Eric Longenhagen Prospect Chat: 5/16/25

Eric A Longenhagen: Howdy, everyone. Hope you’ve all had a pleasant week. I’m enjoying the last little bit of mild weather here in Tempe and looking forward to conference tournament play.

Eric A Longenhagen: Brewers list went up yesterday:

Eric A Longenhagen: Milwaukee Brewers Top 45 Prospects | FanGraphs Baseball

Eric A Longenhagen: I’ll probably keep things tight to an hour today. I’m flying to Florida next Friday and I’m going to chat earlier in the day, so be on the lookout for that next week.

Eric A Longenhagen: Okay, let’s address your many queries.

Rockies Optimist: Adael Amador looks not great, but maybe its the Rockies stink? Also, Jared Thomas/Kyle Karros legit? Karros seems more floor and Thomas more ceiling.

Eric A Longenhagen: I do think it’s time for some change in Colorado. I, too, have fits and starts of Rockies optimism because I think they scout well in the amateur space, especially internationally…

Eric A Longenhagen: But many of their players plateau or get worse. For instance, Sandy Ozuna‘s velo is down and his delivery is suddenly more violent and seemingly ill-timed. This is one example of a kind of pervasive thing…

Eric A Longenhagen: on Amador, I’ll think he’ll be okay. The trajectory of Luis Garcia, Jr.’s career is what I think is a reasonable expectation for him. Luis García Jr. – Stats – Batting | FanGraphs Baseball

Eric A Longenhagen: He’s young, he has barrel feel, the switch-hitting utility is nice…he’ll be okay.

Eric A Longenhagen: I agree with you o the prospects and their respective variances.

AthleticsFan2195: Could the A’s call up Denzel Clarke anytime soon, or sometime this year at all? The lineup is clearly in a decent spot, but the defense has been horrible, and JJ Bleday is not hitting enough to offset the worst CF defense in the sport.

Eric A Longenhagen: I think your logic is sound. You could maybe argue CF defense matters slightly less in that ballpark, but Clarke is the kind of guy who robs a double a game, you’d at least be running someone out there who has a true, elite skill.

Mike: Any draft buzz you’re hearing for the Red Sox?

Eric A Longenhagen: I don’t have any team-specific dope that deep in the round.

Guest: since graduating has Barger developed in any surprising ways?

Eric A Longenhagen: His swing is different. He still has a pretty elaborate leg kick but it’s it’s now more “in-and-out” rather than “up-and-down”, if that makes sense. Here’s the old one:

Eric A Longenhagen: Addison Barger, SS, Toronto Blue Jays

Eric A Longenhagen: You can see how explosive he is, it just took him until he was 25 to find a swing that worked for him and actual, MLB-viable versatility on defense.

drplantwrench: do you have any takes on who the angels should draft at 2? my fellow fans are conflicted with “wasting” the pick on a college pitcher, is that the right move anyway?

Eric A Longenhagen: If I were LAA I’d be trying to cut, I think. If you like one of the HS shortstops (I like Carlson, I’d be trying to levy hometown this and that) but they don’t have a home until pick 10-ish, that’s the group I’d be drilling down to see if it’s a fit for an underslot deal…

Eric A Longenhagen: But their tendencies have been, ya know, the college guys.

Eric A Longenhagen: I like the college arms, fwiw, and it’d be fine if that’s what they do. That’s just not what *I’d* be looking to do by default if I were picking 2.

Cat Latos: Small sample, but are you seeing anything that suggests LAD 2B Kim has made improvements since arriving to the states?

Eric A Longenhagen: I think he’s a great little athlete who’ll be a good defender at a bunch of key positions over time, he seems like a sunny, happy guy who’ll be cool with playing that role and good to have around. I don’t think he’s an impact regular or anything like that. Luxury utility type.

Meidroth Muscle: What are your thoughts on what the white Sox did with colson Montgomery.  Seems a little unorthodox.  Is this a last ditch effort on a once promising, but fading prospect?  I say fading, but he’s still young and time to turn it back around

Eric A Longenhagen: I’m not sure what the right answer is, but I also think it would have been cruel and counterproductive to keep running him out there to K half the time.

Oaktown Blues: Gage Jump has been great so far this year; does he look any different than he did pre-draft?

Eric A Longenhagen: Breaking stuff is playing much, much better. Definite arrow up guy.

Scotty: Carson Whisenhunt is showing much improved command in AAA… you buying it at all?

Eric A Longenhagen: Not *totally*, I think he’s kinda just aiming down the middle with his fastball which is helping him avoid walks, but his fastball is getting blasted…

Eric A Longenhagen: Opponents are slugging .700 against his fastball this year.

Eric A Longenhagen: I think he’s good, clearly, he’s on the hondo. But I don’t think he’s suddenly a 3% walk rate guy.

Mario: CJ Kayfus.. will be be on this year’s CLe team list? can you share your thoughts on him?

