"Welcome to the Season" Free For All Mailbag
Happy Minor League Opening Day! Or at least, one of our Minor League Opening Days — we seem to be somewhat flush in them this year! Anyway, to celebrate the fact that all four full season affiliates will be in action together for the first time all year, it’s time for another There R Giants’ Free For All Mailbag. As I’ve said, I’m going to try to have these at least once a month, and if folks like them, I’ll bump it up to multiple times a month during the season — so be sure to leave feedback on your way out the door.
We got plenty of great questions this time out, but before we get to my answers, I’ll remind you all that you can get all of my Giants’ prospect content, including Minor Lines game recaps every week day, by becoming a There R Giants’ subscriber.
And with that, let’s see what’s on your minds on this fine Opening Day:
Any intel on Dylan Cumming? Nice SFGprospects tweet this week featuring K clips with a nice frisbee slider.
I believe I can help you here! Dylan Cumming is one of several undrafted free agents the Giants signed after the 2022 draft — and with drafts now shortened to just 20 rounds, this form of minor leaguer is going to become more and more prevalent as teams look for the same kind of intriguing, under the radar players they might have drafted in, oh say, the 28th round back in the day!
Whoa! How did that get in there? Anyway, Cumming was signed out of Liberty University (by way of Chicago State) and, not for nothing, hails from my wife’s home town of Grand Blanc, Michigan, so I like the kid already. I did see him pitch once at camp, and he is a true slider monster, throwing a big sweeper repeatedly that looks like it should have success against lower level hitters this year. That’s clearly going to be his calling card, along with a cutter that he throws in the upper 80s.
It’s the kind of arsenal that is increasingly popular in the game today. It’s so popular, in fact, that Baseball Savant has actually designated the “sweeper” as a new pitch for the 2023 season! So Cumming is definitely part of a cool new wave in player development, and he could be a guy on the move if he’s effective at missing bats with it. He joins a pretty big group of Giants’ minor league pitchers who are slider-forward guys. One thing I noticed at Giants’ minor league camp was that while they didn’t bring huge velo in arm after arm, the Giants could really throw a staff full of breaking balls at their opponents. That seems to be a clear organizational direction at both the major and minor league levels.
With all the corner infielders the Giants have, I see a huge roadblock for Schmitt to get any time at the major league level. Short of Brandon’s knee giving out (knocking on wood), do you agree he probably will spend the year in Sacramento regardless of how well he does?
Hate to give the boring old answer, but I’ll toss this one in the “things will work themselves out” bin. Yes, the Giants have a plethora of right-handed hitting corner players, so much so that they seem to be working on their own variation of the old Steven Wright “why don’t they build the whole plane out of that black box stuff” joke (why don’t they make the whole roster out of 1b?).
But I think that’s a feature, not a bug, when it comes to the development of Casey Schmitt. It means that, barring some unfortunate injury news, they should be able to let Schmitt develop at his own pace and not be put in a situation where he’s rushed to the majors as a forced contingency (otherwise known hereabouts as the Joey Bart Plan). Schmitt has barely played about A ball, and, as I noted in the opening Minor Lines of the season, he’s shown that he still has things to work on, particularly regarding his plate discipline. If he forces the issue at some point this year, then I’m sure the Giants will be happy to find a creative solution to the roster crunch. And if that can’t happen, as Kyle Harrison said in spring, it means the team will be doing pretty well. Either way, I suspect it’s good for Casey to continue to get his reps and learn his lessons at the relatively low stakes environment of Triple A for the time being. Creaky knees and strained abductors will no doubt open opportunities sooner than we hope.
I noticed that Brett Auerbach spent a good amount of time in major league camp for a couple of spring trainings now, including this year, where he played a variety of positions over several games. Did the big league club just need an extra catcher in March, or does his positional versatility give him a reasonable path to the majors?
This is one of those “both things can be true at the same time” questions. Major league clubs in spring ALWAYS need all the catchers they can get. Go watch the early weeks of camp and you’ll see waves upon waves of bullpen sessions, stacked up five or six at a time and continuing on for hours — and every one of those pitchers getting his work in needs someone to catch. Here’s the minor league version, but trust me, when you’re jamming some 80 players into the start of big league camp, it looks much the same:
That said, there is no mistaking the love that Farhan Zaidi bears for players who can add “catcher” to the slashline of their overall skillset. During Zaidi’s time as the Dodgers’ GM, the team regularly employed Austin Barnes as a C/2b/3b, and, as the Giants have cycled through players like Yermin Mercedes, Ford Proctor, and Blake Sabol (not to mention Brett Cumberland, Andy Thomas, Rob Emery, Thomas Gavello, etc), it’s pretty clear that Zaidi’s on a continual look out for another version of the same sort of Frankenstein’s catcher to enshrine on the Giants’ roster. If Brett Auerbach proves himself capable as an offensive player against upper level minors competition, I don’t think there’s any doubt that his defensive flexibility will get him opportunities with the big club.
