By The Baseball Beginnings Guy
May 24, 2013
Reed Reilly profiles in a set-up role, at least that is what my eyes tell me from this recent look up at SLO. Have a look at the video and then I’ll write.
By The Baseball Beginnings Guy
May 21, 2013
Nick Vander Tuig has had a pretty good season in that UCLA program, where you throw strikes or you sit while others throw strikes. To the video:
By The Baseball Beginnings Guy
May 14, 2013
Trey Ball is going in the first round. OK then. Gonna bet people have Chris Sale on him.
By The Baseball Beginnings Guy
May 14, 2013
As a man of a million stories, here’s another one. Ryon Healy’s senior year, I go see a night game. I can’t even remember who Crespi was playing anymore. I had seen Healy at Area Codes, where the broken bat didn’t dissuade me because the long double sold me. I had seen him at Brewers fall ball, and damn I loved the power. Then I went to check on him in the good old C.I. of F. Ran into an area guy I know. What do you think of Healy, I ask? College guy, comes the answer. I’m like, “Da (expletive)?”
Hey, I learned long ago never to doubt myself when I look at players, and I don’t care if the guy next to me thinks the guy we’re looking at is a college guy. People make mistakes in baseball all the time and they make them because they fail to take into consideration all the present variables that you might have to dig for in order to identify why or why not a guy is a major league prospect. This is why I don’t like the amateur baseball machine, the beauty pageant baseball, the pimping off of kids to travel teams, the collecting of hats and freebies along the way. That doesn’t make you a major leaguer. What does? Let’s have a look at Healy now.
By The Baseball Beginnings Guy
May 8, 2013
Jordan Kutzer. Who is this guy and why haven’t I seen him in a game? It’s not very often that I see a guy throwing a flat so well that he actually looks like he is throwing off the mound, and it’s even more rare when it’s a guy who can whip it down low from that submarine slot. But the truth is…I have seen this guy before. Where?
Brookside Park, Pasadena. Spring 2010. I’m there with 800 other scouts to see Dylan Covey. The guy pitching for Pasadena Poly is a junior wearing those orange-and-white uniforms. I remember walking up the right field side and seeing this tall dude getting loose. At the time, he wasn’t throwing all that hard, but he was just a junior growing into his body. I made a note, I saw one pitch, I liked him. Then I went and watched Covey.
Fast forward and I’m working my beat. I see this dude throwing for Stanford, and I’ll be damned, it’s Kutzer — but now with new and improved submarine slot. And what gets me is this — this guy is a nightmare waiting to happen for right-handed hitters. I mean, this guy has the potential to be Ewell Blackwell death to right-handers, and hey, just like old Ewell from Bonita High, he is from the 626 Sidewinders bloodline. Yes, Indiana Jones chased the Grail Bloodline. Old Beginnings guy is chasing the 626 Sidewinders. (more…)
By The Baseball Beginnings Guy
May 7, 2013
Kohl Stewart probably has a lot of ink and eyes on him this spring and I haven’t seen him since August. So when I saw him, he was a big, strong physical kid with a good arm. Beyond that, well, any sort of hyperbole on my part would be pre-draft jocksniffing journalism, and that ain’t my style. Big kid, throws hard, let’s see what happens next. All I can really tell from this video is that at the time it was filmed, he was a thrower and not a pitcher. Or that’s all that I will say in public that I can infer from even the quickest look at anyone I see.
By The Baseball Beginnings Guy
May 3, 2013
I look at Brett Thomas and I see a guy who reminds me of something I learned a long time ago. It is the old belief that just when you think you’ve seen everyone you think you have come to see, you better not stop looking at all the players, because just when you think there’s nobody else, “Up Jump The Devil.”
Yes, I always remember old Jim Walton teaching me that, and anybody that Del Crandall trusted with his pitchers is good enough for me. So up at the University of Oregon, where many a scout has trudged to see Ryon Healy hit home runs and Jimmie Sherfy close games, is a left-handed hitting outfielder named Brett Thomas, who just might, “Up Jump the Devil.” And hey, you got nine innings to wait for Sherf, so look at the leadoff guy while you’re at it.
I look at Thomas and I see a left-handed hitter who lives 4.15-4.20 down the line, can play all three outfield positions and close the gaps in center, has enough arm to play, and is an athletic guy growing into the hitter with the strength and pop he needs to have in order to survive professionally. Thomas is the junior leadoff hitter at Oregon who has 14 doubles – one less than Healy, who the world agrees can hit the sh*t out of the ball – and he’s gotten better as his junior season has gone along. Healy’s got a ton of RBIs and Thomas has a ton of runs scored. Good aggressive base runner, can steal a base, can go first to third. That has value, but you gotta watch. If there is one hitter in that lineup who has helped make Healy better, this is the guy.
So ask me what his role is and I say major league fourth outfielder with defensive versatility, occasional pop, average to plus speed, playable arm and a hardnosed, hard-working attitude, who can be signed for cheap. I see Sam Fuld, who was a 10th rounder out of Stanford, the school that wears tight white uniforms from 1983.
By The Baseball Beginnings Guy
May 1, 2013
And with the second pick of the 2013 draft, the Chicago Cubs select Mark Appel and hope he’s not Mark Prior. That’s my guess at least, we’ll see if I’m right. As for Appel, this is the third consecutive year I have seen him, and here’s what I think this time. I bet he’s getting sick of signing all those Team USA cards though, even if he’s too nice of a guy to admit it.
By The Baseball Beginnings Guy
April 25, 2013
Tom Windle is a guy I saw as a freshman and then again as a junior when he wasn’t so much of a secret anymore.
By The Baseball Beginnings Guy
April 22, 2013
Marco Gonzales is seen here. Watch the video and I’ll see what I have to say.
