BP's Top 10

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go birds
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BP's Top 10

Post by go birds »

This wasn't posted prior to the trade, but here is BP's top 10. Who the heck is Wadye Ynfante, you ask? Well see below!

Alex Reyes, RHP
Carson Kelly, C
Magneuris Sierra, OF
Jack Flaherty, RHP
Sandy Alcantara, RHP
Jordan Hicks, RHP
Andrew Knizner, C
Tyler O’Neill, OF
Harrison Bader, OF
Wadye Ynfante, OF
10. Wadye Ynfante, OF
DOB: 8/15/1997
Height/Weight: 6’0”, 160 lbs.
Bats/Throws: R/R
Drafted/Acquired: Signed February 2014 by the St. Louis Cardinals out of the Dominican Republic for $125,000.
Previous Ranking(s): N/A
2017 Stats: .299/.374/.491, 7 HR, 11 SB in 43 games at short-season Johnson City

The Good: The 2014 Dominican signee is tooled up, with plenty of upside. The dream is that he sticks in center, where his 50 arm is enough to go with a 50 glove at the position. He’s an athletic player with 60 speed, but I expect him to add a little mass that slows him down a half-grade. Combine this average center field defense with 60 power and a chance for a 50 hit tool, and things begin looking pretty good. The key is a high-leverage, lofted swing with a closed shoulder, strong hands, and excellent barrel control; best displayed when he lets the ball travel deep and relies on quick hands to go oppo, or his powerful hip rotation to pull with power. His zone awareness is inconsistent, and the timing of the swing rests upon a leg-lift he likely doesn’t need to get to his power. In later looks, he shortened his load to quicken his bat while still displaying plus power.

The Bad: It is difficult to separate the “bad” from the “risks,” with the Ynfante’s since it is his rawness on both sides of the ball that limits his realistic value. While I like the swing when he’s locked in, when he’s not he gets fooled by soft stuff, borne out in his high K-rate. If things don’t break well, he could move to left field, continue having K-issues, make the above hit-tool projection look foolish and not be able to tap his plus power. Splitting the difference, it’s a 45 hit tool for me and a future regular role.

The Role:

OFP 55— Above-average center fielder
Likely 45— second-division outfielder

The Risks: He’ll head to full-season ball at age 20, so Ynfante has plenty of development time left. He’ll need it, as he’s still raw as an outfielder, including late breaks and some rough routes, and the swing-and-miss is enough to give pause. I’m bullish, but the risk profile is significant.

Major league ETA: 2021

Ben Carsley’s Fantasy Take: Watch list unless your name quality is a category in your league. Then, Ynfante becomes a solid third- or fourth-rounder.

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phins
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Re: BP's Top 10

Post by phins »

What's funny is that the Cards told you how they ranked them when they wouldn't part with Flaherty, O'Neil, Hicks, Adolis Garcia, but would part with Alcantara and Sierra.

FanGraphs was smart enough to pick up on this when they almost ranked them in that order above. They had Adolis Garcia and Alcantara in the "Others" category so I don't know who they ranked higher, but they didn't even have Sierra in that list, which I agree with.

The lone exception is Hicks, whom they did not rate that highly, and I agree with that because of the risk factor with him. Having Ynfante this high is basically like the time they had the out-of-nowhere OF from Juco that high and I just rolled my eyes. Ynfante is better than that, as he's a legit prospect, but that just screams "look-at-me, I'm different."

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go birds
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Re: BP's Top 10

Post by go birds »

I dont disagree with you.

But i also wonder if it speaks to the lack of upside in our system.

phins
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Re: BP's Top 10

Post by phins »

go birds wrote:I dont disagree with you.

But i also wonder if it speaks to the lack of upside in our system.
I get what you're saying, but I wonder if you're suffering from "upside fatigue" with our system. There are a handful of systems who have crazy upside within them. The vast majority of them got that upside by being terrible AND trading away all their veteran players. The Braves have high upside players because they made a plan bent on doing exactly that. It sort of bit them as well.

For the Cardinals, I would argue you did see a shift towards upside and the results were very poor. We took Nick Plummer based on his perceived upside and that was a major mistake. If we had continued on our "best college arm with velocity" strategy that we've employed for years, we'd have Walker Buehler right now.

Then the Cardinals doubled-down on the upside strategy and took Delvin Perez, and that has been an abject disaster. They also took Dylan Carlson, who they saw a lot of upside in and he's been meh.

Joey Wentz, Lucas Erceg, Alec Hansen, and Bo Bichette would've been high upside plays and if we'd have taken them we'd all be extolling the virtues of the process. Austin Hays, Jesus Lazardo, Khalil Lee were all upside plays that hit for other teams. We rolled the dice several times and were bit. Then we went back to the college righty model and ended up with Dakota Hudson, Connor Jones, Zac Gallen, who were all nice picks.

After hitting the upside market hard in the draft, they went crazy in the international market and, quite frankly, seem to have whiffed big-time. Most of the players they spent huge money have been disappointing and/or went backwards in performance. Watch Ivan Herrera, whom I hadn't ever seen until the Pan Am U16 games and he was a wow talent we signed for almost nothing.

We all want upside. Every one of us do. It's just that with that upside swing you are also taking on a lot of risk. The Cardinals have employed a strategy that looks for upside, but I would tend to say their scouting approach has been off more than anything.

There are some upside prospects in this system, but they're all a ways away except for O'Neil and Reyes. If you look at the results of the Cards dipping into that arena, you can see why they might be a big gun shy to continue down that path.

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