'Stros 2013 Post-draft Analysis

Pitching, pitching, and more pitching. Advanced, polished, collegiate pitching at that. Mike Elias, Jeff Luhnow and Co. clearly took an approach to this go round to take as many arms as they could get their hands on, taking 24 pitchers out of the entire 40 selections. College bats were also taken in bulk. This draft class looks very similar to the game plan Luhnow stuck with in St. Louis. This class may not be as sexy as last years with the high ceiling upsides, but will move quickly through the system and should see the big show in only a few years. The feel here is that this was the second part of the 2012 draft. It feels a hell of a lot like a two part album, or movie feature if you will; As if there was a figurative "To Be Continued" at the finish of the 2012 draft. The first half, Luhnow saturated the system with a lot of young high upside talent, and the second half filled holes with polished, major league ready caliber talent. There should be a high turnover rate of guys who see the show from this draft class.
     
     The draft is headlined by the obvious sexy selection of hard throwing Mark Appel, the well polished Andrew Thurman, pitchability lefty Kent Emanuel, prep catcher Jacob Nottingham with plus power projection, and Devonte German and Austin Nicely, two prep arms with plenty of upside who wont be easy signs. I expect Ramsey, Holberton, Mcdonald, Gregor, and Kemp to be sleepers moving forward. I espicially like Gregor's on base ability matched with his pop he showed in the cape last summer. Kemp is a guy who quietly pulled SEC play of the year honors with his plus contact tool and plus plus speed, and will push DDJ quite a bit as he adds to the middle infield depth. The rest of the way i'll be looking into the profiles of some of the more notable selections.
   
   

 You might want to slip your sunglasses on because the future is bright with this one. Mark Appel is finally a Houston Astro. Thank you sweet baby Jesus. With the first overall selection on Thursday, Luhnow could not pass on Appel two consecutive years. This was the safe, and regardless of the fruition of the pick, I believe it was the right pick. He's incredibly advanced and polished, and should slot into the major league rotation within at most a year and a half to two years. He's battle tested against upper tier competition, having thrown four years in the Pac 12, as well as seeing time with team USA. Appel's arsenal consists of a plus-plus fastball that touches 99 and sits comfortably in the 94-96 range, a plus slider he features as his out pitch that sits in the upper 80's, and a good, very underrated change, that sits in the 81-84 range with good bite and great speed differential to it. Mark features very good command of his arsenal, walking only 23 hitters in 106.1 innings of work his senior season. He finished his collegiate career as the all time strikeouts leader in Stanford history with 372 K's. Appel figures to sign for at or just below slot value of $7,790,400. Appel is an absolute top of the rotation arm, and should fit nicely in that 1 or 2 role. It would be clutch if Appel would take around 7 mil, as that would free up the cap needed to pull German, Nicely, and maybe Schick as well. Luhnow said today in an interview that he expects him to be signed and on the mound by July. Fingers crossed Boras doesn't hold negotiations up. We'll see Appel in Astros orange and blue sometime in 2014.

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Andrew Thurman was taken with the 40th overall selection with the first pick in the 2nd round. Thurman was Irvine's friday starter and has good stuff across the board. Keith Law has him going as high as the 15th overall selection, and he fell to us at 40. It feels as if we pulled two first round picks this year as well. The 6'3 righty commands all four of his above average offerings very well. His heater sits comfortably in the 91-93 range, and he can get it up to 96 when he feels like comin in hot. His secondary consists of a curve, a slider, and a change. The hook is probably his best of the offerings sitting in the 76-78 range with a sharp break to it. His slider as well as his change sits in the low 80's, the slider with decent 3-9 bite, and the change holds a good speed differential with a bit of downward movement. He commands all of his offerings and mixes his arsenal very well. Most scouts have slapped the MOR ceiling on him, and I can definitely see him as a good 3 in the future. He should slot into the latter half of the top 10 prospects in the system behind arms like Cosart, Appel, Mcullers, Folty, and Nitro. We should see Thurman in a few short years, ETA last 2014-early 2015. Hot damn I fancy these first two selections quite a bit.

Kent Emanuel, the 6'4 southpaw, was taken with the 74th overall selection with the first pick of the third round. He has been given comps to our very own Dallas Keuchel, with a few more ticks on the radar gun. He tops out at 91, and relies heavily on his change-up and control of his secondary. He was a Friday night starter for one of the nations premier programs so he's fairly battle tested. Inefficiency in his mechanics lead me to believe he can pick up at least a couple ticks on the gun. His lazy glove side hand and poor back leg drive leads to very poor hip-shoulder separation, and depending on which pitching "guru" your talking to, hip-shoulder separation can lead to up to 80% of velocity production. Hopefully someone in the front office picks up that aspect of his delivery in his tape and helps tack on a couple digits to his velo, because his ability to command his offspeed paired with a 93ish mph fastball would be a very sexy combo. Mayo and other analysts have commonly slapped labels such as "back end of the rotation guy" and "workhorse" on him. Worst case scenario his three quarter release slots him nicely into a bullpen role at the major league level which isn't too terrible of an outcome. This is a high floor, moderate ceiling guy, but when you can control your arsenal like he's said to be able to do, he's definitely worth keeping an eye on. ETA late 2015-early 2016. 

