Scouting Reports for the 2016 Giants: San Jose Giants Prospects

Hello everyone and first of all, Merry Christmas to all of my kind readers! It's been a good Christmas for me as my family went on a trip today. How's your Christmas going so far? By the way, I have added batting hand/throwing hand on the profiles as I have forgotten to put it in previous scouting reports. I'll get to it right away.

My gift to the readers reading right now is my scouting reports for the San Jose Giants. It is on par with Richmond in terms of the excitement to write about as there are plenty of good prospects to scout on and some of the players that we might see in AT&T Park might've had a taste of playing for the San Jose Giants this year. I will highlight here several of the top prospects in the system as well as some tidbits on selected players that are not top prospects but sure gets my attention. 

2017 MLB Draft: First Look At The Draft Prospects Part 1

I started working on the San Jose scouting reports before I went idle which should be tons of fun but I figured it's better to write up the 2017 MLB Draft prospects first.

It's the middle of the offseason and the organizational evaluations like the Top 100 Prospect lists and the Top 30 Prospects of every organization are slowly coming out. But there's also one list that are starting to pop out as well. The 2017 MLB Draft prospect lists are slowly churning out as well. In the case of the Giants, they are currently slotted at 19th in the first round but there's still a great chance that the club will move higher due to a lot of the top sluggers who received qualifying offers have yet to sign and there's a possibility that club like the Astros and Angels will sign one of those sluggers. I'm going to take a look at some of the prospects that the Giants could draft that could fit in their philosophy and the fit in the system. Even though the draft is 6 months away, it's not bad to talk about the prospects don't you think?

Out In Front: Evaluating the Melancon Deal + Something Extra

When I told people that I have plenty of unfinished posts, I did have plenty of unfinished posts at hand. This is one of a few that I have left unfinished before I hibernated.

With the offseason in full swing and the Winter Meetings just recently concluded, the Giants made a notable acquisition signing Mark Melancon to a 4 year-$62 million deal. The deal looked like an slight overpay to a guy entering his age 32 season in Opening Day but when Aroldis Chapman and Kenley Jansen to $80+ million deals, Melancon now looked like a fair deal. This is one of the most obvious signings in the offseason as the Giants was meant to sign one of the top-shelf relievers available after they had an awful bullpen corps this year, blowing more saves than I have ever seen from a Giants team in recent memory. I am digging deep on what the Giants going to get on Melancon.

Scouting Reports for the 2016 Giants: Augusta GreenJackets Prospects

I am back to writing prospect reports after a couple of weeks of studying really hard. My hardwork paid off by the good grades that I received in my quizzes and exams. 

Anyway, it's time for my third part of my scouting reports and it will cover the Augusta GreenJackets. The Augusta roster was packed full of excitement and potential with a bunch of young but great prospects. They actually put up a good record and their chance to play in the postseason came down to the wire but after a lot of promotions and trades, the season went away and the final roster was gutted fairly hard as the top prospects moved up to San Jose for that team's playoff run. As a result, the prospects left in the roster don't have the same luster as the guys that have come and go but there's still a good number of prospects that are worth looking at.

Blogger's Note

Hello, kind reader! I'm back from my hibernation which is technically busting my ass off in studies and it produced satisfying grades. I'm now back to blogging (I am free for almost a month) and I have a lot of unfinished work to do starting with my Augusta prospects so in 1 to 2 days, I hope I can release it to all of you people. I hope I can touch on the deals the Giants made this offseason as well as other teams (I'm looking at you White Sox) to evaluate their prospect haul. Lots to be done so enjoy reading!

OIF: Tyler Beede Interview

Hello everyone! It's not the even year that Giants fans have been hoping for as the Giants playoff run ended in the NLDS as the Cubs beat them 3-1 highlighted by the Game 4 bullpen collapse that has been the story of the season. I'm not that mad or disappointed as the Giants already had 3 titles in the past 5 years and the remaining teams have been waiting for their taste of the championship as late as more than 100 years. The bullpen issue must be addressed for next season in which I will write up in the offseason.

Meanwhile, I am planning to release my Augusta scouting reports soon but this came fresh from my personal e-mail account today and it's my interview of Tyler Beede. For those who doesn't exactly know him, he's a 2014 1st round draft pick by the Giants and he won the Eastern League ERA title this season. I got the opportunity to interview about stuff his 2016 season and some slice of Beedah. I have copy pasted the contents of the mail but edited some parts for clarity. I hope you enjoy the interview!

