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Hence at number 2 for me. I am going chalk up his AA time as a learning experience. And it’s the most innings he’s ever thrown.
I’m going to leave this round open until tomorrow mid morning since we are so close. I think it’s at 4 for Roby, 3 for Hence and Saggese, and 1 for McGreevey and Scott. I picked up an earlier vote that LRCardinal did in round 1 for their rounds 2 and 3 vote to move Saggese up to 3.
So if you’re out there and you have an opinion about our minor league players, feel free to join in the annual voting!
Lots of guys look good in the Texas League, Pugs.
They sure do, Bling. Like Ray Lewis Lankford, Oscar Francisco Taveras, Gregory(Gregg) Scott Jeffries, Johnny David Damon, Joe Leonard Morgan, John Milton (Mickey) Rivers, Darryl Eugene Strawberry, George Chelston Springer, Bobby Anthony Grich, Nate Colbert, Hank Benjamin Greenberg……oh, and let us not forget Jerome Herman Dean aka Jay Hanna “Dizzy” Dean. Thomas Darren Saggese will be one of this game’s stars.
Two players, both 21 in the Texas League. Very similar defensive/baserunning abilities.
Player A posted a 128 OPS+ with a .220 isolated slugging while walking 9% of the time and whiffing 27%.
This got him ranked as a consensus top 30-40 overall prospect. Highest was 28th (Baseball Prospectus).Player B had a 142 OPS+ this year with a .233 ISO Slg, also walking at 9%, but fanning 23% of the time.
Player A is Nolan Gorman and Player B is Thomas Saggese.
Nothing against Cardinal pitching prospects, but I’ll take Saggese for the #2 Redbird prospect.Taking up where Bob left off, since this is about projecting, its probably worth mentioning that Player A is 6’1″ 210 lb. and Player B is 5’11” 175 lb. This presents the question of whether Player B’s offensive output will hold up in higher level play given his stature.
Also worth noting, as a minor leaguer, Player A was deployed on the left side of the infield until moved due to being blocked. Player B was deployed on both sides, but moremso on the right side. This, taken with Blake’s scouting report when Saggese came on board, suggests Player B will be best suited to the right side in upper level play, and will top out as an average defender there.
With Bob and Nigel weighing in, that pushes Saggese to our #2 prospect. Saggese truly has an excellent approach to hitting and with some batted ball luck, he could be a .300 hitter each year. Like Bling, I’m a bit concerned with his size and defense and the fact that he’s not really a SS and has never played OF. However, he was definitely a great pickup in tandem with Roby for 1/2 year of Montgomery.
1. Winn
2. SaggeseVoting is now open for the #3 prospect. I’ll stick with Saggese’s trade partner in T K Roby for my next pick.
Saggese doesn’t look all that special to me. His AAA debut maybe clouded my judgement. His size/build is below-average too. He reminds me of Skip Schumaker with potentially average-good defense at 2B/3B.
Anyway, my vote for #3 is still with Tekoah Roby.
Sorry for jumping in late. I’m voting for Tink Hence at #3. Surprisingly for me, my formula had Wynn and Sagessee at 1 & 2 so I’m in line with the voting so far. Hence and Scott are very close, but Hence’s ceiling puts him over the top at #3 for me.
Happy to have you join us in this journey Grenadier!
FYI – I’ll keep the selections to one name per round for the first 8 rounds. That’s about the time I feel like there’s a gap between the guys who have loads of talent and those who are more maybes. Then, we can start submitting 2 per round until it feels like we need to go to 3 (maybe by the late teens). I’ll stop moderating around 25-26 and then CardsFan64 will take it from there. Also, I think I’ll keep it on a roughly 36 hour timeframe for each vote. That should be long enough to give most people time without holding the process up too long.
Tink Hence at #3 for me.
Similar health/durability concerns as Tekoah Roby, but Tink has a few small advantages. He holds runners much better than Tekoah — stealers are just 17-for-32 against Hence over the past two years, and a miserable 7-for-17 in 2023. Roby meantime has permitted a 28-for-34 across ’22/’23. And perhaps relatedly, opposing batters have hit Roby quite hard with men on base in both ’22 and ’23, slugging .507 or higher each year.
And lastly, Tink is coming off a career-high 96 innings while Tekoah missed a lot of time in 2023. (Tekoah’s AFL performance was truly a mixed bag, so that neither helps nor hurts him in my book.)
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But just as an aside, it’s probably worth noting that Tekoah & Tink are not at all atypical when it comes to current pitching prospects. Even the very, very elite ones have question marks surrounding their chances of ever throwing 150, 160 innings on a regular basis, nevermind 180 or more.
Lemme show you what I mean. Here’s a list of the top 10 pitching prospects in all the minors, per Fangraphs: Skenes, Painter, Harrison, Tiedemann, Abel, Lesko, Hence, Stone, Brown, and Madden.
Their average innings load for 2023 was just 86. Their average career high? Just 104. So Tekoah and Tink fit right in. (Industy-wide there’s simply too much emphasis on velocity & movement, and not enough on location & durability. That’s my opinion, but what do I know? I’m just an internet blowhard.)
Scott for #3. He did a great job in Arizona. Everyday player who brings terrific speed and defense. Plus he hit over .300 this season. Roby’s right shoulder is still a question mark.
Bob, thanks for all your in depth analysis. While we may agree or disagree at times, I always appreciate that you bring a lot to the table to consider. It certainly makes these discussions interesting. And honestly, I’m right on the line between Roby and Hence (I had them 2/3). I like Roby’s stuff just a little better – especially that curveball – but Hence is a bit younger and not far behind him in level. I would have never thought to look at their ability to hold runners, but that can be very important.
Hence & Roby had similar performances at the same level, but Hence is a year younger and pitched more innings. So, I am going with Hence at #3.
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