Midseason Rankings: A Visual Basis IV

Welcome once again to the visual basis evaluations. I guess these are the 7th and 8th I've done. For today, I'm sticking with one organization, the Pittsburgh Pirates. Analysis, as always, is based on the results of a google image search for each player. Greater detail regarding the process and the accuracy of such a system can be found here: http://yourteamsuxmineisrad.blogspot.com/2013/06/mid-season-rankings-visual-basis.html

The Steel City has long been known as a football powerhouse, but the Pirates have been a pretty lackluster pro sports team for quite some time.  Not since the days of a skinny Barry Bonds and a youngish Jim Leyland has Pittsburgh seen a team with very much talent. That has changed in the last couple years. Here are two up and comers for the Pirates.



Gregory Polanco

At this point last year if you mentioned the name Gregory Polanco to the average Pirates fan they would take a moment to correct you and say, "No, Placido Polanco plays for the Phillies, that team on the other side of our ridiculously large state."  Not so anymore. Sometime in the last twelve months this gentleman has rocketed to the top of the Pirates prospect list, and for good reason.

Let's get started with one of those not often talked about saber stats that will make your calculator friendly cohorts bust a load into their pocket protectors. It's the Polanco Cranial Scale (PoCS). There are three simple requirements for the measurement of this particular stat.

1. Your last name has to be Polanco
2. You have to play baseball
3. You have to have a head

Gregory meets these three categories, as do 23 other professional baseball players (Yes, 23, and if I get ambitious I'm going to break down all 23 Polancos on the PoCS stat. I rarely get ambitious.).

It should come as a surprise to absolutely no one that the leader and man all others seek to measure themselves against on this list is none other than Mr. Placido Polanco himself. Noggin girth, while crucial, isn't the only cranial statistic that matters when measuring one for the scale, and I'd love to share the full scientific

Placido Polanco's big fat head

process with you, but it's ridiculously complicated. Some might even say there really are no set rules or criteria for the list. Without getting into too much detail, I can say they are wrong. Let's just say it's a series of precise measurements involving bubble tape, peanuts, Jon Kruk, and a step ladder.

So, Placido is the baseline. A career .300 hitter with an above average OBP isn't a bad benchmark. Players can rate out somewhere between PoCS +10 or -10 depending on their individual measurements. Gregory measures out at a +7 which is currently the highest PoCS rank of any Polanco to play the game.

There are two absolutely stand out factors from the above photo that, when combined with an excellent PoCS score push Gregory into the upper echelon of prospects.

First, we have the knee high sock/ short pants combo. It is a fine indicator of speed and directly correlates to a high OBP (This is based on a quick analysis Nate Silver executed on the back of a cocktail napkin while enjoying a drink on the evening of the 2012 Presidential election. Legend has it, he came to the conclusion right around the time Fox News "expert" Karl Rove was losing his shit on live television). There are of course outliers like Brandon Inge, but Polanco lacks the douchebag Ed Hardyesque arm tattoos that undoubtedly eradicated what little talent Brandon Inge ever had for getting on base.

Secondly, he appears to be wearing what looks an awful lot like a bowling glove. I'm not sure why this is a plus, but I just feel it in my bones. Like a salmon knows to return to the spot it was born to spawn, Gregory's batting glove knows how to guide him around the bases in an effective, efficient manner.

In summation, High PoCS, socks, bowling.  Polanco has the stuff.



Alen Hanson

A few things come to mind when I think of this shortstop phenom in the Bucs system. First off, even though the Pirates have one of the best teams in baseball this year, I couldn't tell you who their starting shortstop is. This tells me he must suck. So, even though Hanson is presently at high A, you should expect to see him in the Steel City pretty soon.

For you traditional stat people I can say he hits for average, and has speed. I think he's stolen 300 bases so far this year. He possess the kind of talent that when he's not playing they have to store him in an underground concrete bunker, as evidenced by the picture above. This has earned him the nickname, "The Warhead".

He certainly seems to have grasped the fundamentals of the television interview. Arms crossed, serious look on his face. I'm sure he's taken the Crash Davis course on how to speak to the press. It's not something a lot of young high A players have a handle on, and it allows him to focus more on other parts of his game, like stopping anything that is hit on the ground to the left side of the infield. Reports coming out of (insert name of tiny hamlet where the Pirates high A affiliate plays here, accompanied by clever mascot based on a regionally relevant industry/animal/pastime) say that the guy who plays third usually brings out a lawn chair to play defense.

