Spring Training Opinions Part 1

Hello! It's been a bit since I have posted. I have been particularly been busy watching the draft prospect performances online as well as WBC in my free time so I haven't really take a real deep look at the Spring Training games until lately. Here are my first opinions on the recent prospect performances in Spring.

The Top Prospects of the San Francisco Giants in 2015: Tier 2

Welcome to the Tier 2 of the top prospects of the San Francisco Giants. Ranking tier 1 is kind of a no-brainer for me as I already have a clear view on who to include because they are just really impressive in my eyes like Beede, Arroyo and Bickford and their ceilings and their learning curves. After tier 1 though, it will going to be much, much harder to decide on who to place on the right tiers because of the seemingly even playing field on a lot of guys. I did my best to place them in the right tier and do justice on why I placed a prospect in the specific tier.

Top 30 Prospects of the Giants in 2015

I decided to make the full Top 30 Prospect List for the Giants in lieu to the top 30 prospects made by MLB.com, Cove Chatter, and GiantsProspectTalk on Twitter. I thought that making a full list and not just a Top 10 would be the best way possible to really compare and dictate the prospects because even though the cream of the crop are all set, the rest of the crops are still important and there are possibilities that they are rising in terms of their stock or value. I remember when the farmers here are not wasting anything that they can still harvest even though the monsoon season reek havoc on their crops because they are still important. 

I'll do this Top 30 some sort of a Twitter style. Short, compact but solid thoughts about the prospects that I'll rank. There's a lot of prospects to choose from and I kind of hate ranking prospects because honestly, I would prefer a big board where I'll throw in the prospects that I like in here and you'll be the judge, just like the thought process in terms of the Draft. But I'll do this ranking to help you guys where I project the prospect's value for us. It is separated by tiers so that if you ever have problems with ranking prospects like I do, tiers can really help to differentiate the quality of the prospects and you can ignore the numberings altogether and just rely on the tiers.

I am writing this article actually just before the Trade Deadline and I am ranking Mella as the number 5 prospect and Duvall as the number 21 prospect before being traded. Now that it's now past the Deadline and they are just the prospects who got traded, it made me easier to just move up guys up the list.

I know there will be agreements and disagreements on my rankings but I made this Top 30 with all of the factors (age, floor versus ceiling, development curve, the feel to perform, performance this year) that I consider for ranking prospects. And just like what I always do, FanGraphs profiles will open for most of the prospects and MiLB.com for the select few prospects that I find their FG profiles really shady.

If you want to see who are the prospect risers and fallers this season, come check this really good post from Shankbone's blog and I will move some of the prospects that I listed in the top 10+10 before for the latest update. If you want to see a better introduction or overview of the Top 30, check out Mr. CoveChatter's introduction on his Top 30 before he takes his blog down and return to his original site. If you want day-to-day updates and the daily status of Giants prospects, DrB's everyday blog post is hands down the best in the business.

Finally, here's my ever expanding Scouting Reports series if you want to see my full thoughts on most of the prospects mentioned below and you could see my other previous posts of Something Extra for additional thoughts. 

Part 1 for Arroyo, Beede and Mejia
Part 2 for Mella (now traded), Okert and Santos
Part 3 for Blackburn, Garcia and Tomlinson
Part 4 for Blach, Marshall and Miller
Part 5 for Cole, Fargas and Williamson
Part 6 for Fox
Part 8 for Coonrod, Duvall (now traded), and Webb
Special Part for Crick

Out In Front: Breakdown of Tyler Beede's Latest Start + Something Extra

Here on the latest edition of Out In Front, I'll talk about Tyler Beede latest start as I covered him on Twitter last night in America (early morning here). I'll provide an inning-by-inning breakdown about his latest start and probably, his last start before the Futures Game where he's included and together with Keury Mella, they represent the San Francisco Giants in the game full of top prospects and future stars in Cincinnati. Here I go.

