79 replies to this topic

[Mike B]

Fast start (pun intended) for Bradfield.

 

18 games across 2 levels and 19 steals. (with on on-base over .500)

Not bad.  The stolen bases are eye opening.  The doesn't suck either

[BobPhelan]

He has the lowest whiff percentage I’ve ever seen. If the season wasn’t ending soon he’d be in Aberdeen.

[BobPhelan]

Promoted to Aberdeen.

[BobPhelan]

A/A+/FCL

 

.291/.473/.329 (.802), 22 R, 3 doubles, 6 RBI, 26 BB, 25 SB, 79 AB

 

144 wRC+, 23.6% BB rate, 14.5% K rate, .038 ISO

[BaltBird 24]

Love the .473 OBP, but with his speed he should be hitting more 2Bs and 3Bs.

[Mike B]

Love the .473 OBP, but with his speed he should be hitting more 2Bs and 3Bs.

I thought the same thing until I looked at the AB's.  Only 79 AB's.  26 walks is incredible.

[BobPhelan]

He will be at fall instructs next week, not wasting any time working with him on things.

[mweb08]

Love the .473 OBP, but with his speed he should be hitting more 2Bs and 3Bs.

Well he's kinda turning a fair amount of hits into doubles in a different way.

[BSLRoseKatz]

Well he's kinda turning a fair amount of hits into doubles in a different way.

 

I'm sure his speed is turning groundballs into singles too 

[BaltBird 24]

Well he's kinda turning a fair amount of hits into doubles in a different way.

True, but a .038 ISO is atrocious. Like worse than Richie Martin bad, who had a .051 ISO with 3 XBH in 105 plate appearances in 2021 bad.

I don't think that's sustainable and still being a useful regular.

[TwentyThirtyFive]

They def will tweak and try to get more pop out of the bat but there never will be much there. Yes he can be a heavy singles hitter and a useful reg. It obv puts more pressure on his wheels and glove and even his ability to draw walks but its not crazy. Look at Juan Pierre. Who hes been compd to more than once.

[TwentyThirtyFive]

Its so early in his pro career but hes kinda projecting how I said on draft night. I dont see him being a Top 100 guy. Maybe the back end but not a Top 50 guy for sure. Hes not gonna wow anyone with the pure hit tool and power. Those are 2 of the 5 tools and on prospect lists the bat and its potential gets more love than pure speed and D. It just does. That doesnt mean he cant be an effective offensive player if he can get on base and then take enough extra bases while on base. But a 280/350/380 minor league slash line isnt gonna get you on prospect lists

[Mackus]

True, but a .038 ISO is atrocious. Like worse than Richie Martin bad, who had a .051 ISO with 3 XBH in 105 plate appearances in 2021 bad.

I don't think that's sustainable and still being a useful regular.

 

Its definitely not sustainable.  .050 is close to as low as you'll ever see from a guy who gets any MLB run.  There have only been 18 times in the past 20 years where a guy with 200 PA has been under .050 ISO, out of 3300 individual seasons.  

 

Amazingly, Jose Molina had an .009 ISO in 247 PA in 2014.  2 doubles.  Next lowest is .033.

 

So he'll either start being able to find a little more pop or he won't advance.  Its a clear disqualifier if it continues, but also I think he's pretty likely to find some more pop or he wouldn't have been someone teams considered in the 1st even with his speed and glove.  If we looked, I'm sure we can find plenty comps of guys who had no pop in their first year or two in the minors who end up developing enough to get by.

[hallas]

Its definitely not sustainable.  .050 is close to as low as you'll ever see from a guy who gets any MLB run.  There have only been 18 times in the past 20 years where a guy with 200 PA has been under .050 ISO, out of 3300 individual seasons.  

 

Amazingly, Jose Molina had an .009 ISO in 247 PA in 2014.  2 doubles.  Next lowest is .033.

 

So he'll either start being able to find a little more pop or he won't advance.  Its a clear disqualifier if it continues, but also I think he's pretty likely to find some more pop or he wouldn't have been someone teams considered in the 1st even with his speed and glove.  If we looked, I'm sure we can find plenty comps of guys who had no pop in their first year or two in the minors who end up developing enough to get by.

 

There have been 4 seasons with less than .050 ISO and more than 4 WAR: 1965 Maury Wills (.043 ISO, 5.1 WAR) 1980 Ozzie Smith (.046 ISO, 4.0 WAR) 1992 Ozzie (.46 ISO, 5.1 WAR) and 1991 Brett Butler (.047 ISO, 4.7 WAR.)

 

Butler isn't a bad comp, but he had a bad year with power that year, his career ISO is .082.  He had a pretty nice career.  If Bradfield performs like that we should all be so lucky.  The other obvious comp is Ichiro, but he had more power; he never went below .070 ISO during his prime years.

[makoman]

He had .150 ISO this year in college and .181 last year. I’m not going to assume he’s a < .050 guy now after ~100 PAs.

[BobPhelan]

He hits the ball pretty hard for his size. More line drives/fly balls and less ground balls will be the goal. He also doesn’t swing and miss much and has great plate discipline. I think he’ll be a better baseball player than “prospect”.

[RichardZ]

What was Joey Ortiz ISO in his debut year? Colton Cowser? If there’s one thing the Orioles developmental system has proven it’s that they can get players to tap into their power. If Bradfield can be a 10-15 homer guy, he can be a star. We’ll see.

[TwentyThirtyFive]

He hits the ball pretty hard for his size. More line drives/fly balls and less ground balls will be the goal. He also doesn’t swing and miss much and has great plate discipline. I think he’ll be a better baseball player than “prospect”.

The anti Colton Cowser if you will. Better prospect than baseball player. Ill stop

[BobPhelan]

The anti Colton Cowser if you will. Better prospect than baseball player. Ill stop

Boooo

[Nigel Tufnel]

Law:

 

Bradfield is an 80 runner and either a 70 or 80 defender in center, depending on who you ask and perhaps when you see him, not that it matters that much in the end — he’s got two top-end tools, and that gives him a high floor and a lot of runway to work on the other aspects of his game. Bradfield seemed like a lock for a top-10 pick after his freshman year at Vanderbilt, when he hit .336/.451/.414 as a 19-year-old in the SEC, stealing 47 bases in 53 attempts, but somewhere, someone convinced him to change his swing to try to hit for power, and while he did go from 1 homer as a freshman to hitting 14 the next two seasons, his overall hitting went backward and I think helped Baltimore land him at pick 15 last season. (It did not help that Bradfield constantly tried to bunt for hits, putting himself behind in the count and doing nothing to right his swing. I have a lot of feelings about this.) He’s not a power hitter, but he’s not powerless, if that makes sense — he is capable of putting 5-10 balls in the seats a year, but the more he tries to do so, the worse he’ll be as a hitter. Last spring, he was loading his hands extremely deep, taking a huge stride, opening his hips way too early, then collapsing his back side to try to lift — or will — the ball out of the park. He needs a simpler approach, like the one he had as a freshman, that focuses on putting the ball in play, as he’ll end up with a lot of extra bases thanks to his speed, and he does have enough strength to drive balls to the gaps and catch up to major-league fastballs. I don’t change players’ rankings or evaluations based on their parent organizations, since that could change at any time, but I think Bradfield is in an organization that will figure out what to do with him very quickly. At worst, you’ve got an elite fourth outfielder/pinch runner, while the ceiling here is huge defensive impact with an average bat.