Scouting Reports for the 2016 Giants: Salem-Keizer Volcanoes + Other Notes

In the second part of my end of the season scouting reports, I'll cover the Salem-Keizer Volcanoes. The Volcanoes overall had a great amount of offensive talent (notably the OF trio of Quinn, Reynolds, Brusa) but they got promoted for the SJ Giants playoff run. Interestingly, Ronnie Jebavy was under the Volcanoes roster after he injured his shoulder but I plan to write him up on the SJ Giants portion as he last played for them. 

I hoped you enjoy the new format of my scouting reports and personally, I found it pretty easy to read and understand. I hope you will enjoy this Volcanoes series!

Scouting Reports for the 2016 Giants: AZL Giants Prospects

It's the end of the minor league season for the Giants so it's time to unleash the scouting reports for the Giants prospects this year. I'll mix it up this year, with me writing reports in every level. I will consider the final roster in writing the reports or where the players ended up in the final game of their season. (e.g. even though Heath Quinn raked in the NWL, he got promoted to SJ so you'll see him in the SJ Giants write-up) I will not write-up on all of the prospects because that's pretty stressful considering my studies and other stuff. Instead, I'll write up the top prospects as well as other notable prospects that is worth taking a look at. I'll also change my way of doing scouting reports as you will lots more of semi-colons per report.

In the first scouting reports for the end of the season, I'll take a look at the AZL prospects for the Giants. I hope you enjoy this one!

Scouting Reports for the 2016 Giants Part 3: Duggar, Hinojosa, Shaw + Something Extra

In the Part 2 of my scouting reports, I'll focus on the three of the San Jose Giants that was promoted to Richmond all at the same time; Steven Duggar, C.J. Hinojosa, and Chris Shaw. Three different hitters all in the same 2015 draft class: Duggar as an OBP specialist with great speed to defend the OF and steal bases, Hinojosa as an all-contact hitter with little speed but great feel to field, and Shaw as a tank-of-a-human-being power hitter that is not just all-power. All are very impressive in my eyes. Let's get into it.

Out In Front: Review of the Futures Game + Something Extra

The 2016 Futures Game is done and the World Team won by a score of 11-3 on an impressive offensive performance by Yoan Moncada and defensive gems by Manuel Margot and Eloy Jimenez. But for me, that's not what I am concerned at the most. I'm more concerned on the performance of the two Giants prospects that played in the Futures Game, Phil Bickford and Adalberto Mejia. In this edition of Out In Front, I'm here to talk about the performances of Mejia and Bickford and in Something Extra will be the performance of some interesting prospects.

The Mid-Season Prospects Special

It's the middle of the regular season and the Futures Game is coming very, very soon and we'll see the Giants' very own Phil Bickford and Adalberto Mejia to pitch in that game. It's also the best time to dish out to you my mid-season prospects special. It is a look back at the top prospects after their first halves of the season which also includes where I will slot the draftees for this year by the organization and much more. 

Scouting Reports for the 2016 Giants Part 2: Howard, Krook, Quinn + Something Extra

Good day to everyone and it's time for some scouting reports! This time, it will be the recent signees in the 2016 draft class for the Giants, shortstop prospect Ryan Howard, lefty pitcher Matt Krook and outfielder Heath Quinn. For those who don't know it, Howard is a 5th rounder from Missouri, Krook is a 4th rounder from Oregon but a Giants fan growing up and Quinn is the 3rd round pick from Samford. If you have missed it, I already did a rough scouting report on the three and other 2nd day selections here and I want to focus on the three because first, they have already agreed to a contract with the Giants and second, I think that they have a good shot to be valuable contributors for the big league club in the near future. Enough chatting, it's time for the scouting.

2016 MLB Draft: Reactions on the Giants' Day 2 Draft

Most of the people will probably stop following the MLB Draft in Day 2 because most of the top dogs of the draft class have been drafted in the first day and second day is not as exciting to follow compared to the first due to the speed of the draft and the number of the picks. I'm not the kind of person. For me, the second day is the make or break of the draft class for any team. Many of the stars today came from the rounds 3-10 of the draft and many jewels and diamonds in the rough are really found there. It is the test for the local area scouts of each teams to deliver the unheard of guy and persuade the front office.  It is also a great time to load up on fallen prospects that may want big money and play with the budget.

