Was suppost to be a superstar.

Trust the Pads to draft a pitcher as a shortstop ;)

Ranger fans will remember that Mark Teixeira was originally drafted as a 3B, but couldn’t handle the position defensively and was forced to move to 1B. I wonder if he ever thinks about that when he counts his gold gloves?

This guy was suppost to be the Yankees next superstar infielder.

isn’t doing too well.

some love in this regard.

C Ben Davis…

Remember how everyone, including John rated Ben Davis to be the best prospect in baseball(at one point)? He had all of 38 career HRs in 486 career games…

and to be fair, Catching prospects are harder to develop than most position players.
although I AM rooting for Mr. Davis to come back as a RHP….

but for the last 10 years… uhm…it’s a little too early to call though I like Daric Barton. Strike Zone Judgement and plate discipline isn’t everything. 9 HRs in 450 ABs for a 1b/dh type isn’t going to cut it.

about reading comprehension and ADD then it is about baseball….How many people named pitchers???? yeesh!!!

It’s an interesting exercise going back through the old lists…..compared to pitchers, hitters seem much more likely to live up to their expectations…or at lease carve out a career.

I think most of the big flops, and reasons have been hit on by others

Burroughs….never developed power
Patterson…..never developed command of strike zone
Mateo———injuries and plate discipline
Dee Brown…lack of discipline?
Choi….too much patience? slow bat?
Phelps….discipline
Henson….plate discipline
Marte….discipline, contact, power didn’t translate
Stokes…..inuries
Guzman….plate discipline..loss of power

It looks like Delmon Young and Brandon Wood could join this list

In general, very little attrition due to injuries….mostly hitters without good plate discipline/pitch recognition fail to make the transition…..sometimes power doesn’t transalte

former number one overall pick. Also, Kris Benson, Jason Stokes, Rickie Weeks?(may be young enough to still have a good career), Greg Miller, Chris Burke, and Kyle Sleeth.

When you consider the difference between what a player was expected to be and what a player became, I’d say it’s shaping up to be Andy Marte. Marte was expected to be a star and produced at every level of the minors with good peripheral stats. He just can’t hit major league pitching at all . . .a lot of the other “failures” here at least put up some early promising performance or have turned into minor contributors if not stars. Marte just isn’t anything . . .he’s not a guy who should be in the majors at all.

the seattle lefty was supossed to be the next randy johnson…injuries

also:
lhp bruce chen atlanta braves..never could fully harness his stuff and potential
of goerge lombard atlanta braves…..couldnt make contact but had great tools
jaret wright cleveland indians…to an extent

and any cub prosect to come through the system in the late 90’s early 2000’s i.e. 3b kevin orie, of corey patterson, 3b david kelton, 1b hee seop choi, rhp angel guzman (still some hope), of ryan harvey, 1b brian dopriak, rhp bobby brownlie and on and on and on….lol…not really

He never was able to put much of a significant career together that you can label his career as a failure as opposed to merely a disappointment.

Anyone for the African lightning?

Although it is too early to be definite about it, I think both Richie Weeks and Jeff Francouer are nearing the time when they may be considered major busts if they repeat their recent seasons. And while many never saw him as a top prospect, C.J. Henry was a first round pick and was supposedly a key part of the Abreu trade.

Didn’t he have absurd minor league numbers?

a .300/.400/.500 hitting catcher that I thought was the future at backstop for the Astros after finishing 5th in NL ROY in 2000 . . . he went to Detroit with Roger Cedeno and Chris Holt for Ausmus, Brocail and Nelson Cruz (the RP, not the OF) and injuries only allowed him 89 more AB’s . . . 63 in the minors and 26 in the majors. A big fall at a scarce position, his batting numbers from 22-24 in the A+ to AAA minors were really great. Now that I look back on it though and think about the timing and his sudden jump in power . . . well . . . i don’t want to make any accusations or anything . . . I’ll just say he was a greatly hyped bust.

I’ve seen a few people mention Delmon Young’s name and I don’t quite understand why.

Sure he was supposed to be a .300, 25-30 HR guy but he is a .290, 10-15 HR, 10-15 SB player.

