Davis has had a very strong post-ASB for Dunedin. Line of .296/.389/.385 in 160 plate appearances with a 11.2 BB%, 20 K%, and 16/1 SB/CS.

Good timing for Davis to save his career.

ESPN magazine with a very good piece on Vlad's junior and senior (but don't call him that).


http://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/20240751/toronto-blue-jays-prospect-vladimir-guerrero-jr-trying-live-famous-father

Davis has had a good enough run that he may be regaining prospect status.  Crazy to realize he only just turned 23.  He's needed two years at both Lansing and Dunedin, but both times his second season has been promising.  He's the sort of talent that someone may take a shot at in the rule v draft, but he's likely far enough away from the bigs not to warrant protecting.  If he can stay hot like this, perhaps someone in the org likes his tools enough to lobby for him on the 40 man - he was considered a project even when we drafted him.

On the topic of, I just examined the roster with Bluebird Banter's awesome rule-5 eligible tables.  We really aren't looking at any super-hard choices - guys like Harold Ramirez, Chris Smith, Refsnyder, Campos, Maille and Dermody are the sorts of names that might be exposed, depending on whether or not we tender contracts to Goins, Aoki and Loup.  That's with two roster spots open for FAs.  I'm assuming Zeke gets a contract offer.  If we tender all three of those bubble guys (man, I hope not!) it's guys like Reese McGuire, Dwight Smith Jr., Francisco Rios and Angel Perdomo who get exposed. 

https://www.bluebirdbanter.com/pages/rule-5-eligible-players-2

I continue to hope we give the likes of Rowley, Fields, Mayza and Carlos Ramirez a look in September to help make a decision- currently I can see all 4 getting protected if my roster crunching above is correct.

What do you guys think?

I think Rowley, Mayza and Ramirez are slam dunks. No way for Davis. Fields one of many on bubble (likely not) but only room for 4 or 5 at best.....Janssen needs to be protected. I continue to think Tellez is left off and Pentecost on bubble though I can't see anyone taking him. 25 man rosters really restrict what u can do in Rule 5.

25 man rosters really restrict what u can do in Rule 5.

Especially now with 8 man pens. A Tellez or Pentecost might get snapped up by a team that is planning to tank going into the season, but there are few like that and there are, in all likelihood, more valuable prospects on other teams unprotected lists.

Does any of the Vlads speak English? It's too bad we never get to hear them in interviews.

the 25 man roster restricts what contenders can do ... SD has kept 21 year old Allen Cordoba on their roster all year - he of the -0.9 fWAR - and the kid had never played above rookie ball.  They've also got 21 year old catcher Luis Torrens out of A ball.  The first guy drafted, who also ended up in SD was 22 year old Miguel Diaz, who took five years to make it to low A ball.  My point is just that prospects of the calibre of Tellez and Pentacost are simply never exposed.  any non-contender would take Tellez, or Pentacost, unless the industry gives up on him as a backstop - he's still catching, and the org still talks about him as a catcher.  If any catcher gets exposed, it's McGuire.  

To me, it seems that teams take fliers on role players - older relievers, utility guys or backup catchers - or super toolsy kids a long way from the show. 

Take a look at the players drafted last year - aside from Sparkman, do you guys recognize anyone?  I certainly didn't. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rule_5_draft_results

I don't agree. I don't think anyone would take Tellez or Pentecost and if they did, it would be even odds the player would be returned and if they weren't it would be much less of a loss than other Jays who might need the roster space.

There will be prospects far better than those who are left unprotected by other teams. What San Diego did last year was a one time thing. Usually around 14-16 players are taken in Rule 5, mostly pitchers or catchers.

And we need to add Greene as well. Despite a less than stellar performance. he could be gobbled up. I would say 10x more chance he would be lost than Tellez.

letting a prospect with rowdy's track record go because of one bad season where he was young fornthe level is ludicrous, imho.

well I think adding him would be ludicrous. There cannot be an over abundance of 40 man spots allotted to prospects who cannot contribute at the major league level as spots are needed throughout the year as we have seen this season. I don't think Jays can add more than 5 and 5 already seem as way more likely than Tellez. You also need to make a call on the chance the player ys selected by another team and I think the chance of Tellez being taken is about as near zero as you can get.

I have nothing further to say on this subject unless it pops up again after the season.

yeah, he's a lock to be stolen if available.

PeterG, if you are done with the convo no worries, but I would love to hear which prospects you think are better than Tellez that have been left exposed.  I explored a few of the recent rule v drafts, and linked to the last one above, but I really haven't recognized any name prospects. 

Agreed on Greene.  FWIW, my 40 man would be:  Stroman, Sanchez, Happ, Osuna, Biagini, Tepera, Barnes, Leone, Borucki, Martin, Donaldson, Smoak, Tulo, Travis, Urena, Alford, Zeke, Pillar, Dwight smith Jr., Pompey, Pearce, Hernandez, Gurriel and Morales from the current 40 man - 24 guys.   The prospects I would add in order are:  Jansen, Greene, Tellez, Pentacost, Romano, Murphy, Pannone, Fields, Mayza, Carlos Ramirez, Rowley, Rios, McGuire, Perdomo. 