For the Giants, all of the players drafted were college prospects, mainly pitchers and outfielders. John Barr and his staff have done a great job in picking players that have seemed to have fallen in their laps. Below is my reaction and a short scouting report for the drafted players of the Giants from rounds 3-10.

2016 MLB Draft: God Gave the Giants Bryan Reynolds

It seems like fate, destiny or whatever that the Giants, with just one pick in the first day of the 2016 MLB Draft and it's at number 59, drafted Bryan Reynolds, an outfielder from Vanderbilt. Of all the prospects available at that the time when the Giants are on the clock, it has to be him. Listed as number 2 in the top Cape Cod League prospects by D1baseball.com, Reynolds was listed at number 8 in the 2016 MLB Draft preseason list and thought that there's zero chance that the Giants will ever get a taste, not even a lick, of him. As the college baseball season progressed, it's becoming clearer and clearer that he'll not be in contention with the Giants so he is off of my mind as a potential Giants pick. But at the time of the draft itself, Reynolds continues to slip in the draft in reasons unknown and it is becoming clearer and clearer that the Giants will draft him after 58 picks.

Wrenzie's Final Giants Draft Big Board

The 52nd MLB First-Year Player Draft is just less than 24 hours away and a lot of people are anticipating for it. The top of the order is still a mess as there's no consensus 1-1 player in this year's draft class but the strength of this year's draft is the depth of it, not on the top prospects. 

For the Giants, there's a lot to like in terms of their position in the 2nd and 3rd round even though the allotted bonus pool for the organization is the 4th worst in MLB as well as having just $1,090,000 for pick 59 and $625,900 for pick 95. Picks 59 and 95 allows them to pick the first-round talents that have fallen off the draft and are ready to be plucked. They can also pick relatively unknown prospects or somewhat unexpected for them to pick because of their recent draft trends. If they are picking straight up, I can see them pick up a college performer, most probably a pitcher or an outfielder on their top 2 picks or they can sandwich in a solid infielder in replacement of a pitcher. I would love them to front-load their budget towards picking a HS outfielder as the HS OF class that surrounds their picks are exciting while having some solid floors. The college scene is not bad either.

Below are my favorite picks, most probably picks and possibly 1-2 combos for the rounds 2 and 3. I will not going to go very deep in the draft picks as the Giants have much more coverage in that than I do. Enjoy!

Scouting Reports for the 2016 Giants Part 1: Beede, Bickford, Suarez

Welcome to the 2016 Scouting Reports series for the San Francisco Giants prospects! It is another year, another great time to scout prospects. There have been a lot of impressive Giants prospects right now in the system (I'll touch on to them along the way) and I will do my best to deliver good scouting reports for the people to read and enjoy.

In the first part of this year, I'm going to touch on 3 pitchers, Tyler Beede, Phil Bickford, and Andrew Suarez. Possibly the three biggest pitchers in the organization right now, people have been clamoring for information about them as well as videos for the prospects. The grading system is still the same as last year with the addition of current grades of the prospects tools to compare it with the potential of the player. It is still based on a 20-80 scale and I have done my best to deliver the best scouting reports that you will ever find for the the Giants. I hope you enjoy!

My Thoughts On Scouting: Hitters

Good day everyone. I'm here to talk about my thoughts about scouting prospects and scouting in general. I am fairly young to say the least for scouting and I have a relatively short experience in scouting but I think that you can learn something from me about scouting in general. 

There are a lot of amateur scouts nowadays. They could be very devoted with all of their full equipment of tools to record everything on a prospect and they could be as casual as a guy holding a radar gun or some kind of recording device. There are some where they feed off the other people's work to make their own work. I think I fall in the third part. Everyone has their opinions about scouting and I have some different opinions on others but also some that shares the same line of thought. Even though I am a guy with just a laptop and Internet connection right now, I am hoping to get to America to fulfill one of my dreams to be a scout for the Giants or just be a freelance scout where I scout guys for a hobby.