As always, though, the “if he proves himself capable as an offensive player” portion of that sentence is carrying an awful lot of freight.
How do you think the Giants will handle this year's Rule 5 candidates? Schmitt and Dabovich would appear to be locks, but do you think they'll push harder on the likes of Bailey, Swiney, Murphy, McDonald(?)
This is a question for a mailbag several months down the line! Honestly, as transactional as the Giants tend to be with their 40-man roster from day to day, predicting how many spots they’ll be able to reserve for their minor league inventory seven months from now is a pretty tall order. It’s going to take a full season’s worth of information to be able to make many of these calls — a year ago today, Jose Cruz, Nick Avila, and Keaton Winn wouldn’t necessarily have jumped out as obvious Rule 5 candidates after all. Who performs — and even more importantly — who is healthy will play vital roles in answering your question.
But, from this 60,000 foot view, I’d guess that Schmitt likely makes the roster at some point before the year is out, and quite possibly R.J. Dabovich does as well, if he makes some more strides with his fastball command. After that, I’d be pretty surprised if they didn’t protect Patrick Bailey, absent a real backwards step from him this year. But beyond that group, I think guys will have to force the issue with strong 2023 campaigns.
Quick prediction on the first player(s) in the system to get bumped up a level, once they've 'ticked the boxes' in their initial assignment?
Uh….quick eh? I guess Carson Whisenhunt is the easiest response. The fastball command is something he’ll be working on this year and maybe getting consistency on his breaking ball, but that changeup is going to be a real “Get Out of Jail Free” card up his sleeve whenever he’s in trouble in the Cal League. I can see him busting his way out of there fairly early. Just eye balling it, I’d guess right around the time the spring snows melt and the Pacific Northwest begins its summer warm up?
Have you heard anything on Uber Mejías recently? He still isn't in the transactions log, and I assume he would've been in Arizona (not their Dominican facilities) due to his age
I didn’t see Uber Mejías pitch while I was in Scottsdale, but he was around and I believe participated in games with the group that will be working in extended spring training. I’d expect him to be part of one of the ACL Giants’ rosters once the complex league gets going in June.
Any sense on why the organization seems to prefer Wilson at SS and Fitzgerald at 2B, when it seems clear to me that Wilson doesn’t have the ideal speed or arm for SS, whereas Fitzgerald does? I find this baffling - unless it’s some sort of asset-management situation where the Giants want to be able to say to potential trade partners “Hey look, Wilson hits well AND he’s a shortstop!” Which I guess is why they are keeping Luciano at SS even if it’s doubtful that he’s a SS in the majors? (Not that they are trying to trade him, but keeping their trade options open.)
I don’t think I can give you any more insight than your question already implies. They surely do seem to prefer Wilson at SS — virtually any time the two have shared an infield, it’s been Wilson who took the six spot. Wilson has also been the one of the pair who has been promoted more rapidly at each level. As to the “why,” I’m not sure I have a good answer for that. I will say that when given the chance to play shortstop every day in Wilson’s absence, Fitzgerald’s defensive game really grew to a new level, so perhaps getting to stay back in Richmond this spring will help Fitz continue to make defensive strides.
I will say that when I saw him last April, I thought Wilson’s arm looked much stronger than it had the year before, and I could see him at the position. Late in the year when he returned to Richmond after missing nearly two months from hamate surgery, he didn’t look like he had his legs under him fully, and the arm had less of the early season zip to it.
I guess if I really try to make sense of it, the logic is that they prioritize Wilson over Fitzgerald as a prospect in general, and thus want to develop him to his maximum potential, which would be trying to keep him at short. That evaluation no doubt has much to do with Wilson’s offensive potential and Fitzgerald’s struggles with contact. Because the Giants always want to maximize their ability to get offense from every position, keeping the guy they have the most faith in as a hitter at the most valuable defensive position makes sense. And it’s not bad for Fitzgerald, either, since his potential path to big league value really is as a jack of all trades utility man, so being familiar with lots of different positions helps him build up that portfolio.
