Latest / Sports Avenue Twisted Podcast / Episode 56 feat. Eli Ben-Porat - Talent in the FSL, Triple A, and Call-Ups to the MLB

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Episode 56 feat. Eli Ben-Porat - Talent in the FSL, Triple A, and Call-Ups to the MLB · Sports Avenue Twisted Podcast

0:26
Welcome to another edition of the Sports Ave.
0:28
Twisted podcast. We have a guest in here who is a
0:31
contributor to the Baseball America and he does to cover
0:35
prospects in AAA and the FSL. Eli Ben Porat.
0:38
Welcome to the show. Just let the world know what
0:42
what else you do besides Baseball America?
0:46
Professionally, I I work as a data analyst for Rogers, which
0:49
ironically owns the Blue Jays, even though it's not really had
0:54
nothing to do with that at all. Thanks for joining us today,
0:56
man. We're excited to have you and
0:58
excited to deep dive into the world of prospects and
1:02
everything else. So thanks for joining us today.
1:05
We meant to get you on I think a week ago, but there was some
1:08
miscommunication there on our part.
1:10
So we apologize for that. But we're excited to have you
1:12
today, man. Good.
1:14
Love talking baseball all. Right.
1:17
So the first question I want to talk about is the FSL, the
1:21
Florida State League. It's usually known as as a ball.
1:25
And I want to I want you to talk about some of the prospects that
1:29
are there. And I know you wrote about some
1:31
of some about them, right? For example, like the Conor
1:35
Griffin's, the Edward Florentines, Edward traits, the
1:38
Arun Escobar talk about the top guys and where they fit, where
1:42
they stand and what their potentials are.
1:45
So I think the the guy with the highest ceiling is probably
1:49
Edward Florentino. His combination of launch angles
1:53
and zone contact is basically Jose Ramirez.
1:58
Obviously he's an 8 ball and Jose Ramirez is doing in the
2:00
major leagues for a decade. Except that his raw eggs of
2:05
velocity numbers aren't exceptional.
2:08
Like they're only roughly Major League average.
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And I don't know where I feel about this because there's this
2:14
consensus that people will add power and I haven't actually
2:19
looked into it, but from what I'm seeing with most batters,
2:24
what you see is pretty much what you get.
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I don't actually see batters like significantly add exit
2:30
velocity as they get older. Batters often will add EVs just
2:33
because they change their training.
2:36
But I'm I'm not necessarily a big believer.
2:38
Again, my confidence here isn't super high.
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I haven't done any definitive research in it, but I'm not
2:44
convinced that batters will organically add a lot of powers
2:48
as they age. So The thing is like, I want to
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I want to understand here because we talk about certain
2:56
players for certain prospects who are in the FSL, which is 8
3:00
ball. And you know, it takes a couple
3:02
years from some of these guys to get developed and we don't know
3:06
what their their utmost potential is.
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But is there a name that you could think of that that you
3:12
think that, OK, this guy has the tools to be that player and has
3:18
the trajectory like, for example, like a junior Caminero.
3:21
I mean, a lot of people didn't know who he was.
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He was in the Cleveland organization and he got traded
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to the Rays and look at what he is today.
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Is there any guys like that? Well, Bryce Rayner for sure, OK,
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for sure, for sure. Bryce Rayner is is going to be
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he's he's going to be a fantastic player.
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But for guys who are less well known and I think people have
3:41
forgotten about Bryce Rayner because he got he injured his
3:43
shoulder and then he's kind of being off the radar.
3:46
Like his data and Connor Griffin's data were pretty much
3:50
equivalent when they were playing in single A.
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Of course, Connor Griffin's now in AA and is probably the best
3:56
prospect in baseball, but Rayner's exit velocities are
4:03
outstanding. Like they would be like he could
4:04
fit in the Major League lineup right now.
4:06
Obviously he's not ready, but like those like his metrics
4:09
would fit in the Major League lineup.
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The, the guy the guy that I hear a lot about and I have a source
4:14
in the Cardinals organization who's super high on him is Randy
4:17
L Rodriguez. His early data weren't that
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great. And this is one of those I, I
4:25
never trust my eyes. But when I look at his swing on
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videos and highlights, it looks like he should have so much more
4:31
power. But like his exit velocities are
4:34
just like average ish. It's kind of like an Edward
4:37
Florentino. But what my eyes tell me with
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his swing and his body and frame is that there is a lot more
4:43
power there. I just it's just not showing up.
4:47
I want to ask you about one more prospect.
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And you know, it's Eduardo Tate. And he was part part of that
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package for Joanne Duran. And I believe he's a catcher and
4:58
he's probably going to be the Twins catcher for the future.
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And a lot of people think that his bat is advanced and people
5:08
believe that, you know, he he has the potential to be a really
5:12
good player. Like do you have any thoughts
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about him? Yes, I've heard about him a lot,
5:16
I think a couple of times last year.
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So he's repeating single A and generally what I see with
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prospects who repeat a level is they tend to over perform.
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So you always got a discount performance a little bit when a
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guy's repeating a level for the second time.
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I'm just pulling up his data here.
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The reason why I'm not super high in Eduardo to eat is his
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contact is always being OK but not great.
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OK. Like his raw power is great.
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Like you're not going to find a lot of guys his age who could
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hit the ball as hard as him, but he's repeating single A and
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again, his own contact is kind of below low average.
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And that doesn't necessarily like if you want to be a guy who
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succeeds with below average zone contact, you've got to be a
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masher. You got to be not necessarily
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Nick Kurtz or but or Matt Walner, but like there's that
6:11
trade off. And unless you're really mashing
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and getting the ball in the air consistently, I don't see it as
6:17
a as a recipe for success given given this current data.
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Talk about some of the pitchers, the top pitchers in the FSL with
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guys like Leomar Martinez, Braden Davis, Leo Sakura,
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Wellington, Arsenia Austin Case, Johnny King, a lot of guys, lot
6:37
of potential down in in the FSL. So tell us about some of the top
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pitchers down there. I like Johnny King a lot.
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He's got a great fastball. But what I'm what I wanted to
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talk about actually with the FSL is what I've noticed with the
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Miami Marlins. And if you look at their FSL
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staff or a lot of pitchers who just recently were drafted,
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pretty much all of them have the, you know, the hypert
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fastball. Like they all like pretty much
7:05
every single one of them, including this guy, I think his
7:09
name is Cannon Pickle I'm just fascinated with.
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So Pickle has a cut fastball with 20 inches of IVB.
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And I don't want to get hyperbolic here, but the only
7:20
again, he has no, and he has no command.
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The only guy that I that I could find that had like a similar a
7:26
similar fastball was Kenley Jansen's rising cutter.
7:30
Obviously he's not Kenley Jansen, but the it's such a
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unique pitch shape and they got him in the 20th round.
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And what I can never wrap my head around is why don't more
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teams go after these types of guys?
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80% of them will flame out because they don't have the
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command like my my favorite guy, Brock Moore, I still believe in.
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But like the the traits you need to go from being a college guy
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or high school guy to get to the major leagues, you have to be
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such an outlier of an outlier that taking a quote UN quote
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safe pick unless you have like a path to getting them outlier
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traits in, you know, either velocity or movement, I think
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happens far less often than taking these guys with
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exceptional traits and trying to hone them into major leaguers
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from a command perspective. Do you think that with some of
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these pitchers, like like you said, and these guys take time
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and, and The thing is like, what kind of pictures are they
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usually? Because you know that college
8:36
pitchers usually get in advance. Like for example, we could talk
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about Trey Savage, right? I believe he started in a ball
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and now he's in AAA. Like you could talk about him
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or, or somewhere to these lines or Thomas White for the Marlins.
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Like, like, like you look at some of these guys and you look
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at the way these guys develop and the Marlins seem like
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they're they're great at it. If you look at Peter Bendix
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coming from the Rays organization, that's what
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they're well known for, right, for pitching development wise,
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right. We'll we'll get to that later.
