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Ben Badler
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@BenBadler
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A lot of teams have a dozen-ish 2019 international signings for their Tricky League team. The Blue Jays have more than 40. Game today at the D-backs academy.

BA 2020 MLB International Prospects Preview

Manuel Beltre, SS, Dominican Republic

Beltre, 15, is the most famous player in the 2020 class, as he has spent years documenting his daily training on his Instagram account of more than 35,000 followers. A baseball rat, Beltre has a simple, repeatable swing from the right side and is one of the top hitters in the class, with ample game experience and a baseball IQ well beyond his years. He's expected to sign with the Blue Jays. Beltre trains with Jaime Ramos.

Mike Green mentions Lott's Moreno article on the Dodgers thread. The org moved Moreno from SS/2B to C early in his development. But if he's going to be an elite hitter, does it make sense to move him back to the less physically demanding position of 2B?

It definitely crossed my mind, ayj. I am thinking that it would be nice if one of Moreno and Kirk moved over to third base. It is funny that Cavan's dad only flourished when he moved out from behind the plate. It's a strange situation when your two best minor league hitters are both catchers and you have a pretty good young one there already. Assuming we keep all our position players, and everyone pans out, where do you propose we put everyone in the infield? Bichette and Jansen are probably the only two who I trust as delivering defensive value at their current positions.

Can anyone enlighten me on what the Tricky League is?

Another strong outing from Michael Dominguez who now sports a 1.29 ERA in the GCL.

The Tricky League is a Dominican prospect league for players not yet eligible for the DSL. It usually features recent signings from July 2 and after.

Bill James had an outstanding chapter in the 1987 Baseball Abstract about player careers by position, and the effect playing a certain position has on how good a career hitter the player will be. He studied players coming into the big leagues at similar ages, who had very similar stats in their rookie season, so he was comparing apples to apples, then checked to see how those players fared over the rest of their careers. He saw that rookie catchers who were GOOD hitters lost about 25-30% of their career games and about 40-50% of their career production by being catchers. GREAT hitting rookie catchers lost even more than that. He concluded by saying that if he had a catching prospect who was a good or very good hitter, he would shift him to another position unless he was a very good defensive catcher.

Interestingly, he found that 2nd basemen lost almost as much as catchers, compared to outfielders, or even compared to shortstops. I would expect that with the recent rule changes about sliding restrictions designed to avoid collisions from taking out the 2nd baseman to avoid the double play the careers of 2nd basemen are likely longer and better than when James did his study.

Thanks, Dan.  That rookie study is an all-time great, with many interesting observations backed up by data.  The way James handles the race issue is quite wonderful. 

Interestingly, he found that 2nd basemen lost almost as much as catchers, compared to outfielders, or even compared to shortstops. I would expect that with the recent rule changes about sliding restrictions designed to avoid collisions from taking out the 2nd baseman to avoid the double play the careers of 2nd basemen are likely longer and better than when James did his study. I wonder what impact the no running the catcher rule might have on wear and tear? The other day it was suggested that Robbo-Umps would allow catchers to adopted new stances since the value of pitch framing would be largely mitigated. Tomorrow's catcher could play 162 games and largely concern themselves with monitoring the basepaths and keeping the pitcher in good spirits.

Bad formatting, my bad...

Shapkins no doubt are killing it on the IFA market. It's pretty impressive.

I often wonder how these IFA actually choose the team they'd want to go to - I mean, why the blue jays of all teams?

It's a testament to shapiro that whoever he has hired down there is not only able to spot the talent but to convince them that we're the team that they should sign with.

I mean vladdy we actually had to bid high to get but it seems like these guys are now choosing us without us needing to pay so much.

Doubling their salary and an 80 million investment in the training complex probably makes a big difference.

The other thing about moving C’s so early in their development is that they are so darn unpredictable. One day you think you have too many C prospects the next day you have none. One day you wake to find Eric Kratz had a better MLB career than Guillermo Quiroz. Stuff just happens with C’s. I think you’re better to leave them there as long as possible.

I wouldn’t mind seeing the Blue Jays develop their catchers in multiple positions, saving their legs theoretically. 3 games at catcher, DH 1 game and alternative position for another 1 or 2 games a week. Would be great for someone like Moreno. A little time at C and 2B. Unsure if this REALLY affects their development as a catcher. Just a thought.

Good players mostly plays shortstop.
Athletic guys get thrown in the outfield.
Catcher is a difficult position that requires a lot more work than others.
Teams have to keep lots of catchers around because half the prospects are pitchers and they need someone to throw to.
Because of that, minor leagues catchers make more money than the other prospects; they work harder.
The offensive bar is also lower.

Jansen should not be blocking anyone.
As soon as Yan Gomes had an All-Star year, Cleveland traded him away.
It's a lot easier to trade an extra catcher than an extra second  baseman.

If Jansen’s second half offensive production is closer to his norm the he’s probably something like a 4 WAR player over 450-500 ABs - that’s going to block a lot of players. I agree that holding on to aging Cs is a recipe for disaster though.

Another way to look at it is that you don't base a prospect's development on the performance of other players.

