Archive for the ‘Keith Law’ Category

Layin’ Down the Law: Klawchat Nuggets

Posted by Andrew Stoeten under Keith Law on Apr 02, 2012

On Thursday, Keith Law had a chat with readers at ESPN.com, and as always, I checked the archive four days later and have exhumed all the Jays-related tibits for your reading pleasure– and this week there were some serious gems. To wit…

Jon Cook (Research in Motion)
Please rank these 3 based on Ceiling. Neil Ramirez, Drew Hutchison and Nestor Molina.
Klaw
My top 100 (which included the first two but not Molina) is based primarily on ceiling, with probability a secondary factor, so you should always look there first for questions like this. Molina’s either a back-end starter or reliever so he’s not really in this discussion. [The shorter answer is, of course, Hutchison, who was more than 50 spots ahead of Ramirez in the 100.]

Cognitive Dissonance (Dorsal Anterior Cingulate Cortex)
Help! Blue Jays pick Eric Thames over Travis Snider. Signed Dustin McGowan to a two-year, $3 million. Can I still believe Alex Anthopoulos as Wunderkind narrative? Or is being nice to players the marker inefficiency?
Klaw
I know everything thinks silent AA is a ninja … but neither of those moves made much sense to me. Mcgowan’s injury history should preclude any discussion of a multi-year deal.

Robert (London)
If Henderson Alvarez was eligible, would he have made your top 100 list?
Klaw
He made it last year, and he didn’t do anything to disappoint in 2011, so…

Steve (San Jose)
Looks like my HS teammate Eric Thames won the starting job in LF for Toronto. I know you’ve always seen him as an extra OF — so do you think he lasts the year as a starter? Is .270/.340/.470 with 15 HR or so attainable?
Klaw
I’m not sure how that split line comes to be, but I see a below-average defender who only hits fastballs, not an everyday guy.

aaron (boston)
Any prospects outside your top 100 receiving significant rave reviews?
Klaw
Austin Hedges would be one – and I’ll say again I screwed up by omitting him. Kiley saw Syndergaard throw really well earlier this week. Heard good things on my Cleveland sleeper, Ronny Rodriguez.

Ryan (Fredericton)
RE: David Cooper… everyone knows he has no power, but do you think he could hit .310+ in the majors?
Klaw
I do not.

Me (Where I am )
Do you expect Brett Lawrie to exploid into a Ryan Braun type breakout or are the expectations based on last years small sample overblown on him?
Klaw
I think he’ll be a star, and fairly soon, but last year has created unreasonable expectations.

@ryanpicks (Freddy Beach)
D’Arnaud + McGuire for Hosmer … who says no first?
Klaw
The Royals, with a long list of choice profanities.

Joshua (Vancouver)
Do you see Adonys Cardona as a guy that could be on the top 100 in 2013 or am I rushing things a bit? I believe it was you who said they wouldn’t be surprised if he hit 100 at some point.
Klaw
Maybe for 2014, but yes, real upside guy, he’ll get to triple digits at some point.

20 Comments

Layin’ Down the Law: Beede, Votto, O-Dog, & More

Posted by Andrew Stoeten under Joey Votto, Keith Law, Tyler Beede on Mar 22, 2012

Keith Law chatted with readers today at ESPN.com, and since I’ve hardly posted anything today (having the excellent excuse of doing a run-through for the Getting Blanked video show we’ll be embarking on daily at the start of the season), let’s take a look at the Jays-related tidbits– of which there ended up being several:

Ian (Toronto)
Hey Keith. The Jays missed out on signing Tyler Beede, much to the disappointment of fans. Now that time has passed and we have more data on Beede, do you think this is a miss the Jays will come to regret?
Klaw
No. And they didn’t miss out. The two sides couldn’t agree on how healthy he was, so the discussion fell apart. He has not looked good so far this year, according to a half-dozen scouts I’ve talked to who’ve seen him.

Ron (Toronto)
It seems like for the next two years, there will be an endless Joey Votto-Blue Jays discussion in Toronto. Given the Jays likely timeline and team needs, is Votto the player you would suggest they go “all-in” on, whether it’s in free agency, a trade, or a trade and extension?
Klaw
Great player, but I don’t get the whole “sign every Canadian you can” concept. How about just signing the best players?

Jon Cook (“Work”)
Do you think at any point in your lifetime you will share with your readers what it was like to work with JP Ricciardi. In addition to that do you think you’d ever provide the details on what really happened between JP and Orlando Hudson. O Dog didn’t have nice things to say after, but didn’t elaborate.
Klaw
Nothing happened. Hudson was 0-for-the-spring, wasn’t playing well at second base, and needed to go to the minors, so we optioned him. Complete non-story blown up by the media.

