Angels PRE-SEASON Top 20 in Review
by John Sickels on Jun 23, 2006 3:36 PM EDT
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Los Angeles Angels PRE-SEASON Top 20 in Review
This is the PRE-SEASON Top 20. These grades are PRE-SEASON. Anyone who complains about the grades or ratings based on 2006 performance will be rapped firmly across the knuckles with a bat autographed by Daryl Sconiers.
1) Brandon Wood, SS, Grade A
Hitting .289/.373/.567 with 26 doubles and 15 homers for Double-A Arkansas. Power production is excellent. Main worry is strikeouts; 90 whiffs already in 263 at-bats. He's drawing walks but the Ks concern me.
2) Howie Kendrick, 2B, Grade A-
Hitting .398/.436/.674 in 52 games for Triple-A Salt Lake, but just 3-for-26 in major league action. He'll be fine in the long run.
3) Kendry Morales, 1B, B+
Hit .317/.360/.472 at Salt Lake, now at .231/.286/.365 in 26 games for the Angels. Like Kendrick, I expect he'll be fine in the long run.
4) Jered Weaver, RHP, B+
Won his first four major league starts in brilliant fashion. He has nothing left to prove in the minor leagues and is ready for a rotation spot.
5) Erick Aybar, SS, B+
4-for-12 in the majors, .303/.351/.480 in Triple-A. I think he's ready to hit something like .260-.275 in the majors now, but will need more time to develop power and reliable on-base skills.
6) Jeff Mathis, C, B
Just 4-for-39 in major league action, .310/.346/.456 for Salt Lake. Has he been passed by Napoli? It would be ironic if he has....scouts have always preferred Mathis' pure athleticism to Napoli's power.
7) Thomas Mendoza, RHP, B
4-5, 4.97 in 15 starts for Class A Cedar Rapids, 77/20 K/BB in 92 innings, 98 hits allowed. More hittable than expected, but his control is good. Needs more time to develop.
8) Steven Shell, RHP, B-
Combined 4-4, 3.39 with 47/19 K/BB in 77 innings between Double-A and Triple-A. Throwing strikes, but I think he needs a good dose of Triple-A before being pushed into a full major league role.
9) Nick Adenhart, RHP, B-
9-2, 2.08 in 14 starts for Cedar Rapids, 89/21 K/BB in 90 innings, 72 hits and just two homers allowed. Doing great, throwing hard, throwing strikes, no ill effects from Tommy John procedure.
10) Alberto Callaspo, 2B, B-
Traded to Arizona, hitting .313/.385/.418 for Triple-A Tucson. I think he will slot best as a reserve infielder.
11) Michael Collins, C, B-
Hitting .295/.358/.406 for Class A Rancho Cucamonga. Good solid line drive bat, but hasn't developed much home run power.
12) Trevor Bell, RHP, B-
Just activated from extended spring, threw five shutout innings in his first start for Orem in the Pioneer League.
13) P.J. Phillips, SS, C+
Just activated from extended spring, is 2-for-6 at Orem.
14) Sean Rodriguez, SS, C+
Hitting .298/.359/.526 for Rancho, with 14 homers, showing surprising power. Strikeout rate has spiked this year and his walks have dropped, so the power boost is not without cost. Will be interesting to see if this holds at higher levels.
15) Joe Saunders, LHP, C+
8-3, 2.50 in 15 starts for Salt Lake, 72/24 K/BB in 101 innings. Doing very well especially considering PCL pitching environment. A major league sleeper for late in the year?
16) Hainley Statia, SS, C+
Hitting .264/.337/.354 in 63 games for Cedar Rapids. Not much power, overall somewhat disappointing but he is young.
17) Mike Napoli, C, C+
Hitting .290/.421/.570 in 35 games in the majors. I think his average will come down, but the power and walks should remain. Think Mickey Tettleton.
18) Ryan Mount, SS, C+
Just activated from extended spring training. 2-for-9 so far at Orem.
