Quote:
Originally Posted by lukasberger
So to be honest, Helland may not have been the finest ever second round pick  He's so obscure I couldn't find any mug shots to use. |
Curse you, Tommy Tanous!
At least I'm not the only one getting boned by my scouts; the Pittsburgh AI used their 2014 2nd rounder on 3B J.J. Matijevic, who made a baaaad decision by not signing and going to Alabama instead. One mediocre (.706 OPS) season in the SEC later, he fell to me in the 31st round of the 2015 draft, played poorly, and got released. So the scouts are lying to everyone, thankfully.
And to be fair to Tommy, he did make some nice evaluations on 2014 draftees. Here are a few that could use faces:
C Matt Morgan (4th round)—kind of plodding, but advancing. Will be at Brooklyn this year.
3B Aldo Koutsoyanopulos (5th)—.306/.383/.503 at Kingsport last year, so not just a fun name to say.
LF Gerard Hernandez (6th)—couldn't get PT at Port St. Lucie in '14, but a .953 OPS in '15 means he's moving on up.
C Zach Taylor (12th)—may have to play some IF for Brooklyn this year (Morgan has an 84-rated arm, after all), but after posting a .354/.409/.612 slashline at Kingsport in 2015, he's gonna play.
And, the steal of the draft,
3B Xander Wiel (31st!)—zoomed all the way to a cup of coffee at Savannah by the end of 2014, and had been solid there for the past year plus. (Having trouble hitting when I bump him up to the FSL, it's true, but I still have hopes.)
Also, P Nick Eggemeyer (30th) never impressed me, much, but Kansas City liked him enough to ask for him in a trade that helped me clear some useful budget space, so that's good enough for me.
And thanks for your work on the "2015" class.
ETA:
Just for the halibut, three shots of The Infamous Riley Helland. (He plays for Oaks Christian in Westlake Village [CA], which is a baseball factory, but I guess Tommy focused more on his freshman and soph performances than the disappointing .276 he hit as a junior. We'll see how he does this year…be funny if he had a strong senior season and ended up a stud.)