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Saturday, March 18, 2006
 
top prospects: tigers
dave dombrowski. wherever he goes, he builds a strong farm system. now he's got the tigers. they used to be crap. how are they now?


1. Justin Verlander, rhp
2. Joel Zumaya, rhp
3. Cameron Maybin, of
4. Brent Clevlen, of
5. Wilkin Ramirez, 3b
6. Humberto Sanchez, rhp
7. Jordan Tata, rhp
8. Tony Giarratano, ss
9. Jeff Larish, 1b
10. Kevin Whelan, rhp


i'm supposed to say something here. i mean, i can't just launch right into the player analysis.

how are you?


Career Pitching Statistics for Justin Verlander:
Year Team Lg. Age Org Lvl IP H HR BB SO WAL CON HRP ERA
2002 Old Dominion NCAA 19 0 NCA 113.0 83 2 43 137 .092 .675 .007 1.91
2003 Old Dominion NCAA 20 0 NCA 116.1 94 2 43 139 .088 .686 .007 2.40
2004 Old Dominion NCAA 21 0 NCA 105.2 90 8 43 151 .096 .629 .031 3.49
2005 Lakeland FSL 22 Det A 86.0 70 3 19 104 .055 .683 .013 1.67
2005 Erie East 22 Det AA 32.2 11 1 7 32 .060 .706 .013 0.28
2005 Detroit Tige AL 22 Det MLB 11.1 15 1 5 7 .093 .857 .024 7.15


justin verlander killed everyone at old dominion. then he didn't have anyone to play baseball with. that was silly.

yeah. in his first season of professional baseball, justin verlander skipped straight to high-a. then he pitched in double-a, and was unchallenged. then he pitched in the majors.

what do you want me to say. he's good.


Career Pitching Statistics for Joel Zumaya:
Year Team Lg. Age Org Lvl IP H HR BB SO WAL CON HRP ERA
2002 GCL Tigers GCL 17 Det Rk 37.1 21 2 11 46 .076 .654 .023 1.93
2003 West Michiga Midw 18 Det A 90.1 69 3 38 126 .101 .629 .014 2.79
2004 Lakeland FSL 19 Det A 115.2 90 10 58 108 .117 .753 .030 4.36
2004 Erie East 19 Det AA 20.0 19 6 10 29 .112 .633 .120 6.30
2005 Erie East 20 Det AA 107.1 71 8 52 143 .117 .636 .032 2.77
2005 Toledo IL 20 Det AAA 44.0 30 2 24 56 .129 .654 .019 2.66


joel zumaya is young, and he strikes people out. by the boatload. but he's got a little problem with walks. he's got enough juice to be effective anyway.


Career Batting Statistics for Cameron Maybin:


yep, that's right. we have no data on cameron maybin. he was drafted out of high school last year. he's apparently very talented.


Career Batting Statistics for Brent Clevlen:
Year Team Lg. Age Org Lvl AAB W K HR 23 WAL CON POW AVG
2002 GCL Tigers GCL 18 Det Rk 105 8 24 3 5 .071 .771 .099 .330
2003 West Michiga Midw 19 Det A 484 76 111 12 29 .136 .771 .110 .260
2004 Lakeland FSL 20 Det A 425 48 127 6 29 .101 .701 .117 .224
2005 Lakeland FSL 21 Det A 496 70 118 18 32 .124 .762 .132 .302


so far, the detroit farm system is looking pretty thin. brent clevlen repeated a level, and he still has trouble making contact. and his power is only good, not great. the one thing in his favor is he's reasonably patient. patient hitters often show improvement. but he's got a long way to go.


Career Batting Statistics for Wilkin Ramirez:
Year Team Lg. Age Org Lvl AAB W K HR 23 WAL CON POW AVG
2003 GCL Tigers GCL 17 Det Rk 201 14 51 5 13 .065 .746 .120 .275
2005 West Michiga Midw 19 Det A 498 42 143 16 23 .078 .713 .110 .262


what happened to him in 2004? did he get hurt, or is that year missing? we get our data from the baseball cube. occasionally there are errors.

but anyway what can we say about this 2005 season? it's terrible. low patience, terrible contact. . . . decent power, but terrible contact. why is he a prospect?

i guess baseball america's doing that thing they do where if there are no good prospects in the upper levels they pick some young guys. you might as well. young players improve, sometimes by a lot. all we can do with wilkin is wait and see.


Career Pitching Statistics for Humberto Sanchez:
Year Team Lg. Age Org Lvl IP H HR BB SO WAL CON HRP ERA
2002 Oneonta NYPL 19 Det A 32.1 29 1 21 26 .143 .794 .010 3.62
2003 West Michiga Midw 20 Det A 116.0 107 3 78 96 .146 .789 .008 4.42
2004 Lakeland FSL 21 Det A 105.1 103 9 51 115 .109 .726 .030 5.21
2004 Erie East 21 Det AA 12.2 10 1 6 15 .111 .688 .030 2.13
2005 Erie East 22 Det AA 64.2 72 10 27 65 .092 .756 .050 5.57


ok, this is not a good farm system. humberto sanchez is decent, but not great. his stuff is not dominant, and his control is not good. and he's had some trouble with the long ball. i don't think he's gonna make it.


