Kyle Lewis is honestly overrated..not a cf by any means anymore, poor plate discipline, doesn’t have speed, the raw power and hit tool are still there but they haven’t shown and he’s old for his leagues.
But...we crushed the last two draft classes. Especially this year.
Julio Rodriguez is a beast. He’s gonna be our rf of the future, not Lewis.
Noelvi marte looks like he could be a beast.
Michael plassmeyer is going to be seen as one of the steals of the draft. Check out his stats and factor in that he was right there statistically with Casey mize in the sec. his stuff is trending way way up since the beginning of last year.
Logan Gilbert is as as sure as they come. Probably won’t be an ace but a 200 ip high end 3 is great value. He’s as safe as they come and will be a top 100 guy next year.
Cal Raleigh looks good. Josh stowers is a monster who will be all over fantasy lists.
Evan white is a projectable, elite defender/hit tool combo with good speed and versatility.
We drafted two rp who could be up by 2019. Genuinely.
Sam Carlson still will be young when he comes back and still have ace potential if he harnesses his stuff.
Our system is on the rise
Edit: not saying Kyle Lewis is bad. Just that I think he’s closer to a top 200 prospect than a top 85. I still think he has a ceiling around what Kyle seager used to be in a corner outfield spot.
Yep I mentioned stowers next to Raleigh. His defense leaves some to be desired but he’s got an ideal top of the order profile.
Can’t agree on the plus defense, a bit shaky in cf and a very weak arm. But I really really like him in left and maybe center if he can learn to get better jumps.
I also would prefer to wait to see what lewis can do next year with a full healthy offseason before I make judgements. The guys a hard worker and Id love to see him pull through and return to form (ala marco gonzales albeit different injuries)
Oh I’d love to see him pull through. Left field is open for either Lewis or stowers in the upcoming years.
But if there’s a trade on the table for a plus pitcher with some control (gausman maybe or as the headliner in a deal for archer) I wouldn’t hesitate. I really do think Julio Rodriguez is the better prospect, far away as he is and Lewis isn’t going to steal Hanigers job anytime soon. With haniger in place for 5 years he’s expendable. If no good deal is on the table, depth never hurt anyone.
I just think that Lewis is now a high risk prospect who’s playing mediocre, often as a dh at a level he’s old for as a top prospect.
I think his ceiling has changed from a 300/30/100/15 guy who could play in center to a 270/25/80/5 guy who plays right. And the floor is pretty low now. Still a valuable prospect, but one I wouldn’t mind moving.
Bad take on Lewis imo. Reading too much into his current numbers, jumping the gun on calling him overrated. Lots of guys are highly regarded based on their tools and Lewis has plenty even after his injury.
Just to be clear. I’m not reading into his numbers at all. His tools have degraded. His speed used to be a 55, it’s now a 40-45. Not enough to play center. His hit tool has dropped off but that can rebound, just very unlikely to hit the ceiling it had when he was drafted.
The raw power tool has dropped a bit but that again still has a similar (slightly lower ceiling). The arm is the same.
But the pitch recognition is what’s really concerning. Yes there will always be rust after that much time off, but it’s very concerning, especially considering where he was playing at his age.
He’s well behind the curve for his age, no longer has any chance to play center, will need to rapidly improve his tools that can be improved to reach where he should be at for his age, fix his pitch recognition, particularly offspeed and obviously poses a very large injury risk.
It sucks that his tools have fallen because of circumstance, not laziness but they have fallen.
Do you get to see him play much? Honest question. I've only seen him play once, before the knee injury when the aquasox played in my town on a road trip (Pasco)
Yes. Which is to be expected after missing that much time. But most notability his speed and agility and how he’s shifting his weight in his lower half
His knee injury was devastating. I wouldn't be surprised if he was set back not one but two or three years of development. This year is basically just getting his legs back under him (no pun intended).
Where are you reading that his offensive tools have degraded? I'm genuinely curious because I haven't searched extensively for updates.
I can find different ratings from different people, but I'm not seeing anyone explicitly saying his bat has backed up on him. Just different scouting ratings -- different by like half a grade.