Imagine how good he could've been if his first 8 seasons didn't look like this.

The sweatband coordination is also a strong indicator of talent. It shows he can accessorize appropriately, and if you ask anybody who had the misfortune of wearing a Padres uniform in the seventies they'll tell you
to what extent not looking good can hamper your game.

Those cross arms and that stance just scream that he has a kinetic energy waiting to be unleashed. Like he's the lovechild of Rickey Henderson and FloJo.  I expect him to be a solid hitter in the majors and should probably steal 120 bases as a rookie.

Hicks Buxton: The God Article

Aaron Hicks doing what he does

Byron Buxton just standing there

I recently commented to a friend of mine at work, that it looked like Aaron Hicks might actually be getting the hang of the major league baseball thing. He replied by pointing out that it won't matter too much as the next great thing in the history of great things, Byron Buxton, would soon be in the twin cities to supplant young Hicks in centerfield.

Because my co-worker is wrong, I decided to take a break from my normal evaluations and pen this special piece evaluating the pros and cons of each player, mainly to prove that he's wrong, and I'm right...as usual.


Let's start with Byron Buxton. In the extensive research I conducted preparing for this piece (15 minutes worth of skimming articles I found in a google search) I came to one definitive conclusion. Old fat guys on twitter love them some Byron Buxton (Ok, one old fat guy and a lot of younger less fat guys probably more accurately described as husky, but I'm assuming that one old fat guy is a solid representation of old fat guys everywhere). They speak of him reverentially, and dare to utter his name in the same breath as that of the great fished one, Mike Trout. Buxton, at 19 years of age, was dismantling low A ball to the tune of a .341 average and .559 slugging percentage. He has recently been moved to high A. This is supposedly because his performance warrants it. Based on the stuff I read on bleacher report and other web outlets, I can only assume it's because he ran out of parks to play in at that level because his skill set drives even the most rational observer of baseball into such a frenzy that crowds witnessing his greatness ultimately riot and burn the stadium to the ground.

He has slowed down slightly at high A hitting .298 and slugging .421, but it's a pretty small sample size. This dip could be due to a variety of things. For instance, maybe he felt more inspired as a Cedar Rapids Kernel than he does as a Fort Myers Miracle. Maybe there's a little bit more to distract a 19 year old kid in Southern Florida during the summer than Central Iowa. It's hard sayin'. I'd compare these numbers to Aaron Hicks at the same level, but I won't, even though I currently have a tab open on my browser that would easily allow me to do so. I'm going to say it's pointless, but in reality I'm really that lazy, and I'm fairly certain it wouldn't help my argument here, and there's no room for contradictory evidence when one is trying to construct a consistent narrative.

Knocks on Buxton are that he's got a few problems with his swing. One being that it's pretty level which is going to produce more groundballs and line drives and lower his home run rate. I've read the Twins teach that to their prospects. Somebody should tell them they aren't playing in that shithole called the Metrodome anymore so they won't get the benefit of that turf that makes ground balls do crazy things often times making good defenders look like 8 year old shortstops in a tee-ball game and generally driving any fan of an opposing team crazy. I've also read that he doesn't appear to be quite as fast as he's been given credit for.

Let's move on to young switch-hitting Aaron Hicks. It's weird. In 2012 nobody really expected that he'd be in the majors, let alone starting center field for the Twins, but Denard Span, Ben Revere, and underwhelming spring training competition (along with a ridiculously good spring training by Hicks) put him in the spot he's in today. He put up a .285 average with 13 homeruns and 32 stolen bases in AA last year, yet he'd been roundly considered as something of a bust. Apparently he came in with near Buxtonian expectations and when he failed to meet them people decided they were unhappy with a high batting average, decent power, and 30+ stolen bases. Looking at what the Twins are working with on the major league level, you'd think Minnesota fans would be jumping for joy, but if I've learned anything from Garrison Keelor, it's that Minnesotan's don't get excited about much of anything. Unless, of course, we're talking about Prince. They love Prince.

It's true that, overall, Hicks has put up some less than stellar numbers so far this season. He's been flirting with the Mendoza line and isn't showing a lot in the power department, but since his trip to the DL and short rehab stint earlier this season, Hicks seems to have turned a corner. Since his return he's hitting .275, slugging .500 and has an OPS of .826. He also patrols centerfield like an absolute boss.

