Book Excerpts

by John Sickels on Jan 18, 2007 12:47 PM EST in News

More book excerpts. I will do the Edwin Encarnacion Crystal Ball tomorrow.

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Lillibridge

Have you seen his PECOTA forecast? It makes him look like an even stronger prospect.

by sdangler on Jan 18, 2007 1:26 PM EST 0 recs

Holy Crap

He was the throw-in on the LaRoche deal? Wow, Davey got fleeced.

by sdangler on Jan 18, 2007 1:27 PM EST up 0 recs

davey

Isn't apparent to everyone that mr. littlefield is a complete idiot?

by kolbotn on Jan 18, 2007 4:47 PM EST up 0 recs

Lind

Will he even play much this year with the big hurt in the line up? Guess they need to make a trade or two.

by ChrisRef19 on Jan 18, 2007 1:33 PM EST 0 recs

OR

The Big Hurt could get hurt. Like usual.

by The Colonel on Jan 18, 2007 6:12 PM EST up 0 recs

If Lind was in the everyday lineup for 2007, I would be fairly confident that he would challenge for ROY. Unfortunately, that may be a problem from what JP has said. Ricciardi plans on keeping Lind in AAA, unless he gets regular AB's. So he'll need someone to get injured, a Reed Johnson regression, or a trade to land an everyday spot.

by parrot11 on Jan 18, 2007 1:47 PM EST 0 recs

Lillibridge

John, no concern that he is a bit old for the leagues he played in? He'll be 23.5 by the time he gets his first taste of AA, and so I think his A numbers have to be viewed cautiously.

If he puts up the same #'s in AA, I will agree with your ranking, and you must feel confident he'll do just that to give him such a ranking.

by BaseballBrain on Jan 18, 2007 1:59 PM EST 0 recs

If he

puts up similar numbers in AA to what he did in A (.850 OPS with 50+ steals in less than 500 AB) out of the shortstop position, he's an A- prospect at least, and would likely be a top 25 prospect in baseball.

I can't believe I'd never heard of him until this trade.

by Galt on Jan 18, 2007 2:43 PM EST up 0 recs

Shhh........

(Goldstein pretty much raves about him, too).

by siddfynch on Jan 18, 2007 8:35 PM EST up 0 recs

John and BP

Ranked him PIT's top 3 prospects. If you havn't heard, you havn't been listening.

by cooper7d7 on Jan 19, 2007 8:56 AM EST up 0 recs

2B

Anybody else think this is the heir apparent to Marcus Giles?

by rwperu34 on Jan 18, 2007 3:27 PM EST 0 recs

Maybe

The Braves seem convinced that Kelly Johnson can handle second base, but I'm guessing Lillibridge will be in spring training, and if KJ looks awful could get a shot. They moved Furcal up (to split time between second and short) when he had very little AA experience. More likely, he'll be in that Furcal-as-rookie role (two starts a week at short, two at second) in 2008, and replace Renteria in 2009.

by Mac Thomason on Jan 18, 2007 4:54 PM EST up 0 recs

Lillibridge

I thought of David Eckstein as a possible comp for Lillibridge over the summer

by captoats85 on Jan 18, 2007 3:45 PM EST 0 recs

Brian Roberts

Roberts is a much better comp, if you ask me. Position, speed, slash stats, development path, ARL...Roberts is very similar in all.

The main concern I have is that Lillibridge strikes out kind of a lot and is a little old.

by limozeen on Jan 18, 2007 8:37 PM EST up 0 recs

That's why

the pirates traded him, I suspect. They probably don't consider him a prospect at all.

by Vaux on Jan 19, 2007 4:10 AM EST 0 recs

Not a prospect?

He was a 4th rounder 2 years ago? The PIT might not be a well run organization, but I don't think theyare that nearsighted.

by cooper7d7 on Jan 19, 2007 8:55 AM EST up 0 recs

Littlefield v. Schuerholz

no contest

by Johnny Ruin on Jan 19, 2007 11:48 AM EST up 0 recs

Lind Projection

I'm sorry to say that I don't think the Lind projection is well-grounded in reality. Mostly the .300 batting average doesn't seem likely at all; he was a .300 hitter in double-A but there's a substantial difference in quality of pitching between the two levels.
I know he posted .300+ averages in AAA and the big leagues last year, but those were extremely small samples of performance and those averages was inflated by unsustainable BABIP. Note that I don't think he's going to be a low-average hitter, and there's so much variation with batting average that nearly anything is possible. But I think a .280-something type of average is an appropriately optimistic projection for Lind.

I know it's only 15 or 20 points, but those points do affect OBP, etc. and the overall evaluation of the player, so I think it's somewhat important. That said, we don't know anything about what John's experimental projections mean so maybe I'm jumping the gun on this one.

by FI on Jan 19, 2007 12:15 PM EST 0 recs