A Guy To Pay Attention To

It’s already my third post and I haven’t even talked about any of the teams current players. This is a really exciting time for Padres minor leaguers. Granted, there are no world beaters but there are a handful of guys who could crack a major league roster within the next couple years.

SS Drew Cumberland

Probably my favorite player on the team at this time. Cumberland shows a lot of promise as future major leaguer, as a bat and hopefully a plus fielder. I don’t have any qualifying statistical basis for my claim on his fielding, but observing him, its clear he has potential. The guy is fast, stealing at a 90% clip for April. Unfortunately, this doesn’t completely translate in the field. Personally, I don’t see him at a perfect fit at short because he lacks a natural range, which lets a lot of ground balls escape into shallow center. This isn’t really cause for alarm, because mis-plays of this nature are fixable, i.e. Derek Jeter’s fielding under Torre vs Girardi. Better positioning and improved fielding mechanics could work wonders for Cumberland’s fielding value. I haven’t really analyzed his arm strength, but it might be better for him to shift over to 3rd where he may be less of a liability, but that sort of devalues him as a hitter, so I’m at an impasse. Also he competes for time with another hot hitting SS prospect, Cole Figeuroa, who only has one error to Cumberland’s five, and who is more spry defensively. Luckily, there isn’t a logjam at either position on the Padres so he has options open to him.

In the batters box, Cumberland has been a beast, posting a line of .439/.617/1.056.

Pardon the aside

For the uninitiated, this represents On Base Percentage/Slugging Percentage/On Base Percentage + Slugging.  On Base Percentage can be effectively described as the percentage that the batter does not make an out. Slugging weights each type of hit with a specific value, so doubles are worth twice as much as singles, triples are worth three times, home runs are worth four times. This effectively tells you how hard a player hits the ball. OPS is just the addition of the two, and it is a quick and dirty way of seeing how well a player gets on base and drives runs in.

Well now that you understand, I suppose I should explain to you that this is really impressive. If Cumberland was playing in the majors he would be mentioned up with Robinson Cano as one of the hottest hitters in April. While impressive, don’t let this fool you into believing that he is the next Albert Pujols, because the Cal League is very hitter friendly due to mostly sub-standard pitching and some faulty defense. Nonetheless, Cumberland is making a splash. His ability to hit for power, with 3 homers, firmly plants him as a middle of the line up hitter, though his OBP and speed on the base paths could also allow him to hit leadoff. Frankly, these are the sort of things that shake out a higher level but it gives you a picture of a major league equivalent, so I feel it is fruitful to include it. Cumberland’s patience at the plate isnt an issue, as he post a slightly below average strike out rate, as well as an average walk rate. For a guy producing so well offensively, you might expect a couple more walks, but one has to remember he is not facing MLB pitching. In summary, at 21 years old Cumberland projects to be an effective Major league bat and an acceptable fielder, who should excel at every level and give the Padres a spark in their aging in-field.

Some notes:

• This is my first real analysis of a prospect so I hope I didn’t mess it up to badly
• This is first in a series on Storm players
• Goddamn, it is hard to find a picture of Cumberland in a Storm jersey