Dominikk85

Maybe madrigal can become a player like jeff McNeil. Ideally of course he improves power and patience and becomes a ben zobrist type.

Depends on whether he finally can play 100+ games. If he plays 120 games and performs he likely will be at least top15 if not top10. But if he has another sub 60 game season with injuries it is hard to rank him that high. Really all about health for him.

To be fair that probably is a 95th percentile outcome. Using the 60 hit 60 power from fangraphs he would project for about a 120 ops+ or so in his prime. That is very good of course but Donaldson was an mvp level hitter. If vaughn turns out into a 120-130 ops+ hitter with slightly below average defense he would be a top10 1b in the majors and that is fine. Anything more than that can happen but should be seen as a bonus.

There are plenty good sub 6 foot players. It is just a little unusual for a 1b, most 1b players are 6"2+. Top war 1b last year 1. Freeman 6"5 2. goldy 6"3 3. Carpenter 6"3 4. Bellinger 6"4 5.votto 6"2 However just because the normal 1b prospect is 6"3 he doesn't have to fail. Prince fielder is the same size and he was really good before he was hurt.

Doing much better this year batting 365 with 17% Ks this year. No homers yet but still a nice line. Longenhagen kinda predicted that saying he is an advanced college hitter who had that terrible start last year due to injury and thus gave him a 40+ rating. Good choice to let him repeat A ball imo but I think they should soon call him up to AA since he is already turning 23 this summer and seems to handle A ball now which of course is not a huge challenge for a good, polished college bat. I think 2-3 more good weeks at A ball and he should be up in AA.

The cubs did a great job building their team the last years but their public relations the last 3 years have been a disaster: -trading for abuser Chapman -nazi grampa emails -the Russell situation and its handling Can't take away from wit they did on the field but they need to control their public relations a bit better.

I agree witt is more than two years away but moniak is not the same prospect as witt is. Moniak was quite a surprise and there were always questions about his power and tools. Reason he was so high he was supposed to have a very advanced hit tool for a hs guy and had a chance to stay at center. I'm not a fan of picking an advanced, polished hs bat with middling tools, if you want that you can just as well pick a college guy giving you more data and certainty on the player.

Cubs were quite solid with hitters (albeit their real success stories were mostly high picks) but absolutely dismal with pitchers. Cubs pitcher dev in the last 5 years was right up there with the red sox and orioles in badness.

K rate basically doesn't matter, a K is just an out. However more Ks mean you need to produce more with the remaining batted balls because a K is not only a missed chance for a groundout but also for a single, double, walk or homer. League average K rate is a little over 20% in these days but 30% can work too if you hit 35 homers. I developed a formula using K, BB rate and ISO to judge players. https://community.fangraphs.com/introducing-k-bb-iso/ Basically it means the higher your iso and walk rate is the more Ks you can afford. Lower to medium powered guys with a sub 170 iso better have a K-bb rate of under 12 or so while guys with a 250 iso can be productive with a high teens % K-bb. Above 20% it is getting tricky unless you have true 80 grade game power, in that case even 30 homers might not be enough to be a much about league average hitter.

Kiley said if one of Vaughn or rutschman is available the sox will take them but if they go 1,2 lodolo could be in play. I think the sox are not keen to take a HS guy.

But i can also understand mlb of wanting a zero tolerance policy for the word so a white player can't see this as an encouragement.

I agree. Using the word yourself is different. Many fat people for example make fat jokes about themselves to take away the power of mobbers. Still I'm no fan of this strategy of for example fat or disabled people to use that strategy. It works of course but you also marginalize yourself a little doing it. I understand the intention of taking away the power of racists but the n word is a white racist creation and it would be better if it dissapears altogether.

