Promotions, promotions, promotions
No, not the Mike Veeck kind…
Clayton Kershaw, the #1 pick out the Dodgers a year ago, has been promoted from low Class-A Great Lakes to AA Jacksonville, where he’ll start tonight against the Mudcats. This shocks me. Kershaw is just 19, and while his Ks and H/IP ratio in low-A are outstanding, he’s had a lot of command issues (50 BB in 97 1/3 IP, less than 5 IP/start) and has been showing some signs of wearing down in his more recent outings. The Dodgers don’t have any particular reason that I can see to push him, and their track record with younger pitchers (Greg Miller, Scott Elbert, the since-traded Blake Johnson and Chuck Tiffany) hasn’t been especially good recently, with only Chad Billingley and now (maybe) Jon Meloan clearing the minors without development and/or injury issues.
Cameron Maybin has been promoted to Erie by the Tigers. Maybin is just behind Jay Bruce, who’s moved through three levels this year without skipping a beat, in the race for “best prospect not currently in the major leagues” (with apologies to Fernando Martinez). Maybin’s raw numbers are pretty good - .304/.393/.486 at high-A Lakeland, with 83 Ks in ~340 PAs the lone real negative - and when you consider the context of the league and park, they’re even better. I don’t like the K rate, but they’ve been coming with less frequency recently.
Tampa Bay has promoted Jacob McGee to AA as well, from high-A Vero Beach to Montgomery. McGee will make his AA debut tonight as well, pitching for the Biscuits against Chattanooga. McGee has been fantastic of late, closing his FSL stint with 14 innings of shutout ball in which he allowed seven hits and three walks while fanning 18. As I’ve said a lot recently, the Devil Rays as an organization are about where Milwaukee was three years ago, and while their row is a lot more difficult to how than was the Brewers (hello Yankees and Red Sox), keep an eye on what’s going on in the Trop.
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Anyway. . . wanted to point out that the Dbacks promoted Gerardo Parra to Hi-A Visalia. Went 4-6 in his first game last night with a 2B and a BI. Curious your latest thoughts w/r/t Parra.
Also - any new thoughts re: Chris Carter. He had a nice little power spike in July (.705 SLG) but appears to have faded terribly in August. But at least he's finally slugging 500 in AAA (even if only temporarily). I still think he needs to be dealt to an AL team.
Longoria was promoted to AAA about a week ago. I wasn't that impressed with him when he played here; his swing is somewhat long and it looked like he could be tied up by inside heat. But the power is real; he crushed a ball out over the CF wall at Five County, which is extremely hard to do under normal circumstances and even harder to do on still summer nights with no breeze a'tall.
-- MWE
Jason Pridie has been hitting the snot out of the ball since being called up to Durham. It's not the Blue Monster, either; he's posted a 1.021 OPS on the road. Pridie's resurgence is a little bit reminiscent of what happened with Crawford and Baldelli, although both were younger at the time.
Probably the biggest disappointment this year are the steps backward taken by Eliot Johnson, Wes Bankston (who spent most of July on the DL but who hadn't done much since April), and Joel Guzman.
Dale Thayer, whose 75 career saves in the Southern League appears to be an all-time record for career saves in that league (per Stacy Long's blog), was promoted to Durham. Tony Peguero was demoted back to the Biscuits. Thayer, who was the PTBNL in the trade last year that netted the Padres Russell Branyan for their stretch run, has led the SL in saves in each of the last two years, and is currently leading the league again. He's another one of those minor league closers who could probably help a major league team somewhere in the back of the bullpen.
-- MWE
Pridie is a real surprise but he has always been a toolsy guy. He's a legitimate CFer too so at the least he can probably make the majors as a 4th or 5th outfielder.
Elliot Johnson is by far the biggest disappointment to me, he wasn't a great prospect but there was plenty to like. Bankston I already basically gave up on before the season started, I used to like him a ton as an above-average first baseman in the majors but he just can't stay healthy and the hitting has collapsed this year and last, he never had a real high ceiling so there's not much reason to hold out hope now. As for Guzman I don't even give a damn any longer, he's just a complete mess. Promotions to the majors and struggles from the middle and lower ranks have depleted the prospect depth quite a bit this year but even with his tools Guzman won't even sniff my Top 15, I imagine I'll bury him outside the Top 20. Maybe that's a little extreme but from both his performance and everything I've heard about him I have a very low opinion of his prospect status.
4 1/3 IP, 3 H, 2 ER (both solo HRs), 4 BB, 4 K.
Kershaw was all over the place early, running lots of deep counts, but except for a pair of solo HRs he wasn't hit especially hard. He left trailing 2-0, but Wade, Orenduff, and Troncoso held the Mudcats scoreless and the Suns came back against Nestor and Mobley late to win 3-2.
As a side note: Carolina's bullpen has had problems throwing strikes all year. It's frustrating to watch, especially since the team has played well enough otherwise to be in most of their games, like tonight's, even with very little in the way of quality hitting prospects.
-- MWE
-- MWE
Houston C prospect JR Towles moves up to AAA, his second promotion of the year. Towles didn't hit well at Salem, but found his stroke after being promoted to Corpus Christi (.324/.425/.551).
The Braves bumped Chase Fontaine, a second-rounder a year ago, from Rome to Myrtle Beach. Fontaine hit .288/.402/.399 in 95 games for the R-Braves.
Boston promoted 1B Aaron Bates from Lancaster to Portland (EL). Jon Still, the Red Sox 4th round pick in 2006 out of NC State, moves up from Greenville to take Bates's spot with the JetHawks.
-- MWE
I'm just delighted the guy is someplace where he might get a shot.
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