9:06
But like, like what's the trajectory?
9:09
Because like, I'll give you a name, Brandon Berriera for the
9:12
Blue Jays. He was drafted out of high
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school and I and I get it, he was injured and he's been
9:17
injured and like what do you look at the differences compared
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to like a high school kid to a guy who signed for overseas in
9:24
the Dominican or wherever and and then call it pitchers itself
9:28
it developing wise. So when I evaluate pictures
9:37
coming out of college or, or, or high school, it's more or not
9:40
really high school, but it's more about developmental traits
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in my opinion. Can they throw a fastball that
9:49
will be Major League plus or average at least?
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And that's one of two, one of two or three ways.
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So if you can throw a cutter, you have a lot more leeway
10:00
because a cut fastball doesn't need to have plus ride.
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But most guys can't throw a cut fastball.
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Or you got to have plus vertical ride on your fastball.
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Or you need to be able to throw a sinker and you need to be able
10:10
to use scene shifted wake to get that sinker to have plus
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movement. If you if you can't do one of
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those three things, it's very, very hard to succeed as a major
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leaguer. So Barriera doesn't barrier is a
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barrier a? Barrier A Brandon barrier.
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Barrier. So the thing with Barrier is
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that like he was drafted I think in 22, he was the first round
10:34
pick and he ended up getting Tommy John.
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But like a lot of people, like some of these people compared
10:39
him to like a Ron Goodrey type of guy.
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Just throws hard throws. You know, his stuff with the
10:44
change up and stuff, like just just his delivery, the way he
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pitches left-handed pitcher. But he hasn't really done enough
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and he was throwing sessions in the development accomplice.
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But he reinjured himself, unfortunately.
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Yeah, so I mean, pitchers, like high school pitchers are, are a
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crapshoot, even even the very, very best.
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That's why I'm very can't wait to see Seth Hernandez when he
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when he comes in because he we should get data for him.
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If he's pitching, he's on the Pirates.
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So all my favorite prospects are like on the Pirates, the
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Cardinals, the Jays, you know, the teams that that that have
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FSL data. Yeah.
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Like the issue of Barriera is, yeah, as fastball as negative
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trace and without without that like unless you can be super,
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super native. So LA and and there are very few
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guys who can succeed like that. To get to to a player here
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that's closer to the majors and Spencer Jones and Yankees have
11:48
been reluctant to include him in any trades or anything like
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that. I mean, the guys having a
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really, really Goodyear, you know, 28331 home run, 66 RBI's.
12:00
He's got speeds with 25 stone bases with the 977 OPS.
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Just tell us about what type of player this guy could be.
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What's his ceiling? What you know, what are his his
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strengths, what's his traits and and do you think that this guy
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is going to be the the real deal at the next level?
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I'm I'm a big Spencer Jones believer.
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It's easy, easy 80° power. So last year I was less in on
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Spencer Jones. So the the flaw, the flaw is
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clear with the with Spencer Jones, like everyone knows he
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swings and misses way too much. But everything else about his
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profile is exceptional. And it becomes the question, how
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much zone contact, how much contact overall do you need to
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be successful in the major leagues?
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And Spencer Jones is basically a Matt Walner who can play center
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field. His exit velocities, his hard
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hit launch angles are basically at the Nick Kurtz level, which
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means all he has to do is get his bat and the ball 20% of the
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time. 30% of the time you know is it bats.
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And when he makes contact he's going to do a lot of damage.
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If he was a first base guy, I'd be all out on him because teams
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aren't going to want to sit through that when the guy
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doesn't. 5 plus defensive value, but he can play center field and
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if you can play center field, you don't really have to have
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that much that much offensive value in order to be successful
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Major League. So on the other end of the
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spectrum, like we talk about a guy like Denzel Clark, if you go
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to the rookie of the year leader boards, he's he's almost
13:49
accumulated to WAR in, but in half a season and he has a 75 or
13:55
something weighted run creation. Plus like he's been a terrible
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hitter, but because he's won the best or perhaps the best center
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fielder in the game, it doesn't even matter.
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Does this strike out? Does this strike out rate
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concerned you? I know he hits for power.
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He's going to be a power hitter. I don't care.
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And you don't care. I literally don't care.
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If you look at Matt Walner, Matt Walner is hitting is hitting 200
14:21
this year. He is, I think 20% better than
14:25
league average, something like that.
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I haven't, I haven't looked at his numbers recently.
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Let's let's just check it up so I don't mislead anybody.
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Matt Wallner for his career has been a well above average
14:37
hitter. This year he has a yeah, 118 and
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his that's with a 245 Babbitt, which is way, way below his
14:46
career In 2024 is he was 55% of the above league average and
14:51
year before that he was 42% above the league average.
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If you hit the ball as hard as Spencer Jones, you got to hit it
15:00
in the air and he changed that dramatically from last year to
15:04
this year. The Yankees must have had him
15:06
undergo a swing change because he's really, really not the same
15:11
hitter he was the last two or three years of his career.
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Right. Next next player I want to talk
15:18
about is. I think he's risen to the
15:21
occasion, perhaps even the top pitching prospect in the Red Sox
15:26
system is paying toll and and he's been an absolute fine for
15:30
them. And he was drafted last year and
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what's been successful for for him and how soon could be could
15:38
he be up? Could he be up by next year or?
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Oh, he's, he's ready now. I mean, we've seen with college
15:44
pitchers, my philosophy with pitchers is it doesn't really
15:48
matter how much experience they have.
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Like it's either their pitches have plus traits and they can
15:55
throw it in the zone or doesn't or not.
15:57
But it's I don't know if I'm out in an island here, but I believe
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like other than being able to feel game situations of being
16:06
able to perform in under pressure, but I feel like you
16:10
could just take a guy, have him to throw bullpens in the lab and
16:14
then put them on a mount. And I know people call me crazy
16:19
for saying that, but I I don't care if you've proved yourself
16:23
at single A, AA and then AAA. If you're stuck plays, you're
16:27
stuck plays, and Peyton Tolles stuff will definitely play in
16:30
the Major League well. Recently been talking a lot
16:35
about Force Whitley with the with the race he was I believe
16:40
he was DFA Ed by the Astros. He was drafted by the Astros and
16:44
was DFA Ed and then the Rays, I think they traded for him and
16:49
they're trying to, I believe, make them into a starting
16:52
pitcher again in the minor leagues.
16:55
So tell us, tell us what you've seen from what the Rays do
16:59
because they're known for doing this, taking other people's
17:02
scraps and fixing them and turning them back into what you
17:06
know, they they were expected to be or even making them better.
17:10
So tell us what you've seen from Force Whitley in the Rays
17:14
organization, and what you think you could become.
17:17
So this it blows my mind that Whitley was designated for
17:22
assignment and nobody picked him up other than the Rays.
17:27
Sorry. He the Rays designated for an
17:29
assignment. I think the Rays got him and
17:31
then they had him play pitch in the major leagues and then they
17:33
designated for assignment and nobody took a chance on this
17:36
guy. Like we literally just went
17:39
through a whole draft cycle and other than maybe like two or
17:43
three guys in this draft we have to pay multi $1,000,000 signing
17:48
bonuses. I would put Forest Whitley's raw
17:52
traits up there with practically anybody in the draft class.
17:56
His ability to spin the ball, his ability to throw the ball
17:59
hard, hit the hit, you know, throw strikes there.
18:03
There aren't a lot of readily available human beings in the
18:06
world that you can acquire for 0 acquisition costs like Forest
18:10
Whitley and like all they've done really is told them to
18:16
throw his change up more. And so he's now throwing his
18:19
change up I think 21% of the time.
18:22
So this goes back to what I was talking about before Forest
18:24
Whitley, despite the ability to spin the ball and throw it hard,
18:29
he can't create plus shapes with his fastball.
18:34
So that's a big problem. If you, if you can't create plus
18:36
shapes the fastball you're going to have, you can have a very
18:38
inconsistent career. But so, so sorry.
