I checked the offensive league leaders in the Eastern League and Eric Thames is third in OPS.   The leader is Tagg Bozied who is 31 and second is Hector Gimenez who is 27, Thames is 23.  In other words, Thames has the best OPS of any prospect in the league. 

When I saw Thames in June I made the following comment in my scouting report:

The best word to describe Thames at this point is raw.  At the plate he seemed too aggressive and was swinging at pitches that were a little too high or too wide. 

His manager, Luis Rivera, also made the point that coming into 2010 Thames had only 200 professional at-bats.  Since June Thames has made a significant improvement.  I looked at Thames true outcomes numbers for April to June and for July and August.

Apr-Jun: 290 AB's;  12 HR; 21 BB; 70 K

Jul-Aug: 170 AB's:  12 HR' 28 BB; 42 K

In the last two months Thames has notably improved his walk rate.  In turn this has allowed him to get better pitches to hit to increase his HR rate as well as his overall hitting stats.

I think Thames is now a top ten prospect for the Jays.

Interesting note from 1bluejaysjay:

""From what we’ve heard, High-A is a miserable place to be, because of no crowd, temperature, and the coaching staff. (Hitting coach Justin Mashore is a negative personality.)""

(http://1bluejaysway.blogspot.com/2010/08/know-your-prospects.html)

I had not previously seen negative comments regarding any of the Jays development staff: can anyone with more familiarity on the matter comment further?

We know there are no crowds (Tampa and Clearwater draw the fans).  We know the temperatures are hot, hot, hot.  I have seen Mashore last year at Lansing, obviously in a limited way.  He is not a "warm and fuzzy" type, he appears to be a hard nosed ballplayer.  But he is getting paid to make the hitters better, not to sweet talk them.  Are the hitters getting better?  There has been a regression in the second half of the season.  I believe only Hechavarria, Perales and Bowman have moved up from Dunedin this season and they were all special cases.  Many of the rest of the hitters have stalled in Dunedin.  D'Arnaud and McDade started strongly but have faded.  Yan Gomes has probably been the most consistent hitter.

This could be a chicken or egg situation.  Is he caustic because the hitters are not hitting well, or are the hitters not hitting well because he is caustic?  I don't know.

Sickels rarely see Jays prospects, he is based in the middle of the US and he sees mainly teams within driving distance of Kansas.  So his comments on Thames come from looking at Thames' stats, just like the rest of us are doing.  I say the jury is still out.  We keep talking about how inexperienced Thames is but in this case his abilities against lefties are still under development.  I say we won't know how well he can hit against lefties until the middle of 2011.  If he keeps replicating his recent improvement then he will be more than a platoon player, if not then let's find a complementary righty.

It's also tough so say let's platoon Mastroianni and Thames.  Mastroianni's value is best suited to centre field, his offensive numbers might be light in left field.  You could say let's play Vernon in centre and Thames in left vs a righty and Mastro in centre and Vernon in left vs a lefty but would that work with Vernon?  I have my doubts.

The myth I'm supposedly perpetuating, for China Fan courtesy of Clarence & the Toronto Star, July30 - 

“(Critics) can be surprised all they want. Up to a few games ago, Edwin and Lyle Overbay were hitting more than anyone average-wise. We talked earlier in the season about (Overbay) becoming a free agent and how we wanted to give him a chance to play (and showcase himself). Well, we want to give Edwin a chance to play, too. Everyone will get a chance to play. You will see guys rotate around the field....“You will see Jose at third and Travis in right,” said Gaston, who will also start using DH Adam Lind at first in preparation for a potential move there next year when Overbay is gone."

Since Clarence made these remarks on July 30th, Bautista has started one game at 3B, and Snider has started 14 of 21 games, only 2 of them in RF. I appreciate how well Overbay has been hitting since June came around and don't think he should be removed from the lineup, but if the only way to get Snider regular ABs is to bench Overbay (and it isn't) then that's what has to be done. It's ludicrous that the team is 12 games out of the playoffs in late August and Clarence is still managing every game like he cares about the team's final W-L record. An option was completely wasted on 5 games of Arencibia because of Clarence's refusal to start him (despite saying he was called up to do so) and he's retarding Snider's development by not having him in the lineup every single day. And at this point I don't even care if it means Travis bats 9th behind John freaking McDonald, the kid just needs to get some every day ABs so he can get comfortable at the plate at the MLB level and be ready to mash for the Jays in the near future.

It's hilarious to hear China Fan cite Lind's poor defensive abilities and lack of experience at 1B as a reason to not be playing him there, as well as Snider's OPS being lower than Lyle's and the fact that the Jays might need Overbay at first base next year after trading Wallace. Why is that funny? Because those are all the exact reasons why Overbay's playing time needs to be cut back at this point in the season - to give Lind experience there in case he's needed, to give Snider regular ABs to aid in his development so that OPS can start to rise to where we all think it will end up, and to depress Overbay's worth on the FA market if the Jays need to bring him back. At the end of the day I don't care if it's Wells, Bautista, Overbay, Lind, Encarnacion, or Lewis' playing time which suffers, TRAVIS SNIDER NEEDS TO BE PENCILLED INTO THE LINEUP EVERY DAY!

