Baseball America has a profile of Tim Melville as the top story on their draft page (subscription only). He has not had the greatest season he could have hoped for, which has been partially blamed on the weather in the midwest and on a fluke injury where he was struck in the eye by a hockey puck in gym class. I know that others aren’t as high on him and his stock has dropped this season, but of the players likely to be available at #13, I hope the Cardinals take Melville. He’s got a big body, high upside and a mature approach. He doesn’t really fit the Cardinals usual M.O., and I am convinced that if Friedrich is available the Cardinals will take him over Melville, but I like the kid.
Also, in case you haven’t heard, Mike Parisi is getting the start for the Cardinals on Saturday and Kelvin Jimenez was called up to take Joel Piniero’s roster spot while he takes a brief DL hiatus. Erik was flabbergasted by this move in the comments of yesterday’s DFR and I have to agree with him. Jimenez has proved that he is not an MLB-quality reliever, while Mark Worrell has gotten hitters out everywhere he’s gone. It is time that he received this chance instead of Jimenez.
The system went 3-2 on the night, all the details are after the jump.
- The signs of life for Colby are getting stronger. He went 1-3 with a double, a steal and a pair of walks. His BABIP is .216 right now, which makes me think that we are in for a spectacular ride as his luck evens out.
- Jarrett Hoffpauir, David Freese and Nick Stavinoha each went 2-5. Hoffpauir and Stavinoha each had a double and Stavinoha stole a base.
- Brian Barden went 3-5, Joe Mather went 1-3 with a double and Gabe Johnson went 3-4 with a double.
- Mitchell Boggs pitched a complete game, throwing 116 pitches. He gave up one run on five hits and four walks, while striking out five.
- Shane Robinson, who had been struggling a little bit, had a bounceback night, going 3-5 and bringing his average back up to .377.
- Jose Martinez went 1-3 with a homerun.
- Mark McCormick got the start and gave up three runs in give innings. He allowed four hits and four walks and he hit two batters while striking out three.
- Marco Gonzalez gave up only a solo homerun over the course of his two innings.
- Luke Gregerson had a rough outing, giving up three runs in only two thirds of an inning. He gave up three hits and walked a pair.
- Jon Mikrut finished out the game with a perfect 1.1 innings.
- The story of the night was the relief corps, which, aside from two hit batsmen from Davis Bilardello, was perfect over four innings. Bilardello gave up no hits or walks in two innings, Josh Dew pitched a perfect inning with one strikeout and Francisco Samuel pitched a perfect inning with two strikeouts.
- Elvis Hernandez started and lasted five innings, giving up two runs on six hits and four walks. He struck out three.
- Arnoldi Cruz, playing third base, went 2-4 with a double.
- Donovan Solano was 1-4 with a double and Luke Gorsett was 2-3 with a walk.
- Quad Cities managed only two hits on the night, singles by Domnit Bolivar and Adron Chambers. Burlington committed five errors, which made the only Quad Cities run an unearned run.
- Pete Kozma is in a bit of a funk. He was 0-5 tonight and is riding a 6-39 streak over his last ten games that includes zero extra base hits.
- Brian Broderick pitched the first four innings and only allowed a solo homerun in the second inning.
- The relief was initially good, with Brian Joshua Wilson pitching three scoreless innings followed by another two scoreless from Thomas Eager.
- Things fell apart for Dylan Gonzalez, though. He gave up three runs on four hits over two innings.
- The batting line of the day goes to shortstop Osmir Medina who went 3-4 with a double (he also committed an error in the field).
- The pitching line of the day goes to Yonathan Gonzalez who struck out the side in the ninth while giving up one hit.
Filed under: Daily Farm Reports
erik
azruavatar
fewgoodcards
roarke49
theredbaaron
francisco samuel hasn’t walked anyone in his last 4 appearances and only has 2 walks in his last 7.1 IP. if this guy keeps throwing strikes watch out b/c his stuff is filthy.
Agreed on Samuel, FGC. He can supposedly get the ball up there at 97, with a slider that approaches 90mph. That’s almost unreal.
Real Soon Now, we’ll need to start the Free Brian Barden campaign…
A good farm system backing a pretty decent Major League club? Man I could get used to this.
As mediocre as Jose Martinez’ BA has been this year, he’s 2nd on the team in RBI with 36 and only two behind team leader Allen Craig.
Colby hasn’t been that unlucky. Just loook at his line drive rate. It seems like he just hasn’t been making solid contact. Hopefully he is coming out of it though.
I was at the start that Melville missed with the eye injury. I talked to a Holt coach myself just a couple hours after it happened. He missed one start due to it. It did not impact him at any future starts by all accounts. The weather talk is also insane. I saw him twice in good weather and once in bad weather and he looked the same all three times. Now his family has sent a letter out to scouts making demands of 10-15 slot money. If he had performed well this year, he wouldn’t have to do this kind of posturing and he could simply let his game dictate where he is drafted.
shaneo69 - that goes to show you what a worthless statistic the rbi is. Martinez is at .266/.299/.378 so far on the season and his isolated power is 50 points lower than it was during his half-season at Springfield last year.
