In an otherwise depressing draft season, Kyle Funkhouser did his best to raise our spirits over the weekend, delivering a signature performance that – outside of Dillon Tate and the recently injured Chris Shaw – most of this year’s top amateur prospects have yet to.
Florida State outfielder D.J. Stewart was regarded as a first-round talent heading into his junior season, but after seeing him during an Easter weekend series at N.C. State in Raleigh, I came away with a lesser opinion.
A 28th-round draft pick by the Yankees out of high school in 2012, Stewart batted .364/.469/.560 as a freshman, then slashed .351/.472/.557 as a sophomore last year on his way to being named the ACC Player of the Year. He hit a disappointing .232/.362/.316 while playing for the USA Baseball Collegiate National Team last summer, although he’s now carrying a .306/ .506/.595 line through 37 games this season. I got two looks at Stewart last week – one on Thursday and the other on Saturday – which is more time than you want to spend without sunscreen at Doak Field unless you’re a masochist who delights in the stinging pain of hot showers.
The results weren’t pretty for Andrew Suarez, who battled himself as much as he did the North Carolina Tar Heels in Chapel Hill last Saturday.
Pulled after throwing 60 pitches in just three innings (4 H, 1 ER, 4 BB, 2 SO), the Miami lefthander repeatedly missed with a fastball that didn’t reach higher than 91 mph and was altogether a much different version from the one selected by the Nationals in the second round last year (subsequently becoming the highest-drafted college player to not sign). Granted, a late-February oblique strain caused him to forego his next two starts – missed development time that can explain the lower velocity from last year. But the control struggles were entirely new, as he walked just one batter in the two starts leading up to Saturday.
The primary concern that scouts have about Michael Matuella is durability. So when the Duke righthander was scratched from making his second start of the season due to a forearm strain, it was a setback that led the Blue Devils training staff to keep him on strict pitch counts over his next few appearances. On Friday night against Pittsburgh, however, the reins were loosened and he showed evaluators the form that made him a candidate to be a top-five draft pick before the season began.
Since I missed Taylor Guerreri in Rays instructs, the biggest name player I saw in camps was recent first round pick Richie Shaffer. The Rays took Shaffer 25th overall out of Clemson and was seemingly the second-highest player on the board for many clubs in the first round, with at least one team in the top 10 picks having Shaffer in their final group. I didn’t see Shaffer as an amateur but got a solid look before he went to the Arizona Fall League and he’ll be an interesting player to monitor in 2013 to see how his tools play in pro ball.
The one thing scouts would mention first about Shaffer when I talked to them before the draft was bat speed. Not his hit or power tools, but bat speed specifically. If you’ve read my other articles you know that I focus on power and fastball velocity and how it is created—if it’s natural arm speed or strength or if the player is cheating mechanically to enhance his tools. Bat speed is to hitters what arm speed is to pitchers. It’s the building block of hitting and power so you don’t have to cheat to get either and have a chance to have both. A player can be raw at the plate but if he has bat speed there will always be a scout willing to overpay the player.
Shaffer doesn’t disappoint in this regard because it’s true plus bat speed, especially rare to find in a college hitter for the aforementioned reasons. Normally bat speed comes from a wiry strong, athletic, skinny-frame player, typically dual sport guys that can run a little bit. Another reason scouts lead with the bat speed on Shaffer is that he doesn’t fit in this box. Shaffer has a pro body, a strong, lean, tapered 6’3, 210 pounds with broad shoulders and an above average arm that could play anywhere on the field. That said, Shaffer isn’t a quick-twitch type athlete, as a below average runner with some stiffness and mechanical movements in his defense at third base. He could move to right field but given the foot speed and a body that should only get bigger, first base seem like his eventual home.
Instructs is a great place to find prospects you weren’t able to see during the season whether they were injured, hidden on backfields, or recent draftees. Rays righty reliever Nick Sawyer fits into the last two buckets as the 1232nd pick out of 1238 picks in the draft and a late-rising arm that signed for only $50,000 out of a Texas junior college.
Sawyer is only 5’11, 175 and during draft season, the rap on him was a smallish righty with some arm speed and command issues. While his command isn’t great, it’s fine and his delivery is cleaner than I anticipated. Sawyer sat at 93-96 mph for a few innings with his four-seamer, often spotting it up in the zone but with enough juice that hitters had trouble doing anything with the pitch.
Sawyer’s curveball was 79-83 mph and was very effective, buckling the knees of Bill Hall twice. The break would vary from three-quarters to more of a downer pitch with slight tilt but have very tight rotation and bite, flashing plus potential when it’s right. The thing to follow with Sawyer is his changeup, as the 86-87 mph was bad the first few times he threw it, improving throughout his outing. Eventually, he flashed a couple average pitches with some sink, fade and solid arm speed.
