Hello!

Since I haven't seen anyone on here talk much about minor league baseball, and since I'm between projects at work (don't tell my boss), I thought I would write a little update on how our prospect have begun their season. I keep checking box scores for the four levels every morning anyway, so I might as well share.

Just to get it out of the way, 70 plate appearances and 20 innings are small samples, but let's face it, we need a distraction from what's going on at the big league club.

AAA Reno

As everyone knows, this is the first season for our AAA affiliate in Reno. They haven't exactly made a great start to the season, and they sit in second place in the PCL South with a 7-10 record. It's worth noting that out of Baseball America's top 10 DBack prospects, only Cesar Valdez, no. 7, and Billy Buckner, no. 8, are in AAA (I'm not sure I agree with Buckner, he of the 4.41 career ERA in the minors, being named a top 10 prospect). Most of the players on this team are career minor leaguers/ quad A types, and it's hard to see any of them, save Whitesell, help the big club anytime soon.  It's also worth noting that the PCL is a hitter's league, so the numbers should be viewed accordingly.


Batters:

The Good:

• No surprise regarding the first name you'll read here. Josh Whitesell picked up where he left off last year, crushing AAA pitching to the tune of .351/.479/.561 (last year's line was .329/.427/.571). His BABIP is at a very high .429 but he sustained a BABIP of .416 all of last year, so I don't think he's in for much of a regression. I know Major League Equivalent stats are pretty much garbage, but www.minorleaguesplits.com says the above line translates to .263/.373/.404, which would make him our best hitter behind Reynolds and Lopez. Whitesell can hit for power and he has a great eye, but he has to play in AAA because of Tony Clark and his veteran leadership :( I could write a 1000 words about Whitesell, but I'll just add that the only guy to have a better season in the PCL last year, Nelson Cruz, is OPS-ing .911 at the big league level this year.
• Another guy off to a hot start is 3B Agustin Murillo, who after two subpar seasons in AA didn't play in our system at all in 2008. His line after 15 games is .309/.391/.509 with more walks than K's and a normal BABIP of .340.
• OF Alex Romero has also started well, hitting .292/.387/.477, with a great BB:K of 1.5 and a BABIP that's under league average.
• Our two catchers, John Hester (.333/.395/.513 in 43 PA) and Luke Carlin (.321/.406/.464 in 32 PA) have also put up good numbers sharing time behind the dish. Hester, 25, has good power for a catcher (.190 ISO in his minor league career) and if he keeps up his current BB:K of 2, he might become a valuable player. Carlin played in 36 for the Padres last year, so I imagine he'll be up if the need arises for a catcher.
  
• Recent callup Josh Wilson put up .260/.344/.420 in 61 PA, decent numbers for a shortstop.
• Also of note is OF Brandon Watson, who is hitting .345, but he doesn't walk or hit for power, so his value is at the mercy of his BABIP.

The Bad:

• OF Chris Roberson (.262/.304/.429), OF Trent Oeltjen (.255/.339/.345), and 2B Ruben Gotay (.240/.361/.300) have started slowly this year. Gotay put up better numbers than that in the majors last year and he OPS-ed .767 for the Mets in 2007, so he's certainly better than what we've seen so far.

Pitchers:

The Good:

• Recent callup Esmerling Vasquez was dominant to start the season, with an ERA of 0.93 and a K:BB of 9:3 in 9.2 innings. He was our minor league pitcher of the year in 2007, but had a terrible year in '08 coming back from injury. He has major league stuff but he needs to work on his control.
• Leo Rosales allowed only 1 earned run in 9 innings, but his peripherals don't look good, he only struck out 3, with 2 walks.
• Jose Valderde clone (according to Bob Melvin) Jose Marte has been pretty good, with a 3.21 ERA and 13 Ks in 14 innings, albeit with 7 walks.
• Seth Etherton is the only starter without an embarrassing line, as he is 2-1 with an ERA of 3.27. However, his K:BB ratio is a terrible 9:8 and he allowed 4 homers already.

The Really Really Bad:

• Cesar Valdez, our minor league pitcher of the year in 2008, is struggling out of the gate. 3 starts, 12 innings, 7.50 ERA and 2 HR allowed. His K rate is also much lower than last season.
• Fellow starters Tony Barnette (8.47 ERA in 4 starts) and Evan MacLane (6.75 ERA in 3 starts) are also struggling, but their FIP stats are significantly better than their ERA (4.85 and 4.43, also pretty bad).
• In the bullpen, Abe Woody and Jon Coutlangus have an identical 7.94 ERA in 11.1 frames.
• The most interesting case here is that of Josh Ellis, who has outstanding controllable stats (11K, 3BB, 0HR in 8.1 innings), but has been absolutely slaughtered by a .516 BABIP to the tune of an ERA just short of 12 (11.88)

Well, I hope you enjoyed this little AAA report. I'm probably going to do AA before you guys get out of bed. Let me know what you think.