8/11/2015 TUESDAY MINORS THREAD .... BBA's Best Tools for 2015

[thethe]

Never understood why people were so quick to jump off the Sims bandwagon.

[clvclv]

Never understood why people were so quick to jump off the Sims bandwagon.

Let's be a little careful about trying to load that train up too quickly. His WHIP still sits at 1.59, and he's walking 6 batters/9 IP for the season.

He's had a couple fairly decent starts - it's not like some light clicked on and he's suddenly turned the corner and become a Top 100 prospect again. Hursh has similar WHIP and K/BB numbers in 2015.

[sturg33]

Never understood why people were so quick to jump off the Sims bandwagon.

Because he was performing horribly?

He's improved his K-rate somewhat. And k-rate is what I care about the most in the minors. But he's not mowing people down either

[thethe]

Because he was performing horribly?

He's improved his K-rate somewhat. And k-rate is what I care about the most in the minors. But he's not mowing people down either

Pitchers progress at different rates. We all scout sat lines way too much. Reports from guys like deester are more valueable. He wasn't a fan of Sims so I heavily weighted his input as hr has seen him pitch. We never know what the coaches are asking the pitchers to work on.

[sturg33]

Pitchers progress at different rates. We all scout sat lines way too much. Reports from guys like deester are more valueable. He wasn't a fan of Sims so I heavily weighted his input as hr has seen him pitch. We never know what the coaches are asking the pitchers to work on.

You have to put some credibility in actual performance. So far, Simms hasn't been good.

[thethe]

You have to put some credibility in actual performance. So far, Simms hasn't been good.

He has always maintained a good age to level ratio. Yes, at some point they need to perform. Sims has already and it's still too early to hold him to thatbstandard.

[Preacher]

I frankly don't know how everything works with the slot system... but I would have rather taken higher upside picks and forgone some signings... In other words, sign 8/10 higher upside players rather than the 10/10 we did.

I wanted Cameron or Hayes

If you wanted Cameron you would be punting on a lot more than 2 other draft picks -- maybe that's still what you wanted to do, but it would have meant drafting under slot guys at several spots in the top 10 - and then I have a feeling you'd complain about that too.

Just for perspective
Riley+Herbert+Guardado+Graham (our 3-6 picks) signed for just over 4 million total. 4089500.

Would you rather have - Cameron or Riley/Herbert/Guardado/Graham? Its fine if you'd still rather have Cameron, but people act like the Braves could have gotten all of this premium talent and just punted on the 8th pick or something, its silly.

[zbhargrove]

I frankly don't know how everything works with the slot system... but I would have rather taken higher upside picks and forgone some signings... In other words, sign 8/10 higher upside players rather than the 10/10 we did.

I wanted Cameron or Hayes

Well it's turning out that the picks we made have quite a bit of upside thus far. So maybe quality scouting is better than article rankings?

[clvclv]

He has always maintained a good age to level ratio. Yes, at some point they need to perform. Sims has already and it's still too early to hold him to thatbstandard.

18 good starts at Rome in 2013 aside, Sims has never actually had much of a track record of "performing". I don't think anyone's given up on him, but he still struggles to throw strikes, and many of the ones he does throw tend to get hit. He's been working on things for two years and doesn't appear to be improving much. His developmental curve looks much more like Hursh's than Teheran's at this point. Julio never struggled like this, even when he was working on things - at Sims' age, Teheran was working on those at Gwinnett and was only walking half as many much more advanced hitters.

[Deester11]

Pitchers progress at different rates. We all scout sat lines way too much. Reports from guys like deester are more valueable. He wasn't a fan of Sims so I heavily weighted his input as hr has seen him pitch. We never know what the coaches are asking the pitchers to work on.

Thanks thethe, I have seen him quite a bit. I've always said the tools are there. I would post videos but the external HD doesn't jibe with my Mac. So I've resorted to Braxton videos and Albies. Anywho, I'm no scout but I've played and coached up to HS so you could say I'm inexact but a fan. I use the eyeball and a few stats so it's a mix for me. ERA, WINS,LOSSES don't really concern me. But here are my thoughts on Sims:

His fastball is special at times. He can blow it by just about anybody sitting around 93 upwards of 95-96 effectively. Secondary pitches can be good to above average mostly. Where he gets in trouble is adversity. I want more bulldog and I've seen more kitten AT TIMES. I like him a lot. I've seen Touki and Sanchez and they seem stoic when trouble happens. I'm not worried about Sims walks right now, but I think he's working on a full arsenal and command. Results do matter. He's been hot/cold early in his career and it puzzles me that his stuff hasn't translated.

I still think his talent alone makes him a top 10 Brave prospect, but I would also say he's gotta start getting consistent results. It can happen.

[smootness]

The thing I like about Sims is his K rate. It dropped last year at A+, which was a concern, but it is back up now and even higher at AA than it's ever been. That is a good sign and gives me hope.

The hit rate has also dropped at AA. The obvious problem is that a BB rate that wasn't good but wasn't a huge concern in 2013-2014 has now ballooned to 5.2% at A+ this year and 7.8% so far at AA. That's less of a concern for me than a low BB rate combined with a low K rate, but at 21, it's time to start getting that down while keeping the K's high.

Next year will be a big year for him. If he can come back to AA and keep his K rate high while dropping his BB rate to something like 4% or lower, then I think he will jump back into his old status as a really good prospect. The jury is still out, and he has work to do, but I'm actually higher on him now than I was after last year and the early part of this year.

[rico43]

The thing I like about Sims is his K rate. It dropped last year at A+, which was a concern, but it is back up now and even higher at AA than it's ever been. That is a good sign and gives me hope.

