Junior Lake

Whats his deal/upside? He had a good AFL, but how soon can we expect him in the bigs, if at all? And with Castro at short - does Castro or Lake become 3B options? Thanks.

His upside is immense. I'd go so far as to say he has the best raw tools in the entire system. The potential is there for 20+ HR and 40+ SB while playing good defense at SS. However, he some major issues. He strikes out too often, doesn't like to take a walk, and routinely makes mental mistakes in the field.

CUBZ99 is right. Among those scouts who don't feel like Lake will ever get his approach in line there's a growing sentiment that the Cubs should convert him to the mound. His arm strength grades out at a pure 80 (on the 20-80 scouting scale) and he could potentially be a dominant late inning reliever (or perhaps even a starter). Even those scouts that want him to stay a position player mostly want him to move off SS (mostly due to mental errors)... but where he ends up is an uncertainty even then -- I've seen 3B, 2B, CF, RF, and LF all mentioned. And whether he moves to certain spots might influence whether he decides to bulk up and trade some speed for power.

It's fair to say Lake is a bit of a wild card. Aside from the undeniable tools, everything about him is a question mark. I wouldn't expect to see him in Chicago next year though. While he's certainly got the talent to force his way up, he's got more than enough to be working on in the minors.

I bet this is it for Lake: he either makes huge strides this season, or he's converted next offseason.

"Huge strides" is probably an exaggeration.

Ian Desmond is a pretty good comp for the career path Lake is on right now. Low walks, high strikeouts, poor fielding, but with a bit of pop and some speed. Desmond grades out as a somewhat below average regular, with fWAR totals of 1.3 and 1.4 the last two years.

If Lake takes a good step forward in any one of those categories (or numerous small strides), that would make him a league-average starter. He'd still be young, cost-controlled, and have considerable upside beyond that.

As long as Lake is making some forward progress it doesn't make much sense to cash in a chip like that just to gamble he might be a closer someday.

Rob, whether fair or not, I think there's a slight difference in a Lake v. Desmond comparison. I think that there's always been a sense amongst scouting types that Desmond had the tools to play an above average short and they hope that he puts it together defensively. Lake's best defensive assessments still suggest that he's better off moving. I understand that you are simply comparing career paths, but I guess what I'm loosely trying to say is that Desmond gets some benefit of the doubt on his defensive, and so you hope a guy with his offensive tools and defensive potential put it together, whereas with Lake, really, for all the focus on his shoddy defense, it's his bat that is going to make or break the day for him, and he won't get the benefit of the doubt/extra looks on account of position (if this makes any sense at this late/early hour).

 

davell - The hard thing with projecting Lake to a super-util type role, for me, is that his swing is the type that needs to get in a groove. Unless they can get him 3-4 starts a week, I think that's going to be tough. But ... guys do adjust.

The comparison wasn't meant to be exact, just an approximation. A reasonable projection for Lake based on what he's showing right now probably has Lake with a little more power/speed than Desmond... but an inferior fielder and showing a slightly worse plate approach. Those are pretty similarly valuable players. All I was working towards was finding a reasonable estimate for a WAR target.

If you're saying that Desmond is going to get the benefit of the doubt because he's more likely to stick at SS, I'll agree with you. If Lake moves to 3B, the Cubs front office likely wont stick with him through a couple below-average seasons while hoping he'll turn it around.

If you're saying that Desmond deserves the benefit of the doubt over Lake because he's more likely to stick at SS... that's a little more tricky.

I bet this is it for Lake: he either makes huge strides this season, or he's converted next offseason.

 

"Huge strides" is probably an exaggeration.

 

Ian Desmond is a pretty good comp for the career path Lake is on right now. Low walks, high strikeouts, poor fielding, but with a bit of pop and some speed. Desmond grades out as a somewhat below average regular, with fWAR totals of 1.3 and 1.4 the last two years.

 

If Lake takes a good step forward in any one of those categories (or numerous small strides), that would make him a league-average starter. He'd still be young, cost-controlled, and have considerable upside beyond that.

 

As long as Lake is making some forward progress it doesn't make much sense to cash in a chip like that just to gamble he might be a closer someday.

i get serious indigestion every time i read that Lake and Vitters have "huge upside"; it's so ignorant to overlook their total cluelessness of the strike zone or inability to field their position and hope that's somehow able to drastically change; their upside is to i guess suppress these problems just enough to sneak their way into the majors for a few seasons

I don't think you know what upside means. Hint: It's not just the most likely scenario.

Also, who overlooked anything? I went into detail about Lake's issues.

then tell me, what's his upside

Do you really not understand the term?

I stated it earlier. Lake has the raw physical tools to hit 20+ HR and swipe 40+ bags while sticking at SS. There's also something like a 2% chance of that happening. But he has the ability to do things that guys like Ryan Theriot never possessed the physical skills to achieve. That's the upside.

Upside is not the same thing as most likely outcome. And nobody has said anything to misrepresent what the most likely outcome for Lake is.

The main tools of evaluation that Hockey Futures uses to evaluate prospects include a rating scale of A-D on a prospect's probable ability to fulfill his potential and a separate scale of 1-10 rating the prospect's tools. An example: 9-10 has future HOF potential. 7-8 probable top 2 line with regular all-star appearances and so on down the line. The letter scale works as: A - most likely to reach potential, to D - most likely not to reach potential.

 

For Baseball: I would use 9-10 as HOF, 7-8 All-Star, 6 solid major leaguer, 5 - fringe regular, 4 - fringe utility, 3-4 - AAAA minor leaguer, under 3 - career minor leaguer.

 

If I were to apply this scale to Junior Lake at SS his tool rating would 7/8, but his probability rating would be a D. Thus, 7D at SS. As a third-baseman, Lake would rate a 6D. As you can see, his tools play up at SS, but not as much at 3B.

 

I would rate Vitters as a 6.5C

Brett Jackson as a 6.5B

Anthony Rizzo as a 7.5C

Trey McNutt as a 6C

Javier Baez as an 8C with the ability to upgrade to a B

 

For Andrew Cashner, I would have rated him as a 7D starter, (injury issues) but an 8b as a closer.

 

Feel free to alter and enhance this scale.

I've seen stuff like this done before for baseball... though for the life of me I can't remember where. It's certainly an interesting idea though.