Kiley McDaniel Chat – 1/24/18

Kiley McDaniel: Hello from sunny Orlando. I am prepared to chat with you.

Jared: Hi Kiley.

steev: Hi Kiley,

Kiley McDaniel: You guys are so formal, you can just skip to calling me biased next time

Alex: Hi Kiley, what are your thoughts on Cristian Pache’s ultimate offensive ceiling? Thanks!

Kiley McDaniel: He’s an interesting one. I’ve joked that he’s an LSU wide receiver athletically, so almost anything is possible in the long-term. More practically he needs to refine the approach and lift the ball a little more, but he’s also a 70 runner and if doesn’t improve at all he’s something like Kevin Pillar, which may not be what Braves fans want but that’s an everyday guy.

GP: How would you define a successful offseason for teams like the Twins, Jays, Rockies, etc. who are behind the rest of the wild card field? The Twins in particular are on the upswing but seemingly aren’t a big FA signing (e.g. Darvish) from catching Cleveland or the wild card favorites.

Kiley McDaniel: These are tough ones to define because one of them could easily be in the 70’s in wins next year and one could make the playoffs, so the “successful” offseason would be acting toward that end before you know which way the breaks will fall. They are all three at 79-84 wins right now, so in general I’d say multiple moves to get to 85-88 (if you have the money) or trusting the kids (if you have them) is the general correct move generically speaking.

Dez: Can Gleyber Torres be a 3 win player for NY in 2018? How many wins is he worth in his prime?

Kiley McDaniel: Sure he could be, I mean look what Bellinger and Judge did last year as elite but not top-10 overall prospect. I would say 3-4 wins at peak with an outside shot for more.

SSS: Any thoughts on Alex Kiriloff? He dropped far in all the rankings despite a great 2016, and the fact that his TJ was on his non-throwing arm. It won’t hurt his hit tool or power will it?

Kiley McDaniel: Tend to agree, more that he hasn’t played much in pro ball and lost some name hype as a result than his long-term outlook has changed. I was bullish on him the summer before he was drafted and still am. Not enormous upside since he’s a corner OF without a 7 tool, but there’s a broad base of tools and skills.

Barry: Who will win more World Series titles in the next 5 years, Yankees or Astros?

Kiley McDaniel: I’ll go with Yankees since they have the money to add a couple 5-6 win players via 2019 free agency whereas the Astros seem to be scraping up against their payroll ceiling. Plus the playoffs are kinda random anyway. They would both be in my top 5 for this sort of exercise though, maybe top 3. Cubs and Dodgers are probably the other two on that level. May be an interesting article!

capconstrained: When rating prospects, do you think in terms of base, breakout and bust cases?  Do you also attach a probability to each case?

Kiley McDaniel: I do, in part because I’m kinda OCD about rankings so just saying hey I prefer that guy, I feel like I need more evidence than that to feel good about it. We may be rolling out some versions of this in the future as well.

Jared: Who are you taking between Justus Sheffield and Chance Adams? How do you see each of their careers going?

Kiley McDaniel: I’ll take Sheffield. I’m doing the NYY list after the ATL list, so you’ll find out soon enough.

Ted: Under the radar guy to become the top righty pitching prospect in baseball?

Kiley McDaniel: Eric and I talked about that for a bit last night and Nate Pearson came up as a guy that could explode. I remembered that when I saw him last spring I saw some parallels to Tyler Glasnow, who did just that. Not the same player, obviously, but shape of the breaking ball, long stride, some mechanical stuff, big guy with big arm speed, etc. there’s some similar stuff going on…but when it comes to pitching prospects, if I talk long enough I pretzel myself into ¯\_(?)_/¯

Darryl: If you had to pick a core of 4-5 guys (from one team) for the next 5 years, who are you taking?

Kiley McDaniel: Another good article idea! Lots of fun options but I would want to take some time and make sure I don’t forget anyone. Obviously those four teams referenced above would be in the mix.

Erik: Will Willians Astudillo ever get to be my favorite major-leaguer, or will he remain my favorite minor-leaguer forever?Has there ever been a player remotely like him?

Kiley McDaniel: I don’t have encyclopedic knowledge of minor leaguers, but I’m not aware of one. I think he’ll be a career AA/AAA player, but there if he hangs around long enough, he could be the 4th catcher for a team with a couple injuries and maybe gets that cup of coffee

Erik: Start with a hitter who has a 50 in all five major tools. For every five points you move a tool up, you have to move another down ten. What is the best player you can construct this way? (Bonus points, who does that player most resemble?)

