Evan Grant with prospects #11-15

Ok. Still taken in by windblown homeruns on BP eephus pitches I see. Your confidence in his bat is heartening, or something. You don’t really disagree with the idea that defense is the substratum that underlay elite SS prospects do you? Ave present defensive tools for a 17yo don’t project to future average ML tools. Other than “leadership” and arm Profar doesn’t seem to be in the same league as Andrus in terms of range, baserunning and speed. His glove is unproven at this point unless you believe that “soft hands” is a measure.

 In comparison, I don’t believe that there was much ambiguity about Andrus’ defensive skill set at 16-17 – plus across the board that projected at the ML level as near plus. Neither Profar or Sardinas deserve to be considered in the Andrus stratosphere based on what we know, think we know, claim to know, assert we know about them IMHO (right now). I think considering both as having AA ML ceiling (for differing reasons) is very reasonable but hardly worth an “elite” ranking. But then again I don’t value prospects for their fantasy value, rather on the likelihood, looking at all year to year measures, that they will reach their realistic ceiling, . And right now, there aren’t enough “measures” to reasonably assert Profar projects as an elite prospect, just instructs hype (and even less significant, hype from the DSL “B” team, mostly full of newly signed DSL org guys who will never make it stateside- credit Goldstein for hyping this nugget).

Now if Jason Cole wants to claim (or accepts the claim) that Profar has a defensive skill set equal to that which Andrus possessed at the same age, I’d like to hear it. He has after all seen all three players in person, if only for a couple of games for Sardinas and Profar (and, last but not least, some impressive workouts). Also, just for fun, I’d like to hear what proportion of the Profar talk coming from Ranger’s sources involved “uncanny makeup” vs tool talk? If I had to guess – and based on all the vague characterizations about Profar’s tools in all of the recently published secondary sources – I’d guess a 60/30, Makeup/Tools ratio for Profar-talk. IF it was the inverse, then you’d think the Profar tool talk would be much more concrete with less slippage into the “makeup” meme when Internet Prospectors weren’t sure (Goldstein again).

Also, I’d like to hear some specific quotes from Sardinas “doubters” (ie, from said scouts) that JC seems to be keeping close to the vest as it were. Or is there just a specious assertion that more Profar talk indicates a lower Sardinas ceiling – Profar is better because no one asks any questions about him? Funny thing is that I think JC would peg their ceilings as pretty close together if not the same. Am I wrong on this JC? You do after all write that Sardinas could develop into an elite SS prospect, right? Do I need to subscribe to LSD to get the answer?

Anyways, at this very preliminary juncture, and, well, at least until the end of their first year, I feel comfy asserting that Sardinas projects as the better defensive shortstop. If Profar proves his equal in the field and/or both prospects prove to have elite ceilings over the next couple of years, then that would be nothing but welcome and exciting prospect news.