OFFSEASON ROSTER EVALUATION: Starting Pitchers
Game Date: November 1, 2000
First, the offseason awards have started. I let the AI select award winners for the first 99 years of Republican League history, and I see no reason to change that now.
The Frontier League Most Outstanding Rookie Award goes to
Tony Aliaga, the 24yo defensively challenged OF for the Texas Drillers. Aliaga hit 336/393/488 in 110 games after being signed out of the Dominican Republican in May.
For the Metropolitan League, the 2000 Most Outstanding Rookie the Georgia Rebels’ 25yo 3B
George Decker, who hit 301/384/546 with 31 HR in 137 games. Decker, chosen in the 16th round in 1996, is already a Rebels’ fan favorite, but slumped badly in the League Championship Series against Pennsylvania.
POSITION REPORT: Starting Pitchers
(All ratings by
Stan Johnson, Scouting Director for the North Carolina Aeros. I’ll give actual ratings for big-league veterans, potential ratings for prospects, and both for the handful of prospects finishing their development in the big leagues.)
As an organization, we have just a tiny bit of young starting pitching talent, some of whom are already proving themselves on the big-league stage, but beyond that there is absolutely no organizational depth.
The best arm on the staff is actually on the 60-day-DL, and nobody knows just how good the arm actually is. Last year’s second overall pick, 18yo RH
Daron “Buddy” Davis ( Stuff 4 / Movement 3 / Control 3 / Stuff Potential 8 / Movement Potential 6 / Control Potential 7) pitched well in 14 big-league starts this year, but suffered a torn labrum in August and won’t return until Spring Training at the earliest. Buddy throws very hard with an excellent slider and gets a lot of ground balls. The OSA scouting service actually has his ceiling much higher than our own scouts. His recovery from the torn labrum is important enough to the franchise that I’m doing daily conference calls with his masseuse.
Our #2 starter at the moment is LH
Esteban Feliz (Actual:3/4/2 Potential 7/7/5), a 22yo junkballer who dominated AAA last year but gave up nine homers in 13 starts after being called up.
The rest of the rotation isn’t very good. The “other” Davis is 22yo LH
Duane Davis (Actual:3/3/2 Potential:6/6/5). We’ve even got our own old, wily (six pitches!) innings eater in RH
Cory Lewis (5/5/6). Our other two SPs specialize in being awful: 23yo RH
Jim Travis (3/3/2) and 25yo RH
Chris “Volcano” Thompson (2/3/2). The nickname precedes me, but I assure you it is well-earned.
In the farm system, the only “prospect” who excites my scouts is
Kinnojo Masuda (4/7/7), a 21yo southpaw who got tattooed in the Rookie League last year. The Baseball America staff sees some potential in 24yo journeyman LH
Michael Miller (6/7/4), but he got smacked around pretty badly in AAA last year.
If Buddy Davis can be OK coming off of his shoulder injury, we at least have something to work with. If not, we’ll be giving up runs in bunches.