18:43
So the solution to that for most pitchers is to just have a
18:46
kitchen sink arsenal and that's what they've done.
18:49
So if he throws his fastball 37% of the time, throws the keys up,
18:54
the now his cutter is up to 27% of the time, change up 21% of
18:58
the time. And if you're throwing 5
19:00
different pitches and mixing them all in, it helps to mask
19:05
the, the fastball a lot. Kind of the the Max freed
19:09
approach. So the next player I want to
19:13
talk about is Bryce Eldridge and he's the San Francisco Giants
19:17
top prospect in the system and he's in AAA right now.
19:21
And I think he's finally solidified himself as a one
19:24
position at first base now. And he looks like he's going to
19:26
be the guy, if not this year, next year for sure.
19:28
Like he's a power hitter and it's and his average is decent,
19:33
but it's what's the important traitors.
19:34
I think it's OPS is what a 38? So talk about Bryce Eldridge.
19:40
What's his profile and and how important could he be part of
19:43
that Giants organization long term?
19:46
Long term he's he'll figure it out.
19:49
Short term, I wouldn't rush him to the majors just yet.
19:53
He has a massive hole like bottom third of his own and he
19:59
just will miss all of those pitches.
20:02
So you don't want to bring him up and and just have Major
20:06
League pitchers. Spamming pitches the bottom
20:10
third of his own and he's just whipping and whipping and and
20:12
losing his confidence. He needs to fix that before they
20:16
before they can bring him up outside of that flaw, which is
20:20
definitely a big flaw. Everything else about the
20:22
profiles phenomenal is his raw power, his launch angles
20:28
fantastic. Like outside of Samuel Basayo,
20:35
like he's got the the highest power upside of anyone other
20:39
than Spencer Jones, Spencer Jones and several Pasado, he has
20:42
the highest power upside of anyone in the minors.
20:49
Soccer boat, Two guys that were recently called up in top Mets
20:55
pitching prospect Nolan McClain, who's given two starts for for
20:59
the Mets and looks fantastic. I believe he pitched yesterday
21:02
against the Braves and he looked wonderful.
21:05
And then Bubba Chandler was just called up and I believe he
21:07
pitched yesterday as well and 4 innings pitched, 2 hits.
21:13
You know, I think he actually got a save yesterday, I believe.
21:18
He looked, he looked, he looked amazing.
21:19
I was, I was flipping between him and Bieber.
21:22
I had my, you know, my computer had both screens on and Bubba's
21:26
the real deal. I don't, I don't understand why
21:29
the pirates wasted. I mean, I do understand why the
21:31
pirates wasted so much of his time at AAA.
21:34
Like they either should have called him up in in early May
21:38
and I guess once they hit like mid June, they're like OK, fine,
21:42
we got to wait. So he's prospect eligible for
21:43
next year, which I think discouraged him a lot as you got
21:51
it when you got when you show up in the mail, you got to compete
21:54
at such a level in order to be successful.
21:56
When you know like that your performance really doesn't
21:59
matter because you're just basically stuck there until
22:03
until past the whatever super 2 deadline or whatever whatever
22:06
deadline is. I'm not so familiar with it.
22:09
Yes, of course your your performance is going to regress.
22:12
And all that really matters for a guy like Bubba Chandler is the
22:14
raw stuff. He's throwing 98 to 100.
22:17
It's plus right in the fastball. His change up look fantastic.
22:20
His slider look fantastic. I don't even know if he threw
22:23
the curveball very much that's also on the pitch.
22:25
Like he's he's got the classic pronator profile of the fastball
22:29
change up slider, curveball. And all four of those pitches
22:32
are going to be plus pitches. At least like I, I remember last
22:39
year I did, I did an article on the, the Futures Game and I was
22:42
watching Bubba Chandler and that really like he blew my mind.
22:45
And I'm going to get a little bit scouty here, even though I'm
22:48
not a scout and do not trust anything my eyes say.
22:52
But there's certain pitchers when they throw and it looks
22:55
like I don't really think they can sustain 98 to 100.
23:00
I look above a Chandler and I go this guy.
23:02
This guy can easily throw a 98 to 1. 100 I just wanted your
23:05
thoughts on Noel McClain as well in his start to his Major League
23:10
career. So Nolan McClain is the the
23:12
classic modern 2 fastball pitcher.
23:16
I'm seeing this a lot when I, when I dive into the data.
23:19
It's guys who throw a fastball on the sinker with the exact
23:22
same spin axis. That means out of the hand, it's
23:25
going to look identical to the batter.
23:27
And the only thing they change is the seam orientation.
23:31
And, and some pitchers can do this and get tremendous
23:34
movement, movement deviation. So his fastball in AAA, his
23:41
fastball got about 12 1/2 IDB, which isn't great, but his
23:47
sinker, it gets 3.7 inches of IBB.
23:50
So there's like 9 inches of vertical differentiation between
23:55
his fastball and his sinker. And the batter has practically
23:59
no information about which which pitch is which, which means
24:04
each, each pitch should theoretically play up compared
24:07
to the other one. And then outside of that, he's
24:09
got a a sweeper that he gets 29129 hundred RPM gets you know,
24:13
15 to 18 inches of of horizontal brake on it.
24:17
Another plus plus pitch mixes in the cutter which is actually the
24:21
modern 3 fastball approach which actually is is is a big thing
24:26
these days. Apparently is the highest spin
24:28
rate in the majors. Yeah, yeah.
24:31
So his sweeper got to like 3032 hundred or something. 3162 was
24:35
his average spin rate on some of his sweepers.
24:38
So or his curveball depends on like savant classifications are
24:41
a little bit weird. So yeah, that doesn't surprise
24:43
me. So just so that's that's what
24:45
I'm talking about. When when, when, when I when I'm
24:48
looking at guys from the draft, I want guys with these traits
24:53
like spin rate in and of itself doesn't make you a good pitcher,
24:55
but spin rate with a good development org for the team
24:58
that knows how to teach the guy how to leverage that, then you
25:01
can develop a real weapon because your movement is you can
25:06
create movement in one of two ways.
25:07
You can create movement by efficient spin and the balls
25:10
move a lot or by steam shift the weight movement which is using.
25:14
I'm not going to explain the property I'm going to try but
25:17
basically it's movement that deviates from the spin direction
25:20
which is theoretically more more deceptive to the batter.
25:40
I'm not a big believer in sprout.
25:43
He needs velocity too much to be to be successful.
25:46
It doesn't mean he won't, but I don't like if it, if his V low
25:49
is like 9495. I, I, I don't know how
25:53
successful he'd be. Like his, his performance has
25:56
gone up or down based on how hard he's throwing and guys who
26:00
feel like they have to Max out their VLO in order to be
26:02
successful. I, I, I don't have a ton of
26:05
confidence in that sustainability, both from a
26:08
health standpoint and a performance standpoint.
26:11
Jonah Tong. I've been, I think I was one of
26:13
the, you know, forefathers on the Jonah Tong terrain, but I
26:18
was a little bit surprised when I saw his first AAA data.
26:22
His fastball's phenomenal. It's been phenomenal since back
26:25
in the in the Florida State League.
26:26
And that's what that's why you can you can see these guys
26:29
coming in the FSL when they have those outlier trades like Thomas
26:32
White last year, Tong last year, like those were the two guys who
26:36
had those tremendous, tremendous fastballs.
26:39
And his change up was good too, But then he barely threw his his
26:43
his slider in his curveball. Like it was just those two
26:46
pitches. And he was like, I think we
26:50
threw like 5 pitches, 5 or 7 pitches that weren't his primary
26:53
pair. I don't know if that will work
26:57
in the majors. Maybe it will, maybe it won't.
27:01
He's probably hesitant to say this, but like it's a lot of a
27:07
Spencer Strider type of profile. It's two very good pitches and
27:12
then the other pitches grade well on the stuff model.
