I think Snider's age/level career to date (save the late season call up) is the same as Jay Bruce's, with his numbers paling a bit.  A formatted comparison of those two would be interesting to see.....if only I knew how....

What is the difference between the AAA leagues? I thought they would be the most similar.

Just going off the top of my head, the PCL is an extreme hitter's league while the IL is a neutral environment.

I believe both the Eastern and Southern Leagues are pitcher's leagues.

Jay Bruce formatted like the above...

Year	Level	Age	Abs	Ave	OBP	SLG	OPS
2005	Rookie	18	192	0.266	0.341	0.484	0.825
2006	A	19	444	0.291	0.355	0.516	0.871
2007	A+	20	268	0.325	0.379	0.586	0.965
	AA		66	0.333	0.405	0.652	1.057
	AAA		187	0.305	0.358	0.567	0.925
Total			1157	0.299	0.362	0.543	0.904

Note: Totals are estimated used the figure for each year and AB's to estimate a total (too lazy to figure it out right).

Syracuse has been viewed as a very good park for getting a solid idea of hitters.  Generally it has been a pitchers park in a pitchers league thus what you see is what you get as a rule. 

Guys who spent their AAA career in Syracuse and lifetime AAA numbers...
Vernon Wells: 265/322/444 vs ML: 282/331/479
Shannon Stewart: 310/395/449 (includes a few AB's elsewhere on rehab's) vs ML: 297/360/430
Alex Rios: 262/298/374 but just 195 AB's vs ML: 288/339/452
Aaron Hill: 301/339/468 but just 156 AB's vs ML: 284/339/409
Adam Lind: 333/406/525 over 472 AB's vs ML: 274/314/461 and growing
Russ Adams: 288/348/408 over 483 AB's (pre-rookie season) vs ML 248/314/376

Note: Adams now has 1489 AAA AB's and has hit 275/346/408 overall (weird eh?).

Interesting to note the guys JP brought up had minimal time in AAA.  Even Lind has less than a full season's AB's in AAA which surprised me.  For comparison Wells had over 1000 AB's in AAA and Stewart 628 AB's pre-sticking in the majors.  I thought Ash was bad for leaving guys in AAA too long and this seems to show it (both with Cito and without thus you cannot blame Cito for it).  Checking a couple of guys at random from the WS years: Sprague had 1264 AB's in AAA (mainly trying to learn to catch), Jeff Kent skipped AAA, John Olerud skipped the minor leagues altogether.  Seems JP is mid-way between Ash and Gillick here.  Give the kids a bit of time in AAA but if they have the talent bring them up before a full season of AAA is under their belts. 

One other thing about Syracuse as a hitting environment (which may only end up applying the AAA guys for this year)...

They just switched from turf to grass. When they did this they moved the bullpens from behind the left field fence to along the foul lines. They then moved the left field fence back. The power alleys are 375' and 385'. Straightaway center is 408' and its a little deeper in a couple spots. These dimensions added to the grass have made this play more like a pitcher's park than before. Chip Cannon, Kevin Melillo, Russ Adams, and Hector Luna, to name (or cherrypick) a few, hit significantly better on the road. Buck Coats blows this out of the water, however, but this still seems to play like a pitcher's park. I don't see anywhere on Milb.com to aggregate home/away splits, and 2008 park factors haven't been released, so I don't have too much data to back this, but the changes to the park should be kept in mind when evaluating this year's stats.

My fear is that yeah, they have both have hit about the same in their 20 year old seasons, (Snider has hit about .275 combined) but Fielder had a whole other year in AAA before hitting the majors.

I really feel that expecting Snider to do much next year in the majors is dangerous and likely to set him back.  I would prefer he be sent back to AAA next year for 160 ABs to prove he is ready rather than break spring training on the big club and prove he is not.

Given JP's situation, I expect it will be the latter tough.

Given JP's situation, I expect it will be the latter tough.

Just like he put Adam Lind in the 2007 opening day roster before flying away in his time machine to break Joe Carter's ankles because he makes his decisions solely on the basis of trying to ruin baseball in Toronto.

What is the difference between the AAA leagues? I thought they would be the most similar.

The PCL is notorious as an extreme hitter's league.

because he makes his decisions solely on the basis of trying to ruin baseball in Toronto

Well, not intentionally anyway. 

No, I said that because JP has never been the most patient guy and is likely to be less patient as there is more pressure to succeed.  Another year of 85 wins next year will likely mean the end of the JPR era and he has got to know it.

My problem with this move is - I've basically been thinking like a GM instead of a fan.

As a Fan - the sooner we get to see this wunderkid the better. I am excited about seeing him. In fact I'm gonna tape the game so I can look at it years from now and see the kid in his first game!

As a GM - I'm worried about losing him when he's 26 instead of when he's 28. HOWEVER, as a GM I would make sure that I told Ted Rogers that IF we bring Boy Wonder up now -YOU TED are going to have to understand that you're gonna have to pony up many muchos pesos - at least a year or two earlier that you'd have to if we waited. When I presented this to Ted he said "Son, you bring the boy to the Center named for ME and I promise I'll come up with the money when you need it!" Now I feel MORE confident - lets see this kid play ball! 

Even Lind has less than a full season's AB's in AAA which surprised me.  For comparison Wells had over 1000 AB's in AAA and Stewart 628 AB's pre-sticking in the majors.

Lind was drafted out of college; Wells and Stewart out of high school. I'm not saying this accounts for the difference, but the typical developmental path for a hitter out of high school is different than for one out of college. This is an apples/oranges comparison.

Observations:

Looks like a kid. Big lower body - not too long before he's got 1st baseman or DH written all over him. Moves surprising well in the field. BEAUTIFUL, SMOOTH, POWERFUL swing. Yummy, yummy!

BEAUTIFUL, SMOOTH, POWERFUL.....Yummy, yummy!

Please, this is a family-friendly site.

"Please, this is a family-friendly site."

Yes, I was rather shocked to read about Travis Snider's swinging on this website!

It's a comparison that I made a couple months ago on another site, but there is one important difference: Fielder was a much more refined hitter at 20, one with better strike zone discipline and with fewer holes in his swing. As a result, he was ready to hit major league pitching straight out of the gates, and a regular by age 22. Snider, meanwhile, is almost certainly going to fall flat on his face this season -- and probably next season, if JP starts him at the ML level -- because he is still getting by on talent alone. Even Fielder likely would have struggled somewhat if pushed as hard as Snider has been, though I fear we could be looking at a .200/.250/.330, 2.5 AB/K rate September from our rookie.

That Snider has made it this far on talent alone does indicate his remarkable upside, however. A focused fall in Arizona and a full season in Syracuse would do him wonders, and given those luxuries it's not out of the realm of possibility that a 22 year old Travis Snider could duplicate Fielder's age 22 production.

Not holding out much hope that he'll bang out 50 at age 23, though.

How big is strike zone judgment in a 20 year old?  A good question.

Fielder had 93 K's in AA at 20 over 562 PA's or a .165 K average vs 65 walks - a .116 walk average
At 21 in AAA he K'ed 93 times over 441 PA's = .211 K average vs 54 walks = .122 walk average

Snider had 154 K's over 3 levels at 20 over 559 PA's = .275 K average vs 61 walks = .109 walk average

Not good.

Adam Dunn (well known for K's) at 20 had 101 K's in 520 PA but in A ball = .194 K, 100 walks = .192 and at 21 82 K's over 412 PA's = .199 K average

Hmm.  Looks like Snider better fix those holes fast or he is in deep dog doo.  If he is given a full ML season at 21 he might reach 200+ K's.  Big time challenge for Cito and crew.