The Orioles are limping to the finish line

All good things must come to an end. In the case of my podcast, mediocre things have to end too. Since you are reading this post on Camden Depot, you are well aware that the site will be shutting down at the conclusion of MLB's regular season, which is rapidly approaching. That means that these weekly-ish posts of the podcast episodes must also end. However, another well-known Orioles website has been kind enough to step in and offer us a new place to publish our show, and we are incredibly grateful.

Bookmark it now! Going forward, you can expect our new episodes to be featured on...(drum roll)(dramatic pause) Eutaw Street Report! You can follow along at EutawStreetReport.com or on Twitter and Facebook. If you subscribe to the podcast through Google Play, Apple Podcasts or some other app, nothing will be changing! Keep doing what you do to support the show. But if you are more into browsing the web, then head over to ESR's site, read their other O's content and give us some love. We are very excited about the new partnership!

Of course, I cannot end this post without thanking the Camden Depot community and Jon Shepherd for giving me a weekly platform to post about this podcast. It has helped us grow in significant ways by exposing us to a new audience. It's much easier to create something when you know other people are appreciating it as well. We could not have accomplished 26 episodes without the driving force that came as part of being featured of the Depot once a week throughout what was an otherwise miserable season to be an Orioles fan. I just cannot say it enough; thank you!

You can subscribe or listen to the podcast on iTunes/Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher, Podbean, TuneIn and a few other places as well. If you are into social media, we can be found on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube. Wherever you go, give us a five-star review or a "Like". It helps us out a ton! Thanks for the support!

Pre-Opening Day Norfolk Tides Thoughts

Joe Reisel's Archives

The Norfolk Tides, the AAA affiliate of the Orioles, open their season Friday night at home against the Gwinnett Stripers. The Orioles' minor-league spring training camp broke up earlier this week, and consequently a preliminary opening-day roster has been named for the Tides (and the other Orioles full-season affiliates.) Of course, it's a preliminary roster because transactions can still be made even up to the day of the first game. It's possible the Orioles will sign another low-level free agent, like Michael Saunders, and assign him to Norfolk.

Nevertheless, there are a few features of the preliminary roster that intrigue me (as someone who sees the Tides a lot) and may be of interest to you. In no particular order:

• Only six of the Tides pitchers are on the 40-man roster. In the past few years, the Orioles have used the Tides staff as a source of additional arms when the parent team had a need. Of these six, Chris Lee is currently on the DL; David Hess, Yefry Ramirez, and Tanner Scott are making their AAA debuts and are not likely to be early call-ups. Only Donnie Hart and Jimmy Yacabonis fit the stereotype of the recent Tides pitcher who can readily ride the Baltimore - Norfolk shuttle.
• In a recent tweet, the Tides announced that Jimmy Yacabonis will be the third man in their starting rotation, following Yefry Ramirez and David Hess and preceding Jayson Aquino and Tim Melville. It seems strange that Yacabonis, who has never started a professional game, would be converted to a starter at the AAA level. It's more likely that Yacabonis is being stretched out for future use as a multi-inning relief option. As mentioned above, Yacabonis is already on the 40-man roster, and he would be more valuable if he could pitch multiple innings if he's promoted to the O's. 
• Both Tides catchers - Andrew Susac and Austin Wynns - are on the forty-man roster, and neither is particularly young. If Chance Sisco proves himself major-league ready, and the Tides need a 40-man roster spot, either Susac or Wynns would be a possible candidate to be removed. As could Chris Lee or, I suppose, Yefry Ramirez.
• The player I'm most looking forward to seeing is DJ Stewart. I didn't realize just how good his 2017 year at Bowie was. Granted that Bowie is a good hitters park and Norfolk isn't, there's still a chance he'll be a productive hitter. It might be fun to have him be the leadoff hitter; it would definitely be fun to see a 6'0:, 230-lb player who has stolen 46 bases in two seasons.
• In Joely Rodriguez, Garabez Rosa, Engelb Vielma, and Jaycob Brugman, the Tides have four players who are the only players in professional baseball history - at least as far as I have been able to find out - to have their respective first names. 

DJ Stewart is Hyun Soo Kim

After the 2015 season, Hyun Soo Kim let it be known that he was interested in applying his skills to the Major League game.  Many in Korea predicted automatic success.  Kim was known as one of the best pure hitters that Korea had ever produced.  Athletic though with a bit of a bad body, he could have been called the KBO version of Tony Gwynn.  Combine that with the 2015 success of Jung Ho Kang, widely considered a lesser talent, and there was quite a bit of anticipation.