27:16
But does he have the confidence to use them in an actual game
27:20
situation? This kind of goes against what I
27:22
was saying before. But so clearly he can make those
27:25
pitch shapes in a lab, but he's not able to or not willing to
27:29
throw those in in game situations.
27:32
So I'd like to see the complete arsenal and the willingness to
27:36
throw that complete arsenal because otherwise hitters will
27:39
adjust to his stuff no matter how good it is.
27:44
So the next question I want to talk about is a guy just came
27:47
out of nowhere and now is probably a top three rookie
27:52
candidate. It's Isaac Collins, left fielder
27:54
for the Milwaukee Brewers. And I know you wrote a little
27:57
bit about it, man. And what has made him so good
28:02
for the Brewers. And look at what the Brewers do.
28:04
Like they always find these guys and they just, they just just
28:08
play well. And talk a bit about what Isaac
28:11
Collins can be. And, and I think he's a little
28:13
bit older than the average rookie.
28:15
I think he's what, 27, I believe, or 28.
28:17
So talk a bit about him and, and, and how did he blossom to
28:21
become a rookie Rookie of the year candidate?
28:25
I think there's a big underestimate underestimation of
28:29
just how much talent there is right below the Major League
28:34
level. Like there's like if and if
28:38
everything comes together, you can have a lucky season.
28:41
Like I, I don't think Isaac Collins is going to be a
28:43
superstar. He isn't a superstar, but what
28:46
he showed last year in AAA was kind of like decent stats.
28:51
Like he hit, he hits the ball close to average.
28:55
He he makes a lot of contact and sometimes those guys just have
28:59
really good seasons. It's like you, you know, you,
29:03
you spit out a random number generator and some guys just do
29:06
a little bit better. Some guys do a little bit worse.
29:08
I think if you reroll the season 100 times, I don't know if we
29:12
ever, I don't know if we'll see the season again.
29:17
So it's, it's a collection of basically Major League average
29:20
tools. You get a collection of Major
29:21
League average tools. Sometimes the guy performs 20%
29:23
better than Major League average.
29:26
And there are a lot of these guys in triple AI.
29:32
Think the guy that I'm very keen on seeing in the major leagues,
29:36
a guy like Christian Frank Franklin, who was traded from
29:40
the Cubs to the Nationals. And he has the ball super hard.
29:45
His swing decisions are impeccable.
29:47
He makes a lot of contact. And he's just sitting there
29:50
waiting in in AAA for his chance to to get an extended run.
29:54
So sometimes these guys, you know, get their chance and the
29:58
ball bounces right for them and they have a great season.
30:04
So yesterday early in the morning, it was announced that
30:08
catcher Sam Besio has signed an 8 year, $67 million extension
30:13
with with the Baltimore Orioles. He's such a young catcher.
30:17
He's only 21 years old. He's only had 16 at bats in the
30:21
majors with the with the injury to Ali Rushman now he'll be
30:26
taking over the catching duties probably till the end of the
30:29
season. I don't know if Ali comes back
30:31
with an oblique injury. So, so yeah, that's what I
30:35
figured. So what are your thoughts on on
30:39
Basayo, the extension and what happens with Adly Rush?
30:44
What do they do with Adly Rushman going forward?
30:46
Or what do they do with Basayo is does he move to first base?
30:50
Do they keep Miss Catcher? Do they trade Rushman?
30:53
What's that situation there? And what are your thoughts on
30:56
Basayo and his future at Catcher?
31:00
As a catcher, I think he'll be fine.
31:03
I don't think he's going to be a great catcher, but he wants to
31:06
catch and that's really all that matters.
31:08
Like he's got to be close enough to being a good enough catcher
31:11
and he's got to want to catch. And if he's willing to do that,
31:15
this like I, I've never seen anything like his data before
31:19
like his his metrics were better than Nick Kurtz is a AAA.
31:25
That's how good he was across the board.
31:28
Like I, I randomly tweeted, you know, Samuel Basal and Nick
31:31
Kurtz is catcher and people go ha, ha, ha.
31:33
What are you talking about? And you know, then I just post
31:36
here's Nick Kurtz at AAA, here's Samuel Basayo at AAA.
31:40
And Basayo was basically was better across the board, better
31:42
launch angles, better contact, hits the ball harder.
31:46
Of course, Nick Kurtz is leveled up and now he's Aaron Judge,
31:49
apparently, you know, so you know, so, you know, take that
31:53
with with an appropriate, you know, pound of salt.
31:56
But that's just how that that's how incredible his his
32:00
underlying metrics work. And he's doing that as the
32:03
youngest guy. He's never faced a guy older
32:04
than him ever in his professional career.
32:09
Like, like the Sky's the limit for this kid.
32:11
He could lead the majors in home runs and it would not surprise
32:14
me at all. Wow, it's it's, and even more
32:19
than that, like when when I look at Pasayos, like where he hits
32:22
the ball hard, it's it's absolutely absurd.
32:27
So he'll hit home runs above the zone.
32:30
He'll hit home runs at the very bottom of the zone.
32:33
And that's why you see him basically swing at everything
32:35
because he he knows he can basically hit a home run on
32:39
practically any pitch. This is not necessarily the best
32:41
approach. And he's 20 years old.
32:44
So it's the if, if he ever gets a little bit more selective,
32:50
like this could be the best hitter of baseball and he could
32:52
be catching at the same time. So he's a bad ball hitter and
32:56
and it's. It's yes and no, because it's
32:59
not like a bad ball. It's like fastballs at the very
33:03
top of the zone. He'll crush them.
33:05
So even if a pitcher executes A fastball perfectly, he might
33:10
have hit a home run on it. Right.
33:12
Or if you bury a fastball, you know, at his ankles, he might
33:14
have home run on that, too. So like, how are you going to
33:17
game plan a guy like this? So it's kind of like Salvador.
33:21
He's basically Salvador Perez but better.
33:26
Wow. Crazy.
33:28
So, yeah, so like I, I don't like, I my favorite, one of my
33:35
favorite prospects, like I, I, I struggled to express the just
33:39
how much potential he has. It's not, it's not the
33:43
performance. The performance is outstanding.
33:44
Like the home runs, like it's every single box you'd want to
33:47
tick on the offensive side. It is, except for the zone
33:50
contact which is slightly below average, but with power like
33:53
that it really doesn't even matter.
33:55
It's plenty good enough that he's going to make tons of
33:57
contact. You see it like he doesn't.
33:59
He doesn't look overwhelmed in the majors at all.
34:01
And my only quibble was I'd love it if he'd be a little bit more
34:05
selective, draw a few more walks, and then force pitchers
34:09
to give him better pitches to hit because that will only make
34:11
him even more dangerous. So let's let's talk about the
34:14
Canadian Owen Casey. He just got called up not too
34:18
long ago. I believe it was the final game
34:20
against against the Blue Jays, his hometown team that he grew
34:25
up watching and look at the fact that like he was already ready.
34:29
But the only thing is that he's been blocked by Kyle Tucker.
34:33
And we know that Kyle Tucker is a potential free agent after
34:36
this year. And I believe that Owen Casey
34:39
was part of that you Darvish deal, right a few years ago.
34:42
And and how good of a player can OA, KCB and there was already
34:49
shown small sample sizes that he has the trajectory to do so.
34:53
And could he potentially be A5 tool player?
34:57
Oh absolutely. So well, A52, I'd say 4/2.
34:59
I don't know if he's ever going to hit for a high average, but
35:02
the power is definitely there. He's, you know, two or three mph
35:05
above Major League average, the contacts slightly below average.
35:09
His launch angles were good but not great.
35:12
So he's not going to hit 40 home runs, but if he can field, I
35:18
guess he's the type of guy they can do 25025 to 30 home runs
35:22
easily. So I don't know.
35:24
I don't know if he's, I don't know if that's a superstar,
35:25
depends on the glove. But he's definitely a legit
35:29
very, very good baseball player that is more than deserving.
