Everett

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=== Up To Speed, Dept. ===

Lonnie of MC gives the following Executive Summary:

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Some of you may have heard of Ji-Man Choi, and some of you may not have. No matter, I planned on rehashing his story for you all anyway...

Back in the summer of 2009 a group of Seattle scouts attended a pitching demonstration in South Korea by a High School pitcher with the name of Seon Gi Kim. Catching him that day was converted third baseman Ji-Man Choi. The Mariner scouts liked what they saw from young Seon Gi Kim and signed him to his first professional contract. The kid behind the plate also impressed the scouts and he too was signed with little or no fanfare.

Both young men started their professional careers in the Arizona Summer League at Peoria. Seon Gi Kim ran a high ERA, but impressed a lot of folks with his periphials.

Meanwhile, Ji-Man Choi was doing something that no one expected; he was killing the ball. While in Arizona as an 18 year old Choi ran a .378/.459/.541/1.000 slashline. He showed a phenominal batting eye with his 27/39 BB/K rate.

Since he was so new to catching the M's brass decided to move him into the position slowly, so he spent that first year in Arizona playing 1b for 29 games, and catcher for 10. The combination of his defense and his offense got more than a few of us excited about the possibility of actually having a catcher who is a complete package.

Late in the 2010 season Choi was given a surprise promotion all the way up to A+ High Desert where he played 1B and DH. In 50 plate appearances he went from an interesting and exciting player to a bona fida prospect. While with High Desert Choi put together a slashline of .302/.380/.442/.882. Not many 18 year old kids can make the transition from the Arizona Rookie leagues to the uber competative A+ Cal League with such aplomb.

Based upon his performance in 2010 a lot of us were really excited to see where Choi would end up in 2011 and if he would be a full-time catcher or not. Gordon (G_Moneyball) and I saw Choi in ST in March of 2011 and were gidddy to see him walking around in catcher's gear. He looked about as good as any kid could look in the early stages of ST and when we both left we felt that for sure that Choi would break camp with either Clinton or Everett, but it didn't work out that way...

Sometime during the later stages of ST in 2011 Choi started to experience pain in his back. I don't have all of the particulars, but such was the pain that Choi did not play a single game in 2011, and in December a broken bone in his back was discovered (again, no details). Choi had two screws and a metal rod placed in his back and was shelved for several months beginning in 2012. Finally, sometime in March/April he had the screws and rod removed and was allowed to start practicing and begain playing baseball in earnest when he was assigned to Clinton. 

Choi made his 2012 debut playing DH on May 19 and went 2/4 with a double and a ribbie and hasn't slowed down much from there. So far in 2012 Choi has played 30 games at 1B, and 27 as the DH. Through the 57 games that he has played in, Choi has put together a slashline of .306/.421/.497/.927 in a predominantly pitcher friendly league. Choi has a batting eye of .653 (.500 is the baseline for a good prospect. Anything north of their is gravy.) with 32 walks and 49 K's. He has a walk rate of 12.3%, which is bloody awesome, and a strikeout rate of 18.85% which is just as awesome.

The issue at the moment with Choi is will hit for enough power to be a legitimate 1st baseman. So far this year he has hit 12 doubles, 1 triple, and 8 homeruns. His isolated power(slugging - average) is .191. If he is able to keep this sort of production up then, yes, he can be viewed as a legitimate 1B.

It's too bad that Choi will most likely never play catcher again. As a catcher, his potential was off the charts.

Lonnie

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That'll do for us too.

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Cool Papa sez,

Weird that they would have Paxton in AA (along with Taijuan and Hultzen).

He already pitched there last season. I guess it's a way to keep pressure off the org to have them in the majors the moment there is an opening or someone struggles. It will be the perfect chance to see exactly how Walker compares to the older, college-trained pitchers, which will be fun.

Who was it, Jeff Sullivan who noted that Tennessee is a better climate in April and May?

Along with that, we fancy that Jay-Z forsees a Maddux-Glavine-Smoltz type golf group, one stimulating another to 3-hit shutout into 2-hit shutout into 1-hit shutout... he has to align his rotations from the top to the bottom of the system, and it could be that he didn't have four open slots at the top rung.  Counting Erasmo's slot at Tacoma, if he winds up there.

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:: shrug :: AA or AAA, they are all three of them under-challenged in any case.  A starting high school point guard doesn't get better playing 1-on-4 in the driveway with the neighborhood kids.  He gets better in a camp with Bobby Knight pointing out his weaknesses.  

Playing in the driveway is TERRIBLE for him, and a good way to get hurt, by the way, since he's not focused.  Worst thing in the world for an elite athlete, to let him overmatch players who are far worse than he is.

They want to secure the 7th years, or keep the IP down this year, or let them dink around with their command and control, or whatever, fine, Tennessee is as good a place to stash them as anywhere.  Stash them in Everett if you want.

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=== Holland's Deal ===

By the way, Derek Holland became the latest young gun to give a hometown discount which looks terrible for him on paper, but which looks great for him in real life.

We kibitzed, in this series, the Rays' (tremendous) idea of giving an 8-year deal to a rookie starting pitcher.  Matt Moore could feasibly make $70-80M in his first 8 years, if he turned out to be a great pitcher.  The Rays guaranteed him $15M, with the probability of making $40M if he's any good at all.

 Also see:  POTD Why Nick Franklin Must Bat Lefty.  Exec sum:  Franklin has a Griffey-, Ichiro-level swing from the left side ... and a worthless swing from the right side.

Lonnie of MC, reasonably so, doubts Nick Franklin's ability to see ML time in 2012:

...unlike G, I believe that Franklin will start 2012 back at Jackson with maybe a midseason promotion to AAA Tacoma.  

The main reason that I say this is because although his AA stats are small, they still indicate that he is stuggling when he bats right-handed against lefites.  The split is Grand Canyonesque (.226/.273/.419/.692 batting right hand, and .385/.429/.519/.948 as a lefty)  2011 was supposed to be the year where Franklin fixes his issues when he goes righty, but all of the injuries and crap that hit him did not allow him to make any sort of meaningful attempt.  With a split that wide it is going to take at least a full year, and maybe more to either get his RH swing down, or bag the switch-hitting all together.

This is a non-trivial issue right now with Franklin, and I seriously don't see him even getting a cup of coffee until 2013.

I know that you aren't high on Brad Miller, G, but he has a big thing going for him.  Zduriencik didn't pick him in the second round for nothing.  Right now, I put a heck of a lot of faith into what Z is doing.

Maybe those splits are because he's a lousy hitter right handed.  I read it on the internet :- )

One was born in Venezuela on July 27, 1992, and, almost 19 years later, is listed at 6-4, 195.

The other was born stateside two weeks after, on August 13, 1992, and, almost 19 years later, is also listed at 6-4, 195.

They are both right-handed and can bring the ball in the mid-90s or higher.

===  Wear A Helmet, Man ===

I/O HQ: Grade 8D:  Potential is (remains) to become an impact player in the majors, a well-above-average third baseman.