Take a look at his walk totals. If anything, he might be on the right track rather than the wrong one. If he can draw 50+ BBs a year he’s a good #2 hitter with his speed and hitting ability. Then add in the fact that he’s still only 23. 20 HR power could still develop.

Young might be an underachiever as of right now, but he’s not a bust.

I may cathc some heat, but there are some recent and in-process Hoped players fizzling as we speak. I am listing them in no particular order. Some will be OK, but many on this list will or have recently bombed or just not lived up to their hype.

I put the non-major league players in parentheses (In Minors)

C – Jeff Mathis, (Landon Powell), (Neil Walker), Jeff Clement
1B – Billy Butler, Daric Barton, (Billy Rowell), (Eric Duncan), (Justin Huber), (Curtis Thigpen)
2B – Rickie Weeks, (Kevin Melillo)
SS – Bobby Crosby, Brandon Wood, (Chris Nelson), (Reid Brignac), (Joel Guzman)
3B – Andy Marte, Alex Gordon, Andy Marte, Kevin Kouzmanoff
OF – (Felix Pie), Austin Kearns, Karim Garcia, Delmon Young, Travis Buck, (Eddy Estevez-Martinez),
P – Homer Bailey, (Donald Veal), Andrew Miller, (Mark Rogers), (Phil Humber), (John Van Benschoten), (Kyle Sleeth), Edwin Jackson, (Thomas Diamond)

 I thought “the Crushin Rushin” Kouzmanoff has done an ok job. not spectacular, but adequate.

2007: .786 OPS , 18 HR 74 RBI 484 AB
2008: .732 OPS, 23 HR 84 RBI 624 AB

I also hold out hope Alex Gordon may turn it around, still young enough to do so.

Dustin McPherson
Simply did not get the K rate under control in time to get enough regular playing time against big leaguers, without being a liability in the lineup. Then got hurt, further stunting development. Change of organizations may still save him, Jack Cust style. At the same time, a guy like him with limited defensive options needed to hit and hit well – he couldn’t afford much of a development stall, and thus the margin for error was smaller. Comps low on the defensive spectrum who skated thru this window are Adrian Gonzalez, Travis Hafner, and Carlos Pena. Note that in each case, success came after the organization traded them. Another comp that didn’t make it was Choi (though I don’t think he was ever rated as highly).

Comps higher on the spectrum who have been allowed to languish because of their defensive position include Bobby Crosby, Jhonny Peralta, Alex Gonzalez. These guys are not busts because they are measured with a different yardstick, but still have never come close to reaching the offensive ceiling that some people thought they had.

Ruben Mateo
Injuries, and the tools never quite turned into skills. Sad.

Alex Escobar
See Ruben Mateo.

Andy Marte
This guy might take the cake for me, because everyone seemed to miss on him. BP, BA, John, scouts, and three different organizations. Wow. He had the tools, had the plus upside to the defense that would give him a pass on offense (for a bit), had good stats in the minors, and hasn’t been snakebit by injuries. What happened to cause everyone to miss?

Joel Guzman
Here’s a guy that’s almost the opposite of McPherson. He started high on the defensive spectrum, then kept growing and sliding, while stalling out offensively. Did he outgrow his tools? To me, he seems a little unique, or at least unusual compared to others on this list. What current prospects are at risk of this – maybe Rowell and Angel Villalona?

Jeremy Reed
Another unusual case, in which a super-high OBP and batting eye did not eventually translate into enough power, and his defense did not turn out to be good enough to keep him in the lineup. If he were Endy Chavez he’d still be on the roster. Dustin Pedroia was a minor league comp who turned out to have the pop (and a more forgiving position). Perhaps if Reed had been with another organization, they could have found a role for him, So Taguchi style. Certainly a guy who can get on base and play a good defensive OF has a role somewhere in the majors, but he could not find a niche in SEA. (Probably because they are such a powerhouse).

Sean Burroughs and Matt Bush
Some people were pretty skeptical from Day 1 of both of these guys (more so for Bush than Burroughs). Burroughs is a case of power just never developing….had it, we would have seen a Sean Casey or at least a David Bell. Bush, well, lots of people called him an overdraft and a project from Day 1. He’s a bust from an opportunity cost standpoint, but not from a scouting standpoint because he never played well enough in the minors to even move high enough up onto lists (did he?).