Kiley McDaniel: So I’d 20 out the throw and run and make him a 1B. That gets me to 60 hit, 70 power and 50 defense. That’s something like a 3-win player so I’ll take it

Jake Mintz: Do I know you from bumble?

Kiley McDaniel: You probably only looked at the picture of my dog

William: Prospects chat? MLB chat? What are the parameters?

Kiley McDaniel: Anything! Intentionally didn’t say prospects chat since my first three articles weren’t really using the same scope as last time I was at FG (which was essentially prospects only).

CJL: Do you buy the upside for Yordan Alvarez? Astros are treating him like an untouchable/can’t miss guy in trade talks, but wondering if he’s really that good

Kiley McDaniel: I am IN

Kiley McDaniel: Liked him as an amateur and there’s a chance for 6 hit and power, though lots of guys with this skillset choose to emphasize power/contact more. Will be interesting to see what the Astros development does with him going forward. Great debut, definitely beat expectations but some people knew something like this was in there.

Aaron: Could you name your top three starting pitchers eligible in upcoming draft?

Kiley McDaniel: I’ll give you more than that! On the HS side, Ethan Hankins, Kumar Rocker (both GA) and Matthew Liberatore (Arizona) are probbaly the consensus top three. College side you’ve got Brady Singer (Florida), Shane McClanahan (USF) and I’ll say Ryan Rolison (Ole Miss) would probably be my three but you also have Kowar (UF) and Gilbert (Stetson) in FL and Mize (Auburn), Pilkington (Miss St) and Hjelle (Kentucky) in the SEC, so the southeast is really strong this year, especially up top

the real brian: Who is the best dressed front office employee in all of baseball?

Kiley McDaniel: Not front office but Twins’ senior adviser Deron Johnson always looks sharp

Bartleby: Do you ever prefer not to answer some questions?

Kiley McDaniel: Eric and I also talked about this yesterday. After I run through all 30 systems I’ll probably answer like every non trolly question in a row since I have a good feel for everyone in every system but when I’m getting up to speed on systems I’ll pick the ones about areas I already feel comfortable with, but I’m conscious to not just do a Braves prospect chat.

Erik: How many prospects would you NOT trade one-for-one for Christian Yelich?

Kiley McDaniel: Another good idea for an article. Rosenthal wrote something smart about this today. Essentially with every free agent seemingly have a reduced price and prospects thus having an inflated price, that means solid, market-value-ish players are now a little below market. That means Yelich is worth a little less than normal (with all kinda of alternatives on the FA market at the moment) and prospects (who you can only get via trade) are worth even more than usual. So that list of prospects not on the table is probably bigger at this moment than it would normally be.

Prospect lists: Is there any effort to update prospect lists as trades go through? The Cardinals’ list doesn’t have Schrock or Munoz, and with no A’s list it looks like we won’t ever read their reports

Kiley McDaniel: They will be accounted for, just keep bothering me and Eric and we can give specific answers when each trade is accounted for.

Billy Beane: Have you ever seen a player in a non-baseball context and changed your opinion of him at all?

Kiley McDaniel: Seeing certain HS kids at Area Codes eating lunch at Chipotle always helps the grade

Matt: So is Mickey Moniak still a prospect? Has signing a 1.1 or other top pick below-slot and spending elsewhere been a successful strategy overall?

Kiley McDaniel: Carlos Correa would like to speak with you outside

Clueless Dumbass Asks…: How long before the draft do teams know who they are going to select in the first/second? How dependent is this on draft position?

Kiley McDaniel: With the new CBA where there’s hard spending limits and so at the high picks you kinda have to know the player’s number before you draft him…and the top 5-6 picks can get hammered out night/week before…at some point teams in the 20’s know it’ll likely come down to a handful of players but it’s not as set as you may think. The mock drafts are informed by teams and they often know less than the writers. Team picking 3rd and 43rd probably knows less than me about who is going 20th.

Theo: Darvish to the Cubs. Makes too much sense not to happen, right?

Kiley McDaniel: That would be my guess

William: Hi Biased

steev: hi biased

Kiley McDaniel: Hello, gents.

E: Do you live in Orlando?

