Better prospect...Bell or Snyder?

[Sports Guy]

Who do you choose and why?

Personally I think it is Bell and its not particularly close...He has more power, better plate discipline, plays a more premium position and sounds like he is a better defensive player.

[Big Mac]

Who do you choose and why?

Personally I think it is Bell and its not particularly close...He has more power, better plate discipline, plays a more premium position and sounds like he is a better defensive player.

Completely agree.

[allstar1579]

It's actually very close for me, too close to really pick one. They are very different prospects, but I don't know that I can say one is better.

[OSfanfromCT]

I chose Bell, and for me personally it came down to position. I'd rather have a legitimate hitting 3B prospect rather than 1B (obviously...at least it seems obvious...). Also, Snyder's weak bat at Norfolk for the better part of the second half of the year also seems curious to say the least. Although I'm by no means worried about him yet, I'm skeptical for now, and I'll be looking closely at the Norfolk box scores to begin next Spring.

It'll be nice to see how they both match up next year in Norfolk together and compare them then.

[Mashed Potatoes]

I think it would've been a very tough call if not for Snyder's AAA season. He's now had more games with the Tides than he did with the Baysox. His OPS in Norfolk is .671. I certainly haven't lost faith in him but, ewww.

(BTW Justin Smoak only has a .723 OPS and that's in the PCL).

[crawdad]

Bell.

He has a good bat and it has less of a need for improvement at 3B.

Snyder barely has the bat right now to be considered a ML 1B. He needs to kick it up a notch that I have yet to see. Hard to make it with a Lyle Overbay/James Loney bat as your upside.

[xKHx]

Bell, I do not see anyway to argue the other. Nice pick up SG now you can say you predicted a trade to all the naysayers that ask if you ever get one right. It all falls on you if he busts though :laughlol:

[JamesI]

I like Snyder and I'm really hoping he ends up good enough to be our 1B or DH for years to come. But Bell is the better prospect.

[Arthur_Bryant]

Who do you choose and why?

Personally I think it is Bell and its not particularly close...He has more power, better plate discipline, plays a more premium position and sounds like he is a better defensive player.

I don't know enough about the defense, but everything else is spot on.

Snyder has better contact skills, but it's still Bell overall.

[QBsILLEST1]

Im unable to make a good decision. Snyder is younger and has a more pure bat, hes a real pure hitter. He also has been making tremendous strides with his pitch selection and his discipline. He knows how to make the necessary adjustments to hit in any condition as well, and anywhere he goes no matter what the competition level, he seems to hit. I think that Harbor park hurt his power numbers, but I am confident that next season he is going to hit better there.

Josh Bell isnt as pure of a hitter, but he has some of the best power in our system. He also has a very good eye which should help him succeed in the ML. He also is a switch hitter, though he may end up ditching that futher down the road if his splits do not get better. He apparently has a good glove at 3B as well.

I honestly rank them very closely, I would have said Bell until I saw Snyder's increased OBP this year which tells me that he is still developing pretty well. So I rank them equally, Bell has more power, but Snyder is the better hitter and should have a higher batting average at the major league level. I am also confident that Snyder's power numbers are going to be better once he gets out of Norfolk since he hits HRs the opposite field so often and Norfolk is notorious for not allowing many opposite field HRs.....

[QBsILLEST1]

Who do you choose and why?

Personally I think it is Bell and its not particularly close...He has more power, better plate discipline, plays a more premium position and sounds like he is a better defensive player.

I think that Snyder's AAA stint has turned some people off. If you look at Snyder's AA season compared to Bell's, it matches up nicely since they are the same age. While in AA, though it seems Bell has more power, Snyder actually had the higher slug%, Bell's is somewhere around .520 combined between Bowie and the Dodgers AA team. Then, both of them had about the same separation in OBP, but of course Snyder's was much higher due to the better batting average. Snyder's spread about about 80 points in AA and so was Bell's between the 2 teams.

Who knows how Bell would have done with a promotion to AAA, but Snyder held his own. He still maintained good discipline as well which is a very good thing. But like I said Id rate them equally, but Id lean toward Snyder if I absolutely had to choose 1.....

[Malike]

Bell is a better prospect, but he's going to have to prove that he's more than just a platoon player before I'll go on record and say he's going to be the better overall player. Right now, he's looking like a one side of the plate type hitter.

[JTrea81]

Bell by far. He already hits for more power and has better plate discipline than Snyder.

And he's a decent defender at 3B.

[RVAbird]

Im unable to make a good decision. Snyder is younger and has a more pure bat, hes a real pure hitter. He also has been making tremendous strides with his pitch selection and his discipline. He knows how to make the necessary adjustments to hit in any condition as well, and anywhere he goes no matter what the competition level, he seems to hit. I think that Harbor park hurt his power numbers, but I am confident that next season he is going to hit better there.

Josh Bell isnt as pure of a hitter, but he has some of the best power in our system. He also has a very good eye which should help him succeed in the ML. He also is a switch hitter, though he may end up ditching that futher down the road if his splits do not get better. He apparently has a good glove at 3B as well.

I honestly rank them very closely, I would have said Bell until I saw Snyder's increased OBP this year which tells me that he is still developing pretty well. So I rank them equally, Bell has more power, but Snyder is the better hitter and should have a higher batting average at the major league level. I am also confident that Snyder's power numbers are going to be better once he gets out of Norfolk since he hits HRs the opposite field so often and Norfolk is notorious for not allowing many opposite field HRs.....

Brandon Snyder is ten days younger than Josh Bell. That's about as irrelevant as you can get.

While Snyder probably has better bat control and overall hit tool, Bell has much more raw power (and has displayed it with more success), will walk more, plays a more valuable position and looks to be at least average there, while Snyder seems to be an average at best first baseman.

It's a close call as to who will be the better offensive player, although I like Bell's power potential.

It's not really a close call as to who will likely be the the more valuable player. Oh, IMO.

[alexei606]

Still questions about Bell's body type - he lost a lot of weight, but, is still has a thick lower half; that usually means a position change, ala what Brett Wallace will most likely have to do. Couple that with range issues and it looks like Bell is a good candidate to move to 1B; thus, if that does occur, his bat has to play bigger. He also does not hit lefties at all - and apparently his swing from the right side is noticeably worse, thus, not a true switch hitter and more like a platoon candidate. These are two big issues - how many platoon 1B are successful ML players? Of course, he is 22 - which means it is not good that he already has weight problems, but, it does mean that he might be able to learn to hit lefties either by improving his swing on the right side, or ditching that and try to hit from the left side. That said, at 22, he better start showing progress soon - or he will be labeled a platoon player.

Snyder did very well in the Arizona Fall League (AA and AAA competition) and in AA - he held his own in AAA. Still don't know about his defense, Stockstill intimated that he has improved dramatically in his foot work and he started to play more 3B at the end of the season; others still say he is below average. His hit tool is better than Bell's according to both his statistics and scouting reports. It also looks like that he is developing more patience and power, though, his power does not compare to Bell's left side at least not now. Snyder has a much better body type and he has really put on muscle since signing. Power is said to come last - so I still think that the jury is out on how much power he will obtain.

allstar1579 has seen both play at Bowie, IIRC, and states that he can't pick and it is very close. So, having not seen either one, I will go with allstar's opinion and say they are even.