Jacob Nottingham, the 6'3 prep catcher, was taken with the 167th overall selection with the first pick of the 6th round. The report on Nottingham is that his power is his most valuable asset and that it may develop into a plus tool as he moves forward. He profiles as a steady receiver with an industrial fire-hose for an arm. Slot Nottingham into the system, and the depth at catcher looks pretty damn good. Jacob was a two sport standout in high school and turned down Arizona's scholarship offer to play tight end, so athletically he may be able to slot over to right field if need be during the course of his development considering Jason Castro's ravaging of American League pitching and general badassness for years to come. I'm just salivating over Nottingham's video in anticipation of his future ceiling with the stick. Signability concerns always come into play with high school commits to top tier programs, but considering Nottingham's twitter bio already reads "Houston Astro" and his cover picture consists of the Astro logo, I'd say its safe to say he will be signing. We may see an overslot here, but nothing too unreasonable, maybe 100-250k over his designated slot. Its always a crapshoot putting ETA's on prep draftee's, but we should expect to see him in the window of 2017-2018. 

Austin Nicely, a 6'1 southpaw, was taken 287 overall with the first pick of the 10th round. Nicely's heater sits in the upper 80's touching 91 at times. His secondary consists of a curve and change, which reportedly need work, but what high school arms secondary doesn't.. He's committed to Virginia, so he wont be an easy sign. He's athletic and young, so presumably his velocity should see a bump over the next several years. Reports I have found state that he has an advanced feel for pitching for a guy his age, which can only mean good things as he continues to add definition to his secondary. He will almost certainly require an overslot considering his 10th round slot value is much too low for an upside lefty with college commitment. Fingers crossed he sells his talents over to Luhnow and AstroNation. ETA not a clue in hell. 

Devonte German, a 6'5, 240 right handed pound prepster, was taken 317 overall with the first pick of the 11th round. German is a three sport standout and a two way player. His strength and size profile well both on the bump and in the outfield. German sits in the low 90's and it's reported that he has bumped it up to 98 in some workouts so the upside is certainly there. I wasn't able to find much on the rest of his arsenal, but considering that he was a two way high school guy, it's safe to assume that like most hard throwing prepsters he has a sharp, but raw secondary offering, most likely a hook or slider, and a very raw and undeveloped changeup. German was quoted saying his pitching numbers looked something to the tune of..."12-4 with a 1.64 ERA and 157 strikeouts in 115 innings pitched in my junior and senior year combined.". The other  little tidbit of information I did find on him was hitting statistic, and granted high school numbers are about as useful as a poopy flavored lollipop, but the numbers I found definitely indicated that he can swing it just in case the Astros decide to change direction with him going forward. Being taken after the 10th, German doesn't have slot specification, but It will most definitely take in the 100-300K ballpark to get his signature I would imagine. He's raw, but there's a healthy amount of upside here. ETA I'd be bullshitting you if I made an assumption here. 

In Summary: I'm more than pleased with the crop we pulled this go around. You can absolutely never have too much pitching, and we certainly took our fair share this draft. Although we didn't see the extent of upside that we did last year, there certainly was no shortage of young upside talent taken this year. Gregor, Kemp, Holberton, and Ramsey are all sleeper collegiate guys in my opinion who may make Luhnow look like a genius going forward. We definitely could've had a sexier draft by taking names like Wahl, Serano, and Denney that fell quite a bit, but Elias and Luhnow had guys like Gregor, Kemp, and Emanuel at those spots on their draft board for a reason and to call Luhnow on anything is blasphemy. I just cant get over Appel and Thurman with the first two picks, what a haul for the future of Astro Dominance. Consider me pleased as punch with the draft in its entirety. Hell yeah, Go 'Stros. 

(A common pastime of mine is bitching, and i'm sure it will become a staple of many of my posts over the next couple tumultuous years at the ML level....so here it goes, my first annual bitch.)

My bitch: Really cant complain about too much here, as i'm very pleased with the draft, and i know better than to second guess the wizard that is Jeff Luhnow, but.... for the sake of bitching I must say that I would have loved to have taken Jon Denney when he was served up to us on a silver platter all the way in the 3rd. I also wouldn't have been opposed to taking Biggio earlier and overslotting him. It would just kill me to see Biggio on the back of any other jersey.