How do you think the lower minors will be impacted by the relative lack of position players drafted the past couple of seasons?
I don’t think there’s any doubt that the position player inventory at the low levels is somewhat thin. With so many players starting the year in rehab, it was almost a daily act of creativity for the team to fill out four lineups every day in minor league camp. And while I think Jose Ramos really did impress the heck out of the Giants’ evaluators, part of the reason he’s jumping from the DSL to Low A certainly has to do with a lack of middle infield options for the level — especially in the wake of Anthony Rodriguez’ injury.
The real question for me is: what are they going to do if there are more injuries once the season starts. Outfield is pretty well covered, but injuries in the San Jose or Eugene infield could cause some folks to learn a new position on the fly! And I think this could impact the organization’s ability to promote some players in the low levels as well.
I don’t want to sound over-dramatic. The two A ball rosters are fully covered for now with five, fairly versatile infielders apiece. But if guys go down from here? The only player I see in extended in a position to come up and take a roster spot is Dilan Rosario or maaaaybe Elian Rayo. Let’s hope for some hitters in this year’s draft!
After restructuring the minor leagues a few years ago and now cutting down the number of players an org can carry on their domestic milb rosters, can you speak to why mlb continues to shrink the farm system?
Is it just money? Cause that just seems crazy.
Yeah, it’s just money. And what’s worse, it’s just money that only SOME organizations are concerned about saving. But those same organizations are dead set against other organizations having the option to spend more if they so choose. It’s very much a lowest common denominator way of thinking. If you want to get a real inside view of how much clubs think about saving money, I’d recommend reading Evan Drellich’s Winning Fixes Everything (the book has some issues, but I do think it’s a worthwhile read for anybody who cares about the current state of the game).
A (yearly) question & a rant...the rant is why does MLB have the Giants playing consecutive series with a day off in between games? Freaking beyond stupid.
My question is checking in on Carson Ragsdale & Rohan Handa. Any updates? I think Ragsdale has begun to throw, but no clue about Handa
I know this scheduling quirk drives my west coast friends mad, but as a long-time denizen of the east coast, I can tell you that those early off days come into play VERY OFTEN, thanks to the cold, rainy, early spring weather in the northeast. They are essentially built in weather postponement buffers and they save schedulers headaches every year. Imagine the Giants having to find an off day later in the year to get back to New York or Chicago to replay one of these six games (and it seems like the entire Chicago series did dodge weather). Annoying, but useful!
As for your question, Carson Ragsdale is throwing great and is built up as well as anybody else in the system. He should be ready to go as a member of Eugene’s starting rotation — and he could well be the best pitcher on that staff. Rohan Handa remains in a frustrating holding pattern, still working his way through rehab from last year’s shoulder surgery. Handa spent all of 2022 working to get back on the field, but he finally underwent surgery late in the year, and is now working his way back. As for Seth Corry (who you also asked about), he’s also recovering from a fairly serious shoulder surgery. If all goes well, perhaps we’ll see him later in the summer when the ACL starts up.
Is there any intel on what happened to Mikulski? It’s like the college guy was swapped out for someone completely different.
Yeah, Freaky Friday for sure. He was barely scraping 90 again this spring. I really have no explanation for his downward path. Stuff backs up sometimes but his backup has really been a whopper. Would love to see him gain some of those ticks back again.
If he can stay healthy, should we be getting pretty excited about Melvin Adon.
I’m excited that he’s made it back from such a difficult rehab and is throwing well again. He turns 29 in a couple of months, so I wouldn’t expect him to be a “young core” type player, but turning into a useful big leaguer would be a really inspirational tale. So….yes?
Having just seen Volpe debut, do you think the Giants have an aversion to drafting HS talents at top of board? Would they have gone for say Holliiday or Jones if given opportunity last year? Current draft prospect list has a clutch of HS around Giants first pick.
I’d probably use the term “proclivity for” rather than “aversion to.” The Giants do occasionally dip into the high school stock in the first round (Heliot Ramos, Christian Arroyo), but there’s a pretty long and clear organizational tilt towards college players, especially now that the team is highly model driven in its draft process. College players come with greater stores of data and longer track records. There’s more certainty there. Still, don’t think people inside the org don’t recognize that Corbin Carroll went off the board a few picks after Hunter Bishop, and don’t think it doesn’t sting just a little bit to see their divergent paths.
After reading Kyle Haines' interview with Melissa Lockard on The Athletic, it appears the Giants are internally a lot higher than the national consensus about their farm system quality. In your eyes, having just seen a lot of them in camp this spring, does that ring true for you?