Are there any right handed bats this offseason that could handle first base and maybe an occasional corner OF start? They have to rake lefties (because the Jays can't for some reason). If there is I'd have no problem with Overbay at 1B in a platoon role. Hopefully Lind reverts back to hitting lefties around his 2009 rate instead of like a pitcher on dialysis.

But he already has 551 plate appearances in the majors -- at the age of 22.

Spun differently, it's been two full seasons since his call-up (1500 potential PA's) and he's only had 551 plate appearances.  Is that what you call developing a player?  Making good use of his cheap service time?

Seriously, you wanna give 1500 plate appearances to a guy in his 21 and 22 year old seasons?  Age is more important than call-up date.  Don't forget that Snider has managed only a .750 OPS in both seasons when he was given a lot of playing time.  You'd definitely want more than a .750 OPS from your left-fielder if you're playing serious baseball.  It would have hurt the Jays significantly to give 1500 plate appearances to a kid with a .750 OPS.   That wouldn't be "making good use" of your players.  As for service time: that's probably an argument for leaving him in the minors, not calling him up. As for Snider's own development:  giving 1500 plate appearances to a raw kid, sink or swim, is a good recipe for destroying his confidence and screwing him up permanently.  Better to ease him in slowly, as the Jays are doing.

Finally, it's quite incorrect to talk of "two full seasons" or "1500 potential plate appearances" since his call-up.  Snider was injured (or in minor-league rehab) for 10 weeks this season, and he played 48 games in the minors last season.  So he hasn't had anywhere near "two full seasons"  in the majors. 

Let's face it:  despite the fanboy worship, Snider hasn't yet proven that he can produce the offensive numbers that are needed for a mediocre-fielding outfielder to earn a job.  I'm sure eventually he will, but at age 22 he is not superior to any replacement-level outfielder.  As a result, for the team's benefit and for Snider's own benefit, the Jays are gradually easing him into a full-time role over the course of two or three seasons.  That's precisely how he should be handled.

92-93, you began by criticizing Gaston for his use of Barajas and Overbay, but you seemed to have backed down from that

No I didn't. I said that keeping Vernon in CF in 2014 because he'd be upset about moving is something the organization shouldn't care about, and if they do it will be a continuation of what we've seen the last couple of years with Overbay and Barajas.

You're claiming that Snider needs playing time to get "comfortable" in the majors.  But he already has 551 plate appearances in the majors -- at the age of 22.  How much more "comfortable" can he get? He is playing the vast majority of Jays games this month, even though he was injured for a big part of the season and he is struggling with a .754 OPS.

Two thirds is NOT the vast majority, and it's interesting you speak of comfort. Hill and Lind had to stay in the top of the order for way too long (and in Hill's case in the #6 spot too) because Cito is reluctant to move players around the order, he wants them to be comfortable. Why is that same courtesy not extended to perhaps the organization's #1 asset?! How is he supposed to get comfortable in the big leagues never knowing when he shows up to the park if he's going to play at all, where in the lineup he's going to be, and what position he's going to be at?!

Your theory about OPS automatically rising with more PAs is a little weird. 

I said nothing of the sort, and your delusional reading comprehension is starting to bother me.

Playing Lind at 1B and giving Snider an every day job is hardly "tanking games". It's finding out what you have for 2011 once 2010 can be written off, and it's what good management does once they realize it's time to start looking ahead. The Blue Jays don't owe it to MLB to play Lyle Overbay everyday at the expense of Travis Snider.

Thanks to vw_fan17 for providing further evidence that Snider is getting a lot of PAs for a player of his age and a player of his OPS.

For me his chart shows the exact opposite. Top prospects all over the place are receiving significantly more playing time than Snider is. Even Mike Stanton, who never played AAA and has a half season of AA under his belt, already has 50 more AB than Snider despite starting his season 2 months later.

I just find it amazing when fans get so outraged whenever Snider is not in the lineup -- as if it's some conspiracy of stupidity among every single person in the Jays organization.  I'm sure the Jays have done a lot of thinking and discussion about how to handle their top hitting prospect, and I'm willing to defer to them on this...That kind of decision would have to be approved by Anthopolous and a host of other coaches and executives.  There's no way that Gaston could be doing this unilaterally.  Face it, the Jays have made a collective decision that Snider needs to be developed gradually, and he'll get a full-time role when he warrants it.  If you think the Jays are wrong, you're entitled to your belief, but don't pretend that it's a result of Gaston taking a personal dislike to him.

If Anthopolous burned an option on Arencibia for 5 starts and doesn't want Snider receiving regular ABs, there's an even bigger problem here than I thought. I was willing to chalk it up to Clarence's madness and AA's unwillingness to pick a fight with a manager he didn't want and knows is gone soon anyway. You'll have to explain to me how everyday lineup decisions have to be approved by Anthopolous, because I can't fathom how that's the case. If it were the GM would write out the lineup card each day and leave it to his field manager to take care of the actual game grind. It's not like AA can fire Cito for not listening to his suggestions that Snider receives more than 2/3 of regular playing time.