One more signee posted on the milb.com transactions page: LHP David Hernandez, 17-year-old from Mexico.
He is young for his college class too (July birthday). While his football was mainly in HS, there is a chance he is still catching up a bit. Used to play more infield so if he could add 2B/3B to the mix he might be a decent utility prospect.
Every signing period you should feel like you are at least coming away with a talent equivalent to a second round pick. A hand full of teams come away with a first round pick kind of talent. The Phils have peaked out at third round type guys the last 2 years.
I guess I can't be too surprised or disappointed by that because all of these kids were already under informal deals long before the Phillies hired Chung (just over a year ago), so it's same as it ever was. It will be another couple of years before the entire scouting apparatus feels like his, same as with Mattingly (who was hired in 2021) since changing an entire development culture takes time too.
Whereas a director of domestic scouting should be able too walk right and run a pretty good draft (though obviously that was not the case for several past Phillies guys either).
And he was basically full season of ABs in high A last season. A .703 OPS isn't great, but he has speed and a lot of positional flexibility, and this was his first real taste of pro ball, since not many ABs in his draft year. He'll be at Reading this year at age 22. It'll be what you see is what you get, because at 5'11" and 205# he is fully developed, physically. He seems like good value for the international money we traded. I doubt we could do better spending that part of our allocation. He's a guy who seems to have a reasonable chance of being a bench guy on the Phillies in 2026.
.703 OPS and 41 steals would be very acceptable. I would also presume by that number of steals that he has plus-plus speed which hopefully can translate to above average OF play. (Agreed an assumption)
He did put up a RC+ 104, so he's not a hitting league artifact.
It also looked like the Dodgers adjusted his swing to hit more fly balls.
24 games in LF, 18 in CF, 69 in RF, so he's a corner OF, but if they kept him in RF might have the arm to stick there.
Two years to evaluate him before he's Rule 5 eligible.
His Fangraphs scouting report had him at 40 speed unfortunately. Must be more smart than fast on the bases.
Ranked 46 a year ago.
Campbell was a high school infielder who ended up settling in right field during his college career at Texas, where he had a power breakout as a junior (he only played a couple of weeks of pro ball after the draft). The compact Campbell has a minimalistic set-up and swing, with basically no stride and a very short load. He’s a dangerous gap-to-gap hitter with this simple operation, which looks as though he’s using a two-strike approach the whole time, expertly guiding the bat head around the bottom of the zone. Campbell does have trouble with up-and-away fastballs at times, and right field is a tough profile when you don’t have a plus offensive tool. I’d really like to see if Campbell can once again mix an infield position into his defensive duties. If so, he’ll likely hit enough to be a versatile part-time weapon.
And it didn't really cost us $750K if I understand correctly. We didn't send money to the Dodgers, just permission to spend their $750K.
Well, opportunity cost.
Again, I’d really love to know what the plan was before they new sasaki would be posted. I thought it was strange the guardians didn’t seem to be in on any significant international guys this year, but at least they had a plan to use pool to dump roster salary. Shaving a few million from the Phils roster to get to get under the last payroll tax tier would have been more beneficial than this..
Well, obviously people can quibble about the strategy or the player, but Phillies have now added a 2023 4th round pick (in the Gilbert trade) and 2023 8th round pick after having not actually picked in the second or fifth round themselves that year.
I just think I trust our pro scouts, development staff and the players being older more than I trust our international department and the players being so young.
And I don't see what's beneficial about getting under the tax right now. They still wouldn't be able to sign a player without going over it (even this new NRI Japanese pitcher might have taken them over it) and beyond that it's only money. They'll still be players at the deadline if they need to be.
The Phillies scouts/development seem to have a clue, signed Kemp and Anthony as college FAs and both are now top 30 prospects. Campbell seems similar, you see basic skills and something you can tweak in his swing to generate more power. If he ends up a RH utliity IF/OF with power (Kemp?) it's a win.
Not sure exactly how to evaluate the Campbell deal, but I guess I am disappointed with the return especially if it is a million dollar allocation. For that price we should get someone who fits at least into the top 20 of the system rather than the top 40. MLB does rank him 27th in our system which of course is a bad view of our system compared to the Dodgers if Fangraphs ranked him 46th there. The guy the Reds got seems to have a higher ceiling than Campbell.
This is not to denigrate Campbell who is young for his class and survived in a pitching environment in High A in his first full season. He is a decent 4th OF/Utility prospect though the lack of infield experience last year may mean he is not really that good there. RIght-handed utility guys are really not valuable though, certainly compared to left handed bats that can be the long side of the platoon.
It just feels like we should have gotten a bit more (i.e. higher ceiling) for that much international allocation space. I am sure we just did not have the agreements with any top prospects dating back a couple of years (and it is really not Chung's fault), but the lack of connections with top prospects in an international class is really not an excuse to get a somewhat minimal return in a deal like this.
Well yeah but I just don't think the Phillies were truly going to be able to finish the season under that threshold. How would they have done so in this context? Nobody's taking Nick (who we need anyway) or Walker for international money. If the Phillies really wanted to chip away at that they wouldn't have signed Joe Ross, and/or they could have settled for Painter and a patchwork of 5th starters instead of adding Luzardo's salary.
I really thought you meant it could help them avoid the next threshold, which they will still probably exceed (but which those moves above were all designed to avoid for now compared to pricier FAs, as was Kepler).
Perhaps. On the other hand, Lantigua (the guy the Reds got) is 2.5 years younger, and has spent two seasons in the Dominican Summer League. If his ceiling is higher, he's farther from that ceiling, which suggests that the odds of his just not making it are higher. It's not an obvious call, to me at least.
Fun fact, and question?: Arnaldo Lantigua (the guy the Reds got) is from Puerto Plata, in the Dominican Republic. Rafael Lantigua (infielder the Phils signed to a minor league deal with a NRI)...is also from Puerto Plata. Relatives? Brothers?
Clearly we went for higher floor and lower ceiling. I just tend to err in the opposite direction since we can get AAAA players cheap.
I guess the big story is the value of the allocations is pretty small this year. It is a down year for the free agent class and all the top names are already locked up (which is partially the Phillies fault). This was the best the Phillies could do and I do think it is better than overpaying (like we did for Josh Gessner) one of the few prospects still available.
Just wish we had locked up a better class in the first place I guess.
Can't argue with that...but it's effectively ancient history, given how long ago those lockups occurred.
Has there been indication of multiple players "committed" to LA being signed elsewhere? Or was Serrano (who did bail) the only commit they had worth discussing?
L.A. lost a trio of players who had initially committed to join the team. Dominican infielder Darell Morel (Pirates), Venezuelan outfielder Oscar Patiño (White Sox), and Dominican outfielder Teilon Serrano (Twins) have signed elsewhere. Francys Romero reports that L.A. intends to complete its other verbal agreements — roughly 15 in total. Baseball America’s Ben Badler reports that the Dodgers finalized a deal with Venezuelan pitcher Carlos Ramirez tonight.