Batter's Box Interactive Magazine - He's An E-NOR-maus Prospect

Pronounced EE-muss, I figured that's close enough to "enormous" prospect. I did pull a side muscle reaching for that one, thanks for asking.

Wednesday afternoon, the Jays had to rally to tie the Phillies 7-7 in Clearwater, Florida. How clear is the water there, anyway? Anyways, Brad Emaus (#69 in your program, #1 in your hearts) is having a fine spring so far with a .333 batting average after a 2-for-3 performance that included a two-run homer yesterday afternoon. The 22 year-old, soon to turn 23 on March 28th, could be in Toronto sooner than later if he keeps this sort of thing up and hopefully he will find more interesting things to do than plucking eyebrows. An 11th round pick out of Tulane in 2007, Emaus had a nice winter ball showing in Hawaii where he slugged .556 after a solid year in Dunedin last season with a .463 SLG.

At the dish, Jason Lane contined his hot spring by hitting his 5th homer and is batting .350., Cody Haerther had a 2-for-2 day at the dish with 2 RBI and Howie Clark was 1-for-1. On the mound, it wasn't quite a banner day for Jesse Litsch, who gave up 4 runs (two unearned) in 4 2/3 innings while Scott Richmond, no doubt hurt by the lack of activity from the World Baseball Classic, gave up 3 runs in 3 1/3 innings but did strike out four. The good news was Jeremy Accardo pitched a clean inning and picked up a K to lower his ERA under 10.

Tonight, the Jays send Casey "The Fugitive" Janssen (cue awesome theme music here) to the hill against the Yankees where he'll face some guy named Burnett. Gee, I hope he can stay healthy for this one. First pitch from Tampa is set for 7:15 p.m. EDT and can be seen on MLB.TV.

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In the World Baseball Classic Wednesday night, Japan beat Cuba 5-0 to advance to the semi-finals. They join the U.S., Venezuela, and Korea in the final four that will be held at Dodger Stadium beginning Saturday. Japan will play Korea to determine seeding in the Pool 1 final this evening at 9:00 p.m. EDT at Petco Park in San Diego. The loser of tonight's game will play Venezuela on Saturday and the winner will face the U.S. on Sunday.

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In other baseball news, the Edmonton Cracker-Cats of the Golden Baseball League have been renamed the Edmonton Capitals (as Edmonton is the capital city of Alberta, get it?). Just recently, the Ottawa Rapids/z of the Can-Am League changed their name to the Ottawa Voyageurs. It's a chance to turn the page for both franchises which suffered from crappy ownership, especially in Edmonton. The good news for Edmonton ball fans is the team is now owned by Oilers owner and local resident Daryl Katz. Hopefully, it's onward and upward for both teams as they try to keep baseball on the map in the Great White North.

Posted by #2JBrumfield on Thursday, March 19 2009 @ 11:32 AM EDT.

He's An E-NOR-maus Prospect | 18 comments | Create New Account

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Helpmates - Thursday, March 19 2009 @ 01:06 PM EDT (#197295) #

Thanks for the Emaus plug; I was wondering if anyone was going to comment on the spring he's been having. He also has more walks than punch-outs. I guess we'll see what happens. Has anyone heard anything about his defense? Looks like he's been primarily at second this spring.

John Northey - Thursday, March 19 2009 @ 02:39 PM EDT (#197297) #

Emaus is interesting. Just checked his Baseball Cube page (has college stats too) and saw that he is listed as 3B/2B. He did poor in low A in 2007 but really did well last year in A+. AA should be where he starts 2009 but this spring has to have opened a lot of eyes in Jays land. His Baseball-Reference page is messed up, listing him as playing with team 129 for 3 games. Still, if we take its other stats at face value we see 14 games at DH last year which isn't a good sign. At 3B his fielding percentage was a pathetic 915 after a 916 the year before in limited playing time (41 games total with 11 errors). At 2B he was at 980 which is good for a guy in A+ I think but without more quality stats all we can say is that he boots too many to stay at 3B while he doesn't boot too many at 2B and 78 DP in 96 games is a very good total thus he might belong at 2B.