19) Gustavo Espinosa, LHP, C+
Extended spring training.
20) Drew Toussaint, OF, C
Hitting .241/.327/.432 with 10 homers for Rancho. Showing some power but not dominating the way a player his age (23) needs to in A-ball.
Comment:
I think the Angels and their fans should be happy. Weaver looks great, and I still expect Wood, Kendrick, and Morales to be a solid offensive core by 2008. Napoli has done very well, and Adenhart's full recovery from Tommy John surgery is good to see.
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Halo Catchers...
It's Napoli.
It'll take a while for other catchers to catch up, they're generally slow developers. You burn those bridges when you come to them.
by abbreviatedman on Jun 23, 2006 4:18 PM EDT up reply actions
good defense, actually
i doubt he'll keep hitting quite like this (obviously), but it's not even a question right now as to who will be the Angels' starter -- Collins and Conger aren't even in the picture.
I guess I would be curious to hear John explain Sickels' low ranking, and I don't mean that in a critical, nyah-nyah way. I totally accept that you hit some and you miss some, but it's worth asking why was he so overlooked. Just on the face of it Napoli pretty much had the same statistical history as Mathis, only Mathis had produced his numbers when he was one year younger. On that front, then, Napoli should certainly have been ranked lower than Mathis, but in the same ballpark. And Baseball Prospectus -- in a score for them -- had Napoli ranked (if memory serves) as the 2nd best catching prospect based on a closer look at his numbers and, I assume, their fondness for the power/patience approach he has.
Another catching prospect that John seems to have missed on is Josh Willingham, though he seems to have turned into a LFer. Still, at either position, Willingham had an ever more oddly low ranking, since his history was probably more obvious. Since Willingham and Napoli are similar style players, is there a pattern there?
And I really hope this doesn't come off as snarky or passive aggressive, I just think it's an interesting question.
Napoli
willingham
Napoli....quoting from the book, "I see Napoli as something like a cross between Matt LeCroy, Mickey Tettleton, and Rob Deer. Someone should be able to get some use out of him. Grade C+." Let's see what he does over a full season before we know whether that's an underestimate or not.
by John Sickels on Jun 24, 2006 10:07 AM EDT up reply actions
okay
in any case, my point wasn't to be accusatory, but rather to ask for reflection. i guess that ain't happening. no problem. though what's the point of a "review," then?
sorry
I think a fuller piece on Napoli would be a good idea for Monday. Remind me if I forget.
by John Sickels on Jun 24, 2006 12:46 PM EDT up reply actions
no issue at all...
Willingham
I don't think John has anything to be apologetic about, either in his rating or his reaction.
willingham sort of an outlier anyway
a lot of these guys end up spending their peak years in the minors, cuz, really, just the asset of hitting is not worth that much in the collective minds of mlb teams. T
that's why all teams, at least most, would be all except - won't get into that - don't have a problem filling the 1st base/dh position with a hitter. i mean there's ALWAYS hitters wasting away in the minor leagues.
willingham's just fortunate that he was with the Marlins after their fire sale and gets to spend his peak years in the majors.
by dryice on Jun 25, 2006 11:07 AM EDT up reply actions
Collins
Comparing....
Would you say that is more indicative of the systems themselves, or did you just get a little luckier picking the top 20 for the Angels? I am sure that the Phillies have some young kids doing well in their system, but they just werent as highly thought of, less toolsy, etc when these Pre-Season lists come out.
Also, what do you expect out of Sean Rodriguez in the future?
the phillies have an odd system
on the other hand, they have no position prospects in full season ball who have had even a respectable season. not baez, not costanzo, not jaramillo.
it appears as though john highly overrated the organizations hitting depth, and underrated the organization's pitching depth. there is a lot of talent in the phillies organization, but not a whole lot of balance.
by overlord on Jun 23, 2006 6:26 PM EDT up reply actions
Phillies system
Rodriguez
Callaspo
Callaspo's minor league career stats compare favorably to Adam Kennedy's (source: the baseball cube, stats are through spring training at the time of this post).
