I like Taylor. He's playing a bit over his head right now at the plate. His BABIP both in Jackson and High Desert is over .400. That's what happened with Catricala and Romero. Cat fell off the edge of the earth by the "Here be Monsters" sign, but Romero has still been good - just not obscene like he was with a sky-high balls-in-play average.
Taylor never had power in college, but he had a good eye. I expect the walks to stay, but the power isn't gonna rise. My concern with him is he strikes out a lot for a supposedly light-hitting SS. Maybe that's because he's amping it up trying to keep the power numbers up, but power's not really his game. Gappers and speed is what he does.
He's a better hitter than Bloomquist (and walks twice as much). He's also a better fielder, both than Bloomie and IMO Miller. Taylor can make plays in the hole that Miller struggles with, but it's not a big enough difference IMO to justify a Taylor-over-Miller choice. Taylor isn't Omar or anything, and makes his own inconsistent throwaways.
But Miller is gonna be worth his weight in gold here in a minute. So do you move Miller for a huge piece and then just install Taylor? Taylor is also a leadoff man, with his OBP skills and ridiculous steals rate. Another year like this from Taylor isn't putting Franklin in danger, it'd be Brad who'd be on the move.
IMO Taylor's a .270/.360/.380/.740 kind of SS, with 35 steals a year. That has worth. Chone Figgins had a very nice, plus-WAR career doing that, and it wasn't at SS.
I expect Taylor to make the end of some top-100 lists this coming year, certainly honorable mentions. I have him ahead of Owings (another BABIP freakshow), Panik (about the same with the bat after you adjust for luck and some other things, but moving to 2B) Ahmed, and some others. He'll probably be a B- player for Sickels, maybe C+ if the BABIP scares him off. (Aside: How does the best hitter list in the system go now?)
He's a good prospect. He's neither Miller nor Franklin, though so unless one of those guys moves he's trade bait. Hard to make a top-150 prospect into a utility player. I do expect us to take it slowly with him. He may even start next year back in AA, trying to slow him down so we don't have to make any decisions about trading him or putting on the big league bench in the immediate future. In a perfect world I'd love to have Taylor's OBP and RH hitting available for this lefty lineup, so if the trade market doesn't like him, then move him around the infield next year, get him comfortable, and put him on the bench. Cuz I don't plan to cough up Miller or Franklin for anything less than Stanton. If Stanton's in RF, then Miller at SS is a good alternate to our historically unique MIF attempt as it stands.
Otherwise I'll take the history, and the players already manning those positions.
~G
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