Rod Carew: Not fat or on twitter

I can't ignore what is obviously my most compelling argument in the great Hicks Buxton debate. Rod Carew. Hicks worked with Carew in the off-season and Carew seemed to have a pretty good opinion of Hicks as a hitter saying something like, "Aaron Hicks is quite possibly the best hitter of our time. If you unfroze Ted Williams, and showed him Aaron Hicks he'd say 'Let me die now (again, I think?) for I have truly seen god and his name is Aaron Hicks'" (quote cannot actually be attributed to Rod Carew, but while I don't know Mr. Carew, I've read a bit about him and feel pretty confident that he would say something to that effect).  Carew isn't some old fat guy on twitter. He's not fat, I'm fairly confident he doesn't know what twitter is, and he's a career .328 hitter.


What I'm saying is Hicks is a solid natural talent that's probably in about 20 feet over his head right now as his progression was rushed a bit. He's playing really good defense (based solely on web gems I've seen while watching Baseball Tonight as I avoid going to bed because I don't want to get up and go to my job in the morning) and seems to be coming around at the plate. It's true, Buxton is the number one prospect by many accounts, and annihilating single A baseball as a 19 year old, and that can't go unrecognized, but to paraphrase a popular saying a Hicks in the majors is better than a Buxton/might be Trout/might be Brandon Wood looking a horse giver in the mouth in the minors.

To summarize, Hicks has had solid development and production through the minors, and in my expert (haha) opinion is beginning to prove he can play at the highest level. Buxton is the pride of prospect watchers and twitter pundits who could very well be the next Mike Trout. He also has a few years to show us he's not. I'll take Hicks, and if Buxton is as good as they say he is, well I hope he's alright playing a corner outfield position.

Mid Season Rankings: A Visual Basis III

Alright, here we are ready to go for round three of my mid-season evaluations of the top prospect talent. Analysis, as always, is based on the results of a google image search for each player. Greater detail regarding the process and the accuracy of such a system can be found here: http://yourteamsuxmineisrad.blogspot.com/2013/06/mid-season-rankings-visual-basis.html

5.  Our 5th up and comer to be evaluated is none other than Michael Choice. 

Mr. Choice is a 23 year old outfielder currently toiling away in Sacramento because Billy Beane is spending too much time trying to channel his inner Brad Pitt and find the next fat Jonah Hill super stat nerd. The current outfield consists of Yoenis Cespedes, Coco Crisp and Josh Reddick. Cespedes is good in left and Crisp, although he's old as hell, is still kind of holding it down. The idea that this young guy is rotting in Sacramento while Josh Reddick flirts with the mendoza line is amazing.

I mean, c'mon, he's got his own bobblehead for chrissakes, and what a beautiful bobblehead it is. I did a little bit of research into the bobblehead market. First, it is almost impossible to create a bobblehead that actually looks like the player it's built to represent. It's like cold fusion, they just don't have the technology yet. Honestly, without his name on the one pictured above, I'd think maybe it was Bobby Bonilla or Tony Gwynn. Also, like cold fusion, bobbleheads are extremely expensive. At least Michael Choice bobbleheads are. Each bobblehead is handcrafted by an elderly German fellow who imports baby seal teeth and whale blubber, and that's just to make the base of the figurine. My point here is this: Why would you throw together a bobblehead version of someone if they weren't virtually guranteed high levels of success at the next level? You wouldn't. The bobblehead alone, just by virtue of having Choices name on it would probably put up a better OBP than Josh Reddick.

Mr. Choice also grades out rather well on the color spectrum of sunglasses to respectable size of Jesus piece ratio. A stat that was ultimately the downfall of Dontrelle Willis. Willis made the mistake of going full color spectrum on the shades and then buying a Jesus piece the size of a large dog. This was shortly after Dave Dombrowski gave him more money than the nation of Bolivia. We all know how that worked out.

Michael wisely sticks to the orange/yellow/red portion of the color spectrum and has a piece that modestly announces that he has a little cash to throw around and he's down with J.C., but he's not trying to be the pope or anything.

All things considered, Choice looks poised to make a huge splash in the bigs, and imagine how well he's gonna do playing for the Dodgers in a few years after Billy Beane trades him in the last year of his contract for the rights to the motion picture Moneyball Two Electric Bugaloo.