Theo is a good GM but the last 3 years his free agent signings had been an utter disaster. First years were pretty good (lester, zobrist) but the last years had been terrible: -heyward: 184M, has been one of the worst hitters in the majors since -darvish: 126M, injured, terrible -chatwood: 38m, utter disaster -morrow: 21m, injured all the time I would say this is almost worse than the 40 busted small signings of the sox who were not expected to do much anyway. I'm not saying theo did a bad job, he always will be the guy who brought a WS to the cubs but this is 350m wasted on 4 players who barely produced anything. That the cubs are still good despite wasting 350m shows how good their core is but this is still hunting them nowadays, they might win their division again but they went from a juggernaut to a team projected for 86 wins. The Cubs are still very good and even might win another WS but they went from an all time great dynasty to a merely quite good team mostly due to whiffing on those two huge contracts.

Pretty terrible start to the season. In two starts he has more walks than Ks and gave up a boatload of homers. I still think there is K upside though. His slider actually has a good swing and miss rate and if he ramped it up it could cause more Ks albeit probably won't lower the walks. But of course at his age I understand they want to develope him into a complete pitcher and not into a 40% slider guy like corbin although ultimately that might be his future even if it limits him to be a 5 inning guy.

I agree, nobody doubts his power. If he was a 45 power guy maybe you could doubt him but all the publications have him at like 70 power. His K rate is currently a bit high at 32% (compensated by an unsustainable babip) but that is normal when you first face mlb pitching, he was always 17-20% in the minors and should be about 20-22 in the majors after some adjustment.

I love lodolo's motion and his stats are great but just like with bishop I don't like that he only broke out this year. His freshman and soph year he wasn't bad but really not that special. Are those gains sustainable?

I think you can risk drafting a pitcher that high but only if he is a top talent. No issue taking a guy like mize this year at 3 because the ceiling for a pitcher is worth the extra risk. But lodolo while a good prospect probably only has like a realistic ceiling of a 3 starter. Now vaughn doesn't have a much higher ceiling but doesn't come with the same risk. Imo extra risk needs to be balanced by an extra high ceiling. For example I don't like to take a polished HS hitter with middling tools, if you want that take a college guy because the risk is lower for the same upside. Same applies IMO to a pitcher, if you take a pitcher top3 the upside needs to be off the charts.

Interestingly he still had 9 Ks in his loss.

It was only two starts but so far he has been insane. 32% Ks vs just 4% walks. Interestingly he has massively ramped up his slider usage to 40%, basically Corbin style. This is probably not quite sustainable but the slider is a very good pitch. Just hope he can stay healthy. Should the sox try to trade him due to his injury risk? Or can he become the staff ace they need?

Also something that can be corrected. I know player development wasn't a strength but lisle should be able to fix that.

I think a pitcher would fit the Sox well but a third overall pick is too valuable to waste it on a non elite pitching prospect. I'm not against a pitcher and if a guy like mize was out there this year I would say go for it but there is a reason at this draft the top10 of most lists are almost all hitters. Fangraphs only gives one pitcher even a 50fv this draft. My opinion is in the draft only take a pitcher top5 overall if he is half a grade better than the best available hitter. I mean it would be stupid to take a 55 hitter over a Stephen strasburg in the draft first overall just because he is "safer". But if the best pitcher has the same or even a lower grade than the best hitter I don't think you can do it just because you need a pitcher.

Hitting the other way isn't super hard with the right mechanics but it isn't for everyone. It helps babip but it is also tougher to hit homers to center or oppo than to pull. Some guys need to be pull hitters to hit for power. That is also one of the effects of the shift, it forces many hitters to make a decision between obp and slugging. Ideally you have true oppo power but for many hitters trying to go the other way would mean less power.

I agree. But he also wasn't going to he a 1.600 ops guy, his true talent is probably in between. I still think he is probably the best college bat. Bishop has been crazy but track record matters too, I think you need to be careful with guys having one huge breakout year. Sure players develope but it could also be a huge career year and some regression following. Vaughn has done it for 3 years, he still is the safest pick, even rutschman "only" was good for two years after a bad freshman year.

Second giolito start was more the old gio. On the positive side 4ks in 4 innings isn't terrible but those walks of course were way too much. How was his velo?