Jonathan (Tampa, FL)
How high do you see Virant going in this draft? Seems like the kind of projection guy the Blue Jays would pounce on at #22, no?
Klaw
First round. Do they really have a track record of taking projection guys? They took Beede, the opposite of a projection guy, last year.

Daniel (Charlotte)
What is the single greatest 1 game performance you have scouted?
Klaw
Can I count two from Toronto? Delgado’s four-homer game, or Halladay’s 99-pitch 10-inning CG against that awful Tigers team in 2003. Took a no-hitter into the 8th when Kevin Witt broke it up. I don’t buy into the whole “inevitability” thing, but those were two instances were I felt from early in the game that I was watching something different.

17 Comments

Layin’ Down Even More Law: Minor League Camp Notes

Posted by Andrew Stoeten under Aaron Sanchez, Keith Law on Mar 19, 2012

Apparently Keith Law wasn’t done with writing about the Jays when at the end of last week he told us that Kyle Drabek seemed to be taking well to the mechanical changes the club has got him to make, and that Dustin McGowan looked like ““a shadow of what he used to be.” He also took in a game featuring the Jays and Phillies minor leaguers on Friday, providing some detailed notes at ESPN.com (Insider Only), the most interesting of which– for our purposes– feature Aaron Sanchez.

Law is upfront about how much he likes Sanchez– something we’ve seen in his recent top prospects lists. In 2012 he listed him as the organization’s second-best pitching prospect, behind Drew Hutchison, and thirst-best in 2011, behind Kyle Drabek and Zach Stewart– however, the 2012 consensus of top Jays prospects, based on Law’s and several other lists, done by Steal of Home has Sanchez behind McGuire, Norris, Nicolino and Syndergaard, as well as Hutchison.

So, Law is high on him– and he explains part of the reason why, saying that Sanches has “got great makeup and the delivery and body are what they’re supposed to look like.”

Sanchez has added some weight since Law last saw him, and against the Phillies he was “mostly working in the 94-96 range, showing good feel for a changeup but less for his slider.”

For a lot of evaluators, Sanchez has sort of slipped in behind the other high-end Jays pitchers in A-ball after not having the best year in 2011, so it’s nice to see that Law maintains his belief, writing that “now that he’s sitting in the mid-90s it’s hard to offer any reasons for skepticism beyond the usual caveats on young pitchers.”

He also provides notes on a few other Jays prospects, like 3B Kellen Sweeney– who didn’t look great, he says– and pitchers Dustin Antolin, Tyler Ybarra, and most impressive of all, John Stilson, who “was 91-94, straight but firm, with a hard-tumbling changeup at 79-83 that dropped almost like a splitter, showing one hard downer curveball at 81. There’s effort in the delivery, and stress on the shoulder, and the command wasn’t good, but if that’s how he looks right out of the chute he could move quickly through the low minors this year.”

Yup. That works.

5 Comments

Layin’ Down the Law (Again): Yesterday’s News

Posted by Andrew Stoeten under Dustin McGowan, Eric Thames, Keith Law, Kyle Drabek, Position Battles, Prospecting, Rotation Battles, Travis Snider on Mar 16, 2012

After yesterday’s heavy dose of realism, Jays fans demanded that Keith Law, the obliterator of all their little hopes and dreams, come forth and defend his absurd views on Dustin McGowan!

Or… probably it was just his contract with TSN Radio. Or maybe they just asked.

Either way, KLaw hit the airwaves– the free, public airwaves that I can quote anything from with a clear conscience, I should add– this afternoon and elaborated on what he saw yesterday when he took in the epic Grapefruit League tilt between the Jays and the Astros in Kissimmee.

And, actually, he skipped a lot of the stuff about McGowan. Or… probably I just tuned in a little too late to catch it.

What I did hear was pretty seriously awesome, especially where two the players I’d like to see the Jays not dick around are concerned: Kyle Drabek and Travis Snider.

He also talked Anthony Gose, Travis d’Arnaud, about the back of the rotation in general, and followed up his piece from yesterday with some activity in the comments.

