2012 MiLB ST thread

[Tedaldtada]

Yeah, I really can't believe they've got him stateside already. This Brewers MiLB season is going to be a lot more interesting to follow than last season imo.

 

Tons of interesting hitters on their way towards full season ball. Even someone like Kenny Allison is worth at least paying attention to. From the pictures, Ozuna and Reed both look the part.

[TooLiveBrew]

If it was not for Rivera, after the way they have been aggressive with him, it would have not shocked me for him to start in Wisconsin. With Rivera there and needing to play everyday, I think he starts at Helena but is the first call him Rivera has to miss time.

Talk about culture shock -- from the D.R. to Helena, MT. I'm not sure the typically-uber-cautious Brewers will start Arcia in Helena; it'd seem to fit their (at times painfully-) slow approach to start him in the AZL league.

[YoungGeezy]

They did it with Alcides at 17....

 

Love the mention of Kenny Allison! I got to see him play and i cant stop thinking Lo Cain. A stretch but kid has talent

[Mass Haas]

Sounds' blog photos

[Mass Haas]

With a new month today, use your first J-S free visit to view the Peanuts and Cracker Jack blog, scroll down for nice articles on the Latin transition program and Jalen Harris.

[TheCrew07]

They did it with Alcides at 17....

 

Love the mention of Kenny Allison! I got to see him play and i cant stop thinking Lo Cain. A stretch but kid has talent

 

I think it was pretty obvious that Arcia was going to play in Helena or better this season based on what he did at such a young age in the DSL and his family's bloodlines. Obviously he's one of my favorites, but I did try to be objective when doing my user P50 and talking about his placement. I believed people would come around on him then, and I still do. I placed him where I did because talent wise I couldn't justify placing him any lower to myself.

 

The Brewers under Melvin have been much more likely to push hitters rather pitchers, I don't think this is a surprise and I hate to keep point it out but it's not even unprecedented as Escobar played in Helena as a 17 year old. Without rehashing the entire promotion debate from last season I'll just say that I'm a progression guy. Regardless of position or draft/signing status, or results on the field, every prospect should have progression mapped out for them so they know exactly what they need to be working on and what goals they need to reach to be promoted to the next level. After all, if the young men aren't improving everyday they are losing ground because someone out there is taking that next step forward.

 

I don't have any problem with the pitching progression the team has set up and Tunnell has talked about in various interviews over the years. I think it's a good idea that players hit a certain benchmark before earning a promotion. While every player's goal is to make the show, from experience I'd say most young men aren't very good at goal setting, and a progression system kind of makes it easy for them, setting up incremental goals. For example, I hear all the time on the football side that a player's goal is to be all-conference at X position. When I ask, "How do you get there?" the answer is usually something stat related. Well yes that's the ultimate result, but what I'm really asking is what areas of your game do you have specifically improve on to obtain your goal? Many times they've never even thought about it, running backs just want to score TDs but don't realize how many yards they leave on the field because they missed the hole, read the block wrong, let one defender tackle them, and so on. That's why I'm really into the "Tunnell System" for lack of a better term. Concentrate on fastball command, once they got that move onto breaking stuff, then holding runners, etc. It makes sense to me and it's the way I tend to go about coaching... we just keep working through the technique progressions because I don't have much time for 1 on 1s and every kid is going to be a different place along that path. Give the young men incremental goals and keep them moving forward towards something all the time.

 

I'd like to think they are doing the same thing with the hitters both offensively and defensively, but my gut tells me they aren't and that progression for position players is driven entirely by the offensive side of the game. We've had too many woefully deficient prospects in one area or another (defensively mostly) come up to the major leagues. I'm not talking about holding players down in the minors to be finished products, because I don't think that's a realistic goal, players are really never finished progressing or they end up out of the game. I just don't think it takes much to be competent defender, it's all just "want to"... it can take longer to learn how to take pitches and be more selective at the plate, but fielding fundamentals are pretty basic. Fielding should be the easy part of being a MLB player, it's just you, the ball, and the field. There's no mind games with another player... just catch the ball and throw it the appropriate base, it's as straightforward as baseball gets.