Hrm. Another guy who is at 2B. Getting waaaaay too crowded there. Still, at least they can move to the OF/1B easily and in some cases to 3B (although not in Emaus' case from what I can see on the surface here).

TamRa - Thursday, March 19 2009 @ 03:14 PM EDT (#197298) #

I've said it before and I'll say it again....I'd put Emaus at 3B this summer and force him to prove absolutely he couldn't handle it. If he can, he's the answer to all the "What if?" questions about Rolen.

Mick Doherty - Thursday, March 19 2009 @ 03:59 PM EDT (#197299) #

His Baseball-Reference page is messed up, listing him as playing with team 129 for 3 games.

True, but WHAT a three-game run! One game at 1B, one at 2B, one at 3B, four hits, two walks, three RBI and two runs scored in 11 plate appearances, a 1.101 OPS ... that "projects" pretty nicely!

Wonder where the numbers came from.

#2JBrumfield - Thursday, March 19 2009 @ 04:00 PM EDT (#197300) #

John Sickels has posted a feature on Adam Lind's prospects for the 2009 season on minorleagueball.com. It also links an article he had about Linds last year. Interesting read.

smcs - Thursday, March 19 2009 @ 04:31 PM EDT (#197301) #

His Baseball-Reference page is messed up, listing him as playing with team 129 for 3 games.

That would be the good ol' Hawaiian Winter Baseball League. Emaus played for the Honolulu Sharks. As to why they are listed as "129" on bbref player pages, I have no idea.

Gerry - Thursday, March 19 2009 @ 07:36 PM EDT (#197302) #

Emaus is not great defensively, he is a stocky guy, body somewhat like Travis Snider. BA describes his range as "fringy". BA also compares him to Ty Wiggington because of his size, his power, his ability to play 2B and 3B, and his defensive abilities.

ramone - Thursday, March 19 2009 @ 07:39 PM EDT (#197303) #

So Jansenn was pulled in the first inning with an injury, his fastball was sitting at 85-87mph.

timsevs - Thursday, March 19 2009 @ 07:49 PM EDT (#197304) #

Apparently Janssen left the game due to shoulder tightness...

Anyone think that putting a guy stright into the rotation after a shoulder injury, who has only pitched as a reliever in the ML is pushing things a bit? So how is the rotation looking now?

1 Halladay

2 Litsch

3 Purcey

Any guesses on 4 and 5?

TamRa - Thursday, March 19 2009 @ 08:20 PM EDT (#197305) #

Unless there's a new setback on the injury, the reporting has consistantly been that Janssen is the presumptive #4. Obviously injury would change that. By the way, if you are under the impression he's only ever been a reliever in the majors that is incorrect. He was a starter his whole career including the better portion of 2006 in the majors.
In 2006 he was dominant early until he suffered an injury he didn't report to the coaching staff and he sucked for his last 9 or 10 appearances....sucked so VERY badly that it can't possibly be a true reflection of his healthy abilities.

As for the #5, it's Richmond vs. Mills with Clement lurking in the rear view. Mills is trying to force them to carry him, while the smart conservative move is to go with Richmond and let Mills at least taste AAA first. It's anyone's guess which way the dice will fall.

As for the advisability or not, of taking either Janssen or Richmond (or even Purcey if you doubt him),keep in mind that unless they are quite successful, Mills and Cecil (and eventually McGowan) stand to take their job away from them so it's a win/win for the Jays.

westcoast dude - Thursday, March 19 2009 @ 08:58 PM EDT (#197306) #

I believe the roation is now set: Clement and Richmond will be fine at 4 and 5. Clement is set to be a huge asset if he stays healthy, and so far it's looking good. One big advantage of Vegas being the AAA town is the great weather in April will be a tonic for everyone, especially the pitchers. If anyone in the Jays rotation falters, we have the luxury of multiple young guns just itching to show their stuff. Now I'm getting excited.

timpinder - Thursday, March 19 2009 @ 10:35 PM EDT (#197307) #

Glevin - Thursday, March 19 2009 @ 10:59 PM EDT (#197308) #

Clement hasn't been a half-decent pitcher in years. He was atrocious in the minors last year and I see no reason to give him a rotation spot. Mills and Richmond seem like better bets.