Player AB's 2B 3B HR SB/CS BB/K's AVG OBP
Adam K 1255 80 19 22 65/19 78/144 .311 .355
Alberto 1919 112 18 22 59/37 144/97 .310 .357
Kennedy was a better baserunner and had shown a little more pop in his bat (10 HR in his last 367 AB with Memphis immediately prior to his MLB promotion helped considerably), so their respective batting averages and OBP's may suggest that Kennedy had more to offer within the same on-base and batting average.
But these batting averages and OBP's really weren't similar at all. Callaspo's phenomenal walk and strikeout ratios with a similar average suggest two things in my mind:
- Callaspo provides his team with higher-quality plate appearances than Kennedy during the 65% of PA's in which neither reaches base successfully. The difference in K/AB of +6% for Callaspo translates to 30 more balls put into play per 500 AB which could advance or score one or more baserunners.
- Callaspo's walk and strikeout ratios indicate that his ability to hit for contact is far more advanced than Kennedy's (or that of all current minor-league prospects with similar batting averages and OBP's). This far more developed contact hitting skill increases his odds of continued success and improved production vs. MLB pitching.
I believe that some organization will recognize that skill, manage to acquire him for the going rate of a minor-league utlity infielder, and receive a consistently productive starting MLB infielder. In fact, I don't understand why the Royals or Twins haven't made that move already.
I was about to
by Brett Perryman on Jun 23, 2006 7:09 PM EDT up reply actions
re
by bootsy on Jun 23, 2006 7:28 PM EDT up reply actions
Park effects affect so little, though.
What effect does a ballpark have on a player's strike zone judgment or ability to make contact? Those two skills must be as completely independent of the ballpark's dimensions as possible in my opinion. If you are also claiming that a small park forces opposing pitchers to nibble and walk more batters (and even if that were true), then Callaspo's teammates would almost never strike out, either. In fact, EVERY prospect who played a significant number of games for those minor league teams would have managed freakishly low strikeout rates and extremely impressive walk ratios; however, that has not been the case. In terms of BB/K and K/AB, Callaspo has been in a league of his own for all five of his minor league seasons in five different parks at four different levels of professional baseball, and he only drew seven intentional walks in his first four seasons.
When you speak of "waaaaaaay better parks", what is so much better about them? Are you referring to several "hitter's parks" with short fences which should favor his (low) home run total while reducing his singles, doubles, and triples with smaller gaps (and therefore indicate that he is even better at hitting for a high average with gap power than his numbers currently suggest)? Or are you referring to parks with spacious outfields (normally considered "pitchers' parks") which should favor his batting average, doubles, and triples at the expense of a few HR?
The ballpark effect is only one factor among many. It is not as powerful as the quality and health of the actual player, nor the quality and health of his opponents and teammates, and it only affects the most extreme flyball pitchers and flyball hitters significantly (a relatively small percentage of all players) when the weather conditions are also favorable while the opponents are poor or making mistakes. A player's home park affects no more than half of his games (less than half of them if more regularly scheduled days off and DL stints occur during homestands or if a pitcher is consistently more effective and lasts longer in road games).
Slugging percentage nearly acts as an equalizer in that sense -- it takes more singles, doubles and triples to replace the impact of 10 extra home runs:
Hits/AB 2B 3B HR AVG SLG%
125/500 24 1 25 .250 .452
145/500 32 2 15 .290 .452
That's an extreme example to illustrate a point. For a real-world example, check out Mark Loretta's home and road splits from 2005. He posted a higher slugging percentage at cavernous Petco Park because he hit more singles and doubles there.
Response
Thank you.
Hmm
by ClutchHomer on Jun 24, 2006 12:34 AM EDT up reply actions
Well - someone has to state the obvious
Not the first thread to not necessarily focus on the initial starting point - happens.
