Ok, I'm tossing out this post about some of the top guys sitting in the brewers farm system right now. The draft is coming up and we have about two months to get something done before we have to decide to run a fire sale on a couple guys or keep them around for a pennant race.
The number one prospect in the brewers farm system right now is Matt LaPorta. LaPorta was the Brewers number one pick from last year. He was drafted as a first basemen and was moved to the outfield. LaPorta is playing at AA Huntsville and he's absolutely tearing the cover off the ball right now. There's been a lot of talk about LaPorta being called up for interleague to DH for the crew. The 22 year old is hitting .328 with an OPS of 1.104 in 128 at bats this year. He has 10 dingers, 12 doubles and 38 RBI's. These stats are all pretty impressive, however I think the stat that stands out he most for LaPorta is the fact that his BB:K ratio is almost 1:1. He has 20 walks to go with only 23 strikeouts this year. LaPorta is probably less of a threat to steal a base than Prince Fielder, if that's any indication of his speed. The biggest question mark about the young man is where he's going to play when he does get called up. He's been playing almost exclusively in left or right field where we currently have Ryan Braun and Corey Hart, who more than likely aren't going anywhere in the near future. LaPorta does have experience at first, but as of yet the Brewers haven't had him play there. There will have to be some moves made before LaPorta finds a permanent job up at the big league level.
If you think LaPorta's numbers for AA are good, check out Mat Gamel. This kid is on fire, he's batting .372 with a 1.1o5 OPS in 148 at bats. He has 8 bombs, 33 RBIs, 5 triples, 10 doubles. He's been running with a 2:3 BB:K ratio, which is also some pretty good plate discipline, just like LaPorta's shown. Here's the exciting part, he bats lefty. Unfortunately the kid's fielding ability at third is worse than Ryan Braun, as difficult as that might be to comprehend. He's only 22, so one would assume he probably has about two more years of minor league ball to get that whole, ball goes into glove, throw ball to first thing figured out. We got Billy Hall for another two years after this year, so we're not "hard" pressed to move Gamel up that quickly. However if Hall keeps striking out and playing mediocre baseball behind the plate, the urgency might be greater than it is right now.
Alcides Escobar is another double A'er on the list. He's the 21 year old shortstop that was making a lot of noise during spring training with his slick glove. He made a couple of SportsCenter's top ten plays of the day during his time playing with the big boys. Escobar started off the year behind the plate just terribly, hitting below the Mendoza line for the first few weeks. Escobar has seemingly found his bat again and gotten his average up to .263. He's got some speed, but not a lot of power or patience at the plate right now. We have Hardy at SS and I really feel like these guys are almost the same exact players, so I guess it would be a matter of when Escobar is ready to play and who the Brewers feel like moving, whether it be by trading or just unable to retain their current guys.
The number four guy on our list is pitcher Jeremy Jeffress. This kid has a lot of potential going 9-5 last year with an ERA of 3.13 and getting 95 K's in just 86 and a third innings pitched for single A West Virginia. His fastball regularly hits the mid to upper 90's range and he has a nasty slider. Unfortunately the 20 year old Mr. Jeffress was slapped with a 50 game suspension at the end of last August for testing positive for a banned substance. He should be coming off that ban sometime in the next week or two, so it will be interesting to see where he ends up playing and if he will continue this kind of pitching at the next level of the minors.
Popping in at number 5 is our catcher at the AA level, Angel Salome. Salome was also suspended for 50 games last year in July. His suspension came about about 3 weeks ago and he's been on a tear since then. In 72 at bats the 21 year old has hit .403 with a couple of home runs and 15 RBI's. He seems to be a fan of fanning with 15 K's in 72 at bats, but that's probably actually pretty good for an every day player in the Brewers system, but he has time to improve seeing as he's only 21 years old.
I'm lumping the next two guys together because I'm sick of talking about our outfielding prospects playing in AA ball. Seriously, we have a shit ton of potential sitting down there. Cole Gillespie(probably no relation to my old gym teacher Penny), 23 and Michael Brantley, 20. Gillespie is one of those potential 5 tool guys when he's got his wood working for him. Good power, he can hit for average well enough, and has some speed. Brantley is the brewers center fielder down in Huntsville and he is a speed demon. He's hitting .328 with an OBP of over .400 from the left side of the plate. He doesn't hit for a lot of power, but he's already got 11 stolen bases on the year, this guy definitely brings a different dynamic than the other two outfielders he's playing with right now.
Zach Braddock, the kid has shown some lights out talent at the rookie league and lower level A league in the last two years. He's had huge K rates and has been moved up to the higher single A squad in Brevard County. He's only had a few starts in Brevard, but he's been roughed up a bit since the move up. Braddock only pitched about half the year in 2007 because of an un-named injury. He had Tommy John surgery in 2004, but it's unclear as to whether or not there was any connection between the two injuries. He was an 18th round draft pick in 2005 and he's only 20 years old.
This next prospect is probably going to be the most interesting one for anyone reading this blog that has payed attention to the Brewers in the last few weeks. The 25 year old is the current closer at AAA Nashville and apparently he's been pretty decent at converting save opportunities on his way up. Unfortunately the Sounds are playing terrible this year, so there really hasn't been that many save chances for Pena. Throughout his minor league career his ERA has been around 2 and his whip's been about 1, which seems like pretty solid numbers for a closer. He's been roughed up a bit this year, but that could possibly be chalked up to coming into games in non-save situations, which closers notoriously have issues with.
We have a bunch of catchers floating around at all three levels of our systems, so its somewhat encouraging that one of them should end up working out. We have a lot of outfielders and a few infielders hanging around who could be ready within the next two years. The biggest red flag I see right now is pitching prospects. The guys we have that are really "wowing" people are all sitting down at the single and double A area, not up at AAA with aspirations of making the jump. Also, and I hate to say this because I've been saying the exact opposite of this for the last 3 months, but it looks like if we had to make a decision between keeping Fielder or Braun(which we will have to) it might make more sense to keep Fielder than Braun because of our current prospects in the outfield and at third. Of course we could always try and move LaPorta back to first down in AA so that in 2 years we can dump the son of the fattest man in Major League Baseball history off on some AL team so he can do what he was destined to do from day one of entering the league, DH.
I wouldn't be too surprised to see us make some moves with the glut of players we have at the outfield position. A few more of those Gabe Gross for Josh Butler deals could be coming to try and load up our farm system with enough arms so that pure percentages says we'll at least get two major league pitchers out of all of them.
