Numbers porn.Originally Posted by zbhargrove
Numbers porn.
I think TD has a real shot. Glad they are finally giving him some work at 3B. Hopefully his plus defense at 2B translates.
I would like a lot of things. But the fact that one of our elite prospects is a 2B rather than a 3B doesn't mean we've taken the wrong approach or that we'll have more MLB holes to fill.
It would be phenomenal if we had awesome prospects at every spot. But while not an elite guy, Riley is a quality prospect. He has flaws and concerns, but most do. The likelihood of getting a 3B or OF prospect at the level you're talking about wasn't real great in the trades we made.
Does anybody? We have guys like D Peterson and Demeritte. Are they elite prospects? No. But if you're looking for enough elite position prospects to fill an entire roster in a 1-2 year span, what farm system in the history of baseball has produced that?
Yankees farm system is pretty well-rounded in its current form.
I don't think anybody thinks we're going to have dozens, or even multiple, aces. Obviously fans are going to be optimistic and project more guys than is reasonable to reach their realistic ceiling or something close to it. But I think it's mostly just that we recognize that pitching comes with risks and it is good to have a lot of it.
It's funny, the answer to, 'Have we targeted too much pitching?' has often been, 'Yes, because it is risky and more likely to bust,' from those who oppose it. But that's not groundbreaking territory, it's actually the exact reason many others believe in it.
I think there has been an assumption from those who oppose the overall strategy and trades we've made that the options were getting pitching or getting hitting in equal quantities and talent levels. But I think that assumption is blatantly false, and I think it is false precisely because of the reason always used to oppose the strategy - again, that pitching is more risky and likely to bust. That reduces its value and makes it easier to get in return in trades in both quantity and quality. So it is likely that our choices were a pitcher like Max Fried or a hitter like Rymer Liriano, not Max Fried and an equally talented hitter.
DirkPiggler (05-23-2017)
It is, for sure, and it is very good. It's actually position prospect heavy. The question, though, is whether their hitting talent in the minors is clearly superior to ours or whether it simply seems that way because they lack anything close to the level of pitching we have.
Torres/Frazier/Rutherford/Mateo is a great foursome. Is it clearly superior to Albies/Acuna/Maitan/Demeritte?
They will hopefully have maybe two aces and some filler. that would be a really good result.
1990 Braves? Are you confident in the Braves ability to field a quality lineup in the next two years without investing lots of resources on outside talent?
Two aces would be too optimistic imo unless you feel like Julio is an ace. I can see our current group producing two starters that are 3-4 WAR players. And yes that would be a really good result.
I guess the counter is Margot, but it is not quite one to one.
You can see that Chris Sale got an elite prospect whereas the Sox sort of laughed at Teheran. The Braves had the assets they had at the time they had them and there was a certain market for them.
The Astros spent five years in hell. the Cubs spent nearly that long. The Braves are going to keep trying to acquire assets pitching and hitting. There is no real one obvious way to do it and the examples people give weren't entirely all one way or the other either.
Yeah, that would be ok, but hopefully maybe they'll do better.
The 1990 Braves had a farm system loaded with elite prospects at every spot on the field?
If we get lucky yeah. I think predicting or expecting any pitcher to be a 5+ WAR guy is setting yourself up for disappointment. There are like 10 pitchers a year that do that. And even less that those who can do it consistently.
It wasn't a serious answer but the Braves produced all-star after all-star position player and many quality role players from their farm from the late 80's and early 90's. They had much better luck with position players (as do most every other team) than they did with pitchers.
Southcack77 (05-23-2017)
I'm not arguing that. But we're talking Dave Justice, Chipper, Klesko, Jermaine Dye, and Andruw over what...a 7-8 year span? And trying to compare that to a snapshot of a farm system at one point in time. I would argue that our current farm system has as much position player talent as we ever did at any one time in the 90s.
Southcack77 (05-23-2017)
Well, I guess that would depend on how you gauge superiority. Is the Yankees group, on average, more ready/polished? Possibly. Does the Braves group offer more long term potential? Possibly.
The question was, 'Does anybody have enough positional prospects to fill their roster?' When you look at who the Yankees have graduated the past few seasons (Judge/Sanchez) and what they have on the horizon ... they seem to fit that bill pretty well. Or, at least, considerably better than Atlanta.
Last edited by Hawk; 05-23-2017 at 11:20 AM.
The Braves have 3 position players in the current top 100 right now and one of them is 16.
91: Klesko, Houston, Chipper,
92: Chipper, Klesko, Kelly, Lopez, Mitchell
93: Chipper, Lopez, Klesko, Kelly, Nieves,
94: Chipper, Klesko, Lopez, Kelly, Williams,
95: Chipper, Andruw, Williams, Dye, Hollins
96: Andruw, Dye, Smith, Hollins
I don't think our position prospects compare at any point to what we had in the early 90's. Te Braves had multiple top 25 hitting prospects in those years and hit on almost all of them.
There are only a handful of Braves starters who have had sustained success since 1990 and really only Wainwright lived up to his hype you could say for one reason or another. In fact the best pitcher the Braves have produced since Glavine never even showed up on a top 100 prospects list.
Which is why the whole "Braves Way" silliness about focusing on developing pitching is nonsense. The Braves dynasty was built on 3 HOF pitchers (1 acquired through draft, trade and FA), and a stable of stud position prospects.
The Braves never were, and are not not now, a pitcher factory. Why they decided to go that route now is a complete mystery.
Because they got scared of the price tag for Lester and Price and think they only way to get a ton of good pitching is to develop it yourself to avoid paying for free agents.
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