Brandon Wood's high K rate
by southboundpachyderm on Jun 23, 2006 5:09 PM EDT reply actions
re: Brandon Wood k's
Arredondo
With all
NAPOLI
I suspect Jeff Mathis will be traded very soon.
by Rev Halofan @ Minor League Ball on Jun 24, 2006 3:41 AM EDT reply actions
Espinoza
Stephen Marek
by laG on Jun 24, 2006 8:44 PM EDT reply actions
BA's LAA preseason #18
92 1/3 IP, 2.14 ERA, 1.02 WHIP, 75 H, 7 HR, 81/19 K/BB in 15 games started.
Considering he was a draft-and-follow guy who wasn't able to crack a JuCo rotation (and hadn't done this well through 15 games/14 starts as an older-than-average player in Rookie ball last year), that's a surprise. Considering that he's about 10 weeks away from his 23rd birthday, that Marek is a pitcher (high injury risk), and still at low A at his age should still weigh down his grade and realistic expectations for now, particularly in a system as deep as the Angels'.
You are correct to note that his stock is rising enough to keep him on the prospect radar next year, but he will need to maintain this level of performance while earning more than one promotion per year in order to potentially grade as a high B or any sort of grade-A prospect by preseason of 2007 (unlikely) or 2008 (a possible long shot). If he only moves up one level per year -- high A in 2007, AA in 2008, AAA in 2009 -- he will make his MLB debut at age 26 or 27 which is not a great pace.
John graded Marek as a C this preseason. In my opinion, Marek may warrant consideration for a C+ at this exact moment (not a correction of the preseason grade at all), but his grade probably won't and shouldn't rise much more than that if or when he begins to pitch well without injury at the AA level (i.e., Stephen Shell, 6 months older than Marek, and pitched at AA last year; also, the much younger trio of Adenhart, Bell and Mendoza. Adenhart and Bell are already performing similarly well at a higher level or at least as well at the same level as Marek, and Mendoza has struggled some, but is not yet 17).
The Angels also have five positional players which John graded at a C level but did not include in his LAA top 20. Since most of them have reached AA without the injury risk of a pitcher, Marek may have trouble breaking the top 25, but he almost certainly would rank in the top 30.
Even with Marek's surprise performance at low A so far, BA seems to have overrated him this year by at least 5.
More on Napoli
According to the Los Angeles Times, "If Angels fans still fume about the loss of relievers Bobby Jenks and Derrick Turnbow, who were claimed off waivers, think how they would feel if rookie catcher Mike Napoli was batting .313 and cracking home runs for another club right now. It could have happened. After hitting .282 with a league-leading 29 home runs and 118 RBIs for Class-A Rancho Cucamonga in 2004, Napoli was exposed to the Rule 5 draft, meaning any team could have plucked him from the Angels as long as they kept him on their major league roster for the entire 2005 season. Napoli was not chosen, and two years later he has emerged as the Angels' starting catcher. "Our intelligence suggested that other clubs were not as aware of him as we were," General Manager Bill Stoneman said. "We took a chance. It was an educated guess. Had another club liked his catching skills as much as his hitting skills, they would have taken him. That wasn't the case."
Pretty interesting gamble.
Bigger gambles with Napoli
Napoli led all Texas League catchers with 14 errors and 13 passed balls. He struck out in nearly 1/3 of his AA AB's. He was still recovering from a 2003 labrum surgery.
His power is probably for real, but if anyone expects him to continue batting near or above .300 in his MLB career, that is also a bigger gamble in my opinion.
I wouldn't be surprised if Jeff Mathis surpasses Napoli by sometime next year, or perhaps even sometime this season.
Someone else has suggested that Mathis is trade bait, and that is a good point, too, but the Angels probably can make room for both if they can't get what they think they deserve for Mathis in a deal. And since Napoli's trade value may be near an all-time high, perhaps he's the real trade target.
In any case, it will be interesting to see how the Angels handle these two players, and I don't think John nor BA "missed" with their higher rankings of Mathis in the preseason.
