Nationals Baseball: The fifth rule of no-fight club

Friday, December 10, 2021

The fifth rule of no-fight club

Is you don't talk about the Rule V draft. But no baseball can go on, not even FA talks so here we are.  The Nats selected 4 guys in the minor league section of the Rule V draft (which means they don't have to stay on the 25 man roster)

Andrew Young

Young is ironically the oldest player the Nats picked up as he'll be 28 early in 2021. He has one big skill - power and that's only grown as he's matured. The problem is that he strikes out a lot and the last two times up he's only managed to be above average at the plate by maintaining a Top 10 in majors type HR/FB rate. That usually doesn't hold up as major league pitchers have more time to adjust to you AND the fact that he should be starting his decline soon... well its a tough sell.  Made even tougher by the fact he doesn't have a natural position, the kind of guy who plays around the IF because he can and he can't hit enough to play 1B. That's not going to age either. 

But could he play a full season and you get lucky as he turns into something someone else might like? Sure.  Or could he cut down on those Ks and be a decent back up IF who can hit a homer, a C-Fielding Danny Espinosa? Maybe. Of course you don't grab him for that, you grab him for the 1 in 1000 chance he clicks and is a power hitting MI. 

The rest are live arms

Curtis Taylor  Impressive K numbers in some minor league outings. Generally had been hard to hit and hard to homer too.  Why was he available? He's 27 next July, he walks a ton, and the Blue Jays had a bunch of guys they liked more. Also all the trends have been bad as he's moved up. Guys with better patience and hitting seem to catch his mistakes and hold off the rest.

Matt Brill Repeat above. More unhittable and unhomerable but also wilder and has seem to hit a wall in AA where his combined numbers over 2 years and 60 IP is an ERA of 6.34 and a BB/9 of 6.  I don't care how many guys you K that's too many.  He was a converted offensive player but he converted in college because he couldn't hit enough there so it's not like he's going to switch back in AA. 27 next year

Dakody Clemmer 26 next year, the Indians have a very deep system. He's had decent results in the minors but in different ways.  Early on he was an ok control, meh K, fantastic homer control guy ( 7 homers in nearly 200 IP). Coming out of the missed 2020 he went big into Ks and they went way up... but so did the walks. Homer control was still there.  I find him more interesting than Taylor or Brill but the truth is if 2 months into this season the K jump shows itself to be a fluke there's nothing here with the guy unlike the others who truly have those live arms. That's why he's draft in the last round 


Nats have plenty of holes, so certainly fine grabbing these guys. The age says these aren't long term fixes (such is the way for most of Rule V) but if the Nats are looking at 2022 with an eye toward 2023 these are the types you want.

1 comment:

Antonio Rainey said...
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