Travis Bergen has been returned to the Jays and sent to Buffalo.

Anthony Kay is throwing a shutout through 5 with 6 Ks. He's definitely in the mix for 2020.

Kay is still walking too many batters, but he's definitely showing positive signs. He has struck out 31 in 26 innings (28 in his last 22 innings) and only allowed 2 home runs (0 in his last 3 starts) since the trade. Big difference from his brief AAA numbers with the Mets.

The Jays historically have moved guys from behind the plate to other positions once in the majors, such as Carlos Delgado (caught at first in the majors then was moved to LF briefly then to 1B), and Ed Sprague (caught in 91/92, then 3B full time in 93 and beyond, would only catch again in his final season for exactly 1 inning).

Funny thing - the guy who was one of the most successful catchers developed here (Pat Borders in terms of time in the majors and his WS MVP) didn't catch his first 4 seasons in the minors, then at 23 started to and reached at 25 playing only 7 games at other positions (not counting DH) in the ML portion of his career. So much for the myth that kids need lots and lots of time in the minors to become good catchers.

How odd for SF to send Bergen back this late in the season. Just 10 more days and he'd have been on the September roster and their property for 5 more years. They aren't seriously in the race (4 1/2 back of the 2nd wild card but 4 teams between them and the 2nd WC so not likely to get there, currently at 500). Fangraphs puts their odds at 1.5% - hardly the time to cut bait on a rule 5 pick imo.

There seems to be a few IFA 18 year olds performing well in the GCL, in addition to Martinez. Of course, Orelvis is only 17.

Kloffenstein with seven strong shutout innings tonight.

Very nice to see Bergen returned. Bochy is retiring after this season, and the Giants are trying very hard to get the team into the post season for him. I still like Bergen's chances. Including this year, he's only thrown 122 innings in pro ball, and he's already in AAA/mlb. His numbers in 'Frisco weren't really all that bad. His opponents BA was .240, which is pretty good, his WHIP of 1.37 was decent, he allowed fewer hits than innings pitched, and struck out almost a batter an inning. Doing that after very few innings in the minors is impressive. Another guy with a shot at the Jays' bullpen in 2020.

Good game for Godley. I liked his acquisition, and think he has a shot at a rotation/bulk pitcher spot next year.

John, I don't think it's odd the Giants sent back Bergen. It's Bochy's last season and will use the players they have to give them the best chance to win. They are not giving up.

And Bergen has not been good. The only reason his stats aren't worse is because of Oracle, which mitigated his fly ball tendencies. On the road, teams have slugged .636 against him. For context,only Yelich, Bellinger and Trout are slugging better than .636 this year.

Giants, and seemingly 28 other teams, probably think him no better than guys they can pick up on waivers.

Great to see the performances of Kay and Kloffenstein. It seems like every night 1 or 2 of the Jays' good pitching prospects is throwing 5+ shutout innings. Very encouraging.

Still seems odd given they did keep him this long so odds are the front office saw something in him and the 13th man on your pitching staff isn't so vital that 2 more weeks as that pre-September call-ups was going to change anything. That is what I see as odd - keeping a Rule 5 guy this deep then cutting him loose with just under 2 weeks to go until you can bury him so he only sees action in 10 run spread games. Cutting him loose a month ago would've made a ton more sense.

Bergen only allowed runs 5 times this season - 3 times up until a week ago, then 2 runs each on the 14th and 17th (one game they lost by 4, the other they won by 5 so he wasn't the difference in either). His WPA was negative in only 7 games vs positive in 10, neutral (0.000) in 4 games. So he wasn't a massive weight on the team by any stretch. For comparison Aaron Sanchez was positive for WPA in 11 games for the Jays, negative in 12.

Yeah, he might be worthless to them and is no more than another arm you can get off the waiver wire, but if so then why keep him so long? Dumping him after 2 bad games seems very short sighted.

Well, they kept him so long because he was on the IL for a long time. He only recently came off.

Bergen threw in 15 rehab games. That's quite a few.

He's probably going to be exposed again this fall.
If nobody was willing to grab him off waiver and finish his rule V year, it's unlikely that anybody would want to have him for a another full year.

Kay, Hatch and Zeuch will be added. McClelland as well. Espinal  has to be considered because he probably gets a call up if someone is hurt. Wall and Palacios, Baker and Snead are borderline.
Copping, Issacs and Sopko should be safe.

Of course, Luciano, Tepera, Borucki and Shoemaker need to come off the 60IL.

I'm probably "lighter" on these guys than some, but as far as I'm concerned, you can jettison Adam, Boshers, Buchholz, Ramirez and Davis off the 40 without really worrying too much, and I hate to say it, but Devon Travis is probably almost there too.

Then you have guys like McKinney, Stewart, Kingham, who if you think you can do better, you can outright those guys as well. That's 9 guys I think you can probably replace on the 40 as needed. I don't see the 40 man roster crunch as being that much of a thing.

I actually thought that Jason Adam has pitched fairly well any time I've seen him which admittedly isn't much considering he's only had 8 innings of work. I'd like to see him more before the season is over before I'd pass judgement on him.