35:32
He's had like 4000 pitches seen in AAA already.
35:37
So he's, he's more than ready. Yeah, that's crazy because The
35:41
thing is like, you know, the thing about Kyle Tucker is that,
35:46
like I said, he's going to be afraid.
35:47
He's probably going to command a lot of money.
35:49
And and you look at a guy like PCA that they had, I think he
35:53
was also acquired in in the Mets in another deal, of course.
35:56
But you see what PCA is like. Do you think he could be a
36:01
immediate contributor? Owen Casey.
36:04
For sure. OK, Yeah.
36:06
OK, yeah. So, so guys who hit the ball as
36:07
hard as he does, you're going to run into twenty home runs here
36:13
and that's enough like, and as long as you're not completely,
36:18
you know, you're not a complete windmill, you'll you'll have
36:20
enough success if you're given enough runway to to play.
36:26
The guys I'm usually more concerned about are the guys who
36:29
had like fringy power. And it's like, if they're not,
36:33
if the ball isn't bouncing their way, they're they're they're
36:35
going to maybe get 10 home runs. And those guys are a lot, a lot
36:39
harder to have confidence in. We've talked about quite a few
36:46
AAA guys in recent in the recent segments and recent questions.
36:53
So tell us about some of the some other guys in AAA that
36:56
you're really excited about and that you think have the
36:59
potential to be an impact player for their teams.
37:02
I'm. Going to give you a name that I
37:04
believe deserves way, way more attention.
37:08
People are really sleeping on Carter Jensen.
37:11
This, this dude is he's going to be the catcher for the for the
37:15
Royals next year, give or take what Salvador Perez wants to do.
37:20
I don't know how long Salvador Perez wants to wants to catch,
37:24
but you know, if he says he wants to catch, then Carter
37:27
Jensen will be DH. But every, everything of this
37:31
guy does is, is is really high level.
37:35
I'm starting up the stats so I can actually talk.
37:43
Sorry, wrong here. Give me a second here.
37:53
I think I've written about Carter Jensen once or twice.
38:01
Like to me, he's the number 2 fantasy baseball catcher behind
38:06
Samuel Paseo that's currently in the minor leagues.
38:09
So like his 90th EV is one O 7.3 mph.
38:13
That's roughly 3.5 to 4 mph above average.
38:18
So if you if you want to convert that to tools, every two mph is
38:23
roughly A10 on the on the 2080 scale.
38:26
So if you're at one O 7 three, you're roughly A70 grade raw
38:29
power. His launch angles are
38:33
phenomenal. He's getting a 16° hard hit
38:35
launch angle. That means when he's going to
38:37
get hard, he's getting it in the air, and that's the recipe for
38:41
hitting home runs. His own contact and four seamer
38:44
is 86.5, well above average. It's like everything this guy is
38:48
doing is really good, and his chase rate is only 21.6%.
38:54
So he's got that perfect trifecta of hitting the ball
38:57
hard. Sorry, four things.
39:00
Hits the ball hard, hits the ball in the air, makes contact
39:03
against fastballs and does not chase breaking balls.
39:08
It's it's such a perfect analytical profile.
39:11
I have huge confidence in Carter Jensen becoming a a high impact
39:16
major leaguer. And I think would be outside of
39:18
Samuel Basayo, probably the favorite to win rookie of the
39:21
year next year. And of course it's going to be
39:23
some guy like Isaac Collins that nobody predicts.
39:25
But you know, if, if, if we're if I'm predicting next year's AL
39:32
Rookie of the Year, it's going to be Basayo and Jensen.
39:37
So you wrote an article a few a couple weeks back and you
39:42
mentioned about some guys like First Whitley and Johnny King
39:45
and Christian Franklin already and Owen Casey as well.
39:49
But the other guys that you didn't mention in here is Tony
39:52
what Tony Blanco who has power and Didier Fuentes who was who
39:57
had his cup of coffee when he got called up with the Braves.
40:00
And he was like one of the youngest pitchers in the Braves
40:03
organization that got called up in like the last 50 years or so.
40:07
And Nick Schnell, I think you mentioned about Nick Schnell,
40:09
but talk about some of those guys.
40:11
What are those guys are about? So TDF Fuentes, he's got the,
40:16
the, the fastball issue. So his fastball isn't always a
40:20
top notch pitch and that makes it very difficult for him to to
40:24
compete so that the shape is kind of meh.
40:26
And so if his velocity is good, he'll, he'll have enough.
40:29
But he just needs, he just needs time.
40:31
He's he's very young, clearly wasn't, wasn't ready for the
40:34
major leagues. But I think Fuentes has a has
40:38
got a lot of lot of potential. Tony Blanco, that's he's like my
40:44
favorite, my favorite archetype. The the the odds of him making
40:48
the major leagues very slim. But man, man, is he a fun, fun
40:56
dude. Like you talk about the eye
40:58
test. When you look at his swing, it's
41:02
like a Francis Nagato kind of looked to me.
41:07
I don't know if you guys follow ever watch UFC, but like, you
41:10
know, when you see like those huge UFC heavyweights and you
41:14
look like if you know, if they gave you one punch, you'd never
41:16
wake up? Like that's what Tony Blanco's
41:20
swing looks to me. Like.
41:23
Boy, can that guy swing a bet hard and like the metrics back
41:29
it up. But then he just, he's like
41:31
Elijah Green. So is he going to make the major
41:33
leagues? Probably not, but it'll be fine
41:38
if he if he ever figures that out just a little.
41:40
Bit in, in a recent article that you wrote prior to the article
41:47
that that Rocky had mentioned, you wrote about some guys like
41:53
you mentioned Carter Jensen, but Robbie Snelling, Gabrielle
41:58
Rincon, JJ Weatherholt, Sal Stewart, Alex Hoppy, Hunter
42:03
Fiducia. Talk about some of those guys in
42:05
the article you wrote and and just tell us a little bit about
42:09
about that. Yeah, so Robbie Snelling
42:13
definitely has upped his game. Like I I looked at his data last
42:16
year to cut like a AA start that had stack as data and his
42:20
fastball now is a plus ride. So this is he's in the Marlins
42:23
org now, right? Yeah.
42:25
So clearly there's some good stuff going on in in the Miami
42:30
organization, like they figured out how to get their guys
42:34
throwing the hybrid fastball. And so it's it's completely
42:39
unlocked in. And so the rest of the arsenal
42:41
is is built around that. The change up is get gets a lot
42:44
of a lot of the steam shift awake movement.
42:46
So it gets a lot of depth and run.
42:49
And I think he's got a sweeper and maybe a curveball like it's
42:52
he's he's going to be a good pitcher.
43:00
It was for us to be talking about.
43:01
There, the other ones you mentioned about is Gabriel
43:03
Rinseau, JJ Wynkos, Sal Stewart. Like I want you to talk a bit
43:09
about Sal Stewart because if you look at their depth charts and
43:13
you look at who they acquired Brian Hayes at the trade
43:17
deadline, so he's at third base now.
43:20
Then you got Cam Coulier and now you got Sal Stewart.
43:23
And I know you wrote about Sal Stewart, but his I believe he
43:26
has like elite bat speed, I believe, right?
43:28
Talk about a couple of those guys and where those players
43:32
stand as well. I, I, I mean, outside of
43:35
defense, I take Sal Stewart over Kip Ryan Hayes.
43:39
I mean, I was looking at Kip Brian Hayes's stack cast data
43:43
and his bat speed is like bottom percentile lately.
43:48
So I don't know how sustainable that is.
43:51
He's a great defender. I don't know, I don't know how
43:56
long term that is, but Sal Stewart, we're talking about a
43:58
fly ball exit velocity of 94.3 miles an hour, which is 5 miles
44:04
above Major League average. You're going to hit a lot of
44:06
home runs like that. I would I would just throw Sal
44:10
Stewart out there and see and see what he can do.
44:14
Cam Collier is probably more of a first base guy.