The scouting outlook that emerged from folks focused on the KBO was a bit rosy.  His speed was noted at average, but in Spring Training and later measured by Sprint Speed in the Majors that kind of fell apart.  Kim was the second slowest left fielder in baseball, just ahead of Melky Cabrera.  He could make decent routes.  He knew his limitations, but that awareness can only blunt the lack of range so much.  The changes in his swing to showcase more of his power in the KBO had to revert and go back to how he originally found success.  That took months to figure out.  All in all, it was a mixed bag.  Kim had to rely on his contact skills with nothing else to keep him afloat.  It worked mid-year 2016, but really at no other time.  He now finds himself back in the KBO and likely to dominate there.

Watching D.J. Stewart in 2016 and 2017, he actually looked a bit like Hyun Soo Kim to me.  Athletic, but bad bodied.  Moderate raw power than can translate into games with the right mechanics and approach.  Below average overall fielding.  The two differences that came forward though was that Stewart had a bit more raw power and he is far more able to apply himself on the basepaths.  Stewart understood and felt comfortable in how fast the game was played while Kim had difficulties (at a higher level).

To compare them, I brushed off my KANG model to project what D.J. Stewart would do (using long-term PECOTA projections) against what Hyun Soo Kim actually did at the same age:

		AVG	OBP	SLG
Kim	2012	.291	.358	.382
	2013	.302	.382	.470
	2014	.322	.396	.488
	2015	.326	.438	.541
Stewart	2018	.318	.450	.597
	2019	.326	.463	.618
	2020	.314	.450	.600
	2021	.327	.464	.624

PECOTA through KANG sees particularly more power coming from Stewart.  Stewart also appears to be able to draws more walks as well, but it should be noted that Kim made a point to adapt his game his final year, so you could potentially imagine Kim's power and discipline being underutilized in previous seasons.  Still, Stewart shows more walks and power.

I then wondered how it would look like with Stewart's projections before his 2017 renaissance.

		AVG	OBP	SLG
Kim	2012	.291	.358	.382
	2013	.302	.382	.470
	2014	.322	.396	.488
	2015	.326	.438	.541
Stewart -1	2018	.267	.380	.520
	2019	.263	.378	.521
	2020	.260	.376	.516
	2021	.260	.372	.514

They still do not quite match up.  Stewart still shows more power and similar discipline.  However, his hitting ability plummets.  If you squint though, you see something.

The hope for Stewart is that his hit tool appears to be more well-rounded than Kim's.  Yes, the skill set is marginal, but broader.  Also working for Stewart, by likely coming to the Majors at a younger age, his defense should be more capable.  This will make him less of a minus value overall to the club and enable him to have more opportunities to let his ability shine through.  Kim was not afforded plentiful chances when his offensive play would go into funks because of his defensive limitations.

Aggressive Minor League Assignment for DJ Stewart Makes Sense

DJ Stewart at Florida State (photo credit: Thomson20192)

Aggressively promoting a player through a team’s minor league system is not necessarily a good thing or a bad thing. Sometimes it works out and sometimes it doesn’t. Every player is different, and the success of aggressively promoting a prospect depends on whether or not an individual player is physically and emotionally ready for that next challenge, as well as the front office/coaching staff being able to recognize it. The Orioles have promoted some of their prospects pretty aggressively in recent years, with varying degrees of success, and the organization has been more aggressive than usual in 2017.

While aggressive minor league assignments can be questionable at times, I think it makes sense for D.J. Stewart. Stewart was the Orioles first round draft pick in 2015 (#25 overall), as someone who the organization felt had an advanced hit tool that could move him quickly through the system. And while Stewart has already played at several minor league levels (he started his season in AA), the results haven’t been what were likely expected from him.

Click to enlarge

The one thing that Stewart has consistently shown is that he does a really good job controlling the strike zone. His walk rates throughout his minor league career (shown above) are a good indication of that. However, as a strong college batter transitioning from the SEC to single A, a walk rate in the 10-16% range is something you’d probably be more likely to expect than be surprised at. Additionally, with not unreasonable strikeout rates, Stewart appears to be making enough contact.

The problem is Stewart’s apparent quality of contact. Full disclosure: I have never seen DJ Stewart play in person. Stewart’s approach and walk rate allow his OBP to stay in the range of “acceptable” to “good”, despite his low batting averages. However, based on the limited minor league numbers available, Stewart’s low batting average does not appear to be luck driven. While his BABIP was low in 2015, it doesn’t appear so low as to account for his overall batting line. Furthermore, it’s entirely possible that his line in Frederick was propped up by the increased BABIP during his time there.

