Games are underway in the Florida Instructional Leagues, and ESPN’s Kiley McDaniel was covering the Pittsburgh Pirates this afternoon. Below are some tweets from McDaniel on today’s progress from some of the players, along with some of my notes below those tweets.
http://twitter.com/kileymcd/status/251383411367899136
http://twitter.com/kileymcd/status/251403038080770048
My Notes: Allie definitely has some raw power. My concern when he made the switch to being a position player was that he would struggle with strikeouts, which was the case this season. It’s not hard to find a guy with raw power who can’t hit for average and strikes out too much. That makes Allie a non-prospect as a hitter at this point. He’s a project, and while there is a chance he could improve his hitting, that chance seems very unlikely.
http://twitter.com/kileymcd/status/251384761896038400
My Notes: Heading in to this year I had an irrational prospect love for Gregory Polanco, mostly based on his build and tools. Polanco broke out, which no longer made that prospect love irrational. Luis Urena is now taking his spot. I’ve been following Urena just as long as Polanco. Only Urena has yet to break out like Polanco did this year. Every time I start to cool on him, I watch him crush a homer, or throw a perfect strike from right field to third base, or demonstrate one of his other tools. Urena is a potential five tool guy who can hit for power, and has the build of a major league ball player. It’s good to see that he’s hitting so well in instructs.
http://twitter.com/kileymcd/status/251383612077907969
http://twitter.com/kileymcd/status/251401182898184193
My Notes: Good to see Black keeping the velocity up, even if it isn’t the 99 MPH he hit the other day. I wouldn’t be too concerned with Taillon’s curve. It looked very sharp at the end of the year with Altoona.
Per LA Sports Management, Alen Hanson will be leaving instructs on Saturday to get ready for winter ball with Toros del Este.
I’ll be heading down to instructs in about two weeks to get the final information needed for the 2013 Prospect Guide, and to get some live reports.
Links and Notes
**The Pirates lost to the Mets 6-5.
**Pirates Notebook: Rough Start From Correia Sends Club 80th Loss; McCutchen, Walker Updates.
**From last night: 2013 Is the Make or Break Year for Huntington and Company.