Travis Lee
This guy is interesting. Enough athleticism to have defensive options and weather some offensive stagnation…yet, unlike Adrian Gonzalez, Carlos Pena, and others, he couldn’t put it together despite tries with multiple organizations. To me, he’s a little like Andy Marte (though with more success to this date).

Ben Davis
Can’t remember what years he was ranked, but he was the next Big Thing, right? What happened here? I can’t really recall.

Ben Grieve
A little like a cross between Travis Lee and Dustin McPherson – made it far enough to get everyone excited, then stalled out, had few defensive options, got a few chances in different places, then finally was given up on. Very Sad.

Some summary thoughts

In general, it seems like some guys didn’t develop just because they never turned the tools into skills. Guzman, might be the best example of this.

A larger class of guys are those who had a lot of power (or power potential), but also had plate discipline problems that stalled their development. For these guys, it seems like their ability to survive this stall may be really dependent on the situation (such as their organization), and how many options they have defensively. Guys that sank under this scenario were Lee, Grieve, Choi, and probably McPherson. Guys who made it eventually were Pena, Hafner, etc.

Another large class is guys with nice swings and/or good plate discipline that never developed enough power to carry their spot in the lineup – Burroughs, Reed, etc. Guys who did are Pedrioa, Casey, Grace. Will be interesting to see how this holds for guys like Kouzmanoff, Headley, Lillibridge (erratic, where did that PD go?), and Lowrie.

The last large class is guys that got hurt and had development stunted. Poor Escobar and Rivera. This class is much smaller than it will be for the pitchers.

Finally, there are guys that just seemed to be missed on. I can’t think of a better example than Andy Marte.

I’m generalizing on a lot of this and going off of memory, but I think the overall assessment should be useful.

Sure are a lot of guys who passed through San Diego on this list.

not sure if he was really huge, but he was a MiLB player of the year once, while he was young.

Eric Valent as well. Big Phillies’ prospect was touted higher than Burrell by some.

is a mystery to me too, but as John often stated for young catching prospects:

“Young Catcher’s Stagnation Syndrome” often strikes them. I think this is the best possible explanation….

He’s a major leaguer, but he was an outstanding prospect once. The Braves even sacrificed a year of Dominican signings for signing him too young.

Another guy like Joel Guzman who grew big and lost his luster.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again.

I know John said 10 years, but I’ll pretend to not have noticed, because I just have to mention Billy Beane here. You just can’t have a list like this one without mentioning him.

Three years after being on the cover of SI, he’s not a good baseball player.

Clint Hurdle

He may not be considered a top prospect (i.e. Rivera or Mateo), but he was also on BA’s list quite a few years, and I would consider bust-worthy:

2003 – 37
2002 – 63
2000- 26
1999 – 50

Jeremy Hermida too young? Also, Brian Dopirak, Jeremy Reed, Josh Barfield, Michael Aubrey, Matt Moses, Luis Rivas, Abraham Nunez, Neifi Perez, Benji Gil, and Wil Cordero.

Can’t believe no one’s mentioned Baldelli. He was ranked the second best prospect in baseball by BA, and he’s never produced. His walk rate is terrible and has never really shown anything in the majors. Again, injuries…but he’s a pretty big bust…

Jeremy Giambi- seems to be a steroid story there as part of the explanation

Reuben Mateo- Plate discipline was always a bit iffy but, ultimately, the leg injury

Jeremy Reed- showed a few glimmers of hope last year so maybe he’ll turn it around to an extent, but the huge batting average he flashed in the minors doesn’t seem to have transferred to the majors, injuries havn’t helped.

bill james projected him to hit like 39 homers a few years ago. we’re still waiting.

1. Jason Stokes
2. Drew Henson
3. Brad Nelson
4. Andy Marte
5. Antonio Perez
6. Joe Borchard
7. Michael Restovich
8. Josh Barfield
9. Jeff Mathis
10. Dee Brown

Reasons? All the same reason; too many strikeouts per XBH. None of these guys actually looked that great in AA/AAA, if you look at the peripherals. Brown is probably the biggest exception in a small sample in AA in 1999, but he was mediocre the next year in AAA. Mathis looked decent for one year, in AAA in 2005, but declined from there. Pretty much all of these guys had red flags, though.