Though I do like him. He and Chavez are pretty even for me right now, since both are competing for LF/DH spots if Smoak is what we pray he is and locks down 1B for the next decade.
I just don't think Poythress walks enough to be compared to the Dunns and Big Hurts of the world.
Still, I do think he's got some Greg Vaughn in him, and I wouldn't turn down that by ANY means. I could very much see a .260/.340/.500 hitter out of Poythress. That puts him right in line with Vaughn and some other huge guy named Sexson as a dangerous right-handed power bat that's probably somewhere short of elite (especially in Greg's case).
If Rich can keep up the 2nd half of his Cal League season, anyway.
AA is the test for both him and Chavez: Who actually learned something and who just took advantage of the high-offense Cal League?
Currently I have Chavez ahead by a nose in that race, but Poythress is stayin' with him. Coming out of college they said he had one tool: Power. His bat was too slow (Olerud had the slowest batspeed on his Toronto teams, btw, for all the batspeed-trumps-all afficianados out there), his eye wasn't great (holding at .5 with an acceptable K rate so far), he wasn't a good athlete (though he did play some 3B in college) and being that big with a huge strikezone he'd never hit for average.
It was all gonna come down to power, and a lot of folks didn't think he had enough to overcome the other "issues."
He has a better swing for keeping average than a lot of sluggers, IMO, and he's a big enough guy to drive it out anywhere. If he keeps his average higher then his projection goes way up. If not, I'd be satisfied with "just" a Greg Vaughn type of hitter.
If the power doesn't come through outside of the Cal League then he looks like Tui and Carp have thus far: corner players without corner power who get attacked by pitchers who have no fear of consequences.
I'm looking very much forward to AA this year as the 3 impressive bats from the Cal League (Poythress, Chavez and Seager) hit AA at the same time and look to make a name for themselves.
If Nick Franklin winds up there as well, even better.
~G
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