And this leads us to the real issue, which is the lack of power that Stewart has shown during his brief professional career, which is surprising for a player who had ISO’s that ranged between 0.196 and .276 during his 3 years at Florida State. For a player who is currently playing in left field and may have to move further down the defensive spectrum to first base (ESPN’s Keith Law believes that’s where he’ll end up), he’ll need to put up more power than he has shown to date in order to become a productive major leaguer.

Scouting the stat line alone is not generally advised, and as I’ve stated, I have not seen Stewart play in person yet. However, I do think it’s worth noting that publicly available scouting reports generally echo what we have seen in the stats. Despite being a first round draft choice, Stewart is not considered anywhere close to being a top prospect at the moment. Law had Stewart 12th in the organization and MLB has him 24th, while Baseball Prospectus and Baseball America also left him out of their organizational top ten lists. And in a system as light as Baltimore’s, that’s not encouraging. The common consensus seems to be that Stewart’s bat won’t be strong enough to carry his limited defensive profile.

Having said all that, the decision to start Stewart in Bowie is an interesting (and on the surface, a confusing) one. But this may be an acknowledgement that 2017 is an not only an important season for the young outfielder, but for the major league team as well. Pushing Stewart in order to get a better idea of what they have in him as a player is a good move by the organization in my opinion.

The big league team currently finds themselves in a quickly closing window of contention, and the farm system does not offer the type of talent that can help to the MLB team. Promoting Stewart to AA is a gamble that the organization should be taking. If he handles the jump to AA well (reminder that the jump to AA is a big one), then he becomes incredibly valuable to the organization no matter what they view his future defensive position to be. If they think he will eventually be limited to 1B, he becomes a valuable trade piece this summer that the organization didn’t have to begin the season. And considering he’s blocked at 1B by arguably 3 players already on the major league roster, they can afford to deal him. If they think he can stay in LF, then a successful season allows the team to look for a short-term solution in LF next offseason (Hyun Soo Kim is a free agent after this year), with the thought that Stewart could take over as the starting left fielder sometime during the 2018 or 2019 season.

The Orioles don’t really have time to wait for DJ Stewart to develop at his own pace, so the aggressive assignment to AA makes sense considering their current window of contention. If he succeeds, he becomes trade bait or a possible starter in left field during the next season or two, depending on how he’s viewed defensively. If he flops, they haven’t really lost much, as Stewart will turn 24 after the 2017 season. And a 24-year-old hitter who can’t hit and is limited defensively isn’t all that attractive, whether he’s playing in Bowie or Frederick. DJ Stewart is essentially “house money”, and the Orioles are going to keep playing until they either get rich or end up back where they started.

Performance Scouting: 2016 Frederick Keys Position Players

Yesterday, we took a quick look at Delmarva's position players who logged more than 180 PA.  Today we take a peak at Frederick's.

>180 PA	Age	AVG	OBP	SLG	OFF+
Aderlin Rodriguez	24	.304	.359	.532	119
Erick Salcedo	23	.270	.319	.369	96
Jomar Reyes	19	.228	.271	.336	83
Cam Kneeland	26	.245	.339	.428	105
Steve Wilkerson	24	.251	.334	.343	96
Wynston Sawyer	24	.281	.421	.462	124
Josh Hart	21	.223	.282	.320	84
Jay Gonzalez	24	.253	.354	.339	100
Conor Bierfeldt	25	.264	.336	.547	116
DJ Stewart	22	.279	.389	.448	117
Austin Wynns	25	.303	.351	.436	108

Frederick comes at you with the concepts of lowered expectations and a general overlooking of positional adjustments.  What I mean by that is that Frederick is a much kinder hitting environment than Delmarva.  It can have the effect of making a player look like they are progressing or even exploding onto the scene when either they are treading water or perhaps have merely shown a modest improvement.

DJ Stewart, yesterday's gem is also today's gem.  In the Carolina League, Stewart (22) is playing in line with his age.  Speaking to the ill of the organizational health, only he, Josh Hart, and Jomar Reyes logged significant innings at Frederick on or below league average age.  That is one of the reasons why you hear incessantly from scouts how appalling this system is.  The low minors are stocked with long standing organizational players or retreads from other organizations.

Anyway, Stewart went from a 230/366/352 line in Delmarva to a 279/389/448 line in Frederick.  This display was better than what most people thought would happen.  Most feared that Stewart's wait and see, no contact approach would eat him up in the Carolina League.  Instead, his performance showed an increase primarily driven by an increase in batting average.  That pokes up a red flag.  Digging into BABIP, his Delmarva mark was .325 (roughly league average) and his Frederick mark was .376 (well above league average).  Combine that question about the sustainability of his new found contact is that him performing about 17% above average offensively in the Carolina League is exactly what you would expect the average Carolina League corner outfielder to hit.