44:17
I think so. No, because because I know that
44:21
Cincinnati has a lot of positional player depth in their
44:24
system. I, I know they, they're starting
44:26
to bring up their pitching a little bit you mentioned.
44:29
There was a there was a yeah, friends broke.
44:31
Yeah, there was a joke that that every single prospect for the
44:34
Reds used to be 1/3 baseman. You're talking about what's his
44:43
name? Edwin Arroyo was another one
44:44
that. Edwin Arroyo, I think Nixon Zell
44:47
at some point. Nixon Zell.
44:48
Yeah. This was talking about Elliot De
44:50
La Cruz might be a third baseman who?
44:52
LV, Marte, Sal Stewart, Kemp, Collier.
44:55
Like if you're a position prospect in the Reds, you have
44:58
to theoretically be 1/3 baseman. Spencer Steers.
45:02
Spencer steers another one. Yeah.
45:04
Christian Cardnacio I don't even know where they're playing them
45:07
now. They were they played them 3rd
45:08
to 1st to outfield and I don't know like but that that's the
45:12
thing. But I know Nick Kroll just likes
45:15
to gravitate. Young positional player.
45:19
So you were talking about Hunter Fiducia?
45:22
Yes. So that this is the Isaac
45:24
Collins profile. It's, I think he accumulates
45:28
like 5000 pitches at AAA and it's a collection of tools that
45:34
are basically Major League average.
45:36
He hasn't gotten better. He hasn't gotten worse.
45:38
So for four years, essentially, he's been showing Major League
45:42
tools at the catcher position. And then of course, I think the
45:47
Rays picked him up right? Hunter Fiducia.
45:51
I think the ray did pick them up, yeah.
45:54
Yeah, so that's so we want to talk about the guy who could be
45:56
the next Isaac Collins. It could be Hunter Fiducia or it
46:00
could be one of another hundred guys like that.
46:03
But like there's so much of this caliber of talents.
46:09
It's why I'm going to I hate the term replacement level.
46:12
I think it's so pejorative. But like that's that's the
46:16
concept. Like there are a lot of guys at
46:19
that just like Major League level, maybe they can compete,
46:22
maybe they can't. It's and that's you have to
46:27
produce value above and beyond what those players can produce.
46:33
So it leads to my next question here.
46:35
It's a very interesting one, by the way, because we we're
46:38
starting to see some guys getting called up now, right?
46:40
We saw Colton Montgomery got called up earlier this year.
46:44
He's becoming a factor for the white side.
46:46
I know he I know he's getting his feet wet.
46:48
Dylan Beavers is another guy, another Orioles guy, of course,
46:52
because they they know how to pump position of player
46:54
prospects like no tomorrow. Yes and no, but and.
46:58
Yes and no. Well, it depends, right?
47:00
We can, I mean. Yes or no, because they, the,
47:03
the guys they let away like they, they let Kyle Stowers go
47:08
and that that's, that's a, that's a massive F.
47:10
Like there's no way, no way to slice it.
47:13
Like they they gave him up for nothing, which was night, which
47:15
was a nice thing to do for Kyle Stowers, but they could have
47:18
just given him some run. He was like the throw in player
47:22
quote UN quote and that deal too you.
47:24
Know like I think he asked like either play me or trade me
47:28
right? Because they, they and they and
47:30
you don't want to be the organization that like blocks
47:34
the guy for way too long because then this is just me
47:38
speculating. But you know, work gets around
47:42
and you don't want to, you don't want to be that org.
47:44
So I guess they felt that he was expendable, but that's clearly
47:48
there's no way to slice it. But they missed on.
47:50
They whipped on that. Yeah, 100%.
47:54
And another, another player I want to talk.
47:56
It's who just got called up not too long ago.
47:59
It's Carson Williams. I think he hit a home run
48:00
yesterday for the Rays, right? And, and some of those players
48:05
are getting their feet wet now. Like, I know that it's little
48:10
too little of a sample size to determine what kind of players
48:13
those players are. But to talk about some of those
48:16
players that got called up, besides some of them of course,
48:18
and, and, and where they stand moving forward and could they be
48:23
Rookie of the Year candidates? Carson Williams for sure,
48:28
because he's a shortstop and he's going to produce plus
48:31
defensive value. So anything he does offensively,
48:37
like magnifies that tremendously.
48:41
You know, it's like when Mike Trout would would always be like
48:43
whatever Mike Trout Day was used to be when he would lead the
48:46
lead the league in WAR. Most of that was because of his
48:49
value in center field. So Carson Williams, you know
48:54
what, thinking about it, yeah, it would be him.
48:55
He has a very good shot at winning rookie of the year next
48:58
year. Like his exit velocity, just
49:00
launch angles phenomenal. He's going to swing and miss a
49:02
ton. But if he's if he's producing
49:05
value as a as a plus plus shortstop and he hits 2530 home
49:11
runs, he can he can hit 200 and be a four or five win player.
49:18
I think. I think that's the a big gap in
49:20
perception. Like one of the things I got, I
49:23
get a lot of things wrong, like a ton of things wrong.
49:26
One of the one of the few things that I got right early in the
49:29
season was writing about Carlos Novaez on on, on the Boston Red
49:34
Sox. So he was traded for Yeah.
49:36
So Carlos Novaez. So you're reading the reading
49:39
the Baseball America scan report plus plus glove.
49:43
Great. And then you look at his you
49:44
look at his, his hitting and he was basically a league averages
49:48
hitter. And if if you can be a league
49:51
average hitter and be a plus plus catcher, that's three to
49:54
four wins. And I guess what Carlos Novaez
49:57
this year is basically a four win player.
50:00
He's not going to win Rookie of the year because Nick Kurtz is
50:02
going to win rookie of the year. But Carlos Novaez is almost as
50:07
being almost as valuable as Nick Kurtz has been this year.
50:12
And it's a hard concept to wrap your head around because Nick
50:15
Kurtz is such a better hitter than Carlos Novaez, But the the
50:20
value in being a plus plus catcher is an enormous gap that
50:25
a first baseman has to make up with his bat to to be an equal
50:29
value player. And so Carson Williams in that
50:33
same in that same vein, if if he's a plus plus shortstop and
50:38
he can squeak together in average batting line by hitting
50:40
25 to 30 home runs, that's a four win player like he may he
50:46
may produce more baseball value than Samuel.
50:48
Beside, I was talking about a guy, Nelson Rodda, and he has
50:53
the unsexiest profile you're ever going to see.
50:55
Like he's, he doesn't hit the ball.
50:56
Hit the, I think his, his 90th percentile exit velocity was
50:59
98.7 mph, which is terrible. But everything else about the
51:07
profile is exceptional. It's like a 90% zone contact
51:11
rate. It's a 20% chase rate, which is
51:13
10% below Major League average, an 80% zone swing rate, which is
51:19
10% above Major League average. Like most guys, they're either
51:22
aggressive in the zone, but they chase too much or they don't
51:25
chase but they're not aggressive enough in the zone.
51:28
And he's both exceptional at at swinging at good pitches and
51:31
exceptional at avoiding bad pitches.
51:34
And so he's almost for sure going to hit for a good batting
51:39
average and, and generate a lot of walks.
51:42
And when you package that with the fact that he's going to be a
51:44
probably an average center fielder, that means I'm very
51:48
confident that this dude is going to be a three win player,
51:53
which is a 60 future value. If you, if you want to put it on
51:56
like the, the, you know, how you rank prospects.
51:59
So any, like, if you're going to rank him as a prospect, he's a
52:02
60 future value. I, I, I, I don't know what that
52:05
is in a top prospect, but that's top 30, Top 40.