Eric A Longenhagen: Yep, Guardians list is next, he’ll be on there…

Eric A Longenhagen: It’s fascinating, really, his profile has totally flipped…

Eric A Longenhagen: His contact rate is way, way down (like 66%), low enough that it’s a concern if you’re looking at someone context-free and see they’re whiffing that much…

Eric A Longenhagen: But he’s hitting the ball much harder. Is he destroying it? No. But he is noticeably stronger than before and seemingly swinging harder, with a lot of visible effort (a common thing in CLE’s system, even on the Complex. And if you told me eventually his contact rate would normalize but he’d get to keep this power, I’d be excited about that.

Eric A Longenhagen: I don’t think he’s an impact player but I think he’s got a shot to be a nice lefty piece, 350-400 PA type guy who could take a Pavin Smith type turn later in his 20s.

Phil: I am starting to have serious doubts about whether Casas is ever going to be the guy at 1st, between injuries, bad defense, and extreme passivity as a hitter. If that’s right, is the next everday 1st baseman even in the organization? Assuming of course it’s not the guy who keeps saying he doesn’t want the job.

Eric A Longenhagen: I think your doubts are fair. I like Triston Casas but I wouldn’t be charting the course for our team with him penciled in ink at first. The injuries and performance combo make him sketchy enough that they should want to create options for themselves…

Eric A Longenhagen: On Devers…

Eric A Longenhagen: The way in which I am most catholic is this: Were I in Devers’ shoes, I’d have sheepishly moved to first base, ashamed I hadn’t done enough to stay at third.

Eric A Longenhagen: That’s clearly not how this has gone.

Eric A Longenhagen: And I get why he might be miffed, and I don’t especially care for Bregman so this whole situation is flavored slightly by that, but now he’s actively creating negative attention and discontent.

Eric A Longenhagen: But hey, he’s raking, too.

Justin: Sam Basallo is excelling so far in AAA, despite what was a slowish start.   At what point should BAL be trying to shoehorn him into the MLB lineup, even if it’s only like 4x a week?  “No reason to rush it before 2026” is a perfectly reasonable answer too.

Eric A Longenhagen: That’s a tough one because they need a spark, but he’s not necessarily ready to do anything but run into his power.

Eric A Longenhagen: Maybe trade Mountcastle as part of a deal for pitching and deploy him mostly at 1B/DH? Mounty is a FA after the season, you still add to your big league roster in an area of need…

Terry Loves Tech: I saw someone mention that the Board is constantly being updated in season to tweak top 100ish prospects, is that correct?

Eric A Longenhagen: Yes, like Made moved yesterday when I updated Brewers. I make a couple sweeping adjustments throughout the year and draw up a whole piece about those big updates, but sometimes little thing like injury might cause a slide to the back of an FV tier or something like that.

Eric A Longenhagen: Just kind of whenever I’m in the guts of the site working on it and think it makes sense to polish it.

Justin: So, Joe Boyle seems to have control now.   Is this real, or just a small sample / “AAA is too easy” thing?  What does this look like if he suddenly can walk < 4 per 9?

Eric A Longenhagen: He’s throwing many strikes with his fastball now, from 55% to 66%, he looks pretty balanced and controlled on the mound, there are still a fair bit of up/arm side misses but it’s definitely better now.

GA Blood: Is Aroon Escobar what clicking looks like?

Eric A Longenhagen: 🙂

Eric A Longenhagen: Lemme pull up his minor league statcast search, one sec, I’m curious and haven’t done this yet.

Eric A Longenhagen: Couple more while that’s baking (idk why it’s lagging for me)

Lucas: I know you just did the Brewers prospect list, but are you buying Brock Wilken’s early season rebound?

Eric A Longenhagen: Him we gave a corner role player grade. Keep Biloxi’s park in mind there. Homer-friendly place. Luke Voit type of power hitter for me.

Jonathan: I know scouts have long worried that budgets would be siphoned to R&D and jobs would be lost.  Do you think PD is another potential risk for that now, i.e. more PD folks, fewer scouts (or more junior/video scouts)?

Eric A Longenhagen: It depends how any given team is thinking about dev, I guess. Are the roles on your staff defined, you know how big you want your staff to be year after year? Do you know you want a certain number of people per player in the org? Does contraction post CBA change that? ROI on dev is high, and once you’ve installed the tech needed to do it right (a moving target, of sorts, but there’s a big initial expense to catch up) you might have more budget for personnel.

Eric A Longenhagen: It’s more stable than scouting, I’d say. At least among the subset or orgs where the budget management is part of the owner’s priorities.

Eric A Longenhagen: Escobar stuff: Minors Search | baseballsavant.com

Eric A Longenhagen: It’s good, not crazy or anything. Hopefully he repeats it during a second half in Lakewood.

Billy: Where is Gabriel Rodriguez?

Eric A Longenhagen: Hamstring

Eric A Longenhagen: Okay y’all, I’ve gotta split. Enjoyed it this week. Remember to look for me an hour or two earlier next week due to conference tourney/travel stuff.