As promised, there’s only a few instructs reports left but it’s lasted me the (most warm in Florida) winter as junior colleges started this week and I was in the Dominican last week to see the top July 2 players. Along those lines, this wrap-up from Phillies camp will lead off with a high profile American but finish with three recent international signees that caught my eye.
Larry Greene signed with the Phillies for $1 million as the 39th overall pick in the supplemental round of the 2011 draft. Greene is from the South Georgia, the same area that has recently produced Buster Posey, Kaleb Cowart and Byron Buxton. Unfortunately, Greene isn’t the same kind of prospect but, as the signing bonus suggests, he has the tools to be a successful big leaguer. The first thing you notice about Greene physically also stands out on the roster—the Phillies updated his height and weight to 6’1, 259. That should create a certain mental image, but Greene isn’t fat and runs better than you’d expect; think NFL fullback. And don’t think Ryan Howard because that’s really lazy.
I swear I’ve posted almost all of my instructs reports. From Phillies camp, I’ve got two of the top three picks from the most recent draft, both multi-sport athletes as the Phillies are notorious for drafting.
Mitch Gueller was the 54th overall pick (sandwich round) in June from a Washington state high school that signed for slot, nearly $950,000. Gueller was a high school quarterback and also played basketball, so his solid-average speed and athleticism stood out, along with his 6’3, 215 pound frame and fastball that peaked at 95 mph. Unfortunately, it appeared Gueller was fatigued the two times I saw him in instructs as his velo was down and he had more command issues and trouble repeating his delivery than he should.
The first time I saw him, he was facing Gerrit Cole (report) and while Cole was busy hitting 101 mph, Gueller was a more workmanlike 87-89 mph. He spotted his fastball well early, wasn’t afraid to come inside and he kept the ball down. Gueller was throwing a four-seamer that didn’t move much and as he lost his release point, tried throwing a cutter, sinker and slider, all of which weren’t working. The second time I saw Gueller he was much more crisp, sitting 89-90 mph and showing a usable cutter and slider. Gueller’s slider was 81-83 mph and showed average potential and 12-to-6 tilt with late, short bite. His changeup was a solid pitch, also showing average potential in both outing at 79-82 mph with more sink than fade but good deception and arm speed.
For the last entry from Pirates instructs, I’ll run through a number of players that caught my eye for different reasons, lightning-round style.
I saw Mel Rojas Jr. and Gift Ngoepe a good bit during the FSL regular season, and both will flash big league potential at times but had some struggles at the plate. Ngoepe is a great story as a South African-born, 5’10, 180 pound switch-hitting shortstop that will likely get at least a cup of coffee in the big leagues. He’s a switch hitter with plus speed and an above average arm with good hands and fluid actions that will be enough to allow him to stick at shortstop long term. He also uses his speed effectively in his offensive game, often bunting, stealing bases and finding ways to contribute.
Ngoepe’s weakness is his well-below average raw power and some rawness in his offensive game. He gets thrown out a little more than he should on the bases and needs to pick better spots to run but also needs to tighten up his strike zone. For as much as Ngoepe understands his limitations at the plate and tries to play within them, he can get pull-conscious and try to do something with anything close to the plate rather than being more selective. If Ngoepe can shrink his zone and continue to develop his game, there’s a potential big league future as a utility infielder. He’s a little tough to project given his unusual path, but from what I’ve seen I graded Ngoepe as an up/down player that will make the big leagues.
Rojas has some similar qualities to Ngoepe as a guy with big league tools and a good defensive profile who needs to tighten up his approach at the plate to reach his potential. That said, Rojas has much better size and tools; as a 6’3, 215 pound athlete Rojas is a solid-average runner with a solid-average arm and is a switch-hitter with above-average bat speed and average raw power from both sides. You can see why, with a toolset like that, the Pirates took him in the 3rd round out of an Illinois junior college in 2010.
Despite having covered the headliner arms of Pirates instructs — Gerrit Cole (covered last week) and Jameson Taillon (looking basically the same as when I covered him midseason) — there were still some interesting high ceiling arms on display.
First up is righty Nick Kingham, whom the Pirates signed for an over-slot bonus just under $500,000 in the 4th round of the 2010 draft from a Las Vegas area high school. Kingham made his full season debut in Low-A West Virginia as a 20 year old in 2012 and had a solid campaign—groundballs, good control and a solid K rate despite what appears to be a fluky home run rate fueling a 4.39 ERA.
Those stats imply an evaluation close to what I saw from Kingham in instructs. In a two inning stint, he sat 92-94 with consistent above average two-seam life down in the zone and solid location. Kingham’s 82-83 mph slider was above average at times with long action, occasional hard bite and three-quarters tilt. His changeup was the better off-speed pitch, consistently above average with better command, fade and bottom at 82-85 mph and he threw one that was plus.
