2017 Minor League thread part dos

[TomBradley72]

Originally Posted by KyWhiSoxFan

Zavala is the one who may be pushing Collins right now. It would be great, though, to have three good catching options given the recent Sox history with that position.

I agree- but if Skoug is dominating at Kannapolis- then until Collins shows he's ready for AA (I think entering the season- they would have expected him to be in Birmingham by now) we'll have a 3 catcher log jam at Winston Salem. Based on Skoug's college track record- I'm expecting Kannapolis to be a brief stop for him.

[hoosiersoxfan]

Collins just homered again for the Dash

[guillensdisciple]

Skoug and Burger with the day off?

[Andrew C White]

Jiminez was lifted for a pinch hitter with the bases loaded tonight. Anyone know why?

[hoosiersoxfan]

Originally Posted by Andrew C White

Jiminez was lifted for a pinch hitter with the bases loaded tonight. Anyone know why?

@ChuckGarfien "Eloy Jimenez took a foul ball off his left foot tonight. Stayed in the game for the rest of the at-bat, but is now out of the game."

Hopefully just precautionary

[Grzegorz]

Originally Posted by TomBradley72

Seems like maybe Kopech is really breaking through- prob his best start last night, while Giolito really got lit up.

Question: Is Kopech pitching or throwing?

[TomBradley72]

Originally Posted by Grzegorz

Question: Is Kopech pitching or throwing?

8 IP, zero walks....I think he's pitching.

[TomBradley72]

Nice starts by Lopez and Guerrero last night, Polo with his debut at Birmingham (1-4), Z. Collins hitting .280 over his past 10 games- a very good sign, surprised to see Burger and Skoug not playing at Kannapolis last night.

It's really eye opening the influx of talent in our system (affiliates) over the past week- Jiminez, Rutherford, Cease, Clarkin, Burger, Skoug, Polo- in my 46 years of being a Sox fan, I don't know if I can remember a time when so much talent came into the org in such a brief time span...there have been times when we had alot of pitching in the minors, but this is by far, the most talent we've ever had with position players. It's a lot of fun tracking these guys.

[Maximo]

I find myself coming to the Minor League forum with coffee in hand every morning now. Just checking to see "who did what". Reminds me of checking the box scores in the paper when I was a kid.

There's an energy around this organization that's been absent for a long time. Time wil tell how this all works out, but for the moment I don't care. It's better than where we were.

[Andrew C White]

Saw a comment by a guy I know in a different forum where he was discussing the trade with the Yankees. He is a Yankees fan and has claimed to have inside information with them in the past. I only know him online so don't really know if his claim is good or not. But...

In discussing the trade he said that the Yankees believed Rutherford was not developing as he should. Seems a little early to me to drawing any conclusions but that was his claim. Then I saw this at MLB Trade Rumors...

https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2017/...utherford.html

Blake Rutherford, the outfield prospect who headlined the minor league package sent to Chicago, received less-than-stellar reviews from the five executives, who questioned Rutherford’s power potential and his ability to stay as a center fielder. One NL executive felt the Yankees may have sold high on Rutherford “when the buzz was still good” about his potential. Incidentally, Sherman reports that Rutherford was also part of the Yankees’ offer to the White Sox for Quintana.

I still think it is waaaaay too early to be drawing any conclusions about a 20 year old guy that hasn't even completed one years yet. Particularly one that is putting up good numbers so far.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/r...d=ruther000bla

The Sox almost certainly aren't looking for Rutherford to play CF. Luis Robert has first claim there. And both Jiminez and Adolfo probably have a better claim to RF so even if he isn't a stellar defender (50 grade for both throw and field) he should be plenty fine in LF. And if he hits for average and OBP then not delivering as much power as originally hoped should also be fine as the other Sox prospects promise to deliver plenty of that. Just interesting to see what they are saying.

[A. Cavatica]

Now that we have the #1 system in the game -- at least until Moncada uses up his rookie eligibility -- I confess to being surprised the minor league teams aren't winning more. I know there are a lot of factors -- including the managers' unfamiliarity with the players, the players' lack of familiarity with each other, the fact that the talent is distributed unevenly by position at each level -- but we shouldn't be having days where all the teams lose, should we?

[Frater Perdurabo]

Originally Posted by A. Cavatica

Now that we have the #1 system in the game -- at least until Moncada uses up his rookie eligibility -- I confess to being surprised the minor league teams aren't winning more. I know there are a lot of factors -- including the managers' unfamiliarity with the players, the players' lack of familiarity with each other, the fact that the talent is distributed unevenly by position at each level -- but we shouldn't be having days where all the teams lose, should we?

I think the biggest factor is that, particularly with Moncada up, most of the best hitters are at A+ and below, and most of the best pitchers are at AA and AAA. I think the second biggest factor is that, while our top 10-20 is really stellar, after that our system is average or below average.

Having pivoted from a system that prized developing pitchers to one that drafted and then traded for a lot of hitters (high risk/upside guys in trades and high floor college hitters in the draft), the Sox will need to swing back to the middle and a "best player available" draft strategy, and also start to take some risks with more high upside high school kids.

[guillensdisciple]

Is Burger okay?

[Grzegorz]

Originally Posted by TomBradley72

8 IP, zero walks....I think he's pitching.

So he's mixing speeds?

[Andrew C White]

Originally Posted by guillensdisciple

Is Burger okay?

Is there some reason, other than him not playing last night, that you ask?

I wouldn't worry about him being given a night off every once in a while. I noticed they did that for him in rookie ball too. At Kanny he is rotating positions between third with Remillard and DH with a variety of others. Probably just his night to rotate out.