Top 10+10 Prospects Post-July 4 Edition

Before I'm going to start this top 10+10, I would like to thank everybody for the warm and really positive remarks on my Lucius Fox blog post as well as in my previous. I thought I am who I am there as I shared my thoughts in a fun but informative manner. Once again, thank you so much for reading my blog and supporting me as I continue to write more things about the Giants!

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The 4th of July is over and after all of the fireworks, the backyard boozing and barbecue, the oozing patriotism, and some of the worst Independence Day uniforms I have ever seen, it is time for another Top 10+10 Prospect list. I have made a previous top 10+10 prospect list last month to highlight the prospects that are with us before the Giants' draft picks had signed. Now that all of the top 10 rounds selections had signed and are now playing in either AZL or in Salem-Keizer, and we signed one of the top July 2 prospects in Lucius Fox for $6,000,000 (but I bet for Bruce Wayne and him, it's just nothing), I feel that it is the right time to update my Top 10+10 Prospects list as you'll see the new guys in the list. 

This Top 10+10 list is not related to any of the Top 10 lists did by other people and dogs that are in front of the computer screen. I based the rankings on their performances, their age, their talent level, their development or the learning curve so to speak, as I did my best to balance those things out. The other 10 that you're going to see after the top 10 are the prospects that I personally like and there might be some bias from yours truly in terms of the other 10 but I am sure that those will be the guys that you'll love if you take a look at it. Just like the previous posts, you can see the FanGraphs profiles of the players when you clicked on their name. Less talk and more work, let's get this going. 

An Analysis on the Problems of Kyle Crick

   "The 2010 World Series champions San Francisco Giants with the 49th selection of the 2011 First-Year Player Draft, the San Francisco Giants select Kyle Crick, a right-handed pitcher from Sherman High School, Sherman, Texas..." 

    Those were the words of the great Gaylord Perry when the Giants selected Crick, a high-risk, high-reward pick in the Supplemental Round in 2011, the club's second pick in the draft after the Giants selected Joe Panik, a shortstop from St. John's widely considered at that time as a "reach". Another notable selection in the really deep 2011 MLB Draft is a guy taken number 21 by the Toronto Blue Jays by the name of Tyler Beede. Beede's the only guy in the first round who didn't sign and after a successful college career, he's selected once again in the 2014 MLB Draft, this time at number 14 by the Giants. Fast forward to 2015, Panik's a key cog when the Giants won it all again last October mostly carried by the country strong back of Madison Bumgarner and continues to be a solid contributor, possibly an All-Star candidate, this year, Beede transformed from an enigma with control issues despite an athletic delivery to a groundball lover with way better command and my top prospect in my top 10, and Crick's has been an enigma with his unresolved control issues ever since he was drafted. I am worried about Crick's issues every since the end of his 2013 season. He continues to baffle me how his status has gone standing still in 2014 and possibly even worse in 2015 which makes me think he's just the top 5 prospect of the Giants. Here's some of the issues that I see on him that makes him the enigma that he is today.

   Before I start, you can find Kyle Crick's basic and advanced stats here.

MLB: Giants Top 10+10 Prospects Post-Draft Edition

     With the 2015 MLB Draft now finished and more than 1,000 players selected by the 30 MLB clubs, the final hurdle for the clubs is the signing deadline for the draft selections. For the Giants, all the players selected in the draft in the first 10 rounds have a good chance of signing but I want to exclude them from this top 10 prospect list until they are officially signed. This top 10 prospect list is based on the performance and my own personal judgement on the development of the Giants prospects so far this season.

Note: I didn't include Andrew Susac, Chris Heston, Matt Duffy and Hunter Strickland because I feel they have graduated the minors already. Once the top 10 draft picks of the Giants have signed and how they perform there, I'll make another top 10 prospect list.

The player's FanGraphs articles are going to open when you click on the player's name in bold with their stats and advanced metrics. The stats that you see throughout are accurate as of June 10, 2015 if you're living in the US. Here's my top 10.