Nike’s Ohio State “Celebration” t-shirt is pretty sweet
January 14, 2015Tristan Thompson turned down a four-year, $52 million contract from Cavs
January 14, 2015It’s old hat at this point, but glove-flashing shortstop Francisco Lindor once again tops Baseball Prospectus’ list of Cleveland Indians top prospects. While it feels like Lindor has been in the Tribe’s farm system forever, he just recently celebrated his 21st birthday, having spent all of 2014 playing at a high level in Triple-A despite being one of the youngest in his peer group.
Here’s BP’s breakdown of Lindor:
The Tools: 7 glove; 6 arm; 6+ potential hit
What Happened in 2014: The slick fielding shortstop spent his age-20 season in the upper levels of the system, where he continued to play up to the level of competition despite consistently being one of the youngest in his league.
Strengths: Outstanding baseball instincts; extremely natural player; silky smooth actions; lightning-quick hands; soft glove; well above-average range; arm to make all of the throws; impact defender; easy stroke from both sides of the plate; stays back well; efficient swing path; controls barrel well; advanced approach; picks up spin; heady and smart on the bases; makeup is plus.
Weaknesses: Bat is likely to be a bit on the empty side; contact can be soft; tends to slap when going the other way; will need to learn to do some occasional damage to keep arms honest; over-swings at times; can lunge against stuff with break on outer third; well below-average power; speed isn’t of the impact variety.
Overall Future Potential: 7; all-star player
Realistic Role: 6; first-division player
Risk Factor/Injury History: Low; near major-league ready; consistency of creating hard contact.
Good news for those who have been waiting for the 2011 first-round draft pick to reach the bigs, Baseball prospectus thinks he gets the nod at some point in 2015 despite the team rolling with Jose Ramirez to start the season. His bat continues to keep expectations low, but BP’s Bret Sayre believes that Lindor could hit .290 with 20-25 steals while scraping double-digit homers. The future is near.
The rest of the Top 10 are as follows:
1.SS Francisco Lindor
2.C Francisco Mejia
3.OF Clint Frazier
4.OF Bradley Zimmer
5.CF Tyler Naquin
6.LHP Justus Sheffield
7.OF/1B Mike Papi
8.3B Giovanny Urshela
9.1B Bobby Bradley
10.RHP Mitch Brown
Frazier, the team’s 2013 first-round pick moves down a slot to make room for the surprising rise of Francisco Mejia (This team has a thing for Franciscos). Many fans may not be aware of the upstart catcher due to him spending his 2014 with short-season Mahoning Valley, but the then 19-year old did enough there to wow scouts with his athleticism and skill set both at the plate and behind it. He’s not expected to make the leap until 2018, but he’s definitely a name to watch.
The rest of the crowd includes a handful of first-rounders (Zimmer, Naquin, Sheffield and Papi), a few players who we won’t see for at least a few years (Bradley and Brown) and the intriguing Giovanny Urshela who could have himself a locker at Progressive Field sooner than later. While not offering much in the way of power—he’s more of a contact guy than anything—Urshela does have a right-handed bat and a glove that is already better than that of Lonnie Chisenhall.
If there’s any major takeaway, it appears that home-grown talent can finally be something that is synonymous with the Cleveland Indians. After years of being forced to acquire other team’s prospects, the Indians have a few of their own who can make an impact at the next level.
19 Comments
This recent tidbit might affect Sheffield’s ranking. In fairness, pretty atypical of Tribe amateur picks since Shapiro/Antonetti took over:
http://www.cleveland.com/tribe/index.ssf/2015/01/cleveland_indians_pitching_pro_1.html
a glove that is already better than that of Lonnie Chisenhall
I have an 8yo son who can make that claim as well.
They noted that in the ranking. But yeah—we’ll see how that pans out. Chisenhall had some off-field issues before being drafted, so it’s not unheard of, but not what you want to see a few weeks before spring training.
Lindor just celebrated his 21st birthday.
Was about to say “Chiz!”….
http://sports.espn.go.com/ncaa/news/story?id=2805191
I put prospect lists slightly behind power rankings in my own power rankings of worthless things. Salazar, Ramirez, Gomez, House… none of those guys ever made the lists yet (while Matt Laporta and Andy Marte regularly wrecked them). I guess there’s some value if you’re not familiar with a clubs minor league system at all, but that’s all I take them for.
Math shmath.
Salazar and Ramirez were on it in 2013; Ramirez again in 2014. But your point remains—these can be fruitless at times.
I’ve never seen Lindor play, but it sounds like maybe Omar Vizquel part II is on the way?
I feel like I’ve followed this kid since Tee Ball, oh wait… we have.
With an actual bat.
Though I’m having trouble reconciling below average power with scraping double digit home runs. 10 homers isn’t below average anymore.
If we’re doing edits, Lindor also didn’t all of 2014 in AAA. He started at Akron and spent most of the year there.
Good to know.
He hit 11 HRs last season. Small sample size and all but still. It’s something, especially for someone so young.
I think that’s one of the issues I have with these kinds of lists and prospect chatter in general: seems like the evaluation trumps results, even when the results suggest that the evaluation is wrong. Sort of like with Bauer who, even though he constantly seemed to struggle in the minors, still ended up on top prospect lists simply because he had already been ranked “good”.
But five (and all his AAA homers) were at home in that park in Columbus though. That place wrecks with any comps I try to make. A .741 OPS in AA, and a .558 AAA road OPS, and then a .842 home OPS in AAA.
I like that the evaluation trumps results for the scouts. It’s easy for me to find the results, tell me about the process and what that likely means for the results in the future. They may be wrong more often than many think, but I’d rather have them add new information than just regurgitate what the results say.
I like the evaluations too. Just think they are a piece of the larger puzzle rather than the end all be all.
You would know better than me, but in Omar’s peak years wasn’t he a .290, .750 OPS hitter? Do we think Lindor can be even better than that? More power at his peak perhaps? In reading that evaluation they noted that when he hits the ball to the opposite field, Lindor kind of slaps it there and that was the first thing that made me think of Omar. I remember how he would just kind of toss the bat at the ball and slap it over the 3B/SS’ heads, but he definitely couldn’t drive the ball anywhere when he hit the other way.
Vizquel’s peak seems to be 96-02, when he did go .287/.746. But that was good for only a 93 OPS+ in that era. To compare, that’s pretty much what Michael Bourn has done in an Indians uniform. The league averaged a .780 OPS over that time frame, accounting for Jacobs/Progressive park factors. In 2014, the league average OPS was just under .700, again accounting for those park factors.
So while Lindor may not reach Vizquel’s .746 OPS, he doesn’t have to to be a better hitter comparative to the league. I guess take that how you will for saying that Lindor will have “an actual bat”. My thought is just that if Lindor matches Vizquel’s career 82 OPS+, I’m going to be quite disappointed. Even if he matches Vizquel’s Tribe-only years, that’s a 90 OPS+ or that 93 mark for his peak, I’ll have been expecting more. I’m thinking Brantley’s 2013 is a reasonable projection for Lindor’s prime years.
I think that’s a reasonable assertion. I always wondered if Vizquel was one of the few guys who actually didn’t take performance enhancing drugs during that era, so maybe he is a much more valuable player if he were playing his peak years in 2015… but who knows for sure. He very well might have been on something too, particularly given how rare his stints to the DL were. I suppose no one will ever know for sure.