That leaves two open spots for the likes of Chris Smith or one of Loup / Goins if you tender them contracts.  You could remove current 40 man roster guys like Smith Jr. or Zeke, or plenty of names from the back end of that prospect list as we claim guys on waivers or sign FAs without getting into painful territory. 

I think its really hard to look at rule 5 protections without knowing what the roster plans are going forward. How they plan to fill roster holes, and how much they want to rely on younger guys are major questions.

Personally i'd rather rely on more younger guys on the 40 man roster to rotate them in throughout the year.

Really though Im only worried about Greene, Jansen, Tellez and Carlos Ramirez in the rule 5 and Ramirez is more of a 25 man candidate than a 40 man candidate.

Hernandez has now struck out 14 times in 34 plate appearances for Buffalo. I guess he could use a bit more AAA time after all.

As far as the 40-man roster, it's a good problem to have, but teams with a lot of prospect depth will always run into these issues. The Jays have done nothing but add to the system since Shapiro took over so this was bound to happen. Situations like this might be where the Jays can trade some of their quantity for either big league help or in lateral moves for prospects that have a bit more time left before needing to be protected. Again, good problem to have, but might see a solid prospect or two slip through the cracks because of it.

Shoeless, I don't get why you're concerned about a 25 yr oldwho hasn't played this year, made it above A+,or played more than 50 games more than once in his 8 years with the org,

Never mind. Didn't realize you were talking about a pitcher conversion.
I find the mobile version of baseball reference to be pretty unusable.

To be fair to AA, only 9 of those guys on my list were acquired by Shapiro.  He has added, but the impact prospects he's garnered, aside from Guriel, are still a ways off, or have graduated like Biagini and Leone.  The improved farm is more a result of those long term prospects AA was amassing not being so far away anymore, along with the drafting of Bichette. 

Lexi, I guess you were looking at his batting stats.  Remarkable how good Ramirez looks in a SSS as a reliever - yet to be scored on this year in 25 2/3 IPs.  I'm not ready to rank him ahead of so many other guys myself, but he definitely warrants a September look. 

I wasn't saying Shapiro acquired all of them. My point was that he hasn't traded any of them while continually making an effort to add as much as he can. The two Liriano transactions alone in one calendar year added three 40-man roster prospects for 2018 (Hernandez, Ramirez, McGuire). When you are adding prospects and not subtracting any, then eventually it's going to lead to a surplus. Again, that's a good problem to have. Prospects bust. It's imperative to have a top heavy system but it's also important to have a lot of depth behind them. The Jays are getting there.

Teller's BAIP is 0.254 and his HR/FB% is 5.5%.

Pretty much every other advanced stat is the same as years past except he's pulling the ball a little less.

He's been very unlucky all year and dealing with some serious personal issues, and I fully expect a turnaround next season.

"Teller's BAIP is 0.254 and his HR/FB% is 5.5%.

Pretty much every other advanced stat is the same as years past except he's pulling the ball a little less."

That's not true. His K% is up, his BB% is down, his ISO is down, his GB% is up, his LD% is down. His BABIP is low but a slow guy hitting 40% grounders and 21% popups is always going to have a low BABIP. Almost 60% of the balls he hits are automatic outs. Tellez is going to need to make adjustments if he wants to progress. The problems he has shown this year are not flukes. There is a deeper issue here where he simply is not hitting the ball very well and if you look at his underlying numbers, it looks very very bad. Major league hitters don't hit the ball the opposite way 40% of the time. They don't hit popups 26% of the time. Tellez would be last in the majors in both categories. For example, you look at Lucas Duda as a pretty decent comp (he's a name I've seen as a comp before). Duda pops up 3.2% of the time and hits the opposite way 24% of the time and hits it on the ground 30% of the time and that's in the majors not in AAA. I wouldn't leave Tellez unprotected in the rule V because he is young enough to improve and has a very good track record before this season but I now see him as a long shot to have much of a MLB career. (And I think it's less than 50/50 he'd get taken in the draft. Only an AL team would take him and an AL team that has no chance of competing at all which is...Oakland and White Sox as potential landing spots? It's a very limited market and they might like other guys more.)

Another real problem for me is that the issues we see this year were all being discussed by scouts even when he had good numbers. Many industry people never liked Tellez even when he was mashing. We were seeing scouts talking about his long swing and slow bat when he was killing AA. To me, that says that it is likely this has caught up to him and he needs to make fundamental adjustments if he wants to be a major leaguer.

these 2 were 6 months apart in their AA seasons:


Tellez: 12.3b%, 17.9k%, .324babip, .297avg, .233iso, 152wrc+
Devers: 9.7b%, 17.2k%, .316babip, .300avg, .275iso, 153wrc+

Tellez: 7.8swstr%, 20.8ld%, 20.9iffb%, 43.1pull%, 29.6opp%
Devers: 10.7swstr%, 21.6ld%, 25.0iffb%, 41.6pull%, 33.1opp%


Now rowdy may well bust completely but exposing him after one single bad year when he's performed like that is still crazy to me, and i'd be shocked if there weren't other teams who would jump on the chance to grab him just to see whether he could get back on track.

and another big game from rowdy tonight, looks like. maybe he's finally getting legit hot.

