13 Comments

Chandler is the second best pitching prospect behind Skenes and the the third overall behind Skenes and Johnson.

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Great report. It's been great seeing Bubba rise to the occasion this year

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I think with the way Bubba is ending the season, he's raising his ceiling and becoming less of a wild card and more of a future piece of the rotation. Where he ranks in the majors is still uncertain. It appears like we are starting to get some depth in tiers of prospects.

Tier 1: top of the rotation. (1,2 or very good 3) high floor, higher ceiling

Skenes

Tier 1B: top of the rotation. (1,2,3 or very good 4) medium floor, high ceiling

Chandler, Jones, Solometo and Ashcraft

Tier 2: mid rotation (2,3,4 or solid 5) med floor, med to high ceiling

Harrington, Barco, Kennedy, Priester, Burrows, Shim and Mueth

Tier 3: mid to backend. (4, 5 or depth) high floor, med to low ceiling

Wolf, Sullivan, Shortridge, and Diamond

Tier 4: wild cards (anywhere) low floor to high ceiling

To many to list, recent draft picks, young international and so on.

Tier 5: organization depth

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I really want to argue that Burrows is our best pitching prospect, based on his fb shape, plus-plus change and plus-plus curve, but his struggles at AAA last year and now coming back from surgery forces me to agree with your placement......

A note about FB shape, read an article at MLBTR that states that the strike zone square we now used is gonna be modified in AAA as they take steps to implement the auto ump, the zone is gonna be purposely lower to decrease the amount of strike outs.....So perhaps returning to a heavy sinker usage is gonna make a full comeback, fastball shape be darned.

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Saddest part about Burrows is that he was flashing a new slider (I believe sweeper) in spring training, that looked fantastic. But we never got to truly see it play this year.

As to second part, they're automating it more to better resemble each individual batter. Thing about fastball shape is that it'll still be useful cause it centers around a batters perception.

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Here’s somebody to watch: Omar Alfonzo had two doubles and a triple in game two yesterday. First time up today he homered off a lefty who was the Cards’ 2nd rd pick.

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Is he a catcher or a 1b going forward? It seems that he is spending more and more time at first.

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I always thought he was doing fairly well behind the plate. Was throwing out an insane amount of base stealers at one point. Part of it felt it was just a way to get bat in lineup because they still liked Planchart behind plate.

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Pretty sure it’s Planchart. Alfonzo is a prospect as a C, not as a 1B.

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That's team HR 111, right? With each home run being a new team record after Lonnie's yesterday

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It’s a TTO team.

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I didn't see Bubba throw a single pitch. I was too busy going, "Hey, there's Murph!" Lol

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I’m TV famous!

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