I'm really pulling for Rowdy Tellez. It can't be easy for him having his mother battling cancer over an extended time. It may have affected his performance last year and the start of this year, but he's really been raking the last month or so.

On the human side, I'm empathetic with Rowdy, my mother died of liver cancer a few years back.

But from a baseball standpoint, it's a red flag that someone would let their personal life affect their performance as much as some have attributed to Rowdy. DeMar DeRozan had both parents with serious health issues this past season. He flew from Toronto to LA to spend time with them on an at least one off day, but his performance on the court certainly didn't seem to be affected by his personal issues.

Who knows, maybe it did affect Derozan? Nonetheless, this is an extremely human thing and different people have different abilities to cope with trauma. I also lost my mother to cancer in my late 20's. It impacts you differently everyday. Sometimes it makes you stronger/more focused because it's a distraction from the sadness. Sometimes, I'm sure Rowdy would wake up in some crappy minor league hotel and wonder what he's doing with his mother's finite amount of time remaining.

Regardless, I think it's best to be compassionate and understanding. I sure hope Rowdy is a September call-up and he gets a chance to accomplish his dream while his mother can share it with him.

I don't care whether the family thing is the explanation or not. He's clearly made adjustments such that he is starting to gain some of his prospect shine back. I've always believed in the guy, I love the walk rate and low K% (so does KATOH for what its worth). We desperately need people with that profile on our major league roster.

Agreed W80.

In 5 or 6 years we could have a battery of Santos Moreno pitching to Gabriel Moreno, one Mexican the latter Venezuelan, born 3 days apart.

Good to see someone following the very low minors. CDC. You never know.


Also I would like some of our cheap signings to make it.

The Northwest League transactions column has righthander Orlando Pascual returning to Vancouver from Lansing. Pascual began the year with the C's before going to Lansing where he has walked 16 and plunked two batters in 21-2/3 innings. C's pitching coach Jim Czajkowski will need to work his magic to get Pascaul back to his NWL All-Star form of last year.

Yeah, I was looking at Santos Moreno - his numbers look quite good. Other than the fact he's a 5'9" RHP.

I will forever think of Guns and Roses when I hear Hauschild's name now ...
Sorry to those with losses to cancer.  

As to Tellez and adversity, in my experience, you can handle things until you can't.  I lost my brother, mother and father in the past five years to addictions, illness and age, and somewhere along the way it simply became too much to deal with stoically.  In fact, the attempt to be stoic is likely problematic for some - Tellez has talked recently about allowing himself to be more open and emotional.
Regardless, I too am pulling for him more than most prospects as a result of his struggles.

Adversity either breaks you or makes you stronger. Hope Tellez pulls through.

Hector Perez is having a good start so far tonight: 4 2 1 1 0 4

The craziest thing about his outing (now through 5) is 56 pitches, 42 strikes. Does anyone with milb.tv happen to be watching him?

Great story at the Athletic on Adam Koewen trying to make it back to the bigs a fourth time.  Love the resilience. 

That is encouraging news for Perez.

Perez finishes with a nice 69/51.

I saw what you did there.

Great from Perez. If he gets some control, he'll be a top prospect (and in the majors) in no time. McKinney HRs in 3 straight games. I think the Jays will want to get a look at him in the majors soon. I don't see a star there, but he walks a fair bit and has real power. Could be an everyday player. Has a career .820 OPS at AAA career. Key is if his defense is good enough to stay as RF. This is the issue Tellez has. 1Bmen who can hit are very easy and cheap to find. Matt Adams was 1 year/$4M. Adam Lind had a 122 WRC+ last year and is in the minors this year. Lucas Duda signed for $3.5M. etc... Tellez has gone from a non-prospect to a potential everyday player again which is great and shows real character to bounce back from such a disastrous and difficult year so well. This last month of the season will be very interesting to watch. Will he continue to rake and push himself back into the discussion for playing time next year? Let's hope so.

There's an extra bit of opportunity for McKinney as the 2019 roster looks to be very low on left-handed bats. Less so for Tellez as the 2 only left-handed (switch-hitter) bats that are set for 2019 are the guys that play his position - Smoak and Morales.

I agree that there is a really good chance that McKinney makes it as a platoon bench player next season. He has been playing both corners and 1B down in AA in preparation for this role I believe.

The Jays don't have a right handed bat who plays first to platoon with.
I could see them using a defensive replacement with Teoscar though.

Do we know why Adam Kloffenstein hasn't played since being drated?

Any progress reports on Nate Pearson?

Re: Kloff, I found this last night on the Future Blue Jays site from Aug 5 interview with Scott Sanders:

"I don’t really have any specifics on that (when he’ll make his debut). You know Adam had a pretty heavy workload. Earlier this year believe he threw something in the realm of 80 innings. So for us, it’s just it’s pretty much just the standard progression with every pitcher that comes into the system out of the draft. The first thing that’s pretty much done is assessing where they’re at. From a inning standpoint of where they’re at, from a season progression standpoint. And putting together a development plan that’s specific to them. So you know that (Director of Player Development) Gil Kim (VP of Baseball Ops), Ben Cherington, and the PD are certainly working with Adam. I would certainly expect to see him on the mound at some point soon."