With that in mind, a lot of Stewart's shine wears off.  It then makes more sense why the scouts I talk to are still highly suspicious of Stewart.  It is explained that his increased performance is due to a different approach he takes when going after sub-level pitching and that he simply waits out on level or above pitching.  I do not know how to take that comment as it is a go to for scouts to explain why they dislike a player.  It may well be accurate, but it is too soft of a statement for me.  For me, I simply think that Stewart looked like a miserable miss and now he looks like a potential fringe bat corner outfielder.  That is a modest improvement for the future of the organization, but a notable one for Stewart.

Jomar Reyes was the dream of many prospect-philes the past couple years.  He was young and performing well against much older competition.  Reyes was also a rarity, a product of the Orioles almost non-existent international amateur program.  Last year, some concerns began to emerge though.  He was beginning to fill out and it became quickly understood that he would need to leave the hot corner by the time he reaches the upper minors.  That was a disappointment, but not much of one with his offensive performance. 

What was more of a concern was that right handers were eating up the right handed Reyes while he feasted on left handed pitching.  The concern of a weak sided platoon bat without a position outside of first base or designated hitter is a major concern.  Still, he handled left handers with such ease in Delmarva that it made sense to push him up to Frederick. 

Topping off the year though was a broken hamate bone.  If you remember back to Nick Markakis' broken hamate bone, we all heard a lot about how broken hamates have a lingering effect on power that eventually resolves itself.  It is a baseball myth.  There is no evidence that hamate breaks have that sort of impact on power.  With time, people saw for Markakis that his power outage was simply the natural decline of his skillset as opposed to being related to his hamate.  Likewise, few had concerns that Reyes hamate would result in a lingering decrease in power for 2016.

Sure enough, Reyes came out with a strong bat in April with an ISO of .170, which is impressive for a 19 year old in HiA ball.  And that is about the only positive thing to say about his year, that month of ISO.  He continues to look quite out of place at third base.  He still is eaten up by right handers and he was roughly league average against left handed pitching, which is not good for a platoon bat.  He still is young though and another year at Frederick would make sense for his development.  However, we might be seeing him at first base in 2017 with Aderlin Rodriguez vacating the position there to take it up in Bowie.

Aderlin Rodriguez is 24.  He is a long standing farmhand, given up on by the Mets and the Mariners.  Frederick was his fourth season playing in HiA ball.  All three before came with the Mets.  In 2015, Rodriguez was in AA for the Mets and was performing about league average, but with rather poor peripherals.  They released him. Within a week, the Mariners picked him up to play AA ball and he was awful.  This year, his 80 raw power played up decently and he was a quite dependable for the Keys.  However, it really was not a dominant performance.  It was about 19% better than league average, which is right on par with what one would want out of a first baseman.  Being two years older than his average competition, that rubs some shine off.  Yes, 80 raw power, but being an old guy in your fourth trip round this circuit...it leaves one wanting to see more.

Performance Scouting: 2016 Delmarva Shorebirds Position Players

Numbers are generally guides as opposed to exact definitions.  This series of brief posts will simply introduce you to the performance of the players at each level and provide a context measure of offensive production.  Then, I will write a few words about some of the more interesting players, which is difficult because time and time again I have been told by scouts that this system is a boring one to be assigned to assess.  Anyway, first up is the Delmarva Shorebirds.

>180 PA	Age	AVG	OBP	SLG	OFF+
Cedric Mullins	21	.273	.321	.464	109
Alex Murphy	21	.252	.335	.423	108
Ryan Mouncastle	19	.281	.319	.426	105
Ricardo Andujar	23	.251	.301	.319	91
Yermin Mercedes	23	.353	.411	.579	138
Ademar Rifaela	21	.239	.297	.420	100
Steve Laurino	23	.188	.286	.267	83
Natanael Delgado	20	.250	.305	.375	97
Drew Turbin	23	.211	.313	.312	93
Gerrion Grim	22	.193	.256	.318	82
DJ Stewart	22	.230	.366	.352	108
Austin Anderson	24	.249	.307	.370	97
Randolph Gassaway	21	.330	.372	.511	124

The biggest elephant in the room is corner outfielder D.J. Stewart.  He was selected in the 2015 draft and was thought of as a rather advanced hitter.  Picking up a player toward the end of the first round, you expect there to be some red flags and Stewart had those.  Many scouts who watched him play for Team USA found that his swing was a mess when using a wooden bat.  He simply could not square up on pitches.  Last summer, Stewart looked to prove those scouts right with a rather wretched time spent in Aberdeen.