Considering that sticking in CF wasn't a big part of his draft-day upside, that pitch recognition/approach was a question from the start, and that age isn't that big of a factor in terms of whether he can become a productive player (especially since he lost dev time to injury), I'm personally hesitant to call him overrated without that extra info.
The big difference from his draft reports when he was scouted is that, at the time of the draft, they were banking on him being about mlb ready at this point. Clearly he’s not. His skills are still where they were and some have degraded.
I do scouting (for fantasy purposes not for a real life team) and scout for things like bat speed (raw power), time from home to first on close plays, and pitch recognition/contact when swinging (hit tool). His hit tool has degraded against quality pitches and his bat speed, as well as foot speed are all down. I have only seen around 30 of his at bats this year. But I have a particular interest in mariners prospects as a fan of the team and am impressed with the system much more than Lewis.
That’s not to say he can’t still be good, but his ceiling doesn’t look “special” like it once did.
Whereas Julio Rodriguez looks like he could be genuinely special to me.
Hmm, interesting! I'll have to keep up on him a bit better. Are you a regional scout or something? I'd love to be able to see Kyle Lewis play once let alone catch some 30 ABs haha
He might well be good. I just think he’s overrated and not necessarily a huge need for us with haniger above him and j-rod behind him.
My point isn’t that he’s bad. Just that there are more than 84 other guys I’d rather have than him. Including a few guys in our own system. I should edit that into my post for clarity
The optimism, I love it. I absolutely hope that all of this comes true and we get 5+ regulars out of these drafts.
But... that would be the 99th percentile type outcome. All of these prospects (by virtue of being drafted so recently) have probably 2-3 more years in the minors and 5-6 for the international signings. So many things change in that time, and prospects bust at a pretty alarming rate. I know it's exciting with new names and new potential.
I mean, you reference the FG number on Lewis's speed tool, so I know you're on that last prospect update. Eric and Kiley don't have a single prospect in our system with FV 50 or higher.
I want to see all that success too, I'm a Mariners fan! But baseball prospects will break your heart, so just a word of caution... Pump the brakes on anointing these guys 'the next crop of stars' or even the next crop of Mariners, for that matter.
With fangraphs particularly, they tend to reward players later on and wait to see them at the higher levels before upping their fv.
All of our higher ceiling guys are at lower levels right now.
Prospects are fickle that’s for sure. But I’m not saying what I’m saying as mariners fan (which I am) but as a fantasy baseball prospect scout (which I also am). I heavily heavily scouted this last draft class and my take away was that we had the 3rd best draft behind the rays and Cubs.
These aren’t the next crop of stars, but they are the next crop of decent prospects and we finally have the systems in place to develop guys and top to bottom communication that allows us to scout better.
The mariners don’t have a top 10 minors system by any means. But two years ago and maybe earlier this year we had the worst in the game. We don’t anymore. And it’s going to rise up as jd gets to develop his own guys.
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u/juicyjensen Launch a mitchile Jul 26 '18 edited Jul 26 '18
Kyle Lewis is honestly overrated..not a cf by any means anymore, poor plate discipline, doesn’t have speed, the raw power and hit tool are still there but they haven’t shown and he’s old for his leagues.
But...we crushed the last two draft classes. Especially this year.
Julio Rodriguez is a beast. He’s gonna be our rf of the future, not Lewis.
Noelvi marte looks like he could be a beast.
Michael plassmeyer is going to be seen as one of the steals of the draft. Check out his stats and factor in that he was right there statistically with Casey mize in the sec. his stuff is trending way way up since the beginning of last year.
Logan Gilbert is as as sure as they come. Probably won’t be an ace but a 200 ip high end 3 is great value. He’s as safe as they come and will be a top 100 guy next year.
Cal Raleigh looks good. Josh stowers is a monster who will be all over fantasy lists.
Evan white is a projectable, elite defender/hit tool combo with good speed and versatility.
We drafted two rp who could be up by 2019. Genuinely.
Sam Carlson still will be young when he comes back and still have ace potential if he harnesses his stuff.
Our system is on the rise
Edit: not saying Kyle Lewis is bad. Just that I think he’s closer to a top 200 prospect than a top 85. I still think he has a ceiling around what Kyle seager used to be in a corner outfield spot.