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Wednesday, December 24, 2003

Potential

Because once just wasn’t enough, and I liked it so much I might just keep doing it, here is yet another player comparision:

Player A: .234/.291/.412(AVG/OBP/SLG) .234 GPA
Player B: .240/.301/.435(AVG/OBP/SLG) .244 GPA

Ok, no suspense this time. Player A is Drew Henson in 2003, Player B is Drew Henson in 2002, both seasons played for the Columbus Clippers of the AAA International League. As you can see there are slight declines in each of the general offensive categories. In addition to his offensive production, Drew’s fielding has seemingly been spotty as evidenced by high error totals, though I do not know how to properly adjust minor league fielding numbers for field quality, park quality, etc. In support of his fielding Baseball America once ranked him as the best defensive 3B in his league.

Now, why would anyone be interested in Drew Henson you may find yourself asking, after you’ve seen his production or lack thereof. Well, there’s another stat that is important when looking at Drew Henson, 46% and 50%. Those are his extra base hit percentages during the last two seasons, ‘02 and ‘03 respectively. If everytime you get a base hit there is basically a 50% chance of it going for extra bases, I would have to say you have some incredible power or power potential at the least. That is what Drew Henson possesses that is so enticing to scouts, or at least was. Another thing Drew holds, though not as dearly, is an infamous propensity for the strikeout. This has bothered many a prospect analyst over the years, but I am not particularly concerned with a player’s strikeout rate unless he K’s alot and walks very little (I will explain this in the future). Unfortunately, for Drew Henson he is this type of high strikeout low walk player, though he definitely made some very real improvement in that aspect of his game this season. After striking out in 32% of his at bats in 2002, Drew was able to cut that rate to a much more manageable 25% this season. Unfortunately, his walk rate still remained poor.

As Drew Henson has aged, but not matured like a fine wine, some scouts have soured on the initial Mike Schmidt/good Troy Glaus comparisons. I am personally of the opinion that this is the last year for Drew Henson to prove himself. He is 24 and this will be his third full season at the AAA level, all objective reasoning and even some non objective, points towards Drew failing this year. However, something tells me that despite it being a one in a million chance, there is still a chance that Drew Henson can fulfill his considerable potential. I feel this way because I have followed him extremely closely for a few seasons now and I have seen him put together some incredibly dominant stretches, followed by almost equally incredibly awful ones. This may be the year he consolidates his good and my statistical reasoning for this is his reduced K rate, and the fact that he was an improved player in the second half of last season. In the wildly unlikely case that I am correct and Drew does put it together, I think he has the potential to at his best be a .270/.330/.520 hitter, which would be pretty good for a 3B.

I’ve focused on the minors a lot thus far, and I will try and get to the majors in the near future.