The hit rate has also dropped at AA. The obvious problem is that a BB rate that wasn't good but wasn't a huge concern in 2013-2014 has now ballooned to 5.2% at A+ this year and 7.8% so far at AA. That's less of a concern for me than a low BB rate combined with a low K rate, but at 21, it's time to start getting that down while keeping the K's high.

Next year will be a big year for him. If he can come back to AA and keep his K rate high while dropping his BB rate to something like 4% or lower, then I think he will jump back into his old status as a really good prospect. The jury is still out, and he has work to do, but I'm actually higher on him now than I was after last year and the early part of this year.

A valid factor might be that he missed a month after the bus crash?

[Braves1976]

A valid factor might be that he missed a month after the bus crash?

Yea, I imagine that has been a factor with Sims and a number of prospects effected by that crash.

[auyushu]

This point is always overlooked and dismissed no matter how many times it's brought up 50. Braves were very deliberate with their draft.

It's not overlooked or dismissed at all, it's just not as big a deal as you guys are trying to make out. K'Bryan Hayes signed for less money than Soroka, so we could have easily swapped those two. Chris Betts signed for slightly less than what the slot value for the 41st pick was, so that would have been 100 grand less than what RIley signed for. Riley signed for 1.6 mil, which would have been 475,000 more than the value of the 54th pick. So we would have had to save 375K during the rest of the draft.

So basically we'd have to just go cheap on 2 picks in the 5th-8th rounds to have made it work. Players in the first 3 rounds have a much higher success rate than guys in rounds 5 and up, so I'd much rather go big on high upside players in the early rounds. And several teams did just that in the past draft, signing players to 50,000 contracts with their picks in the 4th, 5th, and 6th rounds. It's a pretty common thing to do to save money to spend on higher upside prospects in the earlier rounds.

Either way, I'd rather have Hayes than Soroka just because we need high impact bats, and Hayes has been fantastic in the rookie leagues as well. But hopefully Soroka winds up being a high #2 starter or better and proves me wrong.

[thethe]

It's not overlooked or dismissed at all, it's just not as big a deal as you guys are trying to make out. K'Bryan Hayes signed for less money than Soroka, so we could have easily swapped those two. Chris Betts signed for slightly less than what the slot value for the 41st pick was, so that would have been 100 grand less than what RIley signed for. Riley signed for 1.6 mil, which would have been 475,000 more than the value of the 54th pick. So we would have had to save 375K during the rest of the draft.

So basically we'd have to just go cheap on 2 picks in the 5th-8th rounds to have made it work. Players in the first 3 rounds have a much higher success rate than guys in rounds 5 and up, so I'd much rather go big on high upside players in the early rounds. And several teams did just that in the past draft, signing players to 50,000 contracts with their picks in the 4th, 5th, and 6th rounds. It's a pretty common thing to do to save money to spend on higher upside prospects in the earlier rounds.

Either way, I'd rather have Hayes than Soroka just because we need high impact bats, and Hayes has been fantastic in the rookie leagues as well. But hopefully Soroka winds up being a high #2 starter or better and proves me wrong.

Not sure what isn't to love so far about who the Braves picked. Its crazy early to make any determination but I wouldn't have changed one pick thus far.

[auyushu]

Not sure what isn't to love so far about who the Braves picked. Its crazy early to make any determination but I wouldn't have changed one pick thus far.

K'Bryan Hayes is hitting .367/.462/.422/.884 in rookie ball with more walks than Ks and Chris Betts was the second best catcher prospect in the draft. Considering we have a gigantic need for impact bats not sure why it's hard to see people preferring us going a different route. Particularly when you factor in that our results when picking pitchers in the early rounds have been less than stellar under Clark's watch.

[sturg33]

K'Bryan Hayes is hitting .367/.462/.422/.884 in rookie ball with more walks than Ks and Chris Betts was the second best catcher prospect in the draft. Considering we have a gigantic need for impact bats not sure why it's hard to see people preferring us going a different route. Particularly when you factor in that our results when picking pitchers in the early rounds have been less than stellar under Clark's watch.

You know that if the Braves did what you're advocating they'd be slobbering all over it

[thethe]

K'Bryan Hayes is hitting .367/.462/.422/.884 in rookie ball with more walks than Ks and Chris Betts was the second best catcher prospect in the draft. Considering we have a gigantic need for impact bats not sure why it's hard to see people preferring us going a different route. Particularly when you factor in that our results when picking pitchers in the early rounds have been less than stellar under Clark's watch.

You are still assuming that we could have taken Riley at pick 54 and there is absolutely no guarantee that happens and then we don't have Soroka who has been awesome so far.

[auyushu]

You are still assuming that we could have taken Riley at pick 54 and there is absolutely no guarantee that happens and then we don't have Soroka who has been awesome so far.

The chances Riley wouldn't be there 13 picks later would be very slim. But either way I'd still rather have the potential high impact at 28 rather than Soroka, we have a bunch of guys that profile to be similar to Soroka already. And we've seen this past offseason and at the break this year how hard it is to trade for bats.

[thethe]

The chances Riley wouldn't be there 13 picks later would be very slim. But either way I'd still rather have the potential high impact at 28 rather than Soroka, we have a bunch of guys that profile to be similar to Soroka already. And we've seen this past offseason and at the break this year how hard it is to trade for bats.

A little research and I see that Betts had Tommy John surgery. Normally I wouldn't care aside from two positions. Catcher and SS. I hope he hits well enough to move to 1B.

Hayes looks good but the Braves got their bats in the international areana. That was the plan clearly.