52:09
So we should really be talking about Nelson Rudd a heck of a
52:12
lot more. He's on, He's on the Angel, so
52:19
nobody will ever care. Well, yeah, first of all, I want
52:24
to ask you who who who do you think has a better shot to win
52:28
AO Gold Glove for catcher, their fires or Christopher Alejandro
52:32
Kirk? I'd have to look at the metrics
52:39
I'm being. They're both having really good
52:42
defensive seasons, so I just figured I'd shoot that question
52:46
at you, but I know it's tough. It's always tough to tell, but
52:51
which players in AAA could be factors next year in your
52:55
opinion? Well, I'd be, I'd be Melek
52:58
Ortiz, another guy. His he he's got that like zone
53:02
contact and and launch angles with the just enough power to
53:06
make it all work. He's he's performed pretty well.
53:10
Could could get a shot with the with the Rangers next year,
53:15
right. Ryan Clifford could be another
53:16
guy. He's just just got to AAA for
53:19
the Mets. I don't I don't know how much
53:21
how much room there is on that team.
53:24
Like a guy I'm less excited about and it makes me very sad
53:28
to say this is is Travis Bazano. He's kind of so when I write, I
53:38
never ever want to write anything that's negative.
53:42
I feel like it's just I don't know.
53:44
I these dudes work so hard and I like competing against like
53:49
humans, other humans that are like 99.99 ninth percentile
53:53
athletes. So I I don't write like to write
53:58
negative comments, but like his Max exit below is one O 8.
54:02
It's like his power isn't average and then the rest of the
54:09
tools aren't exceptional. He he might still end up
54:11
becoming a very good baseball player, but like his 90th EV is
54:16
one O 1.5 that's two mph below average.
54:19
So it's like a 40 power profile. Then again, he has the ball hard
54:26
in the air. So like he's got like this
54:28
optimized approach. Just maybe like an Alex Bregman.
54:31
So maybe you know, you're going to roll this clip back in in two
54:34
years and it's going to sound really, really stupid, but it's
54:38
it's really hard to have a long term success when you can't hit
54:42
the ball like at least at the Major League average level.
54:47
So we'll see. We'll see how it plays out with
54:50
Travis Pizzano. I hope his power numbers tick
54:52
up, but I probably lower on him now that I've seen his AAA data
54:58
than I was beforehand. I didn't.
55:01
I didn't figure I wasn't too high on the one the year he was
55:05
drafted. Yeah.
55:06
So I like to Condon a lot better but.
55:09
He's turned it around finally, like Condon to the, to my eye,
55:14
like the home runs he's been hitting, like that bat speed
55:18
looks exceptional. He's like getting pitches like
55:22
above his waist and smacking them out to the poolside with
55:26
power. So I wouldn't be out in Condon
55:29
anymore. Like, remember, like he was
55:32
better than Nick Kurtz last year.
55:33
I mean, I like, I don't know why I like to choose Nick Kurtz as
55:36
an example, but he was really, really good at college.
55:41
You know, there's rumors that he had like a juiced bat or some
55:44
nonsense like that. I, I, I don't care what kind of
55:49
bat you had. Like, he, his metrics were the
55:53
best in college and then he struggled like, baseball's a
55:57
really hard game. And now he's looking, he's
55:59
looking like himself again. And I can't wait for him to to
56:05
to get to AAA so I can actually see what his data look like.
56:09
You know, there's one player and that's also bizarre his
56:12
teammate, he's chased a Lauder and I don't know what's going on
56:15
with his injuries and he's she looks like he was going to be up
56:19
and I know that they called up CJK for it's not too long ago
56:23
that's. Just like this.
56:24
You're right, right. And it's a couple of those
56:26
players and and talk about some of those, like why didn't why
56:31
didn't care first got called up a lot sooner, which I thought
56:34
she should have because he was playing well in AAA and with
56:39
Chase De Lauder, I know it's unfortunate with the injuries.
56:41
Like, is there any possible way he could also be called up
56:45
later? I mean there's only like 30
56:47
games left so is there any chance?
56:50
They might, but it's, I mean he's looked diminished from a
56:55
metric standpoint. So I don't think he's healthy.
56:59
Like what he was showing last year was like top notch power,
57:03
top notch contact. And now it's kind of like
57:07
everything's meh compared to what it was before.
57:11
So I don't think he's right physically and I don't think
57:14
they'd want to put him in the major leagues when he's not
57:17
100%. So they may just have him kind
57:20
of play out the season, try to get healthy in the offseason.
57:25
Guys like this. I, I, I, I don't know how to
57:27
evaluate. It's kind of like, you know,
57:30
Royce Lewis and guys who were just always injured And it, it
57:37
saps a lot from a player like it's really hard to compete at
57:39
the Major League level. And if you're not right
57:41
physically, it's it's just very unlikely.
57:48
Like what he showed last year was truly exceptional.
57:51
Like his contact and power combination was among the best
57:56
of the best. Like there were not not very
57:58
many humans that can do that, even at the Major League level.
58:02
Right. And this year is kind of like
58:04
his own contact is, I remember I tweeted that out early like this
58:08
year that his own contact was below average, which was very
58:11
surprising. And it's kind of gotten better,
58:14
but it's only averages, which is not what he was showing at all
58:20
early in his career. So he's clearly not clearly not
58:23
100%. So if he ever gets healthy, this
58:28
is one of the most talented prospects in the baseball.
58:33
But that's the big deal. So the last question I want to
58:36
ask you is I know you tweeted about it and it has to do with
58:39
Shane Bieber and I know I know you saw what he can do.
58:44
I believe they developed a different change up, whatever
58:47
that means. I mean, he works with Pete
58:49
Walker, but the fact that, you know, they gave up a significant
58:53
prospect with Cal Steffen, right?
58:55
I believe, I believe he's in high a ref for the Cleveland
58:58
organization. If you look at this
59:02
trajectories, talk about Shane, what he can provide in that
59:05
rotation and could Cal Steven be a player or be part of that
59:10
rotation for Cleveland next year would be odd.
59:14
If I'm AGMI trade all the pitching prospects this year
59:18
alone, So I'll talk about Shane Bieber in a second.
59:20
So this year alone you get Troy, Troy Melton on the on the
59:25
Detroit Tigers, completely off the radar.
59:29
He's got 6 pitches there plus by stuff plus and stuff pro 6
59:34
pitches that are like that's insane.
59:36
It's crazy. Like look up, look up Troy
59:38
Melton on baseball perspectives or fan graphs and the public
59:41
stuff numbers. 6 pitches that are at least above average.
59:45
Gibson, right? Gibson on can't remember his
59:48
first name. Wow.
59:49
Sawyer Gibson, Mom No. No.
59:52
Trey Gibson. Trey Gibson.
59:53
Trey Gibson Trey Gibson on the Orange right?
59:56
Pitches that are that are that are above average.
1:00:00
I forget one other guy but like. There's there's these guys that
1:00:04
basically come out of come out of Cam Schlittler.
1:00:07
That's the other guy, Cam Schlittler, mind blowing stuff.
1:00:10
One of the best young pitches of baseball.
1:00:12
So the way pitchers develop and can't be developed that they can
1:00:17
be taught new pitches, you know, throw a little bit harder if you
1:00:21
can get a Shane Bieber and you're just giving up a pitcher
1:00:25
in single leg. I do in a heartbeat, like every
1:00:29
day. We're not talking about you're
1:00:30
not chatting at Chase Burns. I can be in the majors next
1:00:32
year. Like they didn't trade Trey you
1:00:34
Savage who could probably pitch in the majors.
1:00:37
Is it you Savage or yes, Savage? Like, I don't know, pronounce.
1:00:39
It savage. You savage.
1:00:42
It's much more fun to say it that way.
1:00:45
But yeah, Shane Bieber's change up look look great.
1:00:49
And what I remember watching about Shane Bieber when he was
1:00:52
at his peak in Cleveland is he would throw these pitches, that
1:00:57
guy's ankles, and they would just swing over it and miss by
1:01:00
like 3 or 4 feet. And I'd never understood it.
