizzou duties with them being the number 1 team in the land and all. I will be away for much of the day, but AZ will be around and I’m sure he will have his 2 cents on their Top 10. I may have time to have a comment or two. I hope.
Jay ran away with the last vote, getting 23 votes. Hamilton was the next leading vote getter with 12. #18 now up, will it be Hamilton? Or will it be Todd? Or will it be a dark horse candidate? One player who has yet to get a vote is Kyle McClellan. I mean, this is a guy who walked only 4% of the batters he faced, while striking out 24%. And he gets tons of ground balls. He has the pitches to start, yet the demeanor to relieve. He went from coming off Tommy John to earning a spot on the 40 man roster. To put the cherry on top, he grew up in St. Louis. Does he deserve to be next? Maybe. Maybe not. I’m just surprised he hasn’t got one vote yet.
Filed under: Top 25
erik
azruavatar
fewgoodcards
roarke49
theredbaaron
Hamilton…….
Hamilton.
Todd
todd
Mr. Todd….again
I can’t vote for McClellan quite yet, he’s #20 for me but #19 is Mark McCormick. His stock has fallen, but if his stuff is anywhere near what it once was, it’s still among the best in the system. Look at what McClellan and Motte did for themselves in just one year. I figure there’s always time.
todd
Hamilton - although I like the argument for McCormick. It probably depends on how you define prospect. If it means the most potential to be really good…or most likely to make the majors…or whatever it means, i’m voting for Hamilton.
Todd
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Hammy
Hamilton
I would like to request a profile on Stephen Hill when you guys have the time. Goold was talking about him in his Top 30 thread over at Cards Talk:
“That has to go to Stephen Hill. The first baseman from Stephen F. Austin, and the 13th-round pick, put up a .436/.511/.692 line at his first stop and continued to hit well at Quad Cities. Hitting wasn’t the clincher, though.
The Cardinals believe he can be a catcher. A catcher who can hit like Hill apparently can hit is going to fly and is going to be valuable.”
Later he says:
“As for Hill’s defense. He’s not suddenly becoming a catcher, at least that’s the story I’ve been relayed. The Cardinals knew he had the ability to catch and had previous experiencing catching when they drafted him. The scout talked to him about it before the Cardinals were interested. He’s capable. They think he has enough fundamentals right now to improve at it without starting from square negative-one.”
http://www.stltoday.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=504738&start=32
That just sounds promising. I agree that it won’t make him jump straight into the top 30 discussions but still a guy to keep an eye on.
Todd
Jess Todd
Hamilton
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Hamilton
http://www.baseballamerica.com/today/prospects/features/265257.html
Goold’s list:
1. Colby Rasmus, of
2. Chris Perez, rhp
3. Bryan Anderson, c
4. Jaime Garcia, lhp
5. Adam Ottavino, rhp
6. Pete Kozma, ss
7. Clayton Mortensen, rhp
8. Mitchell Boggs, rhp
9. Tyler Herron, rhp
10. Jon Jay, of
Hamilton
out on the limb here, Tony Cruz
Hamilton
todd
Todd
todd
I’ll go with McClellan which will put yet another double cap last name on the payroll. After that I’ll probably be going with younger players who have shown promise in the low minors. The problem with guys like Hamilton is that they’ve proven enough to show that they’re good professional ball players but also that they’re not going to be above average major leaguers. A few of them, like C. Duncan, surprise in the majors but I just don’t feel it with Hamilton.
hamilton
Todd
I’ll throw in for Hamilton at 18 and Todd at 19 (can I cast that vote in advance?), but here’s a name I want to throw out for #20: D’Marcus Ingram.
He’s a small guy (listed at 5′9″,170), but started showing some power in the fall instructional league. At 19, he had a .325 BA in rookie ball, with plate discipline (.430 OBP, 19 BB, 15 K) and speed (17 SB, 5 CS). I think I read somewhere that he can handle center field.
With the usual sample-size caution flags, we could have a five-tool player here.
Lou, sorry but i’d prefer not to take votes in advance, just saves me some time counting them later. thanks. i like ingram. i had him at 24 on my list, the birdhouse had him as low as 39. i want to see what he does above rookie ball, but the OBP and speed have really intrigued me. he tore up the instructional league, too. i really think he could take off, he’s a definite sleeper.
I like what little I know about Ingram too. It would also be interesting to get some detailed opinions from Luhnow or other insiders about a bunch of the young Latin players that they’ve signed over the last two years. Lara, De la Cruz, Romulo Ruiz et al have all perked my interest and it could make for good Hot Stove talk in January or some time to gather as much information and opinion about them as possible.
Good points, Easy. But I think even the scouts and execs are surprised by how guys actually perform as they move up the ladder. They gave us the heads-up on Martinez, which is one reason I’m enthusiastic about him as a prospect — the scouting reports and performance have mostly matched up.
The downside is that they aren’t going to give us any bad news — the guys who disappointed them after they were signed, or the ones they scouted and could have signed who went on to stardom in other orgs.
The only way to sort it out is to wait for the performance data, which is kind of like waiting for Christmas when you’re a kid. No matter how great it is, there’s always going to be something you wanted and didn’t get.
JDod is not so far out on a limb. Tony Cruz and Steve Hill will either follow the path of Albert (unlikely) or Stavinoha who will get his legs and be great trade bait by this time next year.
I forgot to vote for Tony Cruz.
Hamilton
Hamilton
hammy