2008 community prospect ratings--bryan anderson

by jpahk on Jan 14, 2008 12:55 AM EST

this thread is for discussion of bryan anderson, C, st louis cardinals. here are some links to anderson's stats:

http://minors.baseball-reference.com/players.cgi?pid=456
http://web.minorleaguebaseball.com/milb/stats/stats.jsp?n=Bryan%20Anderson&pos=C&sid=milb&am p;t=p_pbp&pid=457762
http://firstinning.com/players/Bryan-Anderson-a/

i'll leave this thread open for at least 48 hours. you can vote at any time, but since you can't change your vote, if you are uncertain in any way, it's probably best to refrain from voting until after you get a chance to read the discussion.

the numerical ratings should follow this scale:

10 bona fide blue-chip grade A stud
9
8 great prospect, somebody you'd be okay with as the jewel of your favorite team's system
7
6 good prospect, but not among the best in the game
5
4 marginal prospect, but somebody with a pulse
3
2 organizational filler--just a warm body to fill out a minor league roster
1

the rating should be a combination of the player's possible outcomes and his likelihood of reaching those outcomes. in other words, consider both "upside" and "safety" when making your decision--though how you weight them is entirely up to you.

for example, you could give somebody an 8 because you feel he is sure to be a pretty good player, but you could also give somebody else an 8 because even though he has a higher chance to flame out, he also has a chance to be really special. a 5 might be a guy with a decent chance to be a regular, or it might be somebody with a pretty big upside who you are just not very confident will actually ever make it.

Poll

How good a prospect is Bryan Anderson?

7

34 votes

6

34 votes

5

21 votes

4

7 votes

3

1 votes

2

0 votes

1

1 votes

10

3 votes

9

3 votes

8

11 votes

115 votes | Poll has closed

Tweet Comment 10 comments | 0 recs |

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Comments

anderson

he was the flavor of the month during the midseason list. where are those guys at now? his end-of-season numbers ended up being pretty bad, actually.

by jpahk on Jan 14, 2008 11:15 AM EST reply actions

I'll step up

Easy to get fooled by a guy putting up pretty dang good numbers as a 20 yr. old in AA at a really tough defensive position. I feel that he may have worn down over the year, but it's hard to project him as too much right now.

I was pimping him and Wlad Balentien at mid-season and they both screwed me.

by Dfarth on Jan 14, 2008 11:38 AM EST up reply actions

Oh

For the record I gave him a 5 - which I think I've only given to Humber and maybe one other player...

by Dfarth on Jan 14, 2008 11:39 AM EST up reply actions

6

Almost solely due to age and position, but that counts. The next Johnny Estrada, perhaps.

"I feel like I've been around long enough at shortstop to be the leader of Jose Castillo." -- Jack Wilson

by delomir on Jan 14, 2008 12:43 PM EST reply actions

Estrada

I've been thinking Johnny Estrada for a little while now. Anderson has a similar swing to Estrada's too.
Still, that's not a bad major league comparison but I'd rather have Yadier Molina just because Molina is the best defensive catcher in baseball right now and he's not an awful hitter.
I think Anderson is pretty close to being a top 100 prospect if he isn't already. His numbers will probably be pretty good next year if he starts out at AA again and then goes up to AAA midseason. There's no reason to rush him if you're the Cardinals. Its actually better to keep him at AA and bump up his trade value.

He was certainly no flavor of the month prospect. He's a solid catching prospect that has pretty good value to the Cardinals. If his power gets going, and it very well could since he was probably not thinking about power at all last year, he's a better prospect than Hank Conger.

by UncleBuck44 on Jan 14, 2008 5:55 PM EST up reply actions

flavor of the month

i agree that anderson is on the verge of being a top-100 kind of guy. my "flavor of the month" comment was in regards to the fact that he was #43 on the midseason community list. that was an overreaction to a hot 2 months, in my opinion.

by jpahk on Jan 14, 2008 6:21 PM EST up reply actions

Probably

Although it was a heck of a performance early on for someone his age at his position.

More negative info has surfaced about his defense as well that wasn't available at the time. I still have him rated higher than Conger though - his strengths would play better at another position, and while he won't have the same kind of power, he might end up as a servicable 4th OF.

Vogt early, Vogt often.

by Brickhaus on Jan 15, 2008 11:31 AM EST up reply actions

and yeah

i like estrada as a comp, too. high BA, not much secondary average, useful defense. that seems about right. but of course there's always YCSS to worry about. (admittedly i worry about this more than most.)

by jpahk on Jan 14, 2008 6:23 PM EST up reply actions

Estrada - Anderson

Estrada in the minor leagues never really showed any patience at the plate. He didn't walk much at all and he didn't strike out much. His career OBP was .331 and he hit .294 and those numbers are boosted by a great year at AAA at the age of 27.
Anderson's career minor league average is .305 and his career OBP is .367. A 62 point difference compared to Estrada's 37 point difference. And for being 3 to 5 years older than Anderson at a lot of levels, Estrada's career slugging percentage isn't much higher than Anderson's(.433 to .421).

I think Estrada is a safe comparison but I wouldn't be shocked if Anderson hit a little better.
An optimistic comparison I've used in the past is Jason Kendall from his Pirate days with a lesser average and OBP. I don't see Anderson putting up many .330/.430 seasons but I can see him being a poor mans Kendall without the speed.

by UncleBuck44 on Jan 14, 2008 7:06 PM EST reply actions

next batch--suggestions?

i'm close to out of interesting ideas for the next batch of ratings. i thought about maybe doing a couple relievers (morlan? meloan? perez? devine? hansen? cox?), and maybe some more guys from the 2007 draft, but i'd also like to open it up to all suggestions. basically, most of the guys who would show up on a top 50 list are there already, so it's just a matter of finding some interesting 50-100ish prospects to discuss and rate.

by jpahk on Jan 15, 2008 1:15 PM EST reply actions