Pistol - Thursday, March 19 2009 @ 11:44 PM EDT (#197309) #

I think the Jays' rotation will end with Mills and Richmond. It appears that Janssen is hurt and everything I've read about Clement is that he's throwing slop and his fastball only touches the high 80's. If Mills or Richmond falter, Cecil will be up as early as late April according to Blair, and McGowan might be ready in June. No worries.

I agree with this except about the part about 'no worries'.

I don't expect to see Clement in a Jays uniform at all unless there's a lot of injuries. JP said this week he's 'on the outside looking in'.

subculture - Friday, March 20 2009 @ 12:41 AM EDT (#197310) #

I may be biased, as I was born in Seoul (okay, AM biased), but I think there's definitely something to be learned from watching some of these WBC games, in particular the way the Korean and Japanese teams play, and usually win. I'm not just talking about fundamentals (the announcers do a great job covering that angle), but as a GM, I'd be asking myself:

1) Have I done enough to scout these Asian teams for talent that can help my team (esp. when the Korean team only has one major leaguer)? To this point, Korea is 11-2 in WBC games (2006, and 2009). I'm not sure what their record was in the Beijing Olympics, but they won the Gold medal. If I'm JP, I'm wondering if the Korean team that employs first-baseman TK Kim would be interested in a swap for Lyle Overbay! We'll even throw in Johny Mac!

2) How do I create or foster the kind of team chemistry these teams obviously have? While some of the teams (Dominican, American, Canadian) seem to perform worse than you would expect on paper, others seem to play greater than the sum of their parts (the Asian teams, Netherlands). Is it simply pitching? Is it because players roles are clearly defined on these teams, and not the ones loaded with ML "all-stars"?

3) What's being undervalued in our ML game today? If it's no longer OBP or defense, is it something that these teams are doing better than others?

I also can't believe that with 1000 channels on my Rogers cable box, the jays/yanks game tonight can't appear on any of them!

timsevs - Friday, March 20 2009 @ 05:28 AM EDT (#197312) #

My mistake, I forgot he started in 2006

However I think JP has been foolish in the extreme to expect him to come back from a torn labrum and go straight into the rotation. To me it just feels that the way they are handling him and McGowan is all wrong. There seems to be a lot of pressure on them both to come back relatively quickly, and certainly 'MLB ready'. Also I just get this niggling feeling that McGowan would have been better served by surgery (This was prompted after talking to one of my orthopaedic colleagues at work). Has JP somewhat forced the issue as he knows that with no McGowan, Burnett and no guarantee of Janssen we could be looking at 90+ losses in the AL East...

Mind you one consolation was seeing Burnett struggle yesterday. With no Arnsberg and NY pressure do you think he will implode? I think he needs a really good start to the season.

timpinder - Friday, March 20 2009 @ 11:22 AM EDT (#197320) #

timsevs,

McGowan did have surgery on his rotator cuff. If you're referring to the frayed labrum he also has, I read that they looked at it so that they might do both surgeries at the same time and found that the frayed labrum hadn't gotten any worse and chose to leave it alone. Apparently it's relatively common for pitchers to have frayed labrums and they often don't require surgery. It is, however, supposed to be the hardest surgery to recover from if it is performed. Everything I've read is that the Jays won't rush McGowan back, so I'm not worried about that. What I am worried about is McGowan's long-term prospects as a starter. He's already had Tommy John surgery, rotator cuff surgery and he has a frayed labrum. The Kerry Wood conversion might be in order in the not too distant future, in my opinion. I like Matt Bush as a future closer but he's a total wild card, so McGowan might be the answer after Ryan leaves.

timsevs - Friday, March 20 2009 @ 01:15 PM EDT (#197325) #

timpinder

Yeah I was talking about the frayed labrum rather than his other injuries. I think that given the history of pitchers and shoulder injuries, which other people have covered extensively here before, that the odds of McGowan ever truly realizing his potential are getting smaller. I hope he beats the odds.

With regards to Janssen I hope that he only has ' shoulder tightness' and the discomfort is similar to the problems that Burnett had during his time with the Jays, ie. post-surgical / injury discomfort that just has to be got used to. With the Jays history of conveying injury news however you gotta be nervous.

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