22nd-22nd-20th…those were the rankings of the Phillies farm system before 2010. And entering the next decade, Baseball America has ranked the Phillies as having the 4th best farm system in all of baseball. Quite the accomplishment, especially considering they traded away four of their top prospects in the Cliff Lee deal last July (Jason Knapp, Jason Donald, Lou Marson, Carlos Carrasco).
Here is what Baseball America’s John Manuel had to say about the Phillies minor league operation:
4. Phillies: Philadelphia had the depth to trade for Cliff Lee and still have a top-flight farm system. Outfielder Michael Taylor has hit .333 over the last two seasons, rocketing to Triple-A, and fellow outfielder Dominic Brown has better tools, though he’s still a bit raw. Righty Kyle Drabek, son of the former Cy Young Award winner Doug Drabek, has three above-average pitches to go with excellent athletic ability. Beyond their Big Three — all of whom have performed at Double-A or above — the Phillies are bursting with young power arms, toolsy Latin American infielders and athletic outfielders, such as Anthony Gose.
Phillies Assistant GM (Player Development and Scouting) Chuck LaMar:
“We have prospects in our system, and that’s why you sign and develop players. Some of those players are going to play for you. Some of those players are going to help you bring players that help you at the Major League level. That’s the concept behind it. Not all the players you sign and develop are going to play for you, but the key is continually signing and developing those players.”
BlueClaws Blog Says: The ability to “sign and develop” players is critical to any organization for a couple of reasons.
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Affordability: When a player makes his big league debut, he is under the team’s control for six years. If you can produce quality players through your own system, you can save a ton of money compared to having to get those players on the open market or through trades.
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Access to players: Every year organization’s will add around 65 or 75 players between the draft and international free agents. That gives you ample opportunity to find big league contributors. The pool available annually in free agency or through trades is a lot smaller, in part because of:
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Revenue Sharing: More and more we are seeing teams be able to buy up arbitration years of players (as the Twins did a few years ago with Johan Santana). The best players in baseball do not always hit the market (they often do, like CC Sabathia last year), but teams are given a better chance to hold onto their own guys. It makes a big difference.
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Economics: The first thing they teach you in economics is supply and demand. If supply goes down, price will go up. If demand goes up, price will go up. We are seeing both. The fewer quality players that hit the market each year cause their price to skyrocket. That there are fewer quality players on the market each year can cause each to be in more demand than normal. All this means, higher prices for free agents and..
Having that big time farm system is a HUGE asset.
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on Tuesday, December 8th, 2009 at 4:36 pm and is filed under Around the Farm, Phillies.
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