Scouting Report on Ogden Raptors

Here are some reports on some players I saw in a game between the Idaho Falls Chukars and Odgen Raptors.

I had already seen Idaho and written about them on this blog, so I only took some notes on 3 pitchers that pitched in the game and I hadn't seen previously.

Zeb Sneed started the game for Idaho and was at 91-92 MPH with his fastball. He was getting a bunch of grounders and got a bunch of bad luck singles in the 1st when his breaking ball was getting hit. He has a curveball with not much command, and it was all over the place. It is a pretty good pitch when he controls it though. His fastball command was also bad early on, but he improved after a shaky start to the game. His velocity dipped a little too, down to 89 MPH. If he can only control it when it is at 89 MPH, then that is a problem. He is a good looking fielder on the mound.

Josh Killen has a 90 MPH lefty fastball. He got a couple whiffs and likes to throw it on the outside to righties. He also possesses a pretty good breaking ball with a lot of movement. He had some control problems and just some bad luck. He is really slow to the plate and easy to run on.

Chase Hentges is another reliever for Idaho. The fastball velocity is at 89 MPH for the righty, but he was mainly relying on what looked like a change that was getting him some whiffs.

Kevin Allen also pitched, I wrote about him when he pitched for TCU here

Odgen (Dodgers):

I have written a scouting report on Pat Stover already, which you can read here.

Devin Shines has a pretty good right-handed swing, and is balanced, as he can pull it and go the other way. He always seemed to always be ahead in the count, has pretty good eye with some pretty good contact. The small 5-9 outfielder out of Oklahoma State has been great in the hitter friendly Pioneer League, but really struggled in the Midwest League.

Justin Boudreaux doesn't have a real power swing and was having some real contact problems. He was not having a lot of fun when pitchers were throwing breaking balls and had some big whiffs when the ball was near the zone.

Jeremy Rathjen has plus speed that should play well in centerfield. The former Rice Owl has good looking size at 6-6. He didn't look great with the bat, but wasn't a wild hacker either. He has a .717 OPS in 16 games, with a better slugging than OBP.

Alex Santana was fooled on breaking ball, but is a good contact guy. He doesn't seem to like the ball on the inside part of the plate, and has good plate coverage on outside pitches. He does this with a reach swing that seems to kill all his power It is pretty clear he will be a slappy hitter with that swing. At 3rd base he booted a pretty easy ground-ball.

Malcolm Holland chased a breaking ball for strikeout. He doesn't have good lefty swing, and sort of starts running as he swings. He is slappy from both sides of the plate, trying to go the other way. He does have good speed though.

Darnell Sweeney has since been promoted to the Great Lake Loons. He did not get a good jump on a stolen base attempt, but he stole another one easily. He made a bad baserunning mistake as he tried to advance from 2nd-3rd on a grounder to short. He has good looking range at shortstop, and is a switch hitter, little bit of a dip in his swing. He probably won't have a lot of power, so he may hit a lot of weak fly-balls, which is especially frustrating with some potential speed.

Eric Smith out of Stanford is a good contact guy but was hitting a lot of weak ground-balls. He has been above league average as far as OPS goes, but is below average according to ISO. He has walked 5 times versus just 6 strikeouts in 16 games. Like I said, he is a good contact guy.

Carlos Frias is a good sized RHP at 6-4 and just under 200 pounds out of the Dominican Republic. He was keeping his breaking balls low but couldn't get many swings and misses with it. He just wasn't fooling anyone with it. There were a lot of balls hit to RF, meaning a lot of hitters were going the other way. A lot of them were hit hard and his fastball looks unimpressive. He has a good pick off move with a lot of movement in his delivery. He also threw a lot of strikes.

Craig Stem:
91 MPH fastball from the big righty, likes to work away from righties. He probably will have to do that  with that fastball. He has a decent looking slider that is hard to make good contact on no matter the platoon split when the pitch is on.