Read the rest of this entry »

79 Comments

Layin’ Down the Law: Coles Notes from Kissimmee

Posted by Andrew Stoeten under Dustin McGowan, Keith Law, Kyle Drabek on Mar 15, 2012

It’s not often that Keith Law posts an entire piece about the Jays, which means that it’s not often that I have to worry about having to toe the line on just how much of his work it’s appropriate to post here. It’s well worth it to get ESPN Insider– even just for KLaw’s work alone– and I wouldn’t want to devalue that (in whatever tiny way I’m capable of) by quoting too much of his report today on the Jays he saw face Houston, so… I guess we’ll just go with the Coles Notes version. Law’s piece is far more elaborate:

- Law was unimpressed with McGowan, who he calls “a shadow of what he used to be.” Ouch. Apparently he was most unimpressed by how long it took for McGowan to get up to his top velocity of 95 and 96, and his “soft-breaking slider that you can see pretty early out of his hand.”

- The report on Kyle Drabek is much better. He “looked solid with a new, more controlled delivery and increased use of a two-seamer with sharp sinking action.” Law was especially impressed with his new mechanics, landing spot, and the consistency with which he was able to stay in line and not fall off the mound. He also liked the cutter Drabek threw “at 87-88 that looked just the like fastball out of his hand, allowing him to use it in changeup counts.”

- A couple interesting notes from the pair battling for the Jays left field position, as Law says that Eric Thames got a pair of cheap hits on outfield misplays, and that Travis Snider’s lone bright spot– a hard double– was extra bright, since it was on “a ball he wouldn’t have gotten to last year with his hands set up higher than they are now.”

- He also had notes on prospects Travis d’Arnaud, Jake Marisnick, and Anthony Gose– who laid down an “unfieldable” bunt for a hit.

41 Comments

Prospecting: Layin’ Down the Law on Ex-Prospects (And More!)

Posted by Andrew Stoeten under Keith Law, Prospecting on Mar 06, 2012

We knew that Keith Law was still a believer in Travis Snider when, back in December, he gave him an honourable mention in his Top 50 Under 25 list, and sung his praises in the post-list chat. We see today that he hasn’t wavered in that optimism, listing Snider, as well as Kyle Drabek, among seven former top prospects who struggled in 2011, but whose futures he still believes in. Colby Rasmus also gets an honourable mention in the piece at ESPN.com (Insider Only).

“Snider, still just 24, hit at every level in the minors, including repeated trips to Triple-A (where he’s learning nothing at this point because Vegas is such a good place to hit), and is now starting his hands lower, just above his waist, far enough back that he needs just a small trigger to load. This should allow him to drive the ball better, reducing the number of times he gets on top of it and hits it into the ground, and could give him more time to react to a breaking ball. I hate giving up on a player who’s healthy, performed all the way up the ladder and doesn’t have a tangible reason for failure like a mechanically unsound swing or horrible plate discipline, which is why I’m including Snider in this list,” he writes.

As for Kyle Drabek, last year “early struggles led him to overthrow, which led him to pull himself off line, throw fewer strikes and struggle even more. Drabek didn’t lose velocity, but the overthrowing cost him command and flattened out his slider, while his curveball — his best pitch in the minors — became almost a weapon of last resort.”

Law is hopeful of the work the Jays are doing to keep “his delivery on line to the plate and keeping himself calm on the mound, but they might also need to tinker with his pitch selection and get him throwing that plus breaking ball more.”

Um… right? Wasn’t that always supposed to be big pitch?

He also suggests keeping Drabek out of the awful developmental environment in Las Vegas, starting him in New Hampshire instead. Ya… why not that too?

Other Prospect Items of Note

I know he burned a lot of bridges with the Yu Darvish stuff, and people thought that he was a bit over-the-top in his praise of Nestor Molina, but… whatever, Kevin Gray is impressed to fuck with Noah Syndergaard, and I feel I should share.

“The big Texan is every bit of 6-foot-5 and stands tall, maximizing downward trajectory. While standing behind catcher Santiago Nessy, I got a sense of what it might feel like trying to hit Syndergaard. The term “throwing downhill” comes to mind as his fastball vapor-trails from a 3/4 arm slot (maybe a bit higher) and into the glove. If this kid starts commanding his changeup, it’s over.”

“He’s the best pure thrower we have, hitting 97, 98,” says Fisher Cats manager Sal Fasano. “Mechanics are getting better and better. He has a chance to be something special.”

Elsewhere, and lastly, Jim Callis of Baseball America goes back through their top 100, revealing the high and low votes players received from BA writers. Travis d’Arnaud was rated as high as 9th, Anthony Gose 26th, Jake Marisnick 44th, and Dan Norris 50th (!!!?!?!). Overall BA had them at 17, 39, 67 and 91.

9 Comments
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