Stewart spent half of the year this season in Delmarva and was drawing the same reviews.  The word was that he was highly cautious in his at bats and was taking advantage of poor pitching to earn walks and drive mistakes pitches left too high in the zone.  Still, he was not doing much with those mistake pitches.  Word was that the organization was highly confused with Stewart and promoted him to Frederick to force him to sink or swim against pitchers who could actually hit the strike zone.  That move seemed to work out, but a rather sizable clouds still looms over Stewart.  If he is a player who needs better competition to show himself, it begs the question why a drive for self improvement did not show up at Delmarva or Aberdeen.

Yermin Mercedes is another interesting player who has received a lot of fanfare.  At 23, he was an elder statesman in Delmarva.  Long ago, he was an international free agent signing with the Washington Nationals.  He showed a decent arm, poor defense, and a middling bat.  For whatever reason, the Nats dropped him and Mercedes went to Indy ball where he tore the place up.  The Orioles signed him out of the Pecos League and have tried to make a catcher out of him.  His tools behind the plate remain quite questionable and the Orioles have been giving him looks in the outfield.  At his age, you also question the reality of his bat.  Next year, he will likely see Bowie and that might provide a better understanding of how advanced he really is.

Cedric Mullins is a SWINO (Switch Hitter in Name Only). He rakes right handers and a left handed bat and becomes flummoxed by southpaws (115/90).  He profiles as a backup centerfielder, but does not have the size/strength to be expected to show well in left field.  With decent, speed, contact, and gap strength, we should see him progress steadily through the minors.  I imagine he might be ready for a 4th or 5th outfielder role in 2019 or 2020.

The Futility of Mock Drafts: 2015

For many casual baseball fans, the MLB Rule 4 Draft is an anti-climactic event, as the players typically chosen won’t appear in the major leagues for a couple of years, if ever. However, for fans that follow baseball closely, it’s a chance to dream on someone who may be the next future superstar for your favorite team. Expectations are sky high on draft day, as they’re based solely on potential, since the players chosen have not even had the opportunity to begin the inevitable cycle of failure, adjustment, and growth in professional baseball. With a new set of names each year, it can be difficult for people who don’t follow amateur scouting closely to acquaint themselves with the top amateur prospects. Thankfully, there are countless number of top 100 lists and mock drafts leading up to the real thing, which do an excellent job of giving fans a look at who teams may select and the skills those players currently have (and may possess in the future).

However, while those mock drafts serve a purpose of helping fans get better acquainted with draft eligible players (in addition to being very entertaining to read in my opinion), they can be extremely inaccurate, especially after the first couple of picks. That’s not a knock on any of the analysts who put these mock drafts together. They are the best there is at what they do and work really hard at putting together what can essentially be a fruitless exercise.

For the last two years I’ve looked at the accuracy of mock drafts compared to the player that was actually selected. In 2013, I only looked at the mock draft of Keith Law and ESPN’s draft simulator, which attempted to anticipate the remaining picks based on who had already been taken (it was the only year I’ve ever seen it, so it must not have been worth the effort). Last year I expanded to include mock drafts from MLB.com and Baseball America as well. The results the last two years haven’t been great, with the 2013 ESPN Draft Simulator performing the best with 36% accuracy (which is probably another reason why they didn’t bring it back).

Let’s take a look at how things unfolded this year for the first 30 picks.

Click the picture to enlarge.  Green shading indicates a correct selection

The analysts didn’t perform any better in 2015, which wasn’t a surprise given the fact that this year’s draft class was considered thin at the top, but fairly deep. Jim Callis of MLB.com was the most accurate at 30% (9 out of 30 correct), while ESPN’s Keith Law finished at the back of the pack with 13.3%. As you can see, after the 3rd pick in the draft, things got pretty dicey for each of the mock drafts, as small differences in a team’s draft board can make the job of predicting how everything will play out near impossible. In fact, while it may not look like it, it’s amazing that these gentlemen get as many right as they do. So while none of these mock drafts came even remotely close to anything that would be considered a passing grade in school, take some time to appreciate all of the work they’ve done. Because let’s face it, without them, the majority of us wouldn’t know a single thing about most (if any) of these players. So give thanks for the mock drafts that have given you knowledge of the 2015 draft class, and dream about the (for now) unlimited potential of the Orioles first round pick, DJ Stewart.