Ryan Mountcastle 2019

[Punchandjudy]

I find it funny how people made definitive scouting judgement on Mountcastle in Left from a 3 second blip.  Thankfully there is Tony and Luke to keep this forum from devolving into the School or Roch message posting territory. 

What I saw and what I’ve read, makes me want to see more out of him in the outfield.  

[Tony-OH]

On 6/25/2019 at 11:10 PM, RZNJ said:

Mountcastle is a poor man's Trumbo.  Trade him or package while he has a little value.  The bat is good, not special.  He'll be a .280/.300/.450  hitter with little to no defensive value.  His walk totals are embarrassing and signals that he has no willingness to change.

Mountcastle at 22 years old, AAA .309/.333/.513/.846
Mancini at 22 years old, A-/A+ .284/.326/.409/.735
Trumbo at 22 years old, A+/AA 281/.325/.540/.864

Trumbo was in a hitter's leagues.  

[Tony-OH]

4 hours ago, NCRaven said:

Tony, have you heard anything from the warehouse or coaching staff to make you think they would even consider something like that during winter ball?

No, but the Orioles are playing everything close to the vest with the new regime.

[Tony-OH]

51 minutes ago, Punchandjudy said:

I find it funny how people made definitive scouting judgement on Mountcastle in Left from a 3 second blip.  Thankfully there is Tony and Luke to keep this forum from devolving into the School or Roch message posting territory. 

What I saw and what I’ve read, makes me want to see more out of him in the outfield.  

Well if we start having basement living losers racing to be "first" in the comments section then we'll know we have sunken.

[atomic]

12 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:

Mountcastle at 22 years old, AAA .309/.333/.513/.846
Mancini at 22 years old, A-/A+ .284/.326/.409/.735
Trumbo at 22 years old, A+/AA 281/.325/.540/.864

Trumbo was in a hitter's leagues.  

Yeah I don't get this comparison to Trumbo at all. Not too many 22 year old's in AAA hitting .309 with an .846 OPS.  Really not too many 22 year olds in AAA at all. 

[atomic]

Looked it up.  To start the season Mountcastle was the 7th youngest player in the International League. 

[Tony-OH]

2 minutes ago, atomic said:

Yeah I don't get this comparison to Trumbo at all. Not too many 22 year old's in AAA hitting .309 with an .846 OPS.  Really not too many 22 year olds in AAA at all. 

I think some people are too concerned over the lack of walks. Now I'd rather see more walks, but it's less important to draw walks when you can hit for a high average lie Mountcastle can.

[ChuckS]

42 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:

I think some people are too concerned over the lack of walks. Now I'd rather see more walks, but it's less important to draw walks when you can hit for a high average lie Mountcastle can.

I think some fear that the high BA won't be maintainable with such a low walk rate and that Major League pitchers will take advantage of his over-aggressiveness.  Even if he becomes a .280 hitter he will barely be pushing over .300 OBP at his current walk rate.  

His slugging percentage will really have to be through the roof to be anything better than an average hitting first baseman, so it may be important that he can stick at LF.  

[Tony-OH]

51 minutes ago, ChuckS said:

I think some fear that the high BA won't be maintainable with such a low walk rate and that Major League pitchers will take advantage of his over-aggressiveness.  Even if he becomes a .280 hitter he will barely be pushing over .300 OBP at his current walk rate.  

His slugging percentage will really have to be through the roof to be anything better than an average hitting first baseman, so it may be important that he can stick at LF.  

But he's not really overly aggressive. He takes a lot of good pitches, but just hits the ball hard often and puts it in play often.

I think the power will be there in the major leagues and I can see him settling into a Mancini kind of profile though with the chance to hit for even more power and perhaps a better average.

[Can_of_corn]

1 minute ago, RZNJ said:

Mountcastle, age 22.  11 walks and 77 strikeouts in 75 games.  You always point out numbers in A ball and say a hitter is not a prospect based on bad plate discipline numbers. How do you feel about 11:77 in AAA?

At the very least, he needs another year in AAA. Of course, he appears to think there's no problem as long as he's putting up "numbers".    His career numbers in the minors are more than 4 strikeouts per 1 walk.  Trumbo wasn't that bad. Adam Jones wasn't near that bad.  At age 22, Sisco had 32 walks and 96 k's in 344 AB's which was bad but he had a history of decent plate discipline.   

Mountcastle has no such history.  His 77 strikeouts are even worsened by the fact that he doesn't work the count at all.   ML pitchers will exploit that to the max.  Can he improve? Sure?  Is the current version on a path to success?  No way.

I thought I made strong comments without supporting evidence.

[Can_of_corn]

Just now, RZNJ said:

11 walks and 77 strikeouts is evidence.

What his O-Swing%?

[Can_of_corn]

1 minute ago, RZNJ said:

You said I didn't offer any evidence.  I showed I did.  11 walks and 77 strikeouts.  How do you feel about those numbers?

I think that without proper context it is not sufficient to suggest he needs at least another year in AAA. 

[Can_of_corn]

1 minute ago, RZNJ said:

As someone else pointed out, 3 walks and 33 k's in June.  That's not progress.  But he put up 8 homers and an 814 OPS so let's ignore the elephant in the room.

I'm not suggesting it isn't something to look at.

I'm also not suggesting that he at least another year at AAA.

[Aglets]

Here is a list of the qualified major leaguers with a BB rate that is 3.4% or worse (the same as Mountcastle at AAA).

Yadier Molina  (.667 OPS)  (.281 BB/K)

Kevin Pillar  (.681 OPS)   (.222 BB/K)

Hanser Alberto!!!  (.738 OPS)  (.292  BB/K)

Tim Anderson  (.833 OPS)  (.119 BB/K)

Mountcastle has a .143 BB/K ratio

So it looks like it is def possible to be a good offensive player with a super low BB rate but it is definitely abnormal to see someone qualify for the batting title and have a BB rate so low.

[atomic]

31 minutes ago, RZNJ said:

Mountcastle, age 22.  11 walks and 77 strikeouts in 75 games.  You always point out numbers in A ball and say a hitter is not a prospect based on bad plate discipline numbers. How do you feel about 11:77 in AAA?

At the very least, he needs another year in AAA. Of course, he appears to think there's no problem as long as he's putting up "numbers".    His career numbers in the minors are more than 4 strikeouts per 1 walk.  Trumbo wasn't that bad. Adam Jones wasn't near that bad.  At age 22, Sisco had 32 walks and 96 k's in 344 AB's which was bad but he had a history of decent plate discipline.   

Mountcastle has no such history.  His 77 strikeouts are even worsened by the fact that he doesn't work the count at all.   ML pitchers will exploit that to the max.  Can he improve? Sure?  Is the current version on a path to success?  No way.

Mountcastle has hit 15 home runs in half a season of AAA at 22.  He has a high average. I think he will succeed in the Major Leagues.  Mancini wasn't all that great in AAA at 24. His walk totals while not as low as Mountcastle were low.  His Average and power were much lower.  Lets not kid ourselves Mountcastle will hit.  Tony Gwynn didn't walk much in triple A at 22 but hit for a high average and it seemed to work out for Gwynn.