This will be separated to two parts: pitching and hitting. In general, I like scouting pitchers more because I love pitchers and how they do their craft. I love how they go through their craft, tinkering their grips and their ways on how to get a hitter out. Hitters are still very interesting to scout even with that. But both have the same unique way of delivering and honing their craft. From throwing in several angles to hitting a well-placed pitch for a hit and so on, the prospects have the same objective overall. They need to find a consistency in their work so that they can treat it as their second nature and not be concerned by it so that they can just focus on hitting the catcher's glove or hitting the baseball on the black.

My Opinions On Scouting: Pitchers

Good day everyone. I'm here to talk about my thoughts about scouting prospects and scouting in general. I am fairly young to say the least for scouting and I have a relatively short experience in scouting but I think that you can learn something from me about scouting in general. 

There are a lot of amateur scouts nowadays. They could be very devoted with all of their full equipment of tools to record everything on a prospect and they could be as casual as a guy holding a radar gun or some kind of recording device. There are some where they feed off the other people's work to make their own work. I think I fall in the third part. Everyone has their opinions about scouting and I have some different opinions on others but also some that shares the same line of thought. Even though I am a guy with just a laptop and Internet connection right now, I am hoping to get to America to fulfill one of my dreams to be a scout for the Giants or just be a freelance scout where I scout guys for a hobby.

This will be separated to two parts: pitching and hitting. In general, I like scouting pitchers more because I love pitchers and how they do their craft. I love how they go through their craft, tinkering their grips and their ways on how to get a hitter out. Hitters are still very interesting to scout even with that. But both have the same unique way of delivering and honing their craft. From throwing in several angles to hitting a well-placed pitch for a hit and so on, the prospects have the same objective overall. They need to find a consistency in their work so that they can treat it as their second nature and not be concerned by it so that they can just focus on hitting the catcher's glove or hitting the baseball on the black.

Stock Watch For 2016 Giants: April Edition

Welcome to the first stock watch of the Giants prospects in 2016! This will be a monthly diagnosis of the top prospects whether their performance raises or decreases their value but I think I'll do a weekly report starting in June. I think this is pretty straightforward by analyzing their stats, their streaks in every month/week.

First week was a pretty sad week if you are following San Jose as some storm or sort rained out most of the games for the week. If you are following Augusta, it will be a roller coaster ride as the toolsy prospects are still getting acclimated to full season baseball and just starting to get their routine. Richmond is a good spot for following the best prospects for the Giants this year while Sacramento is not far behind, with players that look like Major League-ready. Overall this month, even though the win-loss record is not pretty across all levels, there are still positive notes on the individual performances of the prospects.

OIF: Interview with Steven Duggar

In this edition of Out In Front, I have the chance to interview Steven Duggar, the 6th round pick in the 2015 draft. He will play for the San Jose Giants in his first professional season. The interview was actually scheduled almost a week before today, right around the end of the spring training camp. Unfortunately due to conflicts in schedule, the date was pushed back but thankfully, the interview got through. I had a lot of fun talking to him about stuff and I hope that the topics in the interview will be informative and insightful.

Transcript that's already edited is below:

Out In Front: Latest Thoughts on Giants Prospects + Something Extra

Good day Giants fans! In this edition of Out In Front, I will be sharing my thoughts on many of the Giants prospects that are in the minor league camp. Roger Munter (follow him on Twitter @rog61 if you aren't) is unleashing videos and reports of several prospects on the camp, where some Dominican prospects have arrived to begin their American adventures and some draft picks last year are showing off their tools. GPT and Mr. Andrew Baggarly also has clips that I watched. I will talk about the prospects that have videos and gave my own thoughts on them. In Something Extra, it will be baseball from my home land. 

2016 MLB Draft: Possible Strategies For The 59th Pick

The Giants are in their best shape in terms of farm system depth since the days when the Giants drafted Buster Posey and Madison Bumgarner, with top prospect Christian Arroyo leading the charge. The front office also squeezed out the most that they can in a pretty shallow draft class, drafting guys that doesn't just add top shelf talent but also overall depth as well. However, the Giants doesn't have that kind of luxury that they enjoyed last year with the compensation pick for Pablo Sandoval. Thanks to the outdated QO system and the signing of Jeff Samardzija, the Giants forfeited their first round pick in the process which is a bummer. Even with that, Sabes and company still has their work cut out for them as they have picks in rounds 2-40 to think about in June.