Career Pitching Statistics for Jordan Tata:
Year Team Lg. Age Org Lvl IP H HR BB SO WAL CON HRP ERA
2002 Sam Houston NCAA 20 0 NCA 77.0 92 6 37 40 .103 .876 .021 5.38
2003 Sam Houston NCAA 21 0 NCA 75.1 93 4 32 62 .091 .806 .016 5.62
2003 Oneonta NYPL 21 Det A 73.1 64 1 20 60 .066 .789 .004 2.58
2004 West Michiga Midw 22 Det A 166.1 167 7 68 116 .093 .826 .013 3.35
2005 Lakeland FSL 24 Det A 155.0 138 12 41 134 .064 .778 .026 2.79


what a surprise, he's not very good. the control is pretty good, but the strikeouts are not. and he's old. 24 in a-ball.

a few years ago i was like "with dave dombrowski, the tigers will definitely contend." but has he lost it? what's going on, exactly? is it bad luck?

i wish i knew. i wish i knew.

no, don't say it's ok. it's not ok.


Career Batting Statistics for Tony Giarratano:
Year Team Lg. Age Org Lvl AAB W K HR 23 WAL CON POW AVG
2001 Tulane U. NCAA 18 0 NCA 265 41 37 3 14 .134 .860 .075 .352
2002 Tulane U. NCAA 19 0 NCA 173 22 27 2 8 .113 .844 .068 .238
2003 Tulane U. NCAA 20 0 NCA 275 27 33 8 20 .089 .880 .116 .336
2003 Oneonta NYPL 20 Det A 192 14 22 3 15 .068 .885 .106 .328
2004 West Michiga Midw 21 Det A 166 27 22 1 7 .140 .867 .056 .285
2004 Lakeland FSL 21 Det A 204 17 38 5 11 .077 .814 .096 .376
2005 Erie East 22 Det AA 349 37 75 3 25 .096 .785 .102 .266
2005 Detroit Tige AL 22 Det MLB 42 5 7 1 0 .106 .833 .029 .143


tony giarratano is, as they say in the streets, not very good. he lacks contact, and power. he's a shortstop, so he can get away with not mashing, but his hitting is terrible. his defense is good, but his hitting is terrible.

this is gettin kind of fun, trashing prospects.


Career Batting Statistics for Jeff Larish:
Year Team Lg. Age Org Lvl AAB W K HR 23 WAL CON POW AVG
2002 Arizona Stat NCAA 19 0 NCA 130 29 19 3 7 .182 .854 .090 .328
2003 Arizona Stat NCAA 20 0 NCA 240 84 42 18 20 .259 .825 .192 .372
2004 Arizona Stat NCAA 21 0 NCA 239 36 50 7 17 .131 .791 .127 .308
2005 Arizona Stat NCAA 22 0 NCA 253 64 60 23 19 .202 .763 .218 .324
2005 GCL Tigers GCL 22 Det Rk 19 5 5 0 1 .208 .737 .071 .222
2005 Oneonta NYPL 22 Det A 64 15 6 6 3 .190 .906 .155 .297


no, it's never fun.

where were we? this guy sucks. he couldn't even make contact in arizona, in college. ha! what a piece of crap!

i like that 2003 line: 84 walks, 240 at-bats. somehow his contact went down as he got older. how'd that happen?

finally, we get to piss on kevin whelan.


Career Pitching Statistics for Kevin Whelan:
Year Team Lg. Age Org Lvl IP H HR BB SO WAL CON HRP ERA
2004 Texas AM U. NCAA 0 0 NCA 8.2 7 0 4 11 .108 .667 .000 4.15
2005 Texas AM U. NCAA 0 0 NCA 31.0 21 1 20 40 .149 .649 .014 2.90
2005 Oneonta NYPL 0 Det A 12.0 2 1 6 19 .136 .500 .053 2.25
2005 West Michiga Midw 0 Det A 12.1 4 0 2 22 .047 .463 .000 0.73


he's, like, never played, or something. what the hell?

the numbers we have are ridiculous. cons of .463 and .500. 12 innings is not a meaningful sample size, but it's still a lot of strikeouts.

so that's something.

wow, what a disappointment. i can no longer go around saying dave dombrowski is good. i have to say he sucks. this is really getting me down. i mean, have we no heroes any more? what is the world coming to?

i have to go before i start crying.

too late.
Comments:
Crack is wack. Just say no. Also, don't knock Dombrowski.

Maybe you should learn to read before you attempt to criticize. Also, you may also want to do a little research instead of just reading stat lines to form conclusions.

From the article you ripped, "Baseball America's Top 10 Prospects lists are based on projections of a player's long-term worth after discussions with scouting and player-development personnel. All players who haven't exceeded the major league rookie standards of 130 at-bats or 50 innings pitched (without regard to service time) are eligible. Ages are as of April 1, 2006."

See that, "after discussions with scouting and player-development personnel." That means people who are a whole lot smarter than you.

Even if the Tiger's farm looks thin on the surface, you still cannot criticize Dombrowski for the job he has done. Do you even watch the Tigers, or do you just read minor league box scores?

If you had watched any games over the last 2 years then you could have seen that it was blindingly obvious last year that the Tigers were 2 starting pitchers, a center fielder, and 2 setup men away from being a decent team.

Login/Monroe were not the answer in center and either JJ or Robertson needed to be replaced along with a 5th starter. Also, after trading Farnsworth and Urbina they needed some arms to setup for Rodney (instead they got an aging but so far effective closer and a stud setup man). Who could have guessed how big a difference Leyland would make? Tram's only real problem was managing pitchers; apparently there was more wrong with the rest of the staff than anyone could have guessed.

Obviously no one saw this start coming, but Dombrowski has built this team, # 1 in MLB, and has begun populating the minors with quality players.

I love when it when little ignorant people with big mouths get put in their place, and Dombrowski has done that over the first 40+ games.
 
5'10" isn't that little.
 
Nice analysis. Looks like you are wrong on 8 out of 10.
 
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