Not really a bigger gamble
I personally think expecting that you are smarter than everyone else is a big gamble - and while the Angels got lucky - normally arrogance gets you in trouble and that quote definately has a hint of arrogance IMO.
Smarter than everyone else?
You are correct to point out that a few AL teams would have taken a significantly smaller risk with Napoli than any NL team, but giving any season-long expanded C/1B/DH role to a guy who struggled to make contact in double-A (and led his league in errors and passed balls allowed by catchers), probably lacks experience playing first base (I'd be surprised if he has as much experience at first as, LeCroy, Piazza or Javy Lopez -- and some of those worked out better at 1B than others), and did not have the track record to beat out several available MLB veterans per team at DH.
The list of AL teams is less than 13 after subtracting the following teams:
- Twins (plenty of C depth without LeCroy, too many DH candidates already).
- Orioles (Javy Lopez)
- Royals (logjam at 1B/DH, not willing to risk the potential development of young pitchers or effectiveness of veteran pitchers with Napoli).
- Yankees and Red Sox (loaded with high-priced vets competing for it all -- the Rule 5 draft has little value for them).
- Texas (plenty of DH candidates, especially).
- Cleveland (Hafner, crowded at 1B).
- Oakland (Frank Thomas at DH)
- White Sox (another team too talented to focus on a player such as Napoli, Thome at DH).
- Tampa Bay (Gomes and others at DH).
Again, it isn't so much a matter of every backup catcher being significantly better, but certainly more of a known quantity, and even more so in terms of veteran options at 1B and DH.
Decent analysis - wrong year
That being said - Oakland would have been a great opportunity, Tampa Bay has Toby Hall and Josh Paul along with Travis Lee at 1B and last year Gomes played a lot of games in the OF and would be this year if not for his shoulder, Mariners would have been a great fit in 2005 given their catching woes, Orioles had a ton of problems last year with Lopez injuries, so on, and so on.
He hit .282 with 29 bombs and 118 rbi's in 2004 - power at the catcher position has all but vanished and hitting at the position seems awfully weak these past couple years too. There were plenty of teams who could have taken a flyer on him. Hind sight is 20-20 but 29 taters! Even if he hits .240 which it seems like is the norm at the position these days - 20+ hr power is nice out of your 8th hitter.
Correction and more analysis
Admittedly, I referred to the wrong year when listing his potential competition on a team-by-team basis (see my post on the Angels' prospects in review when I discussed the correct year). Sorry for the mix-up, and thanks for pointing that out so I may clarify my point, which hasn't really changed.
In any case, Napoli's 2005 stats from AA provide further proof that he probably would not have been even a decent backup catcher because of his poor fielding (most errors & passed balls in the Texas League, which presumably had a less skilled pool of catchers than MLB), poor batting average, and poor contact hitting ability (striking out in about 1/3 of his AB). All other arguments regarding 1B and DH still apply, but with different names for competition. Every team had someone who could make contact more often than that and post a more respectable average (and of course, this is generously assuming that Napoli would have been just as effective in MLB as he had been in AA, which is not likely at all).
Nobody drafted him to be on their MLB roster for all of 2005 because he had only repeated A ball several times, was in the final stages of recovering from a torn labrum in 2003, and many other reasons. Any team which picked him up almost certainly would have sent him back anyway.
There were more proven options for backup catching duties already in the majors then, even more questions about Napoli's ability to catch or hit, and most teams which stood to gain from the Rule 5 draft at all were rightfully focusing on less risky prospects (with experience at double-A or higher) to fill larger roles and greater needs.
The bottom line is this: despite the recent kind words from the Angels regarding Napoli's potential value as a Rule 5 pick prior to 2005, they, like every other MLB team, did not appreciate his skills enough to give him a full-time backup role in 2005. I really don't see any gain in hindsight relative to Napoli's rightful role in 2005 (as a first-year double-A catcher who had plenty to learn before earning any sort of promotion to the Show), and I still see no reason to change my opinion that selecting him in the Rule 5 then represented a greater risk than the Angels' decision to protect a different player.
