By John Klima
August 24, 2010
“How goes it young one?” Jim Edmonds asks the rookie right-hander sitting quietly in the locker stall a few feet away. The rookie lifts his nose from his text messages and allows a small smile.
“Nothing much,” Mike Leake tells him.
There are seldom rookies who are rookies in name alone. Only a few of them come around every year, those with talent and perspective. Talent allows them to be here and perspective helps them stay. Simplicity. It’s the same game, oldest saying in the book. It doesn’t matter how good the other guy is. It matters how good you are.
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Category: Baseball Beginnings Exclusives |
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Tags: ASU, Cincinnati Reds, Mike Leake
By John Klima
July 11, 2010
It’s not like the Reds have a ton of money to spend, unless you’re a big-armed left-hander from Cuba. Now that they have some arms not named Harang or Homer that might actually be good long-term fits, the Reds used this draft to plug holes in other areas.
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Category: 2010 Team Draft Recaps |
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Tags: Cincinnati Reds
By John Klima
June 14, 2010
When I first saw Ryan LaMarre in summer 2009 on the Cape on an otherwise windy and cold day in Wareham, I liked his BP swing. At the time, I wasn’t sure how scouts would feel about him. I knew I liked him, but I couldn’t quite tell where he was along the developmental process. It’s hard based on one look and the first and only time you see a player. When you do this kind of work, what the player has done in the past, statistically, is not as important as how he projects with a wood bat in his hands.
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Category: '10 Meet the Player |
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Tags: Cincinnati Reds, Michigan, Ryan LaMarre
By Jen Marder
June 8, 2010
Today the Cincinnati Reds selected Ryan LaMarre in the second round (#62 overall) in the 2010 MLB Draft. Baseball Beginnings has been scouting LaMarre from the start of the draft cycle. Enjoy links to the content we have published on him through the year.
Watch Ryan LaMarre Video
Read Ryan LaMarre Scouting Report
Category: 2010 Draft |
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Tags: Cincinnati Reds, Michigan, Ryan LaMarre
By Jen Marder
June 7, 2010
Today the Cincinnati Reds selected Yasmani Grandal in the first round (#12 overall) in the 2010 MLB Draft. Baseball Beginnings has scouted Grandal. Enjoy links to the content we have published on him.
Watch Yasmani Grandal Video
Category: 2010 Draft |
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Tags: Cincinnati Reds, Miami, Yasmani Grandal
By John Klima
February 26, 2010
Aroldis Chapman got paid and now begins the process of molding a great pitcher’s body and a big arm into a major league starter. This is the first rung of the ladder in professional baseball for Chapman, and Baseball Beginnings has exclusive footage of Chapman’s first on-the-mound bullpen as a paid pro. Have a look and then we will break him down.
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Category: Baseball Beginnings Exclusives |
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Tags: Aroldis Chapman, Cincinnati Reds
By John Klima
January 10, 2010
Reds fans are eagerly awaiting the arrival of first baseman Yonder Alonso, who stopped in the Arizona Fall League on the way to supplying some much needed punch in Cincinnati. The former Miami first baseman, who was a college masher, doesn’t strike me as a pure power bat. Rather, I felt Alonso will become a professional hitter with gap power and about 20-home run potential.
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Category: 2009 Minor Leagues |
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Tags: Cincinnati Reds, Yonder Alonso
By John Klima
January 2, 2010
“Swish” was Bob Thurman’s nickname, long before it was a shoe logo. Thurman was a left-handed hitting outfielder and pitcher who played for the Homestead Grays in the last Negro League World Series in 1948. When he signed with the Kansas City Monarchs and eventually found his way to the major leagues with the Cincinnati Reds, he had changed his age more than his socks.
“I have had my age put back so many times,” an amused and demurring Thurman wrote, “I can’t remember my real age.”
There is humor in history, but a lesson to be learned for today’s Major League teams that pursue Cuban left-hander Aroldis Chapman.
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Category: Baseball Beginnings Exclusives |
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Tags: Aroldis Chapman, Cincinnati Reds
By John Klima
December 26, 2009
The Arizona Fall League is hyped as a league for can’t-miss young prospects, but in reality this league is vastly more important for older players like Reds outfielder Chris Heisey, a 17th round pick in 2006 from Messiah College, a Division III Christian college in Grantham, Pennsylvania. Heisey, who will be 25 on Opening Day, had his most productive minor league season in 2009 when he hit 22 home runs and drove in 77 runs between Double-A and Triple-A.
Heisey’s most valuable tool is his power, which he’s clearly developed with patience and hard work as a pro. I had never seen Heisey before two games in the Arizona Fall League and two BPs, and liked him for what he is. Heisey has strong hands, bat speed, good actions, and a good sound off the bat. He’s not talented enough to be a dominating major league player, but I think he’s got enough pop to produce gap-to-gap power.
I’m sure there will have been some scouts who looked at this player and his age and concluded he is a fringy 48-49 extra at the major league level at best, but I think there’s more here.
This is obviously a very hard-working player who has raised his grades all the way up his organization. Heisey could fit in on the major league level as an outfielder who can play all three positions and provide 16-18 HR power if he gets frequent at-bats. This is a good example of a professional ballplayer without the earth-shattering talent who nonetheless has made himself a candidate to be a very serviceable big leaguer.
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Category: 2009 Minor Leagues |
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Tags: Chris Heisey, Cincinnati Reds
By John Klima
November 27, 2009
When we last saw Mike Leake here at Baseball Beginnings, he was pitching for Arizona State on the road to a season that got him drafted in the first round, No. 8 overall in 2009. We picked Leake up again recently in-person at the Arizona Fall League, where we caught three innings and a bullpen.
Leake is a classic example of what the great scout and former big league second baseman Gene Handley meant when he said, “The gun is a crutch.” (more…)
Category: 2009 Draft, 2009 Minor Leagues |
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Tags: ASU, Cincinnati Reds, Mike Leake