Kiley McDaniel: Yep just moved here and got a puppy so all kinds of new things and also urine on my carpet

Braník best : I was bummed there wasn’t a chat until 2! Totally forgot about KileyChat! Gotta update the front page’s chat schedule

Kiley McDaniel: Will pass that along!

Kiley McDaniel: It is being worked on already!

Seth: Did evaluators just miss on Dansby Swanson?

Kiley McDaniel: Still think he’s the same guy, expect a bounceback this year. While Judge/Bellinger types get lots of attention, some of these top tier prospects have some adjustments to make because, wait for it, they are humans and also in their early 20s.

Brad: Hi Kiley, if you could start a team with one, would you rather have Yoan Moncada or Ozzie Albies?

Kiley McDaniel: I’m ride or die with Albies despite being an OG for both, but it’s obviously close and Moncada has the upside edge. Worry a little about the contact stuff w/Yoan. Albies was exactly what you’re hoping for right away in the bigs plus he’s adorable and can fit in the overhead bin so you don’t have to check him.

Andy: I’ve missed you, Kiley!  Question: will you cover one coast while Eric covers another?  how will this work?  what if I’m an undiscovered stud playing ball in Memphis?!  Who will tell people about my unusual good looks and desires to hit flyballs?!

Kiley McDaniel: It works out that we’re located in FL and AZ and travel is easier for those reasons but we’ll both cover the whole country and while one of us will do one list, we consult the other before any of the other guy’s team lists get published. Joint effort on any official rankings or anything like that. Articles or specific I saw this last night reports or chats will be more one viewpoint than joint.

William: It seems like it would be really difficult for a player (Acuna) to be at ~6 BB% and ~28 K% *and* be above league average as a hitter. Rare. Are the tools that loud?

Kiley McDaniel: It’s crazy loud and the Braves knew it was special when he was in short season, signing scout Rolando Petit knew before that. It was like shockingly obvious. Experienced evaluators would see one AB (with no names on the jerseys) back when he was in rookie ball and be like  whoTF is that guy?! Scouts say the first round types make it obvious for you and that’s still generally true

Brades: I feel like people are underrating Nick Senzel. 1) Why 2) What’s his projection offensively so I can tell people and hopefully they’ll quit underrating him.

Thanks, <3

Kiley McDaniel: No 7 or 8 tool (although some would argue the bat is) and not like a super twitchy athletic type like Acuna, Judge, Bellinger, etc. more steady than spectacular. He’s really advanced and would guess he’s up for more than a cup of coffee this year.

Kiley McDaniel: Go peep that front page chat schedule now

Kiley McDaniel: The gawd Sean Dolinar was freakier and fastier than Jimmy John’s on that one.

Roger: With the first Braves question being from Alex, I can just imagine Anthopoulos coming on here to pick Kiley’s brain.

Kiley McDaniel: LOL our daily calls should be enough for him

alex: Catcher seems wide open for the Braves. What are your thoughts on William Contreras, and the likelihood that he will eventually grow into that role?

Kiley McDaniel: Little sneak peak of the Braves list: Alex Jackson, Brett Cumberland, William Contreras and Drew Lugbauer are all on the list and are guys to follow. Stark difference from a couple years ago when a couple potential backups is all there was.

Prospect Hound: When are we getting more team prospect lists?!? Will you be writing any?

Kiley McDaniel: Yes! Finishing up Braves and Top 100 stuff now, starting NYY and doing some draft stuff. Lots of stuff in the works!

Zach: Who will sign Hosmer?

Kiley McDaniel: Seems like it’s down to Royals and Padres

Long Live Jeff Frye: If current trends hold, might we start to see NPB teams outbidding MLB for mid-tier free agents?

Kiley McDaniel: It’s not that low. The $/win in NPB is waaaaay lower

Jack: How special of a pitching prospect is sixto Sanchez?

Kiley McDaniel: Really special? I don’t know the official degrees of specialness is there a cheat sheet and can someone update me on the degrees of legit because I’m still getting a lot of those questions

Rich: Who and when will somebody decide to bring us a 6 man rotation?

Kiley McDaniel: Problem is truly doing a 6 or 4 man means you have to homegrow all of them since free agents won’t sign with you and change their career long rest patterns. And that limits your flexibility if some homegrown guys don’t work out. Like 5 teams would have to agree to do it all at the same time

TKDC: So Ronald Acuna is basically Mike Trout with a better arm, right?