On a more general level:
As for his 29 bombs (or anyone else's), I personally think power is overrated unless one is discussing all extra-base hits. The number of HR per AB each player produces in a given year may fluctuate greatly, but the percentage of balls put into play by a hitter resulting in XBH is more constant. And extra-base hits, like stolen bases, are only valuable when accompanied by a reasonably high on-base percentage and/or batting average. Extra bases represent the best moments of a players' offensive game, but the player's ability to contribute consistency at the plate and in the field is a much greater indicator of his quality and value to his team.
Furthermore, most fans (especially those who view and understand the game via statistics) will claim that 20-50 AB's are statistically insignificant because they are "small sample sizes" -- unless they are ogling at a small sample size of 20-50 HR (or in other cases, 20-50 AB's which lead a fan, manager, or GM to conclude that a hitter will never be successful vs. LHP's or RHP's).
Although the jury is still out on the impact of offensive strikeouts, very few would argue that they are of great importance to pitchers. I personally view stats as a double-entry system; therefore, strikeouts are as positive for pitchers as they are negatives for hitters (and vice versa). The same principle applies to HR in my mind (positives for hitters, negatives for pitchers). A lone tater usually has a more extreme effect on the outcome of a game than a single whiff, but HR's are more like statistical outliers while strikeouts and balls put into play are more like the common denominators of baseball games.
You can write a book on it
And as far as defense - while recovering from his torn labrum - he threw out 47% of the basestealers (not sure if it was 2004 or 2005). Pass balls and errors are things that can be worked on - he was only 22 at the time.
I like a lot of what you had to say about Callaspo but I think you are trying to find reasons to make this one not work and the fact is that back-up catchers are to give a starter a break or fill in for an injury and a lot of rebuilding teams would have had nothing to lose by using that b/u spot on Napoli. I'm not saying that the Yankees or Boston should have taken a risk like that but a lot of other teams could have.
Good points
I agree with you on several details regarding Napoli. He may have been a more productive MLB backup catcher in 2005 than one or more backup catchers. But would you also agree that this is a difficult, if not impossible, evaluation to state with any certainty?
Without discounting that possibility, I can also imagine at least two reasons why MLB teams did not choose to draft him, even as a backup catcher only:
- MLB GM's probably preferred the safety of the known quantities of experienced backups over an A-level young prospect.
- Legitimate questions about Napoli's skill set and health then (which were answered to some degree in AA, but may or may not have been duplicated with the same or better success in the Show last year...or even by the end of this year, perhaps).
Again, it doesn't mean that I believe that all of them were entirely correct. In fact, since some of those Rule 5 draftees did not last the entire 2005 season in the majors, it logically follows that some GM's were not entirely correct in their assessments. However, I can easily imagine why 29 GM's thought that Napoli was a riskier Rule 5 draft pick than the players who were actually chosen.
As a Kansas Citian, I hope you are entirely correct about Napoli's value as a backup catcher last season. In that scenario, Napoli-Buck would have been a more helpful catching tandem for the Royals last season than Buck-Castillo, and perhaps the season would have had one more small bright spot (really, anything would have helped matters). At the time, I would have personally preferred to see how a catching duo of John Buck and Paul Phillips, but Phillips definitely lacks Napoli's exciting raw power, and the rest is a different matter altogether.
Consider this, too: at least half of the basis for any speculation as to whether he would have been a productive backup MLB catcher in 2005 is because he was not drafted and developed his skills at the double-A level instead. Whether one is skeptical or optimistic about Napoli's ability to produce at or beyond his minor league production for a significantly long career in the Show, the probability and degree of his future success are probably better from both points of view because he played full-time in the Texas League last year. I also believe that Napoli's AA performance in 2005 is more impressive to just about anyone today than whatever his major-league equivalent numbers would have been as another relatively anonymous backup catcher.