Big Steve - I noticed that his linedrive rate was much lower than at any other time in his career, which is a bit disconcerting. I guess make line about luck was just a bit of optimism.
JP - From seeing him in person three times, do you think he is worth being picked at #13? I always wonder if we over-emphasize a couple of months worth of performance leading up to the draft. What do we really know now about Melville that we didn’t know in March when he was considered a top 5 pick? I am guilty of that myself - I saw Aaron Crow pitch one time and decided that he wasn’t worth a top 3 pick.
Is Mitchell Boggs on the way to becoming a solid 4 or 5 major league starter? He’s a horse, his sinker and slider are working, and his ERA, more than a third of the way into the season, is excellent. My take: If he continues down this path, he would be a significant upgrade over Looper next year.
I really am not high on Melville at all. I’d sooner have Odorizzi, but either way I doubt they’ll take a HS pitcher 1.
Last September the Cardinals had that insane stretch without an off day and their pitching was thin (to put it diplomatically), and they didn’t call up Worrell after an OK season at Memphis. After that, it’s hard to believe they’ll ever give him a chance, even if the alternatives are the likes of Kevin Jarvis or Gabe Molina. I guess an oddball middle reliever could have a tiny bit of trade value, but it’s kinda rude to keep him on the 40-man roster like this if they have no intention of ever giving him any major league service time.
Why should they call up Worrell just to send him down in a week? I agree, that he needs to get a chance at the big club. The problem is, this isn’t a chance. Piniero is missing one start and then he’s coming back. If this were anything more, they wouldn’t be screwing around with a bullpen game.
I don’t understand the love for Jimenez or why he was even brought back this year. I really thought Worrell would finally get a shot. His resume is far better than Jimenez’s. I just don’t get it.
Colby’s line drive % has gone from 2 (!) in April to 16 in May. Hopefully, he is coming out of the slump.
In 2006, his line drive rate was 13% at both Quad Cities and Palm Beach. Last year, it jumped to 23%. Looking at the splits, it looks he benefited from Hammons Field. His line drive % at home was 28% vs. 19% on the road.
In response to roarke49, I would not take Melville at 13. I am confident there will be much better options there. When you talk about over-emphasizing a couple months, you have to realize that you are talking about one third of his prep pitching career, since he essentially did not pitch for an entire season due to injury. This year was when he should have dominated. It wasn’t just the numbers, it was the stuff that wasn’t amazing. In all three starts I saw, his fastball was NOT 91-94 like BA, etc says. It was more along the lines of 88-92. He didn’t touch 94 one time in any of those three starts. His control as times was very lacking in some starts this year also.
JP - thanks, I appreciate the first person perspective.
To me the Melville thing is very similar to the Matt Harvey situation.
A guy who was a star on the All-Star circuit prior to his SR year, a guy who people saw as a polished HS pitcher with MLB quality pitch projections who then didnt have the type of Senior year he was supposed to have.
A small dip in velocity, some bad breaks, some inconsistent starts.
The expectations were set so high to begin with…..now is he worthy of the #13 pick?
Before this year, everyone would have said yes….so was he so bad this year that he is not worthy of it?
I dont know…I do know teams are regretting letting Matt Harvey go now and I think teams will feel the same way if they pass on Melville.
The guy I saw on the mound last year to start the Aflac game was the best HS pitcher in the country…even with a less then stellar spring…if proven healthy he is still my choice over the late charging Odorizzi.
Reports are Melville velocity and crispness of his pitchers improved when the weather did.
Thomas Pham is 1 for his last 29 AB’s, so much for him finding his stroke in the MWL.
Anyone care to share a Mark Diapoules…with so many QC watchers..would love to hear one.
Almost a 3 to 1 GB to FB ratio…Dave Duncan might have a dizzy spell.
Though it is unconfirmed by Luhnow, it is claimed by Goold, who could know, that the Cards were set to pick Beaven last year, but he was taken by the Rangers, so we chose the next guy on our priority list, Kozma. If this is true, and I suspect that it is, then the Cards will consider top high school hurlers as their first pick. They have not picked a high school pitcher as the first pick since 1978, so its been a long aversion. But Jocketty and Whitey are gone. The Cards are more willing to project. When Luhnow states that the Cards will consider a HS pitcher, the possibility of this happening is not zero.
Some top HS hurlers are not just Melville and Orodizzi. A guy named Hicks out of LA has a great arm. Seaton is the best in Texas this year (like Beaven was last year). There is another kid from S. Calif named Thompson, I think. Probably plenty more. The Cards should analyze them all, listen to their bonus hopes, and could select one at 13.
My Worrell prediction: if the Cards don’t use him they will loose him to the Padres who will see his value.