1:01:05
Like, so he must be a savant at making all of his pitches look
1:01:10
the same. And that's what I want to see
1:01:12
from Bieber. And you saw that batter after
1:01:15
batter, they would have these awful swings, except for Javier
1:01:17
Sonoa saw him, well, he's awful, awful swings where they'd miss
1:01:21
his breaking balls by by a couple of feet.
1:01:25
And then he had his, he had his signature command.
1:01:27
So like the dude's back, like he looked, he looked exactly like
1:01:30
the pitcher he was at his best in Cleveland.
1:01:32
His velocity was 93, which was what he was when he was a Cyan
1:01:35
pitcher. And the the thing about being in
1:01:39
Toronto is a lot of these American athletes, they don't
1:01:44
understand Canada. I live in Canada.
1:01:47
They don't want to come to Canada.
1:01:48
It's a problem for all major Canadian teams.
1:01:51
The ability to attract a free agent is excruciatingly hard.
1:01:55
Like the Toronto Raptors cannot get a marquee free agent to come
1:01:58
to Canada. The only way that they can get a
1:02:00
free agent is to get them on the team and then convince them to
1:02:04
sign long term. This is what they did with with
1:02:06
Jose Barrios. So Shane Beaver may opt out, but
1:02:10
the fact that he's been in Toronto, he's lived in Toronto
1:02:13
and he's comfortable, hopefully in Toronto, they can then have a
1:02:18
much greater chance at actually signing him long term.
1:02:23
You know, what's so funny about that is if you look at the the
1:02:28
way he was pitching and like, like you said, he was, he has
1:02:32
familiarity too with Andres Jimenez and Miles Straw.
1:02:36
And if you look at the way that's emphasized and and look
1:02:40
at the defense for the Jays as well there, I believe they're
1:02:43
like what top five defensively in in baseball, right?
1:02:47
And given the fact that look, and I get it, the what the fact
1:02:51
that prospects are prospects and like you said, you give up
1:02:54
prospects to go get right now players and you could always
1:02:56
tether to them as much as you possibly can.
1:02:58
But looking at that trade deadline and look at the
1:03:03
pictures that were giving up, I think the next best one was what
1:03:06
Merrill Kelly, I think was the was the next pitcher.
1:03:11
So it wasn't that strong. And the Jays took a gamble on a
1:03:15
guy like him because knowing that, they emphasized a lot of
1:03:18
pitch again, they felt like they needed a frontline starting
1:03:21
pitcher, especially now that they haven't been in first place
1:03:24
since, what, 2016? And now they're, you know, they
1:03:28
need that. Pitch right if if all it took
1:03:30
was Carl Steven to get Shane Bieber, Like you don't think the
1:03:34
Yankees could use a Shane Bieber right now?
1:03:36
Sure that that the Red Sox, like I mean other teams are kicking
1:03:40
themselves that they didn't outfit the Blue Jays for Shane
1:03:43
Bieber. Like this is this is going to be
1:03:46
like low key the best trade deadline acquisition for for a
1:03:50
playoff bound team. I like, I would love to have
1:03:54
Shane Bieber in any rotation. Like if I'm AGM, I would love to
1:03:57
have Shane Bieber in my rotation come to the playoffs.
1:04:00
Worst case scenario, I throw them in there, you know, for a
1:04:02
name or two in the you know, in the bullpen.
1:04:04
The Jays have a like so many options that they can if they
1:04:08
get in into five game series. I, I think, I think they're in a
1:04:14
very good position. Yes, very much so.
1:04:17
I think. I think if he pitches like this
1:04:19
down the stretch and you know, and you know, say he goes on
1:04:22
like, you know, a really good run, I think he could be your
1:04:25
game one starter in the playoffs.
1:04:27
I really do. I'd, I'd probably go Scherzer
1:04:29
just because he's, he's been there all year and you know.
1:04:33
No, I, I get that. I mean, like you said, they got
1:04:35
a number of options. I mean, they could go any way
1:04:38
they want to, you know, based on whatever the matchups are.
1:04:42
Yeah, man, whoever they're facing and whatnot.
1:04:44
But you're right. I just think based on ego and
1:04:47
and competitiveness and how he how he views himself like
1:04:51
Scherzer would be pissed if he wasn't the you know, he
1:04:54
probably. Would I mean, I mean I don't
1:04:56
think Osman would have a problem with it, but you could be right
1:04:59
about Scherz. Yeah, I want.
1:05:00
Yeah, I'd want. I'd probably go Scherzer,
1:05:02
Bieber, Gosman and then, you know, and then maybe piggyback
1:05:07
pick back the Rios somewhere there.
1:05:09
I want to ask the Rios in the question.
1:05:12
I want to ask you one more question before we wrap this up
1:05:15
is and let's just say, you know, I know teams didn't do enough,
1:05:22
you know, work acquiring pitching.
1:05:24
And you saw the Cubs with Mike Soroka like he's hurt.
1:05:27
And there's the Mets like they didn't they didn't get to
1:05:32
acquire or or acquire a starting pitcher and they needed one and
1:05:36
they called him McClain. Could you see anyone that could
1:05:41
be called up before September and be part of their playoff
1:05:44
roster? Is there anybody that comes in
1:05:46
mind in AAA or in AA that could get called up?
1:05:50
Like for example, if you remember Spencer Schwalenbach
1:05:52
got called up last year and he was a big reason why they ended
1:05:55
up being a playoff team for the Braves.
1:05:57
And of course Chris Sale being a saw young winner.
1:06:00
But like, is there any name that you could think of that could be
1:06:03
brought up and be a factor? Probably Pete and Tolley could
1:06:07
be the guy. He's just such an outlier in his
1:06:12
delivery. Like you watch video on him.
1:06:14
He's got like a sidearm delivery that gets like a ton of IVB.
1:06:18
It's very tough for for Major League hitters to pick up.
1:06:21
So I I think they bring him up and throw him in the bullpen and
1:06:25
just have him be like a lefty killer in in the playoffs
1:06:29
because those guys really, really play up in the playoffs.
1:06:34
So they, you know, they'll, they'll put him in the Chapman
1:06:37
and put Tolly in for a couple of tough lefties and I think he's
1:06:40
going to be allowed to let lights out.
1:06:44
Could you see a Jonah Tom game called up because there's his
1:06:46
name has been floated around recently.
1:06:49
Maybe he doesn't have a lot of AAA experience then.
1:06:56
Like I said before, I think they need to see him throw those.
1:07:00
You know, the his his non change up, non fastball a little bit
1:07:03
more and have confidence in that.
1:07:06
But again, like if like the his stuff is so good, you put him in
1:07:10
there like as a, you know, as a bridge to Edwin Diaz, He could
1:07:13
probably get Major League hitters out right now, like just
1:07:16
by throwing that fastball. If, if, if a team can prepare
1:07:20
for him and he's only throwing fastball change up, that's where
1:07:24
his his stuff becomes a little bit more dicey.
1:07:27
But out of the bullpen, absolutely.
1:07:30
He could. He could be.
1:07:30
He could be a monster. Well, Ellie, Ben Porret, we
1:07:36
appreciate you take your time for giving us insight.
1:07:39
It was great information, great work.
1:07:41
By the way, where can we? Where can we find you in social
1:07:45
media and everywhere else? That's just my name on Twitter
1:07:48
at Ellie Ben Porret and that's pretty much it.
1:07:52
The tweet out basically the same stuff we talk about here.
1:07:56
Yeah, man, thanks for joining us.
1:07:58
It was fun. It was it was awesome to to talk
1:08:01
about the world of prospects and and, you know, essentially the
1:08:04
future of Major League Baseball. So hopefully we can get you on
1:08:09
again soon down, down the road, man, it'd be awesome.
1:08:12
Sounds good, thanks for having me on take care of this.
1:08:15
Place to description below where you can find Ellie Bent Pro
1:08:19
Porat. Until next time, take care, be
1:08:21
kind to each other. Signing off to the 4th Ave.
1:08:24
Twister Podcast on Saturday, August 23rd, 2025.