However - it is not like his 29 HR's in 2004 were accompanied by 55 RBI's - he knocked in 118 runs so he was putting the ball into play.
You are definitely correct to say that Napoli put the ball in play more often than he struck out, and he was often productive when he did make contact.
On this matter, I think our biggest disagreement lies in whether his 2004 high-A stats indicated that he was ready for the Show. That was his fourth consecutive year of A-ball (and his third year of spending some or all of the season at high-A Rancho), so I'm not surprised that he established career highs there. It did indicate that he was mostly or completely recovered from his injury, but it was also the first and time in his career that he batted above .270 in a season.
Let's compare Napoli's 2004 (A+), 2005 (AA), and minor-league career numbers to Jeff Mathis's 2003 (A+), 2004 (AA), and minor-league career at-bats, hits, strikeouts, and contact outs (through 2005):
Player ABs Hit SOs COs BAVG KAVG COAVG
Mike04 482 136 166 180 .282 .344 .373
Mike05 439 104 140 195 .237 .319 .444
Jeff03 378 122 74 182 .323 .196 .482
Jeff04 432 98 102 232 .227 .236 .537
Career AB's Hit SOs COs BAVG KAVG COAVG
Napoli 1649 421 515 713 .255 .312 .433
Mathis 1923 536 369 718 .279 .192 .373
Whether looking at each players' combined final year of A+ and first full year of AA or their minor league careers, Mathis has produced more hits than strikeouts, nearly twice as many contact outs as strikeouts, and less than ten percent more contact outs than hits. On the other hand, Napoli has produced fewer hits than strikeouts, less than a 3:2 ratio of contact outs to K's, and nearly 18% more contact outs than hits.
I don't believe anyone is denying that each player brings something positive to the table and can potentially succeed in some major-league role eventually. The Angels, fans, and experts had many reasons to grade and rank Mathis higher than Napoli in the preseason, and Napoli must sustain his current burst of improvement over the next season and half and beyond to completely disprove those evaluations and expectations. Most of all, I believe there is room for both prospects in the Angels' future, depending on their respective roles and continued development.
I think a lot of what you say fits Anaheim
The tendency, IMO, is for teams to value average and many of the strengths that Mathis has while raw power seems to be something that makes a lot of prospects AAAA players but a few (maybe Gomes and Napoli) can actually stick.
I think Napoli in 2004 had to stay in A+ due to the injury and maybe Anaheim was smart in keeping him down and not giving him any promotions or prospects ahead of him prevented a promotion.
I guess this all started because I take exception to how the Anaheim person explained how they exposed Napoli because they felt that no one would take him and it came off a little arrogant rather than coming off as - hey - we finally got lucky on one after the Jenks and Turnbow losses.
Now the funny thing about Jenks and Turnbow is that there was no where for them on the roster with K-Rod unless they became 8th inning guys so speculating on that is kind of funny too.
I enjoy spirited debate, especially when no name calling is involved so thank you for the information.
Average vs. power
The Angels obviously value power enough to sign Vlad and Jose Guillen once upon a time, but not at every position or in an extremely raw player very often. I'm only speculating again, but I also think that the Angels accumulate contact hitters who can be helpful without power while hoping that some of them develop power. If many organizations are valuing OBP and contact hitting, it also makes sense to stockpile those sorts of hitters for the trade market.
The Angels are one of the five best organizations, in my opinion -- they are consistently competitive at the big league level and never seem to have a shortage of short-term or long-term prospects. The real gripe fans should have regarding Rule 5 losses such as Turnbow and Jenks is that the front office didn't move them to fill other needs before they were left unprotected in the R5 draft. And as a Royals fan, I can assure you that the old adage, "you can't have too many good arms" is true, even in the bullpen. I'm sure the Angels would have gladly owned the deepest and most dominant bullpen had they managed to keep Turnbow and Jenks. It would have been similar to the luxury the Astros had over the past two years when they could afford let go of Billy Wagner and Octavio Dotel since they still had Brad Lidge.
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