In this edition, I'm going to examine the possible future scenarios and draft strategies or preferences as well as including some names that have caught my attention but have not been included in my previous scouting reports.

Out In Front: New Site For Prospects

Exams week is coming to a close so I can give a quick thought in this edition of Out In Front.

A week ago, Mr. Jeremy from MLB Top Prospects has hit me up regarding Giants prospects and I responded on his 5 questions about Fox, underrated players, breakout guy this year, and more. I never thought that prominent Giants bloggers like Cove Chatter, DrB, ogc, Shankbone, Candlestick Will, and SF Lunatic Fringe will be included on the chat. I'm just a newbie on the Giants blogging but I feel humbled as the guys that I am included on the chat are the guys that I read up and look up to as they are the guys that have been the most famous bloggers in the business. I feel honored as well for the opportunity to be in the site of Mr. Jeremy. Come check it out on the list of sites on the right. 

Here's the link of the chat. 

Out In Front: Comments on the Prospects on SF-MIL Game

It's the first Out In Front in 2016 and it will feature several comments about the Giants prospects that are tasting playing time in Spring Training. Most of them will be sent down to the Minors for more seasoning but the experience to face hitters or pitchers that they can soon face and learn something from it is incomparable. This will be pretty short as it will be mostly comments on prospects mostly the pitchers in their game versus Milwaukee.

The 2016 Top Prospects Primer

Welcome to the 2016 top prospects primer! I'll write anything and everything about the top prospects for the upcoming 2016 season from my top prospects list to the possible breakout stars this year. I'll write short thoughts about the guys on every list and I'll be as fair as I can and do as much justice in regards to ranking the prospects. 

Farm System Overview

Even though the Giants never had a premier prospect since Buster Posey, the state of the farm system coming to the 2016 season is a positive one. The front office did a very good job on drafting prospects that go to The Giants Way, the coaches did a very good job making the prospects exceed other people's expectations and develop them to solid ballplayers. 

The Giants farm this season is loaded with a lot of solid potential players that can help the big leagues in the very near future. The Giants had one of the drafts last year, giving the farm a vast assortment of prospects from power pitching, power hitting, exciting but raw tools, and solid overall-types. Signing Lucius Fox gives the farm another potential high-ceiling player 3-5 years from now. 

While the Giants seem to develop hitters better than pitchers in very recent memory, the farm is loaded with pitchers more with high-octane relievers on the pen and contact-oriented pitchers on the rotation. The hitting prospects also isn't too shabby, with several high-ceiling and exciting position players, with more pure hitting prospects than power-hitting prospects but also having several players with solid tools across the board. 

All in all, the Giants farm system is in a great state and there should be no initiative to change it because it's proving its worth.

The Top Prospects of the San Francisco Giants in 2015: Tier 4

As I am writing this list, I felt this is the last tier that I will do for this edition of prospects because of the amount of time that has taken me away from writing in my blog especially studying. I felt I have disappointed myself and my readers but I will make a top prospects list to top it all off with a lot of other things at hand.

Welcome to Tier 4! This probably not the best of the best prospects but there are a lot of prospects that I like in this tier and got a good shot at improving and moving up a tier or 2. Several high-ceiling, raw guys on this tier, some pretty disappointing players but still got potential to bounce back and just impressive prospects.

2016 MLB Draft: First Look At The Draft Prospects Part 1

First of all, happy new year to the readers of my blog! Thank you once again for reading and I'm hoping that everyone of you will have a great 2016! 

The 2016 MLB Draft is still 6 months away but hey, I guess it's never too early to talk about it. Unfortunately for the Giants, the team will not have a 1st round pick as they have forfeit it to sign Jeff Samardzija which I think is a really outdated system. So, the Giants will pick from the 2nd round, specifically pick number 58, which is really far if you come to think of it. But if compared to last year's draft crop, this year is deeper and better overall. I'm here to help you look at the draft prospects this year with my thoughts on them and my projections on them. 

In Part 1, I'll help you choose upon the draft prospects that are projected to be close to the Giants pick of number 58. I'm going to use the prospects order of the late Kiley McDaniel of FanGraphs (he didn't die, he just got an executive position with the Atlanta Braves). I'll be doing from picks 52-64.