14 Comments
Sep 27Liked by Anthony Murphy

Always love this one, breakout takes are fun.

Wilbur challenges me with Barco. He's just not visually appealing to me (Hunter, that is. I'm sure Wilbur is plenty appealing). Not really athletic, doesn't have a fast arm or stuff the blows you away. But damnit if he isn't getting results. Hard to argue against him being the biggest riser in the system, which sure would seem to be grounds for breakout status.

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Meant to get back to this earlier.

Anyway, you should like Reed. He seems to be the forgotten guy in discussions of the team's pitching prospects, which is odd given the breakout season. It's apparently because scouts looking at him think he should be throwing 95-96 instead of 92-94, given the motion and physique. I'm not sure it should matter much. I've thought for some time now that a key with him is that his FB and SL are hard to distinguish, which could account for the very high whiff rate on the SL. Watching him this year, I frequently had to check the scoreboard gun reading to be sure which pitch he'd just thrown.

I imagine we'll see Reed and Barco open next year at Altoona. The Curve could also have two big wild cards in Dotel and Ercolani. It'll be a good test of whether the things we've seen with their top pitching prospects this year were real and sustainable.

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You, Murph, and Mel have me sold.

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Sep 27·edited Sep 27Liked by NolaJeffy(BnP)

I guess I am taking things for granted when I start to look at Pitchers and think - oh and that will help us somehow? Reed 4th Round and Barco 2nd Round were well worth the picks. It's one of the things I think about when conversations about firing BC come up. The guy has had good luck in getting the picks, but his ability to build a pitching dynasty in very short order is the best in MLB. Hitting?

I really liked the things that Jhonny Severino did in his age 19 season in the FCL and A. I also like the way the Managers allowed him to get reps at SS and 2B even though he will more than likely be at 3B at PNC in 2 or 3 years, if he continues to hit. The IF I hope they allow in 2025 at A would have Valdez 20 or Plaz 19 at 1B, Caro 19 at 2B, YDLS 19 at SS, and Severino 19, at 3B with Plaz and Ramirez 19 at C. To be honest, that group could start at A+ and do well.

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That's kind of the irony in all of this, in that this is probably the best the International group has looked, and they let the international scouting director go. Granted, it may help prop them up with the rest of the system hitting wise looking dire

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Well, he had nothing to do with Severino, who’s the one real standout.

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Sure, but to varying levels of development at this juncture: Carlos Caro, Roinny Aguiar, Yordany De Los Santos, Tony Blanco Jr., Omar Alfonzo, Bladimir Wilber Dotel, and probably missing some other that have become at least interesting. Idk how much he would impact acquisitions like Ercolani, or even Cheng.

There's also as Murphy and I discussed on a recent podcast, are we sure he should be to blame? And not the group developing them into free swinging, top out at A ball, hitters?

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That's the exact cohort of prospect that top at in A-ball the overwhelming majority of the time league-wide.

Just four starters in the entire NL Central this year have matriculated up through the minors from the international ranks, and one plays for the Pirates.

The others - Chourio, Amaya, and Elly - were all top-of-class talent.

The Pirates clearly aren't *good* at developing these uber-raw international types, but neither are they any better than their peers at accumulating talent from these ranks.

It's just an extremely, extremely low probability play all around.

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Not saying this to refute your point, but Elly signed for $65K lol

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Sep 27Liked by NolaJeffy(BnP)

Oh wow, I had memory-holed that based on how quickly he rose in prospect ranks. Good catch!

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Scouting isn't the issue. They've gotten talent. Feel like I always read somewhere when they traded for him that the Pirates tried to sign Severino but he went with the Brewers instead.

Regardless, identitfying talent (scouting) hasn't been the issue, development has been. At least for me.

I was down there a week and you can see the talent clear as day. It's getting it to translate to success. Which I don't think is on the scouting department.

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Sep 27Liked by NolaJeffy(BnP)

I've wondered and even assumed that when we've traded for guys like Cruz, Severino, and Suero that they were players our international scouts liked but couldn't sign due to better or earlier offers from other teams.

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Definitely true with Oneil, right?

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Sep 27Liked by NolaJeffy(BnP)

Simplicity is best — I blame them all.

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