With 3 RH outfielders it will be easy to mix him in against lefties. Pillar, Grichuk, Teoscar and Morales can all sit 1/3 to 1/4 of the time against right handlers to keep them rested. Grichuk can play CF with McKinney in right and Teoscar can DH with McKinney in left.

I'm not convinced that Pillar will be back. We have a glut of OFs in the minors and Grichuk passes my eye test in CF (he'd only be there until Alford or Pompey is ready anyway).

If he's sitting frequently in September to "rest up" while McKinney, Alford, Pompey, Smith Jr etc... get regular playing time I'm thinking its a tell-tale sign.

I honestly don’t think Pillar is going anywhere. Grichuk didn’t grade out too well in Center and is a top tier right fielder. The Jays have a glut of outfielders but they all project as 4th outfielders for now unless one of them....likely Alford...starts showing more.

I keep going back to wanting to try Gurriel in CF as the infield depth is higher quality than the OF depth.

Because of workload(during high school season), trying to avoid future injury (TJ) and refining mechanics etc. most teams are avoiding pitching their 2018 high pick high school pitchers in league games - probably will be allowed to pitch a couple of innings at end of season.

Checked the signed HS pitchers taken in the 1st 3 rounds and actually most teams have pitched them in league games. SD, Balt, TB, Cinci, Mets, Pitt and Hou kids have pitched.

Cleveland signed 2- 1 has pitched and 1 hasn't.

Along with Kloff, the Nats kid hasn't pitched and neither of the 2 Rangers kids.

I don't think McKinney is much of a prospect. He had a nice 55 game stretch in SWB last year, but aside from that, his numbers the last couple of years have been mediocre. He's hitting .213 in Buffalo after hitting .226 in SWB this year, and might hit under .200 in the big leagues. He's about to turn 24, so he might have another gear to reach, and a year in AAA would be a good opportunity for him to demonstrate if he can do that. I think Alford and Pompey are both more likely to be useful mlb players, although I think the best solution is to move Gurriel to the OF. They need him there more than in the IF, and his fielding at SS/2B has left much to be desired.

“I don't think McKinney is much of a prospect. He had a nice 55 game stretch in SWB last year, but aside from that, his numbers the last couple of years have been mediocre. He's hitting .213 in Buffalo after hitting .226 in SWB this year, and might hit under .200 in the big leagues. ”

He has around a 117 WRC+ in aaa this year. He had a 140 WRC+ in aaa last year. Batting average is a useless stat. He’s not a great prospect, but he is an actual prospect.

Well, batting average certainly has it's flaws, as all stats do, but it's far from useless. If you're making outs 80% of the time when you don't walk, you've got to get an awful lot of home runs and doubles and walks to make up for that. How many mlb players are regulars when they're hitting .200? Walks are great, but they're not as good as hits.

McKinney will not be a regular, but he should be OK as a platoon guy.

McKinney is not a top prospect, but he has potential to be a useful piece. He draws walks (~10%) and hits for power. He hits a lot of fly balls and line drives, which is the type of profile teams look for nowadays. His K% is not great but not awful. Maybe he's a platoon corner OF at best, but I think there are some useful components to his offensive game. I wouldn't rule him out as being a solid big leaguer.

"Well, batting average certainly has it's flaws, as all stats do, but it's far from useless. If you're making outs 80% of the time when you don't walk, you've got to get an awful lot of home runs and doubles and walks to make up for that."

Batting average is useless as a stat. It doesn't show anything. You can hit .200 and be a good player and hit .300 and be useless. I don't even know where you are getting this .200 number from anyway. McKinney LT in AAA is hitting .259. In AA he hit .258. ZIPS has him as a .239 hitter in the majors this year. Obviously, a better batting average is better because it comes automatically with a higher OBP and SLG, but we're not in 1972 anymore. Joey Gallo is hitting .200 with a WAR of 2.1. Harper is hitting under .240 and is one of the best offensive players in baseball. Is McKinney going to be a star? No. But there is a definite chance of being a decent major leaguer. There are plenty of guys with low batting average but power and walk profile (imagine a younger version of current Curtis Granderson or Mark Canha or Eric Thames etc...). The key is his defense. If he can play a decent corner OF, he will have value. If he is a 1Bman, then he will be a AAAA player.

Batting average is not a useless stat because it measures something important in creating runs, which is what an offense is supposed to do. Sure you can come up with a few players who are good despite weak batting averages, but there are way, way more players with bad batting averages who are poor hitters. There are a lot of stats available to look at in baseball, and none is perfect, so the more relevant information, the better. You take 2 players with a .350 on base percentage, one has a .300 batting average, the other a .200 batting average. They hit the same number of home runs, doubles, triples, and have the same stolen base %. The guy with the .300 average is a lot better offensive player then the guy with the .200 average - he's going to have a lot more singles and a lot fewer walks. In some situations, say, leading off an inning, the walk is just as good, but in many situations, say with a runner on 3rd and 2 out, the single is way better.