Uber-analyst San-Man sez:

I don’t think a choice to bypass Wlad is a definitive statement of anything.

The problem with evaluating ANY prospect is that it is a balance between paying attention to production and paying attention to what the coaches and scouts are seeing.

Right as rain ... and IMHO, there are only two orgs in baseball who set this balance where I would.  As Bill James acidly put it,

"Major league organizations pay entirely too much attention to what their scouts tell them, and entirely too little attention to how their players HAVE PERFORMED."

Science tells us bumblebees can't fly, and doesn't apologize when it gets something like that wrong.  As visual scouts, tools scouts, whatever, we ROUTINELY tell people that Mark Teixeira has too many holes in his swing, that Jose Lopez is too far in front of the ball, whatever.  And our confidence is absolute, however many we get wrong :- )

So -- would agree 110% with San-Man's framing of the problemo.  But 99 times out of 100, you're going to see Dr. D challenging orgs to look more at how players have actually performed.

Wlad Balentien has a career .526 SLG in the minors -- a .526 SLG in pitcher's parks, playing high-A at 20, AA at 21, and AAA at 22.  Those minor-league pitchers could pitch.  Wlad hit them.  Somebody tells me Wlad will never hit, well, that's what you were telling us when he was 19, compadre. 

It is reasonable to assume that every trained eye in the Ms organization has poured over every bit of data, (and video), that Wlad produced during 2008.

Yup.

The data that the pro's have available is kind of intimidating.  No doubts there.  :- )

Let’s say, for the sake of argument, that your top three scouts come forward, and all three say — “the kid simply isn’t EVER going to get it. Kids don’t improve because they get older - they improve because they learn something — and we’ve reached the conclusion that THIS kid is incapable of learning anything more from us. We don’t believe it’s going to make any difference if we give him 500 more ABs in the majors or 5000. He’s a AAAA player, and we see no remaining potential to tap.”

:- /

Not quibbling here, because San' is putting his finger on the nature of the problem on the 2009 left field decision.  Brav-O amig-O.

If you’re the GM - what is your response to this report?

My response is this:  Why exactly is he never going to get it?

Is his swing incapable of covering the top half of the zone, like Brad Wilkerson's is?  Does he have a slider-speed bat, like Dan Wilson did?  Is he just suffering from IQ problemos, like Dr. D and Shawn Kemp are?

After my three scouts tell me exactly the reasons for their opinions, I proceed to study that objection to see whether I agree with it.

To be fair, I can't imagine the specific reason that could be offered as "proof" that Wlad is a waste of time.  I've seen the kid play.  He's got everything Jay Buhner or Jose Guillen ever had.  (Well, maybe not quite the eye that Bone had.)

Do you:

A) Tell your scouts they are idiots who need to learn sabremetrics, because your charts tell you he SHOULD produce “X” in the majors during the next two years.

:- ) That's Dan Duquette, not Jack Zduriencik... no, forget that. 

Our charts tell us that Wlad has a (say) 40% chance of producing "X" in the majors at some future time, rather than during the next two years.   The question is whether we're willing to bake the cake ...  But, yeah, this argument goes on all the time.  His performance says X, the scouts say Y.  What do you tell the scouts?  What GM's actually tell them is:  thanks, man.  We need to keep an eye on that.  Have a nice day.

Scouts are more than used to filing their reports and then having orgs use them, or not.  C'est la vie...

B) DFA Wlad — and go and sign the first FA you can get for real cheap - (someone like Wilkerson perhaps).

No, I'd trade him to Detroit for Ramon Santiago :- )

C) Keep Wlad (while seeing if anyone else has interest in him), get a cheap veteran as a plug-in for the position, in case the scouts are right and continue looking for something better — and let Wlad know that he’s not going to just be handed the job in 2009, he’s going to have to get it the old-fashioned way - he’ll have to Eaaaarn it.

A team in a rebuild, has a hot prospect who is ML-ready, they've got NO business using a one-year MLB Vet (TM) to block him, IMHO.

As much as the blog-o-sphere is madly in love with Jimerson, he's still a one-year stopgap.  Jimerson will be 31; he hit for a 69 OPS+ at 30, and he could never hit.  It's going to get uglier and uglier at the plate for him.  Chavez, however sexy his mysterious little glove is, remains an aging, short-term vet in all variations.

My own view is that I haven’t seen anything the Ms have done to date that indicates they are not willing to give Wlad another look. In point of fact, it seems more like they are planning to give EVERYONE a look, and nobody should be expecting to waltz into their pre-determined positions. But, I think it would be a much LARGER mistake to paint a picture for Wlad that he’s going to be getting 500+ ABs in 2009 just because he’s currently the top OF spec in the org.

Right.

We in the blog-o-sphere (notably I) have been kind of shrill about the M's plans for Wlad, but they haven't done or said anything, really, to say that they're flushing him.  We'll see.

.....................

One of the things that used to really set James off, when he was writing his Player Handbooks, was when a player hit his 99th percentile outcome -- and then the org flushed him anyway.  Why did you ever have him around, then?  "Okay, he's every inch what we thought he might be.  Dump him."

When Wlad was 19 or 20, you saw those massive forearms and plus-plus power, and you thought, well, if he just ever learns to make contact, we'll really have something here...

So he learns to make contact, better than you ever thought he would.  Time to kick him to the curb now.

It's just not coherent decisionmaking.

My $0.02,

Dr D