6.  Speaking of the Dodgers, we have Zach Lee dropping in nicely in the 6 spot.


Lee is pretty strange. When I googled him I came up with some interesting Images. A shirtless tattooed hipster showing off his fixed gear bike, a photo of Lee that someone appears to have drawn a bunch of dicks on with a sharpie, and yet another where his face looks like it's been photo shopped onto the body of some kind of primate. I'm not a zoologist, so I don't want to speculate as to what species it actually is.  All of these things indicate to me that people are intimidated by him and are lashing out in strange ways. He should be intimidating. His K/BB ratio is "holy shit/sweet baby jesus does he ever throw balls?"

Lee is, in fact, so intimidating that the conversation in the above photo where he's shaking hands with Clayton Kershaw went something like this:

Kershaw: Ohmygodohmygodohmygod you're Zach Lee.

Lee: Yes, I am. Nice to meet you.

Kershaw: Can I, like, touch you or something.

Lee: Sure, why don't we shake hands.

Kershaw: Can I run over to that set of coolers behind you and get you something to drink, or shine your shoes, or wash your car or something?

Lee: No, I've got this bottled water in my left hand, I'm good.

Kershaw: Ok, well it's an honor to meet you, I love your polo. What color blue is that?

Lee: I don't know, but if I don't throw something 105 miles an hour pretty soon the world is going to become a little less awesome, and I can't in good conscience let that happen.

Guy in background scratching his head: I don't know what's happening, but I feel like my life has changed forever, and when Zach Lee leaves this room I'll probably turn to a life of drug and alcohol abuse to try and fill the void that he left in my soul.

Lee is also quite possibly the only guy that could make this hideous star spangled mistake of a jersey look intimidating. Face it. If you could throw 115 with movement, and then drop in an 80 mph yellowhammer with no discernible change to your delivery, you could probably pitch in a kimono if you wanted to.

Expect to see young Zach Lee very soon, and be prepared to watch Vin Scully try and describe this kids fastball, only to discover it has hindered his ability to speak to the point that he can only blurt out random sentence fragments for the 5 seconds after each pitch, thus creating the nickname "The Stroke" for Zach Lee's fastball. Cue the Billy Squier walk-up music.

Mid-Season Rankings: A Visual Basis II

Welcome to the second installment of my midseason evaluation series. Today I'll be throwing out my next two prospect evaluations. For a quick rundown of how this works all you need to remember is that my impressions are based on the results of google image searches.  For the full rundown you can check post number one here: http://yourteamsuxmineisrad.blogspot.com/2013/06/mid-season-rankings-visual-basis.html

Let's get to number 3.

3. Matt Davidson

Matt is currently destroying baseballs for the Diamondbacks triple A affiliate in some small shithole I don't want to take the time to look up. All I know is that there's a logjam at the major league level partially because Eric Chavez remembered how a baseball bat works.

He's scoring extremely well in some advanced stats. For example his Q-Tip rating is somewhere in the Bonita Applebum range and his BUSTA score rates out at Dungeon Dragon.

For the look test it's pretty simple. Even though he has shockingly weird blonde hair and a duck on his jersey, he exudes confidence. This says proven winner and destroyer of worlds.

Additionally, he has mastered the classic baseball card photo popularized by the Donruss company, if I remember correctly, of pointing the barrel of the bat just off the side of the camera lens. The last guy to do that this well was another fair haired third bagger, Matt Williams.  Color me Sold on Matty.



4. Kyle Crick

I'm as astounded as you are. When I googled Kyle Crick this is the only image that came up, and then the internet exploded. I had to reboot.

The only accurate comparisons I could find were Nuke Laloosh and Jesus. The kid has a 0.48 ERA at high A and his fastball tops out right around 123 mph (one of those numbers is actually accurate). When he pitches women faint and grown men cry. Umpires have refused to stand directly behind home plate in the interest of self preservation. In his first appearance his fastball earned the nickname "The Brown Note" when it caused everyone in the stadium to simultaneously shit themselves.

He projects to be a top of the rotation guy and since most of the Giants pitching staff pitch like they've been digging a little too deep into Timmy Lincecum's personal stash, I'm guessing he'll probably be pitching for the big club next week and could possibly win 20 games, and the Cy Young. I'd give him rookie of the year, but that might anger Yasiel Puig. This kid is a top talent, and well worth whatever it may cost to get him.

Stay tuned for my next installment.