Kiley McDaniel: LOL not sure when this comp became commonly accepted but no, don’t expect multiple 8-10 win season from Acuna or any other carbon based life form. A *peak* of a 4-6 win season is reasonable, with an average around 3-4. Go look how many guys average 3-4 for multiple years, it’s a really short list.

Big Joey: If you joined a new dynasty league, what round would you take Conforto in? Let’s say the league favors OBP and SLG.

Kiley McDaniel: I don’t mind fantasy questions in the sense of this guy or that guy or rank these three but this is too detailed of a question for me to feel like I can offer a good answer

Evan : If Kevin Maitan is no longer a top-100 prospect, where do you think he ranks?

Kiley McDaniel: We haven’t finalized out top 100 yet, but I think we’ll have him closer than some would expect. He may make it.

Kyle : What are your thoughts on Jordan Adel of the Angels? He looked to have a great start to his pro career. Has the outlook on his hit tool improved?

Kiley McDaniel: I haven’t seen him much and heard wildly varying opinions from top-10 for sure to 2nd-3rd round from others (at draft time). Debut was eye opening and showed the bat control/contact that many questioned, so I’m optimistic he can deliver on the tools more than I was pre-draft.

Matt Damon: MATT.  DAMON.

Kiley McDaniel: Why don’t you sit a few plays out coach

Richard, Richie for short: In the year 2056 do you see teams using gene-editing tools to build teams? Imagine raising a player from birth in ideal conditions with fantastic genes. It’d be so neat

Bryan: This is morbid but I’m curious.  What would MLB do if a team’s plane went down?  Say it’s a late September game with playoff implications, so you’ve got a full expanded roster and a bunch of coaches and front office staff on board.  Would they implement some sort of expansion draft-type remedy?  Would that apply to front office / coaching staff as well? Would other teams have sympathy and help out, or view it as an opportunity to step over an organization for several years?

Kiley McDaniel: Gonna leave these two questions right here for the proper authorities

RVA Empire: How does high school scouting differ between the Major Leagues and Colleges/Universities? I’d imagine the ML’s have much more resources but somehow top programs (Vandy, UNC, UCLA, etc.) keep finding eventual ML talent.

Kiley McDaniel: There’s more communication between the scouts and college coaches than you’d think. There’s fall scout teams with HS kids of all ages where the scouts know the kid’s makeup and talent and the college coaches ask them for recommendations, then those scouts get better info from the kids currently at the colleges, for example. Also, as mentioned above, the elite kids make it obvious pretty quickly who is the best. And, for colleges, elite + rich family is perfect (since they are less signable and more likely to go to school) so those get picked over first by the best colleges.

Kiley McDaniel: In many cases, the college coaches find the kids first as underclassmen then spend years trying to hide them from scouts, so it goes both ways

Kyle : Do you have a preference am among the three Angels outfielders. (Adel, Jones, Marsh)

Kiley McDaniel: Adell then Jones and Marsh pretty close, with Jones more 45-55 FV spread outcome and Marsh more 30-60 FV spread outcome that will narrow some during 2018 likely.

Claudius: Will you be resuming semi-regular podcasts with Carson? You don’t even have to Analyze All Prospects anymore!

Kiley McDaniel: We will!

Mike: Who will be MLB pipelines 100th prospect ?

Kiley McDaniel: Am I too old to say your mom? Yes, definitely? Okay then I’ll go with I don’t know.

Matt: Do you rank prospects differently when writing for fans than when working for a team? It seems fans probably care more about ceiling while teams might care more about floor or expected value.

Kiley McDaniel: That is generally correct. Or, more specifically, when lots of guys look similar, filling a particular need or being on a certain timetable  to match what the org is trying to do.

Ken: Kiley – I was surprised to see the A’s take Austin Beck last year. He’s the type of low floor, high ceiling player that they stay away from. How do you rate him? Thanks.

Kiley McDaniel: Seems like the more progressive type teams are more open to players like this since the HS kids with a chance to be a 70 FV aren’t available as free agents, so taking a chance in the draft is the only way to get one. I think he’s a high variance huge tools guy. Similar to Marsh, that FV spread will narrow some this year if he spends the whole year at Low-A and we get a better idea exactly where he’s at.

Cody: Ki-ley Mc-Daniel grades a farm. E-I-E-I-O. Who has an 80 throwing arm? E-I-E-I-O. With a hit tool here and a leg kick there…

Kiley McDaniel: Alrighty I think that’s a sign to wrap things up

Kiley McDaniel: See you bros and lady bros next week!