So, there’s an answer I want to give to this question that I’m afraid is going to sound like spin, or blowing smoke up your orifices, but I promise I don’t mean it that way.
I think it’s important to understand that Player Development people are in the optimism business. It is a core element of their purpose. Their jobs are to help build confidence in young players. To give them the support they need to believe in the best versions of themselves. In a game and a world that is a non-stop negativity generator, they need to help put players in the kind of positive frame of mind that is conducive to growth. For all of the data and technology that has enveloped the prospect world, people skills are still the critical path to success.
And that’s not just true for the big prospect names. Pete Putila has talked about the key to the Astros success being treating the last guy on the last roster as a future big leaguer. That’s how you develop Framber Valdez and Cristian Javier. And it’s how you develop David Villar. By first and foremost believing that path exists for them.
That’s not to say that some of the things you’ll hear from Farm Directors (or General Managers or President of Baseball Ops for that matter) isn’t spin. Smoke gets blown around the game for sure. But most of the time, when you hear Haines or his colleagues in other organizations talk about their players, you’re listening to people for whom belief in potential is a fundamental professional skill from which all other skills bloom. And that belief can, in turn, create reality. You get big leaguers by believing young players have a legitimate path to the big league.
Taking this a step further, I think most baseball fans would be shocked to know how many future big leaguers exist in the minors. Kyle Glazer at Baseball America has studied this in various ways over the past few years, and he’s found that, on average, 110 future big league All Stars are in the minor leagues in any given season. 110! Remember that next time you see a Top 100 list and think it encompasses all of the talent in the minors.
Lowering the bar a little bit, Glazer examined every team’s farm system over a 15-year period (1998-2012) and found that teams had an average of 35 players in their farm system each year who would go on to appear in the majors, and about 11 who would have careers of at least 1,500 AB, 450 IP, or 150 appearances as a relief pitcher. That’s every year and every farm system, 35 and 11 (plus about three future All Stars!). And those numbers weren’t pulled up by a few super orgs. There were very few instances of any team having more than 50 future big leaguers in their system in a given year, and even fewer instances of teams having fewer than 20. In outcomes, the distance between the best and worst farm systems is much narrower than popular sentiment would have it. So whenever you hear someone opine that some specific system is totally barren of talent, mentally register an objection. It’s not true. Every org has players who will turn into everyday starters, valuable complementary players, even stars someday — not to mention the kind of talent that can help clubs pick up a needed relief arm or bench bat in a pennant chase.
All of which is to say that too much of prospect discussion gets pushed to extremes that don’t really make much sense in the hard work of player development. Yes, the Giants hope to produce a full roster of talent that might rival the Braves’ core, or become a pitching factory that can be spoken in the same sentence as Cleveland. They’d love to engender the kind of scouting buzz over new discoveries that every trip to the Dodgers’ complex at Camelback seems to provide. They aren’t there yet.
But they are getting into a place where their affiliates, pretty much from top to bottom, are running out decent groups of prospects at most positions on the field. And, crucially, that’s becoming more true at the upper levels, which have been so thin in recent years. For the first time in a long while, Sacramento and Richmond will be important sites of prospect development — much more so than San Jose this year. The depth is increasing. That’s why I do a Top 50 and not a Top 30 — because I can legitimately see paths to some big league success for the guys I’m wrestling with down at #49 and 50 (and even off the list). That doesn’t mean all of those guys will make it, but I do think they have the opportunity to do so.
My advice would be to stop worrying about “national consensus” — the real national writers know that there’s at least some talent to be found everywhere, and if you hear anything else, know that it says more about the speaker than about the subject. Real talent is making its way up to the top of the Giants’ system, and that should be a source of faith and optimism for you, too. Will it all reach its potential? Sadly, the world doesn’t work that way most of the time. But some of it will … and that’s a happy thought.
And with that lengthy answer, I think I’ve hit my pitch count. We’ll pick things up with the next Mailbag, coming…. well…whenever popular appeal directs. Let me know how frequently you’d like to see these during the year. We’ll look to establish Tuesdays as the normal Mailbag day. Thanks for all the great questions, everybody! And enjoy opening night!
Loved the final discussion on farm systems, I learnt a lot.
Mailbag is a great feature!...very enjoyable along with "What We Learned" articles. Widening and narrowing the scope of discussion always makes for an interesting read here at ThereRGiants.
Thanks, Rog!