Exposing a guy who not even a year ago was seen as a quality prospect, even as potentially being on the ML team in spring this year, seems crazy to me. The 40 man is always littered with AAAA guys and old prospects. Right now there are 19 pitchers on the 40 man, 4 catchers, 9 infielders, 12 outfielders and a DH. That includes 60 day DL guys like Bo Schultz, Devon Travis, Troy Tulowitzki, Darrell Ceciliani, and Dalton Pompey. Of that group only Travis and Tulo are locks for the 40 man. Thus making it a 42 man right now.

I see easy cuts in Aoki or Carrera (whichever the Jays feel is least needed), Dwight Smith Jr if he doesn't impress by years end, Harold Ramirez if he doesn't hit soon, Rob Refsnyder or Ryan Goins as only one is needed, Chris Coghlan, probably 5 pitchers out of the 19 are easy cuts (ie: easily replaced).

I suspect the Jays will lose someone in the Rule 5 next year but they won't expose guys who a year ago were hot prospects unless there is an injury issue we don't know about.

Howell is a free agent. Dermody is an outright candidate.
I'd give Schultz another try.
Tepesch and Valdez are bubble guys.
Montero is gone. Jansen is destroying the International League so far. (OPS 1.156 in 5 games)
I'd still keep McGuire over Maile and Lopez, way more upside.

I think the biggest question is if the Jays will draft in the Rule V this year.

Urena had a nice game last night.  It would be nice if he could keep it up for the remainder of August.  The club desperately needs a shortstop option, and he is probably the closest. 

Logan Warmoth doubled and walked in three plate trips last night.  He is now slashing .360/.424/.560 with decent W and K rates.  He turns 22 next month, and it would be a good idea to give him some work this year at the single A level (perhaps Lansing).

Apparently, Samad Taylor has been assigned to Vancouver. That might mean that Warmoth is moving up. They could have a Taylor/Vicuna middle infield in Vancouver, while Warmoth moves up to Lansing.

yeah Warmoth should be in full season ball for sure. too old to learn much about him in A-.

Rowdy with a 209wrc+ in 9gms in august so far. too much babip and not enough power but a good sign anyways. Keep it up, kid.

I suspect that it would be pretty easy to sneak a 1B/DH type through the rule 5 draft just because nobody wants to tie up their roster. That said, I still have faith in Rowdy and wouldn't personally want to take the risk.

I tend to be an "aggressive promotion" guy. While there are obvious exceptions (i.e. poor mechanics) I think the concept of "rushing" a prospect and ruining him is overblown.

So I would be pushing Warmouth up for sure. But I also would have had Bo and Vlad up within a month.

Suspecting that it would be pretty easy to sneak a 1B/DH type through the Rule 5 draft is suggesting that it isn't very risky at all to expose him. But then in the next sentence you say that you wouldn't want to take the risk he gets claimed. Which is it, do you think we can sneak Rowdy through the Rule V or is it too risky?

Regarding Rowdy. I really like power. Bautista, Hr and a bat flip. EE had the big Hr in the 2016 Playoffs.

I talked about the three A ball / rookie rule 5 draftees on the SD roster upthread.  These are the sort of players exposed and taken in the rule 5.  The idea that a team wouldn't waste a roster spot on a AAA prospect, formerly ranked in the top 100, doesn't make sense.  They are keeping rookie ball guys, but they wouldn't keep a AAA guy of about the same age?   The teams that are willing to make the picks have nothing to lose because they don't want to contend ... that's why I was frustrated with the Sparkman talk this year, it felt like a waste of a roster spot. 

With our emerging crop of young talent, we no longer have the roster spot to use to pick someone in the rule 5. 

SK, I don't see Ramirez or McGuire as 40 man prospects, although McGuire might sneak in at the back end.  No chance for Ramirez ... hes a one tool guy whos tool was absent this year while he stalled out in AA.  Smith Jr. has a similar profile, but had the much better year.  

SK, I don't see Ramirez or McGuire as 40 man prospects, although McGuire might sneak in at the back end.  No chance for Ramirez ... hes a one tool guy whos tool was absent this year while he stalled out in AA.  Smith Jr. has a similar profile, but had the much better year. 

I think Smith Jr, is one of those guys who, if given the chance, will do in MLB what he always does at every level. 260+ in a down year, probably around 280, tops at 300 if he gets lucky for a sustained time. 10 Hrs and 10 SB. Speed, a little plate discipline, but not much defense or arm (this is assumption, as I can't recall much comment about either from pros). That reads a lot like Carrera to me, minus maybe a few head cramps.

I thought I was pretty clear with my sentence.

I suspect that it would be easy to sneak a 1b/dh type through. But I am not willing to bet a solid prospect on that suspicion.