Cleveland Sports Forum

I forget to ask about Anderson, but someone remembered him

Karl (Cleveland): What can you tell us about RHP Cody Anderson? It looks like he had a decent year and is a pretty big guy. Was he close to making this list? What can we expect out of him? THanks for the chat!


Ben Badler: Big, strong-framed pitcher, but also a conversion guy so the Indians kept the leash on him pretty tight this year. He gets really good angle on his fastball and he'll bump it as high as 96, but he's got to come up with a more reliable secondary weapon to miss more bats as he moves up. He's taken to pitching full-time fairly quickly though and has a pretty good feel for hitting his spots already.

My breakout pitcher is big 6-5 200 but not a hard thrower, yet

Morrie (NJ): Could you give us some insight on Luis Lugo? Thanks, Mr. Badler.


Ben Badler: It's a lot of projection you're banking on with Lugo. He could throw in the mid-90s one day, but he doesn't yet, so you're hoping he fills out that big frame and more velocity comes. He's got a better chance to start than a guy like Araujo, but there's still a lot of rawness to his game.

Another cynic.

Pete (North Coast of Ohio): Hey Ben, The Indians brass tell us there is talent at our lower levels of the organization. Is there any truth behind this or is it just what teams say when it's obvious there is no talent at the higher levels and the younger players can't be adequately evaluated yet, good or bad?


Ben Badler: Your instinct is sharp. Any time you have a farm system that is ranked near the bottom of the pack, I think if you looked back historically, you'll find in most cases the organization will tell you they have talent in the lower levels of the farm system. There's some truth to that with the Indians; Lindor and Paulino are legit and potential stars, and you have Naquin just coming into the system as a first-round pick. But beyond them, I wouldn't say they have any more talent in the lower levels of the system than most organizations. It's not like organizations like the Rangers or Blue Jays are lacking lower level talent either, and they probably have just as much if not more there.

Finally an Aguillar question:

Simon (Scotland): Before this season, I'd seen Jesus Aguilar described as a mistake hitter or a AAAA guy. Would you now see more than that being possible?


Ben Badler: Putting him in the Top 10 is probably an aggressive ranking (and I doubt he'd be in there for the majority of systems around baseball), but he is making strides as a hitter. There's still a good chance that he is just a mistake hitter who tops out at Triple-A, but he took enough steps forward both at the plate and in the field to show some scouts there might be more there than they initially thought a couple years ago.

Rich (Oakland): Ronny Rodriguez #8??? Thought he was much better than that. Why did I think that?


Ben Badler: Well the raw arm strength, raw speed and raw power are all checked off on the positive side of the ledger. The problem is everything about his game has to be preceded by the word "raw." It's a really strange development path, between the time he spent moving from the US to the Dominican Republic before he signed, then jumping straight to the Midwest League in his first year, so I think that needs to be taken into account, but there's just a lot of rough edges to his game to be able to comfortably project him as an everyday guy in the big leagues. The Indians internally might have him graded out higher, but there's quite a bit of concern from scouts outside the organization about whether Rodriguez has the ability to put it all together.

STRANGE DEVELOPMENT PATH. IS THAT ANOTHER KNOCK ON OUR BRAINTRUST?

Ryan (Portland, OR): Kieran Lovegrove ... is he cracking the top 30 and what's your outlook on him? Thanks!


Ben Badler: He's in there. I think we overuse the word "inconsistent" in baseball when really we just mean something like "needs to better" or "not good," but it really does apply to Lovegrove. Sometimes he's in the high-80s with the fastball, sometimes he's sitting in the 90s. Sometimes it changes game to game, sometimes it's even inning to inning. Some guys see a sharp slider, others are seeing a slurvy breaking ball. A lot of it's probably because of his mechanics, but there's definitely something there if he can get those issues ironed out.

That's it. No questions about Luigi Rodriguez, Mitch Brown, Chen Lee, Danny Salazar all of whom made the BA Top 10. No questions about Alex Monsalve, TJ House, TJ McFarland who might fit in the top 30 somewhere.

Bottom line is that BA agrees that the Tribe organization stinks and won't offer any help to the big league club for years.

Does that mean they really should trade guys like Choo and Cabrera and Masterson to get upper level prospects? Only if they know who to trade for and none of us would expect made good deals.

civ ollilavad wrote:That's it. No questions about Luigi Rodriguez, Mitch Brown, Chen Lee, Danny Salazar all of whom made the BA Top 10. No questions about Alex Monsalve, TJ House, TJ McFarland who might fit in the top 30 somewhere.

Bottom line is that BA agrees that the Tribe organization stinks and won't offer any help to the big league club for years.

Does that mean they really should trade guys like Choo and Cabrera and Masterson to get upper level prospects? Only if they know who to trade for and none of us would expect made good deals.

Let's see. How did they acquire the 3 players you are mentioning ? Oh yeah, they were upper level prospects that were traded for. Right ? None of us would expect made good deals ? Not sure I understand your logic.

You can bitch about the drafting of players certainly. You can bitch about spending for free agents because this owner does not do that.

But when you start bitching about everything then you are just a whiner !

.

Civ Welcome to the antidolanite faction.

I would be really proud of that.

As someone who voted for Romney, I have the credibility to say this. Rusty is like one of those republican yahoos who thought that that Romney was going to win despite all the polls saying otherwise. He thinks with the side of his body which is opposite his brain.

That is funny. Ken M you are and always will be a little whiner. Crawl back in your hole and yes I am still upset that the Infiniti did not get the job done.

You have no credibility.

I don't believe I belong to a faction. I do think that team management is terrible. The team has not been cheap when it has come to signing draft choices and middle of the pack on international signings. But the development of the newly acquired talent has been woeful. Read the BA column I posted in articles yesterday.

Braves still waiting for Salcedo to flourish
10:31 am November 16, 2012, by David O'Brien

PHOENIX – When the Braves gave Dominican teen Edward Salcedo a $1.6 million signing bonus in 2010, a franchise record for a foreign amateur, they compared it to getting a No. 1 draft pick. They said he was a special player, that he might be ready to take over at shortstop or third base within a few years.

Thirty-three months later, Salcedo has a .240 career average and .694 on-base-plus-slugging percentage with 32 home runs, 156 RBIs and 124 errors in 339 minor-league games, none above the Class-A level.

“It may take him a little longer,” a Braves official said.

He moved full-time to third base and had a modest season at high-A Lynchburg, hitting .240 with a .295 OBP, though he did have 17 homers and 61 RBIs in 130 games. Salcedo was then sent to the Arizona Fall League to compete against many of baseball’s top prospects, including some who already had brief stints in the major leagues.

It did not go well. He finished with a league-worst .140 average and .454 OPS for …